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The Beginning of a New Race

Chapter Nine

Wow, I must be a really big wimp. I don't even know if those two had even touched me. Maybe by reflex I had just self-destructed. Maybe even exploded. Maybe Mr. Red was somewhere right now going insane because he couldn't get rid of the image of my guts flying into his face.

Coolio.

So, as I saw it, that idea would probably be the only form of pleasure I would be getting in a while. It wasn't like things were ever going to get any better for me in this village, however much I needed for things to get better. And by better, I mean drastically better.

For starters, I could do with an actual house, like the ones I saw in the picture books I used to read. Though they were for little children, my age never stopped me from admiring what my life could have been if Earth was still around. If, of course, those silly humans hadn't screwed up the eco-system and had let the trees go extinct.

Could I call them silly humans? I mean, I wasn't really human anymore, was I?

Anyway, everything seemed to be so simple in those books. Nothing to sketchy ever happened to those people. One of the biggest problems that had ever occurred in one of the picture books was a kid losing their shoe or something along those lines.

But nooo, I had to worry about the extinction of my race and blah blah blah this and wah wah wah that. What a chore.

Not to mention I had kinda failed that objective. As far as I knew, everyone I had known had either been turned into a nutcase like me, or had most likely starved to death without the supplies that I was supposed to bring back.

Nothing like feeling like a pile of steaming crap, is there?

Well, for seconds, I could totally go for some really good food. Or just real food, in fact. Something that didn't threaten to either start moving at any moment or possibly poison me, turning my insides to mush. I mean, come on guys, you may be an alien species and all, but the least you could do is build a factory and start producing some actual food. Like, maybe some Jell-O snacks or something.

And with that my stomach went into a fit of growling which then made my insides tingle, thus somewhat convincing me that I had in fact not exploded on the Pure One. Sadly.

But, I currently had bigger and better things to worry about. Yay!

Like how my head felt like it was being ripped apart by a crazy scientist, but very slowly and with a lot of low-grade drugs numbing the operation.

Or like the fact that my knowledge of where I was at the time was equivalent to my knowledge of how to make a Jell-O factory given the very limited amount of resources on the planet.

My eyelids were clamped shut, as if someone were standing over me holding them closed and most likely silently laughing at my inability to pry them open. My new and improved fox nose did me no good either, being that I had yet to learn how to identify people and items by their smell alone. Sadly, I had missed the power point presentation titled Getting Used to Your New Body!, so I had no clue how to even begin to hone in on smelly things.

Even though with this nose, everything was smelly.

My ears weren't entirely useless, however, picking up on the crackling of a fire nearby. But, when I thought about it, that information was entirely useless.

The rest of my body felt as if it had gone to sleep, yet my mind hadn't. I couldn't move any part of my body. No toes that I could wiggle, no fingers I could maneuver, and no bulging upper arm muscles I could flex.

Well, maybe I couldn't do that last bit before, either. That information happened skipped my mind.

With my head throbbing for what seemed like the thousandth time since landing on this god forsaken planet and my eyes refusing to open, I was stuck wondering if I would be willing to let my guts fly out to see Mr. Red flipping out.

A resounding yes from me.

After being completely motionless for the better part of an hour, or so I thought, I started to make up songs and hum them as loud as possible to entertain myself. My mind was still very fuzzy from the pain and most of my thoughts came and went without my recognition of them. I would try to concentrate on my songs, but I would catch myself thinking of something entirely different. One time I even caught myself admiring the finer parts of some black and blue female Homini from a memory, however as soon as I had grasped the idea it slipped away from my train of thought.

I didn't exactly know what I was waiting for at that moment, but I knew something would happen sooner or later. Whether that something would be closer to someone helping me out and giving me some Jell-O, or closer to someone ending my suffering by decapitation, I didn't really care. I couldn't exactly do anything to change the situation. And I definitely wouldn't exactly be really angry if I no longer had to deal with being abused day in and day out by Homini snobs.

And really terrifying Homini snobs at that.

I was right in the middle of humming a dramatic solo of a musical piece I had deemed "Homini Blues" when I was bombarded with a harsh growl as someone decided to make their presence known.

"One would think that after going through what you have, your first action after arriving here surely wouldn't be making that terrible noise with your vocal cords, correct?"

The man on the other end of the voice got me to shut up very quickly, though I told myself that his mind was not refined enough for my musical excellence.

"Ah, there we are. The less you make noise, the better my old ears feel, and the better my old ears feel, the better you will fare around here." He voice had a gravelly quality to it, yet somehow I was calmed by the noise. He sounded like a very nice old man, one that wore a top hat for no reason on Thursdays.

I mustered all the strength I had left in me and prepared to confront the unknown being with a strong, even voice.

"W-who are you? Are... are you the guy?" Naturally, my voice came out cracked and hushed.

"Hmm? What 'guy' do you speak of?" He asked.

"You know, the guy. Head Honcho of the universe, yeah? Being that I'm dead... or at least I think I am, and I'm now talking to you?" It made perfect sense to me.

"Boy, you have yet to shed your shell here on this planet and rise into the heavens. Or at least, not all of it." He grumbled slowly.

At this point I cursed very vigorously in my head, knowing that my dream of exploding and permanently scarring Mr. Red would have to wait for another day to be fulfilled.

"So, to answer my question, you are not, in fact, the guy?"

"No, to answer your question, I am not, in fact, 'the guy'." The sound of shuffling came from a few steps to my right. "I am merely one of the many that shall help guide you on your journey to meet him."

"Wow... that's deep..." I whispered.

"Not very, but see it as you wish." He said with a very lighthearted tone, as if he had guessed I would have said it.

"Okay, so if I'm not dead, then who are you? Some kind of really wise hobo? And an even better question is, do you have any Jell-O?"

After a small bit of huffing, which I chose to interpret as chuckling, he said, "No, I am not a really wise hobo. You should know who I am Ozzy."

At first I was slightly disappointed, because who wouldn't want to talk to a really wise hobo every once in a while? Plus, he had totally ignored my Jell-O question. And, after that major disappointment, I was forced to actually think to find out who I was talking to.

Bummer.

Not only was my head throbbing as if it were being repeatedly hit with a very large stick, but thinking in general was not my strong suit. Yeah, I was never the brightest tool in the shed. Oh well.

I had had very bad memory ever since I was a kid. And not it wasn't just an every once in a while kind of thing, either. I could forget what I was doing in less than three minutes of starting anything, and did almost every time. Though it had gotten much better through the years, my memory was still really bad compared to anyone else's. This most likely resulted from the time I smashed my head into a door while trying to escape from being tagged during a game of, you guessed it, tag.

Physical activity is also not my strong suit.

My parents had always scolded me about my lack of remembering things, but in the end they knew that nothing could be done to fix the problem. It wasn't like the ship had been packed with meds that could boost my memory, or some kind of MRI scanner conveniently sitting in the corner waiting to be used. They just accepted me for what and who I was, and got on with life.

They never dwelled over anything for too long. They were the best people in the world, or at least for me they were.

My mind started to throb even more intensely after the memory of my parents. It was like reliving the first time I had realized I would never be able to see them, all over again. The pain and sadness more or less blocked out everything that was going on outside of the confines of my body. I wanted to give up on everything.

And no, that does not mean I'm a wimp. Shut up and listen to the heartfelt story, instead of calling me names for once.

The first time it had happened, I had stopped functioning completely and simply cried until I could no longer cry. That's how I had spent my second night in the village as a Homini. Granted, I couldn't sleep even without the realization that I would never be able to be with my family again, but it surely didn't help.

But right now, I didn't have time to break down.

Save it for later, I told myself. Cry in the peace and quiet of your tiny little hut with no door attached so the entire world can see.

So, after a while of prying my mind apart for any tidbits of information, I finally stumbled upon the answer.

"You're the leader, aren't you?" I said, more to myself than to him.

"Yes. But I prefer to go by Zircon."