p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" Gregor jumped out of bed. It wasn't just the fire alarm that went off just their their apartment when they were cooking and it got a little steamy. The alarms that alerted the entire building of a large fire were ringing, deafeningly loud. Lizzie ran into Gregors room as he was gathering his few precious belongings. He stuffed some old pictures, a birthday card his grandmother had given him a few years ago, the black, plastic bat that Boots had given him into his backpack. He also got some flashlights and batteries. He kept some in his room. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "How big is the fire?" Lizzie asked shakily. Gregor hoped that she wouldn't have panic attack./span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "I don't know Lizzie. Try to stay calm, okay? We are going to be fine," Gregor said acting calmer than he felt for her sake. "Do you have everything?" Asked Lizzie as he led her out of his room. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "I think so," Lizzie said. She wasn't holding anything, but she was wearing a necklace. It was a leather cord wrapped around a small stone. "Ripred gave it to me," she said when she noticed Gregor was looking. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" Boots was in the living room holding her hands over her hands over her ears while his parents were franticly grabbing their cell phones and the cash that they hid above the refrigerator. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Everyone stay calm," Gregor's mom said even though she was not very calm herself. "And put your jackets on!" Gregor and Lizzie ran to get their jackets, then Gregor help Boots get hers on. Three minutes later they were out the door and running down the hall, then down the stairs. They made it to the first floor, but as they exiting the stairwell and entering the hall, the ceiling fell in. Burning dry wall and old wooden beams blocked their way. Lizzie screamed. Gregor, who was leading his family, jumped back. Luckily, none of the ceiling fell on him. He grabbed the now frozen Lizzie's hand and quickly walked out the hall the other way. He knew the only thing at the end of the hall was the laundry room. As he went along, the smoke chocked him. He wished he could run, but he knew his still weak parents couldn't keep up. They finally reached the laundry room. There was a door at the far side of the room, the walls were in flames and the ceiling was starting to crack. Mrs. Cormaci was already in the laundry room./span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Finally, your here," Mrs. Cormaci said with a surprising amount of calmness. "Welp Gregor, are the currents here?" She asked. Gregor ran over the to grate and looked./span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Yes there here but…" Gregor began but Mrs. Cormaci interrupted. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Good, lets go," she said. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "No, NO!" Gregor's mom cried. "I am not going down there. I am not letting my family down there!" /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Well what else do you suppose we do?" Mrs. Cormaci asked. Just then the ceiling gave a tremendous crack. "I'm not to keen about the idea of going down there myself, but I'm not going to sit here and die in these flames." With that, she opened up the grate and jumped. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "We go see temp Gregor?" Boots asked. br / "Yes Boots lets go!" He said picking her up. Gregor's mom had frozen, in her spot, so Gregor's dad scooped her up and jumped through the grate. Lizzie jumped next. Gregor was right behind her with Boots. As he jumped her heard the ceiling collapse. Gregor never particularly enjoyed the feeling of falling, but this time he felt relieved to be falling away from the fire, deeper and deeper into the ground, slowly making it to safety. But the longer he fell, the more he worried about what they would reach at the bottom. He had no idea if the humans and rats were still at peace with each other. Who would find them first? Cockroaches? Rats? Humans? Gregor figured he could only wait until the reached the bottom to find three minutes later, Gregor felt the ground under his feet. "Man, its lucky that the currents were there when we needed them," Gregor thought. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Lizzie, can you see anything?" Gregor asked. Of course she couldn't see, it was pitch black. But she could echolocated. Gregor was scanning around as well. He could find nothing. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "No, I can't," Lizzie said after clicking a few times. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Well, I guess we will have to walk until someone finds us," Gregor said. "Oh! I have flashlights! How could I forget?" He sat Boots down and swung his backpack off his back. He got out the flash lights and handed one flashlight to his dad, one to Mrs. Cormaci and one to his mom. He and Lizzie could echolocate, and Gregor picked Boots back up, so she was safe. Gregor lead them through a dark tunnel that he remembered lead to Regalia. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" After about ten minutes of walking, Gregor finally sensed a human scout. He and his bat flew off as soon as they saw them. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "We've been spotted," Gregor said. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Is that a good thing or a bad thing?" Mrs. Cormaci asked. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Good I think," Gregor replied. After another ten minutes Gregor heard a bat coming. br / "Gregor?" A familiar voice called. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Luxa!" Gregor called back. "Over here!" His dad's flashlight caught a glimmer of Aurora's golden fur. Luxa jumped off Aurora before she had even landed and flew into his arms. Gregor wrapped his arms around her, and never wanted to let her go again, but he did. Boots tugged at Luxa's shirt. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Hi you!" Boots said. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Hello Boots!" Luxa said squatting down to her level and giving her a hug. She stood back up. "What happened? Why are you here? Are you ok?" Luxa asked. But she didn't even wait for an answer, she just hugged him again and said how much she had missed missed him. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Our apartment building caught on fire, and the only way out was to the Underland," Gregor said. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "So you didn't move?" Luxa asked./span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "No, not yet," Gregor's mom said. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Ok, first, we need to get you all to Regalia. Since Aurora can't carry all of us and these tunnels are perfectly safe, why don't you parents, Boots and Lizzie ride back and we can walk?" Luxa said, but then she saw Mrs. Cormaci. "Oh I'm sorry I didn't see you," Luxa said. "I am Luxa, queen of Regalia. What is your name?" /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" Mrs. Cormaci looked a little taken aback, but she replied, "I'm Mrs. Cormaci. It's nice to meet you." She had never seen an Underlander before. The pale, almost see through skin and violet eyes were so different from anyone in the Overland. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "It is nice to meet you as well," Luxa said. "They are sending more fliers, I'm not technically even supposed to be here, but I couldn't wait to see you!" Luxa said. Before she was finished speaking, two more bats appeared in the tunnel. Mrs. Cormaci, Boots and Lizzie rode a large, grey bat while his parents rode on a slightly smaller black bat. Gregor and Luxa climbed onto Aurora and they were off. Luxa sat behind Gregor. She put her arms around his waste and leaned against his back. "I missed you so much," Luxa said. Gregor could hear the sadness in her voice as she recalled the last four months./span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "I missed you more," Gregor said. He couldn't believe that he got to see her, speak to her. He pulled out his picture of them and she pulled out hers. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "You still have it?" She asked./span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; -webkit-text-stroke-color: #000000;"span style="font-kerning: none;" "Are you kidding? I wouldn't have lost this for the world." There was so much to say and ask and talk about, but they just sat together on Aurora until they made it to the palace. /span/p