Flash Fic Challenge: Let Down Your Hair

 Let Down Your Hair

It was time. 'Zelle put her hairbrush away, gathered up her mountain of hair, and took her place at the bow of the ship, where the figurehead stood in a water navy. Static crawled across her as the protective mage-shield snapped into being around the crew's quarters. She leaned up into the magic and shook out her hair. The static drew it out into a perfect halo: a golden, gossamer fine, sail to catch the solar wind.

With that in place, she herself shifted, her body settling back into its statue form as if she had never walked and talked and laughed with her crew. As if she had never been anything but the ship itself.

One that was named, certainly. Lifted by the wind like a living thing, eager to dance across the asteroids. But hardly more than a feisty container for those she carried. (Those she carried knew better, but the paperwork didn't)

Her crew cast off, the wind filled the sail, and the Rapunzelle was on its way once more to the Spring festival on Mars.