I hear distant conversations before I notice the sun hitting my eyelids. I take a deep breath and open them begrudgingly asking the sun, in my head, why it had to wake me. The first thing I see is Nik's upside-down head with a flaming pool under it. I guess they decided against leaving for a few days and came back in the middle of the night.
"Dude."
"..."
"Nik, you're on fire."
"I stay sleepy."
"NIK!"
"ngmm, what?"
An eye opened lazily and went wide when he noticed the fire and proceeded to roll on top of it; the commotion woke Catty up. She glared at him before speaking.
"How did you not burn down Canada before we got there?"
"Shut up."
Nik wiped at his face, shot a glance out the gaping hole and made his way to the elevator. I stretched and followed suit. Catty got up slowly and scratched at the floor which was just aflame before following.
"Damn Nik, you're over here melting space metal and shit."
"That's probably some lower quality indoor stuff."
"Negative. The metal used throughout the ship is of the same quality."
"That, freaks me out..." Nik said trailing off at the end, unsure which of the brothers voices that was.
"I'm Rould."
"Rould, that freaks me out."
"I apologize."
The three of us piled into the elevator. I pawed at the screen and we started moving to the mess hall.
"So – Rould, Are you in here too?" Nik asked apprehensively.
"My brothers and I are accessible throughout most of the remnants of the Dreadnaught Class, Shinimorte."
"So, you watch us sleep?"
"I watch everyone sleep if you want to put it that way."
"That's creepy man."
"That's what I told him." Vould said flatly.
"Silence Vould. Someone has to monitor the crew's vitals."
The doors opened and I clumsily made my way around the kitchen, gathering the food Yora stored for us after we went hunting. As we sat down to eat Catty commented on my choice of meal.
"Oats, grains, and fruit... You part horse too?"
Nik burst out laughing at Catty's comment, as did Vould whom decided to join us for breakfast by projecting his head in the mess hall.
"What? I mean we're still human, it's not like we only have to eat meat. Plus this just... is more appetizing to me in the morning for some reason."
"Well I do remember Emmy making fun of you for eating 'old people' cereal whenever you came over. You were the only reason we bought the stuff."
"Who's Emmy, again?"
There was a short, awkward silence before Catty answered.
"He was our best friend."
Her words dropped in my stomach like a stone.
"... I'm sorry I don't remember."
"Panzer, we told you already, don't beat yourself up over it. If you remember, you remember. You don't have to know everything. It's not your fault."
"Ugh." I suddenly remembered yesterday and the crowd of people still outside.
"What dude?" Nik asked with a mouth full of pumpkin.
I looked at him wishing I could go back to bed.
"Know everything."
Catty finished her breakfast and brought her plate to the cleaning area as Nik and I continued.
"Oh right - you've become the village elder." Nik said between bites.
"Oh come on, that makes me sound old. I'm only... how old am I again?"
Catty dropped her plate into the washer.
"You're 34 years old or like, 7-ish months, not counting your feral time."
I slumped to the floor, the rest of my food no longer looked appetizing.
"Why do I have to be Google for everyone?"
"Beats the shit outta me dude. Hey, does anyone else find it weird that we eat horse even though some people turned into horses?"
Silence fell over the room, even Vould was speechless. After a few seconds I tried to rationalize it.
"Well... human - horses are larger than normal ones, same with the rest of us and... well... Yeah it's pretty frickin weird."
"I'm a dragon so it doesn't bother me."
"Nik, your ass is reptilian, not a dragon." Catty said sitting back down at the table, opposite Nik.
"Dragons are reptiles Catty! And, I can breathe fire!"
"You don't breathe shit, you're a squirt gun!"
"... Close enough!"
"Guys I'm gonna go downstairs and..."
They continued arguing, paying me no mind. I dropped my bowl of food into the preserver and made my way to the massive group of people outside.
When I got down to the lobby almost everyone seemed to be looking into the ship expectantly. Their gazes caught me off guard and when I got outside I stood at the threshold awkwardly, staring at them before I finally let out a nervous "Hi". I moved back to my spot and almost immediately someone fluttered up to me.
"Is it true you were the first one to wake up?"
"I... Yeah, well on this continent anyway. I don't know about the others."
"What abo.... What's with the sign?"
"What sign?"
He rose his wing to point, and above me was a crude hologram of a flashing neon sign. 'Village Kitten: Q&A'.
"Not funny Vould!"
"I thought it was Kitten."
A few people from the crowd snickered. One guy laughed a little too hard and started coughing.
"Well my other question was, what about the rumour that you're psychic? Is that true?"
"Well... Vould, can you put on the loudspeaker so I don't have to say this 500 times today?"
"You're live Kitten."
His words echoed over the area making me blush, if it was possible for me to blush.
"Ok. On the topic of if I'm psychic the answer is complicated. Um, I can only talk to people I apparently knew from before the Shinimorte was crashed into Earth. Also it's not a one way street. The friends I was lucky enough to find can hear my thoughts as well and there's a distance limitation. About 20 feet. So to those closest to me, if you can't hear me think, I can't hear you think.
"You seem to be doing much better now."
My eyes shot to a bush that shook with seemingly no one near it. At that moment I heard Nik and Catty still arguing as they came into the sunlight. The large Parrot who had asked the questions extended a wing which I met with my paw.
"You don't seem to be as much of an asshole as some others are saying."
The loudspeaker was still on so everyone heard the Parrot's comment which caused more than a few people to go rigid.
"Well... thank you? I guess? I don't go out of my way to be one really. Vould can you turn off the speaker please?"
He didn't respond which lead me to believe he was either ignoring me or he was on another Section, more than likely it was the former.
"Well I guess everyone's going to be heard today, unless you have stage fright."
A few chuckles rolled across the crowd. I glanced in the direction I heard the thought from again but didn't see anything. 3 giant Chip-monks came up to me and they looked frightened.
"Wassup guys, don't be afraid."
"We're girls."
"Triplets."
"We don't know what to do."
"Sorry, I meant 'guys' as a catch all, I didn't mean any disrespect. Um, you don't know what to do about what?"
"What are we suppose to doing?"
Their voices sounded fairly young.
"I don... how old are you three?"
They looked at each other and seemed to be talking with their eyes before the middle one spoke.
"We were 10, but now we're 13."
"O... oh. Um, well... Mei-lin! Are you still here? I need your help." I spoke nervously. It was odd but I felt that I was never really good with kids.
The giraffe stood up and made her way through the crowd, the Gorilla she made friends with followed her.
"Can you help me here?"
"Help you with what? I'm no good with kids."
"You said you wanted to have one."
"That doesn't make me an expert Panzer!" Her eyes went wide with confusion and refusal. She huffed away her reprehension and spoke to the girls.
"What do you three want, specifically?"
"Well, we talked with some people and they said since we can't find our dad we should find someone who could help us."
Mei-lin knelt down, looking each of them in the eye.
"You know, your dad... he might not..."
"We know. He could have died like our mom."
"But daddy told us what we should and shouldn't do."
"But now... we don't know."
The children's bluntness of acknowledging their parents death's made sections of the crowd go quiet.
The Gorilla looked at me, on the verge of tears as he spoke.
"We don't know how many more children are wandering out there without parents!"
He walked towards them and sat down between Mei-lin and the triplets.
"We have to work together." He said putting his hand out, palm up.
Mei-lin was almost recalcitrant. "You want the three of us to raise them?"
I shook my head quickly. "Not the three of us, ALL of us."
I looked out at the crowd, making sure I had everyone's attention.
"It's been said, things are different. We have to change now. The fact there are so many of us gathered here and no one is fighting even though we are different animals is important. We have changed. I'm sure many of us have heard the term, it takes a village to raise a child. Well, Village, they are our children. Just like any others who are afraid and alone."
I looked towards the triplets with a curious glance.
"Do you three realize how strong you are?"
"We're not strong."
"We're mice."
"Well specifically you're Chipmunks. Which... are basically mice." Vould said catching some people off guard, I continued when Vould finished.
"It takes a strong mind and will to wake up from feeling like an animal. Do you remember how you felt before you started thinking with words?"
"We were scared and then we were less scared."
"Then we started eating vegetables. I hate vegetables."
"Then yesterday we saw people with necklaces and they were talking out loud! We wanted to talk to other people besides us. So we came here and got them. But now we don't know what to do."
Mei-lin looked surprised.
"You three can talk telepathically?"
"What's telepathically?"
I answered almost immediately.
"It means you can hear each other in your heads."
The triplets looked hesitant before one of them responded.
"Yes. We could do that before. Daddy told us we'd scare people if we told them."
"But now everyone is scary so we think it's ok to tell you.
There were a few gasps and whispers that rippled across the crowd and more than a few people were nodding. Everyone was scary now.