"May I see your hands please?"
A rumbling purr more suited to the throat of a tiger ended like a laugh. "But of course," he smiled as he extended his hand in the classic handshake position, "just be careful of the talon tips. I keep mine sharp."
Four fingers and an opposable thumb, all relaxed so that the talons were sheathed at the moment. The palm area was the same pinkish flesh color as my own, somewhat callused, and complete with creases and fingerprints. Fingerprints? I stared at the ball of his thumb. Sure enough there were tiny ridges and whorls just like on my own fingers.
I smiled what I hoped what was my most winsome smile as I smeared a dab of sauce from dinner on his thumb and there rolled it against the white drink container. I wiped his thumb off with a bit of clean napkin. Not police perfect but clear enough. It looked as ordinary as the fingerprints my high school biology teacher collected during our study of human genetics.
Could he be human or was he an alien who merely looked like a human with fur and retractable claws? But would an alien have human style fingerprints? I wondered what I'd find out if I had access to a microscope and a blood slide of his. The real differences, the genetic differences, might only show up in a DNA study.
"You're pretty sharp," he told me with that rumbling purr of his weaving around the words, "to figure things out that quickly. JBBBK
(Jib-Beh-Beck) told me that you were one of the smartest ones he's ever caught on your planet."
"Not smart enough--I got caught, didn't I?" My voice was bitter sounding in spite of the fact that I'd decided to try to remain calm and not let them see me sweat. I smiled in an effort to take the sting out of my words but furball had already narrowed his eyes thinking. I glanced at the other men? aliens? in the room. Feathers still hadn't said a thing since he'd come in. All of them were beautiful in their own way, what with glossy fur or bright colors but Feathers would make a good artist's model for a painting of St. Michael as the warrior angel.
Just then, I heard a soft "Thank you." I'd been thinking again when I should have been watching everything that happened closely. I had no idea who'd spoken to me. I glanced back at Feathers just in time to look into his eyes as his right leading primary softly brushed my face. "It was me who spoke just then." And his lips and throat never quivered. A telepath, then. "Yes, that's your word for it."
"Gee, I'm glad you don't have to wrinkle your face up and hold your nose just right, to send to me." I struck my best Sheena Queen of the Jungle pose with my face wrinkled up and one hand artistically
held to my temples. Feathers laughed, ruffled his feathers, wing stretched, and relaxed.
"It should be very easy for you once I show you how..." Feathers touched the side of my head near my ear and I felt warmth or a tickle inside my head. I shivered and then tried to hold still and 'listen' as he 'spoke' to me. Little wonder I received it like I was actually hearing sound. The same part of the brain was doing the processing.
"Can you hear me? Touch the tip of your nose with your finger, if you hear me."
"I'd rather touch the tip of your nose." he sent back to me as he
softly stroked the tip of my nose.
Feathers was flirting with me! JBBBK acted as though he thought nothing was out of the ordinary, but Furball's fur was ruffling up and his talons were flexing. So what was going on? He rumbled
softly to the other Furry guy he'd come in with and a conversation of clicks, whistles and rumbles mixed with regular spoken words emerged. I looked at Feathers and sent softly "So what's going on?
My Cat is rather rusty, I'm afraid."
Feathers was smiling. "They're afraid you'll prefer me to him, is all."
"Gee, and here I'd been thinking all this time it was just a social call." I smiled.
"But my little hitchhiker, surely you didn't think I'd keep you forever, did you? I am coming to a turning point on this voyage where I will have to change to a travel mode that would kill you. So I try to find you a home among a species similar to yours. That is why I invited friends 'over for dinner' as your people say. I was hoping you'd make friends with someone. You bony types are very similar where appendages are concerned. Here you are a female in need of a home and here they are males of species that don't allow their females to leave planetside. Surely you can come up with a workable plan of some sort."
JBBBK's skin colors turned cheery and pulsed softly. Hopefully? JBBBK was matchmaking? He swarmed over into my lap.
"No need dying, if you don't have to, little human. They need your company and you need theirs."
"JBBBK, you could have left me back on Earth. Nobody would have believed me even if I'd been willing to tell them the story of coming across your spaceship while you were sightseeing much less
about meeting somebody who looks like a large dry land octopus."
"And it would have been totally against the rules which I've told you several times, little hitchhiker. I can barely bend the rules to allow you to slip into space as pilot's mate on board a ship. If it weren't for that biowar most of these space-going bony types participated in about a hundred of your years ago, I couldn't get away with doing that much. Now hurry up and make your choice..."
========================================
"JBBBK, it's hard to make a decision this important let alone do it quickly." I looked at him and noticed the color pattern of impatience shifting across his skin. "Umm, exactly how much time do I have?"
"I can hold our position for another 30 of your minutes. By then, you need to be off this ship, if you wish to continue living."
A subtle shading of what I'd come to associate with persuasion crept across his skin now with notes of truthful importance. Okay, he was being serious. Not his fault that sex and mating wasn't a terribly important behavior in the opinions of his own people anymore than it was a monumentally important decision in my own. As my granddad would say it's down to the nut-cutting. I just wished I had his lucky Indian-head penny with me so I could flip it.
"Well, gentlemen, you heard the captain. Which one of you needs a pilot's mate trainee on your staff?" I smiled and glanced about watching to see how they took it. I noticed several quizzical little smiles, and two or three outright confused looks but no one said anything. "I'm only one manual away from applying for my third-rank license." Not a sound. "About another month's work and I should be finished. Until then, I am quite capable of doing whatever unskilled work might be needed."
Furball was deep in conversation with his fuzzy companion. Feathers fluffed and smoothed his feathers.
"You're female."
"I still have to eat---"
"You are more valuable for your companionship than you are for your skills which are not quite up to basic."
I looked over at Furball. He nodded.
"So you do telepathy too?"
"We all do." He sent to me sounding much like he spoke. "We wanted to know you better ourselves so no one told you that telepathy is what your people call "S.O.P." out here."
Oh joy. Small wonder Billygoat Boy had left and not returned after that first meeting and taken Missing Link and the Hairless Wonder with him after overhearing the things I'd thought to myself. I could feel my face growing hot with embarrassment.
"We have an old saying back on my home planet that eavesdroppers seldom hear anything good said about themselves. I guess I'm living proof of that."
Furball laughed his tiger purr again. "Don't be sorry. You can't help how you feel. My crew has laughed their asses off over your pet names. You see, out here, the gift of laughter helps pass the time and keeps us from doing a 'scream-and-leap' when we're under too much stress. I just want to know something?"
"What's that?"
"Explain to me what a Teddy bear is. And a Tigger. And a Bearcat. Furball, we figured out on our own."
Oh joy. It just continued to get better and better.
"A Teddy bear is a beloved children's toy which looks a lot like a bear cub. One of our past leaders was a sportsman and a big game hunter who was offered a bear cub to shoot one day. He refused to shoot it saying that it wouldn't be sporting to do so. People heard about it and someone made up some toy bear cubs and put them up for sale in his shop window. He called them "Teddy" bears after the leader's first name."
JBBBK popped his beak in impatience.
"I'm hurrying!" I took a deep breath and continued on.
"Tigger is one of Wynnie the Pooh's friends. He's a character from a beloved children's story. I always loved the animation movie they made from the story. Even as an adult I'd watch it whenever it came on TV…. And a "bearcat" was a fictional beast that was a cross between two of our larger predators, a bear and a big cat, a lion. Nothing was tougher or harder to kill than a bearcat."
The large furry man I'd nicknamed "Bearcat" smiled at me and then looked over at my boss. "We'll take her with us, JBBBK. 'Feathers' here is willing to travel tandem with us for the rest of this trip and that should give the Lady time enough to make up her mind who she wants to travel with from there."
"Good. All done. Farewell my Little Hitchhiker. I've enjoyed your company. My ship is transferring your luggage to their ship now. Scamper along with them so you can continue living." He squeezed my arm gently with one of his tentacles, plopped off my lap, and headed for his control room.
"I must get into my high pressure chamber and begin my prep-work before count down begins. Happy trip to all of you!"
JBBBK was gone. I'd probably not see him again.
"We better get moving then. Times' awasting and even I know your ships need to be moving away before his ship begins its high grav climb."
We trotted out of the room heading for the portal.
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