The Bright Blue One

The room was unfamiliar, I don’t know how I got here. 

I mean, I know how I got here, a standard mode of teleportation, in which my every molecule was compressed and pushed through space in quite a brash manner and thrown together at the other end. I hope it was my every molecule, anyway. I would hate to have left anything behind. No, I mean I don’t know how I got here. As in, how did a lowly conservationist and Earth enthusiast go from being in a very civilised conference aboard the Command Ship discussing the future of this bright blue planet, to being here. Alone.  

Why me? 

It is dark and cramped. There is a dripping sound somewhere overhead, something pointy jabbing me in the back. When I move too far to the right there is a terrible clattering noise.  

Oh no. This will not do. This will not do at all.  

I try to get my bearings but everything is wrong. Years of research I have done on this planet, files full of pictures, specimens, literature, nowhere does it describe such tight, dark living conditions, such oppressive gravity, and the sapien suit! It is ungainly and feeble. I have been here only two Earth hours and already the stump that supports my grotesque sapien-head is aching, and my ungainly limbs suffered pins and needles before going numb altogether. How did sapiens survive their entire lives like this?  

Where were the beautiful sunsets? Where were the plush furnishings? The books, the music? I would even settle for a small window. 

As if the drip-dripping wasn't enough, now there is another sound. A buzzing tone that seems to vibrate right through my complicated vertebrae and threaten to unhinge me. I feel around in the dark for the offender, if it is a bug I will exterminate it, conservationist or not.  

I pull at the vibrating thing that seems to be trying to burrow its way into a fold of my unnecessarily intricate Earth-robes. It is a handset. I press answer and a video call begins, setting my tight living space aglow. There on the screen are the culprits of this terrible scheme, this awful mess, this method of whole-body torture. The Commander of the galaxy and his board of officials, sitting around the table back on the Command Ship as if nothing has happened. One of them has a muffin. 

‘Bring me back,’ I say.  

Commander Mœdus clears his throat. ‘Varim, it’s good to see you. Are you well?’ 

‘Well?!’ I screech, ‘Well? I am adrift! Cast off by my kind, abandoned, left to perish in an unfamiliar land with nothing but a... a...’ I pick up the nearest object, a can of something labelled Furniture Polish, ‘... a receptacle of some kind of fragrant, lipophilic particles suspended in propellent gas under extremely high pressure- similar to how I feel right now. A cruel joke! A twist of ironic—’ the can goes off and I screech and clutch my face, ‘— My visual cortex!’ 

I lean too far to the right and the clattering noise begins again. 

‘Yes, well,’ says the Commander. ‘You have had a one-hundred-and-twenty-minute settling in period in which you could better collect your thoughts. Tell me, what of your dwelling? Is it suitable?’ 

‘Suitable! Sir, I can’t feel my limbs. Would it have killed you to give me a Pod? Or at least a small area where I could be horizontal?’ 

Commander Mœdus leans in squinting at the screen. 

‘It does look tight. Stof, I thought you were securing him an apartment?’ 

One of Commander Mœdus’s officials leans in now, the head of bio-security, and surveys the screen with an unflinching glare. 

‘That is the cupboard under the sink,’ she says. 

An official on the right, head of warfare, shakes his head and goes back to eating his muffin.  

‘Told you,’ He says with a full mouth, ‘he’s going to die there. Nobody listens to me.’ 

‘I don’t want to die!’ I shriek. 

‘Get out of the cupboard, Varim, for pity’s sake,’ says Commander Mœdus. 

I push at the wall, which turns out to be a door. Light blasts directly into my puny sapien retinas and makes a bee-line for the innermost part of my brain, while the weight of my gangly limbs and crumpled torso pull me to the ground in a cascade of cleaning supplies and broken crockery. I lie in a jumbled heap, cheek to the cold floor, rear in the air, gravity pinning me there as the bottle of polish bounces away over the tiles. I breathe hard as every cell of blood angrily forces its way back into my tangled limbs. 

‘Better?’ asks Commander Mœdus. 

‘Much.’ 

The events that had followed the Conference aboard the Command Ship were a fraught blur, a wide spectrum of emotion. A mismatch of sentiments, with a dusting of terror and refusal. My heart had initially leapt at the thought of Commander Mœdus taking my case, this tiny blue planet, planet Earth, is one of my favourite case studies, and although in a cycle of global warming, still at a salvageable stage. Soon it will reach a non-returnable tipping point and all my research void. What a waste!  

But sending me here to fix it? Me? Well, I have no more experience at contact missions than that can of furniture polish. Actually, considering the pain radiating from these puny sapien eyeballs, the polish is much better equipped to defend itself than me. Why couldn't they have sent the guy with the muffin? He had a gun. 

But no. I, a being very much used to working from the comfort and safety of my desk, had been pushed through the transition stage at such an efficient rate I hardly had time to comprehend what was happening until plonked outside a door labelled ‘Transport Hatch’, but which I voiced loudly should be renamed ‘The Portal of Terror’. By then my refusals were much too late, and also irrelevant. I was reminded very politely, that this project was in fact my idea. An idea I had worked toward and argued for, for many years. 

Of course I want some action on this planet, it needs help. It needs a hero, a saviour. Not me.  

I lie groaning in a crumpled heap now, as the team drone on about things I neither understand nor find relevant, because soon I will surely be dead.  

‘Varim,’ says the Commander, ‘it is really very simple. Twenty Earth weeks should do it, fix the trajectory of global warming in that time, or leave them to their fate. I personally am indifferent to which outcome. I am also, personally, indifferent to coming back to pick you up though I am told I am “morally” obliged to at least attempt it. Is that... we’re definitely sure...’ 

The Commander looks to one of his officials who is leafing through papers shaking his head.  

‘Sorry, it’s in the treaty. Clause eighty-four, something about abandonment. I tried to find a loophole but no joy. It’s very well written.’ 

‘Thank you,’ an official from the other end of the table says. 

Another wail escapes me as my rear end falls sideways, pulling the rest of my useless sapien body into a starfish, a marine echinoderm belonging to the class Asteroidea- a life form I previously considered a marvel and “adorable”, but now seems tinged with malice. Perhaps the starfishes “adorable” shape is not adorable at all, simply the natural pose of a Being devoid of hope or comfort. 

‘Is he...’ says the head of bio-security, ‘is he ok, Sir, do you think?’ 

‘He’s fine,’ says the Commander. 

I raise a finger in the air, ‘I am not.’ 

‘Excellent, excellent. So, Varim, take a day to settle in, and we will be in touch tomorrow.’ 

In an instant the screen goes blank, and I am alone. This is it. This is where I am going to die, starfished on the floor of a strange land, surrounded by broken crockery and scattered cleaning supplies, staring up at a dome-shaped light fitting set into a patchy, flaking ceiling. I brace for it, but after ten minutes, when death fails to arrive, I roll over onto a sharp elbow and look around. 

There are grey tiles lining the small kitchen floor, cream cupboard doors with shining steel handles, if I dare stretch my neck I can see a long, shining tap dripping steadily over a sink. I would like to curl into a neat ball, close my eyes against the monstrosities of my sapien body and primitive dwelling, and remain here for however many weeks this nightmare would last.  

But I am here, and this planet needs help. Also, there is a smell.  

I army-crawl my way past the short breakfast bar, pushing broken plates from my path, toward where the tiles end and a sensible cream carpet begins, and stick out my head to investigate.  

A simple, office chair, a lone lamp, a low, sleek coffee table. At the far end, an open patio door leading out to a small balcony through which the most disturbingly delightful aroma wafts in and lands squarely in my face. I could curl up into a ball and stay close to the transport hatch, wait this nightmare out. I could cut ties with this entire planet, leave it to its fate, wash my hands of it. I could get a different job. I could make sandwiches. I am very good at sandwiches, nice, simple, safe sandwiches. 

I know that, but somehow my useless, death-seeking sapien body has already crawled onto the balcony, feeling the warm radiation of the closest star on my back as I reach a pale, shaking hand up to the small brick wall and peek over the top. 

Bombay on Beaufort 

There are swarms of them. Sapiens everywhere. Walking around each other, standing hand in hand, carrying goods, coming in and out of doors, trapping each other in doorways and saying, ‘Sorry! You go,’ ‘No! You go,’ and then laughing about it, as if nothing was wrong, as if life as they knew it would go on forever, as if their planet is not hurtling toward mass extinction. 

No, I can’t possibly fix this mess. I need to get back to the ship. Immediately. My useless sapien mouth is full of saliva. I will go right back to the ship. Right after I go and find out what they sell down there at Bombay on Beaufort.