Pet Human

A red-haired man sat, arms quivering on a rock. Two dim brown eyes fixed on him, foul air seeping from the nostrils below, and the mouth below that opened.

“Where the hell did you find it Tick!?” Bellowed the voice. The man flinched. Tick also sat inches from the man. Staring at him quizzically.

“Well he was just wandering around.” Said Tick, as if it was obvious. “You know, by some trees.”

“Well obviously by some trees! It’s all trees round here you gravel muncher!” Called Funny-Eye. So called because her eye was a bit funny.

“Well excuse me for pushing boundaries in an effort to find new sources of sustenance in our ever-dwindling habitat!” Shrieked Tick. The man cowered and gave a whimper.

“Sssssh! You’re scaring him!” Hissed Mutha, the one that had been staring the man in the face. “You can’t keep him. What if he belongs to someone?”

“Belongs to who!?” Tick protested. “He was all alone! For all we know he was abandoned and most probably starving.” Funny-Eye dropped from a branch she’d been reclining on and scampered over. She dropped a dirty handful of berries and squashed ants onto the man’s lap. He stared at them. Paralysed with fear.

“Well, he doesn’t seem hungry. Look, he’s not touching the food.” Said Funny-Eye with some glee at the fact that she’d just made Tick seem like even more of an imbecile. Mutha rolled her eyes.

“Well of course he’s not touched it. They don’t eat what we eat. They only eat things what have been put in fire.” She said.

“Right!” Proclaimed Tick. “What’s fire.”

Mutha took a moment to collect her knowledge of natural science, assess it for anything related to fire and compress that into something that Tick might understand. “It’s like… wood but when it gets angry.”

“Oh I see!” Said Tick. “Well I dunno how we’d get that. Always seemed like a stupid idea to me.” It was at that moment that a few more of the troop arrived to investigate the commotion. One of the new arrivals was Smart. So called because he was Smart. He bounded over to the man. Getting close enough for the man to cover his face with his arms and lean back in fright.

“Oh? Who’s this?” He said, peering into the man’s tear-strewn face.

“Dennis.” Replied Tick.

“Dennis!?” Called Funny-Eye. “Why would you call him Dennis!?”

“Well…” Tick was on the back foot now. “It’s the kind of thing they’re called isn’t it?”

“Yeah but… Dennis?” Tick had no response to this. But then again, Funny-Eye really had no explanation for why he shouldn’t be named Dennis.

Smart continued to stare intently at the man and feel his clothes between his fingers. “I’ve seen some of their villages you know? If he’s going to stay, I’m afraid our nests just won’t do.”

“Oh? What do they sleep in then?” Asked Mutha.

“Well, they live in those stone cubes don’t they?” Said Smart, authoritatively.

“Oh yeah? What’s a cube?” Tick replied.

“It’s a regular hexahedron and is the only convex polyhedron whose faces are all squares.” Piped a voice from one of the new arrivals. It was Scratch. Who scratched a lot.

“Right.” Said Tick, seemingly satisfied that he now knew what a cube was. “Well we don’t have none of them.” The troop all stared at Dennis a while longer. Sniffing him, poking him. Scratch clambered onto the rock behind the man.

“Here, what’s this?” He held aloft a branch partly of wood, partly of something shiny.

“Oh he must have dropped it.” Replied Tick in his confident, nasally whine. “It’s one of them sticks what shouts at you until you’re dead. He had it pointed at me when I found him.” Scratch’s eyes widened with joyous curiosity. He examined it, put it in his mouth and attempted to blow through it. Dennis’s eyes almost popped from his head as he gasped. Mutha batted the thing out of Scratch’s mouth. It yelled so hard that a branch turned to splinters. The troop ran in circles yelling in excitement and confusion. Dennis cried audibly.

The noise had finally been enough to disturb Biggun, the silverback. He emerged through thick brush and every male in the troop seemed to shrink at his mere presence. “Tick. Explain.” Rumbled Biggun.

“It’s… it’s a person Biggun.” Tick’s voice was almost a whisper.

“We’re moving out Tick. And it’s not moving with us. Get. Rid of it.” Biggun’s eyes fixed on Tick unblinking.

“What!? Why!?” Tick’s mouth was far faster than his brain, but the words had already escaped before he could wrest control of them and he was left with nothing but immediate regret.

Biggun lowered his voice, which at times was far worse than him raising it. “In case me saying so wasn’t enough for you Tick, how about the fact that they’re dangerous, the fact that we can’t feed it or the fact that I don’t like it?” Tick was silenced.

“I’ll take care of this sir.” Said Smart, confidently. He leaned somehow even close into Dennis’s face and intended to say, “Dennis, I’m sorry but we can’t keep you, you must go.” All Dennis heard however was “OOOOH OOOOOH OOOOOOOOOOOOH!” Dennis yelled in primal distress.

“It’s your accent Smart. Keep telling you, no one likes you Mountainer’s accents.” Said Tick.

“No, no, no. You’ve got to teach it that you’re in charge. Show it that you’re the one with authority.” Interjected Mutha.

“Oh yeah?” Asked Tick. “How do you show authority over humans?” Once again, Scratch had an answer.

“Through legislation formulated by a uni or bicameral system of deliberative assemblies I think.”

“Right.” Said Tick, once again feeling slightly surer of the world around him. “Well I don’t see none of them around here so what do we do?” Scratch shrugged, held the angry branch a loft, and brought it down on Dennis’s skull with a crack.