Lu Han

Everything started ringing at once.

Beeepbeep! Beeepbeep!

Riiing…Riiing…

“Argh!” Lu Han leapt out of bed, golden-blonde hair in a perfect just-out-of-bed mess, casual clothes rumpled. He bounded-literally-over to his study desk, answered the impatient phone and held it to his ear with a shoulder. “Yes, boss?” he mumbled, smacking the annoying alarm clock facedown, effectively killing its sound, and ran for his closet.

“Lu Han? Hope you’re still not asleep? I got the news; it should be arriving very soon, like about…”there was a pause on the other end of the line as Lu Han shrugged on his trench coat, “now.”

What? “I’ll be ready.” Cursing, he threw the phone onto his bed and checked his reflection in the mirror, hoping he was still presentable to the public.

Then, just as all was going still and smooth, everything began again. His house shook and trembled along with its fellow furniture inside in the gust of cold, cold wind that blew in. Papers, and everything that was light enough to be lifted, were whipped into the air, swirling dramatically.

The wind died, all of a sudden, and the house was still and quiet again, like nothing had happened, the only evidence the pile of reports he had taken nearly the whole night to type out scattered all around the house. Lu Han grumbled as he squatted and collected the papers from the wooden floor hastily, throwing a paperweight casually on top. The sizzling sound reached his ears before he turned and saw it.

That massive, giant ball of glowing flame and rock.

Awed, it took him a second before he remembered his job. Camera! Lu Han managed to snap a precious picture of that meteor streaking down across the sky before it disappeared, followed not long after by that expected thunderous boom, even from so far away a distance. His house shivered again for a few moments as the tremors of the huge impact ran through it. By the time it ceased, Lu Han was already turning the key in his lock.

~

The road was damaged with a crater several meters deep into the ground- shallow for such an impact-with sharp pieces of the broken black tar road protruding like dangerous glass shards. Local police barricaded the affected area-which was not surprisingly wide, still-from curious onlookers for safety’s sake as detectives and professors of all kinds surveyed the indention. Lu Han could feel the heat radiated from that meteor all the way at the back of the crowd. He bustled through the sea of people, murmuring apologies as they frowned at him. He gulped in a breath of hot air and swiped at his brow with the back of his hand when he emerged at the foot of the scene, perspiring like he just ran a marathon.

“Sir.” One of the police let him through easily at the glimpse of the renowned reporter pass Lu Han flashed proudly. Nodding his thanks, Lu Han prowled around the parameters of the damaged area, snapping cheerfully away at the remains of the road, at the dulling mass of black rock. He stopped to share his photos with Professor Lay, someone he was very well acquainted-or rather, best friends- with from earlier investigation scenes and from school.

Both popularly famous, young and suave, they acknowledged one another’s presence with beams.

“What have you discovered, Lay?” Lu Han asked.

Lay tapped his index against his lips in a slow rhythm. His never-stopping mind continued running on wheels. “Hmm, not much... We still have no idea why it hit Earth, but,” his voice dropped to a whisper so that Lu Han had to lean in to be able to hear him above the crowd’s din, “we found extraordinary things.” Lu Han perked his ears.

“What?”

“Feathers! Snow white feathers!” Lay exclaimed dramatically.

Lu Han’s brows shot up incredulously. “Feathers? Of a bird?”

Lay shook his head. “We’re not sure about that, but I can almost swear it doesn’t belong to any bird, not that we know of, anyway. Maybe, it’s some new species come to Earth?”

“But, from space? We’ve never spotted any living thing in space yet, have we?” Lu Han’s dark eyebrows dipped to meet, scrolling through his collection of pictures just taken.

“No…No…” The professor echoed, once again, lost in his train of unfathomable thoughts. Lu Han sighed helplessly and stole another few pictures with the handful of spanning white feathers littered surreptitiously around the dent on Earth’s ground. Questions ran through Lu Han’s own mind. Why did the meteor strike? What had been inside that now empty shell of rock? How did the feathers come in? Did it belong to the creature, perhaps, inside the rock? These questions, he would have to leave it to the experts to find out.

Running a hand through his slight curls of golden-brown, he left his thanks with a still zoned out Lay and left quietly home to write his report.

 

It was nearly two in the morning and darkness plunged the country. The streets were empty and silent as graves as Lu Han dragged his tired body home, the few streetlamps the only knights against the dark. Off the pavement and curving into a dark alley where he usually avoided, something blinked dimly, igniting his spark of curiosity.

It took his human eyes long seconds to adjust as he squinted into the blackness which seemed to conceal everything, making it hard for him to see. The light he once saw lit up again briefly, long enough for him to spot the edge of something white before it disappeared from sight behind the pile of abandoned crates and dustbins. Steeling himself for the worst, Lu Han let his curiosity lead him further into the alley. The nearer he got, the clearer and louder the sounds of heavy breathing became.

“He…llo?”

The breathing quieted, implying that perhaps, it was something afraid of him, too. Lu Han continued, egged on by the thought.

“Wha-? Miss?”

Lu Han swung his camera bag behind him and knelt. Someone, a girl, dressed in a white dress lay limply against the grimy wall, face covered by a curtain of dark hair, blood gushing like a broken tap from her open wounds on her shoulder and legs, pooling at her sides, soaking her dress.

“Miss! Are you conscious?” Lu Han touched her on her bared arm lightly, flinching at how cold it was. The young lady muttered something incoherent, and her head lolled on her shoulder, slacked.

Panicking, Lu Han slowly, gently, lifted her in his arms and heaved a sigh of relief. She was light, almost like a feather; he should be able to make it all the way home carrying her weight. He had to hurry; she was losing too much blood, and the nearest hospital was kilometers away. Ambulance wasn’t an option now. Lu Han ran nearly all the way home, which wasn’t too far, thank God.

He panted softly, his breath slight mists in the cool autumn air, as he fumbled with the key and lock, finally managing to push the heavy door open. He laid the girl in his arms on his bed and ran for the kitchen, pulling out drawers and making quite a racket there before he returned with the first aid kit, water and cloth.

At five past four, done with tending to the girl, now wrapped nearly all in clean gauzes, he made his way to the sofa in the open living room and fell asleep before his head even hit the soft cushions, soiled, blood-drenched shirt and all.