Chapter Text
It’s his earliest memory.
He doesn’t truly remember anything specific before this moment. All he knows is that up to this point, it was just him and all of them. They are all similar and kind of look like him, but he’s the only one who is much shorter than they are. They are the ones that give him food and take care of him. They all lived together in a world of hard walls and floors, dimly illuminated by the lights from the ceiling and the bright glowing screens they like looking at.
Often he would play with or try to get the attention of one of the taller people, but right now, he’s just wandering by himself. He’s usually with one of them, but he’s sometimes manages to walk away on his own. It’s just him, moving down the hall on his own two feet, holding that soft yellow thing in his arm.
This time, he seems to have wandered to a place where he’s never been before. He’s not sure how he got here, but he’s looking around at his surroundings, taking in this new place. As he’s moving, he can hear talking coming from one of the rooms to the side. The tall people would always talk to him whenever they give him attention, just like how they talk to each other. This is different, however, as this talking sounds different. Not only does this voice sound higher, but the words don’t sound like anything he’s heard before. He keeps walking until he reaches the room where the talking is coming from. When he gets there, he takes a few steps in before seeing who it is.
It seems like another person, still taller than him, but shorter than the people he knows. It looks like the clothes it’s wearing are almost completely blue. Its back is turned towards him while talking to someone who’s on the other side of a big thing sitting there, so he can’t see who else is here. It lifts up one of its hands, which is also blue.
After being confused, he finally figures it out. The blue isn’t clothing. That’s its skin.
Feeling nervous, he starts walking backwards, before the thing in front of him stops talking. One of its ears turns, making him notice that it is much taller and pointier than his ears or anyone else’s. It turns its whole head around and looks directly at him. Then, he sees the big, yellow eyes staring right back at him.
He is suddenly terrified. He’s never seen anything like this before, and it scares him. He lets out a scream, dropping the yellow thing and running off to the side, trying to escape the monster. He looks over and sees another, a bit shorter than the first one, but still taller than him and glaring at him with its yellow eyes. He cries again and runs in the opposite direction before finding himself in a corner of the room that doesn’t have an exit. He looks behind him and sees both of them following him, making him realize that he’s trapped. Frightened, he goes underneath a desk and tries hiding there.
He’s sitting there with his knees tucked, eyes wet, and breathing hard, worried that they know where he is and that they’ll come and get him. One of them walks over, and he can see the blue legs and feet in front of him. It bends down, and he sees the same scary yellow eyes looking at him. This time, he even notices that they have a weird looking nose compared to what’s normal. He closes his own eyes and buries his face into his arms, too afraid to face this creature. He hears it talking again, with those strange words from before.
“Lu fìpo hì’i fìtxan. Lu hona!”
He hears footsteps, and he can tell that the other monster has walked over too. He hears it speak with a slightly different voice.
“Lu tsapo narvä'. Tsapo keng tsun pivlltxe srak?”
Suddenly, he hears a third voice coming from a distance.
“Pey! Poti txopu sleyku rä’ä!”
He hears another set of feet pattering towards him, and he lifts his head up and opens his eyes to see what’s coming. Another pair of blue legs walks into his view. They bend, allowing this third thing to crouch down. He sees its face, and it looks even weirder than the other two. Like them, it has big, yellow eyes, pointy ears, and a weird nose, but this one also doesn’t have any eyebrows. It starts crawling towards him, making him cover his face and cry some more. Then, he hears it talking to him in a gentler, calming voice.
“Tam tam, ke kan pxoe ngati pivung.”
Letting his guard down by the smallest degree, he looks back up. He sees it kneeling there, holding his soft yellow thing out towards him. He realizes that it’s giving it back to him.
He slowly crawls out from under the desk and takes the yellow thing back, hugging it tightly. He stands up, keeping his distance, and cautiously observes the three of them with less fearful eyes. The one he originally saw is smiling and giggling at him while the shortest one is making a face but also smiling at him. He at least knows now that they aren’t going to hurt him. They look different than anyone he’s ever known, but they seem very kind.
The one who gave him his thing back, who’s the tallest of the bunch, is smiling warmly as he says just one word.
“‘Eylan.”
He doesn’t know what it means, but it makes him feel comfortable.
He begins to smile too.