The Spaceman

The Spaceman

by

Troy Davitt

I do not remember much about my childhood. Not that my memory is weak, but it was just quite a monotonous and boring life. For months at a time, day in and day out was the same. We never had visitors, and our village population hovered comfortably at around two hundred, at most two-twenty-five. Everyone knew everyone to some reasonable extent, and the only things of note were usually deaths from old age. The view was always the same with water in every direction. At low tides, sometimes an interesting looking rock would poke out of the water, but if seeing the silhouette of a rock was the most notable part of one’s day, the rest of the day was somehow even less eventful.

My mornings consisted of wading through waist-deep water when the tidal plains were at low tide, playing with the shoals of fish instead of herding them to town like all the children were supposed to do. The adults knew we shirked our duties to a certain degree, but did not reprimand us unless the previous day’s catch had been lackluster. I was indifferent about the water, not particularly enjoying it to the degree as the younger children, yet it was something to do—a change of feeling from the wooden boards beneath my feet I felt for the remaining part of my day. By noon, the men of the village began their hand cranks and hoisted their nets of monstrous size that lay on the water’s floor up and out, pulling up fish for food, but also different species of urchins, sea cucumbers, large crustaceans, plantlife, and on occasion a nice piece of driftwood. The wood would quickly be fashioned into tools and utensils, with any scrap being attached to the main raft with the intention of one day adding to the handful of shacks we called buildings that made up our village. I had never seen a building be completed.

By evening, food was laid out and all in the village ate. The day's work was not necessarily hard, and while everyone was hungry, there was no famishment nor over indulging. Eating even became boring. Every possible dish had been discovered with the small variation of species we had access to, and some nights I even faked a stomach ache to skip eating. I would rather skip a meal and sleep early than deal with the same flavors over and over.

I had reached the age where some saw me as a child and some saw me as a man, and the confusion of my placement in the village, let alone the world, ate away at me. I began to grow angry of my existence, bitter of my placement in the universe, questioning the reason of life as a whole. Life was not a blur but rather a stagnant smudge, like algae-infested isolated pools of water, the repeated sounds of waves, the constant squinting from reflected sunlight.

That was my frame of mind for my transformative years. I had no escape. I wanted something, anything to happen. I kept that belief until the day the spaceman came.

I was lying on the edge of the main raft around midday, trying and failing to sleep and pass on the time. My mind was wandering here and there, teetering on the edge of awareness and sleep, craving to fall off the edge into deep and dark slumber. Comfort was hard to find on the wooden flooring, and I could feel every nail, every little splinter. every gap between planks. I kept trying to calm my thoughts, but something kept intruding— an almost inaudible sound. 

Among the noises of the sloshing waves and playing children, there was a faint squeal. I first thought of it to be a simple ringing in my ear, but as I turned my head away from the water to get comfortable, I noticed that the sound seemed to now come from behind me. Now that my mind had grabbed a hold of its existence, I couldn’t ignore it. Nobody else seemed to notice; younger children jumping and throwing crab shells did as they did every day, old women soaking their feet in the warm sea water, men hauling fish. I was about to consign the sound to just being my brain creating some sort of stimulus, when right before I closed my eyes, I saw Auntie Vyych come out of her shack. With her baby on her breast, she rubbed its head while she looked up in the sky, lines of worry creeping across her face. 

My head rolled to the sky, but the sun quickly blinded me. I slowly stood up all the while trying to shake off the lethargy which I ironically now found hard to get rid of. I approached her, all the while fighting the sun in my eyes as I tried to follow her gaze. I reached her and turned to face the same way she did. Without breaking her look to the sky, she leaned over to me and asked quietly, as if to not have her baby hear,

“Do you see it?” she uttered.

I replied with a confused and quizzical, “No? What do you see?”

Once again without breaking her gaze, she replied, sounding a bit urgent, “Give me your hand.” She quickly switched which hand she held her baby with and grabbed mine without me offering, pointing it to the horizon. “See, there? Slightly to the right of the center of the sky, below that small cloud. That. That right there. Moving to the right. What is that?”

As my eyes focused, the sound grew louder. My mind split between my ears and my eyes. I could see where she pointed, right where she said: a speck. Dark, shapeless, but there. It moved across the horizon sporadically, fast and then suddenly stopping, then slowly picking up speed again. The high pitched whine seemed almost two-toned, a high note and an off-key lower note almost inaudibly behind it. No Vertu Tide-Kite could make that sound, and definitely could not move as fast as the object did. By how far it seemed to be, no Tide-Kite could grow to nearly that big either.

“What…is it…?” I uttered, not knowing if I was expecting a real answer. 

“A craft…” Auntie Vyych said under her breath. “It looks as if it’s looking for something…” When I looked at her, I saw her expression was a mix of terror, curiosity, and confusion. She began taking steps back, without taking her eye off of the craft, and said to me, “Go get Old Vihra. A Spaceman is coming. She needs to be here when they arrive.”

Before I could ask for any explanations, she had turned and ran back into her shack. The baby began to cry and the hurried opening and closing of cabinets shook the closed shutters of the single-room building.

I didn’t know what all I was feeling at that moment, but fear was clear in my mind. I wasn’t sure how Auntie Vyych could have known that the speck in the distance was a craft. We hadn’t had any off-world visitors in decades. The last one came long before I was born. I stood frozen, and the fear creeped up my spine. By the time it hit my shoulders, I began to shake, and once it had reached the top of my head just a split second later, my body acted without instruction and began sprinting as fast as it could across the wooden ground.

The sound of my bare feet hitting the damp wood drowned out the pumping of my heart through my head. I had never run so fast and every step I took made me more scared. Auntie Vyych’s reaction before planted the seed of fear in my mind and it quickly took root. I did not truly know what I was scared of, but that did not matter at this point.

The door to Old Vihra’s cabin burst open as I stumbled through the door, panting and with each breath, my lungs pained me. The room was dark, with thin streaks of light invading the room through holes and gaps in the walls and ceiling. In the center sat Old Vihra, the matriarch of the barge. Her crossed legs sat on an ornate fabric pillow that had been traded for decades ago, its pattern worn away around where her legs had rubbed against it for years. Wisps of smoke came from candles that surrounded her meditating silhouette that had been extinguished by the force of the door opening. 

“Now child, be calm. Tell me what it is you need to tell me,” she calmly said she opened her eyes. “Why do you cry?”

I placed my fingers to my cheek, touching cool streaks of tears. I had no idea I had begun to cry. I ignored her question and began to tell her what I had seen.

“Soga Vihra, there is a craft! Over the horizon!” were the only words I could get out before I had to take another deep breath.

Upon hearing this, her eyebrows raised in surprise. She asked, “Sagath, how do you know it is a craft?”

I took another gulp of air and choked out,

“I was with Auntie Vyych and she pointed it out to me! She was the one who told me to come get you! She said something about a.. Spaceman! Who are they? Why are they here?”

“Hmmph, Vyych knows better than to scare the children like this…” she muttered to herself. She looked up at me.

“It is ok, my child, it is ok. Let us see who this visitor is, hmmm? We cannot answer your questions without knowing more, now can we?” she said as she put my face in her palms. I could feel the age in her hands as the wrinkles and calluses brushed over my cheek.

I helped her up off of her cushion, and she held onto my arm as we exited her cabin. Our timing was perfect—a large spray of water came from the opposite side of the barge as the ship made a water landing. I could see the glint of metal of the ship just over the building in front of us. It was large, much larger than any building we had here. How something as big as that could fly was unknown to me. 

We crossed a few bridges and platforms to get to our destination, and after rounding the building in front of us, the craft sat in front of me in all its glory. The closest thing in my mind that I could say it looked akin to were some of the sea cucumbers we would haul up in the evenings. It rested in the water, its oblong form half in and half out of the waves that slapped at its sides. If it weren’t for the sea foam that clung to where the waves hit, I would have had difficulty telling where the ship ended and the water started; the blue blue color of its metal shell was eerily similar to the waves below us. A brilliant orange strip cut vertically down the ship, splitting its form evenly between front and back. The back had large striations down it long-ways that ended in a cavernous hole in the back. Steam hissed in loud undulating patterns as waves crept in and out of the hole, undeniably meeting some searing hot piece of the ship.

My knowledge about ships was limited to what the older members of the population would tell us in stories. They described them as great flying crustaceans made of metal that did not need wings to keep them aloft, but instead propelled themselves forward by releasing air at high speed behind them. They were not actually crustaceans, that much I knew, but the science behind how they moved was beyond me. I knew they were man made and created of metal, but my knowledge ended there. 

My body stood rigid as I leaned back to see the vessel in its full almighty size. Atop the middle was what looked to be a large glass eye, faceted like a gem but many times more than the jewelry the elders in the families here wore. As I stood admiring its reflection of the sun, it jolted slightly with a loud hiss, and slid backwards, somehow inside the ship itself. Then, like an angel from heaven and with the sun behind him, the Spaceman stood up.

My fear and anxiety was stayed by Old Vihra’s calm demeanor. She gripped my hand and squeezed it in reassurance. The Spaceman stood on the lip of where the eye had met the ship and with one clean movement cleared the gap of water between him and the dock and landed square and firm in front of Old Vihra and I. The eye he crawled out of closed behind him without him touching it or even saying a word.

“Greetings, young man! Welcome to our humble village! To what occasion can we attribute this wonderful visit to?” chirped Old Vihra.

The Spaceman smiled at us, but his tired and bloodshot eyes betrayed his toothy grin and showed us his true exhaustion. His blonde hair was cut close and straight, replicating atop his head the sharp edge of his jaw. Dark eyes sunk deep into his skull and his nose separated them like the fin of a shark.

“Hello, Ma’am. Thank you for greeting me with such warmth, I have been flying for quite some time now to get here and to hear another’s voice is a great delight to me.” His voice was raspy and sounded as if he had been chewing on dry sand. 

He looked at me and said, “Hello, boy. Nice to meet you.” He stuck out his hand. I stared at it, unsure of what to do. Old Vihra grabbed his hand and shook it, saying, 

“Forgive the boy, we do not greet like this here. He is not used to such customs.” 

She released his hand and grabbed at mine, guiding both to one another. My fingers clasped around his large gloved hand, and even through all the fabric I could feel the strength of his grip. Fear once again began to pick at my brain.

“My apologies!” he said. “Before I came out, I saw you through the glass looking at my ship. Beautiful, isn’t it?” He said while looking behind him at the vessel. I nodded silently in agreement. “Feel free to look as much as you want. Just promise me you’ll only touch it while I’m here!” he said with a chuckle and a jokingly authoritative wagging finger. I looked away and laughed in return and nodded, albeit awkwardly and forcedly. As I looked back at him I caught a glimpse of deadly seriousness on his face.

As more children gathered around to ogle and gawk at the ship, Old Vihra took the Spaceman by the arm and off to the side under an awning to speak alone for a moment in the cool of the shade. I saw him say some words, look serious as Old Vihra said some of her own, and nodded as she spoke. Children ran around me and other adults in the village came out to see the commotion, but my attention stayed on the two I was just with. So much was happening in such a short amount of time, and I felt as if I were the only one who felt any sort of cautiousness from it all. Those younger than me seemed to see everything through a lens of innocent curiosity and those older seemed cautious, but open. 

Without noticing I had done so until I touched it, my hand had reached out to feel the metal shell of the ship. It was colder than I thought it would be. My fingers traced imaginary shapes over it, and they felt a thin seam where two metal plates met that I could barely have even noticed with my eyes. The craftsmanship was greater than anything we were capable of here. 

The two finished their conversation, and Old Vihra began to walk away with the Spaceman in tow. I didn’t know whether I should follow them until a group of children ran around both my sides to chase after them. The sound of the Spaceman’s clopping boots was drowned out by the pitter-patter of a dozen pairs of little bare feet running after him. Mine were included in that group, a bit heavier than the .

All us younger members of the community followed a handful of paces behind the Spaceman, stopping as soon as he stopped and walking when he did, just as a shadow does. Old Vihra walked slowly in front of him, and I could tell by his pace that he was uncomfortable by hers; he would have to take a step or two, then stop for a handful of seconds, then take another step or two. I could see through his strong jaw and trained smile that he was frustrated, but kept up the facade of calmness and casualness. 

Eventually, Old Vihra reached the tent where the Spaceman had wanted to go. She slowly turned around and pulled back the entrance flap with the sounds of chattering beads accompanying the motion. As she did this, she said, “Here we are, Sagath. He is right inside here. I shall bring a refreshment for you” The Spaceman mouthed some form of thank you without having any sound actually leave his mouth, and ducked his head in as he stepped inside. Before Old Vihra even had a chance to even let go of the entrance flap, all of us children had dove right to the opening and were peering in over the sides, eager to listen in and find out more about the Spaceman. I made quick eye contact with Old Vihra as she walked away, and her smile and slight shake of her head gave a sort of confirmation that our snooping was acceptable; children will be children, she seemed to say. My attention was quickly brought back to the tent though, as noises began to be heard from within. 

Inside was the Vo’Dinee. Our medicine man, our priest, our mayor, and our moral guide. He was one of, if not the oldest member of the village. Nobody could remember a time where he was not inside the tent. The adults would never fully explain to us what it was that the Vo’Dinee actually did, but oftentimes when walking past his tent, I would hear the sounds of different containers of liquid boiling and bubbling, and the Vo’Dinee quietly reciting a chant or spell of some sort. I could smell odd odors emanating from within, and at times even a single whiff would make my head spin. How he stayed conscious within the tent with all those fumes always made me wonder if he was even really human. 

I had not ever spoken alone to the Vo’Dinee, I was too young to be allowed to do so. Because of this, I did not ever fully see what he looked like. What I had picked together over the years through glances and peeks was that his skin was like that of leather; dark and almost polished, and he had a bright white beard that while wiry and messy, never seemed to ever have a speck of dirt in it. He wore a long white waistcloth and not much else, except for celebrations and festivals where he would don brilliant costumes of shells and dyed bones. Never had I been able to make eye contact with him though, and in truth was deathly afraid to do so. I never felt in danger when his presence was around mine, but his mysteriousness made me recognize my fear of the unknown. Everyone knew everyone on the barge, but the Vo’Dinee did not seem to have any family members or family name, let alone a name at all; just a title.

I stood silent at the edge of the doorway, paying no attention to the other children around me. My mind raced back and forth between questions, ones I could barely even keep track of. It was quickly stilled, though, once I heard the Spaceman speak.

“Please forgive my intrusion, Elder. I was directed to you by the others in the village. They said you could help me?”

Then the Vo’Dinee spoke. His voice felt like a gift from nature itself, the force of the ocean and the beauty of its simplicity and unity. I had only heard him theatrically recite lines of verses and songs before, and the deep rumble of his speaking tone caught me off guard.

“Please sit down, Sagath. You addressed me as Elder—it is my assumption that you know not of who I am correct?” he said.

“Aye, sir. I was just told that you would be the one to help me. That you could help me find what I am looking for. Something of great importance to me,” urged the Spaceman, emotion coming through his professional cadence of speech.

“Tell me, Sagath, and tell me truthfully. When you look at me, what do you see?”

The Spaceman replied, “Nothing but an old man, sir,” then quickly added in, “no disrespect intended.”

The Vo’Dinee chuckled with a slight smile. I didn’t know he could laugh. 

“Is that all, young man? Not very observant, are we? Humor my old ways of conversation and allow me to tell you a story of my people. It will help you better understand your predicament.” 

The Spaceman sat down quietly on his mat, rigid and cold. He faced away from me, but I could imagine the expression of annoyance on his face. 

“Long before the waters came to this planet, it was a lush forest full of life,” began the Vo’Dinee. “The strongest creatures there were the boar, and Viggri the four-eyed boar was the strongest of them all. With his second set of eyes, he could scout dangers earlier than others, find food quicker than others, and attract any mate he desired. This gift led him to rise to the top of his clan, becoming their leader and guide. One day, as Viggri walked the paths through his forest, he came across a holy man coming the other direction. Blind with his haughtiness and strength, Viggri charged the man to assert dominance and claim victory. He rushed the holy man and quickly pierced his chest with his mighty tusks. 

“The priest fell over and with his last strained breaths asked Viggri, ‘Boar, why did you charge me? Did you not hear me claim no harm to come to you or your forest? Did you not hear me call out to you with offerings of food? Did you not hear me ask for peace?’ Viggri, now understanding the consequences of his actions, responded with guilt. ‘Forgive me, holy man. Blinded by my hubris, my eyes did nothing in this moment but blind me. In a moment where they were not needed, I relied on them and they consumed me. They have done nothing but provide for me yet in one moment I have taken that which is most important to a man—his life. Please, forgive me.’

“The holy man took his last breaths then, and Viggri took his body back to the man's village. He gave him a holy funeral by fire, and with the smoldering embers of the pyre burned all four of his eyes out. He decreed, ‘With my gift I have taken from another, and with my gift I shall take from myself. May I never rely on sight again.’”

The Vo’Dinee finished his story and sat for a moment, gazing blankly at the Spaceman. Both were quiet for a moment, then the Vo’Dinee broke the silence.

“Now Sagath, do you see? I am blind. Not by birth nor disease, but by choice. When I was young I found I had a gift, one hindered by man’s organic creation of flesh and blood. I was foolish and relied on my sight and distorted its usefulness. In atonement, I blinded myself. My gift is the ability to Dinee, or in your tongue, scry. That is how I can help you.”

I had had no notion of the Vo’Dinee’s blindness. I had known of him my whole life yet never heard a single soul speak of his inability to see. It would explain him staying in his tent for most of the time, but would not explain his ability to still mix potions and tinctures. Perhaps he could see in some extrasensory fashion, like how the Vertu Tide-Kites can see in the dark or how at times it seemed that the mothers on the barge had eyes hidden on the back of their head.

The Spaceman shot upright, having begun to slouch through the story. He spoke loudly, “But to scry you must see! To foretell of the future you must have a pool of still water or a mirror, yet you can see neither! How is it you claim to have this ability to foresee the future yet have no means to use it!”

The Vo’Dinee spoke in a tone I had never heard from him before, one of coldness and bluntness. “Quiet, Sagath! Your definition of scrying is to use an observable object, yet in my native tongue it is merely to use a reflection. I do not need to see, only hear you. Your hindrances, your desires; these defining attributes do not need sight alone to understand. I may tell you your future by seeing a reflection of who you are by your speech.”

“This is outrageous!” the Spaceman shouted, standing up from his mat. The Vo’Dinee’s eyes did not follow him. “You propose an act to me as if it is one of magick or mysticism, yet you are just gifted with words! You help man work through his issues by speech alone, as if their words were mathematical equations to solve, not by foretelling a future! No man can foretell a future without sight, even those in my homeland! Without sight, you do nothing but deceive me! ”

“That is enough, sago!” rebutted our leader, no longer using the common term Sagath as a term of respect but instead Sago as one of disdain, one every child on the barge hated to be called. “Your impudence and lack of listening speaks more than you could ever understand! You want nothing but an acceptable answer by your eyes and are unwilling to hear things you do not agree with. Now heed my words, Sago. What you seek, what you desire, I will tell you of it, but be wary of how you view what I give you!”

The Vo’Dinee reached from within his lap and pulled out a small clay container which was corked at the top. Decorated with ornate swirls and geometrical grids and lines, it looked to be of a shape that would make it a hindrance to store in any manner. He quickly pulled the cork and placed it on the wooden ground to his side. The container was raised to his nose with purpose and he took a deep inhale from the now-free vessel mouth. Fumes of colors I could not describe climbed from within the vessel and seemed to dance around him before they entered his nostrils. He seemed to inhale more than was possible, as if the clouds of color were not brought in by his breath but entered him on their own volition, of their own mind. 

It felt like I was watching something forbidden to see. The Spaceman seemed to feel the same way. He stood in silence, silence which I did not expect from how I had seen him act just moments before. 

The Vo’Dinee’s eyes seemed to glaze over and his head tilted back slightly as if he were slowly falling asleep. The fumes stopped flowing from the vessel, and remnants of the gasses wisped out of his nostrils. He closed his eyes, then spoke longer than his breath would have allowed him to.

“I know of who you are and of what you search for. In four days time you will glide through the Great Blue Plains into the Giant’s Spears in a streak of red, to search for what we call Vynalo, but you call Lamassu. You will fail your quest. You will not find what you search for. You will find nothing but disaster and death, flame and ruin! You will leave for Vynalo as a group of three and return as none!”

The Spaceman stood in silence still, and the Vo’Dinee opened his eyes and leaned forward in clear exhaustion from his act of foretelling.

“W…What did you say…?” The Spaceman uttered. The voice seemed devoid of emotion due to shock of what he had just witnessed and heard. I did not know whether he asked in anger or confusion. The Vo’Dinee stood up quickly, seemingly to have regained his composure almost instantly, and loomed over the Spaceman, appearing taller than I remember him being when I had glimpsed him standing a small handful of times before. A bony hand lurched up from its place at his waist and a single withered finger pointed to the doorway behind the Spaceman, directly at its center.

“Go. I ask for food or money in return for using my gift to others, but I ask only for you to leave and never come to this place again. That will be payment enough for me. Dorijei, Sago. I pray you keep what I have said close,” finished the Vo’Dinee, cold and curt with his words. 

The Spaceman’s fist clenched and his shoulders rose and fell with quick, angered breaths, his stance showing the desire for a fight. The Vo’Dinee did not let him fulfill that desire, and instead sat quietly back down, now with his back facing the Spaceman. With a single fluid movement, he licked his thumb and forefinger and snuffed out the single candle in front of him. It was still daylight out and so the extinguished candle did not yet allow true darkness to enter the tent, but was enough to signal to the Spaceman that the conversation was officially over. 

The rest of the children and I also took this as a sign to abandon the doorway as quickly as possible. We all scattered like minnows, running hither and thither across the sun-bleached wooden planks. As I rounded a corner, I was met with Old Vihra with two cold drinks in her hands. I dodged to the right before my mind even registered she was there and missed her by such a close distance, her clothes rustled from the wind I created.

“Whoa now, boy! Why are you running like that, so carelessly?” she asked.

“The Spaceman and the Vo’Dinee are already done speaking, Vihra! You’re too late with those drinks, the Spaceman is probably already leaving the tent as we stand here!”

Old Vihra’s eyes gave a slight show of surprise, just enough to show that she attempted to stay expressionless.

“Is that so? Here– take these refreshments and allow me to hurry to show him back to his craft.” She explained while forcing the tray into my arms. “If their conversation is over this quickly, it must not have gone in our guest’s favor.”

Looking into the cups as Vihra hurried past me, I saw they contained the thick purplish-black sludge that was Urchin Tea, a favorite of the elders in the village and the curse of the children. To call it tea was tantamount to lying— it was thick and viscous, getting caught in the throat of those not acquainted with it. The Spaceman was lucky to have missed out on it. On the other hand, with how he treated the Vo’Dinee, maybe he deserved to drink it. 

He had disrespected the Vo’Dinee and his talents. He came to us for help and treated us like we were the bottom feeders of the waters we floated above. His manners when he first landed were clear now to be just an act, one to get to the Vo’Dinee. 

My grip on the tray of tea tightened as I felt the anger in my chest rise up higher. How was it that one from off-world knew of the Vo’Dinee’s ability to scry, yet me, one of his own, had never known? Or rather, never been allowed to know? Why was something of great a use as his skill kept hidden and not used as readily as any other talent? 

Nevertheless, I checked behind me to make sure Old Vihra was out of sight and, when I was sure the coast was clear, poured the liquid into the water and placed the tray behind a crate of fishing nets. As I stood up, I made eye contact with Auntie Vyych on one of the nearby sections of the barge. She flashed a toothy smile and stifled a laugh as she nodded in agreement. Even she hated the drink.

I trotted across the wooden boards and small connecting bridges to get to the spaceship before Old Vihra and the Spaceman got there. I wanted to see it one last time, to see the Spaceman leave. Even though since his arrival I had been anxious and afraid, the newness and curiosity of the experience played a role in my actions. The wooden boards had felt different under my feet since he had arrived, somehow more springy and new. This sort of excitement had eluded me my whole life and now I didn’t want it to leave even though the presence of the Spaceman himself I could have lived without. My fingers wiggled as my arms swayed, excited to see the craft again—to touch its metal carapace one last time. 

Thoughts ran back and forth through my mind like schools of fish, moving in ways I couldn’t anticipate. As I tried to keep track of them, I realized I had arrived at the craft sooner than I had thought I would. As I looked up to admire its beauty one last time before it left, what I saw startled me. A couple of the younger children were playing around the ship, and two were inside where the Spaceman exited. They had gotten the ship's glass eye open somehow, possibly by prying at it with shells or maybe even muttering a secret word. I feared the wrath of the Spaceman. I saw the rage build as he spoke to the Vo’Dinee and how he did not like what he heard. Seeing his spaceship covered in children, poking and prodding it from within, would surely anger him further.

“What are you doing?!” I asked in a clenched whisper, running up to the edge of the dock. “We said we wouldn’t touch it any more! We told him we wouldn’t! He’s on his way back! Get off, get off!”

One of the smaller girls poked her head out from the inside, wearing a helmet so big it rested on her shoulders while she wore it.

“You said you wouldn’t touch it, we said no such thing!” she snarkily quipped. Her head popped back inside as a different child climbed out and jumped to the dock with something shiny in his hands.

“Give me that!” I hissed at him while I snatched it away. A look of confusion sat on his face for a moment before tears started to well up in his eyes. I didn’t have time to console him. I jumped over the water gap to where he had come from, climbing up and grabbing the lip of the entrance inside and hoisting myself up over the edge.

Inside was smaller than I had thought, seemingly only room for one person to sit within. I would have expected a bed and a worktable and maybe a fish-cleaning station like every house here had, yet what sat was mostly just a large seat. Odd glass discs with numbers in them surrounded it on the inside walls and directly in front sat a sort of large black two-pronged fork that pushed back as I crawled in and placed my knee upon it. I was awestruck by how every surface was covered in something; those weird glass discs with numbers, squares with words in a language I didn’t understand in them, weird metal protrusions that either pointed up or down, tubes and rubber string in all the crevasses, and right in the middle of the seat, the girl I had just seen. 

I placed down the object I had taken from the boy next to her and grabbed the helmet that sat on her head. She yelped as I yanked it off of her and grabbed for it helplessly as I placed it on the big fork. 

“Give that back!” she cried, childlike anger all over her face.

I gave no reply but grabbed her under the arms and lifted her up over the lip of the spaceship. She went to protest but before she could get any real words out, I tossed her into the blue water below. I wanted to aim for the dock but feared she would get hurt if she wasn’t ready for a hard landing.

I took one last look around inside before beginning to climb over the lip myself. I wanted to savor the new environment for as long as I could. I knew that moment could not last. The polished exterior shell felt cool on my fingers, much different from the warmth within the ship. As I pulled myself over the edge and jumped down to the dock with a loud slap as my feet met the damp wood, the one voice I wished not to hear cut through the air.

“What were you doing up there, boy! I told you not to touch that, damn it!”

Fearful eyes looked up to see the Spaceman running towards me. He pushed Old Vihra off to the side out of his with a stiff arm and she lost her balance, falling to the planks with a cry of pain. His heavy boots dug into the wood with each long stride, tearing up pieces of it along the way. 

“How dare you disrespect my word! How did you get inside?! What have you taken?! Answer me, boy!” he screamed as he got within feet of me. 

“I-I didn’t take anything, sir, I swear! The other children, they—”

“Lies! You lie to me! I come here for help and your leader disrespects me, I am stuck behind this impossibly slow old woman, you break your promise you made to not touch my ship, and not only that but you’ve broken into it!” shouted the Spaceman. His eyes were red with rage and flecks of spittle came from his mouth, his teeth gnashing at each word like he were trying to tear be apart with them. 

I stood paralyzed with fear while he stood paralyzed with anger, looking at me and then at the ship, then back again to me. He looked like how I imagined the demons did in the stories we were told at festivals.

He took a sharp, deep breath in and said, “If you won’t tell me what you stole, I’m going to have to use this…” 

My eyes followed his right hand as it reached to his side and unbuttoned a flap on his waist. Out came some sort of device I did not recognize, one that fit his hand perfectly. His arm raised, and he pointed the object at me, the hollow tube that lay perpendicular to the top of it pointed directly at me. His finger wrapped around some small lever-like object. What this was, I was unsure. I did not wish to find out, but my fear froze me in place.

The Spaceman adjusted his stance and stretched the fingers in his hand and said, “One last time, boy. What were you doing in there and what did you take?”

“Sir, sincerely, I did not take anything…” I timidly said, voice quieter than I had wanted it to be and quivering up and down. I wished I wasn’t afraid.

I could see on his face he did not like that answer. He inhaled deep, and I could see the muscles in his arm start to tense, even under the spacesuit. Whatever the device in his hand did was guaranteed to enact judgment unto me. I closed my eyes and raised my shoulders to brace for pain. Tears began to form. 

The sound I heard was not one that I imagined would come from the Spaceman and the object he held. A sort of sharp squelching and the yelp of pained exclamation. I heard what I presumed to be the device he held fall to the wooden boards, then a louder and heavier thud. I opened one eye.

The Spaceman knelt before me. His eyes looked vaguely towards my direction and his face showed confusion and pain. His hands were frozen where they had been when I closed my eyes, but fingers splayed open widely as if pried apart by crabs. I glanced down at his torso and saw a large metal harpoon sticking out through his chest. It had gone directly through his suit from the back and out through the perfect center of his chest. Sharp pieces of bone covered the tip of the harpoon and dark crimson blood poured from where it met his body. A gurgling sound came from mis mouth.

Behind him stood the Vo’Dinee, almost twenty yards away. He still stood in position; arm outstretched, knees bent, torso twisted, all correct except for his head which looked off to the side, blind eyes pale in the sun. He kept that position for a moment and then slowly returned to a neutral stance.

Nobody spoke. The sounds of waves returned to my consciousness from when they had left nearly an hour earlier when the Spaceman first arrived. The mating calls of distant Vertu Tide-Kites came from the other side of the barge, and the sun shone bright and brilliant as it peered through fluffy white clouds, juxtaposed beautifully against the blue sky. A grunt of pain from Old Vihra as she tried to get back to her feet brought me back to the present moment. 

I looked back down at the Spaceman just as he began to lean to one side. His now-dead body fell to my left, finally silence coming from him while his body slumped to the ground, limp, blood still pouring from both his back and front. His face was pale and had an expression of anger on it. He looked like a stone statue. An effigy of hate. 

A bony hand touched my shoulder as the Vo’Dinee knelt in front of me, blocking my view from the fresh corpse and blood that soaked into the wooden boards we stood on. He moved in close to me and I couldn’t help but look at his eyes. They looked like giant pearls. I questioned whether he really was blind after all. His voice covered the sound of the blood dripping into the water below us.

“He lived in anger and died in anger,” said the Vo’Dinee quietly. “I would not have let you die in fear, boy. You live in peace and will die in peace, as all our people do. Now was not your time, but it surely was his. It was his choice. You are not at fault.”

I do not remember much after those words. I know that I began to cry uncontrollably, and the Vo’Dinee embraced me, not letting go until I let go of him myself. Old Vihra led me off to her shack to rest after that.

Not a single soul told me what happened to the body of the Spaceman or what was done with the craft. Whenever I asked Old Vihra and Auntie Vyych what happened to them, both would simply smile and change the subject. 

I wondered if the Vo’Dinee had seen the true future of the Spaceman and lied, or if he saw his own future of killing the Spaceman, or even if his talent was all a lie. I never asked him, and I got the same response to it from Old Vihra and Aunt Vyych as I did with the other questions.

The desire for something momentous to occur died after the Spaceman came. I still found my life monotonous and dull, but there was contentment with it now. The drudgery was now a welcome repetition, one that kept me sanguine and serene, sane and safe.