Memory Transcription Subject: Benwen, Nevok Intern

  Date [standardized human time]: January 26, 2137

  “Anything else I can get you, sir?” I said, helpfully.

  Debbin rubbed his eyes tiredly, but shook his head. It was mid-afternoon. We were back in the main building after our outing, and the Chairman had been catching up on paperwork for the past hour or so. “No, I just have to wrap this one up.”

  “Is it anything I can help with, or…?” I tried. I was just sitting there, twiddling my thumbs. I’d already sorted the Chairman’s office supplies and tried my hand at dusting his shelves, but I hadn’t really been doing much for a bit.

  “No, just…” Debbin grunted. “Give me a couple minutes of space. Gotta, fuckin’... Media blackout protocols. You can run the order over to Security once I’m done. Shoo for now, though.” He flapped a paw at me without looking up.

  “Yes, sir!” I said with as much enthusiasm as I could muster, and dipped out into the hallway. Zillis was standing, alone, guarding Sifal’s office a few doors down. She nodded to me in acknowledgement, and her eyes lit up for a moment, recognizing her new friend. “Doing okay out here?” I asked her.

  Zillis nodded. “Yeah,” she said quietly. “Kinda boring work. Better than being hungry or shot at, though. Can’t complain.”

  “Hmm,” I said, but there wasn’t much of anywhere else for the conversation to go. The idea of boredom, at least, made me think about fun things to do after work. That’s what people thought about when they were bored at the office, right? “So I guess Sifal’s heading to a bar tonight with Miss Jodi?” I said. “That sounds fun. I’ve never been to a bar.”

  “Me neither,” said Zillis, looking wistful. “Not common in the Dominion. Too many people gets stressful. Small groups are better.”

  I tapped my hoof nervously, and twitched a few times. I’d been relaxed most of the day, but now my PD was acting up a bit again. Tourette’s Syndrome, Tika called it. Odd name. “Did you, uh…” I started. “Did you want to do something after work, then, just you and me? Maybe, umm…” I tried to think of what people did together. Movie night at the PD facility had been a highlight of my time there, but it had been heavily curated. My holopad had shown me that there were thousands more movies than I’d ever heard of! “I guess I have a lot of movies I want to catch up on, now that I have my own apartment,” I said. “Did you want to watch some with me tonight?”

  Zillis smiled, but she was misty-eyed. Had nobody ever invited her to something before? “Thanks. That sounds nice. I’ll, um, eat dinner first. So I don’t bother you.”

  My eyes widened for a brief moment. Right. It was hard to visualize, but Zillis was still an Arxur, and dinner for her was a bloody affair. But… but she didn’t eat people anymore. So it wasn’t as bad. And the rest of it… it’s not like she asked to be born a predator. Doctor Tika kept telling me, back in the mines, that it wasn’t my fault that I was twitchy. That I wasn’t a bad person, or lesser, because of the conditions I was born with. So… it wasn’t Zillis’s fault, either, that she needed to eat flesh to survive. It was just something about her that she had to live with. If she could be understanding of me, I could be understanding of her.

  Well, at least on paper. Seeing my new friend tearing bloody chunks out of an herbivore leg with her teeth was something that was going to take some getting used to. I decided to dip a hoof in before I took a plunge. “Dinner’s a good idea,” I said, soldiering forward, “but it’s fun to have little crunchy snacks while watching movies, like candy, or little toasted puffs of grain. Do you have anything like that?”

  Zillis nodded excitedly. “Oh, yeah, we got these things called pork rinds from the humans,” she said. “They’re uh…” She paused, not knowing how to describe them without getting gruesome. “They’re salty, toasty, crunchy, and puffy. Not bloody at all.”

  I took a deep breath and tried to steady my heartrate. I smiled. “Okay, you should bring some! That way we can snack together while we watch movies.” Zillis smiled back. “What kind of movie do you want to see?” I kept a happy face on while silently praying that she didn't want to watch anything scary or gory. Not that the Federation made too many movies like that, but we did have a surprising number of human films that looked awful. There was one about rotting human corpses rising up from their graves with no thought or conscience left, only hunger for the flesh of the living… Who even put those into the colony’s media catalogue, anyway?!

  “Something happy,” Zillis said simply.

  “Oh, me too!” I said, burying a sigh of relief. “I like happier movies. Something like a comedy or a romance, or maybe a fun adventure story. I wasn't sure if the Dominion had movies like that.”

  “We don’t,” said Zillis. There was a melancholy look on her face.

  I nodded slowly. “Got it. More scary and gory in the Dominion… but you didn't like it there much.”

  Zillis turned and looked over her shoulder like she was worried someone was listening… but it was just the door. “Didn't like it,” she repeated, softly.

  I put on a big smile for her sake. “Alright, we'll watch something happy together, then. You can even sleep over if you like! I've got my own room now. We can stay up late watching fun movies together!”

  Zillis nodded, and smiled bleakly. “Sounds nice. See you then.”

  Debbin's door opened, and he stumbled out with the dazed fatigue of a man who hadn't so much as looked up from his deskwork in three hours. “Ah, there you are, Benwen! And Zillis, too.” Debbin waved a small sheaf of paperwork at the door we were clustered around. “Just wanna show this to Sifal, then you can run it over to Security.”

  Zillis stood at attention, nodded, and opened the door. Sifal and Laza were staring at their desktop terminals with a similar look of exhaustion to Debbin's, and they both cherished the opportunity to look away for a moment. Debbin handed Sifal the paperwork. She took a quick glance… then dropped it on the table unceremoniously and stared at Debbin like he'd lost his mind. “Why did you put this on dead tree, dumbass? I can't read Nevok. What am I even looking at?”

  “Media blackout order.” Debbin smiled. “Gonna have Benwen run it over to Security, maybe let him shadow Ol’ Uncle Tippen for a bit and see how that’s done.”

  “Tippen…” Sifal repeated blearily. “That's your Security Director? Garruga's boss?”

  Debbin nodded. “That he is! Old military veteran, survived a couple of raids from you guys. And a distant relation of mine.” The older Nevok leaned over towards me conspiratorially. “Never put a stranger in charge of security, kiddo. That’s the kind of business that stays in the family.”

  Sifal snorted. “Maybe someone in my family ought to tag along, then. Probably good to know how Federation media blackouts work.”

  “I'll do it, ma’am!” Zillis volunteered immediately.

  Sifal nodded. “Sounds good. Debrief me later. And for gods’ sakes, keep an eye out if there are any holes in their process. These people have the weirdest blind spots, I swear…” She picked the paperwork back up and shook it at Debbin in annoyance. “And it's the fucking interstellar age, Debbin. Digitize this shit. Half your employees can't read Nevok, and even the ones who can shouldn't have to play courier like it's Ye Olden Pre-Telegraph Times.” She rubbed her eyes and looked back at her terminal. “At this rate, I'm gonna juice your first quarter numbers just from fixing all your stupid fucking operational inefficiencies…”

  Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

  “Thrilled to hear it,” said Debbin. He took the papers back and walked out the door with Zillis and I. He shut it, and turned to address us. “Alright, Benwen, run these over to security, and tell Tippen to show you two the ropes.” He glanced over at Zillis, specifically. “You may have to talk him down a bit about Zillis, though. Tippen’s a bit inflexible about Arxur. Fought them for years. Old habits die hard.”

  I nodded, trying to look confident so that Zillis wouldn't look nervous. “You can count on me, sir!”

  “Grand. Oh, and umm…” Debbin paused for a moment, considering. “Say, Zillis, maybe this is a bit forward, but… if you're not busy tonight, would you care to catch a movie with me?”

  Zillis's eyes widened, but she shook her head. “Already have plans. Seeing a movie with Benwen.”

  Debbin’s eyes went wide in return. He turned to me with an inscrutable yet proud look on his face. “My apologies, son. I was unfamiliar with your game.”

  “Game?” I repeated, tilting my head in confusion.

  The door reopened. Laza, Sifal's less talkative second, popped her head out. “If that's an open invitation, I'd actually be interested,” she said to Debbin. “That Uplift woman is guarding Sifal tonight, so my evening’s clear. I'm trying to sort out what Federation media might play well with an Arxur audience. Could use a local guide.”

  Debbin froze for a moment in baffled confusion, before a huge grin blossomed on his face. “And I am nothing if not a media connoisseur!” he said giddily. “Happy to have you. My quarters, this evening?”

  Laza nodded curtly. “See you then.” The door shut again without further elaboration.

  “The game is afoot,” said Debbin, as he turned back towards his office with an odd smirk.

  Zillis and I watched him go. “Your boss is confusing,” she said, once he was out of earshot.

  Learning under the wing of a planetary executive was a huge opportunity, but for someone like me, on my first full day out of the PD facility since I was a kit… It was like skipping ahead straight to Advanced Being a Proper Nevok, without ever taking the introductory classes. Debbin knew a lot more than I did, but that also meant I was never entirely sure what he was talking about sometimes. My only other point of reference for older authority figures was the doctors from the PD facility. Debbin was very peculiar compared to them.

  “And complicated,” I said, in summation. Zillis and I chuckled together, and then set off for Security, which was on a different floor. Quick elevator ride, couple winding hallways, and therein lay another door.

  I knocked.

  “Enter,” came a gruff voice from inside. I opened the door slowly. The office didn’t have all its lights on, but there was a burly Nevok seated at a desktop terminal, illuminated by the light of the screen. Tippen, I presumed, looked exhausted and slightly ill, like he’d spent part of the night throwing up instead of sleeping. There were empty paper cups scattered all around his work area, and a couple empty cans of something that only grown-ups were allowed to drink.

  Wait, I am a grown-up! I remembered abruptly. I can drink things, too! And uhh… drive a car? But not at the same time! The doctors were very clear about that.

  Nevertheless, the older Nevok man was out of uniform, just wearing a light vest, similar to but simpler than Debbin’s. I probably needed to get a vest of my own soon. Without his body armor on, though, a trio of long thin scars on Tippen’s chest were visible. They looked just like the scars on Sifal’s forearms, which meant they were from…

  “Arxur,” I said, as I pieced it together.

  Tippen turned his head slightly towards me with a start and froze. “Damn right it is,” he said, reaching for his sidearm.

  “Wait, no, don’t--!” I shouted. He pointed his gun a foot or so above my head at Zillis, who grabbed me and dove for cover behind the doorframe. She had her rifle readied, but was hesitating to fire. “Put your gun away, sir!” I called out to the other Nevok. “She’s with me!”

  “That tells me nothing!” he called back. “Who the fuck are you?”

  “I’m Benwen!” I said. “Debbin’s new intern?”

  “The kit from the mines?” he scoffed.

  “I’m… Debbin sent me!” I tried. “You’re not allowed to shoot the Arxur!”

  Tippen snorted. “Don’t care what that prick says. I’m always allowed to shoot an Arxur.”

  “You were waving the gun at me, too!” I shouted. “You’re not allowed to shoot interns, either!”

  Tippen laughed. “Oh, now that’s definitely not true.”

  I could feel Zillis behind me tensing up, but her touch felt… steadying. I took a deep breath and tried to remember what Miss Sifal had taught me about being assertive. I took a stab in the dark why Tippen was acting so erratic. “Sir, you are the head of security for this entire planet, and you are drunk on the job!” I shouted. “Now put your gun down, and get your shit together before Debbin and the Arxur commander hear about this!”

  There was a long, drawn-out silence. Then some clicking noises. And then the pieces of a disassembled handgun slid out across the floor, coming to rest against the doorframe.

  Zillis sighed with relief, and put her rifle back over her shoulder. Me, I felt giddy. I couldn’t believe that had worked! And I got to use a curse word for the first time, too!

  I took another deep breath and got up, gingerly stepping over the gun for now as I headed into the office. “Okay. I’m Benwen, this is Zillis, and these are papers ordering a planetwide media blackout vis a vis the Arxur.” I swept a bunch of the man’s empty cans and cups into a nearby trash bin to clear some space for the paperwork. “I need you to show us how that’s done while I tidy up in here a bit. And again, so there’s no ambiguity: you’re Security Director Tippen, right?”

  The older Nevok rubbed his face tiredly. “Aye. That’s me. And you’re… that kit with the PD.” Tippen groaned. “Predator and Predator Diseased. Glorious. Great. Why not. Fuck. And now a media blackout? Does Debbin not realize how much work that takes? Gah! I’m overworked and understaffed already. Can’t keep fuckin’ doin’ this. Hang on.” He pushed a few buttons on his desktop terminal, and Zillis awkwardly shuffled off to the side where she could hopefully split the difference between eyeing up the screen without being in frame of any video calls. A long-faced ungulate with striped fur appeared on screen next to an IV drip. “Garruga, it’s Tippen. How ya feelin’?”

  “Reeling,” she said, glancing shiftily to the side, off-camera. “Lucid but bedridden. Why, what’s the news?”

  “Nothing urgent,” said Tippen. “Just too much work to do with all these Arxur milling about, acting like they’re people now. I’ve got one in the fuckin’ room with me right now, hiding off to the side like she’s shy.”

  Garruga glanced over her shoulder, out of frame. “Two here,” she said, tilting the camera. One was in bed, in medical restraints, drinking a thermos of soup with a straw, and the other was poking around the supply stores as a Nevok doctor explained what each of the items was for. There was a brain scan sensor attachment on the counter next to them, like they used in PD facilities to check for predatory tendencies. It still had the little electrode lead stickers on it, like it’d been used recently.

  Tippen shook his head. “Madness. Look, Garruga, I know you’ve gotta recover, but I’m swamped. Any chance I can get you back up to some light desk work soon?”

  “Probably,” said Garruga, still glancing out of frame awkwardly.

  Tippen’s eyes narrowed. “Okay, what’s with the shiftiness? This isn’t like you. What aren’t you telling me?”

  The holopad tumbled as it was snatched up by a much smaller creature. A blur of ruddy fur covered the screen for a moment before it resolved into the face of Doctor Tika, absolutely beaming. “One of the Arxur just passed an empathy test! They’re people! They’ve always been people! I was right!”

  Tippen’s face hit the desk in exhaustion. Zillis, no longer out of frame behind him, gave a tiny nervous wave to Tika.