World-carvers, we were, grandest of architects, spinners of galaxies and snuffers of stars. I— along with my two siblings, along with all of my generation— would carry on the tradition, succeed where our precursors had failed. I was small and awkward and wrong-headed and slow, but one day— one, distant, cryptic day— I, Stumpy, would scratch rivers with my claws.
After choosing a name befitting my lofty work, of course. Something suitably poetic. Something evocative of vast wonders and unvarnished success.
Rushing-Rivers-Cascade-Through-Sparkling-Lovely-Canyons-of-Deep-Devising-With-Shiny-Rocks-On-The-Bottom.
Yes.
Such dreams. Such ambition.
Crippled by a single problem.
I lie: there were many problems. But only one of which I was aware at such a puerile age, adult accouterments not yet activated, unable to remember what had not yet began.
I had never set foot on a planetary surface. Never seen a world. Never seen a star.
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