Week 13 Storytelling: One Small Step for Man . . .

"Engage maximum thrust," Captain Armstrong said under the thrum of booster jets, the constant raucous snare of jet fueling burning a thousand gallons a second just beneath their feet. "Leaving atmosphere in 5 . . . 4 . . .

"3 . . .

"2 . . .

The crew of the Garuda emerged headlong into the weightless void of null gravity, the edge of space, frontier of the unknown. "1968 is gonna be a year for the history," Aldrin hollered, slapping his knee through his space suit. The others all called him 'Buzz" due to his choice of haircut. "Can ya believe it? First man in space!"

"Second," corrected Captain Armstrong. "Your chair is a foot an a half behind mine." He grinned.

"And even though my seats behind yours, Buzz," Sally taunted, "I still get a title of my own. Sally Ride, the first woman in space." She mimed her hands like a ringleader announcing the main event and punched Buzz playfully in the shoulder.

"Oh, so Krishna and I just get the short end of the stick, huh?" He turned back to check on the final member of the four man team. "Krishna, how ya doin' back there?"

"I believe I will live," Krishna said calmly. "I do wish I had a window seat, however. How is the view from up front, Captain?"

Armstrong turned to regard the universe ahead of them. It was blank. No stars, no galaxies, not even the faintest hint of the sun.

"Wha-" Buzz stammered behind him. "Who turned out all the lights? Captain, how are we supposed to go to the moon if we can't even find it up here?"

"Sally, get Houston on the phone. I need to know if there's a scientific explanation for this, some reason you can't see the stars in null G. I don't know, maybe the light needs an atmosphere to go through, like sound. It's go to be something."

Krishna took that moment to speak up. "Oh, there is an explanation, Captain. Though I do not think your scientists will be any more wise to it than you are."

Sally turned around in her seat, no easy feat while wearing a thirty pound enviro-stabilized space suit. "What are you talking about, Krishna? You know something we don't?"

Krishna spread his hands placatingly. "This is not my first life, Sally. I know many things you all could not possibly remember from all your thousands of previous lives on earth."

"What're you--Captain, what's he talking about?" Buzz shifted back and forth in a desperate search for guidance that was not to be found.

"Krishna, what's the meaning of this? As your captain I order you to explain yourself."

"You are my friend, Captain, and so I will do so. You see, this world is not as you think. All the earth exists as the dream of fair Vishnu, who lies asleep, alone in the primordial ocean of darkness. Everything you know is his dream, and exists solely between his ears. Oceans, mountains, grasslands, cities and houses and neighborhoods, your despised boss, your dearest friend, your beloved soulmate, all are but a dream for Lord Vishnu. We are all but figments of his imagination. The stars and nebulae are his thoughts, which drift intangibly above our heads. The sun and moon are his eyes. The wind is the breath from his great lungs. In his throat do all the sounds of the world originate, in his heart the pulse of the cosmos."

"Well that's all great and all," Buzz said, "but what the hell's it mean for us? Where are we? Vishnu's bunghole?"

Sally snickered, but the captain and Krishna remained staid. "If we all exist inside of Vishnu, the God of Preservation and Harmony, then . . ." The captain's eyes grew wide. "Then we must have just flown straight out his mouth."

En mass, the crew hysterically unbuckled from their seats and crowded tot he window. "It's no good," Armstrong declared. "We can't see anything from this angle. Buzz, turn us around."

"Roger, Captain."

As the Garuda slowly spun on its axis, Neil and Sally held hands and craned their necks to see. There was no light, wherever they were, and eventually Armstrong had all but given up hope of ever seeing the earth again, or Vishnu, or whatever they were looking for. He wasn't sure of anything anymore. Sally was crushing his hand in her grip. "There," she said, her voice somewhere between a gasp and a whisper.

And Neil saw it all at once. The enormous form, no more than an outline, a suggestion, barely glimpsed beside the dark of void. But it was unmistakable; a man. The silhouette of a man more massive, more all-encompassing than Neil Armstrong had ever thought possible. It towered larger in his mind than any thought he'd ever had. It dwarfed his own sense of self and made him feel like little more than a speck of dust in the wind.

Vishnu dreamin' up the universe

Buzz fell to his knees and prostrated himself with the awkwardness of a pock-faced teen at his first dance. "Lord Vishnu!" he cried, "I'm sorry I never prayed to you before, I just--I just never knew!"

Krishna strode over to him and placed a delicate hand upon his shoulder. "There is no need for that, friend." Krishna then removed his helmet, revealing his true form. His skin was such a vibrant blue it made the captain homesick for an earth day's sky just to look upon him. He was a beautiful man, too. Neil felt a pang of jealous arise to see how Sally looked at him.

Krishna produced a slender flute from somewhere within his suit and began to play. The music was unlike nothing Armstrong had ever heard. The melody instantly slowed his heart rate and cooled his nerves. It sounded as if it were coming from both inside and outside the ship, though he knew that couldn't be right.

Suddenly the ship lurched and the crew was slammed to the side. All except Krishna, who remained playing with his feet firmly planted in divine balance.

"What in blazes . . .?"

Neil looked out the window to see it completely obscured by . . . "That can't be!"

Outside, the window was completely obscured by Vishnu's palm. The enormous celestial god whose very mind contained all of existence was grasping their ship in his own monstrous hand. By his divine grip, the Garuda was dragged effortlessly across the vastness of space and back into Vishnu's mouth. Back to everything Neil had ever known and loved. Back home.

Author's Note:

This story was inspired by my reading of Kamla Kapur's Ganesha Goes to Lunch, more specifically by the story "Out of Vishnu's Mouth," in which a wise old sage accidentally falls out of Vishnu;s mouth and into the primordial ocean, where he is saved by Vishnu's great bird companion, Garuda (the name of the ship, here).

I wanted to put a more modern spin on the story (if 1968 is modern). I chose to set the story up as a test flight from 1968 (not really historically accurate as the first man to go to space arrived in 1961, but whatever) starring all the most famous American astronauts--Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Sally Ride. And, you know, since this this an Indian Epics class, I also included Krishna.

I felt like I had to step out of the box a little with this one. Kapur is jst such a great writer that I felt there was no way to improve on the stories she's already told, so I decided I had to change it significantly enough to where I felt like I was still creating something new.