Humans are Weird - Defensive Mechanism
Second Sister clicked a soft song to herself as she ran the cleansing cloth over the last of the plates. She set one of the delicate ceramic discs in the drying rack and took a moment to carefully angle it so the sterilization ray would catch every surface on its passes. She had just reached a particularly moving vine in the song, one that always made her antenna tingle with enjoyment when the floor began to vibrate with sound of an approaching human. Second Sister let the vine of the song trail away as she thoughtfully spread a hind foot out to better absorb the vibrations. Something was, just ever so slightly off about the sound of the approaching human. It was larger, probably male-
Her deductions were cut off as a broad, flipper like hand shoved the bead-curtain aside and Human Fifth Brother lunged into the room.
“You look like, like-” Second Sister’s mind curled desperately for an appropriate metaphor to describe the sickly wash of colors flooding Human Fifth Brother’s face.
“Yeah, yeah,” Human Fifth Brother gasped out, his eyes rolling in their sockets in that terrifying way that human eyes would when they were distressed.
His voice sounded even worse than his face looked, and Second Sister wished she could grasp the metaphor that was just out of reach. Human Fifth Brother staggered a little further into the room, clutching the door-frame with one entire arm to stay mostly upright and holding his stomach with his other hand.
“You need medical attention!” Second Sister finally managed to enunciate, setting the cleaning cloth down and stepping forward, preparatory to grabbing the usually stubborn human (though he had seemed to ‘wise up’ the past few years as his own First Sister had observed recently) and forcing him to seek aid. “Third Father is-”
“No!” Human Fifth Brother blurted out, and it seemed he would try to justify his refusal, but just as his mouth opened the colors that washed across his face went from white, to a nearly healthy green, to bright pink. His body stiffened, then arched, and a stream of fluid shot out of his mouth, arched over Second Sister, and splattered over the entire rack of freshly washed food surfaces.
A momentary surge of frustration and anger surged through Second Sister’s frill to the accompaniment of the bleating of the contamination alarm on the sterilization ray. Its simple processor wasn’t able to analyze much in the way of external stimuli, but it knew when its assigned surfaces were contaminated beyond its ability to effectively clean them.
“The plates!” Second Sister shrieked, wondering why everything was just a bit cloudy.
“Your eyes!” Yelped Human Fifth Brother as he staggered forward, grabbed her arm and hustled her towards the sink. “I am so sorry! Gotta’ wash it off. I didn’t mean-”
He grabbed the nozzle that could extend from the sink and then paused.
“How much water pressure is you know, safe? For your-” He waved at her eyes.
Her eyes, and antenna, and frill she suddenly realized, that were now covered in slowly spreading human internal fluids. Fluids that burned. Acid, she grimly realized, his panic now making sense. Humans kept potent acid at the bases of those tubes that led to their mouths.
“Lowest setting,” she snapped.
Human Fifth Brother fumbled with the nozzle a bit to find the settings and she almost snatched it from him, but he finally managed to select the correct one and bodily lifted her to hold her head and shoulders over the sink at an angle with one hand while he ran the water over her with the other, profusely apologizing the entire time.
“Enough of that,” Second Sister finally snapped out, flicking her stinging antenna and wriggling out of his grasp. “We are both going to see Third Father for medical attention.”
She staggered back once free of his hold and glared up at him.
“What was that?” She demanded, gesturing at the dishes covered in clumps of half digested vegetable matter and slowly dripping fluid.
“Don’ know,” Human Fifth Brother said with a shrug. “I just got real sick all the sudden. I feel better now.”
“That I gathered.” Second Sister snapped as she grabbed up another cloth and began dabbing excess water out from under her frill while leading Human Fifth Brother out of the room. Even through her blurred vision she could see that his colors and stance were much healthier. “What I want to know is since when are humans capable of spewing acid two meters through the air, and what the fraying vine exists on your home planet that makes that a legitimate response to … to anything?”
Her deductions were cut off as a broad, flipper like hand shoved the bead-curtain aside and Human Fifth Brother lunged into the room.
“You look like, like-” Second Sister’s mind curled desperately for an appropriate metaphor to describe the sickly wash of colors flooding Human Fifth Brother’s face.
“Yeah, yeah,” Human Fifth Brother gasped out, his eyes rolling in their sockets in that terrifying way that human eyes would when they were distressed.
His voice sounded even worse than his face looked, and Second Sister wished she could grasp the metaphor that was just out of reach. Human Fifth Brother staggered a little further into the room, clutching the door-frame with one entire arm to stay mostly upright and holding his stomach with his other hand.
“You need medical attention!” Second Sister finally managed to enunciate, setting the cleaning cloth down and stepping forward, preparatory to grabbing the usually stubborn human (though he had seemed to ‘wise up’ the past few years as his own First Sister had observed recently) and forcing him to seek aid. “Third Father is-”
“No!” Human Fifth Brother blurted out, and it seemed he would try to justify his refusal, but just as his mouth opened the colors that washed across his face went from white, to a nearly healthy green, to bright pink. His body stiffened, then arched, and a stream of fluid shot out of his mouth, arched over Second Sister, and splattered over the entire rack of freshly washed food surfaces.
A momentary surge of frustration and anger surged through Second Sister’s frill to the accompaniment of the bleating of the contamination alarm on the sterilization ray. Its simple processor wasn’t able to analyze much in the way of external stimuli, but it knew when its assigned surfaces were contaminated beyond its ability to effectively clean them.
“The plates!” Second Sister shrieked, wondering why everything was just a bit cloudy.
“Your eyes!” Yelped Human Fifth Brother as he staggered forward, grabbed her arm and hustled her towards the sink. “I am so sorry! Gotta’ wash it off. I didn’t mean-”
He grabbed the nozzle that could extend from the sink and then paused.
“How much water pressure is you know, safe? For your-” He waved at her eyes.
Her eyes, and antenna, and frill she suddenly realized, that were now covered in slowly spreading human internal fluids. Fluids that burned. Acid, she grimly realized, his panic now making sense. Humans kept potent acid at the bases of those tubes that led to their mouths.
“Lowest setting,” she snapped.
Human Fifth Brother fumbled with the nozzle a bit to find the settings and she almost snatched it from him, but he finally managed to select the correct one and bodily lifted her to hold her head and shoulders over the sink at an angle with one hand while he ran the water over her with the other, profusely apologizing the entire time.
“Enough of that,” Second Sister finally snapped out, flicking her stinging antenna and wriggling out of his grasp. “We are both going to see Third Father for medical attention.”
She staggered back once free of his hold and glared up at him.
“What was that?” She demanded, gesturing at the dishes covered in clumps of half digested vegetable matter and slowly dripping fluid.
“Don’ know,” Human Fifth Brother said with a shrug. “I just got real sick all the sudden. I feel better now.”
“That I gathered.” Second Sister snapped as she grabbed up another cloth and began dabbing excess water out from under her frill while leading Human Fifth Brother out of the room. Even through her blurred vision she could see that his colors and stance were much healthier. “What I want to know is since when are humans capable of spewing acid two meters through the air, and what the fraying vine exists on your home planet that makes that a legitimate response to … to anything?”
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