Introducing Myha Raelle
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I came to Rhea for the same reasons as many of the colonists here. For the same reasons as many of the colonists on all of the new worlds. I wanted room to breathe. I wanted to breathe fresh, natural, unprocessed air. Over the past weeks, we have worked hard to build the foundations of infrastructure that will be necessary for future generations. I came primarily as a xeno-arboriculturist, secondarily as a breeder. I have spent day in and day out marking trees for the other colonists. The electronic tags tell the loggers what to cut down, the agriculturalists which trees will fruit edibles, the medics which trees are suspected of having medicinal properties, and so much more. In all of my studies, I never dreamed that so many trees could grow naturally. I had never seen a heathy world before Rhea. The only real trees I had ever studied were either in a lab or stunted dwarf trees that struggled to survive in the near-poisonous soil and air of a dying world. Wood was so scarce in the Home system that it was unheard of to find a tree decades old. But Rhea has trees hundreds of years old; trees that had grown to be so round that it took a dozen people holding hands to surround the base. That is only what I have found in our primary settlement area.
As for being a breeder, I have never been one to enjoy the company of others. I like my trees. I have had my naked escapades with men and women both, but never found the thrill in it that others seem to find. I had a few short-lived relationships and spent a few months in a poly relationship with two men who were madly in love with each other, but wanted another in their life. I wasn’t it. In all honesty, I far prefer my own two hands and my toys to another person in my bed. There are no concessions, complications, or commitments that way. And as for children, no thank you. I may have said I was willing to be a breeder for this expedition, but I don’t have to raise them, do I? Besides, there are hundreds of other colonists to bring about the next generation on Rhea. Yes, I much prefer my trees.
Shortly after settling, I found another superb reason why I prefer trees to humans; they don’t oft go missing. I have been hearing gossip here and there among the settlers that some have gone missing. At first, we thought that some just ran away from the group or that a native creature, plant, or cavern found a hapless victim to consume. However, as the weeks wore on, more people went missing. There were too many to be accidents, too socially distant to have been coordinated, and too regularly to be attributed to simple chance. When the number of missing persons surpassed two dozen, the theories started. That we weren’t the first to Rhea and it was all part of an experiment by the government was laughable. The government had long ago shown that it didn’t give two squirts of rodent piss about its populace.
In the first few years of a settlement on a new world, the people are under a structure that is quite military in its style, though almost no military are included. Settlements have to show their worth before they are allowed government and to be a true part of the Unified Government of Humanity structure. Understanding this, our commanders and sergeants were not truly so, but it suits their description of power and responsibility. By the time our missing persons reached a full two dozen, those in charge had reached their limit of tolerance. Some plan or happenstance that I was not involved in allowed them to be in the right place at the right time to put an end to the abductions. And that is precisely what they were; abductions. There was another species come to Rhea. And unknowing who or what we were, they did as science expected of them; take samples, examine, experiment, test, adjust hypotheses, and repeat with multiple subjects to determine result validity and longevity. These beings did precisely so, until they were found out by those in charge of us. If not for them, how many more would have become lab rats for these creatures? Would I have been taken at any point?
After the whole encounter, Head Officer Maeck personally came around to abate fears, appease curiosity, and dissuade xenophobic attitudes. Apparently, the creatures were not only intelligent, but seemed to be friendly as well. None of those abducted were harmed, and though returned to the settlement, many of the taken wished to return to the aliens. When Aris Maeck told us all to refrain from calling them birds or birdmen, my curiosity was peaked. Birds I liked. They lived in trees, made their homes in trees, and raised their young in trees. Traditionally, at least. As trees became scarcer back in the Home System, birds had to adapt. However, if there was a tree, you could bet your Key that there was a bird living in it.
Days passed and the settlement grew. Shiny structures went up quickly, land area was cleared even more quickly at the urging of the agriculturalists, and even the groundwork of pipes were laid for plumbing, power, and communications. It was fascinating to watch while mildly disgusting to contemplate how quickly humans conquered virgin ground. We started to see the aliens within the settlement after that. They walked with several of our more important members and seemed to be learning the human language quickly. When they came to my sector, I heard them speaking our language, their stunted beak-like mandibles struggling with some of the letters. And then one turned to another of their species and spoke in their own language. It was beautiful. Not only did they make sounds like some of our language, but it was also laced with clicks, clucks, and coos made simultaneously with the other noises. It was a language that reminded me of a composer’s masterpiece symphony. All of the different sounds working together to create harmony and rhythm that drew in the listener with rapt attention.
They began to wander away from my range of hearing and I found myself following them. I had no other purpose than to hear the music that came from them. I had no other thought, until the human spoke. Not our language but theirs. It was nails on a chalkboard compared to what those creatures could do. Everywhere that these aliens had harmonious clicks, the human throat had to pause the word to hack out a “ck” sound before returning to the word. It was a jilted and jarring noise that hiccupped and coughed out sad parodies of the words spoken by these beautiful beings. I was so dumbfounded by the atrocity that was being emitted from that human mouth that I didn’t even realize I had tromped right up to the group with a scowl on my face. The man responsible for the verbal butchery was none other than Nyco Kyllen, a geneticist whose team I had worked closely with until he was abducted. We had been engineering hybrids of old earth stable trees with the new breeds of Rhea. The hybrids would be stable sustenance trees in years to come.