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Linda's five pebbles were so sweet in their party clothes. Susan's pebbles had completed another year, and Susan had gone all out planning a hatchday party for them. Linda loved a good party, and they had to be sure that whatever Susan planned wouldn't outshine the party they would throw for their own pebbles on their hatchday.
Privately, Linda thought it wouldn't be hard to throw a better party than the one Susan had planned. It was alien themed, and taking place at the Human Education Center. Ugh. They hoped their pebbles never asked for anything like that.
"Linda! Welcome!" sang Susan as they entered the party room.
Karen was already there, along with a few more parents and their pebbles.
"Hello, Susan. Congratulations on the hatchday," sang Linda.
"Thank you, I can’t believe how fast they’re growing up. Here," Susan said, offering a bundle to Linda. "My pebbles have requested alien costumes for everyone to wear."
Inside the bundle were the alien costumes, metal bands to be placed over the carapace with attachments representing the alien's hearing orifices, light sensing organs, and light sensing organ shields. Ugh, thought Linda again. Still, they helped their pebbles put the bands on.
"Look, Parent Linda!" said ♬♬. “I'm a scary, squishy alien!"
"I see," said Linda. "Very scary."
♬♬ giggled.
"I don't want to wear this," whispered ♫.
"Well, you're going to!" hissed Linda. "It's not your hatchday and it's not your party! You will participate!"
♫ whined and tried to wriggle away, but Linda caught them and set the band on their carapace anyway.
The pebbles joined the group playing and singing near the observation area, hoping to catch sight of the alien. Linda just hoped it wouldn't do something gross again, like eating in front of them. Sometimes, Linda wondered why they didn't just send the alien back to its home, surely it would have been happier there.
Linda tuned out the noise of the pebbles and observed the room. It was lavishly decorated, Susan really had gone all out. Representations of the alien and its ship, as well as Savior Rocky, and other alien things were hung up on the walls. It made for a charming space.
"I hope you’re all well," Linda greeted, and the others welcomed them warmly into their thrum.
Grace was having a great day. He slept in, and since he didn't have work, he decided to go out for a swim. It was his favorite way to exercise, it gave him and his joints a break from the heavy gravity on Erid. He floated up on his back, watching the artificial clouds pass by.
"Mr. Grace! Mr. Grace! ♫ will save you, hang on!"
Grace was alert in an instant, switching from his relaxing float to treading water as he squinted at the shore.
♫, one of the pebbles in his new science class, was in his enclosure. They were safely inside one of the xenonite balls the biodome technicians kept on hand near the airlocks and making a beeline for him.
"Hi!" he yelled, waving at ♫. “I’m okay, don't worry! What are you doing in here?"
He realized then that they couldn't understand him. He started to swim to shore.
"Drowning?! Is drowning?"
"I'm okay! I'm okay!" Grace said as he made it out of the water.
He jogged across the beach to the school area where he kept his keyboard. A confused ♫ followed him.
"I'm okay," he said through the keyboard. "Humans can swim, I was having fun."
"Oh, I understand," said ♫. “Apologies."
"What are you doing here?" Grace asked.
"I came to save you! Before that, I came to the Human Education Center for my friend's hatchday party."
"They're having a party here?" Grace asked. "Why?"
"They’re fascinated by you. The party is human themed."
Grace felt like his brain was running two microsoft outlooks and neither one was working. A human themed birthday party? What did that even mean?
He wasn't uncomfortable or anything, it was just a pebble's party. It was strange, sure, but actually he was a little flattered. More than anything, he wished he could see what they were doing the way they could probably see him.
"♫! ♫!" Two little voices sang from across the beach. "We're here to save you from the alien! Don't let it eat you!"
A pair of pebbles was in another ball, rolling their way over to Grace and ♫.
"Mr. Grace will not eat us! He teaches my science class!" said ♫.
The pebbles crashed into Grace's legs as they came to a stop. These ones wore strange headbands. Were those... googly eyes and glasses? And ears?
"They let the alien teach you?"
"He can understand us," said ♫.
"No it can't!"
Grace smiled as he typed out his message.
"I can understand you. Hi there."
The pebbles shrieked.
"It's okay, I won't hurt you," he confirmed.
"You're really squishy looking," said one of the duo.
More voices interrupted. "We'll save you! Stand back, foul alien!"
Four pebbles in a xenonite ball charged forward, and a repeat of the conversation from before ensued. This happened several more times, and Grace was trying very, very hard not to laugh.
"Wow, now everyone's here!" said one of the light orange pebbles celebrating their hatchday. "This is so much better than Parent Susan said it would be!"
"What's this stuff called?" asked their sibling, pointing at the beach.
"That's sand," Grace explained. "Tiny rocks eroded even smaller by the water. Since it's your hatchday and you're all here, do you want a tour of the biodome?"
The pebbles all enthusiastically agreed. ♫, the little scientist, looked the most excited of all. He showed them around, helping to steer their hamster balls carefully the right way when little legs all tried to move the ball in different directions. They asked many, many questions, and Grace thought it was no wonder that the light orange hatchling group had wanted their party here. They were enamored with the human species, it was like...
He was struck by a memory. The orange pebbles' party was like his seventh birthday party. He'd been obsessed with foxes for nearly a year at that point, and begged to go visit them at the zoo all the time. He'd had a fox themed party at the zoo that year. If they had let him in with the foxes, he would have been over the moon.
He wasn't quite sure what to make of it when one of them asked him to eat in front of them, but decided not to dwell on it. He politely declined.
"Do humans celebrate their hatchday?" one of the pebbles asked.
"We do! We have parties just like this one. There's games, presents, all our friends."
He carefully left out the food aspect.
"What kind of games?" asked a pebble, a dark green one this time.
"I can teach you one if you all want to play," Grace suggested.
The pebbles readily agreed.
"Okay," said Grace. "This game is called freeze dance."
"Where have the pebbles gone?" Julia asked, voice tinged with fear as the adults' thrum came to an abrupt halt.
Linda was horrified, they hadn't noticed the reduction in noise, but the party room was silent and not a single pebble could be found.
“♫?” Linda sang. "♬♬?"
There was no response, not to Linda or to any of the other parents.
"Quiet!" said Susan, "Let me listen!"
All the parents were especially nervous after the incident from months earlier, in which a poor pebble found its way into the enclosure and was nearly attacked! The alien keepers would have taken care to prevent a similar incident, wouldn't they?
Straining to hear, Linda finally heard a pebble's voice not too far away, at the other end of the observation area.
"There!" Karen pointed. They must have heard the same sounds.
All the parents rushed toward the voices, then let out a simultaneous cry of horror. The pebbles were inside the enclosure! Julia and Karen rushed off to speak to the alien keeper while Linda remained glued to where they stood.
The pebbles were crammed inside xenonite balls, two or more to a ball, and so were protected from the atmosphere at least. But they shouldn't have been there! This was exactly what Linda had been worried about! After the last incident, why hadn't the keepers removed the xenonite balls from a place accessible by pebbles?
Oh, this was horrible. Linda couldn't observe! The pebbles were so close to the alien, they would be slaughtered! Linda cried again. The alien was revealing its terrible upper-carapace bones, and if the pebbles lived they would surely be traumatized!
Why were they bouncing, Linda wondered? That was the behavior of a happy, excited pebble, not one facing their impending doom! Linda strained to hear more.
The pebbles were talking to the alien? The alien seemed to understand. How strange! The alien had some sort of instrument too, and to Linda's shock, the alien was using it to speak. Some of the noise the alien played from its instrument was nonsense, as Linda expected, but occasionally there would be words.
As Linda focused on the sound, they picked up more and more, including the giggling of a party full of happy pebbles. As the alien spoke its nonsense, the pebbles would dance, and in the silence once the alien finished its babbling, they would freeze, holding themselves as still as an excited pebble could. This was when the alien would speak proper Eridian, each time indicating any pebbles who had not stayed still. The indicated pebbles would slump as through defeated, but return to their excited state moments later.
Were they... were they playing with it? Linda hoped they weren't teasing it. Savior Rocky would be so upset about any mistreatment of his alien. The alien didn't seem upset, at least, although Linda didn't know much about how it should have been behaving.
"It's horrible! It's horrible!" Julia repeated as they returned with a keeper. "You must tranquilize it immediately!"
"We can’t tranquilize him! He will not hurt the pebbles."
"But it is hurting them," insisted Karen. "It is!"
The keeper listened intently to the scene in the biodome. "They are playing. Grace will not hurt the pebbles."
"But-" started Karen.
"Why have the pebbles made it inside the biodome under the supervision of so many parents?" the keeper asked.
Linda felt a flash of embarrassment.
"I’ll send someone to get them. Don’t panic, they will not be harmed."
The keeper left. Karen launched into a tirade on the unprofessionalism of the keepers. The parents waited in a few more moments of tense silence, and soon a keeper entered the biodome and approached the alien and pebbles.
"Hello, Savior Grace. It is time for the pebbles to return to their parents."
The alien babbled something to the keeper, then played its instrument.
"It was great to meet you guys! Happy hatchday!"
The pebbles all said goodbye to the alien and followed the keeper to the airlock. The parents collapsed with relief once the pebbles were returned safely to the party room. All at once they started to scold the pebbles, although none of them seemed to be absorbing the lectures.
"Parent Susan, the alien is so nice!" one of Susan's pebbles said. "This was the best hatchday ever!"
"Yes, yes, yes!" said another. "He taught us an Earth game: Remain Still Unless There Is Music, Otherwise Dance!"
"Fun, fun, fun!" agreed several others.
"I won!" said one of Karen's pebbles.
"No, I did!" argued another.
"Quiet!" ordered Susan. "The party is over. You will all be punished at home."
The pebbles grumbled but followed their parents out of the party room. Linda planned to ground their pebbles. They would not be going anywhere except school for a week!