To Each, Their Stars

It took Paddington twenty minutes to wipe off my tears.

“Looks like you have calmed down.” Reina sounded relieved. “I went to the kitchen to get some drinks for us. Here you go.”

“Thanks, I feel better now… and sorry. I lost my composure there. By the way, what is this?”

“Tea.”

Tea? I looked at the white, ceramic mug she handed to me; a hot, brown liquid was inside, from which I could see aromatic steam rise. Certainly, it did look like Earth’s tea; but it must be something else, considering who offered it. Maybe it is a Rah’tanian brew? I wondered how it tasted like.

I took a sip. The aroma quickly faded, driven into exile by an overwhelming blandness. Then came the bitterness, one that threatened all that is good in the universe and eventually made me a coffee drinker…

A taste I was all too familiar with.

“Reina. How, no, why… why did you get the non-Gold Yorkshire tea?”

The unpleasant, but nostalgic, aftertaste of over-brewed cheap tea lingered in my mouth.

“There are different Yorkshire teas?” The mushroom lady seemed lost. “I am really sorry! My knowledge of human tea culture is still lacking.”

“No no no, it’s not a problem. I am grateful that you managed get me a taste of home.” I wasn’t expecting Reina to apologise. “But how did you make it? I don’t think supermarkets here sell tea bags…”

“The kitchen here can synthesise any food in the galaxy, if it had been scanned by the machine before. The taste is really similar to the original, too.”

So Reina had real, non-Gold Yorkshire tea before.

“May I ask you one thing?” There is something I wanted to confirm.

“Of course! What would you like to know?”

“Perhaps… considering your name and your mannerisms… maybe, just maybe, you are very interested in human culture?”

“How did you know?” Reina exclaimed. In a cute anime girl voice, that is.

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A warm cup of tea in her “hand”, Reina began to tell her story.

“I have adored Earth and humanity since I was born.”

“Rah’tan, our mother planet and the cradle of our species, is a paradise where all creatures can thrive. From verdant forests to arid desserts, from great plains to heavenly mountain ranges, from expansive continents to primordial oceans, Rah’tan has it all. It is said that every creature can find a home on Rah’tan.

“The nature’s bounty is plenty. Food, minerals, sunshine or the lack thereof --- there is no shortage of any of them. There is no need to compete over resources; no need to fight for your life; no strife to speak of. Creatures evolved to coexist, often over long lives and producing few offsprings. We are no exception.”

“Sounds like a good place to live.”

“But it is precisely because it is a paradise, that it is also a prison of the mind.

“As you might have noticed, we Rah’tanians are sentient colonies of fungus. We took this form after tens of millions of years of evolution. Our society was formed in a million-year peace. Generations after generations of Rah’tanians formed and withered in small villages, scattered around the globe, following the same traditions passed from ancestors, whose names are long lost to history. We wished not for exploration and expansion, but to preserve our way of life unto eternity. It didn’t change even our tentacles reached the stars.”

“But Reina,” I objected, “you are different.”

“See, we Rah’tanians have no concept of family. We reproduce by growing our excess body tissues in a communal vat over centuries, after all. And we tend to get imprinted by the first thing we see after we obtain consciousness. For me, it was a human vintage TV set that can receive signal from Earth, that just happened to be put in front of the vat. It seems the villagers were watching me grow while watching human TV at the same time.

…Must be one of the Federation’s diplomatic gifts to Rah’tan. That was how it was used?

“As I opened my eyes for the first time, I was baptised by the power of anime. Unfamiliar languages, surreal actions and peculiar art notwithstanding, I was immediately mesmerised. Crowded cities, incessant traffic, and characters fighting to hold onto their dear lives. A world torn asunder by war and strive, yet dynamic beyond belief and, most importantly, determined to reach farther into the unknown. It was the antithesis of the life we, and our ancestors, had.”

“That’s why you chose a Japanese-sounding name, set your translator’s voice to an anime girl’s, and refers yourself as a female --- even though Rah’tanians, as I understood, are genderless.”

“You are exactly right, Connie!”

“But why did you come here? You could have gone to Earth as a diplomat for someone with your calibre. You could buy plenty of anime merch and have your fill of manga in Japan or something.”

“I wanted to do that. I chased after everything that came from Earth, and even tried to go onto an Earthbound ship once. But...

Reina looked up towards the limitless sky with an expression that I could not decode.

“I realised it was humanity’s spirit of exploration that I admired, and it was the unknown stars I wanted to reach. Look at the sky. Isn’t it beautifully unknown?”

As if they were gems on a maiden’s black veil, the stars were shining with all their brilliance. The green tint --- the subtle, dancing light from the barrier that moderates the weather on the Anchor --- graced the veil with a hint of colour.

A sight not dissimilar to the Nordic skies graced by aurora, I thought to myself. Among the unknown constellations lied familiar stars; hidden behind the dancing light was the unchanging Andromeda Galaxy. It was not just dissimilar. It was nostalgic.

I wondered what the sky was like in Reina’s eyes.

“Connie, you came here for to see the stars too, right?” Reina asked.

Even this line was nostalgic.

“No…” I hesitated. “I just had no choice. It’s not a bad deal anyways, the cybernetics fixed my frail body and I get to have my own research lab…”

“But Reddie said you agreed to come without hesitation, and you were crying about Earth just then. Surely there must be another reason?” Reina replied, using a nickname for Archon Burgundy.

“…Sorry.”

“Ah, I shouldn’t have asked. Sorry!” Realising her error, Reina bowed and apologised.

“It’s not a big deal. It’s nothing grand, unlike your spirit of discovery. I just need some time to sort out my feelings.”

“Is that so?” was the expression written all over on Reina’s cap, but she did not pursue the question any further. “Connie, let’s head back. We have work to do tomorrow and we deserve some good rest!”

She’s indeed a very bright person, and in many aspects, I thought.

…Yes, Reina. Curiosity was not why I looked up to the stars. It was something far less illustrious. Like how Polaris’ shine pales to Sirius’ inspiring brilliance, so was my reason to reach for the unknown: its glory tainted by a sorrowful darkness, yet its stalwart light was what guided my path.