Nelly’s Discovery by Mwandeyi Kamwendo – SEE SAW Comics, Webcomics from the Sequential Artists Workshop

Nelly’s Discovery by Mwandeyi Kamwendo

From off-page: â€œNelly? Nelly, we know youâ€™re in there. Open up. Iâ€™m coming in.â€ We turn from a view of a hilly landscape to the outside of a house, to a door opening into a room with a young figure sitting on the bed.

A man with a stetson hat stands in the doorway looking concerned: â€œItâ€™s not like you to miss mess, Nelly. Did you get in a fight with the other girls.â€ The young figure replies, â€œNo sir.â€ â€œSo whatâ€™s going on with you?â€ Nelly looks uneasy and says, â€œI fetched sprinter back during the storm.â€â€¨â€œThatâ€™s good. Itâ€™s what I asked you to do.â€ â€œYeah, but something happened to me when I was out there.â€

â€œThe clouds came in real fast. We made for cover quick. Sprinter was alright. And I was also alright. I know the country like the back of my hand, so I wasnâ€™t worried.â€ Nelly and a horse walk through a hilly landscape with dark rainclouds overhead. They enter an echoey cave.

â€œWe were just sittin, waiting out the rain. And I was thinking. Thinking about my fights with the others. Thinking of how alone I feel all the time. And then I heard this music. Sir, I swear, it was music Iâ€™d heard before. It was like hearing my Mama singing.â€ Sprinter the horse feeds on some grass in the cave while Nelly sits by a fire. Astronomical symbols and constellations appear around them and they start to look around the cave.

(Off page) â€œAnd thenâ€¦â€ â€œAnd then what, Nelly?â€ â€œI donâ€™t know. Never mind. I guess it was just the wind.â€ â€œItâ€™s normal, to think we hear the voices of departed ones. Perhaps itâ€™s our way of not feeling so alone.â€ â€œThis was different, sir. I mean it.â€ A crushed UFO appears ahead, which Nelly looks at with wonder. They dig a flashlight out of their backpack and venture forward.

â€œYour Mama loved this country just like you do, Nelly. Donâ€™t be ashamed that, sometimes, when youâ€™re down, you hear her in the mind. You miss her. Thatâ€™s okay.â€ â€œI guessâ€¦what I heard just scared meâ€¦Makes me feel even more different. Like maybe I donâ€™t get on with folks for a reason. Like maybe Iâ€™m too different to be saved.â€ Nelly reaches out for the UFO, gets closer, and places a hand on it, as itâ€™s obscured in darkness except for a sliver of light from the flashlight.

â€œYouâ€™re not different, Nelly. Youâ€™re just growing up. Ainâ€™t nothing wrong with growing up.â€ Nelly, surrounded again by constellations and astronomical charting, looks up at the UFO with shock and wonder.

Published On: May 20, 2024

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