Encountering A Sky-Man

I'm awake, mostly. It's time to move. I feel unsettled about tomorrow, but somehow excited. But for now, I must live. I get out of my indent and go outside. The first thing I see wakes me up the rest of the way. It is the object of my hidden love, the beautiful Katie. However, the reason I wake up the rest of the way is because I fear what will happen, not because of her beauty. Recently, I told her how I feel, but I was so nervous I ran before she could say anything. It's still a secret to the rest of our settlement. Still she could see me now, and there isn't anywhere for me to hide in this settlement, so I have to face the wrath of my love.

"Why did you leave?" she says, more shy than she usually would.

"I want... to... keep loving you," I stutter. It's all that will come to me. She says nothing but instead runs just like I had. Though I am sad, I still have to help my colony and hunt for game. While we hunt, I can't stop thinking about her running away, and it only makes it harder for me to catch anything. All I can get is a small critter that could fit in my palm. I get back and go straight to my niche at the settlement. I eat nothing, and I go to my indent.

More and more I feel worse as I wait in my indent, to fall asleep. I still feel uneasy about tomorrow. And I hope The Great Soaring Fires of the Sky will give me the answers that I seek. The most important answer being about whether I really hurt Katie or not.

I'm awake, mostly. It's time to move. I feel unsettled about today, but somehow excited. But for now, I must live. I finish waking up once I remember what I had done to Katie. But more important is my foreboding feeling about today, I can't get away from it. So, I get out of my indent and go outside. I leave to hunt for game before anyone could see me, and I would have to deal with my problems. I'm searching for any signs that something had been here over the night. I find tracks that aren't too big and follow them to a clearing in the tall grass. I've lost the tracks. As I am in a good place, I decide to stare at The Great Soaring Fires of the Sky, in hopes that they will answer my pleas. Now I've lost sight of many of The Great Soaring Fires of the Sky. I turn around and see the breathtaking Katie. It would seem that the very thing I avoided followed me. She speaks first. "Hi," she says.

That's the only signal I need, "I'm sorry if I hurt you. I mean, you ran so fast, why else would you have ran so quickly. It's ok--"

She interrupts me. "Why did I leave? I'll tell you why. I want... to... keep loving you." I am shocked by what she just said. I'm overcome with joy, and she can see it on my face. She continues by saying, "I want to keep loving you just as I have since I first met you." We kiss, several times.

I have never been happier, so I ask her, "Do you want to watch the last Great Soaring Fires of the Sky disappear for the day, with me?" She says yes, and we curl up and watch the sky. But just before the last Great Soaring Fire of the Sky was about to disappear, that foreboding feeling comes back and we both notice that instead it gets larger and larger. It is falling. No Great Soaring Fire of the Sky has ever fallen. So we run out of the way. And after a great flash, we wait a moment, and return to the clearing, or at least what's left of it. There we see a large misshapen man, A Sky-Man, getting out of a larger shiny ball. The Sky-Man has peculiar round ears on the side of his head, bare skin without any fur, no muzzle, no fangs, no claws, no whiskers, and no tail. He had something white covering his body in some places, and had this look on his face that seems as though he had never seen triangular ears on the top of a head, the tall blue grass, the purple leaves on the trees, the orange tree bark, the palm-sized Skitterwisps, the green sky, or even a ball nest. But he still seems happy anyway, and so we show him around, because we too have felt that same happiness before. I don't think he can understand what I say, but at least he seems to enjoy listening. We can't understand a word he says though, but we're starting to catch on.