Page 10 of Planet Zero
“Hello,” the bigger face replied. She also rose from her crouching position between the rocks and came out, followed by her smaller companion.
They were For girls holding baskets filled with berries and mushrooms. They were wearing drab olive dresses made out of the same knitted flax fibers as Addie’s, but theirs appeared to be soft and well-fitting. Little knots and cable patterns decorated the dresses at regular intervals, clearly put there to make them attractive. Tall leather boots trimmed with fur encased their sturdy calves. Their brunette hair hung loose down their backs, except the older girl had a thin braid with a bright green string in it hanging on the left side of her face.
She was tall, the older girl, almost Addie’s height, but gangly, a juvenile of perhaps twelve or thirteen. The younger one was half that age and adorably plump, with a bowed upper lip smeared with pink berry juice.
Addie’s Yuux came down to sit on her shoulder, demonstrating their ownership of her. Each girl appeared to have a Yuux of their own, flying a little haphazardly above their head, not certain if Addie warranted protection against.
The girls openly stared.
“Who are you?” the older one asked.
“Addie.” Addie pointed at her chest. Her proficiency at For language was woefully lacking. She had tried to learn, but Sathe spoke the women’s language well, and Addie had hardly interacted with the males, and so her need to learn it had been low.
She regretted it now.
“What is Addie?” asked the girl, her head cocked at an unnatural angle in surprise. Unnatural to Addie, at least. Completely normal for the For.
“I am… a person,” she used the word she knew because she had no idea how to describe an alien. From what she understood, For people hadn't seen aliens until the women came to Planet Zero. They had no idea other worlds existed. Hell, they had never seen stars up above with the stupid sky always clear and bright gray-blue.
“You look funny,” was the girl’s judgment. “Youspeakfunny.”
“I am sorry,” she wasn’t sure what she was apologizing for. She just didn’t want the girls to… leave soon. She didn’t want to be alone. It didn’t matter that she didn’t fully understand them. For a short while, let them stay.
The little one quit staring at Addie’s person and was now looking at the slingshot. She spoke to her older companion in a rapid, and, Addie thought, lisping manner, pointing at her weapon.
The older girl smiled a shy smile, and said something, addressing Addie.
“What? I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”
“It’s pretty.” The girl enunciated slowly, pointing at the slingshot. “Oh’na likes colors.”
“What? This?” And then it dawned. “You mean, the red string?”
“Yes.”
Little Oh’na stood on tiptoe and whispered something in the direction of her friend’s ear.
“No, you cannot have it,” the girl replied firmly.
Oh’na withdrew, her plump upper lip thinning in disappointment. The basket in her hand tilted precariously and the berries poured out.
“Oh’na!”
The older girl made a quick move to catch Oh’na’s basket and pulled it up to stop the steady downpour of berries, but in the process dropped her own, spilling the blue mushrooms amid the grass.
Addie smiled - they were both so comical in their childish clumsiness, so normal in their anger at each other’s supposed fault. Addie also wanted to cry.
“Here, wait, let me help.” She sniffed covertly as she went down on her knees and started picking up the berries and depositing them in Oh’na’s basket while the older girl made quick work of gathering her mushrooms.
They rose to their feet at the same time and fell quiet.
“I am grateful,” little Oh’na said quietly, looking at her boots.
“You’re welcome,” Addie’s brain furiously processed their language and supplied the simple words lodged in the unimpressive storage of her own memory. “Come with me.” She waved at the girls to follow.
Hesitantly, they went.
Reaching her teepee - and ignoring their puzzlement at what, exactly, this crooked structure represented, - Addie ducked inside and grabbed the extra length of the red string she had saved for slingshot repairs.
