Falling stars

Samantha waited for her parents to be fully asleep. She was going on that trip no matter what they said. She had to go. She started feeling like an alien in her own house, in her own town. She had to go away. She thought reading might comfort her, but it only made her long for adventure even more. Especially when she came upon Paulo Coelho's phrase “If you think adventure is dangerous, try routine. It’s lethal.”. That was the last straw. She checked the bus schedules, she packed her bags. While lying in her bed she was thinking why she haven't done this earlier. She was legal age after all, she could do anything that she wanted. Her parents didn't let her travel too much to not get away from her studies. But tonight was the night, she handed in her last assignment and was free for her life. She loved her parents, but she felt as if a bird in a cage. They expected her to find a job for the summer or apply for internships. Before she joined university, they agreed that after she gets her diploma, she is free to do anything. But something changed along way. They started pressuring her into getting master degree, getting a boring job that didn't correspond to her interests. And finally Samantha snapped.

"Tonight's the night" she thought to herself "Tonight I will see the world."

She left a note for her parents, took her phone, but intentionally turned it off, so they wouldn't be able to call her in the morning and started going towards the bus station. She drove up to another country (bonus living in Europe: you can travel to and from countries quite easily). The trip was all night so she slept most of it - somehow she would always fall asleep in buses.

The bus stopped with a sudden halt. Samantha woke up and nearly hit the seat in front of her.

"What the hell?!" she said, but nobody seemed to pay attention to her.

"I'm sorry, but there has been some trouble with the bus, you will all have to leave" the driver said.

"Ah, c'mon" said some guy sitting two seats from Samantha.

"I know, right?" said Samantha to him. They were the only passengers on the bus.

"Sorry, but I have to let you out" said the bus driver.

"Fine, fine, we're going, we're going" said Samantha.

"Great, we've broken down in the middle of nowhere" said the guy. "I'm Alex by the way."

"Samantha. I wouldn't say it's the middle of nowhere" she said after they were out and the bus closed the doors.

"Why do you say that? Hey, what the hell?" Alex shouted as the bus drove away.

Samantha wasn't even looking at the bus. She was inspecting something on the ground.

"What are you looking at?"

"There's a footprint here. But it's so weird, I have never seen this kind of shoes."

"Well, you know, fashion is weird." Alex took out his phone and the light coming from it made something shine in the ground.

"Hey, what is that?" Samantha asked and picked up a little key. "It's a key!"

"If there is a key, there must be a lock." said Alex absentmindedly.

"You watch Supernatural?" Samantha asked with a smile.

"Yeah, why?"

"You just quoted them"

"Oh, so what is a footprint and a key doing in the middle of nowhere?" Alex asked.

"Well, maybe we should follow all of the footprints and then we'll find out" Samantha pointed to their trail.

Alex shrugged - what else are you supposed to do in the middle of the night? Might as well follow the trail. They walked for around ten minutes when they came across a huge tree in their path. The footprints ended there and there was nothing else in sight.

"Wow" Alex said "This is just like that Willow from Harry Potter. All we need is just some wand waving wizards to jump out of it"

"Whomping willow?" Samantha chuckled "Yeah, well, it's not trying to kill us, so I think we're safe, but it does have a bump on it."

"Careful now, you might end up in that house with some werewolves"

"Your Harry Potter knowledge is a bit rusty, isn't it?"

"I tend to forget names. I remember the plot and everything, it's just hard with the names. Well, go on, press it, we don't have all night."

Samantha chuckled, then made a pretend serious face and majestically pressed the bump. They heard a crack and both of them stood in awe when the tree parted and a staircase down appeared.

"I thought it was supposed to be a highway to hell, not a staircase" Samantha said.

"Yeah, well.... let's go say hello to Lucifer" Alex said. "I wonder if he looks like Mark Pellegrino."

They went down the stairs and stood next to a door. Alex tried opening it, but it was locked.

"Try the key" Samantha suggested.

"What? Oh, yeah, right"

Alex pulled it out of his pocket and the key was a perfect fit. They opened the door and saw a little man scurrying around. On the walls there were pictures of bugs found from all over the Earth.

"Hello?" Alex greeted.

The small man turned around.

"oh, hello, hello! How did you get here? Did you bring some new specimens? My my my, I haven't seen you in my planet? From which planet did they send you here?"

"um, the Earth?" Samantha said.

"Really? But I thought we are just looking at them and examining, not contacting them. My my my, pleasure to meet you!" he went closer to them and apparently he was half their size. They shook hands and the man kept running around them.

"What are you doing here?" Samantha asked.

"We are examining your nature, my dear. Very interesting thing, your nature it is. Look at how many creatures you have!" he showed to the vast bug collection.

"But these are just bugs" Alex said.

"Yes, I know, but they are so amazing! After we finish examining them, we will move on to bigger species, we have been looking for quite a while at you and how are you living"

"Who's we?" Samantha asked.

"Oh, how rude of me! I am Alaino, from the planet of Gasha, many many maaaany lightyears away from here"

"So how did you get here?" Alex asked.

"Oh, with my teleporter of course. Would you like to try?"

"You mean we could go with your teleporter?" Samantha asked.

"Sure!" the little man answered "I have room. And my leaders would love to meet you"

"You wouldn't kill us, right?" Alex asked.

"Kill you? Why would I do that?" Alaino asked surprised.

"I don't know. Experiments?" Samantha said.

"But you are thinking creatures. We would learn more from you if you are alive"

"So you will do experiments on us while we're alive?" Alex asked.

"Silly children, come with me"

They followed the little man into another room. There he took some bracelets and gave to them. They put them on, a bit suspiciously examining them. Alaino pressed some buttons and then both of them felt as if something was trying to expand and spin them at the same time. When their feet touched the ground, both fell and waited for the land to come back to its place.

"Ok, not very compatible with human bodies. I have to write that down." the little man said to himself.

When Samantha and Alex came back to their senses, they were amazed by what they saw outside the window. They were in a spaceship and from it they could see a red planet with three moons around it.

"This is Gasha" Alaino pointed. "We are now in a spaceship next to it because the gravity there is a bit different than Earth, so it would be deadly for you to appear there. Or you would fly. Or you might get crushed to death."

"So which is it?" Alex asked.

"I work with bugs, I have no idea"

"But you live in our planet and you don't die" Samantha said.

"Yes, but I was exactly made for your planet by our scientists"

"Wait, you're a robot?" Alex asked.

"What? No! I was born on this spaceship fifteen years ago"

"You don't seem younger than us." Samantha said.

"Perhaps, but that is not important, our science leaders are coming here."

Samantha and Alex turned their heads and saw two blond tall women approaching them.

"What do you bring for us, Alaino?" one of them asked.

"These are two humans, oh great ones" Alaino bowed down.

"Why did you bring them here?"

"You said to bring anything that's not ordinary.  They wandered into my lab."

"Is that true?"

"Yes." Samantha said.

"Fine. Would you like to stay in our serice or would you like to come back to your world?"

"Stay." Samantha said.

"Leave." Alex said at the same time as Samantha. They both looked at each other.

"It's a chance in a lifetime." Samantha said to him.

"It's a different planet."

"So?"

"You will never see anyone you know ever again."

"That's not true." one of the blonds said "She will able to return for a few days every now and then."

"But what will she do here?"

"We will take a test to define what is her ultimate career. In fact, we can do that now." one of the blonds approached Samantha and took out a pen. "Give me your hand."

Samantha stretched out her palm and the blond scanned it with the pen. She waited a few minutes and the pen went ding and the blond read out: "Explorer".

"It seems you can go and do expeditions. We lack people for that, you would be great for our new team. Would you like to try as well?" she asked Alex.

"No, I want to go home."

"Alex."

"I'm sorry, but no."

"Very well, Alaino, prepare to go back with the boy."

"Yes, oh great one."

"Wait" Samantha said. She turned to Alex. "Give me your number. I will call you when I'm back on Earth."

"You're reckless, you know that?" Samantha smiled and Alex sighed "Do you have what to write with?" Sam took out a pen and a notebook and Alex wrote it down.

"You better come back soon" Alex said.

"I'm going on an adventure" Samantha smiled.

"Silly girl"

They hugged and Alex went with Alaino. They returned back to Earth, Alex wished him good luck and went back up. The sun still wasn't up. He walked back to the road and walked towards the closest bus stop where he caught the next bus to the city. He continued his life like any normal human being, but at night he would look at the stars and wonder, how Samantha was doing. He noticed, that every time there was a falling star, he would get a phone call the next day. He kep aging, but Samantha would return looking the same. Eventually, after one falling star, Samantha called him, but there was no answer. She went to see his grave and on his tombstone it was written:

Alex Wildow

The man who waited for the falling stars

Unknown visitor

„Ugh, I have to do my homework now“ Rachel thought as she slumped into her favorite chair in front of her laptop. „I‘d better just have a few quick looks into Facebook  and Tumblr before I really start working” she thought and resumed her computer. She didn’t even turn off her computer anymore. She just left it in sleep mode when she was away. And even when she was away, she didn’t really was away, as she had Facebook and Tumblr apps on her mobile  and she had mobile internet. No way she is going to miss anything that’s happening online. A few hours and about a hundred rebloggs later, Rachel decided it was about time to hit the books as she heard her mom coming home. She didn’t want her to come up and start asking whether she finished or not. But she got hungry in the mean time, so she decided to make herself some mac’n’cheese. Carrying her plate upstairs she nearly fell as she blindly stepped on a block with a letter L on it.

“Destiel, damn it” she cursed and reminded herself she should clean up some time. Probably never. This time she satisfied herself by just kicking the block into a far corner, so she wouldn’t step on it again. When she came to her room her plate nearly dropped on the ground. There was a woman standing, pillaging through her drawers. She had a weird greenish brown color, but she somehow reminded her of Lara Croft. Probably because of her clothes.

“The key, the keeeey, I have to find the key!” she yelled.

“Um, excuse me?” – Rachel said.

“who are you?” she turned to her.

“My name is Rachel, who are you?” – she decided to put down her mac’n’cheese.

“I am princess Alessandra of Athius. And I need to find the key”

“The key? Listen, girl, if you are cosplaying for some kind of convention, you’re a bit too late for that. But I like the mask though.”

“Cosplaying for a convention? What does that mean?” Alessandra looked puzzled.

“Riiiight, as if I’m going to fall for this one”

“Fall…for this one? Why would you fall? Are you instable?”

“Um. What? No, I’m not instable. It’s an expression. Are you foreign or something?”

“Yes, I have come to this planet to search for the key of Alea. I’m sorry, it was accidentally sent here, we were trying to send it to our twin planet, but it got lost on the way. The coordinates might have been mixed up. But it says, that it landed here.”

“Aha, yeah, as if I’m going to believe that. Do you have some kind of ID?”

“ID? What might that be? Is my translator not working again?” – she scratched a bug on her arm and it wiggled its feet.

“Woah, what the hell is that?” Rachel jumped away.

“That’s my translator.”

“Ok. Weird. Ok, I’m still not sure if I believe you, but I’ll help you look. Hey, do you have a spaceship?”

“Spaceship?”

“How did you get here?”

“I used some portals. It’s so odd, your planet has just a few of them. I had to follow the way the key went. There were two possible routes, and the one I tried before was some kind of tower. But it was oddly built – leaning to one side” – Alessandra flipped through some papers.

“You were at the Pisa tower?” Rachel stood in awe.

“I guess if that’s what you call it”

“Wow, cool.” Rachel accidentally kicked her backpack and her books flowed out. One of the books opened and a shiny odd material key fell out. “Hey, is that it?” she asked after she picked it up.

“Yes!” Alessandra exclaimed while looking at it. “Thank you so much!”

“Don’t mention it. It’s still better than doing homework”

“Your help will not go unnoticed.” Alessandra turned and searched through her bag and took out a necklace. It was bright yellow with many symbols which looked like ancient runes.

“Wow, no, I couldn’t take it.”

“No no, you have to.”

Rachel took the necklace. “Uh, thanks?” By the time she looked back up, Alessandra was already gone.

“I have to sleep more” Rachel said to herself while shaking her head. She wondered how many people would believe her. She decided that probably none.

“Ugh, I should have taken a picture!” she said to herself.

“Honey, who are you talking to?” Rachel heard her mom’s voice.

“To an intergalactic alien called Alessandra! She gave me a beautiful necklace!” she shouted back.

“Very funny, now get on with your homework!”

Rachel smiled. Yeah, no one’s going to believe her. But she could push out a short story out of this. She sat to her laptop and opened a blank Word document.