Episode 78
Travelling Light E078S02 Transcript
H.R. Owen
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[Title music: rhythmic electronic folk.]
H.R. Owen
Travelling Light: Episode Seventy Eight.
[The music fades out.]
The Traveller
6th Nisa 851, continued.
Scarry walked with me to the door of my cabin. He leant against the bulkhead and ran an assessing eye over me.
“Do you need me to stay?”
I shook my head. “No. No, I-I can manage.”
His mouth twisted. “I meant... Do you want me to stay? I have business in the port but I can put it off-”
“I am alright,” I interrupted. Then, more truthfully, “I will be alright. Go on. [sighs] I am sure you need to process their payment or something.”
As soon as it was out of my mouth, I knew it was the wrong thing to say. Something shuttered in Scarry’s expression, a door closing between us.
“No, I-I was joking,” I started, but it was too late.
“It’s fine. I’ll see you at dinner.”
“No, Scarry! Please, I was not trying to be snide…”
He flashed a humourless smile, already turning to go. “It’s fine,” he said again. “Let me know if you need anything.”
And he was gone. [sighs] I cannot understand him. He has these moments of, of real sweetness and tenderness when I feel that we are truly connecting. And then he shuts down again, and will not ever let me make amends when I have obviously hurt him!
Perhaps I should have insisted, followed after him and forced the issue into the light. But in that moment, I did not want to. I just wanted to write to Óli.
No, what I want is to talk to them. I want to have them close, to show them how sorry I am for not understanding what they were telling me. Oh, by the Light, I just want to give them a hug! But they are on the other side of the bloody galaxy.
I just left them there. No explanation, no discussion. I did not even wait until they were properly settled. I was bored and restless and unhappy, and I made that more important than taking care of them.
I threw off my stiff, formal clothes and sat down to write to them, words spilling across the page.
I poured out every bit of grief and guilt, told them how angry I am on their behalf! How sad and sorry, for how their parents treated them. How the world has treated them. How I have treated them.
I set forth my resolution to do better. I cannot make amends for their upbringing, but I can prove to them how false its lessons were. They are more, so much more, than a mere vessel for family honour or shame. They are not silly or melodramatic – or if they are, well it is no bad thing!
I put down my feelings in the strongest possible terms, determined to leave them with no doubt about their place in my heart. I want them to know. I… I need them to know, and to know that this strength of feeling is nothing, not one speck, more than they deserve.
I wrote it all. And… discarded it. I cannot leave such sentiments to the vagaries of the written word. I must see them again. I must. And I must tell them… No. I must show them how I feel.
I started again. I told them I had attended the meeting with their parents, and had seen all I need to. I told them I have found Drunvhitur beautiful – for I think they will appreciate that and besides, it is only true – but that my eyes and my heart long for something more familiar.
I have no certain plans to share with them. I do not know yet how long the trip will take. But I assured them I would write again soon to let them know when to expect my return to Kerrin, and to them.
I have not sent it yet. I am very tired, with a weariness that has seeped into my bones. My morning at the Ranvhitir residence has left me with a pounding headache. But at the same time, I feel so much lighter for having made my decision.
I will have to discuss it with Scarry, of course, and not only to plan the logistics. I cannot even guess how he will take the news. He plays his cards so close to his chest, I am not even sure we are playing the same game.
[sighs] I cannot think about that now. My head is aching. I think I need to lie down for a bit. I love you all, and I am so grateful to be so loved in return. I will write again soon.
[The sound of the data stick whirring fades in, cutting out when the data stick is removed with a click.]
The Traveller
Entry NI85106-2. On the use of folk remedies and home cures among diasporic individuals from various cultural backgrounds.
Key words: community; diaspora; health and well-being; medicine.
Notes:
I have been remarkably lucky in my travels thus far when it comes to my health. I have always enjoyed a robust immune system, a great boon to any traveller, and while I have had periods of feeling rather run-down, this has been as much an issue of ordinary tiredness as anything else.
I have not even experienced difficulty with unfamiliar foods, barring minor differences of taste or spice tolerance. So when I began to fall ill on Drunvhitur, I admit, I did not recognise it at first. I am so rarely sick, it simply did not occur me.
Still, at least it gave me the opportunity to experience first-hand some of the more esoteric medical practices of the cultures to which my crew-mates belong.
When the first pangs of illness came upon me, I was at the end of a rather difficult morning. Suffice to say, I had good reason to ascribe my headache and weariness to simple exhaustion, both physical and emotional. I took myself off for a nap and thought nothing more about it – until I woke up.
I must have been asleep for hours. It had grown dark outside but I had no sense of what time it was. However long I had been asleep, it was long enough for those early tendrils of illness to take root and blossom into a stinking cold.
My headache had become a throbbing vie around my skull, my nose so blocked I could feel my pulse in my sinuses. I tried to find a position to hold my head where I might be able to breathe more freely but nothing was comfortable.
My whole body ached, I-I could not find any position to lie that did not hurt. There was no escaping it. I was sick, with an illness that had fallen upon me swift and heavy as a hammer-strike.
I still do not know where I picked it up. It could have been any one of the ports I have been through in the last few weeks. Certainly I have been rather stressed lately, which no doubt has put my immune system on the back foot.
I did not think of any of that when I woke from my nap. I just lay there feeling sorry for myself. Finally I staggered out of bed and leant against the cabin’s intercom.
“Uh... Scarry? Uh. I do not know if you are busy but, uh... I am not very well. Could you come down here, please?”
Not, perhaps, the most eloquent request. But my brain was so fogged with pain and snot, I could not think much further than telling someone I was sick and hoping they could do something to help me feel better.
I tipped myself back into bed, cringing at the feel of the sheets which I now realised were damp with sweat. But I had no energy to do anything about it. I threw an arm over my eyes, and waited for someone to come.
I must have fallen asleep, because the next I knew, I was waking up again to see Scarry ducking into the cabin. He winced when he saw me, and sat on the side of my bed to take my temperature with the back of his hand.
“By the Saint,” he muttered. “Where was this, this morning?”
I tried to shrug, but could not quite manage it. His hand was cool against my skin and I pressed up into it. “I thought I was just tired.”
“This is a wee bit more than tired, pet. I assumed you just wanted to be on your own. I’ll fetch Oyan.”
He moved to stand but I stopped him, my hand on his arm. “I do not need a medical officer. It is just a cold or the flu or something. Can you just get me some medicine? And some tissues. And... [sighs] I want an auren!”
“An auren? [laughs] I think I can manage that.”
I slumped back against the pillows and he left me daydreaming about cold, juicy pieces of auren and being able to breathe through my nose.
He had not been gone long when there was a knock at the door. I called for the newcomer to enter, and was surprised to see Masha in the doorway.
“Hey, pal. You sick?” I said nothing, feeling my appearance was answer enough. “I brought you this. It’ll help clear your tubes.”
She brought over a small glass jar obviously recycled from a previous life holding some kind of condiment. The original label had been ripped off and replaced with a wobbly sticker bearing a hand-written name I could not read.
I took it gingerly and opened the lid. At once the cabin filled with a smell like someone had fermented a pine tree in malt vinegar. I swore, coughing til my eyes ran, fumbling to put the lid back on.
[spluttering] “What is that?!”
“It’s a ferotnik poultice. You rub it under your nose and-”
“I am not putting that on my skin! It will eat a hole in me!”
“Oh, don’t be wet. We put it on babies at home. Dollop of that on your chest, you’ll be right. It’s my mum’s recipe!” she added, looking crestfallen.
I pushed the jar back into her hands. “Thank you, but no. I do not think that is for humans.”
She rolled her eyes, shoving the jar back in her pocket. “Suit yourself. How about a nice glass of khimizh?”
“What is himidge?”
“Warm milk curdled with vodka and a raw egg whisked in.”
I was spared from answering by another knock at the door. Oyan stepped in, took one look at Masha and jerked their thumb towards the corridor.
“You, out.”
Oyan is not a doctor, but is trained in the sort of rough and ready medical treatments a ship like the Guillemot might need in its travels. Masha did as she was told.
“She didn’t put that gunk on you, did she?” they asked as they ran a medical scanner over my forehead.
[sighing] “No fear. What is it made of?”
“Prayers and battery acid, as far as I can tell. They all swear by it back on her own planet. Blow into this?”
“It is just a cold,” I insisted, though I did as I was asked. “I do not need a medic.”
“Well you’ve got one anyway.” The scanner beeped. “You also have a cold.”
“Thank the Light you were here!”
[laughing] “Rest up. Let me know if it gets worse. And don’t drink anything from Masha.”
They left, and I stared at the wall, wondering where Scarry was and how long it would take to get the smell of Masha’s poultice out of the cabin. I had to hand it to her – the small whiff I had been exposed to had half-cleared one of my nostrils. I rather wished it had not, on balance.
The door went again. Not Scarry. Resimus, bringing a stick of incense and a set of tiny golden bells.
“This is marish wood,” they explained as they set things up to their liking. “It represents heat and dryness. Mucus and phlegm are both cold and wet,” they said, quite matter of fact. And not, I suppose, wrong, in a disgusting sort of way.
They did something to the thermostat, and then I lay there as they lit the incense and rang the bells over various points of my body, telling me all about how the energies would help to open up the flow of… uh… something or other.
“Is this a religious thing?” I asked, my curiosity blunted but not quite dead. “Or a cultural practice?”
“Is there a difference?”
That was far too big a question for my current state. I was sweating again, my cheeks flushed. I tried to kick my covers off, but they were too heavy and besides, Resimus kept pulling them back up over me.
Eventually they finished whatever they were doing and left. My nose had bunged up again, but I could taste something soapy that might have been the incense. By the time the door went once again, I near enough wanted to weep for tiredness.
“Leave me alone,” I croaked, hopeless that I would be heard through the door.
It opened and Tarlin came in. I braced myself for whatever fuss she would foist on me.
“Oh, you poor wee dote. That’s enough of that, now.”
She plucked the incense from its holder and tossed it unceremoniously into a cup of water on my bedside table. She fiddled with the thermostat, turning up the air until it hummed. It was an untold pleasure to feel a cool breeze on my face.
“Resimus, was it? Ah, they’re mad for the heat when they’ve a bad dose. Turn their room into a sauna.”
“My head hurts,” I muttered.
“I know it does, pet. Come on, let’s get you up.”
She propped me up against the pillows, and pressed a steaming mug into my hands. Fragrant steam rose, just tickling at the edge of what I could smell.
“It’s not curdled, is it?”
“Oh, saints, no it is not! It’s just a wee brew. There’s echna for your head; saule bark and lakrits root for you wee nose; ibisk to help you get some sleep; and a wee bit of ysgau berry just because you like it.”
The room was starting to come to a normal temperature. I gave a cautious sip of the drink. It was nice.
“It’s a traditional brew, from my grandmother,” Tarlin explained, sitting herself down at the chair by the desk. “She came from Gumeran originally, in the Hidair system, and these are all plants that grew in the valley she grew up in.
“I suppose we were all lucky they survived being transplanted when she moved to Preshett Station. You know, she was the first of my family to leave the planet. Oh, it was different then. The translator devices hadn’t been invented. Travel was hard – and expensive! But Granny Meara was determined…”
I do not know if it was the tea or Tarlin’s gentle, burbling voice, but slowly the grip of my headache loosened. One whole nostril popped clear, letting me breathe in the herb-scented steam. My chin began to drop onto my chest, and I drowsed, feeling still rather awful but much better than I had before.
I let my eyes close , and kept them closed when the door opened again.
“Are they asleep?”
“Think so. You get them?”
“Aye, eventually. First two shops had never heard of them. Suppose they don’t grow here.”
“Pop them down. They can have one when they wake up.”
I heard, as if from a great distance, the soft thump of a bundle of somethings being set down on the bedside table. Someone lifted my empty mug out of my unresisting hands, and brushed the hair from my forehead with careful, calloused fingers.
“Here, I’ll take that. There’s more tea in the galley if they want it.”
“Thanks, Mammy. I’ll take it from here.”
The chair creaked as they swapped places. The door opened and closed once again, and I slipped to sleep to the sound of someone softly turning the pages of a book and the faint smell of aurens hanging in the air.
[Title music: rhythmic instrumental folk. It plays throughout the closing credits.]
H.R. Owen
Travelling Light was created by H.R. Owen and Matt McDyre, and is a Monstrous Productions podcast. This episode was written and performed by H.R. Owen.
This week’s entry to the archives was based on an idea by Annika. You can see Matt's illustration for the entry on our social media accounts.
If you've got an idea for the archive, we want to hear it. We’re coming to the end of Season 2 but we are keeping in the inbox open, so send in your ideas for Season 3 through our website, by email, or on social media. For more information, see the show notes.
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