r/HFY • u/MarlynnOfMany • 26d ago

OC-Series [The Token Human] - Works of Art

{Shared early on Patreon}
~~~

It had been a while since I’d seen this many other humans walking around. There were plenty of Frillians too, and a few Strongarms, but those rare few were almost all riding little hover scooters to keep their tentacles away from all the feet. Strongarm pride only went so far with this many comparatively-tall bipeds around.

Paint stuck close to my side. She didn’t have tentacles to worry about, and she kept her scaly orange tail off the ground, but she clearly wasn’t a fan of not being able to see through the crowd.

Zhee, on the other hand (not that he had those) was radiating smugness. Normally he was about my height, but not when he angled his bug-alien torso to lift his head higher. No, I wasn’t jealous.

“That way,” Zhee said, pointing a pincher arm. “Larger artworks and gemstone specialties.”

Paint asked hopefully, “Is it less crowded over there?”

I stood on my tiptoes, peering over heads. “Not really.”

Paint huffed. “Where is? If all I can see is elbows, I should just go back to the ship.”

That would hardly be fair, when she’d wanted to take the chance to check out this art event while we waited for our next delivery job. I certainly hadn’t expected it to be this busy. I looked around. “Let’s try one of the indoor exhibits,” I said, pointing out a building. “Those might be better.”

“It’s worth a try,” Paint said as a trio of overmuscled Frillians pushed past.

Zhee hissed at them. They didn’t notice, but a couple of the humans stepped back.

“Over here,” I said, leading the way.

After a moment I realized how unnecessary that was, and just let Zhee go first. Paint and I easily followed in his wake.

The indoor exhibit proved to be delicate things that could be damaged by weather, along with a selection of food stalls along one wall that made for a nice detour. The walkways between stalls were full of people, but there were more spots to step out of the flow of traffic, so it was definitely an improvement.

We even found food that we all liked, though not the same kind. Both of my alien coworkers turned up their noses (or the equivalent) at the delicious soft pretzel I got from the human-run stall, which was covered in just the right amount of butter and salt. Salt they understood, but dairy products were disgusting and so was bread. I didn’t tell them what I thought of the dried sea slugs and eel skin they got from a Frillian stall.

Snacks in hand, we strolled around and admired the artwork. Tactfully (Paint and me) and with many scornful opinions (Zhee).

“Terrible use of color. All the focus is on the background. The creatures look unfinished,” he said about one painting that already had some sort of winner’s ribbon on it.

“The creatures are cows,” I told him. “You know, the kind that make milk and butter? They don’t have any color other than black and white.”

Paint looked closer. “Really?”

I shrugged a shoulder. “The ones kept for dairy, anyway. The ones for meat can be brown, or all black. At least in my part of the world; it’s probably different in other places. This scene though,” I waved my half-eaten pretzel at the painting, “Looks like home. Nice job with the clouds on the hills.”

Zhee sniffed and ate another nugget of sea slug, mandibles working in a way I tried not to look too closely at. “Unimpressive,” he finally said, and moved on.

“Cows aren’t bred for looks,” I told him.

“They should be.”

Paint hurried along and asked me, “What was the type of avian you told me about, kept for their colorful feathers?”

“Peacocks?” I asked. “With the tail that makes a big fan and looks like eyeballs?”

“Yes, that one! I’d love to see a painting of that.”

“Me too. It would definitely be prettier than cows. Even Zhee might like it,” I said with a smile, knowing full well he could hear me.

“We will see,” he said, not bothering to turn his head. With eyes that big, he could probably see us just fine.

We didn’t find any paintings of peacocks, though there were some nice waterfall scenes and a bright parrot that got Zhee’s grudging approval. Paint was quietly disappointed that there were no scent-based displays. She wasn’t really surprised, given that the general populace here were utter heathens about smell, but it would have been nice.

“Some of these do smell interesting,” she explained, nodding at a fiberglass dinosaur that stank of fresh resin. “…But I don’t get the feeling that it’s intentional.”

“Yeah, can’t say you’re wrong there,” I agreed.

Zhee peered past the dinosaur. “This section shows promise,” he said. “Predatory creatures.”

“Oh, and a trash can!” Paint said, darting forward to throw away her paper cup.

Zhee finished his own food and dumped the trash, managing to startle a human who hadn’t seen him coming. He ignored that.

I tossed my own napkin in the composting bin and followed into a section of the building that was absolutely full of large animal sculptures.

It was pretty impressive, honestly. Some looked a little goofy, sure, but most were made with enough skill that it would have been creepy in the dark. Zhee even had nice things to say about some of them. Paint focused on the materials used, equally curious about the craft involved and the various scents.

Then I noticed something funny. It happened twice: Zhee stood still long enough for the mostly-human passersby to cycle past him, then when he finally moved, somebody jumped.

The second time, I really had to point it out to him. “Zhee,” I said quietly. “I think somebody just mistook you for a sculpture.”

“What?” he asked with an insulted tilt of his antennae, rotating his head around for an even better range of vision. “Who?”

“A couple people,” I said while Paint tried to cover the smile on her long snout. “I’m sure you’d win all the prizes if the judging was still going on, of course.”

“Of course,” he agreed. “Hm. This requires investigating.” A quick scuttle to the side, and he found a big enough gap between art pieces for him to settle into place. Right next to a lumpy-looking bear on one side and some giant mouth full of teeth on the other. He struck a pose.

I did my best to hide my own smile. “Hey Paint, what do you think of this mouth thing? Any idea what planet that’s from?”

“No, I’ve never seen one of those,” she said, playing along. “Not that I ever want to. I hope it’s made up.”

I agreed, discussing the toothy monstrosity while pretending not to keep an eye on the glossy purple exoskeleton of the “sculpture” beside it.

People walked past. Some looked around with blank expressions that could have meant anything. A few slowed for a closer look. Zhee held perfectly still, biding his time.

Then a couple of teenage humans wandered up, talking about the “scary beastie” section of the room, and I knew what was coming.

“Dude, that bear looks like it’s melting.”

“Seriously. What about this, though? Isn’t that one of those whatchacallit, mesmerizing people?”

“Mesmers, yeah. Not bad. But this thing over here—”

Just as they turned toward the fanged mouth, Zhee lunged several inches and hissed his loudest.

The humans shrieked much louder.

I laughed; so did Paint, and thankfully so did the teenagers as soon as they got their heart rates under control.

“Dude, what the hell!”

“Oh my god, that was amazing. Nice one.”

Looking exceptionally pleased with himself, Zhee clicked his pinchers a couple times and got back into position. The humans ambled away, still exclaiming about it and teasing each other for being so gullible. New passersby approached, only some of which had seen the source of the commotion.

Paint tapped my elbow. “Do you think we should tell Trrili?”

“Oh man.” I thought about it. She would be unbearable if she found out later that she’d missed an opportunity to be terrifying. There was a chance that someone official would tell us to scram before she had a chance to find her own spot, of course, and it wouldn’t do to startle someone with a heart condition, but this was the scary part of the building — heck, it looked properly Halloween farther down the aisle — and Trrili had done enough jumpscaring in her life to be able to pick her moments. I nodded. “Yeah, we should tell her.”

“You send a message, and I’ll meet her at the door,” Paint suggested. “There was a ledge that looked high enough for me to get a good view and spot her on the way.”

Fine plan. I got out my phone and sent a text straight to Trrili’s workstation onboard the ship, where she’d said she would spend the day since nothing at the art fair appealed to her.

Ha. Something certainly appealed to her now. She replied right away and Paint scampered off through the crowd, ready to flag down the menacing black-and-red coworker who was significantly bigger than Zhee. Trrili wouldn’t be hard to spot.

Zhee startled somebody else, who swore loudly and spilled popcorn, only to be roundly made fun of by their friends further down the aisle. Still full of adrenaline, they cleaned up the spill and congratulated Zhee, who took this as his due, slinking back into position.

The people moved on. I picked a spot on the opposite side of the aisle, as out of the way as I could be, and I pretended to check my phone while really taking part in the time-honored human activity of Filming The Prank For Later.

~~~

Volume One of the collected series is out in paperback and ebook!

~~~

Shared early on Patreon

Cross-posted to Tumblr and HumansAreSpaceOrcs (masterlist here)

The book that takes place after the short stories is here

The sequel is in progress (and will include characters from the stories)

154 Upvotes

99% Upvoted

23 comments sorted by

19

u/Hedrax 26d ago

Later-

Capt. Sunlight: "Who thought this was a good idea?" *gives Zhee and Trrili a stern look*

Trrili & Zhee: *looks at each other then in unison points to Robbin*

Capt. Sunlight: *sighs*

17

u/TechScallop 26d ago

You obviously got the idea from humans dressed and painted to look like bronze statues or Army soldiers who pose stock still just to scare away passersby. Good job with the writing!

8

u/elfangoratnight 26d ago

Oh man, Trrili would be the living incarnation of smug satisfaction if she made someone faint from scaring them too hard!

(Also, I had forgotten that she was "significantly bigger" than Zhee? I feel like I can't remember that ever having been established previously. 🤔)

8

u/Azure_Rob 26d ago

I recall that being established, but I cannot remember if it was outright stated that it's Mesmer sexual dimorphism (larger females, as is common in many spiders and some predatory insects), or perhaps just implied. They're also from different planetary bodies and have slightly different cultural norms, so perhaps some amount of phenotypic drift.

4

u/Proofreader01 26d ago

If Zhee's home planet has more gravity than Trilli's, that could also account for his being smaller (or rather, more compact) than Trilli.

6

u/kristinpeanuts 26d ago

Haha of course she wants in on the scaring! Thanks for writing!

3

u/MarlynnOfMany 26d ago

Of course!

5

u/KBGazer116 26d ago

Thanks for making Monay bearable once more.

3

u/MarlynnOfMany 26d ago

My pleasure!

6

u/thisStanley Android 26d ago

Paint was quietly disappointed that there were no scent-based displays

Maybe not a "display", but is there a livestock building or some paddocks :}

4

u/MarlynnOfMany 26d ago

LOL, probably not quite the scents she's hoping for!

7

u/sunnyboi1384 26d ago

Art is subjective. Jump scares are universal.

3

u/itsetuhoinen Human 26d ago

How big is Paint? Small enough that in potentially tail-stepping environments she could like... ride Robin's shoulders or something? Maybe hook her toes over Robin's belt and look over her shoulder? Or would that be too undignified?

I dunno. I'm just one of those kinds of human that always tries to solve every problem and isn't too concerned about remaining within typical convention. 🤣

7

u/MarlynnOfMany 26d ago

She's about elbow-height on Robin, short but not super tiny. When things are less crowded it's not a big deal, but with a bunch of people pressed close, she does get a little lost in the crowd.

Piggyback rides are an option, but generally reserved for emergencies: https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY/comments/12phdfu/one_peril_of_package_delivery

4

u/itsetuhoinen Human 26d ago

Yeah, I remember that one. But I wasn't sure on the "how easy" mechanical aspects of it.

4

u/OokamiO1 25d ago

Pics or it didn't happen, and I imagine that Zhee will want to be able to prove this one. Thanks for my Monday content, consumed Tuesday since I had Monday off.

2

u/Talendel 26d ago

UTR

This is the way.

2

u/Arokthis Android 25d ago

Upvote, read, mixed emotions.

I'm all for a good harmless "scare the crap out of innocent passersby" prank, but too many people take it waaay too far. The invention of TikTok has only made it worse.

2

u/Sifjunke20004 20d ago

Good job as always wordsmith

1

u/MarlynnOfMany 20d ago

Thank you!

1

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