DN - Atmospheric Reentry

It’s time to make my descent. I nose down and adjust my path to follow the gates into New Port, still hundreds of miles ahead of me. It’s just a matter of ballistics now, so I’m not putting any effort into accelerating. The first wisps of atmosphere begin to whisper past me, almost imperceptibly gentle. It’s time to get into position. There are two ways I can reenter the atmosphere: under power, where I use my flight powers to slow me down so I don’t burn up, and free falling, where I slam into the atmosphere at full speed and bear the brunt of its fury. The second way is faster, but dangerous. Even I can’t be exposed to those kinds of temperatures for long before I start to get seriously burned.

I flip onto my back, my legs stretched out in front of me. Crossing one boot over the other helps me keep them together during the turbulence that’s going to start here in a few moments. That’s important because I’ve got to stay stable; if I begin to tumble, then things will get very bad, very fast. I reach behind me and pull my cape up around the back of my head and neck. As the first glowing streams of plasma begin to gather at my heels and slide up the back of my legs, I tuck my chin down against my chest and cross my arms. My cape is fluttering up behind me, cupped against the back of my head by the atmosphere, which is just now finding its voice. The sky roars at me, dragon’s breath hot and bright all around me. In a matter of seconds, I’m uncomfortably hot. My suit is spreading the heat out evenly, dissipating it as much as it can. I’ve got to keep my arms crossed in front of me and my fingers out of the plasma, or I might lose them.

I think of the fight waiting for me on the other end of this Hell, and my smile grows. The pressure pummels my legs and back. Falling to Earth at Mach 25 in a bathtub of fire, I begin to laugh. Other girls my age worry about midterms and prom dates. Those poor, ignorant children. They will never get to feel this amazing. Some people get superpowers and pretend they don’t have them. They hide from their power. They throw it all away just so they can be normal. Idiots. Cowards. Who the fuck wants to be normal when you can be this instead?

The plasma rips away from me, and now I’m falling through the night sky, wind howling at my back. I flip over and point my head down. Down in Antarctica it looked like late afternoon, but up here it’s been dark for hours.

- Sovereign, Chapter 5