Author: Stephen C. Curro

Veema peered through the glass pod at their latest subject. The human was young, perhaps eighteen years by his species’ standards. Her four eyes noted physical traits and the style of clothing. “Flannel shirt. Denim pants. Heavy boots. This one was hiking?”
“Camping,” Weez replied. “The trap caught his backpack, too. Chock full of materials they use to pretend they are living in the wild.”
“You can’t blame them for trying to connect with their planet,” Veema chided.
Weez was too intent on getting started to listen. He struck the top of the pod with his long tongue to open it. Disinfectant steam poured over the human and then coalesced into pressured restraints over his limbs. “Take the measurements,” Weez ordered.
Veera suppressed a growl as she slipped on the scanning glasses. Weez applied various sensors and appliances to the human. Cerebral wires in his temples. Skeletal clamps on his legs and arms. She recorded the human’s vitals as the devices relayed her information, including height and weight, blood type, and cerebral output.
When she finished, Weez hooked a tube to the boy’s arm and drew a blood sample into a specimen bag. “How much are you taking?” she asked warily.
“Six klarps.”
“That’s more than a human pint. He needs that liquid to distribute oxygen into his system.”
“He’ll grow more.”
The plumage down Veera’s back rippled in distress. Blood fascinated her; no creature on her homeworld possessed anything remotely similar. But Weez was the sort of scientist who would take every drop for research.
Once Weez stored the blood, he handed Veera an extractor. “Take a molar. Or an incisor.”
“That’s not necessary. We have detailed scans—”
“I want a real specimen.”
Veema looked to the human locked in his dreamless sleep. “This will harm him.”
“His species regrows teeth.”
“He’s far too old to grow new ones.”
“Pull a tooth, Veera,” Weez snapped. “That’s an order.”
Veera gripped the device, making the metal hurt her hand. She clenched her feathers to her body as she reached for the human’s mouth.
At the touch of her fingers, the human inhaled sharply. His two brown eyes snapped open.
Weez jumped back. “Curses! He must be resistant to the anesthetic.”
Veera didn’t answer. The human’s eyes were darting in every direction. He spoke something in a human language…words varied across the stars, but tone tone was universal. His was a tone of terror.
“He can’t be seeing us!” Weez reached for the syringe of neurotoxin. When the human saw the needle, he screamed and thrashed in his restraints.
Veera felt her soul twist. How terrifying it must be for him to be pulled from his habitat onto a ship in orbit, prodded and analyzed by creatures he’d never even imagined existed. This couldn’t continue…
“Doctor, stop,” Veera pleaded.
“You know the rules,” Weez muttered. He gripped the human’s neck and aimed the syringe.
Veema lashed out with her claws. Weez collapsed unconscious in a heap of feathers. Stepping over her superior, she approached the human with a compassionate face.
Every inch of the human’s body trembled. His eyes were secreting salty tears, his lips murmuring something that could have been a prayer or a plea for mercy.
Gently, she undid the equipment from his body. All the while, the human watched and held his breath. When she finished, she said in the kindest tone, “I don’t have a heart. But I assure you, I’m not heartless.”
With a crack of her tongue, the pod snapped shut. It dropped through the floor into space and rocketed back to Earth.