• Kira shoved her way through the crowd, working her way up to the list of names. The sky half-heartedly spat rain down on everybody, and a few wisps of her dark, chocolate-colored hair plastered themselves to her face. She wrapped her arms around her body and shivered, peering down the streets. The city was a monotonous gray, houses and shops huddled close together as if for comfort. The street she stood on was cobbled stone, and pools of water splashed over her boots, staining the leather.

    Securing a spot in front of list for herself, Kira scanned the record of survivors. She stared at each name for a few seconds to long, a light frown wrinkling her forehead, as if she could change it to the one she wanted by the force of her mind.

    The man working the post smiled his recognition, eyes filled with pity. She had been here many times before, and always left with the same results.

    People scattered in awe as a heavy tread sounded behind her. A familiar touch landed on her shoulder. Go away, Tak, she whispered to herself. I don’t want you here, go away, go away, go-

    “Kira, he’s not here.” Tak cut to the point, voice laced with sympathy. She obstinately ignored him as she flipped the page.

    “He might be,” she muttered without turning.

    “He’s not. He never has, and he never will be. You’re just wasting your time, you know that.” An old exasperation crept into his tone. Kira kept her mouth shut, running her finger down the columns.

    “You come here every day. Peter and I are starting to worry.” He sighed and ran a hand through his short, coarse hair. “Look, Kira, we miss him as much as you do, but this needs to stop.”

    Nothing.

    “Dammit Kira, look at me!” He roughly spun her shoulder around until she was facing him, her small figure dwarfed by his height. “Val’s dead, okay? He’s dead. He died right in front of me- in front of you too! He’s gone, and no amount of staring at that little list of yours is going to fix it, make it better. You need to accept that.”

    Anger flared in her blood, and her faced burned. She quickly spun and jabbed a finger into this chest “I don’t need to accept anything!” she spat. “We didn’t see him die, we saw him fall. He wasn’t dead!” Kira was shouting by the end of her speech, drawing the stares of all the people gathered in the square. She glared hotly at Tak for a few more moments, then turned on her heel and went back to studying the list. The names doubled, then tripled in front of her as she fiercely ignored the tears that welled in her dark eyes in a vain attempt to pretend they weren’t there.

    The sights and sounds of the crowd around her melted away as memory of the day washed over her. Cold wet morning was replaced by a hazy, gray afternoon near The Canyons, the wide band of misty cliffs that ran around the whole planet. The shielded areas were popular spots for tourists, political rallies, and weary traders with time to spare such as themselves.

    There had been four of them- herself, the pilot of their ship. Tak, the second in command, hid his caring nature with stoic silence. When he stood up straight the tips of his hair brushed seven feet. Peter, their engineer, was young, hopeful, and mysteriously missing his left thumb. He had stayed in the ship, tinkering on some problem that only he could see.

    And then there was Val. Val, the captain of them all, bright and strong, representing everything good and right in the universe. He had an easy laugh that fit his devil-may-care attitude perfectly. Fiercely loyal, he would stand up for anyone, a good quality even if he did like violence a bit too much.

    It had been a bright afternoon, the sun cheerily beaming down on the world, making it a small paradise. It was a rare day, spent on the planet’s surface instead of floating in the abyss of space. Kira and Val had been by the edge of The Canyons, him walked protectively in between her and the precipice. They kicked rocks into the clinging mist and laughed over nothing. Before the world was colonized walking this close to the edge would have been impossible, because of strange beasts that lived in the mist. But the shields had been up for centuries, and no one had given any thought to it. There were no barriers. There was an “anyone stupid enough to fall in, should” mentality.

    A thin, high scream had signaled the beginning of the end. Kira and Val had whipped around just in time to see a young girl being dragged into the air by something out of hell. Dark leathery wings, stretched over thin bones, stood out starkly against the gray-white haze moving in. Long teeth snapped, dripping a black fluid that fizzled and burned wherever it touched. Great bat ears erupted out of a furry, distorted head. The girl struggled and twisted in its vicious claws, begging for somebody, anybody, to save her.

    No one did, though. No one could. Monsters no one had ever imagined could exist were crawling, leaping, and flying out of The Canyon as the shield sputtered and died around them. An oversized monkey with too many joints on each finger, and a tail twice as long as it’s body, was chittering and laughing in a loud, grating voice. People were running everywhere, blind panic on their faces. A lengthy lash of smoke snaked out and wrapped around someone’s ankle, dragging him into The Canyon. Someone had pulled out a gun, and was shooting wildly in every direction. She felt her hair ruffle as a bullet whizzed past her ear. A shout of pain sounded behind her, and she turned, dreading what she already knew.

    Red blossomed on Val’s side as he tumbled backwards, eyes wide with pain and surprise. His ash blond hair waved in the deadly wind, his arms outstretched as if to grab onto something that didn’t exist. Booted feet searched for a ground that suddenly, terribly, wasn’t there.

    Kira remembered running. Val seemed to disappear before she could even get moving, but still she ran toward the edge. Tak, who she had hated more then death itself at that moment, had caught her round the middle and dragged her, screaming, back to the ship. Had locked her in her room to keep her from climbing down into The Canyon herself. Afterward, there were bruises on her palms for days where she pounded on the door. She remembered not being able to breath, her lungs tightening until she gasped for air and still nothing came. Remembered seeing Peter crouched small and scared in Val’s old seat, clutching the red fabric hard enough to tear.

    But mostly, she remembered his eyes. A deep, peerless blue, brighter then the most perfect summer sky. Emotions reflected in them like mirrors. Fear, pain, shock, confusion. Pleading with her to save him, and yet, at the same time, forgiving her for not.


    In the months that passed panic gripped the land. The shields had suddenly and inexplicably failed all around the planet. Those that could escape the planet did, taking all available fuel with them, leaving everyone else to their fate. Cities grew inward instead of out as beasts of all kinds retook the world. After being safe for so long, no one remembered how to fight. Cut off from the other worlds, they retreated into sanctuaries of their own making. Walls were raised, guards and sentries posted along them. Mothers held their children a little longer; fathers locked their houses a little tighter.

    Anyone who had been trapped outside a city slowly and agonizingly made their way back to civilization. Their names were posted around the cities for friends and relatives to claim them, give them a place to live.

    These were the lists that Kira checked so obsessively. Every day, weather fair or foul, she jostled her way through throngs of people to search for Val’s name; every day she went home brokenhearted. The lists were getting shorter, the chances of seeing his name less and less. There were a few like her, a few strangely broken people returning again and again, looking for someone no one really thought existed.

    But she remembered his eyes. Filled with courage and fear, the simple memory pierced her heart. Those were not dead eyes, were not the eyes of someone who was even close to dying. So as long as there was breath in her lungs and blood in her veins, as long as the sight of his clear blue eyes burned in her mind, she would keep checking the lists, day after day, as the sun beat down and the world lost hope.