Chapter I - The Falling Star

The evening of Sunday, The day, the name of which by some hilarious coincidence happened to align with the current task of their proud quartet of lazy programmers, as they were walking down the street, surrounded by people on all sides.

The group, consisting of one short-haired man by the name Joseph, one blonde man in a sweater - Nick, and one black-greenish haired woman by the name Ekaterina - who was currently wobbling in Joseph's hands, desperately trying not to trip over her own legs, was walking down a sidewalk. The road was leading them to the main square of their small town.

The fourth member of the group, Jack, was short, broad as a dwarf and had a ponytail. He was checking his phone every so often, getting lost behind them from time to time.

They were enveloped by a small crowd, going in the same direction. Tonight, they were going to see shooting stars flying past the Earth. The possibility of such an event ever occurring in their town at the edge of the countryside was one in the million.

Who would want to waste that chance?

“O-oh Joe… D-don’t let me go, please…”

Joseph sighed, bringing his pale, barely conscious friend closer. Their coworker, Nick could barely hold a laugh at the humiliating scene as the four of them were walking down the street towards the city square.

Joe didn’t really expect anything new this Sunday morning. The weekend went by as it usually did - some exercise in the morning, dinner, an hour of jogging in the local park, and, of course calling his coworkers online and preparing to be disappointed. Their project has to be ready by the next Wednesday, yet his team never finished the testing phase.

In fact, most of them were utterly smashed.

“He-ey, Joe… how’s it go-o-ing?…”

Ekaterina giggled, staring past the camera with blank eyes, half-covered by the messy, greenish, recently dyed hair. The dumb smile was plastered on her heated face. Joseph quickly checked the view behind the woman. He saw a few familiar faces in the background and a large table, covered with various dishes, pizza boxes, and drinks.

We have only a couple of days left, and you’re already partying?!

An irritating feeling was poking Joe’s mind. His body tensed. A few long breaths steadied his mind, but the annoyance was still gnawing at his thoughts.

He heard a loud laugh. A blonde man in a sweater stood at the far corner of the room, talking with a person standing outside of the camera vision.

It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to call Nicholas, the blonde-haired guy in his twenties, his best friend since college days. Not like he had a lot of friends, anyway - he was way too focused on his studies back then. Even to this day, Joe was still wandering, what made an easy-going slacker like Nick approach him in the first place. Ekaterina, Nick’s ex-girlfriend jokingly suggested that he was simply using Joseph’s help to pass the classes - an idea which wasn’t so far-fetched, as Joe was one of the best students back then.

“Kate, can you call Nick now?”

The drunk woman blinked, then slowly turned around and waved. Well, tried to. Nevertheless, it seems that the message has reached the blonde man, as he quickly and carefully picked up the woman in the chair, carried her over to the couch, and put her down, before taking her place in the chair.

“What’s up, mate? What’s the emergency?”

Nick’s smile was radiating with innocence.

“You haven’t forgotten, did you?”

Nick sheepishly scratched his head. His awkward smile strained.

“You mean the deadline?… Well, we thought it would be rude to miss Jack’s birthday, so we kinda just barged in… and then it turned a bit wild... Yeah. Don’t be too hard on the newbie, man, he was against it too.”

“Was he? Well, I’ll promote him next then. Maybe he’ll take your place at the end of the month. Having a responsible adult around for once sounds like a great deal.”

Nick threw his hands up.

“Don’t hang me out to dry! Your task will be finished by the evening of Monday, sir! I’ll buy you a beer too!”

“Bribing your superior…” Joe shook his head. This lazy son-of-a-gun hadn’t changed since their college days. While Joseph was stubborn enough (or dumb enough?) to force his way through the company ranks and secure the leading position, wasting at least five years of life as a developer, working as an intern even during his college days, fighting through a bureaucratic hell on the way, Nick decided to stay a keyboard monkey - a normal software engineer.

Sometimes Joe envied him. Between grinding his work and having fun by simply letting the flow of life carry him, he wasn’t sure which one he would prefer if he had an option to choose again.

The feeling that his efforts would be wasted was hurting him on the inside.

“You may as well just kneel before the boss and ask for another week. But anyway, there is one more thing you should’ve done - but didn’t.”

“Oh no. And that it?…”

“My invitation?”

Hell, he needed some fun in this gray weekend too.

*****

He reached Jack's apartment when the party was already dying down. Didn't stop him from enjoying himself, by ordering another set of crispy chicken wings and grabbing whatever wine and food were left behind on the table. He took a stool near the table, but the computer chair nearby was looking way more inviting...

The guests were leaving one by one. The chicken wings have finally arrived. He let his thoughts get away from the work and focus on the more mundane stuff. Like the news on his phone.

“Check this out! News say that today falling stars can be seen in our city from the main square, from 10 p.m. until midnight!”

“Oh, that’s cool.” Nick stood up from the couch to grab the last piece of the chicken. “The drunk mess over there says that it’s a pretty unique experience. Never seen falling stars myself, though.”

“I want to go…” The 'mess' in question, Ekaterina, whimpered from the other side of the couch. “But I feel like dying…”

Right now there were only four of them in the apartment. Jack, the intern, was currently busy in his kitchen, while Nick was sitting on the couch together with the black-green-haired woman. Joseph took the computer chair all for himself, with an empty glass in one hand and a piece of ham in another.

Jack, upon returning from the kitchen and stumbling upon this amusing picture, snorted, bowed, and asked “His Majesty” to “relocate his heavy backside”. Joseph’s expression was so smug that Nick’s hand unconsciously raised a chicken bone, only to quickly squash that tempting thought.

After about an hour, the group - consisting of Joseph, his, jokingly called “first mate”, best friend Nick, rapidly sobering still-as-green-as-her-hair Kate and the most responsible among them all, Jack - was on its way to the observation deck near the main square. Carefully and slowly maneuvering through the busy street, they finally reached their destination.

The black-green-haired woman let go of Joe’s arm. Slightly wobbling, she straightened her back, looking at the mesmerizing night sky.

“Look! Look!”

Around them, people were laughing, pointing at the night sky. The clicking of cameras, excited voices, and loud screams were surrounding them, drowning out anything they tried to say.

It was quite a spectacular view, Joe had to admit. Shooting stars blazed through the sky in seconds, leaving behind bright trails of light. He had never seen anything like that before.

“Man, look over there! That bright star!”

Joseph barely managed to recognize what Nick was saying amidst the loud chattering around. He turned his head in the direction his friend was pointing at, and indeed, there was a large, blindingly bright star.

“It’s pretty huge. I wonder what it’s called!”

Kate quickly pulled up a search bar on her phone. Joseph kept staring at the direction of the star. Something was bugging him from inside, and he didn’t quite understand why.

It felt out of place. The other stars were never shining as bright as this one. They were much smaller, taking up much less space on the night sky, and never grew in size so damn fast…

Oh, shit!

He heard screams coming from behind him before someone shoved him to the side. Joe quickly turned his head around, but there was no sign of his friends.

The loud screams, chaotic motion of the crowd, sounds of people running for their life jumbled together. Joe barely managed to figure out the direction people were running to. He felt someone tugging his arm. Recognizing Jack’s ponytail haircut, he sprinted after him, carefully making his way through the crowd.

However, they didn’t make it very far.

The light grew in intensity. Joe couldn’t discern night from day right now.

The window reflections blinded him for a moment, causing him to swear and cover his eyes, desperately hoping not to trip on anything.

The panicked voices and yelling were drilling into his mind. He stumbled into someone’s back, causing him to fall down on the stone pavement.

Joe managed to quickly turn on his back.

He regretted it the very same moment.

The light blinded him. It was incredibly close. His eyes were screaming in pain. Joe instinctively brought his arms up, shielding himself.

It was futile, and his mind knew it.

Still, in his last moments, he found it to be a rather absurd situation. Dying by a meteor, on a completely random day of the year, three days before getting his paycheck. He grinned internally - at least it was one hell of the way out. Not many people could brag about being killed by a huge melting space rock.

Was it even a meteor? Joe didn’t hear anything, except the echoes of screaming far, far away. There was no heat around him, no air pressure - he was enveloped in the light, with no temperature, sound, or smell.

Joseph felt his consciousness slipping.

He tried to get up.

His legs felt no ground beneath.

The mind slowly drifted away. His body was aimlessly floating in the white void. His will to resist the temptation of diving into dark was slowly eroding.

He gave up.

And let the light carry him away into the unknown.

*****

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