narrated by Peanut
So I woke up in the middle of the floor again and there was an argument in the dorm. I could only hear blurred grunts which eventually crystallized into more solid nonsense, albeit now nonsense by context. The first thing I saw when I opened my eyes was Kevin. In his glasses I saw my reflection and on it was something which resembled a classic cartoon dick and balls, sprawled right across my forehead. One ball per lobe and the penis bit was going down my nose. Good morning to you all as well. Nothing like starting the day on the floor in the middle of the bathroom like that – marker scribble on my head, dick still in my hand about to take a piss…and my shoes were missing.
Kevin looked down at me again and shuffled back to the sleeping quarters to get changed. And from there, it looks like the others had all woken up:
“You stole my marker, idiot”
“No, it’s mine – I wanted to use it first.”
“Bronskie, how are you gonna draw when you can’t see?”
“I can focus the urogenital biocomputer and draw like Picasso. Next time you steal from me, I will take off the glasses and cut off your gender with my laser. Do you understand?”
That was Bronnikov at his usual. His paintings did look like a mixture of Jackson Pollock and Picasso, as he claimed “My brown eyes see more photons than your ass in toilet compound”. Inspecting the scrawl on my forehead, I can see this was the artwork of Yaan, who was chuckling to himself, only slightly unnerved by the threat. He was a gentle soul – at least he had steady hands when he drew on my head.
“Nap time’s over sand rats – you’ve got 6 minutes to get ready to dig.”
I zipped my fly and scrambled back to the bunks, scrubbing at my face with my sleeve. In the reflection of the wall, the skin of my face now matched the dust outside, raw and red. Compound 3 is a very unflattering place with all its’ mirrors. I am developing a bit of a gut.
—
The colony is a human zoo, where it is the animals looking at you from the other side of the glass. This must be how monkeys felt when looking at their dumb, bloated and hairless so-called biological superiors on the other side. Only difference is, we couldn’t grow bananas in the glasshouse since Kevin’s weed crops evaded and killed all the fruit.
In this unfilled promise of bananas, monkey see, monkey still do. Monkey dig, monkey work to make the keeper happy. Keeper changes your Pampers, Keeper kept you alive in this big vast and dead planet.
Our keepers were the Med Dept, with their bovine eyes and shaved heads, staring at us like German Tourists from the other side of the glass, with their laundered uniforms and persistent expectation for something to happen.
But they are all too ready to commander us reading the scripts they were given – “Dance monkeys, dance!”
They are hairy and mostly functional, with big unintelligent jaws and small skulls except Rishid. He was the colony psychiatrist and the only employee of the ship who ever spoke to us without yelling, although his temper between nicotine tanks definitely shortened his fuse. Rishid would refuse us nicotine tanks if we got out of line at any point and was generally not very flexible, though he was a “busy man”, as he liked to always state in his slightly exotic yet posh Indian accent.
We wiped down with damp rags and secured our suits and oxygen. There was no nicotine for Bronnikov today and the room filled with an uncomfortable silence.
Everybody shuffled out through the airlock in a single line out to the Gale with our shovels and the morning’s hymn blasted into our helmet speakers: “Dig sand rats, dig!”
