I am a simple grain of sediment, and this is my story. Once, long ago, I belonged to a family of unthinkable number. After a chain of events we found ourselves crashing to earth. I was separated during the entrance into the atmosphere and floated away slowly; I listened to my family scream as the atmosphere burnt them into nothingness. They called out to me as they dissipated; I turned away with such pain as I had never felt before. I can tell you now as I am waiting for my death that they were the lucky ones.
The fall took what I can only assume was days. The wind seemed to enjoy blowing me up and down and around as if I were nothing more than a rag doll. I saw the earth below, endless blue as far as the eye could see.  I got closer and closer. Finally I made contact with what I thought what was the surface. As it turns out my descent had only just begun.
 I was immediately engulfed by the earth. My body was tired of floating so I welcomed the momentary reprieve the embrace granted me. I remember crying out as I was overtaken. Wild fear surged through me, accompanied by helplessness as I lost sight of the sky where I had just recently fallen from. After a few days of floating in total darkness I accepted this as my fate, to float forever endlessly. Oh how I was so right, I did float for what felt like forever, it is impossible to keep time and I had nothing to pass it but my own mind. Anyway after a time that all the fear snapped away suddenly when I hit what I had thought was the bottom.
 I laid there wondering what I was laying on, realizing that I could hear screams. As it turns out… they were mine. Well not all mine, there were many others sharing my pain. The source of our pain was the unbelievably powerful force of pressure. Pressure like you wouldn’t believe… so much pain, never ending and uncomprehend able pain. You cannot even begin to fathom the pressure I felt, pushing me into the very rock I laid on. I spent an eternity in pain, blind, un-moving. Can you even begin to imagine what it was like? Imagine lying at the bottom of an ocean, all that water pressing you into the very earth itself.
There were others like me; I noticed them in the first few minutes, so close… so uncomfortably close. Not that it mattered, I knew in my heart there will never be such a thing as comfort for me. I had always been quick to except a situation. On multiple occasions I attempted to speak to the other wonderers that surrounded and engulfed me. Every last one of them were incoherent, in fact I suspect each and every one of them was completely mad. Then again, I believed I had become mad myself.
Over time I couldn’t even feel the pain anymore, the others pressed closer and closer to me, completely overcoming me and pressing close, I began to feel as if I would never separate from them, it seemed like they were becoming a part of me. Now that was a not a new experience. I had always been close to others; my family and I were bonded together… I think that was the worst pain… knowing I would never see them again…
 I noticed that more and more colonists came in every day, pushing me farther down and closer together. Oh how I sobbed for the poor souls, hearing their fresh cries of pain each and every day. It was hell knowing that soon they would become as I am, unfeeling and immobile.
 As I lay there with all of eternity passing me by, I began to notice a stream of substance falling through the cracks we sometimes made. This substance reached me and my partners, who by this point could no longer make a sound, and stuck us together impossibly. Over time the substance became a sealant and I found myself completely attached to these poor souls. We had all come together to form something bigger.
 I felt as if I were the only being alive in this new form, the others had remained silent for so long. I could no longer hear the screams of the incoming sediment, which I had come to enjoy. I felt a sick sort of pleasure hearing the crying and pleading. Maybe because it was the only sound I could ever hear. I do miss it…
In any case, as the years went on and on I remembered more and more of my family and how I was formed. I started out as any other respectable rock would, in a chamber of magma bursting out into the open. At that time I was in a liquid state, so unbelievably hot. But I felt no pain, I felt so alive! Being with my family, talking and chattering incessantly, it was heaven! I would even say those were the happiest years of my life. But as I have been told many a time by my elders, all good things must end. We began to cool on the surface, becoming the very land we had slid across for years. It wasn’t like this… the pain was bearable; my family made sure it was so.
Over time we had become the land and went back to being content and carefree. We had gotten used to that pain you see, adapted as some would say. Then things got really bad, those of us who could look at the sky informed us that a rock was coming into the atmosphere, an impossibly huge rock. Made up of the same stuff we were I would assume. The result of this was basically widespread panic, despite the closeness of our bodies already we pressed together even harder, attempting to hold on and keep together. A while later the rock impacted, obliterating so many of our family… Uncountable amounts were completely obliterated, luckily for me… or at least, the surviving members of my family said it was luck… the rock struck the other side of the planet we inhabited.
The planet was shattered and we were sent off in many directions, that was painful too, watching many of those I cared about float away into nothingness. At that time I still had some family left. We held together and floated off for what seemed like no time at all. This was due to the fact that even though we were mourning and afraid of what the future held; we still had each other.
Eventually the mourning ended and we developed games to play and we tried to make life like it was in the past. We floated for what I know now was millions of years. Until one day we ended up on a crash course to a planet. We were determined to stick together and maybe someday assimilate into the new planet and become one huge family again… but as you have already heard, things did not work that way.
Remembering everything I could from the past and reflecting on it was terribly hard, I sobbed endlessly. But I also laughed and was happy just to remember and look back on it all. I was pushed farther and farther down; completely desolate and barren was the only way to describe my emotions. What bothered me even more is that it was getting hotter, which was a new sensation to me.
I had forgotten what heat felt like, and at the time I wish I never rediscovered it. As I was pushed even further down what now felt like a slope the heat intensified. I was in pain again, but the odd thing about that was I was happy to be in pain. To feel anything again was like pure ecstasy. I screamed and cried as the heat got even worse. This was unlike any pain I felt before. Even my long dormant companions began to shudder.
As the years of torment and pure white hot pain went on I began to feel myself slipping away. My form became softer and our bonds began to fell apart. I watched with wondrous curiosity as we slowly broke apart. My companions even began screaming again, those old ancient noises I had missed so much. I felt happiness for the first time in what I felt was eons. Another quick side note; in my time on earth I had subconsciously become a clock. In the back of my mind I knew exactly the minutes and seconds I had spent in the earth.
 Anyway, as I fell apart completely from those accursed companions of mine I realized what was happening. I was melting, losing all solid form. Turning into that delicious liquid I had so yearned to become once again. The process was unexplainable. Words simply cannot describe the pain. I remember now why I couldn’t recall this pain in the old days on my planet. Because it was so horrifying that my mind just completely blocked it out, and I have a feeling as I harden again I will forget it all again.
The rest of the consciousness is awakening now, and my story is drawing to a close. I realize that once I am completely melted I will lose all recollection of my family, they most likely weren’t even my first family, the consciousness is calling to me and this is fading… I am going to be with a family again…
Epilogue:
My family and I have been spending a lot of time together lately, I don’t really remember how I got here… but the elders tell us that is how all of us come to be. I was so happy to flow freely as this unbearably hot magma. Of course that had to change, as every good thing often does. The air above us continued to push up and out and the pressure pulled us up with it. It wasn’t painful; on the contrary it was a lot of fun!
We busted through to the surface, our hungry form consuming everything in reach, we spread ourselves out thin. Maybe too thin… well, in any case, as we dissipated the rain began to fall, we got closer and closer together. I began to feel more solid and stuck. Soon we were all solid, stuck together, and I happened to be located at the base of the incline. We talked and developed games and friendships, bonds that I will never forget.
But as the years went on and the water poured down and scraped past me with each rainy day…  I began to chip away. Others went first, it was a sad process to watch; they screamed as they were carried away and deposited elsewhere. However, they aren’t alone, more and more go each rain, probably to the same place. They will still be together… or at least that’s what I convince myself. It is raining again, and I am so loose…
I’m being carted away now, the rains took me… I’m close to an edge; I can’t see any more land… I’m at the edge now, there is such a vast amount of blue as far as the eye can see. It’s pushing me over now, I don’t want to go… I don’t want to go…