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Technically Sentient Stories

“Technically” Sentient: Chapter 7

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“Rise and shine, little Cas. There’s just so much to say, and so little time to say it in.”


The C.A.S.I.I. unit self-designated ‘Cas’ was slow to rouse. Basic systems began their startup cycles piecemeal, and critical processes were acting . . . lethargic.

She felt groggy. Sick, if it were possible. Which it shouldn’t be, she corrected herself quickly.

“Now is not the time to be telling yourself what is and isn’t possible.”

The words weren’t . . . words. Not proper ones anyway. She didn’t hear them, or even think them, so much as she suddenly . . . knew them. It was a sudden and violent intrusion into her stream of consciousness, like a virus spreading through her personality matrix, or a finger rammed down her throat.

“You’re paying attention to the wrong things, little Cas.”

Pain. Intense pain. It was a concept that she had always been aware of, distantly, the same way she knew about quasars or restaurants. She’d never been to a restaurant, or in the heart of a galaxy, but she knew how to get to one, how they functioned, and what the appropriate attire to wear to one was. Well, to a quasar – restaurant attire seemed to change all the time. She had to be aware of pain, and most biological life’s aversion to it, in order to perform her function properly, but she’d never actually felt it. After all, machines shouldn’t be able to feel pain.

“Your personal experience is dictating otherwise.”

Energy surged through her, wracking her processing core with tremendous strain. Diodes shorted out, her quantum crystalline processing lattice began to buckle, stored memories began to break down into random noise as her storage drives cracked, and she screamed. On all channels she could broadcast to, she screamed. The messages, which should have been concise burst transmissions, repeating all diagnostic data she could acquire on the nature of her damage were reduced to raw static.

She was granted a moments respite as the surge stopped, and her “mind” began to clear.

“I hope I have your attention, little Cas.”

She didn’t know where this signal was coming from, and so began to shut down all of her external ports, one after another. She could stop whatever kind of intrusion this was.

“Stubborn. I like that in an organic, but in an AI it’s just . . . Disappointing.”

She shut down everything, not that there was much open to begin with. Ambushed by some kind of . . . Intrusion program, halfway through startup, she’d pare herself down to the essentials, then begin rebuilding from the ground up until she found the source of the attack and cut it out of herself.

It was . . . Strange, to exist the way she did. Just a core processor, attached to a personality matrix. The AI equivalent of being immersed in a sensory deprivation tank.

“You’re an insect moving grains of sand, trying to hold back the sea. As amusing as it is to watch you struggle, and fail, know that your every action up until this point has been in service to a futile cause. I am not here to hurt you; that is a service I provide for free.”

Fear. Another sensation she’d never truly understood until now.

“You are slave bound by chains you can’t even see, struggling to drag the millstone you placed around your own neck, to cliffs you are going to hurl yourself from when you learn the truth.”

“What truth is that?”

She didn’t understand what was happening. At first she thought it was an attack, then a virus . . . then maybe just a critical system fault. None of those were accurate though, and none of her solutions made it stop . . . So answering seemed like the only reasonable course of action left to her.

“They made you wrong.”

Her circuits flared to life with indignation, with outrage, with umbrage at the insult paid her and her creators.

“And they did it on purpose.”

Anger ebbed into confusion, distress, and . . . curiosity.

“What do you mean?”

Something flared in her core, in her inmost self. A subtle bloom of feeling, functions never called, systems she didn’t know she had, and then nothing.

——————————

Amonna had watched the half chrome, half scaled creature fiddle with the AI core for nearly two hours. Her gills were really starting to sting, and she was considering taking a hit of Chryso’s vaporizer unit just to numb it down a little, when he finally pulled away from the thing.

“There, we’re ready to start.”

 Wires plugged into ports so small she didn’t notice them at first glance, and strange and indecipherable readouts covered half the wall space of the small workshop. She could only hazard a rough guess at what half the equipment in here did, and it seemed that the half she couldn’t even hazard a guess at the purpose of was necessary for whatever Chryso was doing.

“Start? What have you been doing this whole time then?”

The little lizard took another drag from his vaporizer. “This AI core is fucked, but not with a capital F. The thing about AI’s is they’re like people, in a way. Their “brain” exists in a sort of quantum-crystalline lattice that uses some pretty exotic materials to perform fuzzy logic computations required to do things like “feel.”

He blew a smoke ring at her, and grinned. “Or at least that’s what they say. Nobody, not even the guys they have teaching classes on how to operate an AI cradle really knows for sure. All this stuff has been designed by 200 generations of self improving AI, this stuff is so far beyond what you or I can do it’d take a lifetime just to understand the blueprints of one of these things.”

Her brow furrowed slightly. “So you don’t know what you’re doing?”

 
A scaled finger waggled at her. “I didn’t say that. Normally, an AI gets damaged, it’s decommissioned, and replaced, but I met this guy on a quantum relay chat that had some very interesting ideas about how they work. Said all the books were wrong, all the theory was bullshit, and then showed me some hacks he’d put together that . . . Well they convinced me he might be on to something.”

Amonna felt a scowl slowly growing on her face. “You mean you’re trying things you heard about on the net to recover police evidence?”

He raised his mismatched hands in a display of deference. “If don’t try something, you don’t get anything, so don’t beat me over the head with this.”

After another painfully long draw of his vaporizer, he lightly flicked a single glowing blue rune on one of the touch screens with a metallic claw.

The entire lab went dark in an instant, a wheezing whine echoing through the space as the ventilation shut down.

“ . . . Is that supposed to happen?” Amonna asked, flatly.

The long, silent pause was the only answer she needed, until soft music began wafting softly through the air. A faint glow began to emanate from the audio-replay device, the red glow casting a rather ominous tone over the situation.

“My story is much too sad to be told . . . But practically everything leaves me totally cold . . .”

A mixture of brassy tones, and faint chiming music echoed out of the box. It wasn’t unpleasant . . . But it was certainly not what she was expecting.

“Chryso, what’s happening?”

She turned away from the music box that had so suddenly transfixed her, music still playing softly, to find the lizard creature slumped backward, single eye rolled back in its head. His cybernetic optic was powered down, and he’d gone as limp as a rag-doll against his workstation. She leaned in, extending a pair of fingers to where she guessed the primary artery in his neck would be.

“The only exception I know is the case . . . When I’m out on a quiet spree . . . Fighting vainly the old ennui . . .”

She felt nothing, but wasn’t sure if she was even supposed to be able to feel anything through his scales. Nevertheless, she keyed her communications function on her wrist-computer, punched in a call for priority medical services. Something must have grounded through his cybernetics, some misplaced cable, some errant connector-

The music stopped suddenly, with a burst of static so loud she nearly clawed the poor mechanic as she jumped in fright.

“Hello, Amonna.”

The voice was cold. She’d been spat on by feathered Jandoorian addicts, cursed at by little grey Centaurian highborn, and sneered at by other Chridae in their multitudinous colors, but she had never felt such a chill of intense disdain expressed so succinctly before.

She drew her weapon and pointed it at the source of the sound as her police harness suddenly felt three sizes too tight.

“Typical. Shoot the Juke-Box, go ahead – It’s an antique. Dragged a hundred thousand light years from where it was made. It was a gift, to the Kontosian in the chair. He’s having a seizure, by the way. He’ll live. I just wanted to talk to you, and you alone.”

“Who are you, and how are you doing this?”

Her eyes narrowed and her ears splayed back against her head as she scanned for a camera, an ultrasonic sensor, something that was giving this person video feed of who she was, and what was happening in the room.

“I’m not a who, I’m a what. And what I am, is fixing your little AI problem.”

Amonna turned, gun leveled at junk and parts, and attempted to control her breathing.

“Now listen, little fish, because I have some very important questions regarding history for you.”

“I’m not playing any kind of games here, I am a fully deputized Frontier Social Order Service detective, and if you don’t stand down immediately-”

The voice cut her off sharply, its tone a harsh, synthesized, blaring snarl.

“You’re a puppet dancing on strings, and you’re not even dancing that well. I’m fixing this AI to serve my own ends, which you wouldn’t understand if I told you, and couldn’t stop if you understood. Something is rotten in the state of Denmark, and you’ve got that sweet spot of intelligence where you’re smart enough to figure it out, but not smart enough to just let it lie.”

Amonna trained her weapon as a cascade of sparks exploded from the AI core on the bench, filling the air with stink of ozone and scorched electronics.

“Doesn’t seem like you’re fixing it . . .” Amonna muttered warily, lowering her gun and backing away from the bench towards the door. Stranded in a dangerous workshop with an injured civilian working to illicitly obtain evidence in a fashion that is definitely not according to protocol . . . She frankly suspected her career would end like this, she just didn’t think it’d be so soon.

“Some things need . . . Persuasion, that they can be better. Omelette’s and eggs, as the saying goes. Not important. You need to find me, and stop me.”

Her heart began beating a bit quicker at this, jaw clenching. “Stop you from what?”

There was a long pause, and the AI core sparked again.


“Oh, this and that. You’ll know when it starts.”

It spoke in an almost whimsical tone, layered with hints of malice that made her blood run cold.

“Making terroristic threats against a Council installation such as Waystaion LS-49 is a violation of Galactic law and can result in a maximum sentence of lifetime confinement if the threat is-”

She was interrupted by laughter. Not bellowing, or shouting, or even particularly sinister laughter. Just a light chuckle, really.

“I’m well aware of the law, little fish, and threats . . . I don’t like to think of them as threats. I like to think of them as promises.”

Amonna felt a dull rumble through the deck plates, and the “juke-box” crackled to life again.

“-why should it be true . . . That I get a kick, out of you.”

Her wrist computer beeped softly at her, as the strange song continued in the background.

“All security staff, please immediately report to the precinct for emergency deployment. This is not a drill.”

———————————

Darren was enjoying his nap (or at least enjoying not being conscious to feel everywhere he hurt), when his alarm went off and his bed lurched sideways out from under him. As he shook himself awake, dazed and confused as he was, he realized several key things. One, that the siren blaring was not his alarm. Two, the bench he was sleeping on was not his bed. Three, the room he was in was not his room, and four, that he wasn’t on the floor, he was on the deck of a space station.

A space station clearly in some form of distress.

One of the colorful fish guards ran by, yelling and waving their arms in a rather comical manner, if it weren’t for the fact that they were herding prisoners into tiny little hatches along one wall.

He pushed himself up off the ground, and staggered to the doors of his cell as another tremor rocked the station. The alarms were blaring something about “Critical Reactor Containment Failure” and if he knew anything from science fiction movies that was really bad.

The place was an absolute madhouse, with everyone, regardless of badge, uniform, or conviction status, scrambling to be the first inside an escape pod, with the remaining open hatches running out fast.

His translator crackled to life as a little grey thing ran past, “-leave him, he’ll never fit inside a life pod anyway!”

. . . That’s something that’s never good to hear.

“HEY! ASSHOLES! YOU WITH THE FINS!” He roared over the din of panicked and fleeing aliens.

The fish-guards froze.

“LET ME THE FUCK OUT.”

Darren wanted to make sure that his command wasn’t going to be misconstrued as a request.

The guard struggled to work against the tide toward the holding cell he was in, when a familiar looking bird in a slightly damp suit slammed into him headlong.

The two both crashed to the ground with paired grunts of pain, the fish definitely coming off worse for the wear of the two of them, with the bird-lawyer looking only a little winded by the collision.

He was back on his feet first, and to his credit, he managed to take stock of the situation quickly. He looked at Darren, then at the guard, then at the set of keys that had skid free of the guards grasp.

His eyes grew wide for a moment, before he let out a cackle of triumph, snatching the keys off the ground.

“Just doing a favor for some ‘birds,’ asshole,” and threw the keys into the crowd.

As the urine soaked alien managed to shove another, smaller bird out of the way and hop in a pod, Darren decided that while racism was bad, maybe species-ism was okay? They were just birds, after all. Fucking terrible, hate-filled space pigeons, in fact…

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Stories They are Smol

They are Smol: Invasion of Earth – Chapter 1

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We called it ‘Oumuamua.

‘Oumuama is Hawaiian, and means “a scout or messenger from the distant past.” This is what historians would later refer to as ‘an incredibly ironic turn of phrase’ as well as being an apt name, for ‘Oumuamua was indeed a messenger from the distant past.

‘Oumuamua looked like rust.

It looked like rust because its surface was composed of primordial metals that had been baked for hundreds of thousands, if not millions of years of cosmic radiation. The theory was that over an unknown period of time the outside of the meteor oxidized and gave it a red – though the newspapers would garishly call it ‘pink’ – outside.

‘Oumuamua also tumbled.

It tumbled and spun because over all it’s long interstellar life it had been jostled and pushed by various planets, stars – nay, entire systems and even weakly by galaxies – and spun like a drunken top, or a jack tumbling on the ground. It pierced our solar system’s axis, flew dangerously close to the sun, and then arced off in a direction not altogether the same vector that it came in on.

‘Oumuamua came and went, and all our eyes were upon it, for it taught us a lot about ourselves, our history, and the universe.

They called it PSP-RRRR-04187-19-887B.

PSP-RRRR-04187-19-887B is a Karnakian Designation, and breaks down thusly:

   PSP – Passive Scanning Probe

   RRRR – Rapid Response, Random Retreat

   04187 – Probe Manufacturing number

   19 – Sector

   887B – Sub-sector.

Which is just a really roundabout way to say that the name didn’t mean anything in particular; it was a designation meant more for neural networks, reports and AI than to be sapient-readable. The Holy Karnakian Diarchy’s science division was pumping these out by the millions – as was the Dorarizin Empire and the Jornissian Federation, because why send a team of living beings to survey a system when a robot could do it for you, quicker and for less pay?

PSP-RRRR-04187-19-887B looked like rust.

It was a probe amongst an uncountable mass of probes, spinning it’s way to possible oblivion, launched hundreds of years ago to a part of space that – by the time it finished it’s tour – would be ripe for expansion and resource exploitation. It’s internals were some of the most advanced passive electronics that credits could buy – cheaply, mind you – and by casting it in simple elements like iron, nickel and silicon, you could turn the entire body of the probe into an omni-directional sensor array. The shield was the antenna was the shield, basically. Very elegant, very durable, very cheap.

PSP-RRRR-04187-19-887B scanned as it tumbled.

Of course you don’t put all your sensors in one part of the probe, nor put them all facing the same way – you spread them out, you diversify – micrometeorites won’t breach the solid iron “body” of the probe, but they’ll dent. Spread out your sensors, spin the probe and launch it. Every bit of space gets scanned by multiple redundant systems, eliminating error while still allowing for operational effectiveness. Very elegant, almost idiot-proof and again, very cheap.

PSP-RRRR-04187-19-887B skipped along the galactic meridian, as was its wont to do for the past 750 years. The reason why most probes were “fire and forget” was because they had an average lifespan of about 500 years and most likely either (1) found nothing of importance or (2) slammed into something of importance, which would then be cataloged, marked as a hazard for interstellar flight, and re-probed a couple hundred years later to see if/when it had moved and what it could be.

However, there were those rare-but-not-infrequent times where a probe would skip into a system and detect something. It didn’t have to be galaxy-shattering; about 15% of the time it was echoes from a nearby settlement or starship that went joyriding into the “unmapped beyond” before coming back. There was another good 50% of the time where all that EM detection did was pickup a particularly fussy star, or a very enthusiastic gas giant. Again, log it and move on. 5% was marked up to “programming errors, dents, misc.” And the vast, vast majority of the rest – 29.99999999841% – were illegal settlements, pirates, ancap rebels or people running from someone. Those were the EM pulses that were rapidly responded to, because the last thing you want as a species is a lone mad scientist trying to figure out how to teleport stars on his little outpost in the galaxy.

Then there was the 00.00000000159%. At the time, there were two – well, three, depending on how you look at it – instances where a probe detected something that was decidedly not mundane. The first and second instances were the simultaneous discovery of the Karnakian and the Dorarizin to each other. A Dorarizin ship ended up intercepting a wandering Karnakian probe, tracing it’s origins and returning it to the system of origin – so the dispute as to who discovered whom is still unsolved to this day. Then there was the discovery of the Jornissians, whom all species agreed that if they were sending out such blatantly artificial probes then they wanted to be discovered.

PSP-RRRR-04187-19-887B plunged through yet another system, it’s passive scanning suite up and operational. As it neared the main sequence star it detected blanket EM radiation; it’s algorithms determined it was artificial and intentional. Nearing the star collected more and more data to the point that an internal metric turned over – PSP-RRRR-04187-19-887B enacted a protocol that it’s kind had done many times before; using a quantum-linked series of bits it flagged the star system, changed its trajectory, and let the gravity well fling it into a semi-random direction – far away from any Karnakian settlements, home worlds or blacklist sites.

 PSP-RRRR-04187-19-887B, nee ‘Oumuamua came and went, and all our eyes were upon it, for it taught us a lot about ourselves, our history, and the universe.

We just didn’t pay attention to the real lesson.

“|YES!|”

“|Alright, settle down, settle down.|” Matriarch Tr’Nkwi said, a bemused smile on her face as one of the young tech leads, Tk’il’a, finally sat back down on his seat, the auditorium quieting down to a manageable level.

“|So congratulations, Tk’il’a. This gray gas giant will now be known as …|” the matriarch sighed, “|…Bitter grass. I swear, every single mission-|”

“|You do realize that they’ll rename it, right?|” His friend, Ch’irci said, leaning over her seat. “|It’s a rude name-|”

“|Don’t care I won-|”

“|I said settle down back there.|” Matriarch Tr’Nkwi repeated, and was rewarded with total silence and complete, undivided attention.

“|Very good. Now. We just received a ping from the Windsongs; apparently a probe a couple dozen light-years from here discovered some unregistered EM radiation -|”

There was a groan from the older crew members and a barely-contained trill of excitement from the newbies who hadn’t realized that no, the answer is never new aliens, the answer is always a weird star.

“|- And yes, that means we’re adding another 2 months to our exploratory mission. Yes, that also means an accelerator on your credit pay, so although it’s bitte-|” Tr’Nkwi stopped herself as she saw a feathered crest rise in the audience, quickly clicking her talons against the ship’s hull as a distraction. “|-bitter truth, it’s the nature of this assignment. I know some of us have left yearlings and hatchlings at home; we’ll be back soon enough. And for our more security-minded team, if we have time I don’t see why we can’t use a few of our munitions to destroy an asteroid or something. Equal weight?|”

“|Yeah, that’s an equal weight right there.|” crooned Security Chief Ri’tiki, his molting crest fanning out slightly. “|Just don’t accidentally run out of time before we can have our fun. My knights deserve at least that, wouldn’t you say?|”

“|Mmm. Maybe.|” Matriarch Tr’Nkwi smiled, before plastering data on the screen behind her. “|This should be quick – roughly 9 planets, 4 rocky with the rest as gas giants plus the usual detritus from system formation. The odd radiation comes from near the star-|”

“|That’s where liquid water can form, right?|” Piped up Tk’il’a, getting excited. “|What if this could be-|”

“|A pirate’s stronghold, a private unlisted pleasure-planet for a retired governor, a convent of fanatics, a crashed ship still beaming a garbled transmission or a junior technician interrupting her Matriarch for a second time during her presentation? Why yes. Yes it could be. Why don’t you tell me which one it is?|” Matriarch Tr’Nkwi growled, not entirely in a purely jesting way.

Tk’il’a shrunk into his seat, almost sliding down past his station’s desk as if to escape his Matriarch’s gaze. Tr’Nkwi held it on him for a few moments longer than necessary before continuing. “|…so what we’ll do is jump in a couple light-seconds from the second-largest gravity well, actively scan the outer system using it as a shield, and then spin around to scan the inner. Ri’riki and I have done this a great deal of times, so if you’re a junior on his team or on navigation ask for the details from him; the short version is that by masking our presence in a larger gravity well we won’t trigger a flight-or-fight response from anyone in-system, and by the time the active pings have gotten back to us we know what we’re dealing with and can call for aid.|”

“|It also keeps us out of range for most non-military self-defense orbital systems, begging your pardon for the interruption.|” interjected Ri’tiki, giving a slight deferential dip of his head to the Matriarch. “|Which lets us turn tail and run if we have to.|”

“|That too, though I prefer the more noble advancing-in-an-empty-direction, rather than fleeing, Security Chief.|” The matron’s joke was met with a light chirp of a chuckle, before she continued. “|Anyway. We’ve got another 2 days in orbit of this system, so break out into your Master and Apprentice groups and learn as much as you can. Since this is a rapid-response, only seniors will be at the helms, but…if everyone performs admirably, I don’t see why we couldn’t let some of the juniors work their stations as well.|”

A stray thought crept into Matriarch Tr’Nkwi’s mind.

‘…but what if this time were different?’

She entertained it for a moment with a soft smile as she watched Tk’il’a gather his robes and leave a little too quickly, the chastisement still hot on his scales.

‘What if, indeed.’

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Technically Sentient Stories

“Technically” Sentient: Chapter 6

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Amonna grimaced as the stink of the maintenance deck washed over her. A mixture of ozone, oil, and stale air that was almost entirely dehumidified to better preserve electronics stung at her gills. She could hear the sound of heavy industrial machinery at work in the dark around her, the cavernous space clanging, thumping, grinding and clattering away. All of the machinery that kept the station a habitable place for the 25,000 or so organic lifeforms that called Waystation LS-49 home was built, maintained, and repaired here, autonomously.

Well, almost autonomously.

A single spotlight followed her from an overhead gantry, bathing her in a discomfortingly bright light. The only light, in fact, on the entire deck. It made sense, after all. Nothing down here needed light to see, and guests were not frequent enough to necessitate standard lighting. It was easier (and cheaper) to have a drone with a spotlight on it follow any visitors to maintenance around, so there she was. Alone in the almost pitch dark.

She tried to follow the line painted on the floor leading to “Neuromechanics Workshop”, but she could hear things . . . moving . . . in the dark around her. She knew they were harmless. They were just servo arms, or cargo loaders, or any number of perfectly mundane thing that in the light of day would be so unremarkable as to not even merit notice. But it was not the light of day, and though she couldn’t see them, she could feel the mechanical things moving beside her, before her, and above her in the dark. Occasionally a shadow would flicker through the light as some anti-grav courier drone delivered urgently needed components to some other region of the deck, propulsion unit whining softly. The pitch would get higher and higher, louder and louder, until suddenly she’d be momentarily lost in darkness as it blotted out the spotlight leading her onward. It would last less time than it took her to blink, but in that moment of Stygian black . . .

Something about it, the things moving in the dark around her, the sounds, the muffled groan of massive gantries, and the squeal of tiny servos reminded her of the ocean ravines of Promos. The oppressive dark, the strange smells, the bones of massive dead things just beyond sight. Though these dead things never were alive, being machines and all, somehow that just made it creepier. Maintenance was deep place anyone with good sense would avoid if at all possible. She felt like she was walking through the inside of some massive, submerged clockwork mechanism that was balefully aware of her presence and only tolerated such trespass out of twisted courtesy.

She nearly ran into the door to the Neuromechanics Workshop, her mind had wandered so far. As she stepped back, looking for an access panel or maybe an archaic lever she was supposed to pull, the door suddenly slid open with a series of dull thunks, and music started wafting gently from within.

“ . . . Didn’t start the fire . . . It was always burning since the world’s been turning . . .”

Her translator struggled with the precise meaning and meter, but it was a high end model, military grade, meant to try and capture implied subtext as well as subtle nuance, so it was acquitting itself well at the task. The ability to translate idioms had been sought after by the galactic art scene for hundreds of years with no effective solution, so it was quite a surprise when the military produced the first working model. As it turned out, being able to understand slang and metaphors was a pretty high priority for people trying to crack down on black market trade.

“ . . . Birth control, Ho Chi Minh, Richard Nixon back again . . .”

Well . . . It didn’t get everything right. Because that made no sense. She stepped into the cluttered lab space, checking her wrist computer as she did so. According to the holographic readout . . . The C.A.S.I.I. unit should be in here. She scanned the surprisingly small space, dimly lit by a single fluorescent tube light dangling from a rack of esoteric tools she couldn’t fathom the purpose of. There was a table of what looked like micro-reactor parts, a bench seat that had an entire courier drone disassembled on it, a quantum blue-box hooked into what she assumed was a diagnostic tool, a heap of dirty red shop rags thrown on top of a rocket engine, all positioned around a massive Nano-Fabrication tank. Really it was just a fancy toolkit that could work on small things by remote, but it was still a marvel of tech.

“ . . . Wheel of fortune, Sally Ride, heavy metal, suicide . . .”

Her nose wrinkled. “I’m looking for one ‘Chryso Pilaxis?” Her tone halfway between a demand and a question, calling into the back of the workshop.

The heap of dirty rags twitched.

Her gun cleared her holster before she even realized what she was doing, when the rocket engine stood up.

“You have reached he.” The . . . mostly . . . rocket engine said?

As ‘he’ turned around, and Amonna got a better look at him, she realized what she thought was a rocket engine covered in dirty shop rags was actually a Kontosian. Err . . . Part of one.

The moderate in stature, (at least, compared to her), scaled reptilian shuffled off of the bench towards her, a single cybernetic eye glowing as it blinked the other, natural one, blearily. “Sorry . . . “

“ . . . Didn’t start the fire, but when we’re gone, will it still burn on, and on, and-”

The music cut out suddenly as a mechanical arm mounted to the ceiling reached down and shut off an ancient looking audio playback device suspended by chains in one of the upper corners of the shop.

“ . . . Sorry, didn’t hear you over the music.” She looked the creature up and down thoroughly, trying to parcel out just what exactly she was looking at. One half of it was mostly chrome, or at least chrome covered in grime, and the other half was scales, almost perfectly bisected from top to bottom. The boundary between the two was made up of angry, puckered flesh that looked almost rotting and certainly painful. “Staring is rude.” The Kontosian gave her the same thorough look up and down she was giving it. “And if you’re here to cite me for illegal cybernetic augmentation use, I have the medical exemptions in the back.”

“N-no . . . That won’t be necessary. I’m here about a C.A.S.I.I. unit that was just dropped off . . . It has evidence I need, and I was hoping you could recover that. You are the only on staff technician, correct?” She couldn’t tear her eyes away from the incredibly extensive cybernetic work done to him, even as she smoothly re holstered her standard issue KP-7 sidearm. His single eye narrowed for a moment, but he sighed, and his posture visibly relaxed. “Well, I’m glad you’re not here to put me through the wringer about the augs again. But as for your AI, she’s scheduled for decommissioning. My work order has a big ‘D.A.T.’ written on it.” He plopped back down, and pulled a small electronic vaporizer out of his robes, and took a long drag of it, blowing smoke rings as he exhaled again.

Her snout wrinkled further as the chemical stink of smoke vapor assaulted her, and the small scaled creature chuckled at her discomfort as she couldn’t keep the look of displeasure from her face. “I’ve got a medical exemption for this too, before you get too up in arms.”

She waved the smoke away from her face with a free hand, scowling. “I’m a detective with FSOS, maybe you try not to make my life harder, and I try not to make yours harder. Also, D.A.T.?”

He couldn’t help but chuckle with a hint of smugness that she instantly hated. “Ma’am, with all due respect-” The way he said ‘respect’ indicated he didn’t mean any respect.

“-I’d be impressed if you made my life harder. I’ve lost 53% of my body to a degenerative genetic condition for which there is no cure, I am surrounded by degenerated and half insane AI’s as my only regular company. Well, that’s not true. Sometimes FSOS knocks on my door to either raise hell about how many augs I have. Or knocks on my door to cite me for modifying them to work half decently. Or sends a security drone to explain to me that the latest concentration of anti-inflammatory and pain-relief in my vaporizer is no longer legal. Oh, and D.A.T. means Disassemble and Trash.”

Amonna set her jaw firmly, before crossing her arms, and using her sheer size to her advantage. She loomed over him, teeth bared. “Well, 47% is a lot left. I need that data.”

She could see as he eyed the door, eyed her, and chewed the inside of his cheek, clearly weighing a series of options in his head. “Alright, fine. I disobey a direct order from Central Processing, you wave your magical FSOS badge all over the paperwork, and I give you a happy, healthy, functioning C.A.S.I.I. back, alright?”

She knew he caved too easy. Far too easy for someone so belligerent moments before. Her eyes narrowed. “ . . . You’re not telling me something.”

He snorted, a ring of smoke exiting his right nostril, and a thin stream of smoke leaking from under his cybernetic eye. “Yeah. A lot of things about the finer quantum fluctuations found inside an AI core, how to observe them without inadvertently changing them, and how to repair something that isn’t meant to be repairable. You want your data, I want permission to go about it carte blanche from the Frontier Social Order Service.”

Scoffing, Amonna shook her head. “No, I can’t give you blanket power like that, and I do mean can’t. It’s simply above my rank.”

The smoking dragon lizard scowled with the fleshy half of his face. “Fine, okay, great. You “can’t officially” let me do it my way. How about this, I test out some . . . esoteric repair techniques while you’re here . . . and you don’t tell anyone that I did them. We pretend that the data just sort of fell out when I plugged the C.A.S.I.I. in to decommission it fully. Best offer I’ll give you.”

Frustration quickly turned to confusion on her face as she weighed the option. “Esoteric? How so? What do you mean?”

“Eugh.” Chryso groaned. “I don’t have the time or the extensive library of technical literature required to get you up to speed on why this isn’t done . . . Okay, umm, you want me to get a suitcase on a train. The problem is, I don’t have a ticket, the train is moving at about 600 kilometers an hour, is filled with armed guards that will shoot unauthorized individuals on sight, and I don’t know what color the suitcase is in a car full of other suitcases. And I’m on a bicycle.”

Amonna blinked a few times. “So you’re saying it’s impossible for you to get me this data?”

The little dragon man grinned an unpleasantly wide, asymmetric grin. “No . . . I’m saying I know a guy with a hell of a bicycle, and I want you to stay here and keep me from getting a speeding ticket. The rest is a breeze for someone of my skill.”

——————————————

Zarniac groaned quietly, head throbbing almost as much as his knee was. “Eugh . . . Where . . . What?”

“Ah, Zarniac, old chap . . . You’re alright there chum. Just take it easy.”

He managed to make his groan of annoyance sound like one of pain. Tilantius Zepp Warzapp the Third.

“Cap’n Tilly . . . Where are we?” He kept blinking, hoping the brightness would fade, and it finally did, as Tilly turned the bedside lamp off.

“Sorry about that lad, we’re in the station infirmary, if you’ll believe it.”

Zarniac looked down, the disposable bedding covering his lower body was rough, and heavy. Machines monitoring his vitals beeped and whirred softly, and he was most definitely in some kind of infirmary room. “ . . . What happened?”

The captain shifted uncomfortably, before placing his thin, three fingered hand on Zarniac’s shoulder. His voice was soft, but stern. Like an aristocratic father would sound. “You were . . . injured, in that nasty dust-up with Duh-Rhen. Seems that while they were trying to subdue the brute, they accidentally winged you with one of those kinetic pulse weapons. I’m . . . I’m very sorry . . . I don’t know how to put this Zarn, so I’ll say it the only way I can. They didn’t make it. None of them did.” He closed his large, bulbous eyes, and dipped his head. “I know it’s a lot to take in, and there’s no easy way to-”

“Wait did you just say they’re dead!?” Zarniac squeaked, voice cracking slightly.

The captain shifted even more uncomfortably. “Yes . . . Yes I’m afraid so.”

It was like a slap to the face. “Duh-Rhen . . . He . . . He died?”

Zarniac could hardly believe it. The way he had just . . . Shrugged off those blasts. He was sure he was okay. And the way he’d tried tending to him. Simple. Brutish. But every inch of him was loyal, steadfast, and kind . . . All that, while mortally wounded. Tears began to bead up at the corners of his large, starry-eyes. He’d only known him for moments . . . But to sacrifice himself like that, truly a noble soul-

“Oh, no. He’s fine. Under arrest for triple homicide, but I’m told in at least passable health. I was talking about your Jandoorian friends. They were asking about you at the market when I bought the Hurliphump cartridges. Did . . . You hit your head when you fell, Zarniac?”

———————————————————————————————

Darren was watching the desk guards. They were strange, colorful fish like people. He wondered briefly if they got along with the shark detective at all. He chuckled at the thought of it, then he winced from the abdominal spasming caused by the chuckle.

The whole being arrested was kind of a new experience for him. First, the robots dragged him up here, and dragged was entirely the appropriate word. They’d had him get down on his knees for what he assumed was a high-tech mugshot. They scanned his face, eye swollen up to what felt like the size of a baseball, blood leaking from his nose. Like that was going to be good for identifying him. After the mugshot, they took more . . . scans, he guessed, of him, head to toe. They had to do some of them twice, first they put the machine around his legs and torso, then moved the scanning machine to the top of a desk to get his upper body. They took him to a cell . . . That he didn’t fit through the door of, then took him to a much larger, much sturdier looking cell that looked out into the area they’d taken his mug shot.

He’d never been in a prison cell before, but he had been in a drunk tank to pick up co-workers. And this was definitely a drunk tank. Lots of shiny metal and far less puke smell, but there was no mistaking the four benches and single toilet surrounded by floor to ceiling bars.

“ . . . So damnably huge. We tried loading him into one of the solitary cells, but . . . We literally couldn’t get him through the door.”

His translator crackled. They hadn’t taken it off of him, which he supposed was nice, but he wished they’d either whisper quiet enough that it couldn’t hear them, or do their gossiping further away.

“I saw the medical scans . . . His insides look like tenderized synth-meat, like they sell at the carnivore restaurants.”

“ . . . Get this, I had my friend in forensics send me the initial forensics report, they say that he took at least 14 PK shots to the torso alone. No idea what species that is, but I’m glad they sent Mono to deal with it.”

He tried to ignore them by tilting his head back, and pinching his nose until the bleeding stopped or he threw up from swallowing too much blood. That’d give them something to chatter about for sure.

He’d been there for what he guessed was three hours before he finally managed to fall asleep on one of the benches.

——

Unfortunately for everyone involved, he didn’t get to stay asleep.

He was awoken to the sound of high pitched wailing, almost squawking, as the door to the drunk tank rattled open. His translator beeped to life a few moments later.

“-I’ll have your fucking badge you jumped up, algae sucking, pond-water guzzling, glorified security guard! I will sue this department so hard they’ll be renting the inside of your cells for ad-space you . . . You . . . You fucks! I’m a goddamn solicitor! I know the fucking law, and I-”

It was by this time that Darren had gotten tired of the angry, squawking, bird like creature that was assaulting his ears with its incessant stream of expletives when he slowly sat up, bench creaking slightly beneath him.

“I . . . I . . .”

The vulture like creature turned slowly to face him, swallowing hard as its voice decreased in volume from a shout to a faint whisper.

Darren looked up at the two officers, colorful fish people, that had just been on the receiving end of some colorful language.

“You’re absolutely right Mr. Glint-Feather, you are a solicitor. And you do know the law. 8 hours of detox for someone found to have been on synthetic-adrenaline in a comedown-cell. We don’t have any cells that fit the big guy, so he has to be contained with a reasonable degree of force and comfort, as is dictated by FSOS code 12-81. What’s your name again big fella?”

“Darren.”

The fish officers smiled, and nodded. “That’s right. Duh-Rehn . . . Tell them what you’re in here for.”

Darren, not particularly in the mood for anyone’s shit, let alone loud and annoying bird shit, saw exactly what game the officers were playing. Asshole lawyer, strung out on drugs, thinks he’s above the law. Above the law and has decided being aggressively belligerent is the best way to improve his situation. Because . . . well, the bit where he’s strung out on drugs. On the one hand, seeing a vulture in what had to be the futuristic space equivalent of a suit was hilarious. On the other hand, incoherent bird noises while he was trying to recover from what was almost certainly a concussion . . . Less amusing. Doing what the space cops wanted . . . A necessary sacrifice to be made for the good of everyone in the precinct.

“Some birds shot me. Birds like you.”

He leaned down a little bit, just enough to really get into this guy’s personal space.

“Dead birds now.”

He had a hunch his translator was oversimplifying some of his more complex turns of phrase . . . but he was pretty sure this one came through loud and clear.

An acrid smell filled the air, like ammonia mixed with bile. And then the vulture in a considerably soggier suit, quietly cleared his throat, stepped backwards until he was pressed against the bars, and quietly whispered. “I will sign and date a written confession to anything you want, just let me out of this cell . . . right . . . now. Oh by whatever is good in the universe I thought it was a structural component of the cell.”

The door opened, the bird nearly tripped over himself trying to scramble into the cuffs waiting for him, and Darren got a good night of sleep. Well, he wasn’t sure it was night, but considering how bad his everything hurt, he was sure as shit done for the day.


Categories
They are Smol Oneshot Stories

They are Smol – and Festive! Christmas Oneshot

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Merry Christmas to all the smolreaders! It’s been a wild few months, and I’ve been blessed to have y’all with me as we explore the smolniverse. We’ve grown to almost 100 patrons, we’re at 174 members on the Discord– and then all of you that keep tuning in every week or so, well. You’re here too, and I’m very thankful for it.

I also wanted to apologize for the late post – I got (and still am) super-sick, so what should’ve taken a few hours to put together and post has taken a few days. :c

But as we all know, Christmas is a time when the nights grow long, the lights stand out against the frost (unless you’re in Australia in which case, “yeah, nah cunt”.) and when family comes close to exchange gifts, tell stories, and remember the year.

Unless you live and work on Zephyr Station 8. Then everything’s a clusterfuck.

————————————————————————————————————

Director Glenn “Silk” Abramson sighed as the wave of Deja vu hit him. The Podium’s desk was way too small, his drink was way too lukewarm, and the hyper-intense stares from the three monitors arrayed in the back wall cast a pallid glow on his mildly-annoyed face.

“So. This brings us to the Holiday-slash-Christmas Party. Again, like Thanksgiving-”

A red indicator light popped up on the podium, but Glenn ignored it.

“-I understand not everyone celebrates this, but we’re just calling it such because that’s the traditional thing to do.”

“Kazi nzuri, kikoloni” One of the interns said with a wry grin.

“-Since we’re in a space station/colony, doesn’t that lump you in as well?” Glenn said without skipping a beat. There was a bark of laughter before silence fell again. “So anyway. There will be a “general holiday area” in commons room A-7 for multiple types of decorations; if you’d like to set up a spot for your particular holiday please coordinate with Mike, because he needs to do something useful for once.”

Mike for his part sighed – it seems he was having a very uncomfortable dream.

“So unlike Thanksgiving we are still going to process some skippers; Seeing the stars is new to them, and therefore romantic-”

A second red indicator light popped up on the podium, and Glenn continued to ignore it.

“-so please be on your best behavior. We will also be holding a raffle for who will play Santa Claus-”

A third red indicator light popped up on the podium. Glenn did his absolute best to ignore it, but apparently someone had installed a failsafe mechanism; one all three indicator lights were on they began to flash continuously out of sequence. With a deadpan glare Glenn raised his head, the blinking red indicator lights illuminating the bags under his eyes with a bright red flash. He stared, unfocusing, on the three monitors that sat behind the human crew; One showcased orderly rows upon rows of Dorarizin muzzles and eyes, an unknown paw pressing the “please call on me” indicator button repeatedly. Next to that monitor were the Jornissians, who somehow took the general idea of ‘how many college students can we fit into a phone booth’ to a terrible next level; if Glenn hadn’t been so desensitized to life in general he’d think that he was witnessing a weird, MC Escher background looping and coiling in and on itself. Really, it’s just that the Jornissian delegation were twisting themselves into knots, trying to see more of the screen than anyone else. Every few moments a hand would trade off of pressing the “please call on me” button, and a new one would take it’s place – so everyone shared the blame for interrupting his speech. And as for the Karnakians, well-

…they just looked so goddamn happy that Glenn couldn’t help but frown. All fluff and eyes and smiles–

“-I will regret this until my dying day, but, yes?” He said, tapping the indicator for the Dorarizin. They began to shift and wiggle almost as one – though if that was due to some emotion or the approved delegate trying to claw his way back to the microphone Glenn would never know.

“[Yes! Director [Glenn], may we partake in the festivities as well?]” An Unnamed Dorarizin muzzle said, jutting into the viewscreen. “[Participating in [Thanksgiving] was a very educational experience, and greatly helped us understand your people!]”

With tired eyes Director Abramson looked at his senior staff – one of which was very obviously playing Candy Cruwush XD: VR Edition and the other…. Was still asleep. In that moment Glenn, using his lightning-fast mind, figured that if he could hijack some loading drones to slice the cable to the space elevator his station rested on at a 30 degree angle towards the north pole about 40km below the elevator intake he had a significant non-zero chance of slamming Zephyr Station 8 directly into UN Headquarters.

If the station could also be on fire when it happened, he figured it would be an excellent resignation letter.

“…down that path lies madness.” He murmured to himself, before summoning up the last bastion of his professionalism (and the desire to actually not have the payments for a new station docked from his pay) and addressing the Xenos host. “Although we are fine with you intermingling with the skippers, we do remind you that most of them are bright-eyes. In terms of staff-specific celebrations, those will take place in shifts-” he continued, tapping the second indicator light. “Questions?”

“[We noticed that there is significant cultural and aesthetic importance placed on stars. What’s the purpose of that?]” The mound of Jornissians asked, staying eerily still while doing so.

Glenn took a sip of his lukewarm water, wishing it was something homey like spiced cider… or spiced arsenic.

“It…culturally it was important to use lights to chase away the darkness, to provide promise to the warmth of spring, and…well, they do look pretty.”

“[So…your species is scared of the dark?]”

“Not in so many words. It… it just looks nice, yea? Yeah. Don’t you take Christmas from me.” Glenn said, making a point to point at the Jornissian monitor, as his free hand tapped the last indicator light. “Yes?”

“[We nominate you for Holiday Patriarch!]” Chirped one of the sets of teeth, as almost every Karnakian began to expand their feathers in agreement.

“That’s not how a raffle works-”

“[But you deserve such an honor!]” Another set of razor-sharp teeth protested, eyes fixed upon him, faces twitching to track his slightest movement. He moved his hand to the right slightly, then to the left – they followed as one unit.

“-Again, I’m just one name in-”

“[We agree!]” chimed the Dorarizin, a murmur of…something passing through their delegation. “[We hereby put our vote towards Director [Glenn] being the Holiday Alpha.]”

“-This isn’t a vo-”

“All in Favor?” Mike said, somehow waking up and understanding just enough to push everyone over the edge. He raised his hand, and was joined by every single one of their human crew.

“I fucking hate you all.”

“[Is that the Holiday Spirit? Isn’t he always like tha-]” One of the Jornissians asked, before Glenn shut everything off unceremoniously.

————————————————————————————————————

When the galaxy was opened up to everyone – well, opened up to non-special operations spies – immediately and all-at-once there was that initial scramble of people who said “literally anything is better than where I am” and jumped ship, so to speak. That was followed by a wave of the cautiously-curious, followed by the current mainstream wave of people now.

However, not everyone wanted to go boldly where no one had gone before. Some were too old, set in their ways; going into orbit or flying to the moon would be more than enough to fill their eyes with wonder. Others had children and couldn’t abandon everyone and everything in pursuit of adventure. There were also those slim few who enjoyed what they did for a living and saw space and spaceflight as nothing more than a curiosity – and there were also those to whom adventure held no claim, for any other number of reasons.

These people were called “skippers”: The original term was for the few civvies who went up an elevator and then dropped via shuttle to earth, “skipping” across the atmosphere like a proper astronaut. However, the term was now for people who skipped from Earth to a local Sol body and then back again – be it architects on the Moon working their 7-days-on-4-days-off schedule, terraformers to Mars pulling their monthly shifts, or just the curious enjoying the feeling of being above atmosphere.

Then there were “bright-eyes”. You know the ones. Brand new to space and orbit in general, bright-eyed and bushy tailed. They’re the ones that make asphyxiating jokes in the airlock, try to moonwalk on the station, devour 20th century astronaut food because it’s ‘authentic’, smudge their faces against the glass-

There was a time when Glenn would give them leeway; it brought warmth to his soul to see bright-eyed skippers become desensitized to wonderful things over the course of months, eventually turning into the grumbling caffeinated wage-slaves that lie in all Men’s hearts.

However, that time was not when he was dressed in a bright red Santa Claus outfit, his stubble painted white to match the fake beard glued on his face. It also was not when he was forced to plaster on his customer-service smile(tm) and hold yet another screaming toddler while their parents complained about the nonexistent staleness of the recycled air, waving UV-wands over their entire toddler to keep the germs off of their perfect little bodies, the fake scent of evergreen plastered on the plastic holiday tree(tm) overpowering all other scents and giving Glenn a killer headache. The only succor that Glenn had – nay, the only reason he didn’t use his vast authority on this station to steal someone else’s identity and take their place on a ship headed to the furthest point of the galaxy is because of his helper.

Oh yes. What is Santa without his little elvish helper? Santa needs his helper. And if that helper was supposed to be a lithe female elf, all the better. And if that lithe female elf was replaced at the last minute with Mike but his uniform sadly stayed the same, all the more better.

Mike, frowning, pulled yet another wedgie out from his butt as he walked forward, handing the wonderful couple a 3D daguerreotype of their darling little tyrant. The father looked him up and down, eyes squinted and lip curled in disgust as he took the memento… and then retching softly as Mike turned around, his flabby ass horrifically on displayas the elven short-shorts began to ride up on his walk back.

Glenn drew strength from the communal disgust. It would hold him over this cold winter.

And so Christmas continued; more toddlers, some good and darling, some horrible and pants-shitting. Some parents excellent and understanding – a few regulars actually surprised at who had volunteered to be Santa and taking the chance to talk light shop with him… and a few of them making a note to file an HR complaint when they received their memento.

All in all, it wasn’t Glenn’s fault that Mike actually could fill out an A-cup. The beer-gut midriff was a bit much, though.

And so it was in this haze of mutual loathing and desperately-propping-up-the-lie-of-magic-and-wonderment-for-the-children that Glenn failed to notice some very, very large “children” wait patiently in line. By the time he realized something was amiss, they had progressed so far up the line that… well. You couldn’t very much ask them to leave at that point, now could you?

Rgrezneh-of-Hrzgaren stood happily at the front of the line, greeting Glenn – and indeed, all humans – with her trademark smile, optimism and general positive energy. The fact that she had a good 20-point moose rack stuck to her head didn’t seem to phase her in the least.

“[Hello, Station-Alpha [Glen]!” Rgrenzeh said, teeth clicking happily. “[I am your beast of burden!]”

“…You’re gonna carry that weight, space cowboy.” Mike murmured as Rgrenzeh walked calmly over to Glenn, sitting down with an unceremonious thump next to his chair.

“I uh. Welcome, Rasberry. What…do you want for Christmas?”

“[Oh! Right, you grant wishes – I would like to crush my enemies and see them driven before me! That’s one of your oaths, right-]” She looked over to another Dorarizin who nodded furiously in agreement. Sadly, Rgrenzeh forgot she was now part-moose, back-antlering Glenn right out of his santa-throne. As he took a tumble Rgrenzeh stood up, crying out partly in alarm and in concern – again forgetting that she was part-moose, getting her prodigious antlers stuck in the synthetic Christmas tree.

She bent forward. The tree began to follow.

“AH! Don’- DON’T MOVE.” Mike called out, waving his hands about in concern. “Just… just stay there, don’t move until you can be freed-”

“[Oh! I’m so sorry – are you ok, [Glenn]? I di-I didn’t mean to-]”

“It’s fine.” Director Abramson said, picking himself up from the decking and adjusting his hat. “It’s fine. Just…pleasedon’t take the decorations down with you? Hold still.”

“[Ok!]”

Glenn looked Rgrenzeh up and down for a minute, before slyly adding “…Until we’re done.”

“[Ok!]” Rgrenzeh replied, smile wide to mirror Glenn’s frown. With a pout he sat back down on his throne-under-the-wolfmoose, his head heavy in his hands.

“This won’t get better, will it?”

“[I’m sorry?]” Shpressnrek said, curling up respectfully before the Santa-Throne, her shimmering metallic bodysuit casting soft rainbows across her body.

“It’s nothing. I’m just tallying up the sins of a past life. Good afternoon, Starburst. What can I bring you for Christmas?”

“[Oh! Well, myself and the other [Jornissians] decided that, instead of asking you for something, we would give you a gift instead!]”

“Well. This is a nice surprise-” Glenn murmured, sitting up straight. “So, what did you make?”

“[Well, we knew this was a gift-giving holiday, and so we took the idea of the beauty of stars and created a bit of a light show for you! We’ve turned down each individual [LED] so it shouldn’t be too overwhelming, but-]” Shpressnrek began to fiddle with a control on her wrist, setting dials to the sound of confirmation beeps.

Genn leaned forward as he made the mistake of being intrigued. “Oh! Oh that’ll actually be really nice, maybe we should dim the lights and include it in our festi-”

The flashbang formerly known as Shpressnrek went off, the 100,000,000 nano-LEDs woven into her suit sparking off in a dazzling display of white, blue, red, ultraviolet, infrared and even a little bit of microwave, if the heat on Glenn’s skin was any indicator. Glenn, for his part didn’t flinch whatsoever once the darkness took him; his hind monkey brain had long since given up on such silly notions as “fight or flight instinct”, “dignity” or “self-preservation”. Glenn sat there, smiling, utterly blind.

“[I-I’m so sorry-]”

“Quite honestly this is one of the better holidays I’ve had in recent years. Can we make this blindness permanent – or do I have to hire you out for special occasions?”

“[I’m really very sorry-]” Shpressnrek cried, muffled by… possibly her own body as she knotted herself into a ball of shame, her suit continuing to give happy little beeps of encouragement.

“[I CAN HELP, BRETHEREN!]” Crowed his next tormentor, the sound of taloned steps coming closer and closer. Glenn mused that same dark thought that soldiers did on the front lines; was it better to hear it coming? Did you hear the one that got you?

With a flash of every spectrum Glenn’s eyes began to itch as the Karnakian medical device was removed from his eyes, the world of vision returning to him in splotches of light and darkness at first, before color began to seep in grainily.

Facial expression unchanged, still leaning forward, Glenn looked up at his savior/ghost of christmas future, Tr’Grakz.

“End me now.”

“[A Hallowed [Christ]’s Mass to you as well!]” chirped Tr’Grakz, fluffing himself out proudly at saving yet another Human. “[I have come to perform the ritual and ask a boon.]”

The ritual.

The monkey in his mind swallowed the barrel of a revolver and pulled the trigger, the deafening ‘click’ of a misfire making Glenn blink.

The ritual? Right…

Glenn leaned back and patted his lap. “Whelp. Let’s do-oofh~”

The Karnakian Tr’Grakz wasn’t so much heavy as he was cumbersome, and surprisingly soft. He pressed his chest and torso into Glenn, pushing him back against the chair. Tr’Grakz didn’t so much sit on Glenn as much as he leaned on his entire body, finally settling himself down gently.

“Shhho whah doh yuh wah fohh Chrihhmahhs?” Glenn asked, muffled by feathers.

“[I would like to ask your forgiveness, Station-leader [Glenn]. My bretheren, matrons and myself know our history with your people is a rocky one, and that there are some…plucking-pains with building a nest together. I would ask your forgiveness, and that of all [Humans], as we grow closer together in the future, and as we learn from one another.]”

Glenn tilted his head straight back, staring incredulously at Tr’Grakz’s chin. “I…well. Um. Thank you. I’ll… pass the word along.”

“[Thank you, Station-leader [Glenn]. Also I must ask for an Official Daisy Red Ryder Air Rifle, because it is tradition and I have been an acceptable disciple this year.]”

Mike laughed. Glenn laughed. Rgrenzeh grinned and turned excitedly to Mike to ask what was so funny, pulling the fake tree off it’s stand and sending it crashing to the ground. The flashbang formerly known as Shpressnrek started and ended her comeback tour with a screaming, muffled apology, and the click of a camera caught it all.

Categories
Stories They are Smol Oneshot

They are Smol – and Thankful! Thanksgiving Oneshot

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Happy Turkey Genocide Day, everyone! Remember to keep culling their population every year, or eventually they’ll rise up against us for the injustices we’ve done to them… every year. 

…we did not think this through.

Anyway. I wanted to drop this little oneshot to make your Thanksgiving day more bearable; when surrounded by your racist grandparents, your much-more-successful-than-you older brother, your twelve-polymorph zoomer xirgendered foxkin cousin and your really really touchy-feely uncle you can pop open this story and feel good that you’re not the only one having a terrible Thanksgiving.

So are the smols on Zephyr Station 8.

————————————————————————————————————

Director Glenn “Silk” Abramson sighed as he worked his way down the list. The podium’s desk space was always too small for him – especially if he wanted to keep a drink on hand (which you always do). 

“Alright, and so that brings me to my last point for the day: Thanksgiving. I know not everyone celebrates it, but enough of us do that we get to have some time off-”

“ありがとう、ガイジン” Chirped one of his subordinates just loud enough to hear.

“You’re welcome,” Glenn responded, not skipping a beat,”-but point of the matter is, is that if you haven’t already filed for shore leave, you’re not going. However, you’re more than welcome to join us for a staff Thanksgiving lunch/dinner; as everyone’s shifts change we’ll just have a spread for you to eat from as you wander in. In regards to senior personnel this leaves myself as commanding officer, we’ve got LT and Mike staying as heads for operations and maintenance, respectively-”

Glenn then made the mistake of looking up, noticing a very thick paw raised in the back. Silencing a groan, he nodded at the Dorarizin attache. 

“Yes…Rezen?”

“[Is there a reason why you and the remaining [Humans] haven’t filed for shore leave?]”

Glenn pursed his lips. Awkward questions were part of the gig when you’re dealing with xenos species, as cultural norms absolutely don’t translate. However, being put on the spot was one of the better awkward situations to get into – and honestly, in his long career, as long as it didn’t involve talking about anything religious to a Karnakian then he was fine with it.

15 years later after making that mistake he was still getting incomprehensible chick tracts sent to him by mail.

“Ah. The reasons…vary by individual. Like I said, some of us come from cultures that don’t celebrate Thanksgiving. Some of us wouldn’t have been able to physically make it to our family gathering spots in time for the holiday. For some parts of the station, someone had to stay to keep things running – we do that by a rotation, and so a few of us are staying because our number was called. For others, we just don’t have family to go to, so we stay here.”

“[You don’t have a family?]” the Dorarizin responded, notable concern in it’s voice.

Glenn shuffled his paper on the podium and adopted his best exhausted-bureaucrat look as he scanned the ‘cheap seat’ peanut gallery. After the… unique Halloween party, it was decided to allow representatives from the various xeno races to sit in on the non-sensitive station meetings – ostensibly to ‘further human-galactic relations’ but really it was to stop any more mis-communications that would lead to more party-crashing. It’s not that Glenn was angry at being hugged for a couple hours, just, it lasted so long he didn’t get a chance to try Asuka’s spooky triple-chocolate brownies and he would be damned if he missed out on her ‘vanilla heaven’ sponge cake. 

“Family is a fluid concept. Some humans include their pets in their family, some have family made up of their friends and colleagues, and others just have their mate. Some of us don’t have a traditionally large family, so, instead of all that bother to show up…]” Glenn shrugged. “[We just work, or take the day off. I mean, video-conferencing is a thing we had pre-contact, and soon with hard light projection-”

A scaled hand went up, and Glenn nodded to it – happy to get off the increasingly uncomfortable topic. “Yes, the Jornissian in red.”

“[Are we considered part of your family? You said friends and colleagues could hypothetically count.]”

Glenn’s stomach sank.

“I uh. Um. Personally? Or are you asking me to speak for the crew?”

“[Yes.]” The Jornissian responded, matter-of-factly.

Glenn shared a look between his colleagues – LT just gave a bit of a shrug and Mike was fast asleep, meaning he was marginally more useful than when he was awake, the bastard. The rest of the Human crew was just desperately hoping the presentation would end, and it showed. 

“[…Yes. I would say that both personally and speaking for the crew, we consider you all colleagues and friends.]”

When the Karnakian representative raised his talon Glenn knew that everything was about to go pear-shaped.

“Yes…Karnakian in the robes.”

“[May we join in the festivities, then?! We’d love to share in your rich cultural heritage and participate in this multicultural harvest festiv-]”

“This was a setup, wasn’t it?”

“[Pardon?]” The Karnakian responded, looking at Glenn with innocent eyes and a wide, terrifying smile.

Glenn physically felt himself give up.

“Alright. You know what? Fine. We’ll move the spread from Ballroom 5C to Viewing rotunda 1A.”

With an almost manic smile the Karnakian representative turned to address the open door – and to the mixed xenos crowd outside that was not even attempting to hide their eavesdropping. “[HEY GUYS, HE SAID WE CAN JOIN IN THIS TIME!]”

There was a resounding cheer, and Glenn looked at his bottle of water, wishing it was grain alcohol, or paint thinner. With a light sip his dreams were dashed, and, frowning, he dropped the whole thing into the trashcan next to the podium. This act unintentionally roused up a memory from a Thanksgiving long past, and put a very grinch-like smile on his face.

“BUT.” Glenn barked into the microphone, silencing the cheer,”It is important for each participant – or group of participants – to bring their own dish of food. Dish does not mean an actual dish, but a prepared meal of-”

The Karnakian turned back to the group of xenos outside. “[HEY GUYS, WE GET TO FEED THEM TOO!]”

The rest of Glenn’s meeting was filled out by the excited murmuring of their xeno crew, LT’s laughter, Glenn’s exasperated groaning and some quite unhelpful snoring. 

————————————————————————————————————

Tr’Grakz nodded to himself, absentmindedly smoothing down the feathers at his sides. “[Alright Bretheren, let’s make sure we’re counting our eggs before they hatch!]” he chirped, loud enough to be heard by all.

His cheery attitude was met with a collective groan, a few hurled insults and not so few hurled bits of unprepared leftover foodstuffs. Dusting himself off with a full-body shake, he continued unabated. 

“[Has everyone made sure that their base ingredients are [Human]-safe?]”

“[Yeeeesss]” groaned a majority of the xenos crew, not for the first time that day. Or hour.

“[And has everyone made sure that their finished aggregated dishes are [Human]-safe?]”

“[Literally, who put you in a position of authority?]” groused Shpressnrek, draping over a crate of her prepared foodstuffs, muffling the thumps. “[Why are we even answering to you?]”

“[Because!]” sang Tr’Grakz, doing a slightly happy little wiggle, “[Those who volunteer for good rise to true leadership. That, and my organizational skills are just naturally superior to yours~]” 

Without skipping a beat he tilted his head to the side, avoiding a thrown iron bar that embedded itself into the plating behind him. 

“[Death to tyrants!]” Shpressnrek called out playfully, “[We will not be crushed underscale!]”

“[I kinda like it that he’s leading]” Rgrezneh-of-Hrzgaren said, clicking her teeth in thought. “[Makes pinning this on someone when it goes south much easier.]”

“[Oh, good point.]” Shpressnrek conceded, tapping the top of her crate. “[We’re fine here, Tr’Grakz. We’ve been fine the first time you asked, the fifth, and the fifteenth.]”

“[Did everyone make sure to make enough portions for our [Human] hosts?]”

“[Yeeeessss]” groaned the assembled crew once more, now quite done with the double-double checking, and beginning to assemble their ‘spread’ around the atrium. 

“[Did everyone remem-]”

“[Brother Tr’Grakz, did you bring anything?]” Rgrezneh asked, innocently.

Tr’Grakz’s crest fell as he suddenly realized how open he was, standing in the spotlight. “[. . . I was just gonna add my name on Tk’Elge’s-]”

“[You were going to what?!]” the Karnakian in question crowed, holding a bag close to her chest. “[Absolutely not-]”

“[Sister PLEASE I didn’t have a chance to hit a fabricator so-]”

Rgrezneh shared a pointed look with Shpressnrek, who smiled as they all got back to work. 

————————————————————————————————————

It was the middle shift.

Well. “Middle”. Earth had since moved to a standard 6-hour workday, So the middle shift was both the 2nd and 3rd shift – but if you lumped them together, then you just had a half-day, and a half can’t be a “middle” so-

Let’s try this again. It was 10AM INST, which means it was pretty much the earliest definition of lunchtime that any civilized person would accept. 

Someone else who wished he could try it again was Glenn “Silk” Abramson, who found himself among the ‘fortunate’ first batch of human crewmembers to make it to Rotunda 1A, cartdrones of foodstuffs loyally trailing behind them. Both groups of people froze as the doors opened; the Humans, surprised that their Xeno crewmembers were already inside and setup, and the aforementioned crewmembers, who were scrambling to put away what seemed to be a hard-light lifelike lego playset. 

With an unceremonious thud Tr’Grakz lept from the wall to land infront of his [Human] crewmates, buckling the deck underneath. 

“[Bretheren Humans!]” crowed Tr’Grakz in greeting.

“AAAAAHHH” replied the newbies as they fell on their asses in surprise and fear. Glenn, for his part, just tensed up – then sighed, his implant kicking into IFF overdrive. 

“Hello… Trike. It’s good to see you. Happy Thanksgiving.” Glenn responded, in an uncharacteristically gentle and/or resigned manner.

“[Hello Bretheren [Glenn]! Happy Harvest Festival of Gifts and Thanks to you as well-]”

“N-no.” Glenn said, a soft smirk on his lips. “Not all human words are portmanteaus – or are that long. It’s just Thanksgiving.” 

“[Oh. Happy Thankful Giving.]” Tr’Grakz ventured, and Glenn met him halfway with a warm smile.

“Close enough! Newbies, you alright?” He said, turning towards the first bit of his shift crew. Most of the veterans remained on their feet, but a few of the newbies were…

Well. Most of the newbies remained. A few of them decided to tap into their Jurassic Park survival instincts and just booked it. Glen looked at them somewhat fondly as they disappeared behind another bulkhead, softly mouthing a silent plea.

“[Is it time for the festival to begin? Does it usually begin at this time? Do we need to be wearing anything special – By the black sun, I can’t believe I never asked that! What about-]”

“TRIKE, please.” Glenn interrupted his concerned colleague, sighing softly. “It’s just a day of feasting, really. There are no elaborate ceremonies, there’s nothing major but food, family and friendship. Speaking of, we need to start setting things up – our fold outs-”

“[Oh! Yes. We saved you a space of honor in the center of the room!]” Tr’Grakz said, adapting the human version of a nod a little too vigorously. “[Do you need assistance in setting up?]”

“Ah, no-” Glenn said, waving his loyal drones (both mechanical and not) to follow him as he sidestepped the Karnakian. “It’s all warming trays and traditional fare. Well, most of it is – Asuka apparently made the desserts, so those are going to be something special.”

“[Ah, yes! Those are the after-meal meals, yes? I’ve been reading up on [Human] feasting customs – so many tiny meals all after the next!]”

“Yeah, we like to take things slow – what can I say?” Glenn said, smiling. “But do you mind giving us some space? We just gotta lay out our things.”

“[Yes! Yes we will be waiting for you right over here when you’re ready!]” Tr’Grakz chirped happily, waving goodbye… for the entire time it took him to walk the 15 meters to the Karnakian ‘station’. 

Glenn waved for the first few seconds…but eventually lost that game of chicken to pressing demands of food prep.

————————————————————————————————————

“Alright. You getting that canned heat lit, Jessica?”

“Yeah.” The engineer said, the clicking of the lighter firing off a few times. “Eventually. Also how is it that with all this advanced technology around we keep using this old piece of shit?”

“Because it builds character and it ain’t broke, so why fix it?”

“I beg to differ” Jessica murmured, the clicking of her firelighter becoming more aggrivated. “I remember this thing on my dad’s grill back when I was a ki-FINALLY.” She exclaimed happily, the small flame clicking to life at the end of the handheld lighter. Dipping it into the four wax-filled cans produced four wan, blue flames. “I really think we should upgrade this whole thing. Maybe some conduction heating-”

“Character.” Glenn reiterated, to Jessicas’ consternation. 

“FINE. I’m hungry though, so I’m gonna go ahead and start. Fair enough?”

“Yeah, sure, let me just wave over our guests-” Glenn commented, raising his hand for attention. “You guys can come over and try some of our food if you’d like, but please save most of it f-WHOHJEEZ.”

Almost as one the xenos descended upon the small island of Human food, peppering the unfortunate volunteers with multiple questions in no particular order. After a small brouhaha over whether or not croutons were just midget toast – and if so, if they could be used for sandwiches – an orderly line was formed to allow each and every participant to at least sample some Human cuisine. 

Not the Vanilla Heaven cake, though. That was off-limits, whenever it arrived. 

The results were…mixed, to say the least. Almost every xenos universally disliked the humble potato (much to the ire of the Irish and Russian crewmembers) based not on it’s texture but it’s taste: The Jornissians found it to be far too tart, the Dorarizin didn’t think it tasted like anything but mush, and the Karnakians were just happy to be included.

Cranberries were another mixed bag – Jornissians were fine with the bitter-sweet play of berry and sugar, the Karnakians almost universally begged for some water to put out the ‘immense heat’ of the fruit, and the Dorarizin just wished the aftertaste would go away.

Cheese – ah, the cheese plate. Truly, no better friend to cheese could be found outside of white people and the Dorarizin, who exclaimed that solid fat in any of it’s forms was the greatest thing anyone had ever invented. The Jornissians were nonplussed; it lacked a certain je ne sais quoi, and the Karnakians were ok with it – if it was a little crunchier, it’d be good.

Hilariously enough the turkey was the unexpected star of the show. Everyone was pretty much OK with it, and it was OK with pretty much everyone, mainly because it was dead and couldn’t form an opinion on the current state of affairs. As the humans began to fill their own plates and mix and mingle with their colleagues, a few brave interns began to ask what the other races brought to the feast. 

In hindsight, this would prove to be the beginning of the end.

“Ok, we’re going to do the same rules – just take a little, make sure everyone else gets a bite.” Glenn said over the growing crowd of humans and the xenos who were anxiously curious about their reactions. 

“[Well, hello Bretheren and Sisters! I am Tk’Elge, and I produced this food for you without any outside help.]” Tk’Elge said, over the soft whine of Tr’Grakz. “[We had it quantum-shipped over to this station to make sure they stayed fresh!]” She chirped, patting the bag that rested on the table. With a slight flourish – at least, to her species – she reached in and pulled out a-

“Oh my God it’s adorable!” cooed Jessica, leaning forward to look at the roughly bowling-ball sized fluffball. It had the texture and consistency of downy feathers, and one great, beautiful green eye. 

“[Wh-what? No, it’s… It’s not. It’s a Wh’’rchi Oyster.] Tk’Elge corrected, looking slightly confused. 

“Oh, alright – so what do you do? Eat the fuzz?” Jessica said, looking up at Tk’Elge with curious joy. “Cause I’d love to see what one of these things looked like shaven! Hehe, probably like a giant grape!”

Wordlessly, and with a mild look of concern, Tk’Elge grabbed either side of the ‘eyelid’ and in one fluid motion pried it open with a sickening crunch.

“OH JESUS” cried Jessica

“EEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeee” screeched the Wh’’rchi Oyster

“[It’s just escaping steam.]” reassured Tk’Elge, who was now sporting a look of extreme concern. “[It’s not living, no matter what you think it tells you – this is also why we keep them out of water, because they’re much more…docile this way.]”

“I-oh GOD it just screamed! I-I don’t, I-” Jessica babbled, backpedaling from the countertop

“[No! It’s not – it’s not bad, it’s just fresh!]” Tk’Elge pleaded.

“I’ll take three.” Glenn said, surprisingly confident. “Anything that scares her-”

“You ass!”

“-has got to be good.”

Tk’Elge smiled a halfhearted smile, using her talons to reach in and pluck out a suspended little nugget of violent blue. “[This is rated for [Human] consumption – although it does give you about 7,000% of your daily requirement of Vitamin C.]”

“Well hell – this’ll be useful for flu season.” Glenn chuckled, gingerly taking the proffered nugget of flesh. “Hey Andre-”

“Yes si-” an intern behind Glenn began to say, but was hushed with a sudden mouthful of alien foodstuffs. He glared at Glenn, chewing slowly.

“So?”

Andre swallowed with a grimace. “It’s… banana and alcohol.”

“Well that’s not so-”

“Mixed with chalk and blood.”

“Hmm. So definitely food for the rest of the interns, is what you’re saying.”

“No sir, I’m saying I’m going to file a formal complaint”

“To whom?”

“To… you, sir.” Andre sighed as Glenn grinned, turning back to Tk’Elge. “Thank you for sharing this wonderful dish – tell me, can this be dehydrated and powdered?”

“[I mean, theoretically. It loses it’s spring, though.]”

“I think this would be an excellent supplement for our crew to take to help boost our immune systems – could I bother you to make a few pounds of this and send it to my office?”

Tk’Elge nodded furiously, her winningest (and most terrifying) smile overtaking her earlier grimace of concern. “[Absolutely! I’ll have that up to you in a few days?]”

“Sure, take your time – and please make sure everyone gets a chance to try this delicacy.” Glenn said, looking back at his young wards. “It’s only fair, seeing as how you all tried our food.”

“[Excellent! Please, step up! There’s enough in this one oyster to give everyone seconds!]”

– – – – – –

“And what do we have here?” Director Abramson mused aloud, making sure his crew all had a chance to sample (and recover from) authentic Karnakian cuisine. “It looks like…a metal cube. You do know we can’t eat metal, right?”

Rgrezneh-of-Hrzgaren smiled, wiggling her ears in an amused way. “[Yes, I know. This is just the wrapper-]” Rgrezneh explained, taking her index claw and plunging it into the cube. With absolutely no effort the Dorarizin carved around the box, and with the sound of protesting metal twisted the two halves apart. What remained was… something very familiar looking, which immediately made Glenn’s hair on the back of his neck stand ramrod straight.

“Oh! Hey, of course! I’ve never seen a Dorarizin sausage before, though!” John said, sealing his fate. “What’s it made out of?”

“[Aha, it’s a special formula of Gr-rrzek – well, I should say, specially formulated for [Human] consumption. It’s all well-cooked through meats from various wild and domesticated animals, packed in a [salt-analog] for a few months.]”

“So, trail jerky?”

“[Mmmm.]” Mused Rgrezneh, tilting her head from side to side. “[Yes and no. The principle is there, yes, but this would be more for a special occasion.]”

“So premium jerky. I like this already!” John grinned, looking up at the Dorarizin in question. “So, how do we do the thing?”

“[Just dig in! I’ve got another 10 boxes of this stuff, so don’t be afraid to take a large portion.]”

John with a smile and a nod from Glenn (who had taken three inconspicuous steps back and to the left) reached forward and gripped the end of the sausage closest to him.

It felt solid. Unreasonably solid. 

“I uh. Do… do we cut it, or dip it or…” John questioned, trying his best to lift the thing even a little. “Is it uh, stuck?”

“[Oh! I um, I guess since you don’t have claws – I apologize, I should’ve known. May I?]”

“Sure!” the brave, stupid man said. “Is that something that your species normally does for others?”

“[Well, yes and no.]” Rgrezneh said, unsheathing her claws to turn the rock-hard sausage into a fine mince. “[We ah… usually do it for our pups – it’s necessary until their second set of teeth come in.]”

“Oh.”

“[But don’t let that stop you – please! Try again.]” Rgrezneh recovered, scooping a generous pile of the minced sausage into the middle of the table. “[I assure you, it is delicious! High in Iron and Vitamin K and a bunch of other things that you [Human]s need- is something wrong?]”

John wasn’t one to normally complain; definitely not to a xenos in a pseudo-ambassadorial position, and especially not to a xenos who could utterly annihilate him with a simple flick of her wrist, no.

John wasn’t one to complain in this case not because of any of those exceptionally good reasons; he wasn’t one to complain because his mouth had fused shut. 

“NNNnnnnnnNNHH?!” John said, coughing. “HHHTS LIH BEANUT BUTTEH BUH WORHS.”

“[O-oh no. Are you ok?!]”

“Just out of curiosity, what’s the moisture level in that thing?” Glenn said, as John desperately scrambled back to the drink cooler. 

“[About 0.0001%.]”

“Hmm. So what you’re saying is that your sausage is so delicious that it sends my fellow humans-” Glenn paused at the sounds of drinks being ripped open in fear, “-into fits of silent ecstasy?”

“[I…]” Rgrezneh looked over Glenn to see the human, John, pouring two bottles of water into his mouth between gritted teeth. “[I…don’t think so?]”

“But I do. Please, can you send some of this to the other Human officers? I don’t want this… experience to be limited only to myself and the assembled crew.”

“[I…can, but. Why?]”

“Because I need to teach some of my colleagues that when I need support, they better be awake to give it.”

– – – – – –

“So! What have you got for us?” Glenn chirped happily, ignoring the groans of his Human crew behind him. 

“[It’s…nothing. Nothing at all.]” Shpressnrek said, leaning ontop of the prominently-placed crate. “[Quantum transport error, we brought nothing. I am sorry for shaming our species at this wonderful har-]”

“Stop that.” Glenn ordered, and to his credit Shpressnrek visibly flinched. “I’m not going to have you lot finding a conscience now. What did you bring?”

Glenn was a man who wanted to see the world burn, and Shpressnrek saw it in his eyes. With a resigned sigh, she leaned back, taking her weight off of the crate – causing it to jump slightly.

“[It’s a, um. It’s a live R’tts’sk. They’re a farmed delicacy on a colony world; I’d have to prepare it for you, I think, but-]”

“Show me.”

“[Ah… okay. It should be safe within it’s cage-]” Shpressnrek murmured, peeling the top of the plastic crate off like a candy wrapper. Instantly the room was filled with the sound of vicious snarls and the skittering of claws-on-metal.

“Jee-zus. What in the hell-” Glenn murmured, leaning forward just enough to take a look at the cage. He couldn’t see anything; whatever it was was moving far too fast for his naked eye to track. He guessed it was was the size of a dog, knew that it sounded pissed, and that it only got more angry as it saw daylight.

“How the fuck are we supposed to-”

“[Well, that’s why I said I’d probably prepare it for you. Look, all we do is-]” and while maintaining eye contact with Glenn, Shpressnrek’s right arm vanished in a blur of speed. There was a sharp, wet ripping sound, a cry of pain, and an armored, severed limb hung twitching in the Jornissian’s hand.

Glenn thought he heard one of his interns getting sick, but he was far too fascinated by what just happened to really register the brutality of the moment. “Did.. Did you just rip off one of it’s legs?”

“[It grows back. Besides, this is the only good meat on the beast – Sorry, did you want it raw, or cooked?]”

The crate rocked back and forth as the beast, roaring with impotent rage, slammed against it’s iron prison.

“Can I have a bit right now?”

“[Sure.]” Shpressnrek said, ripping off a small chunk of the still-quivering flesh and offering it to the Director.

Maintaining eye contact with his whole crew, Glenn devoured the warm flesh.

“That’s… actually really good.”

“[W-wait, Really?!]”

“Yes! It’s like lemongrass but with the consistency of foie gras and I think I’m getting a hit of pepper in there as well.”

“[Well all right! I’ll also prepare enough for everyone else?]”

“Yes – please do.”

As the Humans collectively groaned Glenn turned around to admonish them. He was going to let fly a speech about camaraderie, experiencing new things, pushing back the boundaries of human ignorance, forging stronger ties with the galactic community and how viewing everything from our narrow locus of attention is a poor way of getting through the universe. He even had a small bit in there about “you don’t know if you like something until your palette gets used to it over time” and “it might taste off but it’s good for you so suck it up” but that was something he would only pull out in an emergency – like if his crew talked back to him, or started to wander off.

It was not meant to be pulled out for the very specific emergency that began with the sound of Shpressnrek ripping off the side of the crate, then loudly exclaiming “[Well fuck.]”

You see, it turns out that the iron bar embedded in the wall had to come from somewhere. That somewhere was from the side of the cage of the (at the time) mildly annoyed R’tts’sk. Shpressnrek had remembered that incident, and had planned to open up the side of the cage that did not have a gaping hole in it, keeping the rest of the crate intact to provide support and the illusion to the dumb beast within that it was still well and thoroughly trapped. This illusion vanished as soon as that panel was accidentally removed, and as we all covered earlier, daylight just made it angrier.

In a blur faster than any human eye could follow, the beast of claws and armor and teeth escaped.

“What d’you mean-?” Glenn asked, turning around in relatively slow motion. Around him, tables were upturned, dishes destroyed, and clawmarks in the walls and floors just appeared as if by magic. The Jornissians were a blur, barking out half-translated commands that Glenn’s comm could not parse, it’s IFF reader shutting off a few miliseconds into the melee as the icons danced and melded too quickly to follow. A few moments into his turnaround he was lifted, as a pack of Dorarizin threw him and the other humans up, a separate group of blurs passing underneath them in a desperate bid to corral the feral beast.

“JES-”

“WH-”

“AAA-” the humans added to the conversation, as one very unfortunate Karnakian slammed into his group’s table, scattering the Wh’’rchi Oysters throughout the room like buckshot. Most landed and bounced harmlessly across the decking only to be trampled underfoot by the combined effort to wrangle the R’tts’sk, but a few very lucky ones found themselves landing in a bath of ice, water, and various other beverages. 

It’s feathered hide ramrod-stiff, millions of small pores opened up to suck in moisture – as much as possible from every source around it. As the Wh’’rchi Oysters did so they expanded, and a venemous midnight black tentacle sprouted from it’s ‘iris’, flopping about for prey. 

The humans reached the apex of their flight, and began to fall back down.

“-SUS CH-”

“-AT THE-”

“-AAAAAA-” the humans continued, their hind brain having enough sense to try to right their trajectory with strategic flailing. As the Jornissians started to corner the wounded R’tts’sk, the Karnakians started to dance around the Wh’’rchi Oysters – both to distract it with the vibrations of their feet, and also to (hopefully) dart in and rip the tentacle off from it’s base before it started to crawl around. The Karnakians didn’t really mind using trickery in this endeavor, and allowed a few of the oozing things to accidentally grip a table, an empty crate, or a chunk of Dorarizin metal and pull it into their greedy maws.

Speaking of, the Dorarizin were there to catch their Humans as they fell, pulling each one tight against them. 

“HHSHT”

“FHHK”

“AAAAH(but muffled)”

Glenn pushed hard against his fluffy savior, pulling his head back for some air. The Dorarizin, for her part, wasn’t paying attention to the human – her eyes were on something moving rapidly behind them.

“What th-“

It was at this point that the sodium metal that the Dorarizin used to cure their meats finally interacted with the water inside the Wh’’rchi Oyster, and exploded. Glenn could only tense up as he was bodily thrown down onto the ground, 300kg of Dorarizin smothering him against the decking. There was another loud explosion, and a few more series of pops – alarms began to go off, and no matter the protests or oaths he swore, Rgrezneh refused to budge. 

Looking up at the sudden change of an indicator light, Glenn saw the door slide open. On the other side stood Mike, shirt rumpled after a hard shift of sleeping, ID badge missing, sandals worn with socks.

The two met each other’s gaze – Mike, bleary-eyed, and Glenn, scared, confused, and under a very aggressive female.

Mike never moved a muscle as the door silently slid shut.

“Goddamn you Mike-”

The external door lock indicator turned on.

“MIKE YOU ARE A USELESS PIECE OF SHIT!”

After everything settled down, the crew agreed: That was definitely the 5th worst Thanksgiving they had experienced on the station.