Crabfall

God didn't want them.

That much was obvious after the twentieth loss. More after the fiftieth. The boos from the win. The screams of fear from the beak. They always knew they weren't wanted here. As ball hit bat and as flesh slid past mandible.

The time in the hole felt like eons. Blaseballers don't need to sleep, or drink, or eat. It just helps.

On earth it looked the the sky was cracking open. The Grand Unslam repeated from some unknown game as great bands of darkness streak across the sky.

They were unwanted. And so they returned.

Nothing should ever escape a black hole. No one would ever speak of how they did. Stars streaking out of the sky wrapped in hardened chitin and burning on re-entry. The sound was deafening, and the heat was unbearable. Impact was like a hundred car crashes all at once, and then white hot shells cracking and sputtering down to cherry red and finally dull orange.

It took the press a frenzied hour to race to the impact site. The first Star to crack open was all metal legs and iron body. Pedro took it better than most. His roar of triumph blew out van windows and cracked camera lenses. More of them broke out instinctively, seeking out whoever hurt their comrade. The situation was tense at first, half a dozen Crabs stalking forward, covered in wounds but unbroken as they tried to protect first and understand far far later.

A word from Kennedy's lips halts them. Too old for the people from outside of town to understand, to powerful for the ones who knew to want to hear. A word of commencement, a word that belonged only in a Ritual.

The cameras that still worked broadcast the Crabs as they were reunited with their Mother, after a decade separated. The questions could come later, the consequences would be damned. But in that moment She could be seen above the waters of the Bay for the first time since Her death.

Kennedy didn't think tears would come anymore. He barely kept himself together enough to complete his duties.