Not attacking. Not scheming. Splooting —the full-body, belly-down, legs-akimbo sprawl of a creature that had given up on dignity entirely.
Klik’s voice crackled over the comm. “Dr. Voss? Are you… bonding with the anomaly?” splootalien
For the next six hours, she tried everything. Fish-shaped treats? The splootalien rolled onto its side, splooting laterally. Holographic prey? It batted it once with a limp paw, then ignored it. A mirror? The alien looked at its own reflection, seemed to admire its pancake-like grandeur, and splooted harder. Not attacking
By morning, the creature had splooted its way into the station’s common room, claimed the softest sleeping pod, and been officially named “Captain Pancake.” The probes launched just fine once the crew realized the gravitational issue was just Captain Pancake purring at a specific resonant frequency. Klik’s voice crackled over the comm
Dr. Xylar Voss, a xenobiologist who had seen enough horrors to fill three field guides, was dispatched immediately. When her lander punctured the ammonia-sulfur atmosphere, she expected tentacles, teeth, or at least a good old-fashioned acidic ooze. Instead, she found it .
Dr. Voss stepped closer. The splootalien rotated one googly eye toward her. Slowly, majestically, it lifted one floppy leg and let it flop back down with a wet thwap .
She patted the splootalien’s fuzzy flank. “ Thwap. ”