Chapter Six

Falling. Fire, fire all about me, but I am cold, I am numb. I may be falling, or maybe the ground rises to greet me. To say hello, to allow me to smear my remains upon it. Blue, green, black, white, red all mix together into a lovely kaleidoscope, a kaleidoscope of doom. My doom. I'm going to die. There is simply nothing worse than knowing how it ends.

Falling faster now, cold fire. The wind blows me all about, and I welcome the sensation of the burning heat. My body is cold, so cold, so frozen. Where am I...? The blackness has taken over my eyes, my ears, my body, my mind. Where am I? What am I? I hear someone screaming my name...who is she? What does she want from me? How does she know my name?

I like this, I like this feeling of falling. I like the sensation, how free I feel. Falling to my death, and I am free. Something on my face is melting, pouring off behind me, but what? I don't remember any more... who I was, who I am, who I will be...what is that? Something glows...

I feel like a leaf, a leaf falling far slower than my body. There, can't you see it? There's my body. But where is my mind? Where'd it go? Is this it? Am I? I don't know anymore, I just don't know. I don't. Will I ever? Maybe, maybe not. Does it matter now? I'm dying. I would have liked to know who I was, but I suppose everyone dies with unfulfilled wishes. The ground whooshes up, impossibly fast, and I'm coming down to meet it. Do you need a hug, ground? You must be lonely. Everyone walks all over you all day, all night, but does anyone say hi? Well, I will. Here I come, to hug you. Here I come...

CRASH!

Chapter Seven

Boring. Boring, boring, boring...It's the first week of summer vacation and I'm already bored. Mum and Dad promised to take me digging with them, but they haven't yet. And here I am, sitting underneath the green umbrella trees sipping fruit punch out of a glass with a little umbrella in it. Sounds like heaven, right?

Wrong!

I was supposed to be out having fantastical adventures right now, running around outside digging up treasures that might have fallen from space. But am I? No. I'm not. And all because it's too darn hot out to do anything! My wings are cramped from not being able to move!

I'm a bat. We're usually nocturnal, when we can spot glittering jewels and glinting golden coins better, but I'm kind of a daytime person. That used to worry me, but Mum says it's only natural for adolescents. And it's pretty helpful for me too, since Mum and Dad sleep all day and I get to do what I want. They don't know what I do all day-they think I'm out frolicking in the sun or under the trees, not working for the government to steal bad guy's stuff! Oh, how I love keeping secrets!

But today the government wants me to take it easy. Take it easy?! Rouge the Bat and 'take it easy' don't mix! Not unless you put 'doesn't' between the two so it reads, "Rouge the Bat doesn't take it easy"! I love adventure, can't get enough of it. I'm a very capable girl, what with my extensive kung-fu knowledge and grade-A stealth tactics. Those people don't know who they're dealing with!

A sudden roar sounds from the sky. My sensitive ears pick it up, and I at first assume it to be the usual jet plane. But it got a decent bit louder, and didn't sound quite right...Looking up, around the gigantic umbrella above my lawn chair, I spot something small and red in the sky. Instantly, I am on my feet, kicking the lawn chair behind me. Dashing forward, I keep my eyes fixed to the sky even though it burns them.

"A meteor..." I gasp aloud, stunned by what I'm seeing. It looks like it has enough matter to possibly hit the earth! I may be witnessing the apocalypse! I leap out of my window, my wings opening and catching the updraft right outside my window. If I fly quickly, I may be able to reach its landing point and investigate. Just as I reach the trees, the object lands with an enormous KABOOOMM!!! and the trees shake violently. The very air shudders!

What just landed?!

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Heather stares at the falling fireballs. Her Intercom is still on, filled with static and robots cheering. She keeps her hands on the jet's wheel, but the rest of her body is following Shadow's descent. Heather can feel the flames he's in almost as if they're switched, and she's the one falling...

I'm sorry. Heather wishes she could just tell him. I'm sorry, little bro, I'm sorry. But it's too late. He's gone. He's become a little star...

That's right. You're a star, Shadow. Just as I always knew you would be. I'll never forget you. I'm sorry. Sorry I had a part in all of this. Sorry I knew. Sorry you'll never know...Sorry, sorry, sorry. Tears fill her eyes. I miss you, I love you, come home. Don't be dead...

Don't make me have to live with the fact that I killed you.

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*Shush, Shush, Shush, Shush.*

I trot through the forest-at this point, it's too dense to fly-in my rain boots, pushing aside bright green leaves and deep brown branches. There's mud everywhere from the rains, and some of it's splashed up past my knee-high Wellingtons. Irritated, I yank my boot out of the sticky sludge for the billionth time. I might be about to meet an alien, and if I get there late I'm totally trashing these boots!

Groaning as I realize my other foot is now stuck, I once more wonder if this is actually all worth it. What if I get there and it's just a crashed plane, with a bunch of dead people, or a satellite? I mean, you know, that'd be plenty eventful, but just not the kind of eventful I'm looking for. That'd be a major disappointment. I cough, suddenly realizing that there's a foul smell in the air.

Pee-yew! What the heck is that?! I put a hand in front of my nose, coughing, my eyes watering. It smells like burning hair! Still hacking and wheezing, I realize with a jolt that the smell is no doubt coming from the crash sight. There was something alive in the crash.

I rushed forward, leaping over tree roots and occasionally frantically pulling my shoe from the sludge. Panting hard-running is difficult when you're used to flying-I found myself flapping my wings in an effort to move faster. If someone came down in that meteor, they might be hurt! (Also they might be from space. But more to the point, they could be dying!)

I can imagine it now. I reach the smoldering crash site, scrambling into the crater and shoving aside extremely hot rocks. In the center is a large creature, a big green man, dying. The blood shall be... purple. He'll have a deep voice when he speaks to me, with a kind of metallic edge, and he'll say, "I won't...make it... Earth female, may I...tell you of my people?" Then he'll tell me about their divine mission in life right before he dies and I'll have to do something about his body. Eww.

Or maybe when I get there, he'll be crawling out of his ship, and he'll look at me and say- Hey, wait, is that the crater? I stop abruptly at the edge of a long furrow in the ground, the realization interrupting my daydreams. I was expecting a sort of round dent in the ground, huge, like a giant squished his thumb down...

I look to my left, where it's shallower, and I see that farther back some of the trees are on fire. The dirt actually seems to be melted-I hadn't thought such a thing possible-and I can tell that whatever it is had to go through a whole lot of trees to get there. Looking to my right, I can see more fire and a lot of destruction. Branches and leaves and earth are all chewed up in big, ongoing mounds on either side of the furrow. I begin to walk along the top of these, making my way to the (perhaps final) resting place of...whatever or whoever this is.

As I walk along, the trench gets deeper, and so the excess dirt pile gets higher. I'm not usually afraid of heights, being a bat and all, but I didn't like where this was going. What [not] on Earth had landed?! I flapped my wings (less trees now, it's easier for me to fly) and zoomed over the crash site. Come on, how long can this trench be?!

Turns out I didn't have to fly for too terribly much longer.