Betty Adams's Blog, page 11

Humans are Weird – Caution

 Humans are Weird – Caution Quilx’tch was perched at the door of the oven excitedly when the entire building gave a soft wumph sound and one violent shake. Quilx’tch gave a click of horror as the oven jolted in response. He was vaguely aware of various alarms sounding but of far more concern was the repeated vibrations caused by the massive blast doors sliding down to isolate various sections of the university. With glum acceptance he opened the oven and tenderly removed the protein complex, now hopelessly collapsed. He prodded the congealed mass thoughtfully with one claw. The first massive jolt had doomed his efforts no doubt. With a sigh he carried the dish over to his work station and began cutting out a sample. This would provide some good data for what a failure looked like at least.
Outside the baking lab the frantic skittering of a Shatar fire response team ran past and Quilx’tch was grateful that this laboratory was confident enough in its containment procedures to have lockdown as the standardized response instead of evacuation. He recorded density for the sample and waved a camera wand around it, careful to get all angles. Records taken he took a little nibble and gave a startled click.
“This is delicious!” he declared to the nearly empty room. “Why, by the thread, do the humans insist that a souffle is ‘ruined’ if it falls?”
He dumped the rest of the food into a light weight carry case, it would just do for a test bite for a human and trotted towards the door. He examined the threat display and was calculating if wanting a human to taste his efforts before they cooled too far was enough of a necessity to override the current threat level but before he had the chance to risk offending the local Shatar head of safety and security the threat level dropped to a point where it would be permissible to travel the halls. The walkways vibrated as the blast doors retracted back to their standard position and Quilx’tch stepped lightly out into the hallway. Almost instantly the upper levels were filled with a milling mass that would no doubt resolved into frantic Winged if Quilx’tch chose to aim his main eyes up at them. He did not. However before he could reach the nearest human an umber Winged with bright blue berry juice staining his chest fur, and wing hooks, and wings, dropped down in front of him and flew backwards to keep pace.
“What was that explosion?” The Winged demanded without introduction of any sort.
Quilx’tch fought down a sigh of irritation.
“I do not know,” he said firmly.
“But you are not nearly freaked out enough to be entirely ignorant!” The Winged nearly yelled out in his excitement. He had attracted most of his flight and the edges of several others by the looks of it. “You have got to know something!”
Quilx’tch sighed and shifted the carry container in his hands.
“This is purely speculation, set your hooks into that,” Quilx’tch said, “but I suspect that Human Friend Charley put one of the new high heat tolerant portable ovens in the large crucible.”
The collective Winged pulled back with astonished chittering as they processed that.
“What data would lead you to speculate that?” one finally demanded.
“Earlier today I heard him and his lab partner reading the restrictions,” Quilx’tch explained. “They were quite curious as to why the instructions explicitly forbade placing the oven in the crucible even for cold storage. The final moments of the conversation I heard was Human Friend Charley assuring his lab partner that the crucible was very sturdy, and that they had extra small ovens.”
“Can you verify that?” One of the Winged cut in.
Quilx’tch sighed again and made a show of putting a paw up to his primary eyes.
“Well,” he said a slowly as he could. “Your distance sight is better than mine. Does that distant blur surrounded by smaller blurs coming out of the main crucible lab look like Human Friend Charley being escorted to by security to you?”
With as little politeness as focus the startled Winged instantly flew off in mass to surround the approaching blurs in a larger blurrier blurs. Quilx’tch waited patiently for the mass to come into focus and then waved two of his appendages vigorously until Human Friend Charley turned and steered the mass towards him. The Shatar head of safety was talking away about something with her frill flushed vibrant green but she did not seem to mind, or even notice when Human Friend Charley turned his attention away from her and bent over Quilx’tch.
“Sup lil bud?” Charley asked.
He was missing most of the hair on his face and his skin was glistening with both heat damage and what appeared to be rapidly applied medical gel, but his grin spoke of no discomfort and his voice was smooth.
“How does this taste?” Quilx’tch asked without introduction, holding up the protein complex. It was dreadfully impolite, but Human Friend Charley was the nearest human and it did look like the head of safety was about to drag him off.
Charley instantly opened his mouth and Quilx’tch tossed the remainder of the protein complex in. Charley chewed the food obediently but his face instantly distorted in disgust even before he swallowed. The human shook his head as he allowed the Shatar safety head to drag him away.
“Tastes awful,” the human called out before turning down to talk to the Shatar.
Quilx’tch noted that down and turned back to his lab. However before he could even move all his motile appendages a single step before a bright red Winged dropped down to the walk in front of him.
“Why aren’t you more startled?” the Winged demanded.
“Because I am used to the abrupt behavoir of your species by now,” Quilx’tch said, feeling quite proud that he did not say rudeness.
“No, No!” The Winged interjected with a wide wave of one claw. “I mean why weren’t you startled when there was an explosion that locked down the building!”
Quilx’tch heaved a sigh in the fully polite silence the Winged left after that question.
“I suppose I am growing use to the behavior of humans by now as well,” he said.
The Winged again hesitated a very polite time before responding. He kept glancing down the hall after the human.
“That does not seem safe…” the Winged said slowly.
Quilx’tch was not sure if he was referring to the explosion, Quilx’tch’s acceptance of it, or some other thing, however the Winged did not object when Quilx’tch stepped carefully around him and went back to start another souffle.
Author Betty Adams Books
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Humans are Weird - If It Fits

Humans are Weird - If It Fits  Seventeenth Trill fluttered into the welcoming coolness of the base, with its scent of stal mammal and dry dirt, leaving the blistering heat of the outdoors behind him with a shudder. His sensory horns had not been even normally sensitive ever since that radiation incident on one of the outlying space stations, but for the moment they stung as if he was some softhorn still fluffy from his mother’s last grooming. With a weary sigh he angled towards the counter where the multitool that was supposed to be a simple external sensor was supposed to be sitting. It was clear long before he got there there that the large device was missing, but out of habit he gave a perplexed click and the rebounding sound slapped against his horns painfully. He landed less than gracefully on the counter and rubbed his horns absently with the soft skin of his wing while glancing blearily around the cavernous entry way. The base had originally been more than well enough funded and stocked when the Winged had arrived on this planet, but somehow more rangers kept arriving, needing housing and feeding and medical attention and the supply shipments always seemed to be a few wing beats behind them. Every tool had to be made multipurpose even if that wasn’t in its original specs. The sensor now doubled as a biometric reader to log rangers in and out of the base. It was designed for extreme condition weather observations, had a surface that absorbed quite a range of sound waves, making it a bit difficult to spot with echolocation, but it reflected most light making it easy to spot on the dark floor. Seventeenth Trill glared around the floor around the counter and cast an uneasy look at the piles of human clothing stacked on the bench. If it was under there finding it was going to be a journey in of it self. With a sigh he flung himself back into the air on his aching joints and gave the room a quick sounding. Rather to his surprise and relief something caught his attention immediately.
Just to the side of the door there was a small shelf. It was caused by a mismatch in the door and the wall, both prefabricated items not meant to be used together but forced into a useful alignment. The space was too small to be useful, even by Winged standards and the material of the inner wall just happened to closely match the sensor in color. Had Seventeenth Trill not been so familiar with the odd echo that section of the wall gave he might not have noticed the sensor at all. Feeling even more puzzled than before he flew up to the sensor and smacked it irritably. The long oblong gave an obliging chirp as it registered his signature, and then a dissatisfied bleat as it noticed he was over heated. Seventeenth Trill snarled at it and hit the override before ducking his head and pulling the carry harness over it. Technically the sensory was light enough to carry in his feet, but it was much easier to center the mass and he was exhausted. He landed back on the counter, yanked the harness off his head after a few failed attempts, and shoved it into the proper position. A vague mental thermal drifted between his horns regarding who exactly thought it was a good idea to put the sensor there, but the soft cooling attraction of a dust bath was luring him deeper into the base and the thought dispersed rather quickly.
It was five days later when it happened again and Seventeenth Trill gave an exasperated chirp as he examined the situation. Previously the attached harness had been sticking out and had made it easy to move the sensor. However this time the harness was folded under and between the sensor and the wall. As the sensor almost completely filled the space it was quite the scramble to pull the harness out while not knocking the sensor to the floor, or falling off the narrow space himself and he skinned several knuckles in the process and left more than a little fur on the rough wall. The third time it happened Seventeenth Trill simply grabbed the wall and kicked the sensor to the floor. He grimly mused that if it was rated to be thrown into a flowing stream that couldn’t hurt it. He used his feet to drop it back on it designated place on the counter and flew off in a huff to the security booth.
The local flora and fauna were both fairly safe and there were no settlements near, so they had no designated security officer. It took Seventeenth Trill some few hours to first find the security footage, find a camera that actually functioned and gave a good view of the entry way, and figure out how to set the internal programs to track the movements of the sensor in order to discover who was moving the sensor. The first incident to his surprise dated several weeks before he had first found the sensor in the odd place. One Ranger Jones had come in, covered in mud which dated the event as weeks ago before the dry season even if there was a question about the meta-data. The human had been rather slow in shedding his protective outer layers and had been absently staring about even before he picked up the sensor to clock in. It seemed pure chance that his eye had caught on the odd ledge and he had smiled a bit, but almost absently set the sensor in the space. The next human who came in, One Ranger Frost had noted the sensor missing from the counter and had spent nearly half an hour searching for it, Frost had clearly had the same thought about it being under the clothing as Seventeenth Trill had, and had wildly disrupted the organization of the room before finding the sensor and replacing it on the counter.
A few times the analytical sub-routines noted the sensor being moved significantly more distant from its intended location it had been dropped, or set on the bench, but time after time some human spotted the ledge, smiled and set the sensor in it. Some of them removed the sensor and returned it to its location after they had set it there, but it usually fell to the next human to search for, find, and replace the double use sensor. Seventeenth Trill stared at the screen in perplexity. If so many humans were displaying the behavior, it was not even a simple majority of the base, but is was a significant minority, there was likely some point to it. He shook himself out and checked the last known location of Ranger Jones. He found the man busily tearing apart a decaying tree, seemingly with his own raw strength and chirped loud and low for his attention. The human glanced up at him and grinned through his protective face covering.
“What’s up Seventeen?” he asked, standing and stretching his back.
“Why do you keep putting the entry sensor on that ledge by the door?” Seventeenth Trill demanded, deciding to get right to the point.
Ranger Jones blinked at him and his breathing slowed as he thought over the question.
“I did do that,” he said slowly. “Once?” The end of the word rose in confusion and he tilted his head curiously at Seventeenth Trill.
“You humans,” Seventeenth Trill said with a wave of one wing hook. “It keeps getting put up there.”
Ranger Jones nodded slowly and send the air around them gusting about with a deep breath. His hands made a clicking sound as they flexed in their protective gloves and Seventeenth Trill noted that the gloves boasted some augmentation that was presumably helping to break up the rotting log.
“Welp,” Ranger Jones said, reaching up as if to scratch the back of his neck, and then seeming to think better of it, “I can only speak for myself, but it fit.”
Seventeenth Trill stared at him waiting for the rest of the explanation. However Ranger Jones seemed to consider that enough and bent back over the log.
“You set the sensor in the place because it fit in the space?” Seventeenth Trill demanded.
“It fit perfectly,” Ranger Jones went on. “Like the space was made for the sensor. I can see how that would be annoying though. I’ll spread the word to leave the sensor be if it’s causing trouble.”
At that the human began tearing apart the log and Seventeenth Trill flew back towards the house. Ranger Jones was respected among the humans and this would resolve the problem. But the Winged was still no closer to understanding what about the ledge being the ‘perfect shape’ induced the humans to set the sensor there.” Author Betty Adams Books
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Humans are Weird - Vengeance is Mine

Humans are Weird - Vengeance is Mine  ​​Tsk’tsk drew in a deep breath, letting it expand his lung to a comfortable stretch and visibly lifted his primary gripping appendages away from his work station. He took the time to stretch and shake out each appendage and clicked his chelicerae loudly in satisfaction. Ckck’ks, an almost painfully young transfer from the University, his body covered in dense fluffy fur, stepped into the orb of his office with slightly more confidence than he had shown when he had first hesitated at the entrance. Tsk’tsk arranged his appendages in a polite attentive posture and waited for the fluffy hatchling to speak.“I do not know if I have something of the nature of a security issue to report,” Ckck’ks said, unease in every angle of his body.
Tsk’tsk waited twice the polite six seconds before responding.
“You do not wish to pluck the web of the human’s character?” he asked.
Ckck’ks positively puffed out in shock and the fluffy one’s primary eyes stared at him out of the dense brown fur in innocent amazement. Tsk’tsk wondered idly if he should explain that when someone came to the chief of security with a problem that did not fit cleanly into the weave there was usually a human plucking the threads somewhere, but the fluffy thing visibly shook himself and shifted his datapad between his two gripping paws.
“There is a, a profound personal disagreement between two of the humans on base,” Ckck’ks began slowly, “my personal friend James Rodgers and his friend Susan Alan. I think that perhaps formal intervention would help.”
Tsk’tsk ran a paw over his chelicerae thoughtfully. As fluffy a hatchling as he looked, Ckck’ks had graduated with respectable grades from the University and was presumably an adult, legally at least. He should understand basic professional separation of one’s home web and one’s professional web.
“I take it that this disagreement is interfering with the daily weaving of the base?” Tsk’tsk asked, tapping one paw claw rather pointedly against the ground behind him. Ckck’ks’s pause was a bit more than polite and his appendages shifted uneasily.
“It will soon,” he said slowly, “if we don’t weave around the disruption. I think that human screams would be quite disruptive to the daily weave of the base.”
Tsk’tsk stiffened and dropped his appendages back down to his work station, opening up another casefile without taking his primary eyes off of Ckck’ks. “Perhaps you should start from the beginning before you get to the screaming,” he suggested.
Ckck’ks bobbed his center of mass in agreement. “Human Friend James and Human Friend Susan were mutually put in charge of defending the base against those long bodied insects with the legs that extend, the humans call them stilt roaches. Three months ago they had a disagreement as to which of the chemical repellents was the best and Human Friend Susan used the one she preferred without telling Human Friend James. I do not know that that is what led to the stilt-roach infestation in Human Friend James’s sleeping quarters but he blames it on her.” Ckck’ks paused and rubbed a few paws together in a visible effort to center himself. “Human Friend Susan was transferred to the northern base immediately after that for an unrelated task but Human Friend James never retracted the vow of revenge he had made during their last confrontation. I think he is going to enact that revenge the first night Human Friend Susan is back.”
Ckck’ks stopped speaking and rested back on his hindmost appendages in the way that indicated he was done speaking. Tsk’tsk pondered the information as his paws tapped lightly on the screen of his work station.
“Your information suggests that Human Friend James is going to deliberately cause a stilt-roach infestation in her sleeping quarters,” Tsk’tsk said slowly. “However we are long past the local stilt-roach season. Has Human Friend James been breeding them in captivity?”
Ckck’ks gave an oddly unreadable full-body twitch and waved a paw in negation. “My apologies, I left out critical information. When Human Friend James found the stilt-roach infestation he trapped the majority of them and euthanized them using a cold box. He then removed their soft tissues and preserved their exoskeletons. Over the past three months he has created a template for, and printed out the components to, a system to animate the stilt-roach remains as robots. He wrote a simple code that controls all of them to display behavior that, while recognizably that of stilt-roaches, displays a primary swarm chase behavior. I presume he will focus this on Human Friend Susan.” He fell silent and looked at Tsk’tsk with a pleading expression on his fluffy face.
Tsk’tsk stared at him, his paws frozen over his work station, and took much, much longer than a merely polite six seconds to process that.
“The human,” he finally said slowly, “fabricated out of his own mental silk, a framework to make a stilt-roach into a functional robot, and he individually assembled, how many of these robots?”
“Close to a hundred,” Ckck’ks informed him with a full body twitch, “he showed me. I saw them.”
“And you believe that he intends to use this feat of applied mechanics to extract petty revenge on another human?”
“That is what he explicitly told me,” Ckck’ks said.
“How much time did he spend on this?” Tsk’tsk demanded.
“From what he told me,” Ckck’ks said, “he has been using all of his personal free time, as well as biting into his sleep schedule to no small degree. He, he does not look well rested…” Ckck’ks drifted off, his paws shuffling randomly.
Tsk’tsk let another long silence drag out. “And you are quite sure there will be screaming loud enough to disturb the base?” He asked, knowing he was flinging dry web against the wind.
“Human Friend Susan Alan has two lungs,” Ckck’ks said in a tone of hollow acceptance, “and she knows how to use them.”




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Humans are Weird – The Dark

 Humans are Weird – The Dark Fourteenth Trill felt his anxiety easing as the local star slipped further and further away around the curve of the planet. The gentle evening breezes stirred just enough to send wave after wave of sounds washing over his sensory horns giving him a constant perspective on the surrounding forest that was completely lost in the glaring light and stultifying heat of day. One of the local insects began to chirp, one of the things with too many eyes that lived in the epiphytes in the mid-level branches of the canopy. The sound created brief waves of clarity, making every ripple in the bark of the trees stand out in stark relief. The surrounding insects responded, it was probably their mating season or some such bit of trivia he should have remembered from the daily safety meeting, and the forest was suddenly clear around him. Fourteenth Trill winged along a fading thermal and wondered how he had ever been as afraid of this world as he was the first day he had arrived. His attention caught on the soft pulsing of a giant mammal against the more reflective bulk of a tree and he changed his flight path.

“Bruce!” Fourteenth Trill called out. When the human didn’t respond he heaved a sigh and strained to make his voice deeper. “Bruce!” Fourteenth Trill bellowed out, setting his ribs vibrating with the effort.
The human jumped and his head swung around, eyes darting about in their cavernous sockets trying to locate the small Winged.
“I am above you,” Fourteenth Trill called out, and then remember how sight dependent humans were, “it’s Fourteenth Trill.”
The human’s face broke into a grin and he waved a hand in the gesture that meant he accepted Fourteenth Trill’s landing request. The Winged decided on a shoulder landing as the human was not wearing a hat and happily settled into the warmth of the giant human’s micro-climate. Fourteenth Trill waited for the human to initiate polite conversation, but the wing-beats stretched on with only the sounds of the night forest and the human’s heartbeat and breathing filling the silence. Fourteenth Trill recalled suddenly that humans often liked to sit in companionable silence, he had read it in a book, and decided that such an odd behavior did sound interesting enough to indulge in. He settled down into the soft fabric of the human’s shirt and drank in the shape of the forest around them. Fourteenth Trill was taking mental notes on a nest of local granivores in a nearby tree when a sudden movement of the human’s head caught his attention. Now that his attention was focused on the human Fourteenth Trill noted that Bruce’s heart rate was slightly accelerated, his breathing was even but, his eyes were darting around. After a few moments observation Fourteenth Trill realized that the human was attempting to focus on the loudest sounds, but was undoubtedly failing due to the lack of light. Moreover the human’s pheromone profile was washing against his sensory horns with, not fear, but perhaps heightened caution.
“Are you afraid Bruce?” Fourteenth Trill asked in surprise.
“What?” Bruce angled his head, and one eyeball to look down at Fourteenth Trill. “Afraid...no. I mean not really?”
“Then why are you exhibiting stress symptoms?” Fourteenth Trill asked, giving a poke at where he knew a particularly active pheromone gland to be located from his anatomy drawing class.
Bruce blinked at him a few times and then turned his eyes to the forest around him.
“The woods are lovely, dark and deep,” the human murmured in an odd rhythmic tone, “and through their vastness creatures creep.”
Fourteenth Trill knew full well that there was some cultural context he was missing here, but he pondered that and a thermal suddenly rose under his mental wings.
“You are completely blind right now,” he said with sudden realization. “Without the light you can’t have any sense of depth perception! Oh! Do you need me to guide you back to the lighted area?”
Bruce have a low laugh and shook his head.
“Nah Trill,” he said, “I came out here to just chill in the dark. Yeah, the big dark wood might set my nerves on edge...maybe a bit more than I bargained for, but when it gets to be too much, I can just follow the path back. I’m barefoot and I can Undulate my way back to the light easily enough.”
They fell back into silence now and Fourteenth Trill was watching his friend with fascination as well as drinking in the night forest. The merest breath of an idea was stirring in his mind, an image he wanted to capture. A human in a forest at the very safest time of the day cycle, yet terrified in his deafness. Yes, the strange contrast of a massive, usually bold human shivering back from a familiar landscape merely because of the falling darkness would make a very strange, very striking image. Now just how to capture that sense of irrational fear of, fear of...well fear of the dark.  
Author Betty Adams Books
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​Humans are Weird – Fishing

​Humans are Weird – Fishing Quilx’tch stretched out his motile legs and arched his abdomen deliciously in the soft rays of the afternoon sun. The biting cold of this harsh world had taught him to enjoy the benefits of direct exposure to solar radiation. The light that fell into the small clearing on the banks of the river was just enough to warm him through his joints without burning through the protective chemical layer the humans had taught them to use. That last thought caused the Trisk to stir himself, and he shook out his legs lazily before standing. He ambled to the edge of the hat and peered down over the side. The human’s eyes were closed, but his primary atmospheric pumps were functioning at a rate that indicated wakefulness. 
“Pardon me, Mack,” Quilx’tch said, “could you please hand up the solar protection?”
The eyelids twitched, and one massive arm groped out towards the rucksack beside them. Without opening his eyes, the human felt around in the top compartment for a moment before pulling out a bottle of the substance and handing it up to Quilx’tch. Quilx’tch accepted it and squeezed a few drops out onto his primary manipulating appendages. 
“Need any help with that, Bud?” Mack asked with a yawn. 
“I do not,” Quilx’tch assured him. “Unlike humans we have full access to our entire surface area.” 
“Sure you do,” the human murmured. 
They fell into companionable silence, and Quilx’tch arranged the bottle on the human’s hat so he could use it as a resting couch. He let his attention wander to the leg-like collection of polymer rods and the line that rose from a secure place by the human’s feet and dipped into the water before them. The flotation device bobbed slowly in the minute waves on the water’s surface. 
“Mack?” Quilx’tch asked finally. The human gave a hum that Quilx’tch assumed was permission to continue. “Are there fish in this river?”
There was a subtle shifting in the hat that indicated the human had changed his facial expressions without bothering to move his head. Quilx’tch supposed it was a smug smile but didn’t bother to check. 
“That’s what we’re here to find out, now isn’t it?” Mack replied. 
“Did you check the biodiversity density records in the database before we embarked on this expedition?”
“Nope,” the human said with another yawn. 
“Did you hear reports of fish in this area from the teams of the Gathering?” Quilx’tch pressed. 
“Not a one,” Mack confessed. 
“Do you have any reason at all to suppose that there are fish in this river?”
“Would you be upset if I said no, Mr. Nutritional Anthropologist?” Mack asked with the warm tones of a smile filling the air just as the sunlight did. 
Quilx’tch pondered this question a moment as he drank in the sparkling water and the soft hum of insect life around them. “I do not think I would,” he confessed. Author Betty Adams Books
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Humans are Weird – It’s a Wrap

Humans are Weird – It’s a Wrap The last of the frolicking humans had abandoned the north-facing slopes, retreating with their noise and warmth into their houses to drink heated fluids and regale their less adventurous family members with tales of the days adventures. The soft pulse of mammalian heartbeats, drifting down through the insulating snow, signaled the presences of a few lingering adults who were apparently standing silently watching the stars. Notes the Passing Changes cast awareness over the slopes one more time and felt satisfied that all of the human young had safely made it back to their family groups. The vast majority of the agricultural land was cold and dormant, requiring little to no monitoring on this darkest night of the year. Notes the Passing Changes let awareness centralize in the first house on the list of visitations tonight.
The leaves of the plant that Sandy and Pat had placed in their central living area were more than adequate to the task of giving a clear view of the room. However the conifer they had brought in provided far more data points and it had been simplicity itself to connect it to the forest outside. Though the humans had warned Notes the Passing Changes that they would be giving it to the local domesticated herbivores so it would be unwise to invest any personal biomass in it. The view it gave, a full three-hundred sixty degrees of the human dwelling from the floor to the ceiling was fascinating. The plant itself, the humans insisted on calling the little thing a ‘tree’, was covered in lights and reflective surfaces and extra greenery hung on the walls. The air was thick with complex molecules that drifted out of the cooking room. Human music drifted from the household speakers. Sandy was alone in the room, sitting cross-legged and staring down at a tangle of brightly colored paper, ribbons, and a cloth facsimile of a local predator species. She was also wielding a pair of steel cutting blades so Notes the Passing Changes decided to wait until she set them down before speaking to her. Startling humans who were holding blades had never turned out well.
While the human focused on concealing the faux-predator Notes the Passing Changes took time to observe the pile of items that had not yet been concealed in either the brightly colored paper or the sturdier reflective bags, and compare the mass and number to those that had been.
“Human Friend Sandy?” Notes the Passing Changes greeted the human when she had breathed a sigh, set the blades to the side, and sat up to stretch.
“Eh? Notes?” she asked glancing first at the usual plant and then up at the conifer fragment with a wide smile.
“Will Pat be arriving to help you with this task?” Notes the Passing Changes asked.
“He better no’!” Sandy declared, shoving some hair out of her face with one hand as she grabbed a pen with the other. “I told him ta stay away till I’m done!”
“If my understanding of this celebration is sufficient you only have a few hours to complete the task,” Notes the Passing Changes observed.
Sandy laughed as she carefully wrote something on a tag on the paper wrapped predator.
“Nah, I got most of the night,” she informed Notes the Passing Changes. “The deadlines when the little nephews and nieces show up tomorrow, not tonight at midnight. I just need ta get it all done before I go to sleep so I can rest easy.”
Notes the Passing Changes gave a vague sound to indicate understanding and observed in silence as Sandy concealed several more of the items. Several were already tucked under the tree and one that smelled of the main space port had the label ‘Notes the Passing Changes’.
“Sandy,” Notes the Passing Changes interjected as she paused between wrapping a low grade weapon in paper and arranging a processed food item in a bag, “are you enjoying this process?”
The human paused, turned her head too look fully at the tree, and for a long moment her eyes unfocused as she pondered the question. Finally she nodded slowly.
“Aye,” she said, a slow grin spreading over her face, and her pheromones were in accord with the satisfaction she expressed. “I don’ like the time crunch, but I’ve always loved the warping and the prepping part.”
“You have been gathering these items for many weeks now,” observed Notes the Passing Changes. “Your workload has been limited now that winter is in full angle and the plants are dormant.”
“Yer’ point?” Sandy asked tilting her head and picking up the blades.
“If you do not enjoy the time crunch, and you have had full control over you time these past weeks,” Notes the Passing Changes asked slowly, “then why do you now have a mass of the work to prepare in a decided time crunch?”
Sandy stared at the tree for a long moment and her face flashed with annoyance before she forced it to a more neutral smile and simply gave a laugh that suggested as much fatigue as humor.
“If y’er gonna be making sharp observations just keep an eye on me pen and scissors so I don’t lose them,” she said, bending back over her work.
“Of course,” Notes the Passing Changes agreed.
It would be fairly simple to keep enough awareness here to preform the class while also visiting the other friends on the list. Perhaps another human household would hold the answer.

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​Humans are Weird – Communication

​Humans are Weird – Communication “Have you completed the analysis for the—” Thirty-five Trills cut off the question abruptly as his companion performed one of those contortions nearly unique to humans.
Human Friend Steve’s head swiveled on that preposterous column of a neck, and his eyes focused on the scrubby trees to the side. His face flexed from the polite attention he had been giving Thirty-five Trills and lit up with delight. His throat pulsed noiselessly for a moment and then emitted a series of clicks and trills that were almost intelligible. Thirty-five Trills cast around in confusion to see whom Human Friend Steve was speaking (or attempting to speak) to.
An answering series of the same sounds, again almost intelligible, emanated from the shrub, but this echo carried wild and animalistic undertones that sent Thirty-five Trills shamelessly darting under Human Friend Steve’s hat for cover. One of the nearly invisible granivores was now perched at the end of a branch, seemingly conversing with the human. However they quickly passed on with the human’s long strides, and Human Friend Steve turned his attention back to his sapient companion.
“Have I what now?” Human Friend Steve asked in the same casual tone he’d been using throughout their conversation.
“Were you just conversing with that… animal?” Thirty-five Trills demanded, poking his sensory horns out from under the protection of the hat.
Human Friend Steve blinked slowly and tilted his head to one side as he visibly shifted his vector of thought. “No,” he replied slowly, “I was just… mimicking it, I guess?”
“Why?” Thirty-five Trills demanded. “In the course of the main branch, why? Were you determining if there were more? I know your bizarre pattern recognition had already found that one. That’s why you smiled. Why?”
Human Friend Steve gave a slow shrug and sauntered on. “Don’t know,” he admitted finally. “Just something to do, I guess.”
Thirty-five Trills ran his winghooks over his sensory horns and fought back a hiss of frustration. There was always a reason for this madness. He was increasingly glad that it wasn’t his stated job to determine them. Author Betty Adams Books
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Humans are Weird - Chug

Humans are Weird - Chug Second Father kept an antenna curled towards the Sisters frolicking in the soft duff as he poured the last of the skuul gel into the carry jug. When he was satisfied that the refinement container was empty he gave a happy click and set the container down. He found the lid of the carry jug and carefully secured it. Properly considered the carry jug was far to large to be practical but this one was destined for the humans and their monstrously strong hands. He had placed it on a hover-wagon before he had filled it however and to floated after him easily enough as he waved a hand at First Sister. She finished her leap over Fourth Sister and waved back confidently before trotting over to the side to take up a more supervisory position over her playing Sisters. Second Father fought down a little pang at how quickly she was, they were all growing, and set off towards the nearest human hive.
Human First Father out in the full sun beyond the canopy, erecting fences around a fruit orchard that was particularly attractive to the local large herbivores. Second Father settled back on his hind legs and watched the process with interest from the edges of the forest. The human had most of his outer membrane covered in protective clothing to prevent cuts and tears. He also wore a fairly wide brimmed hat. All in all, it looked like Human First Father was taking the solar radiating very seriously today and would not need the membrane soothing gel. Still, Second Father supposed that the planet was tilting back towards summer and the change in radiation angle would soon mean that the human hive would have ample use for a gel that was good for soothing the heat of burns as well as healing the membrane. It made sense to get the trade completed early. Perhaps Human First Father was also being considerate of the Shatar hive’s needs as well. There would be plenty of time to refresh the pods before any more gel was needed.
As the sun reached the high point in the sky Human First Father reached the place where his wheeled vehicle was waiting, clearly a point he had marked out in advance to end the task for the day, because he tossed his tools and the extra fencing into the back of the wheeled transport and then activated the fence. The air around the tree glittered and hummed for a moment as the fence tried to cover them all, before collapsing to a more sustainable dome that covered approximately three-quarters of the trees. Human First Father considered this a moment before he leapt into the driver’s seat and started off for the road back to the main human hive.
Second Father stepped forward and gave a wide wave to catch the human’s narrow binocular vision. Human First Father turned the transport in his direction and as the human came into focus range Second Father could see that the mammal was dirty, sweaty, and grinning widely.
“Great to see you!” Human First Father boomed out as the wheeled vehicle rolled to a stop beside him. “Can you hop on in and come over for lunch?”
“I am afraid not,” Second Father said waving his hover wagon with it’s load forward. “I am here to deliver that skuul gel you requested.”
“Really?” Human First Father exclaimed, leaping out of his vehicle and coming forward to examine the jug. “I thought the pods wouldn’t be ready for another few days?”
“That was my initial calculation,” Second Father agreed. “However they matured faster than anticipated. First Aunt is investigating why.”
Human First Father causally lifted the entire forty ey transport jug with a single finger and flicked the lid open with his thumb before tipping the whole thing and delicately pouring out just a fraction of an ey of the gel into the wide fleshy center of his hand. He brought the gel sample up to his face. Drew in thee quick breaths through his nose, and ran his bifocal eyes critically over the gel.
“Nice amber color,” he remarked. “It still amazes me how pure you can get this stuff without any industrial level processes.”
“We put all our technological development into perfecting the gene line to make it easy to refine,” Second Father admitted with an amused flick of his frill.
Human First Father wiped the gel sample on his leg and reached into the cab of the transport for a much dented and battered thermo-insulating drinking container. He gave the container a testing swirl and from the sound and the way it moved it had to be about two-thirds full of some liquid. With a satisfied grunt Human First Father popped the lid off of that and poured the skuul gel into the container.
A sudden rush of unease shot through Second Father’s psudo-frill.
“What are you-” he began, only for Human First Father to throw his head back and proceeded to drink the mixture down in great swallows.
Human First Father pulled the depleted drinking container away from his mouth with what must have been a deliberately loud exhalation and his face visibly relaxed.
“That is topical!” Second Father finally managed to burst out. “That means it goes on your skin! It is not rated to be taken internally at all! Let alone in eys at a time!”
Human First Father burst out laughing and popped the lid back on the transport jug before setting it in his wheeled vehicle.
“Not to worry Second Father!” he said, taking another large drink of the gel mix. “I went through and checked the chemical profile against human physiology. This stuff,” he lifted the drinking container demonstratively, “is perfectly safe, quite tasty, a nice texture, and chills you down nice on a hot day like today.”
“I thought you needed it to sooth the radiation burns from the sunlight,” Second Father clicked out, still feeling uneasy. “Really the gel is only for topical use...”
“We’ve learned the patterns of the sun around here,” Human First Father said with a shrug. “Betty and the boys picked up the protocols First Sister taught them and there wasn’t a single bad sunburn last summer. Nope, this,” he reached out a flat hand and patted the jug, “is, every drop, destined for recreational use. That’s why I asked you to put such a low priority on it. Now, if you can’t come and eat lunch with me I have to get home to my wife before she sends Betty looking for me!”
The human leapt back into the vehicle, took one more long drink, and then started back towards his hive. Second Father stared after him in perplexed silence before returning home himself.
It was four days later when Human First Father stopped by the hive with a rueful expression on his face and a rather sickly air about him that Second Father couldn’t quite identify.
“You were right about that gel,” Human First Father announced without preamble.
“What was the toxicity?” Second Father asked with a sympathetic click.
“No toxicity!” Human First Father insisted. “It just sort of messes with something called insulin resistance? I don’t really understand it, but the gist is that there is a strict safe dose. Drink too much and you get hangry and sleepy when you don’t want to. On the plus side it might have medicinal uses.”
“Are you suggesting,” Second Father asked with what he knew was an exasperated set to his antenna, “that you are not giving up drinking the gel?”
“Not a chance,” the human said cheerfully. “All this means is that jug is going to last me longer than I expected. Portion control and whatnot.”
Second Father gave a human nod and while Human First Father continued chatting he began mentally composing a new rule-set on selling humans non-edibles. Of course First Mother would have to approve it, but it looked like Human First Father would be willing to provide plenty of evidence for the need.  
Author Betty Adams Books
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Humans are Weird - The Wrong Broom - Audiobook Versions Animatic - Audionarration

Humans are Weird - The Wrong Broom Humans are Weird – The Wrong Broom



Third Cousin gave a hiss-click of surprise as the canister of dry ice salt tipped over and hit the metal floor of the hangar with a noise that made his frill cling to his shoulders in pain.
“Disorder and confusion!” he cursed and then glanced around sheepishly to see if anyone had heard the profanity.
He shook out his frill that was still tingling with the pain of the noise. He was not in Grandmother’s hive anymore. He was a free ranging seeker with the blessing of both his parents and his hive. There was no reason to worry about offending the elders. Still, he settled his frill carefully, properly, back into its resting position as he surveyed the salt spill. The warning labels, clearly visible on the canister, showed that the substance wasn’t directly toxic to a Shatar but did carry mild warnings. He pulled out his datapad and summoned the specifics. Ah, mildly caustic to his outer membrane; he shouldn’t really handle a spill of this magnitude without a full body gloving, which would take some time and waste one of their precious few full body gloves. Third Cousin vibrated his mandibles as a happy thought struck him as he pulled up the warnings for the newest member of the base. As he suspected, the tougher outer membrane of the humans showed little to no reaction to the salts. He opened a comm line.
“Ranger Dodge,” Third Cousin called out brightly, “please come assist me in the main storage bay. There has been a solid state chemical spill.”
“Sure thing, Third,” Dodge replied in a cheerful tone. “I take it there is nothing more seriously needed than a broom and a dust pan?”
“Well, a simple respirator is suggested but not required,” Third Cousin said. “But the spill is only ice salt.”
Mack Dodge laughed, and the Shatar knew the safety suggestion would not be followed. “I’ll grab the broom on the way down.”
Third Cousin continued his survey of the storage bay, and by the time the tingling in his frill had finally faded, he heard the steady double tread of the human’s approaching footsteps. Third Cousin saw the human turn his head towards him as he entered but didn’t bother returning the binocular vision greeting so unnecessary to his own species but simply lifted his frill in greeting and waved towards the spill. Ranger Dodge glanced at the salt, but instead of addressing it directly, he came towards Third Cousin, holding up the mentioned broom.
“Hey, Third,” Dodge called out, “have you seen the right broom?”
Third paused in confusion but didn’t look up from his work. “Is not the one you are holding sufficient?” he asked.
“Well, it’ll do, I suppose,” Dodge admitted, but Third Cousin could see that his fleshy face was contorted in a look that suggested sullen resentment in a human. “But this isn’t the regular broom. Where did it even come from?” The human pulled at the bristles of the broom in annoyance. “It’s worn all different.”
Third Cousin finally turned his multi-faceted eyes on the human to reassure him that he had his full attention. “That broom came from another level of the base, I assume,” Third Cousin said on careful reflection. “Will it not suffice for the task at hand? Or is it less efficient for the task?”
“No,” the human admitted hesitantly. “But it still isn’t the right broom.”
Third Cousin stared in blank confusion at the human, who was returning his look expectantly. Dodge clearly wanted him to do something about the situation that the human found undesirable. The broom was the same printing as all the others on the base, and Dodge himself had clearly stated that it was adequate for the purpose. Yet he clearly was not satisfied. Still, Third Cousin was not the youngest quartermaster in the core for no reason. Solving problems, even situations that reasonable species didn’t consider problems, was his particular skill set.
“Would you like me to locate and retrieve the right broom for this level for your future use?” Third Cousin asked carefully.
Dodge’s face smoothed out into a look of pleasure and relief in much the same transformation Third Cousin had seen when a human visitor to his hatch-hive had been injured and then received medication for the pain.
“That’d be great!” Dodge replied, before abruptly turning to the task and proving the efficacy of the ‘wrong’ broom.
Third Cousin made a note to track down that particular broom and then another to check the cultural database. If this were not simply a quirk of this individual, and the Great Hive knew that survey core rangers had their individual quirks, the knowledge that humans became emotionally attached to inanimate objects would be critical information for any Shatar working in a quartermaster position.
Author Betty Adams Books
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Humans are Weird - Staking A Claim

​ Humans are Weird – Staking a Claim “-and you cannot possibly guess what we saw coming in over the last ridge,” Wing Commander Fourteenth Trill called out as the wing swept through the open window into the main base. “Oh! How thoughtful!”
There was a chorus of delighted – and mildly amused – agreement as the flight took in the preparations the humans had made for them. There was a massive cushion of velvety material set on a human sized table to capture the maximum amount of sunlight through the observation window. It was surrounded by several springy sticks set into the table. The sticks dangled local seed pods on stout twine. Several of the younger flight members landed on the seed pods grasped the twine, setting the sticks bobbing and the seed pods swinging.
“Not the worst effort I have ever seen,” grudgingly admitted a balding old wing-second as he settled onto one of the slightly raised sides of the cushion. “Bit too soft, but acceptable, don’t know about this strange fur coating it.”
“Now, now don’t be critical of such a nice effort,” the other wing-second scolded, settling down beside him. “We need to encourage interspecies friendship you know, and when you have been gone for days it is nice to come back to a deliberate welcome.”
The wing-second gave a visible snuggle down into the material of the cushion but did pick out a tuft of the strange tan fur to examine while the rest of the wing settled either onto the sticks and twin or the cushion itself. Fourteenth Trill took a moment to circle the room, half amused, half oddly disturbed. It was a thoughtful gesture on the part of the humans, who must be in the waste elimination room at the moment, but there was just something...something off about the situation.
“Is this a blood stain?” one of the flight suddenly demanded.
The entire wing lifted off the cushion with a susurration of wings and stared down at what was, obviously, after the flap, a small but distinct bloodstain on the cushion.
“Not human,” stated the medic firmly. “Not winged either. Some local mammal.”
There was a confused murmur from the flight that lasted until someone gave a frantic predator shriek and they shot for the ceiling. Fourteenth Trill felt a fierce surge of pride as the wing fell into perfect formation. Medic and injured at the center. Combat ready at the edges, mindful to keep a safe distance between them and the ceiling as well as the floor. All two wings-spread snipers with pulse rifles out and ready, but not a shot fired yet, half surveying the room for other threats, half with their weapons trained on the… the thing that had just raised its head over the edge of the table and was looking up at them with four glittering, predatory eyes.
“Eighteen Clicks!” the Wing Commander Snapped out.
“A small local predator,” Eighteen Clicks responded quickly, fluttering forward to hover just behind one of the rifle-wings. “Well documented. Too small to be a direct threat to one of us.”
“It’s a bit bigger than any of us,” the old wing-second growled.
“Look at the prey in it’s mouth,” Eighteen Clicks insisted, “it’s target prey species are less than a tenth of our mass. It poses no threat.”
An uneasy flutter went through the flight at that as they collectively resolved the mass of blood and fur under the eyes into a dead body held in thick, piercing teeth. The creature blinked at them a few times before pulling it’s horrifically long body up, and up onto the table and then prancing over to the cushion where it curled itself up into a coil of muscles, dropped the small mammal onto the cushion, lifted its rounded snout into the air, and started yelping loudly.
“They are a social species,” Eighteen Clicks informed them, ‘living in loose colonies. It is probably announcing that it has food to share but I have never heard that particular vocalization before. It-”
“Mittens!” a human voice boomed through the room, coming from the waste closet, strangely high pitched for the giant mammal. “And what did ‘ooo bring me this time?”
The door opened and the massive Chief Engineer came prancing out, hands outstretched towards the creature, that in turn gave a positive wriggle of delight on seeing the human. Engineer Evelyn, Brock to his friends, was a giant even by human standards, massing an additional forty percent over the species average, usually moved with the slow and careful deliberation of one used to being mindful of a fragile world not built for him. However today he quite danced towards the coil of murder and menace on the cushion before his binocular eyes focused on the agitated, and heavily armed flight of Winged.
“My dudes!” he called out raising his hands in an invitation to perch, or possibly a human gesture of placation, but the Wing Commander needed to perch on something. “Chill! Didn’t you get the message about Mittens?”
The wing surged forward to land on the comforting mass of the human, peeking around at the coiled predator, only the rifle-wings hanging back to secure their weapons before joining the rest.
“What about ‘Mittens’?” Fourteenth Trill demanded. “Please tell me you didn’t just … just … domesticate an apex predator while we were gone for four days. Four days Brock!”
The human laughed and shook his head, dislodging a few cartographers.
“Thank you Mittens!” the human said, stepping forward and holding out a specimen container to the creature.
It uncoiled far enough to drop the prey item into the container and then happily writhed against the touch of Brock’s fingers as the human crooned at it. The predator, so imposing on its own with a prey item between its teeth, looked small, harmless in the human’s massive hands and Fourteenth Trill felt the wing relax around him, before beginning to flutter with a flick of blatant jealousy. Brock was inquiring if the non-sapient predator like ear scritches. Fourteenth Trills was reasonably sure he wasn’t the only one thinking that he certainly would like some ear scritches.
“No I didn’t domesticate it,” Brock finally said, when apparently, the creatures prodigious appetite for ear scritches, and back scritches, and chin scritches, was satisfied and it curled up on the cushion, tucking it’s snout into a thigh leaving just a coil of fur visible. “One, it takes generations to domesticate any animal, and two Mittens decided to domesticate himself.”
“Flap around that again please,” Fourteenth Trill demanded.
“He showed up the day you guys left,” Brock said, heaving them all up with a massive shrug, as he began moving towards the sample freezer. “I still have no idea how he gets in and out, but I kept finding him nesting in my coats. So I made him a bed. He kept attacking the samples hung to air dry, so I made him those toys out of the seed pods. He kept trying to eat important stuff so I bribe him with less important food. He started bringing me these dead rodents in turn, so I’ve been saving them for the ecologist who comes through.”
Fourteenth Trill ignored the agitated chitters of the rest of the flight and fought to get his words in order. Brock opened the sample refrigeration unit and set the rodent down by a wingspread of others.
“So this creature, which you know nothing about,” he said slowly. “Breaks into our supposedly sealed habitation. Steals and destroys both our food stuffs and generals supplies, and your response was to make it a bed and feed it?”
“That about sums it up,” Brock agreed, closing the sample refrigerator and turned back to the predator on the cushion. “Now come here and let me show you why I named him mittens!” Author Betty Adams Books
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