Stargazer couldn't sleep.

That was not surprising. Stargazer was a NightWing. His entire tribe was supposed to be nocturnal. Even so, most were awake all day and appeared asleep at night.

Stargazer was not a fan of this. Luckily, his parents were okay with it, and here he was, perched in a tree, his head pointed skyward like his namesake. Oh, how he wanted to know more about those stars! They just hung there, infininte in their numbers and beauty. What made them burn?

He knew he would never find out.

As the two-year-old dragonet sat on the tree branch, looking into the vast night sky, something caught his eye.

This star was strange.

It was much redder than the surrounding points of light, and it also appeared to blink. As Stargazer watched it, it noticably moved across the sky rather quickly. After awhile, it turned orange and become much brighter. He continued watching it, and it was moving as though as if it was falling. When it vanished over the tree line, Stargazer stared where it disapeared for a moment , then turned his attention back to the stars.

The first thing Alloy felt when she woke up was pain.

I Owww... Everything hurrrrts... I Still feeling a bit groggy, she tried sorting out all the messenges her body was sending her. I Sharp pain in my waist, hurts when I breathe, left foot a little sore, something jabbing my tail, wings are in uncomfortable positions, obviously upside d- I

Her eyes flew open.

She strapped in her seat harness. She mostly recognized the instrument panel in front of her. All the lights were off. One of the devices was a mess of wires and plastic, and a gray spike jutted out from the spot. Alloy suddenly realized that the cockpit was upside down, and she hanging from her seat. The events of the night before suddenly flooded her mind. The engine exploding, the plane crash-landing, Iodine fain-

I Iodine. I

Remembering her co-pilot, she tried twisting to get a look where she remembered Iodine being, but stopped as pain stabbed into her chest. She clenched her teeth, and looked down, er, up in this position, to where the pain seemed to originate. Her heart sank when she saw the source.

A hunk of shrapnel, twisted and blackened, was lodged in her torso, right below her right arm.

Dried blood had seeped out, staining her flight jacket.

As soon as she saw it, Alloy's first thought was I Ew. I

Remembering Iodine, careful to mind her wound, She angled herself to be able to check on the dark purple dragon.

A massive hunk of metal covered most of him.

Inspecting him further, she noticed his eyes were closed and his chest wasn't moving.

I Shiiit, that can't be good I

Straining herself further, she was able to see that the metal between them also went through Iodine's chest. His was definently dead.

Remembering where she was, Alloy went to work on extracting herself from where she hung.

Can't just "hang in there" forever, like Leutinent Hadron would probably say.

Trying to find the release mechanism wasn't very easy, considering that the shrapnel was constantly jabbing her and working its way deeper. Feeling around her harness, she found the latch and clicked it open.

The harness straps suddenly released her, and Alloy dropped like a rock onto the ceiling of the ruined aircraft with a thud.

Hot pain struck through her mind when she landed.

With a pained grunt, she attempted to stand, unsteadily. Staggering around like she was drunk, she turned around to where she knew the first-aid kit would be, trying to avoid hitting her head on the seats.

I Dammit. I

The white plastic box had gotten crushed under a stone spike that jutted from the window.

I might still useable. I

Hoping to salvage it, Alloy carefully pried the shattered case out from its prison, careful to mind her injuries. Mud had covered the cracked face, obscuring the boldly written lettering declaring its purpose for emergencies

After searching the sides for a latch and undoing it, she gingerly lifted the damaged lid.

She gave a sigh of relief.

Although the package was crushed and smeared with mud, the tube of antibiotic ointment and roll of bandages inside seemed fine.

Further probing revealed a bottle of antiseptic alchohol.

With all these things ready, Alloy set to patching herself up.

She wiped her talons on her flight jacket to avoid getting mud in her wounds.

I first, clean wounds I

Bracing for pain, Alloy twisted the cap off the alchohol and slowly poured it onto a gash on her neck. She jerked back, biting back a scream from the pain. Panting, she gave it another attempt, trying to control her reaction better.

When the searing pain subsided, Alloy popped open the antibiotic paste tube. She squeezed a small amount of it onto the gash, then smeared it around, while trying to ignore the pain it was causing.

Once that was done, Alloy reached out and grabbed the bandage roll. She peeled off a length, and proceded to wrap it around her neck.

Once the gash on her neck was dealt with, Alloy turned her attention to the shrapnel embedded in her torso. Time to do something about that.

Alloy wrapped her talons around the gray chunk, and pulled.

Pain exploded in her head, and she nearly passed out.

I I don't think I will be able to do this without help.

Might be time to go out and see what I'm dealing with. I

Alloy started glancing around the dark chamber where she sat. A door was inlayed in the wall at the back of the ruined cockpit. I ah, perfect! I

As she stood up to walk to it, her foot started hurting again, reminding Alloy of its issues. Making sure to avoid putting to much weight on it, Alloy limped over to the door, her ticket out of here. She put her front talons up to the exposed aluminum, adn gave it a firm shove.

Nothing.

Alloy pushed it again.

Still nothing.

Grasping the handle, she tried pulling it.

No dice.

Fuck. How was she going to get out of here?

Alloy glanced at the C-130's windshield. I Could I break that and escape? I

She scanned the scrap pile that was head of the plane. A variety of objects were available that would be suitable to the task at hand. Alloy picked up the one closest to her. It was a chunk of stone about 75% the size of her head.

This would do nicely.

Getting over to the C-130's windshield proved to be difficult. Carrying a small boulder with shrapnel in your chest and a twisted foot requires quite a bit of balance.

After some struggle, Alloy made it to the already cracked and mud-splattered curved glass. She sat down next to it, and raised the rock. After a second, she brought it down with all her strength on the once-clear barrier.

The windshield gave a satisfying smash. It immediatley crumpled. Alloy gave it a couple more hits to make an opening large enough for her to squeeze through.

She gave Iodine one last look, still hanging upside-down while impaled, and felt a pang of regret. I I'm sorry I she thought, then bent down low and crawled into the hole.

I OW! FUCK! There is going to be hell to-Ow!-pay after I get through this. I Alloy keep thinking as she kept brushing against the broken glass that littered her path out. She continued to cuss as she stepped on another shard.

She was out of the cockpit.

Still overusing her colorful vocabalary, Alloy tried to stand up.

Bad move.

She forgot that the nose of the machine use still above her. The C-130 now had a new dent for its collection. Being more careful to mind her surroundings, Alloy finally crawled out from under the crashed cargo carrier and into open air.