I glanced back at Okwu and whispered, “Say thank you or something.” But Okwu said nothing. It clearly didn’t appreciate the guard not bothering to look at or speak directly to it in its language.
“Meduse are too proud to use astrolabes, so this part of security does not apply to it,” the guard said, clearly picking up on Okwu’s irritation. He handed back my astrolabe.
As I took it, I looked past him at the entrance to the Third Fish. The hallway leading inside was the same warm blue it had been that fateful day over a year ago. “Sure,” I said, with a wave of my hand. “It’s fine.” Was it blue when I exited? I wondered, as I put my astrolabe into my pocket next to my edan. I couldn’t remember; I hadn’t been paying attention. I’d had other things to worry about, like trying to prevent a battle. Something red caught my eye on the security guard’s uniform. A breath caught in my chest as I focused on the small red beetle. It walked right over where the man’s heart would be. Red point on white. Red point. On white. I frowned, knowing what was coming, but unable to stop it. The flashback that hit me was so strong I twitched.
Heru’s narrow chest.
His kaftan was white.
A red dot appeared on it like a cursor on a blank screen.
On the left side.
Left side.
Left side. Where his heart lived.
It had been beating. Calm. Happy.
Then it was a muscle, torn through.
The Meduse stinger was white and blood stained it easily.
That red dot bloomed like a rose on the bushes that liked to grow in the desert.
Heru’s blood. Some spattered on my face. As his heart tore, as my mind broke.
Five five five five five five five five five five five five five five five five five five five.
“Binti of Namib?” the guard asked.
I’d spoken with Heru’s parents twice. The first time, his mother only gazed at me through the virtual screen and cried. Openly, unflinchingly, she’d stared at me as if she could reach out and touch her son through my eyes. The second time, Heru’s brother, only a year younger than Heru, called and demanded I recount every detail of the last moment. He didn’t care that it made me weep or that it would lead to a full week of nightmare-packed nights for me. And neither did I. Heru’s brother looked so much like him, same granite black hair and bushy eyebrows. After those two calls, I heard nothing from Heru’s people.
“Binti of Namib?” the guard asked, again.
“Oh,” I said, looking up. I shook myself a bit. “Sorry.”
“You may board the ship.”
“Thank you,” I said. I turned to Okwu and I had to stare at it for several seconds, as I prevented myself from falling into another nasty flashback, this one involving Okwu and how it had initially tried to kill me. Then I said to it in Meduse, “You first, my friend.”
* * *
Crossing the threshold and stepping onto the ship was easy enough. I felt the talking drum in my chest, but that was all. Okwu floated off to its room on the other side of the ship and I was glad to be alone. I needed to be alone. I needed to experience this alone.
I passed a few people in the hallway to the sleeping rooms. It felt strange to be among so many humans again. Too quiet. I clutched my silky shawl closer to my body, feeling people’s eyes on my okuoko and my otjize-covered skin, especially my arms, neck, and face. Even among the many races at Oomza Uni, it had been a long time since I’d felt so alien.
I started my breathing techniques the moment I saw my room’s door; if I began treeing, I’d never experience the full effect of my terror and thus wouldn’t be able to address it properly. This was one of Dr. Nwanyi’s requests, not in this moment (she hadn’t wanted me to take this trip), but in the idea. “When you face your deepest fears, when you are ready,” she’d said. “Don’t turn away. Stand tall, endure, face them. If you get through it, they will never harm you again.”
I took deep, lung-filling breaths as I approached the door. Still, a violent shudder ran through my body and I leaned against the golden wall for support. “Everything is fine,” I whispered in Otjihimba. I switched to Meduse, “Everything is fine.” But everything wasn’t fine. I was walking toward the door, my back stiff, my mind full of equations. I was carrying a tray heavy with food from the dining hall, and everyone on the ship was dead. Chests torn open by Meduse stingers; the Meduse had enacted moojh-ha ki-bira, the “great wave.”
Leaning against the wall, I pushed myself within feet of my room’s door. A woman with a staring small child walked by, greeted me, and entered her room doors away. The hallway grew quiet as the woman’s door locked behind her. The shhhhhp of the door sealing itself seemed to echo all around me. I began to see stars through my watering eyes.
Heru.
He was lovely. I liked him.
Then his eyes changed because a Meduse ripped through his heart. All my friends who should have been in my class. Dead. I am the only human on Oomza of my year because all others are dead. All dead. All dead.
I smelled their blood now. Heard the ripping. No screams, because that required un-torn lungs. Gasps. Spilling. I’d come here. My choice.
I held my otjize-covered hands to my nose and tried to inhale the sweet scent, flowers, clay, tree oils. But I couldn’t breathe. I pressed my hands to my chest, as if I could cup my own beating un-torn heart, as if I could calm it. For a moment, everything went black. Then my sight cleared. I whimpered.
“Shallow breaths, increased heart rate, you’re having a panic attack,” a stiff female voice said in Khoush.
“I am,” I whispered. I didn’t like for my astrolabe to speak, but Professor Okpala had had me set it to speak whenever I had a panic attack. I’d protested back then, but now I understood why.
“I suggest you drop into mathematical meditation.” The voice was coming from my pocket, in which my astrolabe was warming and vibrating gently.
“If I . . . do, I learn . . . nothing,” I gasped.
“There is time to learn, Binti,” the voice said. “This won’t be your last panic attack. But there’s no one in this hallway but me and all I can do is notify the ship’s medics. Help yourself, drop into meditation right now.”
Everything went black, again. And when things came back, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t stop seeing Meduse stingers tearing through bodies with surprised faces. Heru, Remi, Olu . . . I could not force myself to inhale and get air into my lungs. My chest was burning when I finally gave in. I “slipped into the trees” and dropped into meditation.
Ahhhhh . . .
The numbers flew, split, doubled, spun like the voice of the Seven.
And soon they were everywhere and everything.
I grabbed at Euler’s identity, e^{i × π} + 1 = 0, and I went from plummeting to gently floating down a warm rabbit hole with soft furry walls and landing on a bed of pillows and flowers. When I looked up from this fragrant quiet place, the narrowed telescopic view made things above clearer. I was on the Third Fish, a peaceful giant who was like a shrimp and could breathe in outer space because of internal rooms full of oxygen-producing plants that served as lungs. The violent death of many had happened on this ship, of my teacher, my friends, but not for me. No, not for me. I’d lived. And I’d become family with the murderous Meduse.
“Mmmmm,” I said, from deep within my chest. My heart beat slowly. I reached into my pocket and brought out my edan. Quietly, I whispered my favorite equation and the blue current etched into the edan’s fractals of fine grooves and lines. I still did not know what it was, but after studying with Professor Okpala and studying the edan itself, I knew how to make it speak and later sing. I went to my room’s door and let the door scan my eyes. It opened and I stepped into the room where I had learned to survive.
* * *
My first sleeping cycle (for there isn’t even any night and day in space, let alone ones that are on Earth time) was full of violent nightmares so sharp that I could barely tolerate being around Okw
u the next day. I’d never told it about my panic attacks or nightmares and I didn’t tell it now.
Such things did not move Okwu and all it would say was that these would not kill me and I should strengthen myself and push past it all. Meduse don’t understand the human condition; my emotional pain would only irritate Okwu when it couldn’t make my pain instantly better. So, instead, I kept my distance from it that first day, saying I needed time to think. The ship had a separate gas-filled dining hall for Okwu and it found the food there so delicious that it spent most of that first day there. Being on the ship had no effect on Okwu; it felt right at home and easily reveled in the luxuries the ship and the university provided.
I didn’t analyze this too closely. If I went down that desert hare’s burrow, I’d find myself in a dark dark place where I asked questions like, “Who did Okwu kill during the moojh-ha ki-bira?” I understood that when Okwu had participated in the killing, it had been bound by the strong Meduse thread of duty, culture, and tradition . . . until my otjize showed it something outside of itself.
During those first months at Oomza Uni, Okwu had answered my calls and walked for miles and miles with me through Math City during the deepest part of night when I suffered from homesickness so powerful that all I could do was walk and let my body think I was walking home. It had talked me into contacting all my siblings, even when I was too angry and neglected to initiate contact. Okwu had even allowed my parents to curse and shout at it through my astrolabe until they’d let go of all their anger and fear and calmed down enough to finally ask it, “How is our daughter?” Okwu had been my enemy and now was my friend, part of my family. Still, I requested that my meals be delivered to my room.
By the second day, the flashbacks retreated and I was able to spend time with Okwu talking in the space between our dining halls.
“It’s good to be off planet again,” Okwu said.
I gazed out the large window into the blackness. “This is only my second time,” I said.
“I know,” Okwu said. “That’s why being on Oomza Uni was so natural for you. I enjoy the university with its professors and students, but for me, it’s left me feeling . . . heavy.”
I turned to it, smiling. “But you’re so . . . light already. You barely weigh . . .”
“It’s not about mass and gravity,” it said, twitching its okuoko in amusement. “It’s the way you feel about needing to be near the desert. You don’t live in it, but you played in it a lot and you like living near its vastness. It is always there. It is the same with me and space.”
I nodded, thinking of the desert near my home. “I understand. Is that why you wanted to come with me so badly?”
It puffed out a plume of gas. “I can travel home at any time,” it said. “But the timing seemed right. The chief likes the idea of irritating the Khoush with my visit.” It shook its tentacles and vibrated its domes, laughter.
“You’re coming to make trouble?” I asked, frowning.
“Meduse like war, especially when one isn’t allowed to make war.” A ripple of glee ran up the front of its dome.
I grunted turning away from it and said in Otjihimba, “There isn’t going to be any war.”
Three Earth days. When it came time to eat, though I tried, things didn’t get any better. I took one step into the dining hall where the Meduse had performed moojh-ha ki-bira, looked around, turned and went right back to my room, and again requested my meals to be sent there.
I spent much of my time meditating in the ship’s largest breathing chamber. Most were not allowed to enter these spaces for more than a highly monitored few minutes, but my unique hero status got me whatever I wanted, including unlimited breathing room time. Okwu didn’t join me here because its gas wasn’t good for the plants, plus it didn’t like the smell of the air. For me, the fragrant aroma of the many species of oxygen-producing plants and the moist air required to keep them alive was perfect for my peace of mind. And the otjize on my skin remained at its most velvety smooth here.
The three days passed, as time always does when you are alive, whether happy or tortured. And soon, I was strapping myself in my black landing chair and watching the earth get closer and closer.
When we entered the atmosphere, the sunlight touched my skin and the sweet familiar sensation brought tears to my eyes. Then my okuoko relaxed on my shoulders as I felt the sunshine on them for the first time. Even being what they were, my okuoko knew the feeling of home. After we landed and the ship settled at its gate, I sat back and looked out the window at the blue sky.
I laughed.
At Home
A week ago, Oomza University Relations instructed Okwu and me to wait two hours for everyone to exit the ship before we did when we arrived on Earth.
“But why?” I’d asked.
“So there is no trouble,” both of the reps we’d been meeting with had said simultaneously.
It had been over a hundred years since a Meduse had come to Khoush lands, and never had one arrived in peace. The reps told us the launch port would be cleared for exactly one hour, except for my family, representatives, officials, and media from the local Khoush city of Kokure and my hometown of Osemba. A special shuttle would drive Okwu, me, and my family to my village.
The two hours we waited allowed me to shake off my landing weakness. I wore my finest red long stiff wrapper and silky orange top, my edan and astrolabe nestled deep in the front pocket of my top. I’d also put all my metal anklets back on. I did a bit of my favorite traditional dance before my room’s mirror to make sure I’d put them on well. The fresh otjize I’d rubbed on every part of my body felt like assuring hands. I’d even rolled three of Okwu’s okuoko with otjize; this would please my family, even if it annoyed the Khoush people. To Meduse, touching those hanging long tentacles was like touching a human’s long hair, it wasn’t all that intimate, but Okwu wouldn’t let just anyone touch them. But it let me. Covering them with so much otjize, Okwu told me, made it feel a little intoxicated.
“Everything is . . . happy,” it had said, sounding perplexed about this state.
“Good,” I said, grinning. “That way, you won’t be so grumpy when you meet everyone. Khoush like politeness and the Himba expect a sunny disposition.”
“I will wash this off soon,” it said. “It’s not good to feel this pleased with life.”
We walked down the hallway and when we rounded a curve, it opened into the ship’s exit. For a moment, I could see everyone out there before they saw me. Three news drones hovered feet away from the entrance. The carpeting before the exit was a sharp red. I blinked and touched my forehead, pushing, shoving the dark thoughts away.
I spotted my family, standing there in a group, then another group of Khoush and Himba welcoming officials. I hadn’t told my family about my hair not being hair anymore, that it was now a series of alien tentacles resulting from the Meduse genetics being introduced to mine; that they had sensation and did other things I was still coming to understand. I could hide my okuoko with otjize, especially when I spoke with my family through my astrolabe where they couldn’t see how my okuoko sometimes moved on their own. Won’t be able to hide them for long now, I thought.
Any moment, I would exit and they would all see me. I slowed down and took a deep breath, let it out and took in another. I held a hand out behind me for Okwu to wait. Then I knelt down, swiped some otjize from my cheek, and touched it to the ship’s floor. My prayer to the Seven was brief and wordless but within it, I asked them to bless the Third Fish, too. “This interstellar traveling beast holds a part of my soul,” I whispered. “Please give her a safe delivery and may her child be heavy, strong, as adventurous as her mother and as lovely.” I wished the Third Fish could understand me and thus understand my thanks and I felt one of my okuoko twitch. As if in response, the entire ship rumbled. I gasped, grinning, delighted. I pressed my palm more firmly to the floor. Then I stood and walked to the exit.
I stepped out of the ship before Okwu, so the sound
of my mother’s scream reached my ears immediately. “Binti!” Then there was a mad rush and I was suddenly in a crush of bodies, half of them covered in otjize (only the women and girls of the Himba use the otjize). Mother. Father. Brothers. Sisters. Aunts. Uncles. Cousins.
“My daughter is well!”
“Binti!”
“We’ve missed you!”
“Look at you!”
“The Seven is here!”
When everyone let go, I started sobbing as I clung to my mother, holding my father’s hand as he followed close behind. I caught my brother Bena’s eye as he flicked one of my otjize-heavy locks with his hand. Thankfully, this didn’t hurt much. “You’re hair has grown,” he said. I grinned at him, but said nothing. My sisters started swinging their long thick otjize–palm rolled locks side to side and singing a welcome song, my brothers clapping a beat.
And then it all stopped. I stopped in mid-sob. My parents stopped joyously laughing. Bena was looking behind me with wide eyes, his mouth agape as he pointed. I slowly turned around. For a moment, I was two people—a Himba girl who knew her history very very well and a Himba girl who’d left Earth and become part-Meduse in space. The dissonance left me breathless.
Okwu filled the exit with its girth. Its three otjize-covered okuoko were waving about, as if in zero gravity, one of them whipping before its dome violently, as if signing some sort of insult. Its light blue semitransparent thin-fleshed dome was protected by the clear metal armor it’d created on Oomza Uni. From the bottom front of its dome protruded its large white toothlike stinger.
Behind me, I heard clattering and the sound of booted footsteps rushing into the room. When I turned, one of the Khoush soldiers had already brought forth his gun and fired it. Bam! Screams, running, someone or maybe some two were grabbing and pulling at me. I dug in my heels, yanked at my arms. A small burst of fire bloomed in the carpet at Okwu’s tentacles. Inches from Okwu, feet from the Third Fish.
Binti--Home Page 3