places-that-have-never-seen-me

[places-that-have-never-seen-me]

Fireworks don't last. That was the only thought in my mind when I watched the Milky Way burn from the stained window. I didn't know much about fireworks, but I had seen them on Earth a handful of times. Some kind of celebration, we had gathered.

I wanted to say goodbye to that little planet. It was silly of me, sentimental in a way that was almost human. Ani would have laughed at me thirty years ago. Now, she was probably covered in dust, body crippled with starvation.

We had had no choice but to cut off Earth's protection. The resources had to go to planets that could fight, that could give us a hope in the war that had seemed endless. But now it was done, and all that remained was the scorching lines that littered the night sky, while the stars succumbed to our power.

It was silly of me.

When I passed through the hatch and let my form slide onto the jagged ground, I still thought it was silly, but here I was. What had once been a city (the name eluded me, it had been in a language that was both melodic and guttural) was now desert. It was unbearable, and there were several cooling mechanisms on the thin suit that hovered around me. In addition to that, of course, was the constant spray of hydrogen sulphide. Ani had told me that organisms on Earth used water.

I looked around the desert. No water here. I wondered if the extinction had been quick. Surely it had to be, with these temperatures and the dryness. The city had been lush with vegetation and air-conditioners and scattered drizzles through their seasons.

I was here to say goodbye. Not to mourn. Ani had said it was the same for her, but not for me.

I slid forward, just a bit, looking around. The light from their star was horrendous, sickening, even with my protection. I sent a signal to the ship.

In a quarter second, I was surrounded.

Weaponry pointed at my face, useless against me, of course. Held by... humans.

"You're alive," I said, in what I hoped was still the language that they spoke here.

Someone stepped forward. Covered with dust and hair sheared almost to the skull, their skin was coated in some kind of slime. "Identity number, please."

"What?"

"I want your galactic ID."

I hesitated then let it project in the heat-hazed air.

"Hey, this is that one," another of them said, their voice tired but amused. "Called themself Ree."

I started at the sound of the name I used with humans.

"Hi," they said, waving with a scarred hand. "I'm Ani's daughter. My name's Dahlia. She'll be glad to see you."

"Ani?" I paused. They must be lying. There was no way anyone from thirty years ago was alive. And also... "You don't look like a human female."

"And we have the alien TERF, y'all," Dahlia drawled, earning a few laughs.

"Turf?"

"My god, I forgot what they were like. Don't worry, Ree, I am very much human and very much female."

"My apologies," I said.

Dahlia shrugged, and her eyes were shrewd. "Guys, I'll take responsibility for this one. They're harmless."

"I have my ship," I said. "If you try to hurt me..."

"Our ship now, honey," the first person said, to further laughter. "You'll have to ask nicely to get it back."

"Randy," Dahlia said. "Manners. This poor thing." She turned to me. "Our towers hijacked the ship the moment you sent a signal. We just want to know what has been happening, we'll return it to you."

"You... hijacked my ship?"

"The techies had a field day, finally testing that feature," the first, Randy said. "And these bullets are covered with cesium carbonate, just in case you're laughing at our guns."

No. That would...

That would melt through my suit in seconds. Shatter my cytoskeleton.

"Come on," Dahlia said. "I guess you want to meet mum."

I wasn't sure I was thinking straight, or at all. But when I had been led through underground passages, ending up in a cell that was far too hot for me, even with the cooling of my suit, it was starting... to feel real.

They were alive.

And then Ani walked into the cell, throwing herself onto a chair.

She must be fifty now. Gone were the soft coats and dresses that she had assured me were extremely expensive. In their place were neat shirt and trousers, loose enough not to be restrictive. Coated with some kind of gloss that nearly made me lose sight.

"How are you here?" I said, trying to remember the slender human female that had laughed at the sight of an alien and cried at the thought of the thought of war. Complained when there weren't enough clouds in the sky, because it would give her an off-season tan.

Here she was. Laughing in my face.

"Oh, my darling Ree," she said, and her voice was so much harsher, stronger. I could see burns travelled along the contours of her shaved skull. "We're humans. We weren't going anywhere."

"But the temperature. And food, and your water, where did you get the--"

She laughed even harder. "Well, it may be twenty degrees hotter than it used to, but we're hardy little buggers, you know. The tissue culture department has taken care of food, and there are obviously other ways to get water than stare at a sky and pray."

"Pray?" I said, the word unfamiliar to me.

"Here's the thing, Ree," Ani said, sitting in a desert and past half her lifespan and covered in burns. "We just did what we do best."

I waited, for the secret, that had kept this little species going in a war that had shattered all our institutions and left us scrambling for resources in a harsh, unfriendly galaxy.

Ani smiled at me. A few teeth were missing. "We survived."

Humans have always been endurance hunters. We can endure untold physical, psychological, and emotional trauma. Being so unexceptional, we are mocked by the intergalactic community until war shows how terrifying it is to simply… endure.