The Sea Is Ours

by Jaymee Goh

  Dai Ji cleared the plates when she was done. She watched the sink slurp the soapy water down greedily, stripping and breaking down the harsh chemicals and organics so they wouldn’t contaminate the water supply. She looked at the time; it was almost twelve. She returned to her room, picking up her personal radio, and dialled Chalerm. The radio whirred for a while before he finally came through, whispering.

  “Hello, boss, what you want? I in school, must go toilet pick up you know…”

  “Chalerm, I got new casing today. For special match, me and you.”

  “You coming today? Thought Ridzuan host.”

  “Of course I coming lah, Chalerm. Bring extra spider for me. One thirty, usual place. We go first.”

  “Can, boss.”

  Dai Ji shut off the personal radio and picked up her new casing. In the afternoon light that streamed through her curtains, it had a bluish-green sheen on top of its scaly exterior. She ran her hands over it, feeling its smoothness and the buzzing of its circuits beneath her fingers and seeing the hard, beady stare of its python eyes. It was violently beautiful. Dai Ji carefully packed it into a shoebox with two more unsold casings in it and lowered it into her backpack. Pulling it onto her lap, she unlocked the door and stepped out of the apartment.

  In the lift, her Thai block-mate greeted her, and she politely nodded back. He fished for a pack of chewing gum and offered her some. The lift doors shut, and the old gears rattled.

  ~*~

  The circle was smaller than usual today; maybe about thirty kids, with the rest either spooked by the blast or forbidden from coming. Still, Dai Ji could see Towgey darting around, collecting his bets as usual, while Rotan fussed over Heavy Jumper in the middle. Aminah was entertaining her little gang with what looked like a home-made birdlike; the size of a mynah, it repeated her words in a tinny voice and hopped from one leg to the other. Chalerm and Ridzuan were playing capteh, their spiders and casings left in a corner with the Chong twins. The Nanyang Forces officers were conspicuously absent.

  Dai Ji looked at her watch, and rang her bell. The Chong twins once again set up the folding table as the circle closed in. Dai Ji waited for them to settle down, and then spoke.

  “Today got something special for you. Who see me play before?”

  A few hands went up.

  “The rest of you, today your first time. Today I challenge Chalerm and Kiet!”

  Chalerm raised Kiet in the air as he strode to his side of the table. Dai Ji brought out the casing she’d made the previous night, trotting around the circle so everyone could get a look. She tugged on its threads discreetly, and it reared up, baring its fangs.

  “This is Khuai Boey. Ask you, who last night cannot sleep?”

  People tittered, and some of them yawned.

  “Ya. Me too, so I made this.”

  She set it down in “spider here” and stroked its back. It opened with a deliberately loud hiss that trailed off only after a few seconds. Removing one of Chalerm’s water-cooled jars from her backpack, she coaxed the spider into the casing. Towgey passed her the needle and sugar water, and she fuelled up. On the other side of the table, Kiet was already preening itself.

  Dai Ji passed the bell to Ridzuan and took a deep breath. She turned to look at the circle and smiled.

  “You all watch.”

  Ridzuan rang the bell, and the cardboard barrier was lifted. The two casings stared each other down for the briefest of moments, and then charged.

  The Chamber of Souls

  z.m. quỳnh

  Today it is announced that our quarantine is over and our refugee camp sufficiently detoxified to enter the Waterlands of Lạc, the home of our rescuers. Cheers and song rise in the air as the airship descends from the sky. A magnificently carved rồng on the bow of the vessel glistens of lacquered red, orange and gold scales, as its body, decorated by gems, wraps under the hull to reappear in a long curved tail on the other side of the vessel.

  Heavy plumes of vapor expire from fangs framed by long whiskers made of copper metallic strips. Along the side of the vessel, large rotor blades whip the air as two enormous orange balloons, hovering higher than the tallest building in Sài Gòn begin to deflate, pivoting to form triangular sails.

  Thirty days ago, our sinking fishing boat cramped with a hundred refugees fleeing Việt Nam had emerged from a hidden corridor of the South China Sea. We were rescued by the Guardians who had descended from a similar vessel that barely skimmed the surface of the water and we, arms waving and voices strained in desperation, failed to observe what should have been obvious—that our rescuers bore an element of foreignness that we were wholly unprepared for.

  “Where do you hail from? Are you in need of assistance?” a Guardian had called down to us. The language spoken was Vietnamese, but it sounded as if the tongue of the speaker had been wrapped around a poem and restrung in curves back to us. A slight echo of melody lingered after each word.

  Silence had spread among us at the strangeness of the dialect and though we could make out the gist of what was spoken, it was interwoven with words and tones we did not recognize. Whispers of warning spread that our rescuers may be agents of the very government we had fled.

  Tentatively, mother had stepped forward to speak what many had waited ten years to voice, “Yạ, greetings, we are refugees, fleeing our homeland of Việt Nam because of the cruelties we experienced there. We respectfully request asylum.”

  At that, three Guardians had leapt onto our boat, their long black hair, arranged in motley styles that interlaced colorful braided metallic strands with feathers, flapped in the wind as they examined us in our squalor and malnutrition. Their speech clearly carried Vietnamese tones, but their eyes and skin, the features of their faces, their height—they were as tall as the tallest American soldiers, if not taller, and their strange dark tunics, decorated with metallic accouterments, that sheathed one arm and left the other arm bare spoke of a culture completely unfamiliar to us.

  Approaching the eldest among us, my aunt who had made the journey at sixty-seven, a Guardian with jet-black hair spiced with metallic blue had bowed deeply.

  “Yạ, greetings, grandmother,” the Guardian had said, “The sea has brought you to us and we will care for you. Come and we will brew tea and rice for you. You are under the protection of the Waterlands of Lạc, we grant you all sanctuary.”

  Despite understanding only bits and pieces of the Guardians’ words, my aunt’s face had broken into a grimace of blackened teeth and sobs, the Guardian’s message of granted asylum unequivocal.

  “What are you called, dear one?” she had said, wiping her tears on her sleeve.

  “What I am called, you cannot express, but you may call me Jzan Nguyệt after the moon that once carried the tides of our Waterlands. And it is in my hands that you will rest the security of your people, for I am jzan who is the protectorate of these Waterlands.”

  Jzan Nguyệt, as well as all of the Guardians, referred to one another as “jzan.” At first this was confusing, making learning their names challenging. Once in quarantine though, we quickly found this highly convenient since the title was enough to convey respect while eliminating the need to know anyone’s name.

  ~*~

  As we board their airship, I notice that our steps, frenzied and awkward when we entered quarantine, are replaced by lightness as children skip, lovers hold hands, and elders stroll side-by-side. My own mother is all smiles, her arm crooked unevenly through the arm of my aunt as they board together. Despite all of this, I can’t help but feel an odd mixture of excitement, anxiety, and remorse about journeying to a land that will become our new home—to replace the one we had lost.

  As we board, a Healer tells us to grip a sanded bar that runs along the deck. Unlike the heavily muscled Guardians, whose faces and limbs are almost entirely covered with intricate drawings much like our ancient fisherman who drew sea monsters on their bodies, the Healers’ skin is free of any markings and their heads are completely shave
n. In quarantine, they were tasked with providing us with food, shelter, clothing, and herbal medicine. Like the Guardians, they also had a title, “nan,” which they use to refer to each other.

  We had been delivered into quarantine soon after our rescue. It was the Guardian, Jzan Nguyệt, who had brought the news to us: “You will be taken to an atoll island where we will prepare you for entry into our Waterlands.”

  Mother’s forehead had furrowed instantly with concern. I had known what she was thinking; I could see it in her eyes - the fear of incarceration. So many stories had carried their way back to us from people who had made it to refugee camps in Mã Lai, Thái Lan and Hương Cảng. Stories of starvation, sickness, and festering away like prisoners while waiting for dreams that never materialized.

  “Are we prisoners?” Mother’s voice had quivered.

  “No.”

  “Then why-?”

  “Because in our country, your senses are severely impaired. You must acclimate. Because you carry toxins and you must detoxify lest you bring death and illness to our people.” In that moment, in Nguyệt’s voice, I did not hear the graceful generosity we had all become accustomed to, but a fierceness that seemed immovable.

  Despite our fears, though, our “quarantine” was more like a paradise vacation. Instead of barbed wire fences, rationed food, and poorly ventilated stalls, we had been surrounded by miles of green coral reef, a never-ending buffet of rice, nut dishes, and fresh fruits and vegetables, and cool bamboo mats to sleep under the rounded canopy of the sky.

  Quarantine reflected the imagined freedom that many among us had dreamed of. The freedom I had envisioned was somewhat different though. I wanted inclusion, to belong somewhere—to be valued—to be more than the label Việt Nam gave to me—the untrustworthy child of a political dissident. How that freedom will look in the rescuers’ land, I do not know. Would we be equal members of their society, or a relief effort from some war-torn country?

  ~*~

  The airship picks up speed, rising into the sky and the Guardians begin to pull on ropes and equipment, preparing for flight. I hear sobs break out as we watch them. It is not what they are doing that is disturbing; it is how fast they are moving. Our eyes can only catch their faces and limbs momentarily before they are in different locations on the airship.

  In quarantine, they had moved with languor and ease. The thrill of our trip is foreshortened as it becomes apparent that wherever we are going, we will not be among peers.

  “What is happening?” someone wails, “how is it that they can move so fast?”

  I reflexively dig my fists into my eyes to block out the movements of the Guardians. The sound of balloons filling with hot air and the smell of thick plumes of steam dominate my senses and I breath in the warm humid air wishing I were back home. When I finally lift my fists from my eyes, the vessel is surrounded by a blue film behind which the clouds move by at such a tremendous speed that they are just a blur.

  I not only see the movement but I also feel it in the gut of my stomach. It begins as a slow nauseous churning that becomes pain seizing my entire body. I fall over, buckling on the deck, collapsing alongside my countrymen whose kicking legs and flailing arms bruise my sides.

  In the din, I hear the gruff shouts of Guardians in their twisted tongue as the vessel decreases markedly in speed. Healers rush to our side, bringing their palms flat on our head and our chests. Sharp pangs of pain jolt throughout my body, causing my eyes to water. Then as quickly as it had came, the pain subsides. It is not just the immediate pain that dissipates, but every cramp, injury, or discomfort I have felt since leaving Việt Nam—the constant hunger in my belly, the rawness of my bowels, the sharp nagging headache—all gone. Instead I am left feeling renewed as if the past ten years had just been erased. Momentary ecstasy befuddles me.

  “Your people cannot travel at our speeds—it appears to result in severe internal degeneration,” a Healer says to me and immediately my spirit sinks. What was it? What was it that makes us so different from them when they look just like us? When they speak our words? When they bear our faces?

  “We must leave you behind. At this decreased acceleration, we will be open to attack. We are charged to take Nan Ngọc swiftly back to the Guardian compound. We will leave behind sufficient Guardians to protect you.”

  “Protect us from what?” But the Healer has already moved on to help someone else. That sinking feeling lodges deeper inside me and I find myself wishing I were back on my dilapidated fishing boat where I felt, at the very least, human among human beings. I rise in search of Ngọc. Of all our rescuers, it is Ngọc that I feel the most connected to. Ironic since it was Ngọc that all of us had feared the most at first.

  We had all met Ngọc shortly after our rescue as it distributed tea and rice into our wearied hands. I had been instantly dumbstruck by its beauty. Underneath its skin, which wavered between translucency and unblemished coppery bronze, were several layers of rotating gears that intertwined with leafy vines and moss that made up the substance of its body. Its eyes, twin orbs of jade, were fanned by small turquoise and deep blue feathers that added softness to its human-like face. From the top of its head trailed braided branches and vines from which mahogany green leaves, mushrooms, and dark flowers emerged.

  “Yạ greetings, Nan Ngọc,” I had said as it handed a warm gourd of rice to me, “that is also our family name.”

  The automaton had made no acknowledgement of my attempt at familiarity.

  “Yạ, Nan Ngọc,” I had began again, “please tell me again what it is that you do so that we may know what to call on you for?”

  “Yạ, I am here to provide you with food, water, and all that you require while you detoxify. And to collect your souls should you perish.”

  Its words had silenced me and I was afraid to speak to it further. Many of us had avoided Ngọc for fear that its intention was to take our souls like a demon. But Ngọc was boring for the most part, and I saw in its actions nothing mystical or magical.

  During our quarantine, it had spent most of the time cycling through the preparation of nut dishes. Within its limbs were various sharp instruments that revealed themselves once its appendages were removed. With these, Ngọc chopped, diced, crushed and blended nuts with noisy vigor.

  When nightfall fell in the quarantine camp, Ngọc had not slept. Instead, it sat in the middle of camp, surrounded by four Guardians, as if in a meditative state. I had laid silently on my bamboo mat studying with relish its every detail, the way the firelight bounced off its gears and the braid of vines down its back graced with small black flowers.

  “Is it a custom of your people to gaze at others for long periods of time?” it finally asked one evening.

  Startled, I had blushed, feeling the heat of embarrassment from being caught.

  “Yạ, apologies, it’s just that—we have nothing like you in our country.”

  “I am the only one of my kind.”

  “What are you?” I had asked, slowly inching my way closer to it.

  “I am an automaton created to hold souls.”

  My face wrinkled in confusion. “Hold souls?”

  “Yes. In the catastrophes of this world, souls have been lost to the dark void that surrounds our world—never to return—the void from which you emerged.”

  “You mean the Biển Đông?”

  “If that was what it was for you. Our alchemists believe that the void is a transitory medium between universes.”

  “Universes?” I remember straining to understand Ngọc, feeling slightly abashed to have no knowledge of the world beyond my own country where I had spent most of my youth serving in the army. All that I knew was of war and fighting—not of other worlds and universes.

  “In this void, we have lost valuable lineages, many of our people becoming ancestorless. I was created to preserve souls within the Waterlands until a new life is conceived.”

  “How can that be possible?”

  “Within th
e core of my body is a chamber made of the searing of air, fire, molten metal and the tears of the kin of those that have departed. When someone passes, if a new vessel is not available, those that guard over death ensure the soul’s safe passage into the chamber where it awaits rebirth.”

  Its words were a mystery to me and I had stared uncomprehending at its chest, searching for the chamber that it spoke of.

  “It is protected, you will not be able to see it, try as you might.”

  “So if one of us dies…” but I had left my question hanging, afraid to complete it and Ngọc offered no answer.

  ~*~

  As usual, I find Ngọc surrounded by four Guardians.

  “Perhaps this will calm the nerves of your people,” Ngọc says, deftly pouring tea into small gourds. I have always thought it a bit funny that the Guardians would be entrusted to guard someone whose main function is to brew tea and prepare snacks.

  “Can I help?” I offer, finding immediate comfort in being near Ngọc. A tray of gourds filled with hot tea is pushed my way. Lifting the tray, I follow closely behind Ngọc to the chaos of the upper deck. My people are huddled sobbing and shaking, some still writhing in pain while Healers move swiftly through them.

  Without warning, their screams of pain are suddenly replaced by terror as a loud explosion tears through the air. Beside our vessel where once there is empty sky, a large ebony creature appears roaring like madness, encircling our vessel, its long body oscillating in waves of shimmering green.

  I am so filled with astonishment that I forget to be afraid, marveling at the sheer beauty of it. Its large red eyes glow as it circles the boat with a large ocular device on its left eye. From its serpentine back, several people flip and rotate onto the deck, transforming into flashes of light that flit about in all directions.