beccastareyes (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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31_days2006-04-02 09:18 pm
beccastareyes) wrote in 31_days2006-04-02 09:18 pm
[02-04-06] [Original] Nemean Selkie
Title: Nemean Selkie
Theme: I am more land than water
Series: Original
Characters: Phillee
Rating: G
Mythological names were quite in vogue, at least among humans, when the 11 Leonis Minoris system was settled, so the original Human colonists made a play on the star's constellation (the Lion Cub) and christened the planet Nemea, after the Nemean Lion that so plagued the Greek hero Heracles. The Starsailor colonists had their own name for the planet, but it, like most of their language, was unpronounceable to humans not trained in their language.
Phillee had spent most of her adult life on Earth, but she did make a point of visiting her species' homeworld once.
She learned something then -- a Nemean would never fit in 'back home'. It wasn't just the jokes about colonists that every home system seemed to accumulate. Nor was it the expected difference in dress or cuisine or accent. It was the fact Nemea was one of the 'mixed' colonies. Nemean Starsailors were different. They were 'twitchy' as they mimicked human facial and body language without thinking about it, or 'talked' with their hands along with their voices. They spoke in circles and riddles, never saying what they meant. They were clumsy in water, used to walking on land.
Starsailors may embrace diversity, but that never meant they treated the alien as if it were the mundane. She could always see, even without snooping with psionics, when someone had noticed something off about her, or when they figured out where she was from. Phillee much preferred Earth, where at least she was expected to be alien.
Theme: I am more land than water
Series: Original
Characters: Phillee
Rating: G
Mythological names were quite in vogue, at least among humans, when the 11 Leonis Minoris system was settled, so the original Human colonists made a play on the star's constellation (the Lion Cub) and christened the planet Nemea, after the Nemean Lion that so plagued the Greek hero Heracles. The Starsailor colonists had their own name for the planet, but it, like most of their language, was unpronounceable to humans not trained in their language.
Phillee had spent most of her adult life on Earth, but she did make a point of visiting her species' homeworld once.
She learned something then -- a Nemean would never fit in 'back home'. It wasn't just the jokes about colonists that every home system seemed to accumulate. Nor was it the expected difference in dress or cuisine or accent. It was the fact Nemea was one of the 'mixed' colonies. Nemean Starsailors were different. They were 'twitchy' as they mimicked human facial and body language without thinking about it, or 'talked' with their hands along with their voices. They spoke in circles and riddles, never saying what they meant. They were clumsy in water, used to walking on land.
Starsailors may embrace diversity, but that never meant they treated the alien as if it were the mundane. She could always see, even without snooping with psionics, when someone had noticed something off about her, or when they figured out where she was from. Phillee much preferred Earth, where at least she was expected to be alien.