The Apex Book of World SF 2

The First Peruvian in Space ^{Daniel Salvo Translated by Jose B. Adolph}

Anatolio Pomahuanca had reason enough to hate whites. Hundreds of years ago they had invaded and conquered his world and reduced his forebears to the sad condition of serfs or second-class citizens. There were historic changes like independence wars, rebellions and revolutions. But, be it as it may, whites were still those who ruled and decided everything in Peru and throughout the rest of the world. “Now we live in a democracy, we have made great progress in human rights and integration,” they proclaimed. Anatolio smiled crookedly every time he heard such used-up and false sayings. Weren’t the president, the military and the priests white? Had anyone ever seen a native holding a decisive post? If he could, he would have spat on the floor. All whites were shit.

He couldn’t spit because of where he was: a metallic, softly illuminated cubicle full of controls and screens. It was the command post of an orbiting spaceship. Like all spaceships, it belonged to the United Nations. Its mission was routine—to measure solar winds—but this time it had an additional element: Anatolio Pomahuanca, the first Peruvian in space.

Everybody considered his appointment to the ship’s crew an honour; although he had no illusions. His tasks as maintenance engineer were like those of an attendant at a gas station. The ship, built with the best of the white’s technology, was an enormous automatic mechanism destined to follow a precisely sequenced program of instructions. In truth, he and the rest of the crew were mere passengers. The navigation and registry instruments would do it all.

He yawned. His brief turn at the command bridge would soon be over. He had completed his assigned tasks. To check a screen, to verify a measurement, report some co-ordinates…all activities that led nowhere. They have to keep me busy somehow, he thought bitterly.

The captain of the ship and chief of the mission entered the cabin. He smiled winningly at Anatolio, who nodded. An indifferent expression on his face, he rose.

“Everything okay, Pomahuanca?” asked the captain in perfect Spanish.

Anatolio hated whites in general, but more so those who tried to win his confidence or his friendship. It was always easy to notice their intentions, the false mask of respect hiding the contempt whites felt or, even worse, their pity for Anatolio’s race.

“Everything in order, captain.”

“Up to now, you’ve done very well. It’s a great opportunity for a young engineer to be a part of this mission. A lot of Peruvians would like to be in your place.”

“Oh, yeah?” Anatolio knew the whites were incapable of catching the contempt in his words. He knew the whites really considered them an inferior race, a sort of animal that, in the past, was exploited without pity but now had to be better treated. But they would never accept them as equals.

“Of course, Pomahuanca. You have shown the ability of the true Peruvian man to take part in the exploration of space, to go upwards and always upwards, as Jorge Chávez, your aviation pioneer, said.”

“What ability are you talking about, captain? Of the ability to work in a mine? Of the ability to push a plough? Of the ability to be a servant in the home of a white?” Anatolio, without meaning to, had ended up screaming the last few words.

The captain kept smiling. Anatolio sighed. In the past, when Anatolio had asked the same questions of other whites, there had been different reactions. Some left silently, others insulted him. Anatolio preferred the insults because they at least expressed what they felt. The captain belonged to the worst: those who believed there was already a harmonic conviviality between whites and natives as a result of centuries of history that had erased past wounds. In books and official speeches there was no more talk of invasion or conquest; now it was all about the meeting of two worlds or two cultures. He thought it incredible that the whites also believed their lies.

“There are—whites, as you call them—who also do jobs like those you described. Anyway, work dignifies us all.”

“But we always get those jobs! Do you let us be presidents, ministers or ambassadors?”

“Everything in its own time, Pomahuanca. I am sorry that things were different in our common past, and that we now have to carry that burden…”

“What burden do the whites carry? Is being entrepreneurs, big landowners or generals a burden? To drive luxurious vehicles is a burden? To appear in the media? There are no changes, captain; we are still the conquered and you the conquerors.”

“Then how do you explain your presence here, Pomahuanca? How do you explain your education, completely free, with the highest quality standards and in the best universities? Your healthcare? According to your logic, only the whites, as you call us, should be on this mission.”

Anatolio Pomahuanca shook with anger and hatred. He closed his fists while, out of his mouth came the thoughts that had been growing in his mind ever since the mission had begun. They could do what they wanted afterwards, they could sanction him, degrade him; at least he’d had the pleasure of telling this captain what he really thought of the mission.

“Because I am an ornament! A symbol! Because you needed me in order to say you sent a Peruvian into space! So that everybody could believe that “harmonic conviviality” thing!”

The smile on the captain’s face disappeared. His eyes became small decoloured slits, parallel to the lipless long hole that was his mouth. He furled his hearing appendages as he stepped to the command dashboard. Except for the blue crest his species displayed on the head, his scaled skin lacked any pigmentation. The few earthlings who had survived the wars of conquest of the invaders from space had been right in calling them whites.

“You can leave, Pomahuanca, Be ready for your second shift,” said the captain, waving him off with his membranous hands.