I spent much of my time meditating in the ship’s largest breathing chamber. Most were not allowed to enter these spaces for more than a highly monitored few minutes, but my unique hero status got me whatever I wanted, including unlimited breathing room time. Okwu didn’t join me here because its gas wasn’t good for the plants, plus it didn’t like the smell of the air. For me, the fragrant aroma of the many species of oxygen-producing plants and the moist air required to keep them alive was perfect for my peace of mind. And the otjize on my skin remained at its most velvety smooth here.
The three days passed, as time always does when you are alive, whether happy or tortured. And soon, I was strapping myself in my black landing chair and watching the earth get closer and closer.
When we entered the atmosphere, the sunlight touched my skin and the sweet familiar sensation brought tears to my eyes. Then my okuoko relaxed on my shoulders as I felt the sunshine on them for the first time. Even being what they were, my okuoko knew the feeling of home. After we landed and the ship settled at its gate, I sat back and looked out the window at the blue sky.
I laughed.
At Home
A week ago, Oomza University Relations instructed Okwu and me to wait two hours for everyone to exit the ship before we did when we arrived on Earth.
“But why?” I’d asked.
“So there is no trouble,” both of the reps we’d been meeting with had said simultaneously.
It had been over a hundred years since a Meduse had come to Khoush lands, and never had one arrived in peace. The reps told us the launch port would be cleared for exactly one hour, except for my family, representatives, officials, and media from the local Khoush city of Kokure and my hometown of Osemba. A special shuttle would drive Okwu, me, and my family to my village.
The two hours we waited allowed me to shake off my landing weakness. I wore my finest red long stiff wrapper and silky orange top, my edan and astrolabe nestled deep in the front pocket of my top. I’d also put all my metal anklets back on. I did a bit of my favorite traditional dance before my room’s mirror to make sure I’d put them on well. The fresh otjize I’d rubbed on every part of my body felt like assuring hands. I’d even rolled three of Okwu’s okuoko with otjize; this would please my family, even if it annoyed the Khoush people. To Meduse, touching those hanging long tentacles was like touching a human’s long hair, it wasn’t all that intimate, but Okwu wouldn’t let just anyone touch them. But it let me. Covering them with so much otjize, Okwu told me, made it feel a little intoxicated.
“Everything is . . . happy,” it had said, sounding perplexed about this state.
“Good,” I said, grinning. “That way, you won’t be so grumpy when you meet everyone. Khoush like politeness and the Himba expect a sunny disposition.”
“I will wash this off soon,” it said. “It’s not good to feel this pleased with life.”
We walked down the hallway and when we rounded a curve, it opened into the ship’s exit. For a moment, I could see everyone out there before they saw me. Three news drones hovered feet away from the entrance. The carpeting before the exit was a sharp red. I blinked and touched my forehead, pushing, shoving the dark thoughts away.
I spotted my family, standing there in a group, then another group of Khoush and Himba welcoming officials. I hadn’t told my family about my hair not being hair anymore, that it was now a series of alien tentacles resulting from the Meduse genetics being introduced to mine; that they had sensation and did other things I was still coming to understand. I could hide my okuoko with otjize, especially when I spoke with my family through my astrolabe where they couldn’t see how my okuoko sometimes moved on their own. Won’t be able to hide them for long now, I thought.
Any moment, I would exit and they would all see me. I slowed down and took a deep breath, let it out and took in another. I held a hand out behind me for Okwu to wait. Then I knelt down, swiped some otjize from my cheek, and touched it to the ship’s floor. My prayer to the Seven was brief and wordless but within it, I asked them to bless the Third Fish, too. “This interstellar traveling beast holds a part of my soul,” I whispered. “Please give her a safe delivery and may her child be heavy, strong, as adventurous as her mother and as lovely.” I wished the Third Fish could understand me and thus understand my thanks and I felt one of my okuoko twitch. As if in response, the entire ship rumbled. I gasped, grinning, delighted. I pressed my palm more firmly to the floor. Then I stood and walked to the exit.
I stepped out of the ship before Okwu, so the sound of my mother’s scream reached my ears immediately. “Binti!” Then there was a mad rush and I was suddenly in a crush of bodies, half of them covered in otjize (only the women and girls of the Himba use the otjize). Mother. Father. Brothers. Sisters. Aunts. Uncles. Cousins.
“My daughter is well!”
“Binti!”
“We’ve missed you!”
“Look at you!”
“The Seven is here!”
When everyone let go, I started sobbing as I clung to my mother, holding my father’s hand as he followed close behind. I caught my brother Bena’s eye as he flicked one of my otjize-heavy locks with his hand. Thankfully, this didn’t hurt much. “You’re hair has grown,” he said. I grinned at him, but said nothing. My sisters started swinging their long thick otjize–palm rolled locks side to side and singing a welcome song, my brothers clapping a beat.
And then it all stopped. I stopped in mid-sob. My parents stopped joyously laughing. Bena was looking behind me with wide eyes, his mouth agape as he pointed. I slowly turned around. For a moment, I was two people—a Himba girl who knew her history very very well and a Himba girl who’d left Earth and become part-Meduse in space. The dissonance left me breathless.
Okwu filled the exit with its girth. Its three otjize-covered okuoko were waving about, as if in zero gravity, one of them whipping before its dome violently, as if signing some sort of insult. Its light blue semitransparent thin-fleshed dome was protected by the clear metal armor it’d created on Oomza Uni. From the bottom front of its dome protruded its large white toothlike stinger.
Behind me, I heard clattering and the sound of booted footsteps rushing into the room. When I turned, one of the Khoush soldiers had already brought forth his gun and fired it. Bam! Screams, running, someone or maybe some two were grabbing and pulling at me. I dug in my heels, yanked at my arms. A small burst of fire bloomed in the carpet at Okwu’s tentacles. Inches from Okwu, feet from the Third Fish.
“What are you doing?” I shouted. Oh no, I thought, a moan in my gut. I felt Okwu’s rage flare, a burning in my scalp, a fire igniting in me, as well. The anger. Not in front of my family! Unclean, unclean, I thought. I was unclean. Okwu made no sound or move, but I knew in moments, every soldier, maybe every one in this room would be dead . . . except possibly me. The Meduse do not kill family, but did that include “family through battle?”