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Kt’chtst tapped zir delicate, jointed fingers against the data-pad in a steady rhythm, recording the results of the latest experiment, with a deep feeling of satisfaction thrumming through zir long, segmented body. Ze contemplated the future with warm pleasure. Ze and zir senior partner would finish out the year studying the unique crystalbush of Amara VI, by which time ze would be old enough to experience zir secondary adult molt. Living in close quarters with said partner—an admittedly handsome male—had made zir decide that ze was indeed best suited by choosing to molt female, so ze would select the klckt-jelly. With the prestige of such a dangerous and yet valuable project behind zir, ze would no doubt be able to find a fine mate, lay a beautiful clutch, and also continue zir career in a satisfying and lucrative fashion.
Everything was going wonderfully.
Ze had been dubious about spending a full year on Amara, especially in the mountainous region where the bizarre plant-like lifeform ze was studying grew. Summer had been bearable, at least during daylight, but now it was winter, and the wind was howling like a rr’tck outside their shelter.
The howling wind gusted higher, and was joined by a deep, cracking, rumbling sound that Kt’chtst had never heard before. Beside zir Thr’ktck twisted both eyes away from his screen and peered around the shelter. “Do you hear that?” he clicked.
“I do, what…?” Kt’chtst didn’t have time to finish zir thought before the rumble turned into a mighty crash that shook the entire shelter. Instantly the lights went out, plunging the two Ctch’ scientists into darkness. The shelter had a single multi-layered window, and there was moonlight outside—two of the planet’s moons were up—so after a few moments Kt’chtst’s eyes began adjusting to the dark, but zir heart sank as ze realized that the emergency lights had not come on.
Kt’chtst heard Thr’ktck swear, which was a shock, ze had never heard him curse before. And so foully too!
“Sir? What is it?”
“The power is out. I believe a tree has fallen on us. We are lucky the shelter wasn’t breached.”
Kt’chtst shuddered at the thought of the freezing air outside being let into their shelter. They’d be dead within millicycles if that happened.
“Without power, though, the shelter is not being heated. The backup lights have not come on, the tree must have crushed the battery banks as well. And we had a full expedition day, the enviro-suits have only just begun recharging.” Thr’ktck gestured to where the complicated devices were racked against the wall, barely visible in the dimness. “They have no warmth for us, and we cannot wear them out to attempt repairs.” His voice was trembling as he said, “There is a very high chance that we are dead.”
Kt’chtst felt zir legs curling inward in an involuntary fear response, and Thr’ktck reached out to pat zir with one large forward manipulator limb. “There is some hope. The communicator has its own batteries, and there is the human ski resort… It is only that they are many hundred rkkt away, and in this weather I am uncertain if they can send a rescue vehicle. I will contact them now.” He scurried over to the communicator unit and activated it.
Kt’chtst listened to the conversation as zir senior partner spoke to the distant ski resort. It turned out that while they had short-range craft designed for rough weather rescues, they had no long-range craft at all, and the research station was well beyond the range of their rescue vehicles. They were willing to fly as far as they could and attempt a rescue by something called “snowmobile” from there, but it would take them nearly a full day, and Kt’chtst knew that there was no way ze and Thr’ktck would survive the cold for that long.
Despair crept over zir, and it felt zir legs curling again, folding inward in trembling fear. They were doomed.
“Hey, I couldn’t help but overhear,” broke in another voice, just as human as the resort operator’s, but lower in pitch. “If you guys are where my map shows you, my partner and I are only about four clicks away. It might take us some time to get there in these conditions, but I’m pretty sure we could make it. Think you guys can hold out an hour?”
“’!” Kt’chtst clamped zir mandibles down after the involuntary exclamation of relief.
“We will be very cold, possibly to the point of being unresponsive, by then,” said Thr’ktck, his voice surprisingly calm. “But we should survive.”
“We’ll hurry then. Signing off.”
Kt’chtst found zirself tapping zir legs in nervous agitation as Thr’ktck set down the communication unit. He didn’t turn it off, but instead scurried over to his data pad. “Let us find everything that produces any heat, and create what warmth we can while we wait.”
That task kept the pair occupied for a few millicycles. They gathered every battery-containing device in the shelter and made a heap of them at the center of the room. The two Ctch’ themselves were entirely cold-blooded, they radiated no heat for the walls to hold in. Nor did their exertions building a stack of electronics warm them. The various devices were far too efficiently designed to truly warm against the cold that was already encroaching, despite the shelter’s insulated walls. Still, the pair huddled up on the pile, pressing close to datapads and independent measuring units, taking what warmth they could from them.
Then there was nothing to do but wait.
The wind continued to howl outside the shelter. The temperature continued to drop within. Condensation began forming on the walls as they grew cold enough to pull water out of the relatively humid air. Other surfaces, glass and metal and anything else conductive, sprouted frosted layers of dew, the effect spreading from the walls to the center of the room where the two scientists huddled together. In one corner, near where the tree fell, the dew began to freeze. The frost patterns that slowly crept out from what must be a tiny fracture letting in a draft were beautiful, but it was a deadly beauty.
Kt’chtst could feel the chill creeping into every corner of zir body. The hint of warmth from the devices ze was snuggled up against did little to slow the leeching of heat. Ze found zirself curling up instinctively, making zirself smaller, and put the warmest device at the core of zir curl, then stopped fighting the urge. Beside zir Thr’ktck did the same, forming a spiral around the communication unit.
The passage of time began to be strange. Kt’chtst blinked, and yet in that instant a puddle formed where a light fixture had only moments ago begun dripping on the floor. The drops of water, now that ze looked at them, fell too fast, as if gravity was heavier. Ze felt heavier, more sluggish than ze had ever felt before. Ze could hardly move, and the pitch of the wind outside seemed higher, more frantic, but ze knew that this was not so, but that ze zirself was growing slower, zir processes stunted by the cold. If zir body dropped below freezing those processes would stop, and without medical care not available on this mostly-human planet, they would never start again.
If ze reached that point, before rescue came, would the humans know to keep zir and Thr’ktck frozen until medics of their own kind could reach them? Or would the well-meaning mammals warm them and kill them?
Would Kt’chtst die here, never having eaten the klckt-jelly and known what it was like to be a fully developed adult?
The Ctch’ researcher was still conscious, however, when there came a thudding against the shelter door. It was repeated several times before it stopped. After a brief pause, Kt’chtst heard a squeal of protesting metal. The humans must have arrived, and were prying the unpowered outer door open. There was another pause, then the inner door pushed open and something came through the airlock-like entryway and into the shelter. Cold came in with it, and Kt’chtst would have shrunk away from it if ze could have, but ze was too far gone to have such responses remaining. All ze managed was to swivel both eye-stalks towards the newcomer.
The human was on all fours, having been forced to crawl to fit through the Ctch’-scale doorway. It was bundled up in thick layers, but it immediately pushed back a hood and pulled a scarf down, revealing a shaggy thatch of hair both atop its head and covering most of its face. Kt’chtst had a vague, distracted thought that this made the human look like a shaggy animal—ze had watched a documentary on Earth that had showed many sorts of mammals, and ze recalled one being heavy and shaggy. It had been called a burr or something like that? And the hair meant the human was male, did it not?
Kt’chtst realized that zir mind was not in the best condition just now, but relief was flooding zir slowed system, and zir thoughts, though muddled, were far less dark than they’d been mere moments before, when ze had been contemplating zir own death.
A second human crawled in behind the first, the two filling a significant portion of the station’s space. The second shut the door, but it was still bitingly cold, and Kt’chtst felt a grain of worry. Surely ze would not freeze to death here in front of these mammals? They were warm themselves, even if they’d also brought cold in with them.
The second unhooded, and was only marginally less shaggy than the first, with facial hair trimmed shorter, but still covering most of its—his?—features, though his eyes were bright as he looked around, his gaze almost immediately falling on the curled up pair of Ctch’.
“Oh geez. Are we too late?”
“No,” said the other, “they both turned their eyes when I came in. But we should hurry and get them warmed.” He straightened as best he could, given he was taller than the shelter, and took a step, which single long stride was enough to put him right beside where Kt’chtst and Thr’ktck lay curled. His breath steamed in the chill, ample evidence of the now-vital difference between Humanity and the Ctch’. He unzipped his coat, seeming to not mind baring the thinner garment beneath it to the chill. Then he undid the top few buttons of that as well, revealing more hair—shorter than his beard but similar in texture—beneath it.
His companion, however, stood with coat still zipped, drawing in deep breaths. “Okay. Right. We talked about it. Just… Goddamn.”
The first human chuckled. “I know. At least they aren’t spiders. Now come on.” He reached out and gathered up the pill-like spiral of Thr’ktck, the senior scientist looking absurdly small next to the huge, shaggy, mammalian human. The man tucked Thr’ktck into his shirt, then did up buttons and coat again, the scientist barely even making a visible bulge through the latter’s thick padding.
“Right. Right. Okay.” The second human undid his coat and shirt as well, careless of the cold. Then he took another breath, and the next thing Kt’chtst knew the human had strode forward and scooped zir up. The human’s hands were wonderfully warm, and without any further hesitation the human pushed Kt’chtst into a blissful sea of further warmth. Ze was hardly aware of the human’s shudder, only of the way the cold immediately began to drain away.
In only moments ze was warm enough to move again, and without the least hesitation ze did so, uncurling and wrapping zir segmented length around the warm body it was tucked against.
“Oh god!” said the human, giving a lurch. There was a bang, and a laugh from the other man. Kt’chtst was dimly aware that the human carrying zir had jumped and hit his head on the shelter’s ceiling, but Kt’chtst couldn’t bring zirself to care, ze was too busy clinging to the human’s waist with every one of zir eighteen legs while pressing zir entire underside against that wonderful warmth.
“Eeeeeugh.” The high-pitched sound coming from the human apparently wasn’t translatable, but Kt’chtst still couldn’t bring zirself to care, given the radiant warmth now soaking into zir chitin.
“Come on, let’s get moving. The sooner we’re back in camp, the sooner you can ditch your too-leggy passenger.”
“It’s not the number of legs that’s the problem,” said the human carrying Kt’chtst, giving another shudder. “But yeah, let’s go.”
Kt’chtst couldn’t see, but ze could feel as the human bent and crawled back out of the shelter. Ze could hear as the howl of the wind grew stronger. Ze could feel a trickle of it, even through the insulating fabric of the coat. The blazing warmth of the body against zir underside was stronger, though. It was astonishing how much heat the human put out. Kt’chtst still felt chilled and sluggish, but ze was certain that ze would soon be back to normal.
The human moved fast, too. Kt’chtst couldn’t see anything, but ze still had a good sense of motion, and the human was moving at an absurd speed for something with only two legs.
There was a lot of jostling and jolting about as he navigated the crystalbush forest. Fortunately the human’s shirt and coat kept Kt’chtst pressed to his skin with no need for zir to actively cling on, given how weak ze still was. With every passing millicycle, though, ze grew warmer and felt better.
When ze tested the responsiveness of zir limbs, however, the human cursed and jumped again. So ze spent the remainder of the journey attempting to hold as still as possible, not wishing to overly upset zir benefactor.
The journey back seemed to take longer than the waiting had, but then Kt’chtst wasn’t near-catatonic and losing time now. Ze didn’t mind. Though ze wasn’t exactly comfortable, ze was warm and alive and very glad of both.
Kt’chtst couldn’t see anything, but ze could feel quite a lot of irregular motion. The terrain was obviously rough, which made sense. There were no roads here. Humanity had settlements on Amara VI, mostly clustered around the massive luxury ski resort on the Grand Mountains, but none anywhere near the crystalbush forest. Ze had no clue whatsoever why a pair of humans would be out here. Perhaps they were scientists as well? The crystalbush was nearly unique, the only other silicon-based crystalline lifeforms on the planet were tiny, barely above the microscopic. So these mountains were the only place where such bizarre biochemistry could be studied on a macro scale.
Ze let zir mind wander as the human walked on, but eventually the man carrying Kt’chtst halted, and there was a peculiar sound, followed by the human taking a few further steps and then almost instantly beginning to shed his coat.
“Okay, end of the line,” said the other man, and Kt’chtst suddenly was near-blinded by bright light, and surrounded by warm air, as the human carrying zir undid his shirt.
“Can you get off, please?” The man’s voice was strained, and Kt’chtst immediately climbed down his legs, the rough indigo fabric of his leg-coverings giving easy traction. The man made another one of those untranslatable sounds and shuddered.
“Thank you,” said Kt’chtst sincerely, looking up at the human, who towered over zir.
“Eh, you’re welcome. Didn’t do anything any decent sentient wouldn’t do if he could, you know?” said the human, moving his shoulders up and down. “I’m Steve, by the way, this other guy here, who doesn’t have an insect phobia, is my husband Robert.” He jerked a digit in the direction of the second human, whose indigo-clad legs Thr’ktck was currently descending.
“I am Kt’chtst, and Thr’ktck is my superior,” said Kt’chtst, hoping that ze wasn’t making any sort of social error. Ze had never dealt directly with humans before.
“Good to meet you,” said Steve, and he showed his teeth, which seemed odd, but Kt’chtst had a vague recollection of reading something about humans having unusual social cues. Nothing else about him seemed aggressive, so presumably the teeth were some form of greeting gesture and not a threat.
Curious, Kt’chtst swiveled zir eyes and took in zir surroundings. Ze was standing on a fabric floor that seemed to be laid over the bare ground. The floor was cold, but the air all around was so warm that ze hardly noticed. A large, boxy object standing on a short platform radiated a heat ze could feel on zir carapace. The other human, Robert, went over to it and opened a small door on its front, revealing that there was a fire inside, much to Kt’chtst’s surprise. The human took a chunk of wood—ordinary tree wood, not crystalbush wood—and added it to the fire with his bare hands, then closed the door again.
“Here, come have a seat,” said Robert, patting a large cot that sat against one wall of the flimsy fabric shelter. Kt’chtst found herself hyper aware of that flimsiness, and of the chill right at ground level. If the bizarrely archaic fire device—would one call that a stove?—ever stopped burning, the place would be freezing in minutes. But then the warm-blooded humans could survive that, couldn’t they? They would only need to keep moving, and have adequate food stores for a long-term situation. The thought was bizarre, and ze couldn’t help but be unnerved by the thought of living like that, just cavalierly going out in sub-freezing air. Yet of course if they humans hadn’t done just that, ze would probably be dead by now.
Happy enough to escape the cold beneath the equally flimsy floor, Kt’chtst scrambled up onto the cot, and Thr’ktck wasn’t far behind her. The heat was absolutely decadent, and ze stretched out on the soft, padded fabric covering the cot.
Robert sat on the cot too, giving the Ctch’ pair a little room, but it was big enough for all of them to sit.
Steve sat down next to Robert, and laced his digits through the other human’s, in what must be a gesture of closeness or affection. Kt’chtst belatedly recalled Steve’s use of “husband” which meant something like mating partner. The humans both seemed to be male, which made their being mates yet another oddity, and ze almost wanted to ask about that. Ctch’ only mated male to female, but then humans didn’t get to select their adult sexes, did they? If ze had been born to be male, would ze have still found Thr’ktck handsome? With no way to select the klckt-jelly and molt female, would ze decide to mate with a male anyway? It was a very peculiar thought. Ze had heard of rare Ctch’ who selected no jelly at all, and continued to molt as juveniles, which had the benefit of a few extra kilocycles of life for most, so there was an appeal, but one missed out on vast swathes of adult life experience, so it was rare all the same. Ze had never heard of a Ctch’ who mated with the same sex, though.
“I note that you appear to have no scientific equipment,” said Thr’ktck as he too stretched out in the warmth. “May I ask the purpose of your timely expedition?”
“Just camping,” said Robert with another shoulder movement.
“Camping?” Thr’ktck made a querying gesture with one frontwards leg.
“Yeah, just spending some time out in nature, away from it all.”
Thr’ktck’s surprise was obvious, and Kt’chtst felt surprised too. The humans were here, hundreds and hundreds of rkkt from their settlement, in the middle of winter, simply for recreation? Surely that couldn’t be right.
Thr’ktck, echoing zir thoughts, said, “You are here…for fun?”
“Yup!” said Robert
“So you guys are scientists, then?” asked Steve.
“We are,” replied Thr’ktck “We’re studying the crystalbush, which is a quite unusual life form.”
“Oh yeah,” said Steve, nodding his head up and down. “There have been human teams out here too. Footage from one of them is why we decided to come. It’s gorgeous out here, especially in winter, when they’ve dropped their leaves and you can really see the crystalline structure. It’s why we hopped all the way from the resort here. There’s no point living on an alien world if you don’t see some alien wonders, right?”
Robert chuckled, and squeezed Steve’s digits with his own again. “I grew up on Amara, unlike this Earthling here, so it’s not alien to me, but it’s true it’s been nice. There are some cultivated cyrstalbushes around the resort where I work, but not many, and it’s nothing like seeing a wild stand of them. The resort ones are all in pots and maybe twenty centimeters high at most. Some of the ones out here are nearly trees. It’s awesome.”
Kt’chtst was aware that ze was staring at the humans in shock. Ze hoped that ze wouldn’t offend them by such open gaping, but ze couldn’t believe that they’d come all this way, into this mad weather, simply because crystalbush was pretty.
“Do all humans go to such lengths for the sake of aesthetics?” asked Thr’ktck, his tone half curious, half incredulous.
The humans exchanged a glance, and then both started laughing. “Nah,” said Steve eventually. “This isn’t really going to lengths. I mean, we just loaded everything into the skimmer and flew out here. It’s a two-day hop, since we have to charge the panels halfway, but the actual flight time is low, so there’s lots of time to ramble around while the shuttle’s charging. It’s fun.”
“Wandering around in the snow is not my idea of fun,” said Thr’ktck, “but admittedly this may be because I am exothermic.”
“Hah. Yeah. Bet you guys don’t ski, either,” said Robert, grinning.
“No, we do not,” said Thr’ktck.
“If you want to see some humans being really nuts for the sake of aesthetics,” added Steve, “you should see what serious nature photographers do. I might enter some of my crystalbush photos in a few competitions, they’re unusual and I’ve gotten some good pictures, but the guys who regularly win do crazy shit to get their photos. Sitting in a blind in the snow for hours, hiking out to really difficult places, getting into a harness and dangling off a cliff, all kinds of stuff. Me, I just hike a little.”
“Consider me astonished at humanity,” said Thr’ktck, tapping his front limbs in amusement. Kt’chtst echoed the gesture. The humans were very strange indeed. “But also consider me grateful that you were seeking aesthetic satisfaction here, else we might be dead.”
“Well, thank the cyrstalbush for being so pretty, though I guess studying it got you into this mess in the first place. So I guess it’s a wash.”
“I shall thank you instead, and the quirks of humanity.”
“The quirks of humanity are also probably a wash, for saving people verses getting them in trouble,” was the human’s reply, “but you’re welcome.”