The Girl Who Fell Out of the Sky

by Victoria Forester

  Then silence.

  Piper opened her eyes. She was hovering, suspended high above the earth. She could see oceans and continents and the clouds above them. It would have been incredibly peaceful, bobbing about, if her body hadn’t been jammed into a space the size of a large beach ball. Even drawing air into her lungs was an effort, and her eyeballs were the only part of her body she could freely move.

  Panic like hot lava was released into her veins. She struggled, pushing and pulling, on the brink of losing control.

  “Ahhhhh.”

  “Stop that,” said a voice. “Don’t struggle.”

  The sound of the voice distracted Piper from her welling panic, and she moved her eyeballs, scanning the space around her. Her body was rotating slowly, and as she turned, she caught a quick glimpse of a bug flying near her. Then the moment she blinked, it was no longer a bug but instead a creature cramped up in its own enclosed small space just like hers. It was floating about thirty feet away, and then thirty feet on the other side of it was another creature, and so on and so on for as far as the eye could see.

  “Did you say something to me?” Piper called out.

  “If you fight against it, it’ll only get tighter,” the creature said. “You have to stay still.”

  “But I can’t breathe,” Piper panted. “It’s so tight I can’t even breathe.”

  “Take small sips of air. You must remain as small as you can.”

  Piper did as it instructed. With her rising sense of panic momentarily at bay, she was able to assess the creature in front of her. It was hard to actually describe it, since, like her, it was so scrunched up it wasn’t possible to accurately identify what was what. It looked like it had a tail that was coiled around its body, and it was using two clawlike hands to pull the tail like a rope to hold itself in tightly. It had ears that were folded down and a long snout that was pushed onto its chest. Its eyes were twice as large as Piper’s and had red pupils.

  “What’s your name?” Piper managed when she had collected up enough shallow breaths to form the words.

  “Ninsa.”

  “Why can’t I move?” Once again, Piper felt a rising panic inside her, the feeling that she might lose control entirely at any moment.

  “I do not know. It has always been so.”

  “How do we get out of here?”

  “Why would you want to get out?”

  A cramp was budding in Piper’s ankles and in her neck. She had rotated away, losing sight of Ninsa, and this filled her with fear.

  “Ninsa? Ninsa? Can you hear me?”

  “I can hear you.”

  The sound of his voice reassured Piper, and her breath came again. “How do we get out?”

  “Remain still and be patient.”

  “For what?”

  Ninsa didn’t have an answer to this.

  In the distance, a cry rang out, and Ninsa quickly closed his eyes. Piper looked past him to the source of the cry, where another scrunched-up creature like Ninsa suddenly exploded into red flames. Piper had to close her eyes to shield them from the power of the blast. When it was safe to open them again, nothing remained in the space that had once held the creature.

  “Ninsa! Ninsa?”

  “I am here.”

  “What just happened?”

  “He grew. There was no more room for him. You must stay small.”

  Piper shivered. “But I’m growing. I can’t help it. My body wants to grow.”

  Using her fingers, Piper rubbed against whatever it was that was holding her in. It was smooth and seamless and hard—an invisible prison. Next, she took her finger and poked it. Her fingernail created a hard tapping noise. She focused on that, using the nail like a small hammer. “There has to be something that will break this shell.”

  Ninsa could not think of anything and leaned into himself, squeezing tighter.

  The force of another explosion that was felt but not seen caused them both to pause. “Ninsa,” Piper said, “I live on a farm, and we have chickens, and when the chickens lay eggs, sometimes the baby chicks aren’t able to peck their way out. How can I help you get out? How do you normally break out?”

  “I do not know.”

  “Do you have claws? Or super strength? What exactly are you?”

  Ninsa thought about it and said, “I am Ninsa. What are you?”

  “I’m Piper McCloud.”

  “And what is Piper McCloud?”

  Piper sighed. “I’m … well, I’m just a girl. Nothing special.”

  “I am the same.”

  “But no, you can’t be. You were created with something special that you do so that you can break out of this shell.”

  Ninsa floated quietly, clutching himself. “Can you get out?”

  The tapping of her fingernail had produced no results, and Piper was once again fighting an upswelling wave of claustrophobia. “I used to be able to fly,” Piper panted. “That was my special thing. But I got bitten, and now I can’t remember.”

  “All I remember is this.” Coiling his tail even tighter, Ninsa felt the strain of staying small.

  A wave of pain overtook Piper, and she could contain her panic no longer. “We must remember. We must fight!” With all her might she pushed against the shell, screaming as she did so.

  “AHHHHHHH!”

  CHAPTER

  38

  “She’s coming back to us.”

  Piper’s eyes snapped opened to find Jasper leaning over her, his hands still glowing. She could feel herself panting and flailing about. Daisy rushed forward and held her down.

  “Conrad,” someone called.

  Piper’s panic was still cresting when Conrad came into view, looking down at her with concern.

  “Con, Con.” Piper’s voice wasn’t more than a rasp. “I saw them. I saw what they looked like, and it was just like you said: they are communicating with me.”

  “What are you talking about, Piper?”

  “The bugs. I was with them. Somehow. I mean, I wasn’t there physically, but it felt like I was there. And I was talking to one of them.” Piper struggled to sit up.

  Conrad nodded to Daisy, who released her hold and then leaned down to help Piper sit.

  Now that she was partially upright, Piper could see that she had been carried back to Lowland County, and they were all in the old barn. It was dark but for the blue lights over the workstations and the glow from screens. All the workstations were buzzing, and the kids were working hard, rushing from station to station. Jimmy Joe and Rory Ray were in the mix with the Chosen Ones, and Piper could see a cluster of kids huddled around the team-meeting table scrutinizing a turning 3-D globe.

  “We were afraid you weren’t going to regain consciousness,” Conrad said, leaning over the table where Piper was lying down so that he could check her pupils and her vital signs.

  “It’s like they’re stuck inside shells, and they can’t get out. And they aren’t even trying, because they don’t think it’s possible.” Piper felt like she must do something urgently. “We have to help them get out!”

  “That’s what we’re trying to do, Piper.” Conrad helped her down off the table. “We’ve made progress. C’mon—now that you’re awake, we can have a team meeting.”

  As soon as Piper sat down in her chair, Lily was at her side and quickly filled her in on what had happened while she had been unconscious. They had rushed back to Lowland County, and as soon as they got there, they’d figured out a way to release their collars. Getting her powers back was the happiest moment of Lily’s life.

  “I can imagine.” Piper wished it might have been so easy for her to get her flying back.

  “We’ve been hard at work since we got back, and no one got any sleep last night,” Lily yawned. “Bugs are going nuclear all around the planet, and when they go off in clusters, they take down the power grids in whole cities. Conrad says that we’re at the tipping point.”

  By now everyone was gathered around the table, chairs pulled up and wedg
ed into any available space to accommodate them all. Conrad took his place at the head of the table and was on his feet.

  “We’ve been working with the Chosen Ones to trace the virus that Max used on the bugs,” Conrad began. “Using the samples that we collected from the bugs, we were able to use our technology along with the Chosen Ones’ knowledge of the past to piece together what happened. Irma?”

  Conrad turned to Irma, and she got to her feet. She was a quiet girl but not meek. She took a handful of dirt out of a pouch she had hung around her neck, then spit into it and used her hands to shape it. When it was ready, she placed it on the table and blew on it. The mound of dirt looked like a lopsided spider, and as Irma’s breath came into it, the legs began to move, and it came to life.

  “On Mother Mountain we do not have the name ‘virus,’” she explained, guiding her dirt spider so that it didn’t crawl away. “When there is a sickness, we create cures, tiny cures from the things that make up this earth. Generations ago many creatures in Xanthia were sick, and so a cure was created to help them. It looked like this.” She held up the wiggling dirt spider. “But it was very tiny. Tiny enough that it could crawl into the smallest parts of a living thing.”

  “That’s what I have inside of me?” Piper was horrified at the thought.

  “No,” Conrad said. “This virus helps your immune system. Someone took this virus and altered it. As you know, Max is wily, but he’s not that smart. Certainly not smart enough to engineer a virus like this one or know how to alter it.”

  “This boy, Max,” Irma agreed, “tricked us into making the virus different.”

  “Then Max took the altered virus and infected one of the bugs with it,” Conrad continued. “The bugs were the perfect target; they have a hive mentality and work as a collective, constantly communicating with each other, giving information, and telling each other what to do. All Max needed to do was infect one of the bugs for all of them to be affected. This virus is very sophisticated. Think of it like a thought. The thought of this virus is ‘don’t.’”

  “Don’t?” Piper repeated.

  “That’s right. Don’t. As in ‘don’t molt.’ Or ‘don’t fly.’ Or ‘don’t do whatever it is that you most need to do.’” Conrad reached out, activating the computer over the table. Instantly a strand of DNA spun in front of them. A little purple wiggly creature that was spiderlike in appearance materialized next to it. “That is the virus.” Conrad pointed to the purple spider. “Now watch what it does.”

  The spider crawled over to the DNA, settling itself on a strand and wrapping its legs around it.

  “Every strand of DNA is a piece of information. The virus targeted this piece and strangled it. You no longer have that information.”

  “So that’s why I can’t fly?”

  “Yes,” Conrad said. “Exactly. But the truth is you can fly; it’s still there, but you just can’t access it, because it’s covered up. The same is true for the bugs.”

  “Ohhh.” The strand of DNA twirled in front of Piper, casting brightly colored lights over her face. “So how are you going to save the bugs?”

  “I can’t,” Conrad said flatly. “The only person who can save them is you.”

  “Me?” Piper looked around the table, all eyes on her.

  “Because the bugs work as a hive, they communicate with each other, and now, because you were bitten, they are communicating with you, too. That is why you began to glow red when you were close to the bugs; they were sending you information. This communication is a two-way street, though, and if you were to tell them how to break free, they would.”

  “But…” Piper had barely followed Conrad’s complex explanation. “How exactly would I do that?”

  “By showing them how to defeat the virus.”

  “How would I defeat the virus?”

  “Fly.”

  “Fly?”

  “Yes, fly.” Conrad sat down and folded his hands together in front of him. “By accessing the chromosome affected by the virus and turning the ‘don’t’ into a ‘do,’ you will effectively kill it. As soon as you do that, you can transmit that information to the bugs, and they’ll be able to do the same. They will learn from you. If they molt their shell, they won’t blast, and the planet will be saved.”

  “But…” Piper’s hands went to her head, and she held it for a moment. “But I’m normal now. You said so.”

  “That’s not entirely accurate,” Conrad said. “My initial information led me to believe that the superhero chromosome had been killed, but in actuality it’s just dormant, or sleeping. All we have to do is wake it up. I have created a special serum that will temporarily shake the virus off, but it will be up to you to activate it once it’s been released. If you can fly again, the bugs will be saved too.”

  While Conrad’s explanation sounded simple, the practical application of it seemed impossible to Piper. “But what does that mean? How do I activate a dormant chromosome?”

  “You turn the ‘don’t’ into a ‘do.’” Conrad came round the table to Piper. “A normal person wouldn’t find a way to save her friends and unite two peoples. That is not normal. You are extraordinary, and your flying is a sign of that. You are the same person you always were. Just let yourself be the flier you are.”

  Piper thought back to all the things they had tried to make her fly. “I don’t know…”

  “You can. And as soon as you fly, you will save the world.” Conrad looked down at the watch on his wrist. “You’ve got less than an hour.”

  CHAPTER

  39

  The grass behind the barn was coated in cold dew that reflected the beams of the rising sun, making it appear like sparkling diamonds had been tossed over the field. A group of more than twenty kids stood off to the side, their eyes fixed on Piper as she walked a distance away from them and into the center of the field. It was quiet. No one spoke. Piper could hear the rooster waking and crowing, the sounds of the cows lowing and the sheep bleating.

  Her upper right arm stung from the injection that Conrad had just administered to her. He told her it would work quickly to cast off the virus that had attached itself to her cells, but it would be temporary, and it was up to her to get up in the sky fast. The act of flying itself would permanently kill the virus. She knew the bugs were above her in the sky where she could not see them, perilously close to exploding at any moment. The longer she waited, the more of them would die.

  I can fly. I can fly.

  Where was her flying inside her? Where had she put it?

  Stark Raven had said, “Flying is something you do, not what you are.” What did she mean by that? When Piper had been talking to Ninsa, he’d said that he couldn’t remember what he was. What was she? Why did she fly?

  Up. Up. Go up.

  Nothing.

  The eyes of the kids watching her from the edge of the field, their expectations and worry, burned into her. She could feel Conrad silently urging her on.

  Fly. I can fly!

  The soil on her shoes held her down.

  The wind picked at her hair, blowing it in her face, and as she reached up to brush it away, her hand caught on the gold lily pin. She plucked it free, pulled it down, and turned it over in her hand so that the rays of the rising sun glinted off the gold. It was beautiful and shiny, but as she looked at it and felt the weight of it in her hand, Piper realized she actually didn’t like it. She also didn’t like the way it felt on her head: hard and heavy.

  Dropping it on the ground, she pulled her hair back and twisted it into a rough braid, using one of the elastics around her wrist to tie it at the end.

  Maybe she wasn’t going to look the way she thought grown-ups ought to look. Things were not going to be so defined and clean for her. As much as she didn’t like the messiness of her appearance and life, she was going to have to accept it and create her own version of what that looked and felt like.

  With those thoughts sorted out inside her head, Piper closed her eyes one more time. Sh
e took a deep breath, filling herself with it, and slowly the glimmerings of a tingle ignited in her belly. It felt wild and free and uncontained. She leaned in and stoked it with breath after breath until the tingling became a forest fire of electricity and she was thrumming with it.

  Yes, this is it. I remember now. This is how it felt. Like a release. Like the most natural thing in the world.

  Piper didn’t so much reach for the sky as embrace it, and instantly she rose up.

  She ascended slowly.

  At the side of the field, Conrad’s hand became a fist, and he silently pumped it into the air. Jimmy Joe watched Piper fly with gladness and gratitude in his heart; he would never look at her flying again as anything less than the miracle that it was. The “oorah” that came out of Rory Ray’s lips was more a prayer than a call to battle.

  Twenty feet up, Piper’s journey slowed and then stopped as her stomach began to burn hotly with the most piercing red light. Bursting out of her, it ignited like a star turning into a supernova. BOOM! She rocketed up, like lightning striking upward.

  * * *

  Ninsa was holding tight, making himself as small as he possibly could, and the effort of that had become so tiring that he felt weak from it. His strength was failing him. Each moment felt like his last. He wouldn’t be able to hold himself in for much longer.

  BOOM!

  He looked up as Piper’s explosive red wave washed over him, passing through his every cell. As it did so, his mind began to feel a poke, and then suddenly there was a pop inside of it, and all at once he knew what he was.

  He remembered that he was meant to hatch, not remain coiled up in a tiny ball. He was not a small thing: he was destined to be a big thing. And he wanted to be what he was.

  Releasing himself, he felt the terrible pressure of the small space he was cramped inside, and he let out a cry, but it turned into fire. His fire hit the egg and easily broke through it, shattering it apart.

  Ninsa uncoiled his scaly body, released his tail, and flung apart his wings. Opening his mouth, he roared!