Kendra's Discovery

I’m screaming in between the cracks of thunder and flashes of lightning. Spears of fire are hitting the ground in rapid staccato strikes and split an Elm tree nearby. Lightning hits the edge of the bank and the creaky metal bridge. One strike lands in the river, sending an electrical current through the water and into a metal girder of the bridge. I can hear the hissing; the electrical current moves like an arrow, the steel brightening like a branding iron. I am sobbing, hugging my knees, totally immobile from fright as the storm rages above. The bridge provides little cover with its metal grating floor bed. The downpour creates a waterfall streaming through the grating of the bridge. Wind is whipping trees and flinging smaller branches toward me. I keep balled up tightly under the bridge, trying to protect my face and head.

A new crack of thunder has me counting like my older brother taught me, “One thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three,” before another lightning bolt jets across the sky, a diagonal slit in the black clouds. One half a mile away. It’s moving slowly, but it’s moving. I am soaked, but at least the weather is warm.  I’ll strip down and put on my leggings. Jerry was right, telling me to be prepared. Blue sky, blue sky, where are you? As Grannie always said, ‘if there’s enough blue to make an apron, the sky will clear.’

BOOM! Another earth-shaking thunder roll. One thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three, one thousand four, one thousand five, one thousand six, one thousand seven, one thousand eight. Lightning flitters through the enormous, ebony cumulous clouds. About a mile and a half away now. Good. I look up, but there is still not enough blue for an apron.

Heavy downpour has changed to sprinkles, and the storm continues to recede, thunder rumbling miles away. I dig out my Teva sandals from a drenched, lightweight backpack.

I should have put these on when the storm began, dammit. As I place a Teva on my right foot, I hear a crunching sound and spin to look.

Coming down the embankment is a strange four-legged creature. The animal reaches approximately four feet in height, is ribboned by stripes on the brown rump, and has white “socks” from the hoof to its knees on its front legs. The chest has a wide white stripe on each side, beginning at the top of its leg and curving up to its shoulder, swerving along the neck, encircling its eyes. Bullseye! 

Above the circle bullseyes is a long forelock, and a foot-long stringy mane hangs on one side of the neck. The most astounding feature is a thick horn similar to a Big Horn Sheep, but curving forward, not backward like the sheep, its tip pointing up. The animal’s large head resembles an American bison’s, more commonly known as buffalo (an incorrect term!).

During my mammal biology studies, I interned in several countries in Africa. This creature has the striped features of an African Kudo, and the white stockings on its legs are similar to an African Gemsbok. The Bison head throws me off; I don’t know what to make of this unique animal.

The horse evolved from Equus; she IS horse-like; similar more to an antelope even, with that strange head. I will claim the opportunity to name a newly found species!

Excited, I blurt aloud Kuduqusbok.

Kuduqusbok: newly discovered in the United States; mammal….

My musing ends as the odd creature stops, listening. I watch it munching leaves pulled from a tree branch. Herbivore. 

My presence startles it. It rears up, then stamps a front leg, shaking its head from side to side.

“It’s okay. I’m friendly, I mean no harm. What are you, and where did you come from?” I am whispering, reaching my hand out toward it, a leaf in my palm that I picked off my jeans. I’m shivering from being cold and wet, and from this odd encounter. 

Whispering is met with another stamp of her hoof. Its front blue-black hooves have five toes and the rear three.

We stare at each other until it trots off. Using my fastest sprint, I follow. When it stops near a boulder, I quietly watch at a distance. The animal rubs its muzzle on the rock, kneels to lie down, then turns upside down and begins a horse-like rolling, legs in the air. I whistle softly; the Kuduqusbok pauses its rolling and turns her (I’ve established female genitalia) head toward me. She gives a raspy donkey-ish whinny and jumps to a standing position, pawing the ground. It was an impressive gymnastic move that no horse could accomplish.

Taking this as an invitation to come closer, I move slowly in. The large emerald eyes are steady, fearless, more curious. As I approach within two feet of her striped chest, she backs up one step, looking behind her. More noises, and my stomach flutters because I have no idea what is making the noise.

I know she can move faster than I do. What if there is a bear back there? Black bear - no problem, but the grizzlies live here again.

It is not a bear. From behind the rock strides a larger, black version of this creature. It has the same striping, but its coat is black, so the white stripes are striking. Its mane is cream-colored, and the eyes are multi-colored, flashing green, blue, and black. The horn on this adult Kuduqusbok would be four feet long if measured in a straight line; it curves gracefully forward, and her enormous head easily carries it. As the mare (she is a female by normal observation) saunters in, her nostrils flare when she gets my scent. I remain still, allowing her to approach. She must be Mama.

“Mama K, that’s your name,” I whisper aloud.

What is the plural for Kuduqusbok, I wonder; Kuduqusboki? 

Kendra, geesh, you named it that; you decide!

I try to quiet my scattered thoughts, shaking my head. 

Shut Up, Kendra!! 

My thoughts are jumbled but clear up in an instant.

The animal’s nostrils flare, and she spins around, her forelock erect above her horn.

Horses cannot make their forelock go erect! I’ve never heard of or seen this…it’s so weird.

I gulp in abject fear as a grizzly bear lumbers out from behind the boulder, smells the two Kuduqusboki, and rises to its hind feet. Mama K snorts loudly, stamping her front feet in a strange dance.

I have nowhere to hide, no cover, and stand frozen in fear. The grizzly will kill these creatures, and then I’m next!

Soon, I saw there was nothing to fear. The grizzly pounds the ground with its front feet and bellows loudly, snarling. Mama K charges; I understand now what the enormous, forward-curving horn can do.

She uses it as a battering ram, pushing the grizzly back, back, back. My defender lifts her head and swings it side to side, bashing the grizzly’s enormous skull. The bear tries to swipe her with its four-inch claws, but the five toes on her front hoof catch the bear’s paw. Amazingly, I see the toes encircle the bear paw, disabling its power, caught in her grip. Mama K releases the bear’s paw and gives the grizzly a gentle shove. She rears up, and as her hooves hit the ground, she emits a croaking sound that is a cross between a cough-like bark and a loud growl.

The grizzly turns and walks away without looking back.

Wow, she didn’t try to hurt it; she warned it. If only humans could act like this.

Mama K prances to me and somehow signals to the little one to follow. I gingerly reach out to touch her massive horn, and she allows it. Warm to the touch, it feels like embossed silk, hollow and lightweight. 

***

As a jet zooms overhead, the horn turns cold, solid, and smooth like steel. The noise is threatening to her, so I give her a light pat, stroking her forehead.

As the noise subsides and I continue stroking her, she relaxes. Her mane texture reminds me of a cotton mop head, and her long eyelashes blink slowly, her stubby tail twitching. The little one is to my right, lightly prodding my thigh with her horn; I stroke her between the shoulders, and she gives a low rumble, like a purr, from her chest.

A shadow crosses above us, and looking upward, I hope the storm isn’t returning. My discomfort from it has been forgotten in the wonderment of the Kuduqusboki. 

A cylindrical cloud, seemingly so high it has no end, begins to spread above, spinning and pulsating, the colors of a rainbow swirling inside it. As it swirls faster and faster, the colors are pulled into thin strands, spinning into tendrils. I hear a low humming with a defined beat.

Cawing crows gather in a raucous crowd of black feathers soaring below the cloud. The murder of crows then covers the land directly below the cloud, shoulders hunched, preening each other.

Mama K barks again, higher pitched, looking at the cloud above. She moves toward the crows, who turn in unison and stare at her with their jet-black eyes. It is a face-off! The crows are not afraid of her. Crows are notorious for defending each other and taking high branches in danger, but they have not taken roost in the trees.

The sky is clear; it is about three o’clock, and the silence speaks its own language around me - no jets or vehicles clacking on the metal bridge, no large rigs wheeling down the nearby roads. Loud crickets and calls of quail call - an eerie half-whistle, half-meow sound; a flock of ducks flies overhead, their wings whistling, and some squirrels are calling a false alarm.

A low hum vibrates, an undercurrent to the insects and birds. The crows take flight, a black swarm of wings.

***

In awe, I spot it, tipping side to side, floating on the inner edge of the cloud. A black cylinder with a golden door. It exits the cloud and lands before I can blink. My stomach drops again, not knowing if what is inside is a friend or enemy. 

The cloud now has flattened to a line, invisible to the naked eye – except I watched it collapse.

Should I run? Oh, that’s so stupid, Kendra! Run? Where to, and what makes you think you can outrun something that appears and disappears? 

Now, once again, I am frozen in place, but the little Kuduqusbok continues to prod me with her horn. I back up a step, and she stays close by me as her mother moves toward the cylinder.

Mama K lets out a lilting whinny. It’s a mixture of a horse neigh and a puppy howl, and I can’t help but smile. 

Guess she knows who has arrived. 

A series of tiny windows open on the cylinder, and white fireflies (it’s the only way I know to describe them) begin circling the area, abdomens blinking on and off like strings of colored lights – orange, deep red, indigo, pale pink.

These fireflies are bigger than my hands! One circles my head repeatedly until suddenly I hear a low buzzing, like a mosquito, and feel a sting on my shoulder. I slap at it, and the firefly hovers in front of my face as if scolding me for the swatting. It tips to the side, does a quick flying oval in front of me, and then flies into the cylinder.

A loud whoosh accompanies a ramp, lit by violet lights, extending to earth from the flat line, which was the cloud. A figure appears at the top of the ramp, calling in a tone like a Tibetan monk chanting. I guess a height of eight feet, broad shoulders, elongated fingers separated by luminescent emerald light.

Baby K trots to the ramp, Mama staying close. Baby turns and nudges her mother on her shoulder with her small horn. Mama K lightly puts one foreleg over her baby’s shoulder and gives the whinny again, then removes her leg.

The ghostly white figure walks down the ramp, emerald fingers catching the cylinder in his transparent palm - he puts it in the folds of his garb. The visitor is a much taller Keanu Reeves, and I kid you not, he gives me the Spock Vulcan sign! 

I return it, grinning, shouting, HELLO, while noticing his Vulcan greeting looks strangely different.

“Hello.” The voice is deep, like that of the actor James Earl Jones. It booms out, startling me.

“Where do you come from?” 

“Simply put, a dimension that exists on every planet containing life. We exist in a universe within your universe where time is not like yours. Near our scapolite corridor, I caught sight of our missing sentries. The exploration had been skewed, with its record, and we only knew they were missing. When I viewed them here, I opened the ingress so that we could retrieve them. The magnifly verified that you are a healthy female, intelligent, familiar with biology, not yet having borne a child. You have a peanut allergy."

“What? How do you know about my studies…and the peanuts? Wait, the magnifly? The flying thing that stung me?” A small hard bump had risen on my shoulder from the bite. “I have a lump where it bit me. Are you saying it collects data? Without permission?” My voice had raised, realizing the ramifications.

He nodded slowly. “We collect data constantly, and we do not ask permission.”

“Why?”

“Why do we not ask permission?”

“NO! Why do you collect data from humans?”

“We collect data so we can monitor conditions. As I explained, our sentries didn’t get to the keyhole before it closed and were mistakenly left. The record was skewed such that we could not locate them immediately. It is a happy coincidence that I saw them through the looker fisheye. I am here to retrieve them.” He paused, then continued, “You are not a soldier.” The last is a statement, but it seems like a question.

“Correct, I am not a soldier. Did soldiers do something to you?”

“No, humans cannot see Sentinels or Monitors unless we allow it. Our sentries and scouts, however, can be seen. Some of our scouts were retrieved and cruelly kept in buildings with guards on Earth. None from our dimension can do harm; sadly, we were forced to abandon the lost sentries to human experiments and imprisonment.”

My mouth formed a surprised O at this confirmation of what we thought were conspiracies about the government and UFOs.

“Do all the sentries look like these?” I ask, pointing to Mama K.

“No, it depends on the mission.”

He motioned for the Kuduqusboki to exit. The baby happily trotted up the ramp, never looking back. Mama K returned to me and licked my face. Her tongue was dark blue, thick, warm, and slightly rough like a cat but closer to a dog’s.

“She is thanking you for not harming her baby. I thank you also.”

“I could not have harmed either one. I don’t have weapons. Actually, Mama K saved me from a grizzly bear!”

“Grizzly…yes, the ferocious brown lump with long claws, quite mean sometimes. They eat lots of gophers.”

“Do you come here and observe, or do it from your dimension?” They are watching a lot! 

“Monitors and Sentinels are everywhere in the universe. We have extra on Earth because it is such a warring planet.” He motioned slightly to Mama K, and she moved to his side and nuzzled his hand; a hand about fourteen inches long and eight inches wide. I observe three fingers and two paddles, which seem to act like human thumbs. The paddles are centered on each side of each hand. 

The strangeness of the Vulcan sign was from the shape of his hand.

“Why did you greet me with that hand sign?”

“Isn’t that the greeting all earth humans expect from anything you consider an alien? We planted the Vulcan culture into Gene Roddenberry’s head, hoping his TV show Star Trek would make humans more friendly. It did not.”

He looked at Mama K, and she bent a knee in a bow. “I must leave now. It was very nice to meet you, Kendra.”

“How do you know my name? What is yours?”

“We have met before. You were a baby. Your father worked at the Johns Hopkins University in astrophysics. We communicated with him through his dreams. I must leave now; the countdown has begun for my exit window. I have a meeting with the emissary advisory board that I must attend. My name is Pontenramu.”

“Wait! Pontenramu, will you come again? I would like it.”

“No. I will not come back. I only came to rescue the – what did you name them? Oh, yes, the Kuduqusboki. They should not have been seen by humans. I am the Sentinel who manages rescues. This rescue is personal to me; the adult has been my chief scout and shepherd since I came into being. I must leave now. Have a nice life, Kendra. It will be amazing.”

Mama K stared at me for many seconds, then blinked her eyes. She gave one stomp of a foreleg before disappearing up the ramp, Pontenramu following.

I watch the ramp disappear as the flat line expands back into the spinning cloud of violet, turquoise, and emerald colors. A light shines on the ground, a message: Goodbye, Kendra. I stand there until it fades away.

***

Ten years later –

The TV host holds up a copy of my novel; the cover is Pontenramu, drawn by an artist friend.

"How did you come to write this novel?" the host asks.

“I dreamed of a cloud from another dimension and a Being sent to rescue stranded creatures.” 

“Thank you to our New York Times best-selling author, Kendra. You are all getting a copy of the book!”

Pomtenramu closes the looker fisheye with a smile.