Fandom: Originals
Rating: G
Summary: A curious young squirrel gets more than she bargained for when she decides to spy on a human party.
Warnings: none that I can think of
Claimer: This is my own original idea with my own characters. Don't steal! ^-^
Tani’s note: Hey, sup? What's this? An update? A new story? *gasps* Oh my God! ^-^ Anyway, I wrote this for the benefit of an annual fiction contest at my school, and gained second place for it. I didn't honestly think it was that good, but obviously the judges did. Anyway, please enjoy my story, and feel free to send me feedback!
Humans have been talking for thousands of years. Over this time, hundreds of languages have developed. One of the most complex, not to mention confusing, is English. Even those of us who speak it every day often have trouble with it. How much more frustrating must it be for people who learn it as a second language? Those of us who don’t know first hand can only guess. This is the story of someone like that, though not a human someone. This is the story of a young squirrel and her first experiences in the human world.
Risu was a curious little squirrel, and she had never learned to control herself, so it came as no surprise to anyone that when there was a gathering of humans she of course had to investigate. That led to the telling of this story, "Word Games," so named for her confusion at human speech. So come one, come all, and hear the amazing story of the Squirrel Who Was Befuddled!
"You can’t honestly mean to go Risu!" objected Risu’s cousin Kinezumi, fondly called ‘Zumi by all her friends.
Risu shook her head ruefully. "Of course I mean to go ‘Zumi," she replied. "I don’t see how the rest of you can stand to pass up an opportunity like this!"
"The rest of us have a bit more common sense than you," said Kinezumi rather sharply.
Risu grimaced. "The rest of you are just boring! Don’t you want to get out and experience the world around you?"
"We do experience the world around us. The natural world. Humans aren’t natural, they’re dangerous. You’ll learn when you find one of those guns shooting speeding bullets at you simply because you exist."
Risu merely laughed. "You worry too much. I’ll be fine." Then with a flick of her tail she set off, heading for the place where her sharp ears could already hear what the humans called ‘music’ playing.
Humans had always been an area of fascination for Risu. Ever since she’d been young she’d loved hearing stories of the strange creatures with their odd ways, and now she was going to actually see them! She was so excited! She certainly couldn’t pass up this chance just because ‘Zumi was paranoid. After all, it wasn’t like humans came to their forest in such large quantities every day. This might be the only time something like this happened in her entire life.
So she traveled through the trees with the lightness of a cotton spore in the wind, and before she knew it she had reached her destination.
She paused at the final tree before the clearing where the humans were gathered. Contrary to popular belief, she wasn’t reckless, and she certainly wasn’t willing to risk her life just to see some humans. However, she firmly believed that some risks had to be taken or life wasn’t worth living. That led to where she was now, pondering how close she could come to the humans and still be relatively safe. She noted with interest that the tables were draped with long white cloths that fell to the ground. ‘Perfect!’ she thought triumphantly. She carefully checked to make sure that the coast was clear, and then she skipped down the tree, paused again to look for danger, and then skittered underneath one of those lovely cloths. It was so simple! It was almost as if they had been planning on her coming here.
The party wasn’t yet in full swing, but there was still plenty to occupy herself with. Several groups of humans had gathered nearby and were having animated conversations.
Risu could of course understand them. Human language was notoriously simple, and the poor humans were horribly oblivious to their own shortcomings. They actually thought that they were the dominant species on the planet. Of course, if they ever actually managed to make a breakthrough in communicating with the dolphins they might hear a different story entirely. . .
That wasn’t what was important at that moment however. What was important was learning more about these humans, and maybe even proving that they weren’t all as dangerously cruel as everyone thought, just ignorant and a little thick in the head. Maybe a few nuts short of a meal as well, but that was beside the point.
Wandering toward the closest group of humans, she settled down to listen to their conversation. A male was talking in this one. He was saying, "So I said, ‘Baby, you know I’m all for you. I’m just searching for a clue, a sign, anything. . .’"
He continued, but Risu wasn’t paying any attention. She had stopped listening when he said he was ‘searching for a clue,’ a strange image taking over her mind. Logically, she knew the human definition of a clue. But that phrase, it had just inspired the oddest image in her. She could see a jungle of phrases, with a brave human expedition force setting forth into it. They were beating through the jungle, searching for the elusive clue-creature. . .
She shook her head impatiently, and tuned back into the conversation. She knew she was being ridiculous, but some of the odd things humans said were just captivating.
The topic had changed in the conversation, and now a female was speaking. "My boss refuses to give me an extension, so it looks like I’m going to spend all weekend digging for ideas. What a bummer!"
‘Digging for ideas?” thought Risu. ‘Are they deliberately trying to torture me?’ Involuntarily, her mind went back to the jungle expedition party, only this time they had reached the site of some ancient ruins and were now digging for an artifact called an idea. Risu let the picture play out for a moment, then she shook her head. ‘Maybe I’d best try a different group of humans,’ she thought to herself.
Suiting action to her thoughts, she moved on to a different group. Peeking out from under the cloth, Risu saw that this one was composed primarily of females, so hopefully she’d feel more at ease among others of the same gender, even if they were of a different species.
A human with blonde hair and a lot of what Risu knew they called make-up was speaking at the moment. She was saying, "This is going to be so much fun! We are going to rock the house!"
Risu blanked out at that, an image of a house being rocked by a bunch of humans flashing through her mind, but thankfully it was only temporary. She was back to herself in time to hear one of the other women say, "Jessica, there is no house to rock."
The blonde woman grimaced. "It’s just a figure of speech, Ria honey," she replied.
Risu blinked as a dark, amorphous figure appeared in her mind, labeled with the word "SPEECH" in capital letters. She blinked again as her vision returned to normal.
"Now look at that!" continued the blonde woman called Jessica. "You’ve made my train of thought derail!"
This proved too much for Risu to bear. She skipped away from the conversing humans with a ghost train following her all the way.
The next group she found was mostly males. She thought perhaps she’d be safe as males were notoriously dumber than females, at least among squirrels. They were talking about the women.
"She sure seems to be light-hearted enough," said a dark-haired man bitterly. Hearts floated into the air before Risu’s eyes as he continued with, "I guess she wasn’t nearly as broke up about the entire thing as she claimed."
Risu let her tail flick up over her eyes in a horrified gesture as a woman’s image broke up before her eyes.
"Aw, cheer up man," said another of the men. "So what if she’s heartless and cruel? We’re here to have a good time!"
Risu passively endured the image of a woman with no heart flashing before her.
"Come on, I’ll bet I can finish one of these sandwiches before you!" the second man challenged. The first man let himself be persuaded to the contest, and Risu watched with wide eyes as they each began to shovel the food into their respective mouths.
The first man won, saying triumphantly, "Man, I am good!"
The second man snorted, saying, "Oh, definitely. Of course you hear the sarcasm simply dripping from my voice don’t you?"
The other man just laughed and they continued with good-natured banter. Risu wasn’t paying any attention though. The vision of a syrupy substance dripping from the ambiguous figure of the voice proved to be simply too much for her.
With a banshee-like scream she flew from under the table, scaring all the humans within a ten foot radius to within an inch of their lives. Then before any of them could react she was in the trees heading for home.
She reached home panting with exertion, sweat-covered, and terrified. Kinezumi met her at the entranceway to her tree, a knowing look on her face. "I told you and told you, but you were simply too good to listen to me, now weren’t you? You just had to go spy on the humans! Well I certainly hope you’ve learned your lesson now," she said smugly.
Risu scowled at her unhappily. "Shut up," she replied grumpily. "Just shut up."
The End