Page 11 of Alien Barbarian's Little Human

Gog shrugs.

“Then I will carry her.”

“You will what?” The last word becomes a shriek as he lifts me up onto his shoulders. I grab onto his horns out of reflex, because now I’m like ten feet in the air.

The other Drokan snigger, and I feel Gog’s body stiffen up beneath me.

“Micah,” he says softly. “Perhaps you could let go of my horns now?”

I release them immediately, and grab onto the harness for his bow and arrows instead. Shit, touching horns must be some kind of cultural taboo for their people. This is the kind of thing that gets people killed on first contact missions.

“Sorry,” I say. The other Drokan cease their laughter, and Gog leads the way once more, this time with me on his shoulders.

Hopefully, I can go the rest of the night without making things worse for him.

We reach the escape pod after an hour or so of bouncing along on Gog’s shoulders. He sets me down gently onto the sand and gestures at the crater.

“There is your shooting star, though it may not be what you expected it to be.”

“What is this? It is not stone.”

We venture down into the crater. The escape pod represents trauma for me, but also familiarity. I don’t want to get too close, but I don’t want to leave it, either.

Talfa moves in cautiously, his spear leading the way. He peers inside of the yawning maw of the escape pod hatch. A moment later he shouts and rips himself away as a myriad dark winged shapes buzz about him.

Reor laughs as the flying critters buzz off into the sky. Talfa spits in the sand and shakes his spear at them.

“Tell me, Tayfla,” Reor says snidely .”How many centuries will they sing the ballad of your great battle against the waterflies?”

“Your tongue is sharp as ever,” Tafla says to her, but he has a grin on his face. They give each other a look. Oh yeah, they’re banging. I guess Reor gives everyone a hard time. I don’t know why, but the display relaxes me a little.

These aliens are strange, and their ways unfamiliar, and yet they seem just like me in the really important ways. For all of their seeming primitiveness, they have a remarkably sophisticated culture.

I should know better than to judge on technology. When the Alliance did their great survey of Earth cultures, they declared the low technology Kung tribe to have the most ‘perfect’ human society of us all. Bad anthropologist. Bad!

“As you can see, it’s more like a ship than a falling star,” Gog said. “It came off of an ever bigger ship. One that sails through the sky.”

“Preposterous,” Talfa sputters, but Reor and the as yet unnamed blue Drokan look thoughtful.

“Talfa, my jalshagar,” Reor says “do you not remember the great smudge of light in the sky, from which the smaller meteor broke off from? Perhaps the story has merit.”

Talfa opens his mouth to argue, then closes it and shrugs.

“Very well. I agree that it is at least a possibility she is telling the truth.”

“I believe her,” Reor says.

“You have affection for her because the two of you are so much alike,” Talfa grumbles under his breath.

She sticks her tongue out at him. I guess some gestures cross over to different cultures.

“We should make for the village. The Elders will know what to make of her story,” the blue one says.

“Agreed. There is still some night left. We should move on and find a good camping spot to wait out the heat of the day.”

“I know of a place. A larger oasis than the one you found us at,” Gog says.

Talfa snorts.

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