A Beast with a Smile

The crash that sent me soaring through the air and nearly ended my life had a much more anti-climactic ending than I once perceived. Unfortunately, my joy ride was ended prematurely by an unknown savior. A figure with a full yellow metal suit and helmet caught me before I plummeted to my permanent resting place. Her helmet covered her entire face, so I had no idea what she looked like, but her voice was kind and sweet.

“You should be careful where you’re flying. You’re not a bird, you know”, she laughed, holding me while she stood in the electrified water.

It wasn’t her armor that kept the electric bite away. It was her. Somehow, she is managing to push all of the electricity away from us.

As she walked back towards Tiny, the 80-foot Rabbit, the electricity gravitated away from her with every step, but quickly returned to its normal destruction after she was a few steps away. She put me down on the edge of the water, then she turned around.

“This is a safety hazard,” she pouted while stretching out her hands.

All of the decorative lights and street lamps began to flicker as the electricity began to flow towards the yellow girl. It floated out of the water like a beam of light, growing towards the girl, and when it touched the end of her finger tips, instead of a blast of electricity that would leave a normal person’s hair raised, the electric light absorbed into her. It slithered around her body, making sparks and mini lightning bolts along her armor.

The entire city square was pitch black except for the candle-like glow of my savior’s armor. Tiny, amused by the bright lights and sparks, licked the girl, causing his fur to puff up.

“Tiny,” the girl laughed.

The bunny found little disturbance with the shock he was just administered, acting like a few thousand volts of electricity was like when I rub my feet on the carpet and shock Jet.

Tiny jumped up and down, running around his electric friend. She laughed and laughed until I couldn’t help but laugh. I had no idea what was going on, but it was hard not to laugh at a giant fur ball running around with its tongue out. I laughed so hard I couldn’t stand anymore.

When I sat down the girl collapsed next to me. We rested our backs on one of the crumbled statues from the fountain.

“What are you doing out here? I thought everyone at the facility knows not to leave their designated residences after 7:30,” she questioned me.

“The facility?”

“Yeah. You know... here.”

I gave her a confused look, “Do you mean the town square?”

“No, I mean the town.”

“I’m lost. How can the town be a facility? I don’t even know what you mean by facility.”

I was completely puzzled by what she was saying, but in the back of my head it made some kind of sense.

“Well you see…”

She was cut off by a siren blaring through the tornado alarms.

“Oh no,” she gasped, “You need to go. Now. You’re clearly not a part of the facility and not affected by BW so you need to go wherever you came from and never come back. Please, it’s for your own safety.”

I was astounded. I was also at a loss of words and movement.

I must’ve had the dumbest look on my face as I said, “I’m from around here.”

Her response was, “You’re her, aren’t you?”

“No, I said here.”

She laughed a little bit and stood up, “Go home, please, and don’t tell anyone what you saw. Bad things will happen if you do. It was a pleasure meeting you Scarlett. Sorry Tiny almost got you killed.”

“Wait how did you know my name? I have so many questions. How are you able to control electricity, how do you have an 80-foot bunny rabbit, and why do you have an 80-foot bunny rabbit?”

She put her hand on her puff ball and laughed a little bit, “He said you were smart, so I imagine you’ll find the answers to your questions.”

She reached out her hand and a surge of lightning hit her and the bunny, creating a blinding light. When the light and sun spots faded from my vision the two were gone.

“How did you do that?” I asked the dark void of town square.

The whole area had turned into rubble; the buildings were nothing but brick and stone. The decorations that survived the initial bunny hops failed to survive the stampede when Tiny got excited.

I stood up and began to walk home. Again, I traveled on the same road back home, however this walk felt longer. The excitement from my almost early grave had taken a lot out of me. Surprisingly, attempting to learn to fly like an eagle is a lot harder without wings, or a lack of athletic ability, or being a human, or not having freaking super powers.

Now my biggest question isn’t how many licks it takes to get to the center of a tootsie pop. It’s how a mysterious little girl got super powers, how she knew my name, and who the “he” was in her final statements. Shoot, even if I knew why that siren scared her so much I’d be a little more satisfied.

I walked onto my street and noticed that none of the residential houses had been touched by Tiny’s mini quakes. I opened my dad’s front door to a cat with a bowl in his mouth, “I’m sorry, Barnacle, but Mommy forgot to get you food.”

Barnacle dropped his bowl then ran over to me. He followed me to my bedroom. As I lay down, he jumped onto my chest and began to purr.

“Maybe today was just a dream and I’m going to wake up any minute… any minute now.”

Eventually my eyes grew heavy and my body relaxed. My last thoughts were hoping that I wouldn’t have any nightmares about oversized rabbits.