talkingoutyourasteroid

Alien: human steve are you ok?

Steve: yeah man its just kinda cold

Alien: should your jaw be doing that?

Steve: oh yeah that just happens when humans get cold

Alien:????

But like humans are adaptive to different climates so like one day theyre on some alright temperate plantet but a chilly wind blows in

Alien: human steve why are you not doing the teeth vibration?

Steve: huh? Nah man its not that cold just a little breeze

Alien: but human sara is teeth vibrating? Has it not gotten to cold for humans to refrain from vibrating?

Steve: nah you see sara is australian shes not to used to the cold. *whispers* its their only weakness

“DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW HARD IT WAS TO STUDY YOU PEOPLE!?!?! OURS BIOLOGISTS HASENT HAS SLEEP IN WEEKS TRYING TO STUDY THE ECOSYSTEM YOU KEEP CHANGING! one generation its on the verge of collapse, with clear intentions of killing it. then the next generation you are hell bent to repair it! dont get me started on how much of a headache it was that you kept reviving extinct species you killed! we look like total idiots having to go back and change reports to the empire! not to mention are engineer also wants a word with the person who keeps changing tech so that they have to start almost from scratch studying it! like you went from not knowing anything about space to ‘oh we know the composition of near by exoplanets, how they formed, and how the universe was created’ and ‘we should colonize and terraform this planet.’ WITH IN FOUR GENERATIONS! YOU EVEN LANDED ON YOUR *(&(*^(^*&^& (translation unknown…likely to be a swear worse then any word we have) MOON WITH IN TWO DECADES OF DISCOVERING THE TECH TO GO INTO SPACE! oh and our scientists studying human culture wants kill you all herself  because you keep changing culture almost on a daily bases!!! and not to mention you somehow DOUBLED YOUR LIFESPANDS SOME HOW. AND OUR GEOLOGIST IS FREAKING OUT BECAUSE YOUR PLANET DIDNT EVEN HAVE OXYGEN ORIGINALLY AND A FREAKEN CORAL MADE ALL OF IT, FROM WHICH OTHER LIFE FORMS ADAPTED TO THE OXYGEN! oh and dont even get me started on your ‘internet’!”

this would then launch a new golden age of human progressiveness and technological advancements greater then anyone has ever dreamed for one goal, and one goal only. to troll the aliens as much as humanly possible. 

A thing which popped into my head recently is just how weird it may seem to other species we will try and understand absolutely everything. Even stuff we have absolutely no hope of understating.

For as about as long as humans could think, we’ve chosen to think about the hardest things. For instance we often contemplate, and try and prove what happens after you die or we try and figure out what’s beyond our universe. We look for multiple universes. Wonder about how the universe started. And this is just scraping the surface. People have their whole lives didicates to trying answer these impossible questions. Some people even end up having a breakdown over it.

Now imagine an alien race finding this primitive war species, humans, they decided to leave them alone for a bit until they have settled down.

One day the aliens decide to try and make contact, and to their surprise humans welcome them, not only that, they practically worship them. They can feel the excitement coming off of the humans and a few even come up and thank them, or yell how they “are not alone”. Confused by this the aliens inquire into it and a human explains that these are people who have dedicated their lives to proving humans aren’t alone. This takes the alien aback, humans are a primitive spices, only just learning to leave their planet yet for as long as humans could they’ve wondered if they are alone?

As the aliens learn more and more about the planet they learn of the people who try and figure out what happens beyond life, or what’s outside of the universe and other similar questions. Even more confused the aliens ask two main questions, “how” and “why”.

They ask how humans are able to try and comprehend these things, and to their horror they learn we aren’t capable of doing it. The questions in extreme cases have driven people mad, however, a more common consequence of contemplating these things is something called an existential crisis.

This leads into their next question, “why”. They ask why would we ever try and understand things we know we can’t, things which can drive you crazy. And the humans reply leaves them more confused than when they started:

Alien: HUMAN! HAVE YOU BEEN POISONED? WHAT DO I DO!?

Human: *coughing, red, and watery-eyed* n-nah, it’s cool bro.

Alien: I must ensure none of these devil plants are still hidden in the food supply! Who put them there? Was it an assassination attempt?! Who would–

Human: *takes a bite of the pepper again, wheezing through the burn*

Alien: …wh…why…?

Human: Because we can, mostly

It’s easy to forget that among the Umvirate races humans have the least distance from their evolutionary ancestors. They’re charming and friendly, and get along with damn near everyone.

But there are moments when we’re reminded just how animal these newcomers still are. For me, that moment was when our ship crashed.

Smoke clogged the air, pouring from combusting electronics. My ducts wheezed forcefully, trying to force the particles out. Logically I knew it was a waste of effort; no one would be able to lift the section of ship that had me pinned. But every species has some degree of survival instinct in them, and mine wouldn’t let me stop.

Thank the algorithms for that.

A shape burst through the whirling smoke and flames, forcing them to curl around it and snarling as the tongues of fire licked at its exposed flesh. A brief hope swelled within me before my rational mind quelled it. I cannot be saved, it said. Do not drag anyone down with me.

“What are you doing here?” I called, recognizing our human, Ash, whom we’d picked up not two calendars ago. “You have to get out!”

Ash barked in a hoarser laugh than normal, the smoke, I assumed, and said, “And leave you behind? Not happening.” I could see the human’s eyes now, darting about taking in the situation. The pupils widened as it saw where I was pinned and for a moment I was horribly reminded that it came from a predator species. Logic, thankfully, overrode the accompanying worries. Still, it did not have enough strength in its frame to move the metal that had me pinned, not with under this gravity, not even with its deathworlder build.

I tried again to warn Ash away as it approached, but a snarl was the reply I got as the human braced itself against the floor and pinning metal. I closed my ears in grief. We had been warned, of course, how humans will imprint on crew members, treating them as they would family. It was part of what attracted us to the idea of hiring one, after all. But we hadn’t accounted for the bonding working both ways, and now I felt guilt for Ash’s impending death.

I did not hear – as my ears were screwed shut – but rather felt the metal warping as it was bent off of me. Shock overtook me as my brain attempted to make sense of the event. Ash could not have the strength to do that, but somehow did. Thank the algorithms. By the time I could process everything that happened fresh air was assaulting my ducts. Gratefully I inhaled and stared up at the beautiful, grimacing beast that had saved me.

Us, I quickly realized. Several other crewmembers, only somewhat singed, lay in the field around us. I could hear Ash’s ducts working overtime to supply fresh air to its system and my sight returned to it. The human’s eyes were wide and staring at the burning wreckage. Not in fear, I realized, but focus. A focus so intense that I shivered to even be on its periphery. But the guttural roar that burst from the duct of the human shook me even more.

Ash began sprinting back into the burning ship. I lay there in silent horror watching my companion defy every survival instinct it must have and charge back to save more of our crewmembers. And then I saw it happen again.

And again.

And again.

Seventeen members were saved before the fire became too intense for even the deathworlder. It collapsed to its knees at the burning entrance making sounds I recognized as distress. Having recovered enough to move, I drug myself forward and wrapped myself around the human in the manner that I had been told was comforting. It must have worked as the human gripped me tightly – uncomfortably so – as it wailed in grief for the lives it could not save.

I learned later – almost as an aside while giving my report – how it was that Ash was able to accomplish what I had thought logically impossible. Evidently under great stress humans secrete a natural compound very similar to higher end combat stims. This gives them increased energy, further resistance to pain, and unbounded use of their freakish strength. That last thought especially chilled me. It was haunting to know that every feat of power I’d seen until then was subconsciously limited by their brains to prevent their own body from tearing itself apart.

Despite the tragedy, Ash thankfully chose to stay on, though I think it was uncomfortable with the newfound deference shown to it. But there was nothing to be done about it.

I’m totally basing this on my own experience, but so many injuries come from human stubborness.

For example, I’ve made my foot worse by insisting on dragging an I assembled chest of drawers up the stairs, followed by hurting my back from doing so, doing something to a finger by screwing in nails, and scratching my wrist on cardboard.

Humans are weird writing prompt

With the reputation that humans gain in all these humans are weird and humans are space orcs stories, I can imagine some aliens having this reaction to humans.

***

Alien 1: “We left little Sazzik in the care of Human-Carrie”

Alien 2: *screech of alarm* “how could you leave your podling in the care of one of those vicious apex predators?!”

*open to door to a teenager rolling on the floor, quacking like a duck, because it makes the podling laugh*

Human: we just walked quickly after things that were faster than us until they died or got too tired to run away anymore and accepted death.

Alien: what the he-

Human: Yeah, badass, right? There’s a reason we’re top dog on Earth.

Human: *trips over own feet, gets foot caught in a bucket, yanks ladder down onto self trying to stay upright, falls in a pile of limbs and pain*

No, seriously, look around you next time you’re in a building and count the number of things that are shiny even thiugh they do not need to be shiny.

Humans are naturally attracted to any thing that shines, shimmers or glitters— I mean for fucks sake, we invented glitter. There are people right now who work in glitter factories and so whose sole job is to make shiny things for people to put nonshiny things so as to make them shiny.

We paint our nails and faces with glittery varnishes and shimmery powders. We use gloss on our lips to make them shinier. We shine our shoes to make ourselves look smart. We have been known to start fucking wars over who owns the bits of land with the shiny rocks in. Genocides have been commited and kingdoms toppled because one group had a lot of shiny metals and the other group wanted those shiny metals.

Why, then, do we all like shiny things so much?

Well, scientists now think that it’s probably because we evolved in a desert. If you’re living in a desert, then you’re going to need to be constantly be on the lookout for water, and water shines in the sun. So the best way to survive in a desert environment is to just chase after everything that shines because it might be water.

So now imagine how weird this would all be to a species who didn’t evolve in a desert.

Imagine aliens just being baffled by the human habit of wearing certain rocks— or even just pieces of glass or plastic cut to look like those rocks— just because we like the way they catch the light. Imagine aliens who come from worlds where there are a lot of shiny rocks bringing them back for their human friends to see and watching, puzzled, as said human friends start wearing the rocks around their necks, wrists, fingers or even (weirdly) stuck through special holes they make in their ears.

“Thank you so much! These are beautiful!”

“I literally just scooped up some of the gravel from the spaceport— how are you so amazed?”

What if, following the humans are weird thing, most intelligent species in the universe either don’t sing or just sing to flirt or start arguments so when they encounter humans they’re really confused.

Like? They just sing randomly? They actually plan out their singing and there are humans that train for it and make careers out of it? The humans use singing for teaching and expressing emotions other than lust or aggression?

Many humans experience uncomfortable urges to either self-destruct, or cause destruction in certain situations.

Maybe a human, upon finding out they’re stronger and more physically capable than their fellow alien crew members, would start to imagine “hey, I could totally end your life right now if I wanted to… but I won’t because I love you guys”.

Or they may look out into the deep void of space through a window on the ship, and then have this incredible urge to open the hatch and jump out, knowing good and well they would die instantly.