Cape Canaveral, FL - Throngs of animal rights activists descended on NASA headquarters Wednesday in a vehement protest against the ‘murder’ of a free tailed bat during Sunday’s space shuttle Discovery launch.

The outrage stems from NASA’s failure to delay the launch despite the bat’s presence on one of the shuttle’s external fuel tanks.

“I’ve heard of people setting up barbecues, you know, and camping out for the space ship launchings and the like. But a bat? Using that blast furnace of a gas gobbler to cook it? Appalling!” said Nattering Poe, self-proclaimed ’spokestestor’ for PETA, the protest’s organizer.

“Might as well call it ‘Eastern Sizzler’, I mean, come on!”

Yuck Combover, a witness to the launch had a different take on things.

“Awesome!” bellowed Combover, an FSU student and rabid launch fan, “It was like ‘Batman Ends’, get it? ‘The Dark Meat Knight’, right?”

He then burst out into uncontrollable laughter and was swiftly struck in the face by a protest sign that read ‘Bats are People Too.’

Triumph of man or critter cooker? You decide.

NASA’s response?

“The animal did not pose any threat to the crew or the mission,” said Clipboard Buttons, Terrestrial Beast Chief for NASA. “Everything was a go…and it went.”

He, too, was struck by the same protest sign.

PETA plans a memorial service for the flying rodent, but has yet to set a date.