The Origin of Tuffy and the Planet Vertex 56 by Jamel Heron
My name is Tuffy and as of now I am 24 years old. I unfortunately live by myself on a deserted planet named Vertex 56. There used to be a population of over 200,000,000,000 billion people on this planet, but one day everything went downhill. I was around 12 years of age when the “outbreak” occurred. I was walking home from school like always and for some reason the ground was shaking heavily, it was like an earthquake, but different. The ground was shaking for sure, but instead of the ground only shaking it opened up and some green steam started to leak out, stinking up the air. I was thinking to myself, What is this, why does this have to happen on a day like today, why is this happening? I couldn’t shake these thoughts out of my head, instead I was just standing there lost for words. I had absolutely no feeling in my body, I tried to walk but I was so scared to the point it was as if my legs were buried into the ground. I tried to yell out for help but no sound was able to leave my body. Just then I heard a familiar voice. “TUFFY GET MOVING!” It was the sound of my uncle. He grabbed me and started running to an area with no high buildings or landscape. “What were you doing, weren’t you supposed to be home by now?” he said. “I’m sorry, I had afterschool today so I left the school late today.” Just as he was about to talk, the ground started to shake again. The shaking was more aggressive this time. The ground was shaking so hard that it was basically impossible to stand. Just then the ground started to break apart and open up and a whole bunch of green fluid started erupting out of the ground. The green fluid started to get closer to me and my uncle. The closer it got, the more we struggled to move. Eventually the green fluid was directly under us. At first it didn’t feel like anything, then all of a sudden there was an unbearable burn equal to being burned alive. I screamed in pain, not being able to move and being stuck there in this boiling pit. My uncle then grabbed me and put me over his shoulder. 91
