Chapter one
Colors, that changed so violently it made me sick
Mandy
Bright lights that hurt my eyes.
Amanda!
Metal screeching on metal.
MONGOOSE!
"I wanna be a mongoose." I mumbled sleepily and rolled onto my side.
The girl know as Sandy sighed and flopped back into her chair with an irritated scowl on her face. She brushed her dark black hair from her face with an exaggerated scowl. Suddenly her face lit up and she broke out in a sly grin as she slowly began to lean over the sleeping girl in the seat beside her.
She took a long breath before leaning into the smaller girl's ear and yelling "TWO GIRLS AND ONE CUP!"
"AAAAHHHHH!" I screamed in terror at the top of my lungs, which caused almost everyone to turn in their seats and watch my panic attack with disturbed and amused faces.
Sandy burst out laughing before hugging me in a friendly gesture, while I curled into a fetal position, panting like I ran five miles. After I regained my composer I whipped my head around in her embrace and hissed menacingly.
"Aaaww, you really are a mongoose" Sandy teased.
"Why did you do that?" I growled still a bit peeved by all the people staring at us.
"Because where here, not like that's important or anything though" she yawned playfully ignoring my look of surprise. I jumped up and wiggled in my seat around her, much to her complaint, to stare out the bus window at the endless desert of Nevada in awe, drinking up the different sight of the barren wasteland like a dying man would drink water.
Sandy and I grew up in the tropical wonderland known as Miami, Florida. In it you couldn't turn your head without seeing green or rain, so to an extent a desert was quite a new place for us to experience.
Little did I know this godforsaken patch of earth would change my life and the world forever.
Sometimes I'd wonder, if given a chance and if I knew what I do now, would I have changed anything? Could I have pretended that nothing had ever happen and just have gone about my merry little way, or at the very least what could have been my merry little way?
Would I have been normal? Would I really have remained just an ignorant little high school sophomore left to dream of the supposed boundless opportunities that supposedly laid at my fingertips? Would I have ever found a job? Got married? Had kids? Would I have been that one to have that nice, lush, garden house with that white picket fence and the giant mango tree that seemed older than Ponce de Leon himself?
Who knows...Though I highly doubt it. Mom always said I was born to do something special, though sometimes I wish she wasn't always right.
"Awesome" I chirped excitedly and Sandy smiled in agreement as we both stuck or heads out the window enjoying the last rays of sunset on our faces until we reached the small town of Rachel, Nevada where we boarded one last bus that took us to a small bed and breakfast inn on the outskirts of the tiny town. By that time it was close to midnight. Everyone was tired and did not put up much of a fight as they given their assigned rooms and schedules for the next day.
Though I was lucky to be able to share a room with Sandy, unfortunately we both were paired with one last roomate named Terry, whom I disliked immensely.
"Gggrowl!"
I moaned sadly and threw myself onto the bed, waiting for my stomach to stop torturing me and let me sleep at last. Sandy grimaced at the starling sound.
"Mandy, if I have any bite marks on me in the morning I known to light YOUR clothes on fire." The pyromaniac warned.
"Hahaha, so funny I forgot to laugh. Now shut up." I snapped as I groaned in pain and accidently rolled off the bed with a painful thump.
As sandy continued to tease me and I started looking for her lighter, Terry came out of the bathroom with pink nails, a facial mask and all. Sandy and I paused in our antics. I rolled my eyes and could only guess Sandy disliked her as much as I did by the way she glared at the wall in front of her.
I think she might burn holes in it… poor wall.
Terry huffed at our play fighting as she blew on her nails before speaking.
"If I didn't know that was your stomach I would have assumed a bear had gotten in the room." She then glared around the room then finally on me. Sandy snorted.
"Ya, because bears live in the Nevada desert" She muttered under her breath. I rolled my eyes in agreement.
How two science geeks like Sandy and I get stuck with sharing a room with this snarky blonde I'll never know. For goodness sakes, this was science field trip for advanced students, and yet here she was, the only one in our entire school to fail Biology 101, twice.
I had zoned out from her one sided conversation against me as I imagined feeding this future bimbo to actual bears once we got home, but not before catching her last comment.
"…You smell like a stupid bear though, who knows maybe after tonight you'll wake up with a one in your bed. After all wasn't your daddy into stuff like that? A stupid red-neck from the backwoods? Hey! I bet he liked all those farm animals so much that that's why he up and left you and your mom" She sneered as she turned off the light on her side of the room and then proceeded to climb into her bed.
I snarled angrily in her direction at the back hand comments as my fists curled and uncurled by my sides in my lap. Sandy openly glared at Terry as she came over to place her hands comfortingly around my shoulders, whether to soothe me or hold me back I wasn't entirely sure.
Then I smiled as I shook sandy off and whispered just loud enough so that Terry could hear me.
"If one does come in here I'll be sure to put in a good word for you too. Who knows maybe you'll be the one with a bear in her bed, after all your much better at that sort of thing anyhow, and besides you're defiantly hairier then I am." I smirked wickedly.
I could see Sandy silently holding in her chuckles from the corner of my eye and I could see Terry shaking with rage from across the room. I risked one last taunt as I stood up to search for some money to buy a snack downstairs and finally quell my annoying stomach.
"Sleep tight" I crooned in a sickly sweet voice "don't let that bear romp your fat ass tonight."
Sandy started crying from laughing too hard, Terry was quietly steaming under her covers as I grinned like a Chinese cat and I garbed some change before heading downstairs towards the vending machine.
As I climbed down the stairs searching for the vending machine I had seen earlier, I inhaled deeply and savored the cold dry air of the desert not twenty feet from me. The cold air soothed my heated cheeks and calmed my aggravated senses.
I must have inhaled too much sand in the wind because I began to cough violently and my eyes became irritated as a few tears flew down my face. As I kept coughing I searched blindly for a water fountain or vending machine.
After several minutes of choking on dust I stopped and wiped my eyes, but by that time I was hopelessly lost in a maze of hallways with the desert as my only exit.
Somewhere in orbit of the Milky Way galaxy:
The lone pod carrying the infant cybertornean was still cruising through space without stopping. The infant was still in sleep mode to conserve energy for its long flight, with no stop or company from its mother it did not have any reason to come out of recharging mode and waste energy by crying or doing nothing; that is, as long as the pod didn't burn out.
But from traveling for so far and long and after many vorns without any maintenance the pod was about to fail and make a crash landing on any planet strong enough, whose gravity could be used to pull it pod's burner was about to run out, but out of protocol it gave a quick message to its occupant.
Warning! Engine Malfunction!
The loud warning woke the infant who began fidgeting in its cramped conditions.
WARNING! CRASH LANDING INEVITABLE!
Almost as if the baby could understand the warnings, it began to whimper then cry. The pod passed a small moon then began dropping toward a planet whose gravitational field began to pull the pod to itself. The pod was falling now surrounded by fire from its descent and wind whipping around it as it headed for the darker side of the planet. Before the pod gave out entirely it gave one last message then blacked out.
Unmarked planet; life detected; organic
Name: EARTH
Enjoy. :)
