By Tanner Linares
We had been wandering the rainbow-colored
sea for roughly six Earth-days, and although the water was drinkable and we had
plenty of supplies on our vessel before we’d need to resort to that, it was
becoming clearer and clearer to us that we had vastly underestimated the size
of the place.
“Hey,”
Stacy grabbed my arm. “We’re going to run out of food.”
“What
are you talking about?” I asked her. “We still have weeks’ worth of food! You
worry too much. We’re going to be fine.”
“We
have been out here for six days. I told you we should have aimed closer. Now
we’re lost and we’re going to starve to death!”
“Stop,
ok? We’re not gonna starve to death. And we are not lost.”
“Oh,
please. We’re absolutely lost! When you sail on for six straight days and your
only moniker for direction is ‘keep going forward, keep moving straight ahead’
but we have still yet to reach the destination, I think it qualifies us as being
lost.”
“I
don’t think you know what moniker means.”
“AS
IF THAT IS THE POINT, VERN!” She
stomped her foot on the ground and stormed off to her quarters.
I
looked around the vast, empty rainbow sea. It was beautiful, regardless of the
endless sameness. An entire sea made of a liquid that was literally rainbow-colored. It didn’t make sense, but there it was. I looked into the railing and
saw the reflection of the sky above, which shined the color of limes and swirled
with a hint of cream. I took a deep breath in through my nose and the scent of
something that reminded me of vanilla snaked its way inside. Oddly enough, though
we were moving at a relatively brisk pace, I felt an inordinate lack of wind
and/or wind-resistance that defied the laws of motion. As the sea sloshed
beneath our interplanetary vessel, I knew what I had to do.
Creeping
my way down to the lower areas of the ship, I did my best to keep my movement
silent and blend into the world naturally. I stood staring at the door to Stacy’s
quarters. I wanted to walk in, but I knew what would happen. It was not the time,
and it would benefit nobody. I went back to the top of the ship and found the
orbital shots we had used to plot out the trip. I closely analyzed where we’d
landed and how we set off. I checked in with the nav-systems’ history to see
how we’d moved and how far, and then crosschecked it with the orbital shots.
By god, she was right. I thought to
myself.
So,
I set the course adjustments as needed, turning the ship around and angling it
in the right direction. We sailed off and I waited for the right time. Some
hours passed by. Soon an entire Earth-day had gone, but I refused to rest until
I knew I had done it right. Though we’d yet to experience anything other than
full daylight on the planet, the passage of time was not at all lost on me. Finally,
something came into view. I went full-speed ahead and came out exactly where I
needed. I saw the trees sprouting from the ground, hundreds of feet in the air,
with that beautiful purple healing fruit we had searched for for so long. I
felt the edges of my mouth crack as they crept toward my ears. I made my way
back to Stacy’s quarters.
I
tentatively pushed open the door, and saw her curled up into a ball in the
corner of her bed. There was a broken lamp on the ground and papers were strewn about. Slowly I made my way to her and sat down next to her. I pushed lightly
on her shoulder.
“Hey,”
I said softly, “Stacy. We’re there.”
She
turned slowly to face me, her eyes shimmering with isolation and wonder. “We
are?” She asked me, voice cracking as though she’d forgotten how to speak.
“Yeah.
Come look.”
I
grabbed her hand and led her to the main deck. As we stood staring at the
wondrous place we’d just arrived at, she started to laugh, and to cry. She
hugged me and pulled me toward her.
“You
brought us here for me,” she wept.
“Well,”
I began, “of course I did.”
At that moment, I knew we could handle whatever came next.
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