(For best results, imagine the following story being read by Logan Cunningham, AKA the Narrator/Rucks from the video game Bastion)

It’s often mentioned in our stories that there’s plenty about Jalmira that visitors have a hard time getting used to. What isn’t as obvious or talked about is how much about them catches us completely by surprise. Their strange languages and ways of speaking, questions about strange, sometimes unsettling things, their insistence on wearing heavy layers of clothes even in the middle of summer, the tools and items they carry for purposes that we haven’t begun to understand. But the one thing that I feel surprises us every time is how distant they all are. That’s not to say that they aren’t friendly, but one thing I’ve learned from meeting visitors in the past is that they all need their space. They establish this invisible boundary around them and get very anxious whenever someone enters it or stays too long without their express permission. The extent of these unseen walls varies wildly, making them almost unpredictable. I remember one visitor who nearly lashed out like a frightened animal at anyone who came within an arm span of him. He was…not very pleasant to be around.

Even if a visitor is fine with being physically close to others, they often were just as withdrawn emotionally. They are slow to trust, and even slower to open up to us. This causes a lot of confusion, resulting in a lot of misunderstandings. We respect their wishes to be left alone as best we can, but sometimes it seems like they are on the other side of the western mountains or the great sea, like phantoms that we can see but not touch or truly speak to.

When our most recent visitor arrived, I tried to let the others know that she might not be as open as we were, but it was a lost cause from the beginning. It’s something we’re simply not used to, especially for the younger ones who have never seen a visitor before. As we all rushed to greet our new visitor and welcome her to the village, I could see her anxiety, looking like a fish out of water. She seemed very surprised by all of the attention, even when compared to other visitors. She did eventually warm up to us, but there were still those invisible walls, that need for space that was lost on the rest of us.

Needless to say, as much as we tried to accommodate each other, there was plenty of confusion on both sides. There were plenty of folks who ran into her walls head-on and staggered away in a daze, and no one got it worse than Soren, one of my grandnephews. Unlike Perin, there was no doubt that he had a fancy for her from the very start. I suppose there was something about her snow-white fur and brilliant green eyes that entranced him, and for many days afterwards he would have a faraway look and a silly grin on his face. He went well out of his way to do nice things for her, showing her around, bringing her small gifts, dancing with her at the festivals, and it looked like she enjoyed his company. I tried to gently hold him back, warning that she wasn’t like his other friends in the village, but I don’t think he heard me. Not that I can blame him, I would have been the same if I was many seasons younger. She did have very beautiful eyes, they reminded me of leaves on a late summer morning.

Where was I? Oh, right…

I was expecting something to happen, so I wasn’t surprised when Soren wandered home late one night looking thoroughly confused and more than a little heartsick. I made some tea to calm him down and listened to him as he tried to tell me what distressed him so.

That night, he took her to the top of the cliff that overlooked the sea. The night sky was clear and the eldest moon was full and bright, gently illuminating everything in her silvery light. From on top of the cliff, she looked so close that you could almost reach out and touch her. They say that when the eldest moon is out in her full splendor while her two siblings are fast asleep, anything said with the utmost sincerity will remain so forever. I’ve made many such declarations in my time, all of which have not changed to this day, and I believe that Soren was planning on doing the same. I had no doubts of his earnestness, but, as I had feared, he didn’t see those walls until he ran right into them. In short, the visitor wasn’t quite ready yet. Needless to say, he wasn’t quite prepared for that response, but I got the feeling that there was something else bothering him. After all, this wasn’t the first time he found himself a little overeager and had to take a few steps back.

Soren went on to describe that after he had spoken to her before the elder moon, there was a pained look on her face, speaking of some deep anxiety. Sure, he had seen others show a little uncertainty, but this was different, as though she was heartbroken somehow. She tried to explain how she felt, but it only made him even more confused. This much was clear to him, though: she hurt deep inside, and he desperately wanted to help her. But she had withdrawn behind her walls, and there was nothing he could do to reach her. They walked back to the village in a heavy silence, where she muttered an apology before going to where she was staying, leaving Soren wandering home with little idea of what was going on or what to do.

He’s fine now, all he needed was someone to talk to about it. Folks like him don’t stay glum for long. But I made it a point to keep an eye on our visitor, making sure she didn’t get overwhelmed by any other well-meaning but unaware folks. It was clear by then that she had a lot of things weighing on her mind and heart, and it didn’t do anyone any good to go accidentally poking at things like that.

Trust me, I know how it feels.

Part four of Three's adventures in Jalmira. This part was a challenge to write, as the genets' have some very different social norms to what we're used to, so I was trying to write it from their perspective, using language and tone that would appropriate to their way of thinking and not ours. It made me realize that our language in these sort of situations can seem rather harsh if not quantified properly. I'm not sure if that's a quality of our language or our default interpretations of common words and phrases.

Three belongs to  genesisw Send your comments and favs on the artwork itself to http://www.furaffinity.net/view/9420221/