HOZ 1

Ok you have to actually read this now

Far away, on a planet humans called Saturn, lived a race of people who called it Zenon. One of its inhabitants was currently dreaming about theoretical motion when his temporal lobe recognized someone shouting, “RYAN. RYAN. RYAN. RYAN. WAKE UP. RYAN.” As one may guess, his name was Ryan. Ryan grogged as he opened his pupiless eyes and allowed for his conscious vision to return to him. Something was shaking him. Slowly, his eyes focused on a feminine figure who was tall, thick-bodied, and had long dark hair to complement her dark green skin.

“WHat isit, shOKy...?” Ryan managed as he rolled over in his bed.

“The agrinauts have returned! All of them!” the woman identified as Shoky replied. “They came back last night and-”

“Fats-gool,”mumbled Ryan into his pillow.

“Ryan! Wake up! They say they’re going to do the feast in 24 hours and- Oh, Ryan, wake up! We’re gonna miss it!” Shoky grabbed his wrist and started to drag him out of bed.

“24 hours?” Ryan lifted his head to look at her with wide eyes before abruptly closing them again and falling on his pillow once more. "Shoky, that’s 2 whole days away. Why don’t we just stay in this bed for another 7 or so hours and go to the Feast of Human Food when lines are actually forming?” Ryan tried to pull his arm back with Shoky still attached. But Shoky resisted.

“But they’re having a whole festival for it RIGHT NOW and then the council leaders are going to do a speech thing in an hour and then the agrinauts are going to say how it went and it’s going to all be awesome and I’m too excited to sleep,” Shoky bounced repetitively in place to show her point.

“Who said we were going to sleep?” Ryan opened one eye in order to look at Shoky mischievously and began to kiss her hand which was still latched to his wrist.

“Ha-ha,” Shoky smiled sarcastically. “C’mon. I wanna see. In person. This is an historical moment!”

“You can ‘see’ when you watch them on T.V.,” replied Ryan who was still trying to pull her into bed with him.

“Ryan! Why aren’t you as amazed by this as I am?!” Shoky exclaimed. She gathered herself up, standing tall and importantly.

“21 months ago,” she began, hand over her heart. “8 years in terra time- after months of petitioning and forums and debates, our great government allowed for 100 of our spacecrafts to travel to the distant and incredibly hostile planet known as Earth so that we may experience the wonderful foods that the humans have long claimed to be, and I quote, ‘delicious’.” Shoky paused to stare longingly at Ryan’s ceiling.

“Many argued it was too dangerous to travel to this planet whom we all agree hosts simple-minded, violent lifeforms that constantly threaten our peaceful existence, judging by their television shows and science fiction movies,” Shoky shrugged casually at the fearsome description only to suddenly point dramatically at Ryan like an old woman about to lay a curse on someone, crazy look in her eyes and all. “Should we be discovered by these barbaric life forms, an intergalactic war and possible enslavement of zeonite-kind would be inevitable.

“But as we watched human media, we all noticed the one thing that made humans happy beyond all measure.” Again, another pause to nod in agreement at Ryan’s silent ceiling. “Their food,” she finally breathed. “To them, it was more than a necessity to life. It was an addicting lifestyle. Many humans even became bloated from over consumption. Zenon food wasn’t like that. Zenon food didn’t ‘taste’ like much of anything. It made us curious.” Shoky tilted her head while making one of her eyes bigger than the other. “Why did the humans always smile when they ate ice cream? Why did they moan when they ate meat? Why did they cry when they ate a pepper? Why did they rush to the table that had all the fried goodies? What is a brainfreeze?!” Shoky clenched her fist in determination, shaking it at Ryan’s ceiling. “Zenonites had to know!”

Ryan interrupted here,“So the Zenon government had the stupid idea of sending our ships to Earth to take samples from all over the human globe, risking human discovery, just so we could find out what the big deal about McDonalds was.”

“For science!” Shoky pointed dramatically to the ceiling she loved so much.

“For stupidity,” Ryan sat up. “There is absolutely no sound reason as to why we need to send ships to Earth, of all places, just so we could know what their food tastes like. I’m sure it’s amazing, judging by how humans ignore the risk of obesity for it. But humans en masse have been proven to be the cockiest, bull headed species of the galaxy. Ever since we discovered them, we have worked tirelessly to hide from them. There is a highly sophisticated ring around our planet that makes the ‘smart’ people on Earth think Zenon is a gas planet. All our ships and satellites and anything that emits a signal has to be cloaked so it can’t get picked up by all the stupid probes NASA and whatever keep sending. We even had the worst intergalactic debate in the history of the universe with the rest of the life sustaining planets to convince them to hide from the humans similarly- and at our expense, might I add- because God forbid the humans find out about L’Saklian mines. And we’re just going to risk all of that for some cake.”

Shoky shrugged. “The more we understand and immerse ourselves in human culture, the better prepared we’ll be should we ever be discovered.”

Ryan groaned and slumped back in bed. “Stupid.”

He heard Shoky sigh and felt the bed cave in a bit as she lay down. Her arms wrapped around his waist and her lips moving from the top of his neck down to the base. “Ryan, why you gotta be such a grumpy poop pants?” She asked him. “Before today, all we had to observe the humans with were what our satellites could snag from their televisions which they only just got. Before that, we relied on probes for all our information. Now we get to taste what they taste. Who knows? Maybe one day, we’ll find a way to connect with the humans in a way that won’t make them bomb us and we can finally live in a truly connected universe.”

Ryan rolled his eyes internally. “You’re naive if you think we can ever live openly- in peace- with the humans.”

Shoky rested her cheek on his head. Ryan felt her cheek move; it felt like a smile. “Maybe,” she said. “But at least I’m not a grumpy poop pants.”

Ryan turned to face her. “I’m a grumpy poop pants?”

Shoky nodded vehemently.

“Me? Grumpy? With poop pants?!”

Shoky began to giggle. “Yes!”

“You think I’m grumpy?!” With that, Ryan began to tickle her. She screeched.

“Stop!”

“Tell me I’m a happy sunshine shorts!”

“What?!” Shoky laughed.

“Tell me I’m a happy sunshine shorts!” He tickled her harder, rolling on top of her.

“You’re a happy sunshine shorts!” Shoky yelled.

“Thank you,” Ryan stopped. Shoky smiled and wrapped her arms around his neck to kiss him.

“Can we go to Zenon Central and take part in the Earth Food Ceremony now?”

Ryan sighed. “Fine. Let me get some pants on.”

“Ew! You weren’t wearing pants that whole time?!” Shoky gasped as Ryan got out of the blankets that had been covering his lower half. Ryan rolled his eyes as his underweared self searched for clothes.

* * *

Unlike Earth, which is broken up by countries, Zenon society is the only true country on the planet though there are many different cities, regions, and even states. There aren’t really continents on Zenon so much as many very large islands with some littler islands around it with varying biomes which actually help break up and distinguish the regions a bit easier. Zenon is a large planet, however, even without the “gas” that surrounds the atmosphere; it’s just a bit and a half bigger than Uranus, in fact [or Ditapis, as the Uranites (Ditapites) prefer it to be called for reasons]. So even though it’s mostly islands, the population still stretches out more so than Earth even. And on the biggest island around the equator sits the capital of it all, Zenon Central. As the name suggests, it is the center of where all Zenon politics, economics, and culture take place- the origin of all basic commerce. Ryan lived conveniently on the border of Zenon Central, in the residential zone known as Vikopeg.

“Ready?” Shoky asked eagerly as Ryan emerged from his room wearing jeans and a hoodie.

“Yea, I’ll get the cab,” he answered. He went to his desk in the living room and tapped on it. A computer screen appeared, asking him what he would like. He tapped on the “Call a cab” option. No one had personal vehicles in Zenon. Only a very efficient public transportation system. In the few seconds it took for Ryan to escort Shoky to the door, the cab was in front of his house, waiting. It was a hover cab, of course. Zenon got rid of wheels years ago.

Shoky and Ryan climbed into the hovering pod which looked like a paste-y orange, deformed egg with an off color, horizontal stripe around the middle that acted as the window. Inside there was no driver as it had an automated system. Though there was a swivel chair in front of a control panel, in case a manual override was needed. Otherwise, a long, squishy couch lined the wall of the cab with a cooler in the center. Shoky grabbed some water from it and sat down with Ryan. The cab lifted up just above the houses and started towards the area that had a lot of large buildings in it.

Ryan glanced over to see Shoky watch the window as the houses seemed to fly by. They were nothing like most houses on Earth. They were made to resemble the trees zenonites used to inhabit eons ago. They looked more like white light bulbs, except with a rounded rectangle for the bulb and much longer, narrower stems. Most of them were white, anyways. Some were brown, blue, green, yellow, gray, etc. Ryan’s was a boring white. Shoky got hers to be polka dot.

After 5 minutes, they were in Zenon Central. Many buildings followed the traditional pod style. Some were inspired by Earth architecture, however, with cylindrical or rectangular glass structures firmly planted on the ground. They weren’t clustered together as much as they are on Earth, however. Zenon needed room for all the trees and such they planted everywhere. But one clearing was bigger than the others and it was filled with a huge cluster of people. At the far end of one was a large stage with a holographic banner over it reading, “Earth Food Festival”. This is where the cab dropped Shoky and Ryan off.

“Dear zenonites…” came a voice over a sound system.

“Ooh, it’s starting! Hurry up!” Shoky grabbed Ryan and started to run through the crowd. They didn’t make it very far, however. Said crowd was pretty tight.  Ryan couldn’t see the stage very clearly through all the people. Luckily, there was a large screen above the stage for the people in the back, showing a portly man in some pretty royal looking threads standing at a podium. There were some equally well dressed people sitting behind him in reserved silence.

“Today we welcome home our beloved pilots and scientists who risked their lives so that we might partake in the savage cuisine of the greatly feared Earth.” It was one of the council members talking. Roy Xinini to be precise. The most eloquent and animated of the council members. “I know there was a lot of controversy over the matter, specifically fear of being discovered. But I assure you, great zenonites, with our masterful cloaking technology which was developed tirelessly by our wonderful engineers, the extraction went off without a single detection.” The crowd cheered unanimously which made Roy Xinini smile.

“Of course, this mission could never have come to past had it not been for you faithful inhabitants, petitioning, calling government officials, showing up to government forums, and voting in favor of this extravagant undertaking.” Roy Xinini continued. “Now we can literally have another rare taste of human culture aside from just watching their media. This could help us to better understand our oblivious barbarian neighbors who live a mere 3 planets away, and help to prepare us in the unlikely event of discovery. The more we know, the more we understand, the better. Because...”

Roy paused a moment so the crowd could shout, “Knowledge is the ultimate advantage.” and cheer. The planet motto.

Ryan scoffed,“We already understand them. He just said it,” Ryan whispered to Shoky. “Oblivious barbarians.”

“Shh,” Shoky replied.

Roy Xinini smiled broadly. “But let’s not forget the luminaries of this harrowing journey. The three thousand pilots, engineers, stealth extractors, and scientists who actually went on the hundred ships we sent to Earth to bring us a sample of the various human edibles. Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of the Council Leaders of Zenon, I would like to present them now with this honorary certificate that marks their great achievement, the Green Peace and Discovery award.”

“They’re getting a G-PaD?” Ryan exclaimed.

“Sh!” Shoky warned.

Roy Xinini proceeded to hold out the much sought after certificate. One of the men sitting behind the council leader in a captain’s uniform stepped up to the stand, nodded and accepted the certificate with a slight grimace. “On behalf of the previous three thousand nons and gunons who served and risked their lives-”

“-and the lives of everyone else on the planet,” Ryan muttered to himself.

“-for this mission, I, Captain Gurry Brandon Stickl, accept this award,” he said. “You know, when I was offered the position of Head Captain of this mission, I knew it was going to be anything but easy. But we had the best of the best for a team. I wouldn’t be standing here if it weren’t for those thousands of nons and gunons who contributed and made this mission a success and are standing before me and behind me now. It was possible because of them. There’s really not much more to say about it.”

The crowd applauded once more as Captain Stickl stepped away from the podium with the certificate under his arm, waddling away in proud astonishment at the honor he had just received. Roy Xinini reappeared on the screen.

“And of course those nons and gunons will all get their own copies of the Green Peace and Discovery award. But now we must humor our eager press. In 15 minutes, the leaders of the expedition, popularly known as Mission Grab ‘N’ Go, will all gather once more for a press conference to answer all your hundreds of questions about the journey these people undertook. But first!” Roy Xinini interjected. “Let’s dance in celebration.”

Music that sounded eerily similar like dubstep began to play loudly, causing the audience and stage members to dance accordingly. Everyone except Ryan, who was currently making a statement by not taking part of his culture’s need to infuse their appreciation for dance into everything important.

“I’m going back to bed,” Ryan grumbled to Shoky, who was popping and locking.

“What? Why?” Shoky shouted over the music.

“I’ve... got a flight in a few hours. I need to be well rested for it.” Ryan excused himself lamely. “I’ll see you at the Feast tomorrow.”

Shoky made a face but said, “Fine.” anyways. Ryan gave her a quick kiss before leaving to call a cab. With Zenon’s advanced public transportation system, it arrived in front of him just 10 seconds after dialing.

He hated to leave Shoky so rudely but he had to get out of there. Not only because he hated crowds full of people he didn’t know but also because he couldn’t stand listening to how Mission Grab ‘N’ Go was a good idea any longer. Ryan was a proud Zenon citizen who didn’t enjoy risking anything. It’s why he was a pilot for only national flights. No risk of getting stranded in space on the way to the planet of Zealae-Fideon. He thought most of the things the government decreed were a good necessity: Their ever efficient cab system. Their rejection of the money system and inclusion of the job card. How they respectfully told the Edenoid drillers to kindly bug off their massive oil reserves that were beneath their many forests. But above all, he approved of the time and energy spent to hide themselves from the humans. Humans are a race to be feared. The first human movie Ryan ever watched was E.T. A helplessly lost and completely innocent alien tries to get back home but the government tries to kidnap and experiment on him instead. What kind of group of fully grown animals thinks that’s ok?

It was just fiction, however, he told himself. Then he watched Iron Giant, Princess Mononoke, Nausicaa, the entire X-Files series, V for Vendetta and it was around then Ryan began to see a pattern.

Perhaps individually, a human isn’t so bad. But all together, they are a horrible and somewhat stupid people. They ignore their poor and hungry. They have borders that keep fleeing masses in their own terrible countries. They have politicians who only bicker without ever actually doing something to help their people. Not to mention their idolatry of fame and fortune over education and science and how many times violence has been used to solve every major problem. Ryan shuddered to think what would happen if humans ever found out about Zenon’s oil reserves. He doubted they’d be as understanding as the Edenoids.

So why did his government decide that actually going to Earth for grocery shopping was necessary? Just for the pleasure of tasting Earth food? He knew Zenon food was typically bland and water flavored but it was also healthy and sustainable! He understood why zenonites enjoyed watching human media. It was the same reason humans slow down to see a car wreck on the highway. It was an acceptable amount of human horror culture immersion. But going as far as an 8 month expedition to sample their food as well? Ryan couldn’t wrap his mind around the thought process that led to that action.

He had to stop thinking about it. The government probably knew what it was doing. He should just trust that and relax. He should go back to the festival and enjoy his time with Shoky. He should go to a public forum and ask the council leaders what the hell they were thinking. No, he should just go home and take a nap. Yes, that sounds like a good idea. Naps are good.

* * *

Ryan was once again woken by his wonderful girlfriend, but she was nicer about it this time.

“Ryan…. darling.”

He could feel her body wrap around him. “Hmmmm….?” he sighed.

“Ryan, dear, wake up….” She traced his jawline and raked through his golden blonde hair with her pointy fingers. Zenonites had pointy fingers instead of fingernails, see.

Suddenly, he was wide awake. A product of association. “What’d you do?”

“What?”

Ryan sat straight up to look at Shoky. “You don’t wake me up nicely unless you did something bad and need help getting out of it.” He looked at her hard. “What did you do?”

Shoky began to sit up as well. “I didn’t do anything…”

Ryan waited.

Shoky pursed her lips and looked at the bed guiltily. “I found something-”

“Oh, Shoky!” Ryan got out of bed. “You didn’t bring home another flibirathi, did you? Do you remember how long it took to get it out of your pod? Because I do.”

Shoky followed him out of bed and put out a steadying hands towards him, as if he were a cornered animal deciding between fight or flight. “It’s not a flibirathi. I learned my lesson with those.”

Ryan scoffed. “A rare occurrence.” He turned to face his window.

“Ryan, please, this is the biggest thing ever in the history of ever. I really need your support on this,” pleaded Shoky.

Ryan beheld his gunon. Her eyes were filled with the determination of someone in desperate need. Those eyes had complicated his life more than once. He agreed to nothing but Shoky knew he would help when he looked at her.

“Ok, so, you know how I was at the festival,” Shoky continued.

“Yea, I took you there. You woke me up for it,” Ryan impatiently replied.

Shoky clasped her hands together nervously. “Well, they had this ‘Tour the Ships’ thing where you could walk around one of the actual ships that went to Earth. And as I was walking through it, there was a restricted part that was closed for safety reasons-”

“So naturally you went in that part.” Ryan had heard this story before. Shoky didn’t say, ‘Well yea, what do you take me for?’ but her smile-shrug combo did.

“Anyways, it went to this sort of tank thing and I looked inside and that’s where I found this thing and I brought her to your house and please don’t be mad.” Shoky recoiled slightly in preparation for Ryan’s verbal backlash.

Ryan kept his composure as he calmly but sternly asked her, “What did you find?”

Shoky visually examined her lover, obviously not sure as to how he would respond. Perhaps regretting bringing it up to him in the first place. Hesitantly, cautiously, nervously, she flitted to the door to reveal what deserved this introduction.

Ryan stared at what was in the opening doorway. Nothing on Zenon could prepare him for the thing standing before him.

“Hello,” said the thing. “I’m Nalie.”

Author's Note

General suggestions welcome but specifically inform me if there's too much exposition (more telling than showing) and any scientific inaccuracies and how to improve them

Reviews

[KTizzle]

Okay yea, it is a lot of exposition that I feel can work more effectively if you would show things. Instead of telling me it's Saturn, why not show it to me? I feel it would make it more humorous. For example, have him wake up, look out the window and see the rings or a familiar Saturn moon or a planet around it? Try not to be explaining things to the audience. Show a regular day. Did human food smell different? How does it feel to get in a hover cab? Does it bounce a little when you climb in there? Does it hum? I found the whole thing about the country not being as divided irrelevant because Ryan will be taking a flight so you can make an observation about the structure of your world that way. As their riding in the cab, how is Zenon city look. Instead of having a big paragraph of exposition about how it looks, incorporate that in maybe the cab ride where Ryan sees someone using their "job card" and maybe how he used his 3 years ago to get the job he has now.

Once again, I would like more detail on the characters. What do people of Zenon typically wear? For example here, " feminine figure who was tall, thick-bodied, and had long dark hair to complement her dark green skin." What was she wearing? And when she got on the bed and Ryan tickled her, what did her skin feel like? Is it smooth, rough, scaly, does the texture help the race live on Saturn? Does Shokly wear perfume? What does perfume smell like on Saturn? What does Ryan's room look like? Is it messy? Does Shoky have to step over things or is it clean because Shoky comes over and she just likes to be busy? Is Ryan rich, poor, middle class, upper class, lower class? What indicates that? You have interesting characters, I just would like to know more about them. Why not have Ryan and Shoky taste the food so that Ryan can make comments about how more seasoned the food taste? I would find that more purposeful to have him like the food, but not necessarily the people who make the food. I like the fear and concern about humans. I like the Shoky's fascination with humans. I would like to see more of it because you can draw it out some that would make it more humorous. Like for example here, " “Why did the humans always smile when they ate ice cream? Why did they moan when they ate meat? Why did they cry when they ate a pepper? Why did they rush to the table that had all the fried goodies? What is a brainfreeze?!” Shoky clenched her fist in determination, shaking it at Ryan’s ceiling. “Zenonites had to know!” I feel like it would be more effective to show her wanting to have ice cream, which would show she's been to one of these feasts before because it sounds like feasts on human food has happened before. Maybe show that she wants to know what a brain freeze feels like because last time they had pork chops or something. I feel like the dialogue could be more normalize to help with the exposition like for example have Shoky be excited about the food and Ryan question why she's so fascinated in the first place. Make him ask why and in response to her rambling, he explain why he thinks humans are well to be feared.

A little grammar things. This sentence was a little awkward: "Ryan tried to pull his arm back with Shoky still attached. But Shoky resisted." There should be a comma where the period is unless you were intentionally setting a fragment there to give some emphasis. In this sentence, "Today we welcome home our beloved pilots and scientists who risked their lives so that we might partake in the savage cuisine of the greatly feared Earth" I don't really like the use of savage here. I feel it's a bit of an awkward adjective even though I know what you were trying to do with it. You don't have to capitalize things if you would describe the characters more so that the audience knows the characters are excited or not. Body language speaks volumes. Also write out your numbers in prose.

One last thing, I found Nalie's introduction to be a bit weird for me because she was so friendly. Maybe that's how you want her to be unconventional about how children would normally be around aliens. If so, then it's cool. I liked the last part and it does do the job of getting the reader to read more.

[DB Heinemann]

Yea, other people I've shown this to have similar complaints on exposition. I never have been able to figure out HOW to do more showing than telling, though, so your suggestions are very helpful.

I do explain Ryan and Shoky's class in a later chapter but it might make more sense to put it in earlier. And actually, this would have been the first time human food has ever been introduced gto Zenon except by what they've seen on TV. And they can't eat it right now- Zenon was going to throw a big opening festival first. I'll have to make that more clear.

And dear me, I didn't mean for Nalie to come off as friendly though now I see why you would think that. You'll find out in the next chapter she's had some time to desensitize to aliens but her introduction still should have been at least a little timid, hesitant. I'll have to add some words there.

And thanks for the grammar heads up. I do know basic grammar and prefer getting it right the first time but sometimes when I'm in a writing frenzy it just slips me. This certainly has given me some good ideas on how to rewrite the chapter and make it more clear and less exposition-y. So thanks again! I'll have to return the favor sometime.

[Stars and Whales]

I love the concept, love the genre :) I think the main thing I would advise you is to show, not tell, and read over your work to find for yourself any awkward sentences that there may be. However, I did very much enjoy the story, i think the characters are done nicely, and the sci-fi aspect of it is very well done and the scientific concepts are great. I'll keep reading to the next few chapters.

[DB Heinemann]

Thanks! I have been told I need to show more. Definitely something I gotta polish once I finish all the writing and go back for the second draft. But I still try to get as many critiques on this one as possible. This being my main project.
But I'm glad you otherwise enjoyed it! Hope you enjoy the future chapters as well.

[Curly Q]

You have many sentences that end in a comma when they should have questions marks. At the end of a character talking, always place a period or a question mark if appropriate.

Show his reaction to first seeing the human, it will add to this end of the chapter.

[DB Heinemann]

Ooh, sorry about the grammar. I'll revise. And I think it's a lot more suspenseful to just end it with Nalie saying hi. Makes you want to go to the next chapter to find out how Ryan reacts.