Listen, And The Stars Shall Speak

Day Stars

A/N: I'll mostly be focusing on Joy and Kelp's dragonets, or Apple, but when a certain problem begins I will focus more on Ember and Hope and the other dragonets.

Meander hummed slightly as she lay on a Rainwing platform, staring at the sky. Her feet dangled over the edge and she swung them in tune with the song she was humming. Her talons unconsciously conducted the music in her head, the voices of the stars becoming a sweet melody. "Hey Ander-gander," Shore greeted her, climbing up on the platform. "Hello Shore." she replied dreamily. Shore gave everybody a nickname as soon as he met them, even his friend Orange, even though nothing rhymed with her name. He called her Odd-ang. Like he was saying Orange, but rolling his tongue on the r so it sounded like a d. "What are you doing?" he asked, wondering what crazy thing she'd be up to today. Ander was an odd dragonet. She insisted that the stars spoke to her, that they told her things. She spoke cryptically and vaguely, insisting that she was simply 'translating the stars words in a way that reached the very limits of a dragon's comprehension'. And today was no exception. "I'm watching the day stars." she insisted, her blue spotted eyes unfocused. "Day stars?" Shore asked. He glanced up at the sky. "Do you mean clouds?" "No silly, the day stars." she explained. "They're like night stars, but they only come out in the day. See there's one right there, and there." she pointed at empty spots in the blue sky. Shore laid down next to her on the platform and squinted at where Ander had pointed. He stared for so long that his vision unfocused and he saw spots, like you do after staring at a light for too long. Realization clicked in. "Oh yea. I never noticed those before." he admitted. Ander nodded in satisfaction. 

"I don't like day stars much." she declared. "I don't like what they say." "What do you mean?" Shore questioned. He liked learning about Ander's way of seeing the world. She made things that everyone overlooked seem extremely important. "Night stars are happy." she began. "When they watch the world, happy things happen. Dragonets hatch, everyone sleeps peacefully, some dance under the moonlight. They tell me about the happy things, like who everyone is going to fall in love with, or about past nights, like when Mommy and Daddy were our age and they would dance to no music. But the day stars don't see that. When they watch, bad things happen. They see the day, they see the fights, the wars, the bloodshed and the tears. They see all of the depth and destruction and pain of our world and they tell me about the more that's coming. They're not very uplifting stars." Shore was frozen. "Oh," he muttered. To him, it didn't seem like Ander could really understand the concept of morbid. Or traumatizing. But that was Ander. She'd burst out laughing at random moments, when no one had even said or done something funny. Shore, Rin, and their parents tried their best to understand her, but Ander's mind was beyond understanding. They didn't mind much, they liked Ander the way she was. But sometimes it got frustrating. Sometimes it seemed like a good idea to get a bit of help.

"Joy, I don't get why you feel so guilty about this. It's really not that big of a deal." Moon insisted, walking with her friend. Joy frowned. "I just feel like I'm willing invading her privacy, which I don't want to do, but Kelp and I are at a loss. The healers say there's nothing wrong with her, and I think that it might be that she can see the future, since she's part Nightwing, but she just doesn't understand the power, but we don't know." Joy sighed. "It's just....dragons are saying that she's mad and that we should lock her up somewhere which I am not doing. I just want to be able to give someone an explanation when they ask why she's so........unique." Moon nodded. "That's completely understandable Joy. And besides, it'll be over in less than a minute. She won't even know I'm reading her mind. After all, you didn't notice for an entire year." she replied. "Okay, you're right. Let's just get this over with." Joy agreed.

Later that day, Moon sat at a table, searching the raindrops of minds she could hear for Meander's, who was just outside the hut. She latched on to the dragonet's head and frowned. Across from her at the table, Kelp and Joy grew worried. "What is it?" Kelp asked. "Her thoughts, they're almost.....shielded somehow." Moon explained. "Her mind is just a wall and it's buzzing in a way. I think I can get through, but it's strange. I've never seen this kind of blocking before."  Moon concentrated and slowly worked her way through the buzzing wall in Meander's mind. She soon as she broke through it, sounds exploded in Moon's head. She yelled out and jumped in the real world as she tried to focus. There were voices. Hundreds and hundreds of strange voices were speaking. These weren't dragon's minds. This came from somewhere else. Some of them whispered, others screamed. All of them talking at once until they all blended together in a crazed frenzy of sound. It was already making her want to scream. "Skyfire!" Moon yelled. "Give me the skyfire!!" Joy quickly handed her a small stone and Moon relaxed, panting. "What happened?" Kelp questioned. "What did you see?" Joy asked. Moon stared at them in shock. "She wasn't joking." she explained.

"The stars really do speak to her."