Meteors

At the end of the day I left Nandi went home to my tree tent. I was looking forward to just flopping down and sleeping off the feeling of… alien. Not the world so much as me. I felt like an outsider, some interloper that was nosing her way into a place she really had no business. It’s hard to describe. It’s sort of like stumbling into your grandma’s closet and realizing she has a huge collection of leather bondage gear stashed in there, or a secret lab where she’s engineering five meter tall poodles. You realize you don’t know anything about your grandma, and despair of ever feeling connected ever again. It’s disconcerting.

So I went back to the tree tent. Or, well, where I’d left the tree tent. It was neatly flattened against the branches of the host tree, now. My things had been left in a tidy pile at the tree’s base. Most of them, anyway. Upon further inspection, my pack had a decided lack of ration bars. The wrappers had been carefully rolled into little bundles and stuffed in one pocket of my pack, but there wasn’t a single bar left. I couldn’t even find any crumbs! The biofoam injector was also missing. I found it a meter away, upside down and half-buried in the ground between two of the tree’s larger roots (fortunately, it still works. It’s a field injector, so it’s made to withstand getting tap-danced on by an elephant or something.)

I have a sneaking suspicion of who “helped” me unpack. I guess I’m sleeping out tonight. Hopefully the “small biters” Nandi mentioned won’t bother me.

I repacked my things and stashed them in the crook of one of the lower branches of my tree. Then I went in search of dinner. I briefly thought of taking the biofoam and sneaking up on Nohwasi for vengeance, but I still don’t know what a genuine fear reaction is for an Azu-nah. It may be to scratch the offender’s face off. Not something I want to test. Not with my face, anyway.

Dinner was... odd. The clan had a huge amount of food set out, and everyone was tucking in with far more gusto than I’d seen before. At previous suppers the Azu-nah were leasurly to the point of excess, with more reasonable sized meal. They’d slowly enjoy each piece and would sit and worry at shells or bones afterward while chatting with a neighbor. Tonight, they were all much more focused on their food, and were putting it away pretty quickly, like a person late for work. The types of food were different too. Normally, meat constituted maybe one quarter or less of their meals. The more abundant tubers, nuts, and that odd grassy stuff were the staple. Tonight, though, meat and fruits (all the really, really sweet ones) were the main components tonight.

I took a seat by Kohric and Nandi. They kept plying more and more things into my lap and urging me to “eat much!” Kohric must have read my puzzled expression as I gnawed at a fruit. “Tomorrow we must walk for many days,” he explained. “Little water, very little food. We must eat much tonight, or we will hunger much when we walk.”

I’m beginning to really resent the terrible trio for snarfing my ration bars.

It was getting pretty dark by the time the meal was over. Most everyone had simply flopped over around the dim embers of the meal fires, stomachs budging. The talk had dulled to a gentle murmur. The night animals were relatively quiet. It was actually very peaceful, save for the occasional belch (Azu burps are pretty scary. They’re kinda growly, and it seems like they go on too long.)

The sky was dark enough that the stars were out. There’s very little that’s more beautiful than a clear night sky. And I mean a real night sky, not one that’s all dulled by the lights of civilization. This was the type of night when it was clear and crisp, and the stars absolutely blazed overhead. It was gorgeous.

I lay on my back with my head resting on my arms. Nandi had wiggled up to lay behind me, like a warm headrest. We were enjoying the view when someone suddenly spoke out excitedly, “Imi-azuku!”

Everyone snapped alert. Nandi jumped up and my head dropped gracelessly to the ground. There was a lot of pointing all around me. High in one part of the sky were dozens of flashing sparks of light, like shining rain—a meteor shower.

“Imi-azuku! Imi-azuku!”



All around me the Azu-nah were gazing upward, all looking joyful. Kohric came to sit nearby. “Imi-azuku,” he said, “is very … important to Azu-nah. Imi is fall, come. Azuku is… star that is inside.” He tapped his forehead with a finger. “This is of much joy.”

I don’t entirely understand what Kohric was saying, but suffice to say that the Azu-nah view shooting stars as a kind of spirit or omen. It was beautiful to see D’Keda so happy.