Page 28 of Claimed By the Deep
"Yes." The word comes out rougher than intended. "Beautiful in ways that have no comparison here. The water itself seems alive, charged with minerals that create luminescence in the depths. And the silence... not empty silence, but the kind that feels full of possibility."
Meri's expression softens with sympathy. "You miss it."
"Every day." I've never admitted that aloud before, not even to myself. "But missing it and being able to return are different things entirely."
"Tell me what happened. How did you end up here?"
I float quietly for a moment, deciding how much truth to share. But her eyes hold nothing but genuine interest and compassion, and I find myself wanting to give her everything.
"I was part of a contact mission. My people had been observing Earth for decades, studying your development, waiting for the right moment to make peaceful first contact." A bitter laugh escapes me. "I was chosen because I showed aptitude for understanding alien psychology. Ironic, considering how poorly I understand humans even now."
"What went wrong?"
"Everything." The memories are sharp even after all these decades. "We approached during what your people call the early 1900s, when your technology was advancing rapidly but before you'd achieved spaceflight. The plan was to observe from theoceans, study your coastal populations, then make contact with your governments."
I pause, watching clouds build overhead. The weather is turning, but slowly enough that we have time for this conversation.
"Our ship was designed for deep space and water landing, but we underestimated your planet's atmospheric conditions. A massive storm system—what you'd call a nor'easter—caught us during descent. The ship broke apart before we could reach a safe landing zone."
"How many of you were there?"
"Twelve. A small contact team, but we were the best our people had trained for this kind of mission." The old pain resurfaces, sharp as ever. "I was the only survivor."
Meri's grip tightens on the platform edge. "What happened to the others?"
"The crash scattered us across hundreds of miles of ocean. I found three of my crewmates in the wreckage, but they were already dead. The others..." I shake my head. "I searched for months, but the ocean is vast, and our people don't survive well in Earth's warmer, saltier waters without technological support."
"You've been alone all this time?"
"Nearly a century, yes." The magnitude of it hits me again, the way it does sometimes when I'm forced to say it aloud. "Your planet orbited your sun ninety-seven times while I learned to survive here."
She's quiet for a long moment, processing what I've told her. When she speaks again, her voice is soft with understanding.
"That's why you've been watching humans from a distance. You were still trying to complete your mission."
"At first, yes. I thought if I could learn enough about your people, understand your societies and cultures, I might eventually make the contact my crew died trying to achieve." I drift closer, bringing myself within touching distance. "But as the decades passed, it became less about duty and more about... curiosity. Then loneliness."
"What was it like? Watching our world change for so long?"
I consider how to explain nearly a century of observation, of watching a species evolve before my eyes.
"Fascinating and terrifying in equal measure. I was here when your people fought their first global war, when they learned to fly, when they split the atom. I watched ships I recognized from early observations become museum pieces, then scrap metal, then forgotten history."
"You saw the Halifax Explosion."
The memory hits like a physical blow. "Yes. I was exploring the northern waters when it happened. The sound carried for hundreds of miles underwater—a roar like the world ending. When I reached the harbor..." I pause, remembering the devastation. "I pulled seventeen people from the water that day. Bodies, mostly, but a few survivors."
Her eyes widen. "You've been saving people all this time?"
"When I could. When I happened to be in the right place." I wrap a tentacle gently around her wrist, needing the contact. "But there were always more ships, more storms, more people who went into the water and never came up. I learned to limit my interventions, to stay hidden rather than risk exposure."
"Until me."
"Until you." I meet her eyes directly. "You were different from the beginning. The way you moved in the water, the respect you showed for the ocean, the fact that you kept returning to dangerous areas alone. You reminded me why I came to this world in the first place."
"To study humans?"
"To understand what makes a species worth knowing." I bring her hand to my lips, pressing a gentle kiss to her knuckles. "My people sent me here because they believed yours had potential. That despite your violence and chaos, there was something in humanity worth connecting with."
