Space Geographer

I’m okay. My hands shakily survey each part of me. Nothing is broken. Not even my spacesuit. But I can’t say the same for my ship. The observatory window is smashed in, shards of glass like teeth haphazardly sitting in rotting gums are what’s left in place. Outside, the atmosphere is a deep shade of vermillion, it looks like light orange clouds are floating in the sky. With a grunt, I sit up and take in my immediate surroundings, I’ve got to assess the damage. Cabinets and compartments are opened, all sorts of instruments, knobs, and documents, as well as my rations are strewn across the ship. Electrical tape hangs loose in sticky clumps from the ceiling, and perspiration has collected inside my helmet, dripping down like sweat. Is it hot here? It’s really hard to tell through the suit. Then the offending thought: Where is here? I’ve crash landed, but where?

When I signed up to be a Space Geographer, I never imagined this happening. I got that it was a diverse discipline that sought to understand our world and others, but… Swiftly, my brain starts to ache as distressing images of the crash assault my sense. Flashing red lights, warning sirens, deep breathes. Gravity attacking the hull of my ship, pressing and crunching it inward around me with ease as if she was nothing more than an aluminum can. A foreign planet always in view of my observation window. I remember the dread in the pit of my stomach knowing that that’s where I’d have to touch down. With systems offline though, there’s no way for me to tell where in the universe I have crash landed. 

Clutching at the glass dome surrounding my head, I inhale and exhale as smoothly as my rattled self will allow. I check my oxygen — it’s low. Shit. I probably don’t have any extra canisters either. It’s okay. I can get through this. I shift my weight and stand up, the extra bulk of my suit making this simple motion a feat, but I manage and stumble my way over the the dash. Lights are out, the glass plates are cracked, and it really looks like I’m not going to be able to restart the system. Giving it a try anyways, I flick at all the right knobs and switches. Nothing seems to be happening. My suit warns me that my heart rate is picking up. That’ll eat through my oxygen faster. Taking one deep breath, I turn to face the observatory window, maybe, just maybe I’ve landed on a planet that supports life? That could be a blessing or a problem, but there’s only one way to find out. And it’s worth it. If I stay here, I’ll surly run out of oxygen and suffocate in my bulky silver skin.

Another deep breath and a couple of steps forward and I’m at the edge of my comfort and the edge of my ship. I grasp at the shards of glass, pulling and twisting them from the window. Outside, the land looks like loose, rippled red sand. Or is it soil? In the distance, large ruby-coloured dunes line the horizon. It reminds me of the Sahara Desert back home. Home. Earth… I sigh. Turning back, I collect what I can for supplies and rations, including a translator complete with hundreds of languages, both human and alien. Wrapping my provisions tightly in a grey long-sleeved shirt, I tie my bundle to a scrap of ship and wander back over to the observatory window. But I stop in my tracks. Something is moving out there…

Quickly, as if nothing at all, a flash of darkness spills across the broken observatory window. I barely saw it but I know I saw it. Every muscle in my body is pinched tight. I way my options as I fight to override the flight sensation clinging to me like a weighted blanket.

“He-hello?” I venture forward a couple more steps, the weight of my body crunching down on broken glass and plastic. The thing, whatever it is, doesn’t move. It doesn’t make any sound at all, and for a moment I wonder if I’ve made it up. Perhaps I’m hallucinating from the thinning oxygen. Maybe I should risk taking off my helmet? The thought comes out of nowhere, shocking me. My eyes burn with dryness from staring at the mouth of my ship, at the almost sinister-looking red soil blowing in a slight breeze, and at what could be either the greatest discovery of my career, or the greatest mistake I will ever make.

Grasping at the slick glass and insulating fabric, I release the pressure and tear off my helmet. Holding my breath — a fruitless effort, but one I pursue nonetheless — for a moment, then another, then I can’t anymore and I’m forced to exhale only to find myself still alive. Mental note: red, sandy alien planet sustains human life. So far. A small smile creeps across my damp face, the surprisingly cool air fanning at my skin in small whiffs as an almost sulphuric breeze surrounds me.

Overriding my fear of the unknown and stuffing it down below my excitement for discovery, I strip off the heavy material covering my body. Once free from my protective suit, I take a tentative step out of the mouth of the ship and into the soft sand. It embraces my shoes with a familiarity akin to that of stepping into a pile of playdough. Quick side glances let me know I am in fact alone. Whatever it was I saw moments before is now gone. Perhaps the species that inhabit this foreign planet are shy, timid creatures.

“The question is… what do I do now?” My voice is wicked away like a bead of sweat on a runner’s brow, lost in a terrestrial atmosphere. The litheness of my body without the spacesuit on this strange planet is a sensation unlike anything I’ve felt before and I can’t help the feelings of mania blooming inside me. Scanning my surroundings, the bloody red mountains are further away than at first glance, their peaks are swamped in wispy orange and pink clouds. There seems to be no obvious vegetation or water in sight and the entire landscape is made up of shades of red, orange, and rose. The air is thick, warm, and stinky. Oddly enough, I feel like I’m being fermented in a large red jar. But this thought passes quickly when interrupted by a soft clicking noise echoing from behind me. Every hair stands up on my skin. My body is a field of grass in a storm.

One… Two… Three… My breaths are slow and deep. My skin is cool and tingles like menthol leaking throughout my body. Four… Five… with wide eyes and a weak war cry, I spin around, everything is a blur of red until it isn’t. Standing at five and a half feet tall with bumpy, dark green skin hanging loosely around a barrel-shaped body, is an unflattering, unknown creature. A strangled noise escapes me, like a balloon wheezing out the last of its air. I cannot believe this, there’s an actual alien standing in front of me! Other Space Geographers brag about their vague encounters with other species, and, I mean, we do have alien languages built into the translator, so someone, 

somewhere, must’ve run into aliens at some point. But now I have, too! Me. 

Times when my younger brother and I would play with our plastic green alien figurines while sprawled across the beige shag carpet in my childhood home invade my thoughts. Roaming through unknown landscapes and terrorizing a make-believe society of dimwitted humans… Those extraterrestrial-fuelled days are a major part of why I’m here today on this foreign planet, encountering a real life foreign species. I just wish my brother was here to see this, too.

The creature emits that faint clicking noise again, and the hairs all across my body are back to standing at attention. It’s as if the thing is trying to communicate with me. Can it not speak? Does it have a gender? Am I in any danger? The creature is bipedal, extending from its keg-shaped body are long, toothpick-like limbs, the arms are twice as long as the legs and are dragging in the red soil behind the creature. The skin on each limb sits in loose rolls, like green Eighties leg warmers. I take a couple of steps to the side to get a better view the creature, and it does the same. Circling around each other like in an old spaghetti western movie, I almost want to laugh. Until I see the nefarious-looking nails capping each fingertip. At just over two inches long, the creature’s nails are sharp, yellow, and caked with dirt and other filths. What do you use those for, I wonder… As if capable of hearing and understanding my thoughts, the creature begins clicking at me again. I freeze. Can it hear my thoughts? 

There’s something very human about this thing that stands before me. This idea is incredibly unsettling but it lands hard and sticks like rubber cement to my brain. I can feel anxiety seeping into each fold of the greyish pink organ resting inside my skull. I’ve got to shake this off! I’m a goddamn Space Geographer! It is my mission to explore new landscapes and report back on what I find. It is my mission to bridge the knowledge gap between man and unexplored territory! Opening the makeshift sack full of supplies I piled together, I find the translator. It’s a sleek grey remote-like rectangle with a half-moon glass panel and a faded persimmon dial. I’m more relieved than ever before that the device has a microphone and speaker built in for listening and interpreting languages, as I wouldn’t even have the faintest idea where to begin when trying to decode something that sounds like what I imagine a cockroach on AMR would sound like. It is such a completely perplexing noise that it almost seems fitting to belong to an alien. Aiming the microphone at the gaping maw of this life-sized pickle of a creature, I fiddle with the dial, hoping, no praying that something will come of this. What I find is even more unsettling than the distinct thought that this brined vegetable-like creature is quite human… 

“Mask… quick… mask…”

“Mask? What do you mean? What are you trying to say?” I ask, my breathing catching in my throat, like a piece of food I can’t quite swallow. Though, somehow I think I already know what this creature is getting at. I shouldn’t have taken off my helmet. But why? I can clearly breathe with no problem, the atmosphere of this strange planet supports both human and alien life. Is there something more that I’m unaware of? Perhaps some environmental disaster that is about to occur? 

The alien takes a step backwards, looking as if it’s about to take off. 

“Wait! What are you trying to tell me?” I ask again, desperation burning at the edges of my voice. The creature gestures its hand towards me, curling each of its fingernails inwards, then it begins to turn around and walk away, slowly. I think it’s trying to tell me to follow, and so I do. No hesitation this time, my boots sink into the soft red soil with each step I take. The thick atmosphere is naturally warm and balmy, and as far as the eye can see, everything continues to exist in shades of warm reds, oranges, pinks, and golds. What an unusual planet… if nothing else comes from this adventure, at least I had the opportunity to explores something entirely fascinating and otherworldly. 

The creature and I walk along the base of a deep red mountain for what feels like a couple of hours. I’m a couple of feet behind the creature for my own safely. Having drank most of my water, I still feel parched and my throat is tight and tasting sour with each swallow. I’ve stripped off my outer layer and tied it around my waist and have since noticed the sensation that my skin somehow feels thicker. It looks as if a slight rash has begun to develop on my arms, and possibly elsewhere. But the oddest thing is that there’s a discolouration to my skin that is abnormal. All the rashes I’ve ever had in my life leave my skin covered in red, bumpy, itchy hives. This one isn’t itchy, but rather bumpy and almost green. A woozy sensation trickles through my body each time I think about what is happening to my skin, so I try to focus on my surroundings and on the creature leading the way.

By the time we ceased walking, the boiling sun had faded into the horizon. Long, purple shadows now stretch across the heaping, woozy sand. Sweat has permeated my shirt and hair, curling and matting it to my skull. My water is empty and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t worried about when my next drink would be. 

“Where are we?” I ask the creature, watching as it presses its fingers against the side of the mountain we’ve stopped at, the smooth stone is flawless save for some fine cracks running vertically up the length of the mountain. The creature mashes its fingers against the stone, reaching into each crack and grunting with what I assume is dissatisfaction before trying at another crack. Almost as if it’s looking for something… maybe a way in? The thought surprises me and I find myself helping, pressing my hands against the stone and feeling the coolness of it sooth my skin. I close my eyes for a moment, my chest heaving in relief. A rumbling sensation drums through the stone and into my fingertips, vibrating my eyes open and at attention. I scan my surroundings and find that the creature has wedged itself half in a crack. It grunts and wiggles itself further into the crack, its green bubbly body bulging with the effort, like a soft baked loaf of bread rising too far out of the pan. The creature then slips entirely into the mountain and with a deep breath, I follow after it. What I can only assume is the entrance to its shelter or home looks rather narrow and bleak. Peering inside, there’s nothing but darkness.

“Okay… I guess I go in?” The words leave my mouth and echo off the rock. Swallowing hard, I force down the nervousness building inside me, “I’ve come this far, I might as well…” 

I cannot help myself. I am unnerved. It’s cold, too. And damp. Each surface I grasp at is slick and difficult. I want to call out for the creature to make sure I’m not alone, but a part of me wonders if I’ve been led into a trap. A chill runs across me, like an itch I cannot scratch. I cannot tell if it’s just me shaking or if it’s the mountain that’s shaking, like a body quivering in the cold.

My breathing is quick and painful. Count to ten, then repeat… Vibrations, like a steady drum pounding below me sync with my rapid heart rate, when suddenly a bright light shines in the distance as if there’s a crack in the base of the mountain. I pause and hold my breath, listening. The sounds of carefully placed feet navigating the terrain ahead of me give me hope that I’m not alone and I’m almost out of this. Following the sounds, I wander closer and closer to the light, my raw fingers grasping at the slick stone surrounding me and pulling me forward. And the air that hits my face once I break free from the stone is so sweet and fresh, then very soon after it starts to sour like spoiled milk, wrinkling my noise. A flash of green catches my eyes and I can feel my jaw drop and knees grow weak. Wobbling, I crash into the wet stone beneath my feet. 

“What the hell…”

In clusters, like some horrific science experiment… what I can only assume are people, that vaguely resemble somewhere between myself and the creature that led me here, writhe and twist. Moaning, clicking, and gasping for air, their skin bubbles and pops, there’s a green hue underneath the first couple of layers of flesh. They are mangled together in a hellish way, like melting metal and it’s enough for me to bring up all the water I had consumed earlier. Loose and fast, the liquid dribbles down my chin and the front of my shirt with each heave. My fists grip at the fabric across my torso, squeezing it tight until it hurts. All around me, stalagmites and stalactites emerge from the rough, wet stone, like teeth in a cancerous mouth. Torn t-shirts, boots, and splintered helmets litter the uneven ground, pale and drenched. A crack way up high in the cavernous space sheds light down on the equivalent of the pits of hell. 

I am reminded of the smashed observatory window in my ship, and my eyes well up. I should have never left that fucking ship… I never would’ve seen… this. Never would’ve known. Dying of a lack of oxygen would have been a better way to go than the disturbing reality I am now aware I will have to endure. It’s suddenly clear to me now why the creature that led me into the belly of this mountain looks like a fucking brined vegetable. This goddamn planet is nothing more than a steamed pickle jar, and lost explorers, lost Space Geographers are the vegetables inside. The proof writhes in front of me and inside me, there’s no denying that I will not be returning home from this expedition.