Blessing
62: Project Nexus
Muna dipped her thumb into the burnt out embers of the brick stove and brushed off the excess with her index finger. She sat cross-legged on a floor mat facing her daughter Neneh, who studied her expectantly. Muna drew a vertical line down the center of Neneh’s forehead and a horizontal one across it.
“All things divided. All things equal.”
She kissed her hairline above the marking and stared for a moment into her eyes. To Neneh, who was no more than eight at the time, they were sorrowful and full of longing. For what her mother longed, she could not tell, but Neneh popped up nonetheless and ran out of their earthen home to go play with the rest of the village children.
Neneh did not know her mother sat in silence for a long time on that floor mat, staring out a porthole. A breeze rustled her light brown curls and the knowledge she would soon be leaving home for good sank deep inside Muna. It was only years after her mother’s death mere days after drawing that symbol, that Neneh poked through the mystery.
“Neneh… Neneh…”
Virgil held her shoulder gently and shook it, trying to scatter the fragments of the potent half dream. She jerked and unconsciously touched the scar on her forehead, scored with a blade by an elder at her coming-of-age ceremony. It was the symbol she chose to guide her ascent into adulthood, along with the tribe’s customary cheek scars, which were three parallel lines of descending length.
“May your joy be long, your life sufficient, and your pain short.”
The elder rubbed a slurry of tree sap and herb root into the incisions, which pulsed and warmed under his touch. He chanted in the old way, in a language reserved for healers, and she sat still with her eyes closed.
“Neneh!”
“Yeah! What?”
“There’s a client. They asked to see you.”
“Is it Mr. Tully? I just saw him last week about his account—“
“No. It’s someone else. Never seen her.”
There weren’t new people in Nūmka Valley. Everyone who came around were people they knew or whose families had come from the Valley. For one reason or another, the branches extending from the trunk returned to the root so that Neneh knew them by sight. Something about them spoke. Neneh rose from her desk and sauntered down the hallway to the waiting room to see this newcomer.
A young and stern woman, with hair fashioned in a high and intricate bun of braids atop her head, sat with her legs crossed at her ankles. She wore a sleeveless ochre dress with mustard geometric borders. A teal shawl with small tassels covered her broad shoulders which matched teal sandals on feet Neneh could tell were of the plains. Her body was a rising wave as she approached to shake hands.
She nodded her greeting.
“Hi. How can we help you?”
“I’m Kin,” she said, glancing in Virgil’s direction. He sat at his desk, busying himself with his own work and did not look up. Kin lowered her voice.
“Can I speak with you privately?”
”Sure. Follow me.”
Kin sat in Neneh’s office and rubbed her hands nervously turning toward the door to make sure it was closed.
“I have information about what the government is doing with our DNA.”
Neneh stared at her in dull disbelief. “That’s not what I expected you to—”
“I didn’t bring anything with me because I didn’t want to be caught with it. But I needed to tell someone.”
“I don’t know why you’d come to me. I’m not a detective.”
“No, but you’re a Valley ēna and you deal in money. It is the easiest way to go where most of us can’t.”
The Valley people believed the traditional Minoan way should keep all things equal among everyone, but they could not suppress the evolution of a society and a community separate from their own and needed conduits to survive. People like Neneh, who helped organize their government affairs, including filing documents and managing financial accounts, were essential.
The temptation to indulge in city trappings meant their conduits often left, as no young person with any transferable skill wanted to while away their days staring at treasure they couldn’t hold. Neneh was one of the few who stayed because life was not one way or the other, but both. She knew of the city’s bustle and did not begrudge its residents their busy lives or their toys. She simply came back home where it was peaceful and where she was known.
“I understand. So, I guess let’s start at the beginning.”
“Okay,” Kin said, twirling the strings of her shawl around her fingers. “I was born in Okogo, down by the riverside. I think you know the place.”
Neneh nodded and smiled as she removed a small notepad from her desk drawer. Oddly enough, it was brand new. This felt like an omen of both luck and misfortune.
“Anyway, when I was born the people from the capital came and swabbed my cheek like they do all the babies. They have never required us to get formal IDs or take their technology, but they’ve always said, at least they could identify us if we decided to join the kefela. My mother never liked it though. Eight children and it never sat well with her.
“Recently, a friend came to me, someone married to kefela, and told me that her husband was talking to someone about where this whole log of genetic information was being kept and what they were doing with it.”
Her brow furrowed as if she were trying to understand what she would soon say. Neneh regarded Kin with a reassuring glance and readied her pen. Kin pinched her eyes shut as she recited the words.
“They told me ‘We won’t be able to clone this batch. There are too many… internal mutations.’ “
Neneh did not have any idea what it meant, but she scribbled it down.
“I could have gone to someone else, but I figured you might be able to pass on the information. If someone saw me coming here, they’d think that I was opening an account or working on paperwork.”
“I’m happy you felt safe to come here. We have to stick together after all.”
Three faint parallel lines scarred Kin’s cheeks.
“That I do believe. For sure.”
They smiled at each other and Kin shifted, sinking more comfortably in her chair. She went on.
“What my friend heard was one thing, but what I have seen is another. My umi has been in my home since she’s gotten older and we were out in the garden when a man passed by. My umi is one of those women who has a large family but not many friends.
“Okoma.”
“Exactly!” Kin exhaled sharply and shook her head. “Yes, you understand. So, she saw this man and he looked right at her. The umuta left her body. Completely. She dropped her tools and went into the house.
“I looked at him and didn’t recognize him. I’d never seen him before. But he looked like a dweller, so I said nothing. I finished what I was doing and went into the house.
“Umi was holding this photo. Very old. She said “Omoshé aka te shārô. E lo shé emumi lomtu.”
“He was the man I supposed to marry. I last saw him in his grave,” Neneh said.
“Kinshō Liama. He died 50 years ago and my umi saw him walk right in front of her.”
“Is it possible he just looked like him? Maybe the man was a relative of Kinshō?”
“No. He was the last in a small family. Umi told me I was named for him. She married someone else and then had my mother.”
“So you’re thinking his DNA was collected a long time ago when he died and now that clone is alive?”
“I thought you weren’t a detective,” Kin smirked.
“I’m not, just used to trying to make sense of numbers and lineages. And I’m guessing mutations aren’t a good thing, then.”
Kin shook her head. “Probably not.”
“I’m going to see who I can give this information to. Is there a way to contact you?”
“You can leave a message at the community office. They’ll pass it along.”
“Okay. I’ll let you know what I find. If you want, you can come back in about two weeks so I have some time. I’ll just mark you down as a client for land inheritance or something. No big deal.”
“Thank you so much…”
“Neneh.”
“Your name means blessing,” Kin said
“Yes, it’s my grandmother’s name.”
“Ekaró.”
“Ekaró elo.”
Kin smiled brightly and left through the waiting room doors with a renewed optimism.
Neneh sat at her desk, sketching idly at the bottom of her notes and she considered the woman’s story. She could not think of a solution, only a resource, as this was not for her to investigate. She picked up the phone and dialed a familiar number.
“Hi, I’m calling from the Nūmka Valley Affairs Office. May I speak with Detective Anaella Bahn?”
[end of audio]
Did I ever tell you I wanted to be a linguist? I even consulted with a professor about a potential degree years ago. I don’t have to say how time moves, but that degree never materialized. The way language moves is still one of my core interests so I’ve brought it here. I’m developing the Minoan language which will hopefully include all the hallmarks of existing communication.
Some will notice the borrowed word “ekaró” from Yoruba. Ekaró or ekaaro has a Yoruba meaning which is a morning salutation, but with more emphasis on the last syllable. The phrase E lo shé borrows Yoruba sounds where lo is the direct object pronoun like in the phrase No lo quieres in Spanish (“You don’t like it.”)
The way I see it, language will be carried across light years and centuries where they’ll combine in ways we can’t imagine. Even the name Kinshō is Japanese. It’s not about melding to the point of no differentiation but documented traces from branches to roots. This is a culture that will bend, shift, and persist with all the parts of their mosaic represented.
What’s next?
Novel update
More fiction?
Surviving the summer as a working parent with young children
Did you narrate this? Wonderfully written and such an enchanting listen!