Humans are Weird - Defensive
Fourth Trill was swooping down one of the air vents enjoying how almost normal it felt. Most human forged air vent systems were all horribly unnatural, echoing angles, usually made of some material that shrieked and moaned constantly under the pressure of the very atmosphere it carried. Fortunately this base was fairly new and the humans had been experimenting with a more ‘natural’ airflow dynamic based off of observed patterns in some Terrestrial insect species. Something with a venomous sting that human entomologists where very passionate about insisting were not the primary reason Winged were still banned from the human homeworld and most of the oldest colonies. Fourth Trill had made the mistake of flying into the conversational air zone of the ‘those are not bees’ debate once, and while he was not adverse to a nice argument about technical accuracy vs the merits of common usage he really didn’t want to ride that thermal any time soon.
“Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury! I ask you to consider this-”
The voice, warped and distorted, but comfortably so to sensitive sensory horns, suddenly cut off, the passionate tone, a strange mix of command and entreaty leaving a sensation of a suddenly stopped thermal in Fourth Trill’s chest and he turned with delight to follow the voice to its source. Technically Winged were not supposed to travel through the air vents, for a wing’s spread of safety and privacy reasons, but as they could, and quite frankly because they would, there were safety latches installed on every vent panel. Because these vent panels were designed to both human and Shatar asthetic standards, who both had very plant like tastes, that meant that the seam was invisible and the holes mimicked the stomata of broad-leaf plants, incidentally making the vents all but invisible unless, say a human was looking deliberately for the panel, and as this human was being quite loud there was no way for Fourth Trill, not practically anyway, to signal his intent to enter the room loudly enough for the human to hear him. So, balancing social interaction protocols it was perfectly morally acceptable that Fourth Trill’s nose tendrils were wriggling with delighted mischief as he triggered the latching mechanism and entered the hardly private study room where the human was currently pacing back and fourth, bent over a handful of papers.
Forth Trill swung the vent panel to the side and stepped into clear sight of the human, or what would have been clear sight if the human were not making eye contact with the empty air approximately sitting-human-eye-level above a double row of six chairs each. Fourth Trill studied the situation critically even as his fur puffed and smoothed with barely contained amusement. The human, new to this small outpost college, had gone to some effort to arrange the furniture of this room, and several other rooms by the looks of it. Moving that much mass alone was impressive. Following the ‘natural’ aesthetic the furniture had been carved from the native wood of the planet and had been left the raw color. Several tables that must have weighed kilograms each were upended, providing one raised seat against the far wall. The human was currently speaking towards what must be twelve envisioned humans in the twelve isolated chairs (humans seemed to like the number twelve for some reason) and the rest of the space had been sectioned off into what must be spectator seating. From the sound of it the human was guiding the envisioned humans through one side of an argument concerning a contract referencing some extreme body modification and if it the terms of the contract were binding or not.
Fourth Trill waited until every motion of the human showed him to be reaching the emotional height of his argument and the Winged felt his mouth open in a grin. He took off and hovered in the air at human eye level for the distance. No one could claim that he was trying to sneak up on the human, and swept slowly, grandly down to rest on the back of one of the chairs that the human had gestured at before. Fourth Trill stood up and flared his wings out in a way that would be easy to defend as being just for balance, because he was perched on the back of a chair that was not designed for a Winged’s comfort. If it also made him look bigger than usual to a human, there was no way to prove that effect was anything but incidental. He then carefully arranged his lips and the angle of his jaw to show as many of his needle thin, razor sharp teeth as possible. It was well known that Winged tried to mimic human body language to comfort them when they were stressed. He was debating if he should flare or relax his nose frills when the sweep of the human’s gaze swept over him.
“And furthermore! This minor -”
The low, rumbling mammalian r sound dissolved into a much more soothing range as the human interrupted his presentation with a shriek that reached impressively high pitches for such a large mammal. The sweeping gesture of his arm transformed into a flail even as his feet and legs lost their ever precarious balance and he stumbled several steps along the vector his arm pulled his center of mass. The human managed to counterbalance and then stabilize his mass, his eyes blinking slackly as he stared at Fourth Trill, who was very much not (visibly) vibrating with amusement. That would have been undignified. When the silence grew boring Fourth Trill, somewhat regretfully, it was a good grin and a shame to disturb it, opened his mouth to speak.
“Greetings! Were you practicing your legal defense style?” Fourth Trill asked, fluffing his fur out in a perfectly innocent fashion.
The human, now standing tall and relatively stable, glared at him suspiciously for a moment, but they both knew that he could never prove intent in the circumstances and the glare faded into a sigh as the human started to quickly gather his papers, presumably legal notes, and shove them into his massive carry satchel.
“Yes,” he muttered.
“It sounds like a very interesting case,” Fourth Trill observed. “A mature individual coercing a child into an illegal contract. What species does this involve? I am not aware of any aquatic sapient species?”
Blood rushed to the surface of the human’s bare skin dying it a bright red, giving the mammal an almost natural looking color and the human shoved the papers in more quickly. Forth Trill felt a little thrill of excitement. The human was embarrassed by this case. If he could tease the details out of him this should be very amusing.
“Tricky defense,” the human muttered, in low difficult to hear tones. “The young one was mature by her own cultural standards.”
Fourth Trill took to wing and just managed to catch a look at the title of one of the documents.
“How odd!” he exclaimed. “Most legal cases are referred to by at least two names on Earth aren’t they? So-and-so verses so-and-so if I remember correctly?”
The human nodded uneasily and began walking towards the door briskly.
“Why is there only one party named in the title of the case?” Fourth Trill pressed, taking to wing and circling the human.
“It’s not,” the human muttered, deliberately avoiding eye contact and blushing again as he tried to angle towards the door while avoiding Fourth Trill’s flight path.
“What was the title of the case?” Fourth Trill demanded, guessing at the meaning of the human’s vague statement.
The human stopped walking and fixed his eyes on the far wall. Fourth Trill could see when he made a decision, the broad face smoothing and tightening in grim focus.
“There was no case,” the human said with forced calmness in his tones. “The events were fictional and the contract dispute was never taken to a court of law. For the purposes of practice I hypothesized a scenario where it was.”
“That sounds very interesting,” Fourth Trill pressed, feeling a shift in the conversational wind that favored him. “I would like to research this, who was the other claimant in the process?”
The human’s face flushed again and his thick jaw worked convulsively. Fourth Trill gleefully counted that as a win as the human with forced deliberation drew a deep breath.
“The sea witch Ursula,” he said in tones laced with irritation. “The contract was between the little mermaid Ariel and the sea witch Ursula.”
The confession over the human relaxed with a gust of air that seemed to let all the tension out of him and his face twisted into a rueful smile.
“Though in older versions the sea witch had no name,” he said, “but as she was far less nefarious in the older versions it is less fun to take to trial. There is no way to attack her for lack of due diligence in those stories, and no way to attack her for interference.”
“I look forward to researching this,” Fourth Trill declared.
The human smiled, with real amusement this time, and nodded before sweeping his mass out of the room. Fourth Trill gave a delighted chitter. From the human’s reactions he had mined as much amusement out of this situation as possible. It might however be worth investigating why a legal focus human academic would feel so initially embarrassed to be caught using this little mermaid and sea witch for dramatic legal practice.
“Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury! I ask you to consider this-”
The voice, warped and distorted, but comfortably so to sensitive sensory horns, suddenly cut off, the passionate tone, a strange mix of command and entreaty leaving a sensation of a suddenly stopped thermal in Fourth Trill’s chest and he turned with delight to follow the voice to its source. Technically Winged were not supposed to travel through the air vents, for a wing’s spread of safety and privacy reasons, but as they could, and quite frankly because they would, there were safety latches installed on every vent panel. Because these vent panels were designed to both human and Shatar asthetic standards, who both had very plant like tastes, that meant that the seam was invisible and the holes mimicked the stomata of broad-leaf plants, incidentally making the vents all but invisible unless, say a human was looking deliberately for the panel, and as this human was being quite loud there was no way for Fourth Trill, not practically anyway, to signal his intent to enter the room loudly enough for the human to hear him. So, balancing social interaction protocols it was perfectly morally acceptable that Fourth Trill’s nose tendrils were wriggling with delighted mischief as he triggered the latching mechanism and entered the hardly private study room where the human was currently pacing back and fourth, bent over a handful of papers.
Forth Trill swung the vent panel to the side and stepped into clear sight of the human, or what would have been clear sight if the human were not making eye contact with the empty air approximately sitting-human-eye-level above a double row of six chairs each. Fourth Trill studied the situation critically even as his fur puffed and smoothed with barely contained amusement. The human, new to this small outpost college, had gone to some effort to arrange the furniture of this room, and several other rooms by the looks of it. Moving that much mass alone was impressive. Following the ‘natural’ aesthetic the furniture had been carved from the native wood of the planet and had been left the raw color. Several tables that must have weighed kilograms each were upended, providing one raised seat against the far wall. The human was currently speaking towards what must be twelve envisioned humans in the twelve isolated chairs (humans seemed to like the number twelve for some reason) and the rest of the space had been sectioned off into what must be spectator seating. From the sound of it the human was guiding the envisioned humans through one side of an argument concerning a contract referencing some extreme body modification and if it the terms of the contract were binding or not.
Fourth Trill waited until every motion of the human showed him to be reaching the emotional height of his argument and the Winged felt his mouth open in a grin. He took off and hovered in the air at human eye level for the distance. No one could claim that he was trying to sneak up on the human, and swept slowly, grandly down to rest on the back of one of the chairs that the human had gestured at before. Fourth Trill stood up and flared his wings out in a way that would be easy to defend as being just for balance, because he was perched on the back of a chair that was not designed for a Winged’s comfort. If it also made him look bigger than usual to a human, there was no way to prove that effect was anything but incidental. He then carefully arranged his lips and the angle of his jaw to show as many of his needle thin, razor sharp teeth as possible. It was well known that Winged tried to mimic human body language to comfort them when they were stressed. He was debating if he should flare or relax his nose frills when the sweep of the human’s gaze swept over him.
“And furthermore! This minor -”
The low, rumbling mammalian r sound dissolved into a much more soothing range as the human interrupted his presentation with a shriek that reached impressively high pitches for such a large mammal. The sweeping gesture of his arm transformed into a flail even as his feet and legs lost their ever precarious balance and he stumbled several steps along the vector his arm pulled his center of mass. The human managed to counterbalance and then stabilize his mass, his eyes blinking slackly as he stared at Fourth Trill, who was very much not (visibly) vibrating with amusement. That would have been undignified. When the silence grew boring Fourth Trill, somewhat regretfully, it was a good grin and a shame to disturb it, opened his mouth to speak.
“Greetings! Were you practicing your legal defense style?” Fourth Trill asked, fluffing his fur out in a perfectly innocent fashion.
The human, now standing tall and relatively stable, glared at him suspiciously for a moment, but they both knew that he could never prove intent in the circumstances and the glare faded into a sigh as the human started to quickly gather his papers, presumably legal notes, and shove them into his massive carry satchel.
“Yes,” he muttered.
“It sounds like a very interesting case,” Fourth Trill observed. “A mature individual coercing a child into an illegal contract. What species does this involve? I am not aware of any aquatic sapient species?”
Blood rushed to the surface of the human’s bare skin dying it a bright red, giving the mammal an almost natural looking color and the human shoved the papers in more quickly. Forth Trill felt a little thrill of excitement. The human was embarrassed by this case. If he could tease the details out of him this should be very amusing.
“Tricky defense,” the human muttered, in low difficult to hear tones. “The young one was mature by her own cultural standards.”
Fourth Trill took to wing and just managed to catch a look at the title of one of the documents.
“How odd!” he exclaimed. “Most legal cases are referred to by at least two names on Earth aren’t they? So-and-so verses so-and-so if I remember correctly?”
The human nodded uneasily and began walking towards the door briskly.
“Why is there only one party named in the title of the case?” Fourth Trill pressed, taking to wing and circling the human.
“It’s not,” the human muttered, deliberately avoiding eye contact and blushing again as he tried to angle towards the door while avoiding Fourth Trill’s flight path.
“What was the title of the case?” Fourth Trill demanded, guessing at the meaning of the human’s vague statement.
The human stopped walking and fixed his eyes on the far wall. Fourth Trill could see when he made a decision, the broad face smoothing and tightening in grim focus.
“There was no case,” the human said with forced calmness in his tones. “The events were fictional and the contract dispute was never taken to a court of law. For the purposes of practice I hypothesized a scenario where it was.”
“That sounds very interesting,” Fourth Trill pressed, feeling a shift in the conversational wind that favored him. “I would like to research this, who was the other claimant in the process?”
The human’s face flushed again and his thick jaw worked convulsively. Fourth Trill gleefully counted that as a win as the human with forced deliberation drew a deep breath.
“The sea witch Ursula,” he said in tones laced with irritation. “The contract was between the little mermaid Ariel and the sea witch Ursula.”
The confession over the human relaxed with a gust of air that seemed to let all the tension out of him and his face twisted into a rueful smile.
“Though in older versions the sea witch had no name,” he said, “but as she was far less nefarious in the older versions it is less fun to take to trial. There is no way to attack her for lack of due diligence in those stories, and no way to attack her for interference.”
“I look forward to researching this,” Fourth Trill declared.
The human smiled, with real amusement this time, and nodded before sweeping his mass out of the room. Fourth Trill gave a delighted chitter. From the human’s reactions he had mined as much amusement out of this situation as possible. It might however be worth investigating why a legal focus human academic would feel so initially embarrassed to be caught using this little mermaid and sea witch for dramatic legal practice.
RSS Feed
