Into the Sky

Regarding the Beginning - Namyildi

I sometimes wonder if I felt anything the night that she fell from the sky, Miyuki. It's easy for anyone to look back on a pivotal moment in their life and imagine that they could feel it coming.

I'm sure I slept peacefully. I missed the much advertised "meteor shower." Did anyone know what it really was? And the world over, we celebrated it, adored its beauty. Some find hope in a dying star. But when each star is like another half of you...

One night I dreamt of her, one falling star among the millions, spinning in her metal orb, her bloodied face against the window. It troubles me.

And I saw what happened after. I caught a piece of Ryan's memories as we walked through the (). I saw it...

The night was glowing with mechanic fire. For six hours, he looked, and he actually found her, in a pile of broken spheres all lying in a gully. She was screaming for him, through the glass. She pounded with her small, white arms.

"I'm here, Yuki! Yuki! I'm here!" he yelled. She could barely hear him.

"The door!" she screamed. "The door! Get me out! I can't breathe, Ryan!"

He was exhausted. But how hard he tried! The sphere was resting on its door. He strained, and kicked, and beat at it, until he finally collapsed, and just listened to her, lost in her hysteria. Slowly, he put his hand over hers, and looked in, despairing eyes.

"The grenade!" she shrieked. "Don't leave me, Ryan!"

He shook his head, disbelieving, and didn't move.

"Ryan! Don't leave us here, Just do it! The grenade, it will work!"

His tears fell on the window.

"Ryan! Ryan! Don't leave me all alone! RYAN!"

Still, he watched her.

"You have to do it! PLEASE!"

He ran. At the top of the hillside, he turned and held his breath, the weapon in his hand. He couldn't hurt her, but the sphere had to move! The seconds ticked by, and his hand shook wildly. The wind was choking hot. He couldn't seem to slow his thoughts to sense. There were too many things to calculate, and he could hear her crying in his head.

"I'm sorry," he sobbed. The dust stuck in his throat and broke it. He activated it, and watched it, quiet, sailing through the air. His eyes snapped shut against the bright explosion. His face was blistered in the wind. And when he could, he ran to her.

---

The morning after it happened, I watched a man drag something behind the dumpster next to my apartment. He looked around, almost falling over, and then shuffled away. It was nothing I wanted to be involved in. I knew the place I lived in. But the way he had hovered over it, wrapping it tightly, and then brushing his hand over it...No. I felt cold and afraid. I picked up my phone.

Why did I only take it with me down the stairs? I know it was foolish.

Her legs were dirty, and her feet were bare. She was wrapped in the shreds of a navy colored jacket, and there was blood all over her. I nearly gagged and left her there. My whole body shook. I got up the courage to touch her. She was still warm. Was she really dead, or only almost? Her clothes were so strange.

Would the man come back to be sure she was dead? I found that I was angry. The phone sat forgotten in my hand. Before anything, I had to get her away. There was no way that I could carry her alone. And what if someone saw me? The police, here, were a merciless, brutal force, and much feared. Why, why me?

My neighbor, (), was a small clinic doctor. He had fixed my broken arm and given me a number of stitches, once. I forgive him the fact that it was after he accidentally bumped me down the west steps of the building. I dashed up to his door, and beat my palms out loudly on it.

"Namyildi! Are you well?" he said, when he answered to my insistent sounding. The tears poured out. I hadn't realized I was that upset.

I stared and voiced some wordless thing. He asked again.

"I don't know who she is," I cried, and I grabbed his hand and pulled him down the stairs. He examined her as I rambled helplessly, telling him what I had seen.

"I can't believe it," he breathed. "She's still alive. Listen, Namyi, we get any of this wrong, and it's over. At the back of the third cupboard from the left in my kitchen, there's a green and black box. Get it out. Careful--it's very heavy--and bring it down. Oh! Also, I need the white carrier under my bed. We need to get her upstairs to my apartment."

He wrapped her head and neck and arm, and activated his small weightless stretcher beneath her.

"Now the hard part about this is that you've got to keep it at exactly the right angle. The stretcher will adjust it some, but tip it too fast, and the system will reset. Ready? Ok, one, two, THREE!"

Something fell from her hand, as we lifted her up, and landed behind a plastic bag. It sounded like metal; I couldn't move to look at it. Slowly, we carried her up the stairs, but it was not hard. I was shaking, convinced I'd drop her any minute, knowing I had to hurry, or she'd die...

He stripped his bed, and we set her on it. He worked amazingly fast, sending me for many different items. Soon the entire room was converted into a makeshift hospital. Her heartbeat, on the machine, was very slow. () got up to get some water. I sat by her and touched her hand. She looked as though she must be beautiful, but for all the blood and bandages. She had black hair and strange eyes, and was very petite. And to have ended up like this? Her plight held me strangely curious and fascinated. Perhaps it was then I felt something of who she was.

"Don't you work during the mornings?" () asked me. I cried out and ran for the door. Shyardin was a very blunt and demanding man. I had never dared be late before. But now the situation was thrust on me, and I knew he wouldn't understand.

I worked in a small trinket shop, in a place I have learned that earthmen would call a "mall." It was a huge, labyrinthine building of one rambling story, and we were right in the center of the south quarter. I was ten minutes late when I reached the north end of the building, but I couldn't run any longer. I dropped my bag and spun around, holding my chest as if I could pull it wide and let the air in. That was when I saw the man again. The one who had been dragging the girl. I froze.

Don't let him know you see him, I thought. My chest hurt.

I couldn't face him alone. I was already late for work. Trying to pretend I hadn't seen him, I picked up my things and went inside.

I never imagined he would follow me. He had changed his clothes, I realized; these ones were stolen, I imagined, and he wore them in the strangest way. He planted himself in the front display of a rundown booklog, and barely moved. I happened to be looking when the keeper came out to chase him away. Not speaking, he simply nodded, and shuffled over to the next doorway, his eyes on me. And I changed my mind.

I had never seen such an expression before. He seemed to be in physical pain, desperate and afraid, like a child begging to a parent that he fears will beat him. It shocked me. I stared at the shelf in front of me until Shyardin gave a grating yell from the back of the shop. I could hardly think.

My hip hit on the table, and something clinked. I had forgotten I had picked it up. I should have to give it back to her tonight, if she had not died.

It was two small but heavy metal plates, painted brightly, hung from a central ring. The largest held what seemed to be writing in two distinct character sets that were unfamiliar. It pictured seven somewhat distorted men, with drooping caps and bulbous noses. The second was a picture of a black-haired girl in a short, green, one-sleeved shirt, shorts and boots. On her head was a crown of spikes and a red bow, and she held a torch and a large...I wasn't sure what.

My head turned fractionally, as I searched for the man. He still stood just across the way. Quickly, I slipped the items back into my pocket. Gesturing to Shyardin, I went to take my break. I was going to go and meet this man, and all alone.


---

Out of Nowhere--Into the Unknown

I clutched the trinket tightly my hand as I walked, thinking nothing. Soon I could see him following me. We had to get out before the police noticed him. I was sure that, malicious or not, there would be questions he couldn't answer. It was unbelievable. I was protecting him.

Why was I actually walking into a back alley? I knew that it was idiotic. Why had I even gotten involved? It was too late now; he would come for me anyway.

Strangely, when I reached the place, and turned to him, he was the one that looked nervous, trapped. He was appraising me, deciding he could overpower me. Perhaps it was my only saving grace, and so I let him see it easily. What had happened to the woman?