“Paper!” Accountant Lee yelled.
The shout sent an immediate gust of panic though the flight of soldiers surrounding her and they shot into the air. Dozens of dark red wings flapped frantically as they abandoned the comforting bio-warmth she radiated to warily circle their human ally. This flight had never had to learn to respect human instincts in what the giant bipeds called “the hard way” but they knew the legends. If Lee suddenly leapt out of the couch she had been reclining in and held out her hands in supplication, screaming for ‘paper’ they got her what she wanted.
“What kind of paper do you need?” the flight head asked, fluttering up to her face. When Lee froze and stared at him blankly he cursed and remembered to lower his voice into human hearing ranges. “What kind of paper do you need?” He tried again, tilting his head to the side to catch the slow words of the reply.
“Something,” Lee muttered, seeming to dismiss the worried flight and turning to dig through the couch. “Anything I can write on. And a pen, or something to write with.”
The flight head immediately ordered the second wing to fetch the note pad Lee had left in the kitchen. They swept off and by the time Lee had found a writing utensil tucked in the cushions of the couch. Why on the wind would she store it there? They had returned with it clutched between their gripping claws. The frantic chirping of the wing caught Lee’s attention and she held out her hand to receive the notebook. She peeled her lips back and showed all of her blunt, herbivorous teeth in what the xeno-psychologists kept assuring them was a sign of pleasure.
“Oh! There it is. Thanks guys!”
The flight members began talking back and forth, trying to figure out what danger the human needed the notebook to counter. She seemed ignorant of their distress and dropped back to the couch to start writing. The flight head silenced them and chripped a request to land on Lee’s shoulder. She waved her assent absently and he landed carefully on the broad surface.
“What exactly did you need the notebook for?” he asked.
“Oh I had a great idea and I needed to write it down before I forgot it,” Lee muttered without looking up from the writing surface.
“What would be the consequence of you forgetting this great idea?” he pressed.
Lee glance up at him blankly for a moment.
“I wouldn’t be able to write it down,” she answered him.
“So there is no immediate physical danger?” he asked.
Lee snorted and shook her head in a negative gesture.
“Nah, I just needed to get this idea down,” she said as she continued to write furiously.
An audible sigh of relief blew through the wing and they settled down back in the warmth aura of the human. The wing head gritted his teeth and began to mentally prepare the report on this incident. He really couldn’t wait for the next wing head to rotate in. Humans were…disturbing.