Dedicated to @PotterFreak_12
Word count: 2,170 words
Quill: Peacock feather quill.
Parchment: 1 roll
Ink: Black ink.
(The word count does not include the words in or above these brackets)

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"Not for the darkness that resides within each and every one of us, but for the spirit that won't let the shadows win, I laugh at the imprisoned beasts inside everyone's mind. Because, if we would release these beasts, the limits of our imaginations would fall dramatically. This, what we've done here, just shows plainly that those beasts are still locked firmly behind our locked doors. This, this is amazing."

She paused, her eyes flickering back and forward across the sea of three hundred blank faces, a moment of self-doubt flitting over her face. She coughed, clearing her throat as her steely grey eyes settled on a girl, no older than ten years old, sat in the centre of the third row back. A tear shone in the girl's eye as she stared defiantly back at the woman. But she was clearly striving to conceal those unexplained emotions and, only for second, it showed, until her face reverted back to stone, leaving the only trace of her sorrow in the single tear rolling slowly down her cheek.

"Ahem." The woman coughed again, snapping herself back into the room, tearing her gaze away from the girl, and shook her head, running her shaking hand through her hair. "Uh. Thank you." She didn't stop to listen to the raucous applause as she hurried off the podium and out of the room, her tears shielded slightly by thick waves of light brown hair.

The girl, wiping the tear stain from her cheek, stood as the door slammed shut behind the woman. Dragging the sleeves of her green and dark blue checkered shirt down over her hands, she buried the ends into the palms of her hands and bowed her head as she inched her way sideways between the row of chairs. Once clear of the white-painted steel seats, she started to walk faster and faster until she was almost running through the door, her converse clad feet silently thudding on the ground.

"Jenna!" She called out to the woman who was now almost speed-walking away from her, her small black heeled shoes making loud clapping sounds with each stride. The girl called out again, her young voice cracking with emotion as it drifted towards the woman.

"Jenna! Come back! It's about Dad..." The last part is almost whispered but the so-called Jenna paused anyway, evidently indecisive on what to do as she realised that something bad could have happened. "You'll want to know Jenna. I'm sorry." Her choked up voice hardly let the letters through but, finally, she got the words across and almost sighed in relief as the woman paused and closed her eyes in resignation.

"Okay L. You have five minutes. What is it?" Jenna started to walk back towards the girl, her business-like strides seeming indifferent to the now crying girl in front of her.
"He-he's dead." Silence falls around them as Jenna froze in her tracks.
"What?" L could feel the sadness building up more and more inside of her as Jenna questioned her, hoping that she had heard it wrong, that L was telling some sick, sick joke. But she wasn't.

"He's dead, J, I-I'm sorry." Unable to take the strain of concealing her feelings any longer, L collapsed to the floor, writhing with emotional pain as sobs wrack her body. Even saying those words seemed to bring back memories that she never wanted to visit again. Even saying those words made it all too real for both of them.

When L looked back up again, Jenna was still frozen on the spot where she'd stopped in mid-stride. Her face was filled with conflicting emotions of horror and shock but, gradually, as L searched her sister's face, the comfort of that shock began to melt away, leaving behind a picture of unbearable pain.

"How, how did it happen?" It takes her a while to finish the sentence, her words slurring slightly as pain and grief start to drag her into their darkness.
"Fire." L only had time to choke out that one word before the tears overwhelm her once again and she covered her face with her hands in an attempt to shield her fragile soul from the outside world.

It only took a couple of seconds before rapidly retreating footsteps jolt her briefly out of her misery and she snapped her head up, just in time to watch the last trace of Jenna's shoes before they disappeared from view.
She stared, dumbstruck, after J as she abandons her once again. Slowly stumbling to her feet, L let herself sway slightly to the right before righting her sorrow-filled body and sprinting after her sister. "Jenna! Wait! We need to talk about this! You can't shut us out like last time! We need your help..."

Rounding the corner, L found herself almost immediately lost, crowds of people, dressed in suits, each and every outfit emblazoned with the NASA symbol, were rushing this way and that, crossing every which way in front of her. The breath left her and, for a second, her mind transported her back to that fateful night with police and fireman racing past her while she stood still, tears no longer falling down her cheeks. But the memory disappeared within a mere second and she let herself back into the office. Pushing her way through the crowd, she finally caught a glimpse of the brunette head of her sister as people parted for her.

Head of Project Lumos, her sister was well respected in this place. Of course, that would always be the case, wouldn't it - being head of the first and second second-long multi-galaxy space mission would always get you credit.

Finally reaching the doors of her sisters office, L hesitated at the door, watching, with sadness in her eyes as Jenna riffled through papers on her desk. Taking a deep breath, she pushed the door open and stepped inside. "Jenna, please..." She trailed off as Jenna snapped her head up, glaring with piercing grey eyes straight at her.

"I can't do this right now Lorelei. I don't have time for 'personal matters'. I have work to do. I'm just about to send the second rocket up! I don't have time for family!" Her voice was like ice as she spoke, staring deep into L's eyes, daring her to contradict what she had just said. Lorelei gasped, the words cutting her like a knife.

"You always have time for family." Tears started to well up inside her once again as she tried to convince her sister, once again, to care. But what she got was the opposite.

"FOR GOD'S SAKE LORELEI! JUST LEAVE ME ALONE! I DON'T CARE ABOUT YOU, I DON'T CARE ABOUT DAD, I DON'T CARE ABOUT LUCY, I DON'T CARE ABOUT CHARLES! MY LIFE IS HERE, NOT WITH YOU! JUST STAY AWAY FROM ME!" A thousand emotions crossed her face as she shouted, getting closer and closer to her cowering sister as she stepped with each word. It was in that moment that Lorelei realised something, something she had known for year but had always been to afraid to admit. Her sister did care...just never about family.

Ignoring the fact that her sister was towering over her, and dismissing the feeling of a thousand eyes upon them as the NASA staff watched their every move, Lorelei spoke calmly but with such evidently retained anger that it was now her sister's turn to shrink in her path.

"No, Jenna. You don't care, do you? You never have done, not even when you used to pretend. When you used to sing those lullabies to me at night. What was it? I'll always be here for you. Was that it? Lies, all of it. Because you've never cared. Daniel died...and what did you do? You missed his funeral because you felt that placing the stupid windows on that stupid rocket was more important. You were his sister! Now dad's died and mum's in a mental hospital and ooh, look at you, you have to store rations on the second rocket. Who cares? You know what, no. I don't care anymore, you may have won the hearts and minds of everyone on this world. But you've lost me...forever. I hate you Jenna."

Those words were said with such force that spit went flying everywhere. But Lorelei didn't care anymore. Spinning on her heels, she slammed open the door and pushed her way through the wide-eyed, open mouth staff outside. Striding away, she didn't even allow herself a glance back and as she turned the corner, she let herself fall against the pure white wall.

Sobs racked her body as she slid down the wall. Closing her eyes, she let her misery overwhelm her, it's darkness like claws, ripping away at her mind.

She sat there, for who knows how long, until a strong hand landed on her shoulder. At first, she shrugged it off but, as she looked up, she found herself staring into one of the kindest sets of eyes she'd ever seen. "Hey there. Look, I know what'll cheer you up. Come on." He spoke and his words seemed almost foreign to her. Why would someone want to cheer her up? Why would someone care enough to do that? But he smiled and, in an instant, she did so too.

Stretching out his other hand, she took it and, smiling up at him, let him pull her to her feet. "Now, this is going to feel weird but it's just one of Hayley's contraptions." She nodded and squeezed her eyes shut. Suddenly her eyes flew open and she opened her mouth to ask a question. "Who's Hayl..." She never got time to finish that sentence as, a split second later, she was choking.

Waves of hot and cold rippled up her body and, all of a sudden, her lungs stopped working. Gasping for air, she felt herself begin to black out just as a sheet of white light spun towards her.

-----

"Hello? Little girl? Ugh, Jackson, why did you have to bring her on board? This was our spare seat." The voice was friendly, comforting - although a slight bit frustrated - and, as she heard it, she felt her mind straining towards it.

"She was crying." There was that voice, the other voice. That man who had brought her here...wherever 'here' was, it was him. Hold on, where was 'here'? All of a sudden her eyes flickered open, eager to know what was going on. But what she saw was definitely not what she was expecting.

It was white, everything was white. Walls, ceiling, floor - although she couldn't quite work out which was which. But it was all white. Everything. That, that was the first thing she noticed...and then she realised probably the most important factor. She was in a chair. Yes, that doesn't sound very exciting, but this chair was different. It was on the wall. She was lying on her back, her legs struggling to stay on the bottom of the seat, her mind whirling.

Looking to her right, she saw a woman. Dark skinned with beautifully curled hair, she smiled encouragingly at Lorelei. Looking downwards..upwards...downwards a bit, she saw what she could only presume to be Jackson, the man who had evidently brought them here. Another man was directly below her and, just towards the pointed ceiling, sat another woman.

Screens hung down from the wall opposite them, images showing cheering people staring at a long cylindrical object with a pointed nose. British flags waved side to side as people anticipated what was to come. Suddenly, the pictures changed to one of four people, dressed in white suits, smiling jovially at the camera, the caption above reading 'Crew of the Second Multi-Galaxy Space Mission'. It took her a second to realise what was happening. Then it clicked.

"Oh." Emotions clashed within her, fear, excitement and elation each struggling to take dominance. She was in a rocket? She. Was. In. A. Rocket? She struggled to get up but metal bars slid across her, sliding into place.

"I'm sorry, kid. You can't leave. We're set to launch in three minutes." Her eyes widened, her breathing beginning to become rapid. She was going into space? Into a different galaxy? She'd barely even been to France, let alone another galaxy!

"You, you don't understand. My sister will kill me." A sympathetic look passed across the woman's face.
"Sorry girl, no going back now."

Suddenly another voice spoke drowning out everything else. "Launch to commence in 3, 2, 1." Jenna. The single word passed across her mind before the rumbling around her consumed everything.

A white light consumed them all not a second later.

When the light finally faded away, another, this time blue, light bathed the whole rocket. "Welcome to Galaxy Yldris." A voice, clearly male in origin, spoke over the speakers.

Nice name. Galaxy Yldris.