‘People’s biggest fear is getting kicked to the margins,’ said Nuru, the course instructor, who graciously took time to speak with me afterward. ‘Everybody’s got a great-aunt or uncle sitting around the hex, grumbling about how their parents were sidelined when they made market hops in the pre-membership days. Everybody hears horror stories about Human slums or whatever, and they come in here with exciting ambitions but a huge fear of ending up homeless or mistreated. Life outside the Fleet isn’t like that anymore, not if you’re smart about it. Times have changed. There are rough places in the galaxy, yeah, but that’s what my class is for. That’s what this whole centre is for. We want to give people the best start we possibly can.’
I asked Nuru why he spends his days training people for life elsewhere when he himself lives in the Fleet. ‘I lived on Fasho Mal for ten years,’ he said. ‘I loved it, every second. I loved the sky, the open space, the dirt, all of it. But I came home when my mom got sick last standard. Our hex was taking good care of her, but . . . how could I not? So, now I help people get ready for their lives on Fasho Mal, or wherever it is they’re headed. It’s the next best thing to being there myself. At least someone gets to go, right?’
Not everyone agrees with that sentiment. The majority of my time spent in the Fleet has been a delight, but I have, on rare occasion, encountered individuals less approving of my presence. I crossed paths with one of these on my way to the resource centre – not an elderly person, as you might have expected, but a man somewhere in his middle years.
‘We don’t need you,’ he shouted at me as Isabel and I approached the centre. It was clear from the way my skin puckered as he came close that he was intoxicated.
At first, I was not sure if he was addressing me. In hindsight, Isabel knew, as she began to walk more quickly, but in my ignorance, I stopped my cart to make sense of the situation. ‘Are you speaking to me?’ I asked.
The man did not answer my question, but continued on as if that point were obvious. ‘We’re Exodans. We belong here. You get that? You’re not like us. You don’t understand what we need.’
Isabel tried to get me to move away, but I assured her I was fine. ‘I want to hear what he has to say,’ I said. I gestured my willingness to listen to the man, even though he would not understand, even though I believe it only agitated him more. ‘I do not understand why you are angry at me.’
‘Whatever you’re here to teach, take it home,’ he said. ‘Take it home. We don’t need you.’
‘I’m not here to teach,’ I said. ‘I’m here to learn.’
The clarification confused the man, and I admit that I cannot relay what his reply was, for the remainder of it did not make much sense. The underlying intent was anger, though. That much I can say for certain.
‘You’re embarrassing yourself,’ Isabel said curtly. ‘Go sober up.’ My host is gracious and kind, dear guest, but even to my alien ears, she can be quite assertive when the situation calls for it. I thought it best to follow her into the resource centre at that point, as it was clear nothing else of value would be gained from the exchange. Isabel apologised for the encounter (which was hardly her fault or that of her people, but I understood her embarrassment all the same). I told her it was nothing. I have weathered far worse in academic review. But the exchange did colour my time at the resource centre, and I was thinking of it still as I spoke with Nuru later on. I asked him if this was a sentiment he encountered often.
He replied, with weariness, that it was. ‘I get told that I don’t deserve the food in my mouth and the walls around me,’ he said, ‘because I’m taking away instead of giving back. I’m taking away the people who grow the food and maintain the walls, is how they see it. Look – there’s no denying that more Exodans are leaving than coming back, but we’re hardly in danger of dying out. Farms are still working. Water’s still flowing. The Fleet is fine. The people I teach, they’d leave whether or not classes were available to them. But if they left without taking a class or two, they won’t know what’s what out there. That way lies trouble. All we’re doing is giving them the tools they need to stay safe. Exodans helping Exodans. Isn’t that what we’re supposed to be about?’
I asked Isabel her opinion of the centre once we had left – as an elder, as someone who had watched friends leave and trends unfold across decades. My host was noncommittal.
‘Knowledge should always be free,’ she said. ‘What people do with it is up to them.’
Kip
Everything was tingly. Kip had thoughts beyond that one, amazing thoughts that people probably needed to hear. Toes were weird – like really weird, if you thought about it. Thinking was weird, too. He could think about what he was thinking about. Did that mean that there was a separate part of him? A thinking part and a . . . thinking thinking part? That was a super good idea, but first: cake. Man, he loved cake. He wished he had a cake. He imagined a cake so big he could put his face down into it and the frosting would rise up and up around him, like the waves of seafoam in the theatre vids, only thick, dense, enveloping him, taking the place of air, sliding in closer and closer and – and no, no, that was scary. He didn’t like cake. Cake needed to stay small and manageable and away from his nostrils.
Kip had those thoughts, and more besides, but as soon as they’d bubble up, they were drowned out, washed away by the thought – The Thought – that dominated all others.
Everything was really, really tingly.
‘Do you ever wonder,’ Ras said. He was tapping the tip of his nose with the tip of his finger, drumming, pulsing. Kip watched him do so for a short eternity. Tap. Tap. Tap. ‘Do you ever wonder about, like – okay, you’re sitting here.’
‘Yeah.’
‘And I’m sitting here.’
‘Yeah.’
‘We’re sharing this . . . this moment.’
‘Yeah.’
‘But are we really?’ Ras looked deeply concerned. ‘Because think about it. I’m seeing this, right?’ He gestured at the oxygen garden, tracing angled lines outward from his eyes. ‘But you – you’re seeing this.’ He touched the sides of Kip’s face and drew a different set of lines.
‘Whoa,’ Kip giggled. ‘Your hands are so weird.’
‘Dude, listen, this is – this is important. What you see is different from what I see. And nobody’s ever seen this before. Nobody’s ever seen the oxygen garden exactly like I’m seeing it, but it’s – it’s not like you’re seeing it. Kip, we’re – we’re not sharing anything. Nobody has ever shared anything.’
Kip looked at Ras for a long time – or maybe a short time? A time. He looked at him for a time. He blinked. He laughed, but quietly, because he remembered they were supposed to be quiet, and that part was very important. ‘I have no idea what you just said.’
Ras stared at Kip, and he started laughing, too. ‘You’re such an idiot.’
Kip shut his eyes and nodded, still laughing. He fell back into the grassy bed. He could feel every blade of grass, bending to hold him like a million caring hands. They were in the centre of the garden, the best place in the garden, the quietest, tallest, most hidden place, the place where you could actually lie down surrounded by bushes and little trees and leaves leaves leaves. Plants were good. Plants were so good. He loved plants, and he loved smash, and he loved Ras, and he loved life. He loved himself. Wow. He loved himself. Everything was . . . was so . . . tingly.