Earth-1912

“We’re not finding much, are we?” I said, as our ship left Gaia behind.

“Nope,” Tank mumbled, “No news on Duncan or Dawn.”

The two of us and that cricket sighed in our seats. In front of them, Glaze grumbled from the pilot’s chair.

“We’ve only been to two worlds so far!” Glaze said.

“That’s true,” I asserted. “Whatever happens, we’ll be able to handle it.”

“Hey, Glaze, there’s a world we haven’t tried yet, think Duncan and Dawn might be down there?” Tank asked.

I followed her pointing hand to see another world.

“No way!” Donald scoffed, reaching down to flip some switches, “We've wasted enough time. We should just return Felix to Queen Ortensia.”

Before she could angle the steering away, I spoke up.

“Hold on!" I broke in, "My friends could be down there. Let’s just check it out.”

“Forget it!" Glaze growled, losing her patience, "We’re on an important mission!”

“And I'm just trying to find my friends! Just land!” I yelled, also losing my patience.

“No!”

“Come on!”

“Aw, guys, cut it out!” Tank implored, but neither me nor Glaze were willing to be swayed.

“Let’s just—see what’s down there—for five minutes--!” I began wrestling the controls away from Glaze, who clenched onto them tightly.

“No! Don’t touch that!” Glaze yelled, as the ship began to careen towards world at a speedy pace.

“My friends could be down there!” I argued. "We're landing!"

The world got even closer yet, and the sky outside the windshield was beginning to turn blue. The ship passed through a cloud, leaving raindrops on the windows. I was still wrestling for the controls from Glaze, and he could hear Tank and the cricket going haywire in the background as I scanned the dashboard for any controls I could find useful. A big red button caught my eye, and I decided to smack it.

“Don't touch that! Nooo! That’s the eject button!” Glaze cried.

Glaze was vaulted through the now-open cockpit windows as her chair upended her. And with her, went me and Tank. We sailed off into different directions, each of us screaming on the way out. Even the cricket was thrown from his tiny chair on the dashboard, but all it managed to do was toss him onto the controls to try and manage the ship as it free fell through the sky.

I could hear Tank crying out as I fell. I could see the ship starting to rock into a position where the nose was lifting into the air as it became righted, and I realised the cricket was probably able to get the Great Fox under control after all.

I thought he was too little to use the controls effectively.

From there, I plummeted down through the trees with a rustling crash and tumbled through a hole in the roof into a very aged treehouse speckled with moss. Finally, I hit the ground in one piece.