Now im just silence and solitude. Even in this field of reporters and witnesses ready to splash my death on 100 screens, all I hear is the ship. Theres a faint scent of words being said around me,

Duck.

Run.

Freeze.

But I cant hear any of them. Maybe I should be scared as the mechanics in front of me shift and warp into cogs and shapes of advanced tech, but I didnt come all the way here just to be scared. I came to be honest, before anyone else could fill in the blanks with lies. At least thats what I told myself, but mybe I just came to make lies of my own. I wasnt quite sure, even when the doors of the giant portal began to open. But in the end I knew they wanted me to speak. Truth, lie, it didnt matter and they didnt care. Something told me that whoever walked down the steps of this unknown world would know me regardless of what I wanted to portray. They would welcome me as a person of substance, a being of worth and as a human like fugure stepped out of the fog, I felt at home.

The one who walked out was a woman. The cops behind me told me to step back but I didnt need to refuse because she did it for me. With my name on her tongue she flowed down the metal-like structure with grace and asked me why I was here. I felt the truth claw itself from my lunges as I told her that I wanted to die.

Her face was pale, white as light and her hair was just the same, with the dress she wore being no different. She looked like a light house, all roads pointed to her, and when she reached the bottom of the steps she stretched a fragile arm out to me. I met her half way and we held hands while the crowd stood in awe. They wanted me to know her, to know something about these strangers from another planet but the truth was in my ignorance. I couldnt tell this woman from the stary eyed gaurds hiding in the ship behind her, she treated me like family because of this. I could feel her concern, so empathetic and real. She looked me in my eyes with conviction in her tone, and somehow i knew her kind were rarely wrong.

“I know whats in your heart,” she said, “and no being with this much hope wants to die.”

I felt my eyes tear up, “Hope or not there is nothing for me here. Ill tell you now that people are awful as a whole-“

“And as individuals?”

I watched her and she smiled, then she was shot. Her shoulder vibrated from the hit as she tensed and let my hand go. I panicked and watched everybody freak out around me at the war that had just been declared. The cop who raised his weapon was being held back and the crowd was shouting. I expected a reaction from them but hers was not as wild and untamed.

she stood tall and felt the red liquid seeping from her shoulder with steady fingers. Then she held her hand under the wound and asked me what just hit her. I told her it was a bullet and explained what it was. She was intrigued and faced her aggressor. I told her to wait but she walked towards him despite my warning and was fired at by multiple officers. I felt my heart stop, I was scared to lose a person that might understand me, and without thinking i jumped in front of her.

She asked me what i was doing as the shots wrung out and we stood still, unaffected and close as we whispered and I moved strands of hair from my face. I grabbed her hand with mine shaking uncontrollably but she didnt address it and instead she smiled and said she didnt need protection. I didnt understand so she demonstarated. With a steady hand she pointed a finger at me and i was lifted from the groumd and moved next to her, still floating without a single noticable force holding me while my sweater hung low beneath my top. Then she pointed at the cop and a invisble string dragged him forward. When he stood in front of her he screamed, begging for help but the crowd was scared and the cops were out of bullets. So they watched instead and with a gentle hand she put slight pressure on his chest and assured him.

“You are scared. Theres no need to be, i promise you we did not travel a light year just to start a war. We’re curious is all, so now little one, sleep.”

Ive never seen so many bodies. They laid on the ground, everyone who was there with their cameras and friends, they all fell. Their heads still landing softly against the cracked concrete despite her abrupt order, and then she was back to being focused on me.

With a slide of her hand she lowered me to the ground and asked me to show her where our leader was. I explained that we didnt have just one and she hummed.

It was a hum of power, and I later learned that it was the hum of my mother.