Alien Pets, Trisha McNary [free novel 24 .txt] 📗

A few short weeks after she graduated from space school, Antaska stood in front of a clear barrier, waiting and hoping to be selected. She held her small gray and white cat Potat in her arms. Energized with excitement and high-strung nerves, Antaska watched the gigantic green alien Verdantes. Crowds of them walked in the curved corridor outside her “viewing room.”

The aliens, Antaska’s prospective employers, looked in at her and the other humans in similar “viewing rooms” built by the Verdantes to suit their purposes. The walls on the sides of her viewing room blocked Antaska from seeing the other humans and which aliens were taking an interest in them.

Now one of the aliens looked at Antaska and paused. The eight-foot-tall giant approached and stopped right in front of her. Antaska looked up to see enormous slanting green eyes staring down at her. Above the eyes, green curly hair covered an enormous cranium. The alien lifted a large six-fingered hand and waved at her. Antaska waved back and smiled.

Maybe I’ll be selected already! she thought.

“Grrrr!!” she heard and looked down.

Potat stiffened in her arms. She hissed and spat at the Verdante in front of them.

The big eyes of the alien got bigger.

“Stop that!” Antaska said to Potat. “Shush!”

But the tiny cat wouldn’t stop.

“Rrrowwwwwwwww!” Potat let out an endless angry meow.

The alien shrugged big shoulders and shook his head. He lifted up his hands as if to say, “What can I do?” and walked away.

Potat stopped meowing and settled back down in Antaska’s arms.

“What is wrong with you?” Antaska asked the little cat.

She didn’t expect an answer, of course, and she didn’t get one.

“Are you crazy? You might have just blown our only chance to go to space! My life’s dream! Don’t you dare do that again.”

Antaska talked out loud to the cat. It was a habit she’d got into. Sometimes, it almost seemed like Potat understood what she was saying.

This had better be one of those times, thought Antaska.

She felt a slight movement and looked down to see the Potat cleaning a snow-white paw.

Antaska looked up. Another alien, this one female, was standing in front of the clear barrier. She wore the same bright blue space suit as the males. But she had a smaller, more delicate feminine body and features. Shiny bright-green hair brushed her shoulders. Large pale green eyes crinkled up as she looked down at Antaska and Potat.

Maybe Potat will like this one better, Antaska thought.

Antaska smiled up at the alien and waved. The female alien waved back and then made signals with her hands. She pointed at herself, then at Antaska and little Potat, and then up toward space.

Antaska nodded and gave her a thumbs up.

Yes! she thought.

“Grrrrr!” Potat started growling.

“Oh no! You bad cat! Not again!” Antaska admonished her.

But the cat paid no attention.

“Reyowwwrrrrrooowwwww!” Potat let out her endless howl.

The Verdante female’s smallish mouth formed an “O” shape. She shook her big head from side to side.

“No! No! Stop! Stop!” Antaska pleaded with her cat.

But of course, Potat didn’t listen.

The alien lowered her chin and closed her eyes for a moment. Antaska read that as disappointment. Then the large green female turned and walked away.

Antaska’s hopes took a dive. She turned, walked a few feet back, and plopped down on the couch built into the back wall of the small viewing room.

“Are you trying to stop me from going into space?” Antaska asked Potat as she set her down on the couch.

Potat, now calm and settled, looked up at her with innocent gold eyes.

Maybe cats just aren’t adaptable to new things, thought Antaska. Maybe they’re just not that intelligent.

A tiny paw reached out and slapped her leg kind of hard.

“That wasn’t nice!” Antaska told her.

“Am I going to be stuck on Earth with a crazy cat?” she said out loud to no one in particular.

Potat ignored her and began to take a bath.

Antaska sighed and leaned against the back of the couch. With dimming hope, she watched the large aliens walking past outside her viewing room.

A few minutes later, the nutty cat jumped off the couch and walked to the front of the viewing room. Potat sat down there and watched the Verdantes passing by as if she were the one they might pick. Then she looked back and stared hard at Antaska.

I think she wants me to go over there now, Antaska thought. Or maybe this cat has finally drove me crazy.

Grumbling about the problems with cats, Antaska got off the couch and walked over to Potat. She picked up the tiny cat and whispered in her ear.

“OK. You’ve got your way once again. As usual. I hope you’re happy, whatever you’re up too.”

Potat purred back in her ear.

Among the other Verdantes, lanky, thin M. Hoyvil took long strides around the circle of rooms containing Earth humans. It was his second or third time circling around. So many of them! How was he supposed to choose? The humans stood near the front of their viewing containers, watching the passing Verdantes with wide, round eyes. Except at a few of the containers.

Some have been taken already! Hoyvil thought. I’d better pick one before they’re all gone.

He walked past an empty spot to the next one where a male human was performing martial arts moves. The red-haired male was stockier than the usual design for space travel, with cool genetically designed tattoos along his arms and chest.

M. Hoyvil stopped in front of the Earth man and watched him. The man smiled and kicked high in the air.

Hmm. It might be fun to have someone to practice fighting with, thought M. Hoyvil. Of course, it would all have to be pretend. They’re so much smaller and weaker and slower. I could easily kill him by accident if I wasn’t careful. That wouldn’t be good.

M. Hoyvil stood there watching, trying to decide whether taking this one would be a good idea or not. Out of nowhere, he heard the sound of a small female telepathic voice.

“Here! Over here!” said the voice repeatedly and insistently.

Who’s that? he wondered.

He looked around, but there were no female Verdantes close by. And those walking by weren’t paying any attention to him at all. They might have been interested in the human male, but they wouldn’t approach the container when another Verdante was already there. That rule stopped people from fighting over the same pet.

No. The strange, tiny voice wasn’t a Verdante, and it seemed to be coming from the direction of the cube next to him. M. Hoyvil looked over. Now a human female stood there. She held a teeny, tiny gray and white cat in her arms.

Could that Earth female be telepathic? M. Hoyvil wondered. No. That’s not possible.

M. Hoyvil lost interest in the martial arts man. He walked over to stare at the young woman with the cat. The tiny voice stopped.

Did I really hear that? he wondered.

He shook his big green head. The pink-haired Earth female smiled up at him.

This is the one! M. Hoyvil suddenly knew it for sure without knowing why.

He made the hand signs asking the human if she would like to go up to space with him.

She didn’t answer right away. She lifted her cat, stared at it, and talked to it.

Could that cat be sentient? M. Hoyvil wondered. No. That’s not possible either.

But the young woman seemed to be asking the cat’s opinion. The cat leaned toward M. Hoyvil behind the clear barrier and reached out her paws toward him. Then the Earth female nodded her head and gave him a thumbs up.

M. Hoyvil placed his palm on the pad outside her viewing container to select her.