In the darkness, Marco awoke slowly. He knew somehow, that there was somebody else in the room. That was when he saw her coming towards her from across the room.
As she walked through a beam of moonlight, he saw clearly that she wasn't human. Not any species he recognized, she was slightly taller that a human, her heels raised off the ground, six fingers on each of her two hands, orange fur that blended to white at the ends of her arms. Lastly, he noticed the tail. Thick and sturdy, it split a third from the end, and the two tips were exactly the shape of the spades on packs of cards.
A part of him wanted to cry out; there was a strange alien in his room! But somehow, he knew she meant him no harm. He came to the conclusion that he must be dreaming. Therefore, when she came right up to him and sat on the edge of his bed, looking at him intently, it didn't worry him. Somehow, it seemed almost as if she was asking for his permission for something. He agreed immediately. "Yes." he said quietly, again not knowing why.
Smiling, as if she had understood, she gently rested her hands on his temples and closed her diamond-shaped eyes. As an expression of great concentration crossed her face, Marco felt her presence in his mind. It was searching for something, gently probing through the contents of his head. When she found what she had been looking for, somehow he knew what it was. The language section of his brain jumped into life at the touch of her mind.
Then she opened her eyes and smiled again. Still smiling she said – although rather haltingly – "Thank you, little one. You sleep now." As he drifted back off to sleep, she gently touched her forehead with his. In the act of climbing back out the window, she turned back to look at Marco as he drifted back off to sleep. With one final smile, she was gone.
On the way back to her nest, Astrana thought about the little human that she had just encountered. The memories she had seen before she had time to pull away from that part of his mind disturbed her greatly. She knew that he was only young, yet he had already seen so much horror and pain, far beyond what could ever possibly be considered just. "But then," she thought gloomily, "life is seldom fair."
Her thoughts continued along this line until she reached her nest. She had found such a beautiful place for it. Ever though the strange plants of Earth still unnerved her slightly, the sight of a forest stretching out above her and a lovely clearing below cheered her no end. Why just yesterday she had watched a fellow hunter swoop down from a tree and catch a small mammal. A... mouse was what the humans called it if she was correct. The knowledge was usually immediate, but sometimes across species there was more of a delay. Oh, but the hunter! A truly amazing creature indeed.
The inhabitants of this planet astounded her. There was so much more variation of life. Certainly more than any other planet she had ever heard about. Yet they seemed to be completely oblivious to the beauty that surrounded them, destroying it purely for the sake of material gain, from what she had seen of the broadcasts on this planet. "If they aren't careful, they'll end up in the same situation as the B'stcreens." she thought gloomily. "That species has no respect for anyone or anything. It's actually a pity that they developed terraforming technology, already three planets are dead dust balls now." She shook her head. "Some species just won't learn."
Astrana filed her report on the language quickly as she was quite tired after her first day on this new planet. She shut her console down and snacking on a pakaran fruit, made a mental note to find out what types of native plant were edible before her supplies from home ran out. She stretched and let out a massive yawn, then curled up with her tail wrapped around her – more for comfort than warmth – and went to sleep.
A/N: So what do we think hmmmmm? Please do tell.
