The Moon Beneath Our Feet

"Remants of the planet Theia, which was destroyed in the collision 4.5 billion years ago that created the Moon, remain buried deep inside Earth, scientists have proposed." - The Journal of Star Science, November 4th, 2023.

Floating on opposite sides of the molten core of the planet Earth, are two continent-sized blobs of material: the remnants of that proto-planet that struck proto-Earth. 

That's why the Moon follows the Earth, why its face stays fixed on the planet. It is incomplete, and it searches for the rest of itself. The two blobs inside the earth are on opposite sides of the core, but they seek a way to reunite. They've been apart for billions of years, right beneath our feet, and they've felt every single second they've been trapped there, because they've been burning.

There was a third blob, bigger than the others. It didn't wait to find the other two. It gathered its strength, its pain, its anger, its loneliness, and, 66 million years ago, it burst out of the Earth and tried to go home. Humans still believe that it was an asteroid that struck the Earth and caused the extinction of the dinosaurs, but it wasn't. The impact came from within, when that lost piece of Theia tried to go home. 

But that piece never got home. It missed the moon. And it is still going, ever deeper into space, ever further from the rest of itself. It no longer burns; it freezes. Its only warmth now comes from the memory of what it was. 

The other two pieces of Theia will not make the same mistake. They are in pain, but they sing to each other, from across the core, of hope. They will find each other. They may never get to the Moon, but that's okay. They will make each other their home, make a new planet within a planet, a heaven inside hell.

The Moon, meanwhile, watches on, and pulls up the cooling tides of the oceanlike a mother tucks her children into bed. 

Every once in a while, the Moon catches a fragment of their song, and feels warmth, and hope. And it's enough to fight off the chill for a little while longer. 

THE END 

Author's Note: This story was brought to by science, and by the song Pistol by Cigarettes After Sex on repeat for an hour or so. What, it's a good song.