Through Their Eyes

• Jade Monti
• Short Story
• 2016

I’ve lived my whole life searching for life other than my own. But when I found it… It was everything but nothing I expected. They called it earth. The green planes were aglow during the night with artificial light that we space creatures can see light years away. The sea glimmers and ripples as the sun sets it ablaze when it rises to start a new day. Our kind longs to live in their world again, to stand aside the humans and stare up at the stars. The stars that ruled their way of living for centuries. My kind taught them everything they know. Their world looks pristine and untouched. It looks peaceful.
But looks can be terribly deceiving… As I watch over them more closely, wondering where we went wrong, I come up with nothing. They wage war amongst themselves, wipe out entire races and entertain themselves with violence. They abuse their young and steal from their neighbours. Our only law to abide by was that people had to treat everyone as equals. They hold no record of our supernatural existence when we lived among them millions of years ago…
I witness every death. I see the deaths of people who don’t think their good enough and feel tears of humans whose hearts have been broken. Through their eyes, I see the world. It is not as it used to be. People think they are not worthy. They think they are not worthy of the oxygen they breath in and the space they take up. But they are. Every single being on that planet was brought into the universe for a specific reason; their creator ensured that. They are ALL perfect. Every single one of them. And I wish I could tell them that. But I can’t, and that saddens me to the very core of my being. In saying that, some of those creatures are wicked and terrible. But their contrasting personalities is what sets them apart from the rest of their race.
Do you know what makes humans beautiful? Their flaws. It makes me so angry to think that they can let their imperfections define who they are. They let dominant humans tell them what’s right and what’s not. But they are all so gullible. Every single one of them. There is no right and no wrong and that’s what makes their world so appealing and dazzling.
Thinking about what I am about to do to the humans, I want to reconsider. But they said so themselves one billion years ago, ‘destroy us before we destroy ourselves.’ But the world is a fine place. It’s one worth fighting for. And that’s exactly what they are going to do. Nature may take its course and if the humans fall any deeper into the void of catastrophe, then my kind will take action to ensure the preservation of their world. Evil and misery is an imperfection, and one that humans, united as one, can overcome.