Home Is Where You Hang Upside Down
by "The Enduring Man-Child"
All standard disclaimers apply.
Chapter 1
Dawn was beginning to break over the city. As the eastern sky grew gradually brighter Foxglove, after a night of feeding, headed back towards the exotic church she had discovered and made her roosting place for the past week. She swept towards the spire and landed, carefully spider-walking through a small break in the beautiful stained glass windows. She had always made it a point to watch the sunrise before retiring for the day, but the sunrise through these windows was breathtaking.
She sighed as the disk of the sun sailed free above the horizon, clinging upside down to a panel as she prepared for sleep to overtake her. But this morning there was a noise of human voices from below, the sweet smell of incense, and singing with words she could not understand. She was accustomed to understanding humans who could not even hear her voice, much less understand what she was saying. There had been a single exception: Winifred, by profession a cleaning woman but by avocation a would-be witch, could communicate with her, usually by means of much abuse. But Foxglove had taken it because she had been alone in the world and needed a friend, and was quite fascinated by humans. This time had been busy but short, culminating at last in her finding truer friends, and certainly nicer. It had cost her a broken heart, though. And again she was alone.
She was thinking for the hundredth time of screwing up enough courage to visit the large tree in the park where Dale lived, together with the other Rescue Rangers. No matter how many times she had made up her mind to do this she had always backed down, not quite knowing what they really thought about her, considering she had been serving their adversary. As she sighed in resignation of her lack of courage her attention was distracted once again from below. More humans were arriving, the singing was louder, the music was quite unlike any she had ever heard before, and the words were strange. The puzzle of communication, or the lack thereof, once again flooded her mind, providing a welcome distraction from personal issues. But she could not ponder very long, for the daytime torpor was swiftly creeping over her entire body. With one great yawn and another glance at the sunlight filtering through the window illustrating Noah's Ark she fell asleep.