#human crew

He looked back to the two humans still waiting up on the rocks behind him. “Are you sure this is safe? Shouldn’t you enter the water from a lower location?” Like the beach, he thought to himself.

“Well there is a lower spot over there,” Shen pointed to a ledge to their left. When he had followed the humans up here, he had passed that spot thinking it would be the highest they dared climb. But, these were humans he was dealing with. He should have known better. Shen pointed from the ledge to down at the water below it, “The problem is that the rocks are shallow down there. It’s not safe if you don’t jump out far enough. Plus,” he stepped back to get a running start, “It’s more fun from up here!”

Mentik watched in frozen horror as Shen leaped off the ledge and started rotating backward. He was going to hit the water head first! He was going to watch his crewmate die a gruesome death! His mind raced - how were they going to get his body out of there? What would they say to the captain? Why were humans like this?!

But Shen continued to rotate as he fell. By the time he was at the surface, his feet were once again underneath him and he disappeared in a splash of water and bubbles. The other three humans yelled out and laughed as Shen’s head surfaced a few feet away, congratulating him and then beckoning Kellan and Mentik to join them.

Kellan crouched down next to Mentik, putting an arm on his shoulder as humans do as a comforting gesture. “It’s okay if you don’t want to jump, don’t feel pressured to do it if you don’t want to. We’re all here to have fun. We won’t judge you if you’d rather go in at the beach.”

Mentik took a deep breath as he looked down - it seemed like they were so far above the lake. That didn’t stop Human Kellan, who stood back up and with two short steps, lept off the rocky cliff with a loud yell.

How do they just… jump off it like that? It was madness, probably. With everything else he knew about humans and how weird they could be, it might as well be madness. Mentik shook his head disbelievingly as he carefully climbed back down the path he and the humans had climbed up earlier. Well, he supposed that even if he didn’t jump in, he could still enjoy “beach day” while he could.

He’d seen images of Earth beaches before, large sandy expanses between the ocean and the rest of the land. This wasn’t the ocean. The land was made of steep rocky mountains. The “beach” was a patch of small gravel in between the native brush and boulders. Still, it was a much safer point of entry into the lake. Not wanting to be left out of the fun that the swimming humans seemed to be having, he hurried into the waters. It was steep. In only a few steps, he was up to his midriff in water. Cold water. COLD WATER! Oh by all things bright and shining in the galaxy, it was COLD!!!

In less time it takes a starved Krincharge to devour a piplum berry, Mentik was out of there and back on shore. Way on shore. Way away from the FREEZING DEATH TRAP!

“Mentik, you okay bud?” “Hey, you alright?”

“Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it!”

Get used to it? Mentik guffawed. Get used to it? In the time it took to acclimate, the extreme temperature change could kill! What the frewan were they thinking?! “How can you swim in that? It’s so cold!”

“Just give it a bit, you’ll start feeling warmer after you’re in for a bit.” Based off the way that Shen was still gasping, he hadn’t warmed up yet.

“I’m already used to it,” Jay smugly circled around in the water. “Feels great to me!”

Maybe I should have stuck with Winden and the others for surface-leave today, Mentik thought to himself. He sat down on a rock and watched the humans splash and play in the water. Well, they seemed to be okay. They even got out a few times and climbed up to the cliff and jumped off again. 

After a while, Mentik did venture to the water’s edge again. There were little fish swimming around in the shallows. He stuck his arm in a few times, but he could never keep still enough to not scare the fish. He kept pulling his arm back out so it could warm up in the sun. The sun, at least felt nice. And between the small fish and the humans, there was plenty of entertainment. He relaxed a bit and felt himself get a bit drowsy. Maybe this wasn’t such a bad idea after all.