Chapter Text
Living alone in space for God knows how long can change a man, especially when your only source of conversation is your computer and several sentient planets.
This is the reality Astrodude lived in.
He's a smart man, you have to be to be an astronaut, so naturally he's noticed things.
Like how the further away from Earth he gets, the worse the other planets English gets.
Or the conversations he overhears but cannot understand.
The only logical explanation is that the celestial bodies have their own language and were only speaking English for his space.
It makes sense. Modern English has only been spoken for so many years. Before it was a whole slew of languages, and even before sentient life formed the planets had to be able to speak to each other.
This was a groundbreaking discovery. A whole alien language humanity had been missing right under their noses!
Curiosity may have killed the cat, but it did not deter the astronaut.
He had picked up a few common words here and there. He'd heard Luna yell Earth's name enough times to know it's a long whistle like sound.
But that wasn't enough.
What kind of scientist would he be if he didn't explore this further.
One day (or night, it's really hard to tell in space and he had long stopped caring), Astrodude swallowed his nerves and flew his ship towards his home planet.
He had grown accustom to interacting with everyone by now but it was still pretty intimidating approaching something one hundred times your size.
Luna was the first to notice him and gave him a wave. He bounced his ship slightly in return. He'd gotten pretty good at emoting with his ship.
Once he'd gotten within a decent range of Earth, he turned his microphone on.
"Earth?"
Earth looked around at his name being spoken, smiling when he caught sight of the earthling.
"Hey, Astrodude!"
Astrodude steeled himself. He didn't know why he felt so embarrassed. He was just asking to be taught their language, and knowing Earth, he was always happy to talk about whatever.
"I'm sure you know by now that I know you and the others have your own language. And I was thinking..."
Earth nodded along as Astrodude spoke, not interrupting.
"Do you think you could...maybe teach me how to understand it? I've been here long enough I should at least know the language."
Earth beamed down at him.
"Of course I'll teach you dude! I have time to kill anyway!"
Astrodude gets comfortable in his chair. He feels like he'll be here for a while.
The language was actually pretty simple once you learn the basics. It's mostly based off of tone and inflection, the whole language being made up of whistles and similar noises.
And hey, Astrodude can actually speak it somewhat. Of course, being human made it difficult for most words but he can string together simple sentences when he needs to.
Yes it may sound like caveman speech but it's hard to perfect a language you don't have the vocal chords for.
He's just glad he can whistle.
Earth claps in delight.
"You got it dude!"
Astrodude smiled. The past couple of months had been full of trial and error, but Earth was actually a pretty decent teacher when he wanted to be. And seeing his planet literally light up at the subject made it all worth it.
"You really think so?"
"Yeah! Now try it out!"
"What-"
Before Astrodude can protest, Earth is dragging him over to where Mars and Venus are playing cards.
Earth chirps happily at the two, who responded with similar chirps of their own. He nudges Astrodude who looked at him with absolute betrayal before turning his microphone back on and letting out a short whistle that roughly translated to 'hey guys'.
It was a bit wobbly in pronunciation but both planets were clearly taken aback, while Earth beamed with pride.
Earth whistled.
'Yeah, that's right. I taught him our language.'
'And why would you do that?'
Venus grumbled.
'Because he asked.'
'So is he fluent or what?'
Mars trilled.
'Basically. He can understand it but can't speak it well yet.'
"I'm right here still."
The three looked down.
"Well good luck learning I guess."
Mars spoke before turning back to his cards.
"Earth you playing?"
Earth looked at the scoreboard and grinned.
"You're on!"