Coming Home

The first sensations that Sunny became aware of were of the soft, rhythmic tapping of a ceiling fan's chain as it rocked back and forth from the spinning of the blades. While his eyes were closed, the sound grounded him, offering context to where he was-- the only fan in his family's home that was weighted by beads was the one in his sister's bedroom. With sunlight spilling into the window from a low angle, the fan cast swirling arcs of shadow across the painted stone above, marred only by the soft, multicoloured light of dozens of glow-in-the-dark stars.

Even now, in the coolest days of winter, whenever he couldn't sleep, all his family would have to do is turn on the fan, and he'd fall asleep... but even though it was barely sunrise, he couldn't help but feel wide awake.

She was coming home. His parents hadn't known how to tell Sunny what had happened when Tatianna had gone missing. His big sister-- the one who had gifted him his first set of floaties, who had taken him for swimming lessons until he was confident of his skills, and who always shared snacks so he could enjoy a second flavour with him-- had been an interstellar courier for less than two years when her shuttle failed to make its first rendezvous with the larger carrier ship that docked and supplied it, and hadn't made contact since. While she had a habit of using her craft to explore uninhabited parts of safe worlds, the days of radio silence stretched into weeks, and while a couple missed incidences of the expected radio calls had passed them by, eventually the young Xero had begun asking questions.

Perhaps unluckily, he'd stumbled into the answer right away-- her shuttle had been reported missing, and her along with it, presumed crashed somewhere.

He'd been inconsolable, crying for weeks and shutting himself away. Not because she was dead-- he refused to admit that as a possibility-- but because their parents had lied to him, tried to keep him in the dark. Because others around him refused to believe she'd come back alive. Because while she'd been absent, he'd outgrown his first set of water wings, and his swim teacher had insisted on making him replace them instead of letting him wear ones that fit him, even though he'd gotten so good at holding his breath-- he'd been so excited to show her how good he was getting--

And then, one day, he was pulled out of class. Moddy and Zaza were there-- Moddy had clearly been crying-- and frankly, while he'd been dreaming of that moment for weeks now, he couldn't clearly remember exactly what they'd said, only what he'd needed to hear.

Tati was going to be okay. Her shuttle had gone into safe-mode, drifting and then making a controlled crash onto a scarcely-habited world-- a garden paradise like the ones his sister had always loved. Her leg had been very badly hurt, and one of her arms-- but she was up and talking now, and had been able to send word on that she was alive, and okay.

And she was coming home. Today, the fifth! A good number-- He'd been five when she got him those floaties, they had five favourite movies they liked waatching together-- five favourite flavours of treats to split. And it would be her fifth day of traveling in space to come here, and get home, and she might have to go stay with the xero doctors again, but she'd be home, here on Torini, and he could visit her every day until she was ready to come home.

The young Xero looked to the empty space where his sister would be sleeping tonight, and frowned. He had a lot of cleaning up to do before she got here.