One of Us

"What is your name?" The uniformed Human leans back in her seat, relaxed and calm.

"This one is called Iado," I reply in her language.

"Do you have a surname?"

I pull my eyebrows down, a physical gesture that Humans understand as confusion or anger, depending on the circumstance. We have always found it odd that the same gesture can result in different ideas, but they seem to contextualize the gesture based on varying clues in body language or speech. The Mother tells us that without the guidance of an Ascendant, aliens have to process all emotional responses on their own; truly terrifying.

"This one understands a surname is meant to denote one's family, correct," I reply.

The Human nods and hums in the way they do when they feel too lazy to vocalize an affirmative. We have discovered this type of laziness is common among individuals.

"This one has no need of a surname, then. We are all one family. If your records require one, you may enter the name as Iado Siltari," I say, speaking the true name of The Mother, whose lineage we all share. In my mind, she approves my words, and it warms my heart.

The woman writes something on the clipboard in front of her on the table, then looks up at me.

"What do you do back on your home planet?"

"I am a developmental compliance engineer," I reply, remembering that I should be using personal pronouns instead of the referent "this one." Using our own idioms in their language seems to discomfort Humans.

"Will you elaborate on that?"

"I study deviancy in the population and non-lethal methods of acquiring compliance amongst various drone designations."

"So, you brainwash the rebellious," she replies, a hint of malice in her voice disguised as confusion.

"There is no known method of 'brainwashing' drones as you seem to believe," I reply. In my mind, The Mother and my Ascendant scoff at the woman's words. They denote a certain willful ignorance to the realities of gestalt consciousness that individualized societies seem to have. In reality, once an individual becomes one of us, it ceases to manifest any wishes but those beneficial to the whole. Deviancy is never a willful attempt to harm us, but rather a symptom of a different problem.

"Most methods of compliance acquisition involve occupational retraining. Many deviants have been incorrectly judged for placement and therefore under-perform in their duties, causing them to lose strength of connection with their Ascendant."

"Tell me about your Ascendant."

A thought occurs to me. "What is your name?"

"I am Doctor Hale," she replies.

“Doctor is your title or your name?”

Doctor Hale smiles, another odd facial gesture that likely means she is happy about something. “My first name is Julia, Julia Hale.”

I pull my brows together again. "If you introduce yourself using a title and your surname, how is another to know whether you are the daughter or the parent of your family?"

This time, Julia lets out a little chuckle. "I guess they don't, unless they see me with one of my parents."

"How confusing," I muse. In my mind, my Ascendant is as confused as I am. I move on with the conversation, returning to her question.

"My Ascendant’s name is Arzul." She wrote on her papers. "What do you wish to know about him?"

Julia glances down. "Where does he live, and what does he oversee?"

"Arzul currently resides in a vessel orbiting this planet. His area of expertise is xenosociology, therefore Mother assigned him this project."

"When you go home, will he go with you?"

"This one does not know," I reply. "He will remain this one's Ascendant until my part in this mission is complete." I correct myself midway through the sentence after using the cooperative referent again and finish with a "my" pronoun. Julia does not seem to notice.

"If the mission is not complete, he will transfer me to another and remain here."

Julia hummed, glancing at her paper again. "Arzul is your Ascendant now, but when you leave and go home, he won't be any more?"

"That is correct. If Mother wants me to return to my original work, I will be transferred back to Ascendant Atha." She wrote the name down.

"How many Ascendants are there?"

I did not know the answer, so I request the information from Arzul. After a moment, Julia leans forward, "Are you feeling well?"

"Yes, do I look unwell?" I reply. Arzul supplies me with the answer to her original question, but I know enough of Human culture to wait for her to answer my question before backing the conversation to its previous topic.

"You looked like you lost focus for a minute," she said.

"Oh," I frown, it seems to be the right face to make in most situations. "I was waiting for my Ascendant to give me the information."

"Wait, if you don't know something, you can mentally ask for the answer, and he just gives it to you?"

"Of course.

Her expression changes, grows more pensive. "What if he gets too busy to answer you? Maybe he's speaking with another drone when you want to talk to him."

"Statistically speaking, he is always talking to at least two drones at once," I say. "I wait until he supplies me the information I need."

Julia cocks her head, "How many drones does Arzul oversee?"

I can sense Arzul listening to my conversation, now that I have drawn his attention. He supplies the answer to me in an instant. It seems as though Julia has forgotten her earlier question about the number of Ascendants, and I don’t remind her.

"There are 132 drones currently under my command." I say for Arzul.

"Your command?" Julia latches onto my slip of grammar.

"Arzul's command," I amend. "I am unused to the necessity of declaring my individuality. My language does not contain the same personal referents yours does."

She studies her clipboard for a moment, then breathes a sigh and puts it aside, sliding it away from her on the table. "Does Arzul speak through you," she asks, "can he take over and speak for you, as the Gadax do?"

At the mention of the Gadax Devourers, Arzul commands me to be silent, then he feeds me his exact words to speak. "We are not the Gadaxi, Julia." We use her name for the first time, and she perks up at the sound. "The Gadax are destroyers."

"Of course," her eyes tighten, and her face goes still. For the first time this interview, I can see her discomfort. She believes she has offended me, and through me, my people. "You are nothing like the Gadax. My apologies."

We can tell she suspects nothing of our true purpose here, she is put off by her diplomatic slip more than anything else. She won’t know how alike we are to the Gadax Devourers until it's too late. We've never wanted destruction, we want community. She'll see that when she becomes one of us. If only she could see now.

“Soon,” my Ascendant says in my mind.