Lord Brytag the Mighty flew across the night sky that was slowly being lit by an orange light, beneath him glowing in a dark orange in the strange light was the great sky-dragon Kalikorix. "It's nearly here, we must hurry Kal." The sky lit up as if it was in daylight as the pair dove down towards the surface far below.

The night sky was quickly turning into shades of orange and red, a faint roaring was heard above and behind the pair. It sounds painful to their ears. Faster than ever the sky-dragon plummeted to the ground, only at the last possible moment did it open it's wings wide to slow the valiant pairs descent. As soon as Kalikorix touched the ground, Lord Brytag was off the beast and facing the clouds above.

The roar became deafening and he shouted, "This is not going to work." the clouds above parted and a collossal meteor hurtled towards them both. Brytag was a warrior and he knew only strength of arms, perhaps it would be enough to stop this, he doubted every word he thought. "It was nice knowing you Kalkorix." He braced himself as if he had the might to catch it with both his hands and behind him, Kalikorix spread it's wings and breathed a fine multicoloured spray over his friend.

The gigantic star struck the ground and burnt every living tree for ten miles around the impact, the shockwaves toppled trees for another forty miles. In the centre crater where the light was brightest.

The falling stars that evening were beautiful. Even Nikki was too busy watching the streaks of light that shot across the sky to cause trouble, though she’d made a quick flight right after they started to locate Blank. The young woman’s mouth hung open in amazement, reflected starlight shining in her eyes. Blank was similarly mesmerized, but the stars had failed to keep his attention, and instead he tried to suppress a smile as he watched the girl next to him.

“I wonder if you can catch them,” she whispered, stretching up a hand as if to try. “Wouldn’t that be cool? A star to keep?” Her expression wasn’t quite the same as the raw excitement that indicated she was coming up with some wild new adventure, but this was a bit more subdued and awestruck.

“A star… to keep…” Blank muttered to himself, raising his hand toward his head, but halfway there, he forced it down, letting the feeling slip away. Right now, it didn’t matter if he got his memories back, that could wait for tomorrow. For now, he just wanted to enjoy the moment.

Suddenly a meteor far brighter than any of the others blazed overhead, and Nikki gasped. “Wow!” she exclaimed. “Look at that one!”
Blank was already looking, and as he stared at the bright white light, that light burned through his eyes and into his mind, finishing the connection that had just started. In his mind’s eye, his memories, he felt the rain on his skin, hammering wherever his glider didn’t cover, and he barely saw the glider he was pursuing ahead of him. A gust of wind blew him up, and up, and farther up, and just before he passed from view of the other man, he saw a flash of light and then nothing.

Snapping back to reality, Blank put both hands to the sides of his head as it throbbed with a pounding headache. Staggering to his feet, he tried to stumble inside, but only managed to trip himself on the doorstep.

“Huh? Hey, you okay?” Nikki stood up as well, managing to tear her eyes from the falling stars when her friend lurched about. Based on the way he was holding his head, she figured it was some almost-memory, but he’d never gotten off-balance like that before.

Blank spun around to face the stars again, almost falling over as he did. A moment later, he had oriented himself and was pointing at the horizon.
“There,” he said, emphasizing the word by shaking his finger, “that’s the key. That’s where my memories are. I need to get there!” He turned again, making his way into the house more steadily, going for his glider.

“Whoa, whoa!” Nikki trailed after him. “I’m all for chasing it down, but it’s dark. We can’t really fly at night, especially somewhere unfamiliar like down there. Plus if we don’t at least get some supplies and so on, we’ll be in trouble. Even I don’t go in completely unprepared, you know that.”

Blank stopped, turning to look at Nikki. “I can think of a few times I’ve had to chase you down with a pack,” he said, obviously amused.

“Well yes, though I never thought it’d be my turn to try to get you to think something through~” She was grinning fit to split her face. “We’ll go, absolutely. But this is going to be our biggest adventure ever. I mean...the surface! ...I really should have suggested going there before this. So we’ll get together what we need, and leave at first light.” Her eyes shone just as bright as they had in the light from the falling stars at the thought.

Blank sighed, obviously defeated, and didn’t even begin to try talking her out of coming. There was nothing he could say that would stop her, and all he could do was try and keep her out of too much trouble. “Alright then, first light. Are you sure you’ll be awake?”

“I wouldn’t miss this for the world,” she promised.

(Collab with @LostBrotherGrimm)

Rahna grinned at Eli’s response to her suggestion, promptly following after him so that she wouldn’t be left behind. It was a race afterall! Unlike Eli, she quickly put her goggles on before jumping off the edge, her glider unfolding. She felt an updraft push her glider upward, giving her a little more altitude. She glanced downward to see a wave of starlings swirl and loop from below. It was an impressive sight, a sight which disappeared quickly into the trees of the island nearby.

Eli smiled as he moved his glider out of the way. He did get a slight head start, so there was no surprise that he landed on the island a bit before Rahna. His knee did bump into the ground - his landing skills not being on par with his racing skills. “Slowpoke,” he stuck his tongue out, as he leaned onto his glider, watching as Rahna made her way towards him. He could modify the wings on her glider, only a bit - would definitely give her more control. Eli made a few mental notes to himself as he waited for her. Hopefully he wouldn’t forget them.

He ought to get a notebook.

She heard him call her a ‘slowpoke’ the moment she landed near him, letting her gliding skid across the ground like she was surfing on it. She didn’t even bother folding up her glider, carrying it over to him. “You got a head start!” She retorted, but of course, she wasn’t very angry to begin with. In the end, she just gave him a shrug and a chuckle. “So, what did you want to talk about?”

“I…” Eli tried replying, but in all honesty, it was a hell of a question. What do people usually talk about? “How about you choose a topic?” If that was the best he got, no wonder he wasn’t carrying the title of the most charismatic talker in the world. Or Heron, at least.

Rahna couldn’t help but laugh. “We could talk about how silly you are~” She replied in an amused, mocking tone. “Geez, you suggest we talk, but you don’t even know what to talk about~!” She continued, giggling away. “How about this, I’ll teach you about different plants while you fix up my glider! It’s boring, I know, but it’s probably less boring than what you’d come up with.” She said as she rummaged through her bag, pulling out a oddly thick notebook. She look at Eli with a cheeky smirk on her face. She knew he wasn’t going to enjoy this, but it was going to be amusing for her.

The idea of him fixing the glider wouldn’t be bad in itself, but learning about plants? This was probably one of Rahna’s ways of teasing him. She couldn’t possibly be serious? It took him a few moments to notice it, but upon seeing the notebook, a dreadful expression replaced Eli’s usual grin. For a split second, he actually thought of modifying her glider to go even faster, as payback. But then again, this was his idea, so yeah, had he came up with a simple topic, all of this would’ve been a lot easier.

Besides, she loved talking about plants. The signature grin came back as Eli decided to let it slide this time. “Hit me with your best plants!” He proclaimed while approaching her glider.

Rahna half expected Eli to make a run for it, but she was glad that he didn’t. She took a seat in the patch of grass that was next to her, opening her notebook to a seemingly random page. “Let’s learn about a wonderful plant, named ‘Chusanor’!” she began. She started describing what it looks like in excruciating detail, talking about how to grow it and what it does when mixed with certain liquids or other plants.

All the while, Eli could do little but sigh.

---

“The 'Eesramire vine' needs constant sunlight and lots of wood to consume…” Rahna continued, as she had been for the past three hours or so. She wasn’t even close to finished. These notebooks have been organized from A to Z in plant species and everything about them, although most of her notebooks were still in her bookshelf at home.

During these three hours, Eli had managed to fix up her glider, modify it, give it some more spin, doze off a bit, watch some sky, think about food, eat some food. And Rahna barely scraped the surface of her notebook. He was currently laying next to her on the grass, watching the sky and trying not to go all Blin on her. Cocking his head to the side, Eli tried to figure where the hell was she able to write down all that information. Witchcraft, surely. It was the most plausible explanation.

What was that about watching the sky? He turned his head back, light of the day long since faded from its peak. Or was it long? Eli lost the track of time around the letter D. As he inhaled, taking in the breeze, he started drifting off again. A light dream, barely even recognizable. The sky… slowly becoming a smudgy canvas. Canvas filled with flashing lights. What were they called again…

Lights? Flashing lights? Eli sprang up like a cat. “Flashing lights?! Hey Rahna, tell me - am I crazy?” He asked as he watched one light flash after the other.

“If you grind it up--” Rahna stopped mid-sentence when Eli piped up for the first time in three hours. She glanced at his expression before looking at whatever he was looking at, which happen to be the sky. Flashing lights indeed. She slowly closed her book, placing it beside her. Her gaze staying on the light littered sky. Small streams stroked the darkened sky. “If you’re crazy, then I must be crazy too…” She replied in awe. It was such a beautiful sight.

It was definitely one of those moments when Eli didn’t regret not going off on some adventure of his own. The day turned out to be quite memorable even without it. Simply stunning. And it didn’t seem as if it would end in a matter of seconds, for a moment it seemed as if it would never end. Not that Eli wished for it to end. “Two crazy people watching the sky doing crazy stuff,” Eli blurted out, before scratching his head. At what point did this turn into a scene right out of a romantic play? “Eli, you idiot,” he mumbled to himself.

What Eli said didn’t really register in Rahna’s mind until a few moments later. She felt her face go a little red. Was this straight out of a romantic play or something? “Y-you really are an idiot.” She responded with a slight nervous laugh. She tried not to think about it any further than she already had and tried to focus on watching the sky.. Doing crazy stuff. She mind had already gone back to thinking about what Eli had suggested, but such thoughts were interrupted when a single, huge stream of light hit the mountains in the distance, followed by a thunderous rumble. She was speechless. Not that she had said much during the meteor display, but even more so now. It piqued her curiosity. She wanted to know what it looked like, what is was. “Eli.. I want to go see it.” She said quite plainly, her expression still quite stunned by the sudden event.

“Em… Y-yeah, definitely,” Eli mumbled, not quite sure what had just happened. This was one of the most intriguing moments to ever happen in his life. To ever happen in Heron. “Like… wanna go… now? Or do you wanna wait ‘till the morning, tell our parents and stuff like that. Whatever you choose, I’m with you, y’know that.” He said, staring in the distance. This seemed like more than just a simple adventure. And his heart was racing - this was the real deal.

“I.. think we should tell our parents first.. And y’know, be prepared to go down there. I also need to pack some fresh notebooks. I’m sure there’s a lot to learn down there.” She replied in a serious tone. This wasn’t something they should take lightly. She had no idea what was below Heron so she felt that she needed to prepare for it.

A couple more moments had passed before Eli finally moved his gaze away from the mountains. “It’s settled down,” he beamed Rahna a smile before moving away towards his glider, stopping only to ruffle her hair a bit. “Why so serious? It’s going to be okay. No - it’s going to be awesome!” Considering Heron wasn’t that big, Eli wasn’t surprised that he caught onto the commotion coming from almost all sides. This falling light certainly caused quite a bit of ruckus. “Maybe we should check out what’s happening over there,” he pointed in the direction of all the noise. “Then head home for the night, whatcha say?”

She couldn’t help but smile back at Eli when he ruffled her hair. “Y-yeah you’re right.” She replied in an uncharacteristically soft spoken voice. She took in a deep breath, regaining her usual composure. She had also heard all the commotion, thus she nodded at her friend. “Let’s go check out what’s going on~” She agreed as she packed up her encyclopedia and picked up her glider.

--

The pair had moved closer to the source of all the noise, only to hear about the ‘Exploration party’ that was to form at dawn. Rahna smiled at Eli, “Well, looks like we’ll be meeting up with some other people too? I’ll see you tomorrow!” And with that she gave him a quick hug and sprinted off in the direction of her home.

And just like that - she was gone. It seemed that Eli managed to cheer her up a bit from that serious persona she adapted every time something completely piqued her interest. He didn’t quite expect a hug, though - not at all. Eli felt his cheeks reddening a bit. “I really am an idiot,” he stated as he slapped his forehead.

Thema watched as the boy tossed his belongings to the ground and made it apparent that he was going to stay a while. Before she could ask the boy's name, the boy rattled off a question.

"That's pretty interesting, I gotta admit. Can you play it well?"

Thema opened her mouth to speak, but again, she was interrupted by many questions more.

"Oh, can you sing, too? Written any songs yet? Can I take a look at some you've written down? I mean, if you've written some down."

The boy had been asking questions faster that Thema could even think of an answer. After a short period of silence, Thema answered each of the questions.

"I can play it, though, I'm no virtuoso at anything, not by any means." She said. "And I can also sing, though, I'm no grand singer. And to what songs I wrote, I don't quite have my song notes with me. I guess I could play something, if you really want to hear it."

Tivo gave a curt nod in response to each answer that Thema delivered, a simple grin plastered on his face signifying his content with the way this particular conversation was going. He was quite pleased that the bard was willing to share some of her own songs, and he gladly accepted her offer.

"That sounds pretty nice, yeah. Go ahead! It's been a long time since I've heard from a genuinely amateur musician," he honestly opined, eyes gazing up at the woman with a tinge of eagerness behind his expression.

Thema nodded after she heard what the boy had said. She sat on the ground in front of the man, pulling her lute off of her waist. She held the lute rather carefully as she hummed a quick tune while turning the pegs that held the strings tight to the wooden frame. Occasionally, she would pluck a string, giving either a note that sounded pleasant or a note that sounded rather dull.

This went on for a rather short while, but once each string gave a pleasurable noise, she began strumming a simple, melancholic tune. She hummed along with the notes in order to get a feel of a song. Not before long, she began to sing a morose song.



The song sounded sorrowful and incomplete, however, it was sang quite well. Though, the song did feel quite empty, as if it was missing something.

Thema asked quickly, dismissing her own thoughts about the song. She had felt as though her song was empty. It sounded nice, that's for sure, but it didn't feel right. It wasn't what she herself had thought. It was just something that someone would sing from time to time.

Lowering his stature further by leaning forwards some, Tivo listened intently to the song. While Thema strummed the sequence of strings on her lute and sung, he closed his eyes and nodded his head until she had finally finished. He had to admit to himself that she was quite decent -- not that he had any doubts about her ability, really.

After letting out a content sigh, he opened his eyes once more. "That was nice. I don't really understand the words all that well, but, uhm . . . Good job!" Tivo's expression quickly acquired a grin. "The only thing I didn't like about it was just how short it was!" he added.

Tivo was about to delve into a more in-depth conversation with Thema when a streaking, minuscule object ran past the peripheral of his vision, which immediately prompted him to divert his attention away from Thema and towards the particular area above him. However, after finding nothing in his short perusal of the sky which invoked great interest, he turned back towards Thema. He simply dismissed it as being an incredibly fast, white bird of some sort.

"Sorry," he began. "Just thought I saw something weird. Anyway, like I said before, your songs are sort of short in length. Then again, I'm no musician, so I don't know too much. No need to take my advice. You've got talent, though!"

Tivo suddenly became aware of how far forward he was leaning towards Thema and decided to readjust his posture by tilting back a bit, resting the palms of his hands onto his knees. Didn't want to invade her personal space or anything. Common courtesy.

"So . . . Those lyrics. What do they mean? Is it a story of some sort? Does it have a message?"

Thema was taken aback by his question. Did her words have a meaning? She never had thought too hard about it. She knew it wasn't a story, but what was it? It was certainly something she wrote, but for what reason?

"I don't know," Thema said as she rose from her seat, "and I think that's what I'm trying to figure out." Thema looked towards the sky. Occasionally, a dull white streak ran across the sky, but was nigh impossible to see due to the day's light. It didn't look very nice, however, it was still a neat event to witness.

"Anyways, I think it's time for me to get going." Thema said, returning her lute upon her hip. She then turned away from the boy and wandered forwards, with no real destination in mind.