LF Friends, Will Travel

“Yea, we’ll be able to fix 'em right up, some surgery, an amputation and this little dude will be perfectly fine.”

He was called ‘Spek-Pree-Hirrin the Second, son of Knek-Yu-Hirrin, born on a third leaf under the third moon’… or just ‘Spek’ to non-Yunni. His voice burbled and gurgled as he spoke, the amphibian slowly climbing up the wall using the sticky pads on the ends of their limbs before depositing the tools back into the drawers built into the wall.

The Yunni were a frog-like species, sitting at around 6ft tall in their normal quadrupedal resting position. A large rotund belly making up the vast majority of their body, resting on top of the giant three fingered pads at the bottom of each of their limbs, each limb providing enough grip and suction to suspect the alien on flat surfaces with ease.

Spek took a moment to lick each of his three deep red eyes, one after the other, before returning to look at the other two figures in the room.

A Terran and a Scythen stood in front of him, both the bipedal ape and the strange colour changing 2ft bundle of tentacles were in their protective clothing that covered them entirely. A necessary precaution for any non-Yunni on the planet; the bright oranges and blues that adorned Spek warned of the extremely toxic nature of the secretions that covered their skin, and by definition most surfaces that the native sapient inhabitants of the planet had touched.

"Calming statement: See, the little creature will be fine, there is no need to worry friend Joseph"

The Scythen called ’Bob’ spoke in their species normal electronic voice, the disk they were sat on both hovered 1ft in the air, as well as allowed them to communicate with any species who couldn't understand the colour changing language of the Scythen. In front of Joseph and Bob stood a single examination table, upon which a Gibbie lay.

The Gibbie were a species non-sapient of small 2ft quadrupedal mammals. There was a lot that could be said about them: The large spines that covered their back in unique patterns of blacks and browns could be fired at great force across the room. Claws that were known to demolish stone with ease, jaws with giant fangs that could bite through bone without thought. Even their spit was slightly dangerous, being able to burn through certain types of metal through an interesting chemical reaction.

But the most interesting thing about the Gibbie was their general friendliness, as well as immunity to poisons and toxins, including the ones produced by the Yunni. This had caused the small mammals to become popular pets amongst the amphibians.

Spek worked as a volunteer at the "Littleleaf rescue centre.", a non-profit organisation for the care and treatment of all and any Gibbie, such as the one the two strange people had brought with them. The unnamed pet was currently cradling a mangled front left paw from some unknown accident, occasionally giving a pained sad whine as it lay there pitifully, its bright blue tongue reaching out to taste the air.

"So what's going to happen next with him? Is he going to be ok?"

Joseph spoke in worried tones as he reached out to pet the snout of the creature in front of him. Normally Spek would have warned him not to put an appendage near an injured Gibbie's mouth, but the deathworlder had already ignored his previous two warnings.

“Well he seems to be someone's pet, considering how tame he is, but the lack of collar or microchip suggests the little guy was probably dumped. Happens more often than I'd like."

Spek couldn't help but give a deep bassy croak of disgust before continuing.

"We'll put them up for adoption, but I wouldn't count on it. Even for an uninjured Gibbie the adoption rate is only 10 percent."

There was a pause as Joseph's face scrunched up in worry, eyes starting to water slightly as the Terran asked the confirming question.

"What happens if they don't get adopted?"

"Urgent plea: Do not answer that query."

The sudden worry and panic emitting from the Scythen was ignored by Spek, who responded honestly, giving another sad croak as he did so.

"We keep 'em as comfortable as possible, but we have limited space. Eventually we have to… Put them down."

"No!"

The reaction from Joseph was immediate, protectively wrapping his arms around the Gibbie, only barely avoiding being speared by its spines, holding it close as it nuzzled into the chest of the Terran, blue tongue gently licking Joseph back.

"How do I adopt him?"

Joseph said it without thought, an immediate decision being made in his head without regard to the consequences, causing the Scythen much alarm.

"Disagreeing panic: You can't just decide that, that captain will be displeased if I let you bring an unauthorised pet onto the ship."

"But if I don't, Stumpy will die!"

The tentacles of Bob turned the grey of defeat, slumping over in acceptance and defeat. They knew they couldn't do anything about it, as soon as a Terran gave something a name, it was game over, the bonding had already been completed.

Spek used that pause to interject.

"Legally, I just need some form of ID, and a 200 credit payment. I also must legally inform you that if you can't handle… Stumpy, there are no refunds if you return him."

Joseph seemingly didn't care, continuing to focus entirely on the injured Gibbie in his hands as he provided the correct payment and signed the correct papers over the next few minutes.

"That doesn't matter, doesn't it, my little Stumpy. I'm never letting you go, we're gonna get you fixed up then we're going to be best of friends, aren't we."

Spek couldn't help but give a high pitch croak of joy as he processed the paperwork and scheduled the surgery. The Yunni had never met a Terran before, even though his species was technically allied with the strange apes; most non-Yunni didn’t venture onto their homeplanet due to the toxicity of the natives. Spek had heard a lot of things about the Terrans: How they were dangerous predator deathworlders, how they were chaos personified. Seeing this one continue to fuss over the Gibbie seemed to be a far different tale to the stories of insanity and strength he had heard.

“So I’ve scheduled in… Stumpy for surgery in 33 hours, just gotta wait for our normal volunteer surgeon to get here. I’ll keep him comfortable and pain free during that time, you should be able to pick him up in 2 days time. Thanks for this, seeing these guys find a happy new home is why I do this, no matter how little it happens.”

Once again Joseph gave a frown, staring worriedly at Spek as the implication of what that meant sunk in.

“Does that mean you’ve got a lot of Gibbie’s here that need adopting?”

The Yunni gave another sad croak in the affirmative.

“We’ve got about eighteen hundred of them in the back. Medical conditions, injuries. Sometimes just ones with an unpopular colour scheme on their spines. A lot of times it’s for safety reasons, an injured Gibbie is more likely to be dangerous.”

Almost as if to highlight the point, Stumpy gave a sneeze, a handful of spines shooting from his back and embedding a few inches into the metal walls. This didn’t seem to worry or scare Joseph, who instead started to reach for his payment card once again.

“Stern statement: No.”

The electronic voice of the Scythen interrupted the Terran, a stern voice that seemed to try and stop the insanity of what Joseph wanted to do before it had even started.

“But if I don’t do it they will die…”

“Stern statement: No.”

“I will go back there and give every single one of them a name, and then-”

“Stern statement: No. We do not have the space, funds, or ability to adopt 1800 of these creatures.”

Spek watched this interaction worriedly, anxiously licking each of his three eyes once again before asking for clarification.

“You’re not suggesting that the Terran was about to adopt all of them…?”

“Explaining exasperatedly: Yes he was, because friend Joseph is an idiot.”

The Terran in question was now decidedly deciding to sulk, regardless of the impossibility of what he wanted to actually do, crossing his arms and scowling as he did so.

“Fine, can we at least make a video about it, see if we can get anyone else to adopt some of them?”

—-----------------------------------

‘Hurrin-Kaar-Spreen the fifth, daughter of Yuuu-Sha-Spreen, born on the first pebble in the twelfth stream’, or just Hurrin to non-Yunni, was very confused as she approached the rescue centre. She had gotten a call about an upcoming surgery she was about to do: an amputation for a Gibbie, one who had already against all odds been adopted out.

She had expected to see the normal empty front of the building. In fact nobody should have been about, as the current time was outside of the opening hours provided by the volunteers at the "Littleleaf rescue centre". In her wildest dreams she might have hoped to see one or two people waiting to possibly adopt one of the adorable Gibbie’s she worked so hard to help.

Instead there was a steady stream of Terrans, a good twenty or thirty of them approaching the front door, each one seeming to take a moment to read a posted sign, a handful of them attempting to try the locked door before walking away. Hurrin didn’t have anything against Terrans per se, although any species that both ate meat and came from a deathworld probably was bad news.

Slowly, she made her way through the crowd, avoiding touching them as much as possible with her bright black and yellow toxic skin, eventually hopping over to the front door to read the sign that had been handwritten in both Yunni and Terran English.

“NO MORE ADOPTIONS LEFT. GO TO PEBBLESTONE REFUGEE AT FFP49 4PPA. THANK YOU!”

That… that couldn’t be right. There had been over 1800 Gibbie’s under their care last time she had checked, three days ago. Maybe they’d get 10-20 adoptions done in a good month, there was no way they had gotten rid of all of their rescues in this short period of time..

Quickly Hurrin unlocked the door, locking it behind them as they walked into the front lobby… which looked like a bomb had gone off. Documents and leaflets about Gibbie care lay scattered, chairs and lamps were knocked over, and the floor looked like a million people had walked inside at some point.

Behind the desk, Spek sat, head slumped over and the deep bassy tones of a Yunni snore could be heard as he slept upon a pile of datapads, multiple devices all containing adoption paperwork that had been filled out and needed to be submitted. Hurrin was confused as to why he was even here in the first place, the other volunteer should have left over 24 hours ago.

Slowly she made her way to the back, expecting to find the kennels filled with the normal sounds of Gibbies, instead finding the entire room empty aside from one cage, containing a sleeping figure; presumably the patient she had been brought in for.

Quickly she ran back to the lobby, reaching down to shake Spek awake who awoke with a start.

"We have no more adoptions left!… Oh it's you."

Hurrin was still confused, staring out at the mess surrounding them.

"What happened here? Did we get robbed?"

Spek shook their head, giving a large yawn as they continued to properly wake up.

"I've spent the last 30 hours filling out adoption paperwork. Because Terrans, Terrans happened."

The look of confusion on Hurrin's face was obvious as Spek continued to talk.

"This Terran came in, with the Gibbie that needs surgery. Immediately adopted it too. Got super upset at the fact they couldn't adopt them all, asked me to make a video for the Terran Galnet."

That alone should have been enough to clue Spek into the issue: if a Terran asked you to do something, you should run away.

“So I recorded a quick 2 minute video, explaining a Gibbie, the fact they’re a category 8 difficult pet on the galactic scale, and the adoption process. The Terran and his Scythen friend left. Then I started getting the calls.”

It was at this moment Hurrin realised that the building's communicator had been disconnected. She reached down with a three fingered hand, plugging in the device as Spek started to object.

“No no no no no no no! Don’t plug it back in-”

The ringing started immediately, interrupted by the robotic voice announcing how many missed calls they had.

“YOU HAVE FIVE SEVEN THREE SIX ONE ZERO MISSED CALLS. YOUR MESSAGE INBOX IS FULL.”

Without another word a shocked Hurrin disconnected the communication in order to silence the ringing once again.

“I thought it was a Terran prank, people calling up pretending to be interested. Then they started turning up. Slowly, at first, but at the end I was literally giving my speech to thirty people at a time. At one point the payment system went down and I had to do it all manually. I’ve spent the last thirty hours doing nothing but paperwork!”

It was at this point Hurrin spotted something, a notice amongst all the chaos. Picking it up she took a moment to read it, a police report, a notification of their actions on the property..

“Why were the police called?”

“That’s the crazy thing. You know Kyruu, The Gibbie with Spirrel Syndrome? Two Terrans got into a bloody fist fight over who would adopt her.”

Spirrel Syndrome was a skin condition that would require lifetime care and medication, and historically the rescue centre had never adopted a Gibbie with it.

“You did tell them, right?”

“Yes! I warned them she would require thousands of credits of medical care over her lifetime. It seemed to inspire them further! Two deathworlders were literally having a fight in the lobby over who would get to pay that charge, I don’t understand it!”

Hurrin couldn’t help but feel suspicious, all three red eyes squinting as she thought about this. Good things didn’t just happen, there always was a catch.

“Why do you think the Terrans want them? I mean they do eat meat…”

“At 200 credits? There’s far cheaper options. Also… you didn’t see them, they were excited and I’ve never seen anyone fall in love with a Gibbie so fast, even when they got stabbed by the spines or claws. The way they acted you’d have thought I was handing them solid gold.”

The same thing had played out time and time again. While the Gibbie were an exceptionally friendly species, especially the tame ones, most people couldn’t handle the general danger they posed. Each Terran however had looked at their new charges, was an absolute and instant love.

Spek took a moment to sigh, returning back to his stack of paperwork before giving one last thought on the matter.

“It’s that Terran pack bonding. Makes them insane.”