A smell stung the little pink nose. Dark swirls worked their way into the nostrils, choked the creature that breathed in without knowing as she was asleep. Gasping for air, choking a moment on smoke, the little blue rat, a white star on her head, broke into the waking world.
She looked around but saw nothing through the dark, billowing screen. Her dark eyes sparked with a flame coming through the doorway.
“Rosetail!” She cried out, screeching over the sound of burning wood and cloth.
No answer.
“Rosetail!” she called again. She had been sleeping inside their cage, in a nest of bedding and timothy hay. But her best friend, the rat she had grown up with, was sleeping outside the cage as she often did, with their owner.
A cry came out of the darkness. And then: “Bluefur!”
Bluefur replied to her best friend, “I am here, come to me!”
“I can't see you,” the rat said and then added, “We must get Dana out of here!”
Dana...all Rosetail seemed to care about was Dana!
“What about us?” Bluefur asked, her voice growing hoarse from inhaling the breath of the fire.
No reply.
And so, Bluefur bunched her muscles and prepared to make a leap across the room, to the bed where Dana and Rosetail lay. Her pink feet kicked off the ground, forepaws pressed to her chest, and she flew through the dark clouds and landed on the soft comforter of the bed.
An amber rat with dark red eyes was shoving her nose into the human's ear. She knew it tickled her, the whiskers playing against the ear hairs. And sure enough, Dana sat up, opening her green eyes.
She instantly understood what was going on, jumped out of the bed, and ran to the doorway.
“Now what?” Rosetail asked, “How do we get Dana to safety?”
There was a loud noise outside. A shrieking, screeching sound. Bluefur recognized it. She didn't know what it meant, but she felt it must be here to help.
And so she told her friend, “We must get out, Dana is not thinking of us.”
Rosetail was shocked, “What?”
“You heard me,” Bluefur replied and began looking around. Visibility was nearly zero. Scenting the area also did not help. And listening only told the story of flames munching away at everything in the house.
“Look!” Bluefur exclaimed as an odd, terrifying creature came to the window.
It knocked and Dana, who had tears streaming down her face, turned and ran to it, opened it up for the creature to come in after tearing through the screen.
The rats watched as the girl was taken by the monster.
“What is it going to do to our dear Dana?” Rosetail wondered.
“Nevermind that!” Bluefur replied, “The window is open, let's get out!”
She bunched her muscles once more, though this time they were weaker due to the income of smoke to her lungs. She could not breathe the thick substance like the could the lightness of air. But she had to get them out.
So she leapt.
Landing on the window sill, she turned and looked for Rosetail. “Come on!”
Rosetail was obviously scared now that she had to think of herself and not for Dana.
“I-I can't!” Rosetail cried out.
“You have to!” Bluefur replied.
Moments passed, they passed so slowly as flames erupted into the room and began eating away at everything they had ever known. And then, as Bluefur's heart was beginning to ache at the loss of her friend who would rather die a hero, Rosetail came flying toward her, landing not-so-gracefully beside Bluefur.
Bluefur grabbed Rosetail's neckfur to steady her, and then they looked out into the crisp night and wondered at what they were going to do next.
“It is so far down!” Rosetail gasped.
It was true. Outside the window was a large drop and below them was grass and dirt and piles of leaves that Dana had put together to jump in. Also outside, were flashing lights in the street. A large creature, that looked like an over-sized vehicle was sitting and waiting while more monsters ran around doing things.
“We'll fall into the leaves,” Bluefur said, “the fire hasn't eaten them yet.”
Bluefur prepared to jump but Rosetail was hesitant.
“But what if we don't survive?”
“Then we'll burn to death in here!”
Rosetail was silent. Before she could make a decision, Bluefur grabbed her neckfur again and plunged them out of the window.
As they fell the long way down, they saw their lives flash before them.
They were born to a breeder, mothers who did nothing but breed. They knew they were lucky because they were beautiful, as the white rats who were considered plain and ugly, where bred by a different mother and fed to snakes. So the rumors said anyway.
The girls were put with other ratlings and taken to a place with many strange sounds and voices. People would come by and gawk, sometimes pick them up, but never by the tail like they did to the white rats.
And then, Dana and her mother came along. They exchanged green leaves for the two and brought them home. Their friendship was already budding but it would cement as they only had each other now, as far as rat-companionship went.
At first, Dana's father hated them. He screamed and hollered and glared and threatened. But he came around to silence and ignoring them. Which they could live with.
They crashed into a crunch of leaves. It was a pile big enough for Dana to get covered in, and so it was enough cushion to keep them alive with few aches and nothing broken.
“We must get to Dana!” Rosetail cried out as she righted herself and sat up to look for the child.
“We must get out of here,” Bluefur insisted, “Dana is being taken away!”
She was right, Dana was being taken into another vehicle, a white one with more flashing lights on top of it.
“But Dana!” Rosetail complained.
“Dana isn't thinking of us,” Bluefur explained, “if she were, she'd come for us!”
“No-,” Rosetail began.
Bluefur interrupted, “Yes, Dana does not care for us like we do for each other!”
Rosetail looked at Bluefur, her eyes twinkling with dismay and unhappiness.
“So what do we do now?” Rosetail asked.
“We run,” Bluefur said.
And so they ran.
The best friends scampered off into the distance, running through brush and dying grasses, under trees that had shed their leaves and bled starlight onto them from the sky above.
As soon as the moon set and the sun began to rise, they followed its light. The early rays supplied no warmth this time of year, but would a bit more as the great star fell in place overhead and lit the whole world for the daytime.
They only stopped when they could smell other rats. They were near the forest now, which they knew was a dangerous place. They had been taught by their mothers to not only cherish their humans, but to follow them at all costs so they would not be taken by predators. And now here they were, without a human. However, with the scent of other rats, what could go wrong?
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