He was trapped on a death world

He was trapped on a death world and the old human was staring at him.

He had never met an old human face to face before. He had seen them from a distance or seen them in pictures, but he had never actually met one before...... he was beginning to think that was a good thing. Captain Vir's sire was tall and well-muscled with steel grey hair and matching eyes. His hands were thickly calloused and bent from years of work, and that expression of his could have melted iron.

The man tapped his fingers on the tabletop keeping Krill locked in his gaze.

"Where did you say you were from?" The man demanded as the storm raged outside snow and ice pounding against the house's siding threatening to rip the house from its foundation and throw it into the sky.

He was trapped on a death world with its death species.

He stammered out a response, and instead of appearing pleased, the human's eyes narrowed further, "And what is it you do on my son's ship?"

More stammering.

"A surgeon. And where did you learn, what makes you qualified to treat humans."

Captain Vir came to his rescue then placing a hand on his father's shoulder, "Dad, give him a break. He's one of the most experienced, and best members of my crew. I have and will trust him with my life...." He paused, "Don't tell mom, but he was the one who performed the surgery when I.... you know lost my eye."

The man leaned back in his chair arms crossed, "Fine."

In comparison to her mate, the human female was almost opposite in her personality, and it didn't really seem to matter what Captain Vir did or did not say. Not a few minutes after they had gotten inside, she sat him down aggressively crooning over his missing eye.

"My poor boy..... why do you have to be so reckless. I told your father that you joining the army was a bad idea. And now here you are, missing your leg AND your eye." She hugged him to her chest as he squirmed, "I have half a mind to call someone about this."

"Agh.... Mom, I'm fine, really."

Krill looked on in uncomfortable interest shifting at the glower the old human shot at him, but interested in the protective and smothering aggression the female human was showing. As far as he understood Captain Vir was not a child, so there was really no reason for her to be acting like this. He was just now beginning to realize he knew absolutely nothing about human social structures.

He was about to get an even bigger shock when a booming voice roared from the top of the stairs followed by a chorus of three other voices.

"BABY BROTHER!"

Krill looked up just in time to see the three large, human men charged down the stairs to tackle his friend.

The three of them went to the ground hard, and Krill squealed ducking under the table as the three of them began to struggle yelling and squirming.

"HOLD HIM STILL!" One of them yelled

"HE WON'T STOP SQUIRMING!"

"GOT IT!"

And just like that, the three humans rolled away leaping to their feet, one of them triumphantly holding his bionic leg aloft.

Vir stumbled, with difficulty to his foot, "Come on guys give it back." He lurched towards the brother with the leg, but the man tossed it to the shorter brother.

"Sorry, I don't have it, Jeremy does."

Vir turned holding out his hand. The leg was tossed over his head to the third human.

Vir sighed, "You know, I need that to walk."

"Oh come on, stumpy, it's much more fun to watch you hop."

Krill watched from the safety of the table as the gang of humans continued their game of keep-away. The sudden change in dynamic had him in a tailspin. He was just so used to the captain in charge of everything, and here he was helpless against a gang of three humans in his own home. Was it normal for human families to aggressively tease a disabled sibling? It seemed sort of barbaric to Krill.

Vir lunged for one of his brothers, but caught his foot on the outstretched foot of another and came down hard.

His brothers laughed, "DAVID JOSUPH VIR, give him his leg back this instant." Krill looked over to find the female human marching over to swipe the leg from the tallest human, "Honestly, he's your brother and you three act like a couple of wild animals. It must have been hard enough for him to lose his leg much less have his own brothers teasing him so."

She handed the leg back to Vir planting a kiss on the top of his head, "There you go."

With a sigh and a grumble he accepted the leg, "Thanks."

Behind her back the other two boys were making kissy faces. One whispering, "Here comes mommy to the rescue of her little boy."

"Don't sass me Thomas." The woman said turning to glower at the two.

Krill looked on in confusion. He had sort of assumed that the old human would be the Alpha in the human pack, but no, the female seemed to have the greatest amount of pull. At her scolding the three boys had wilted and began shuffling their feet heads down. The alpha female nodded smugly and turned back to her work bustling away leaving the four brothers to glare at each other. Vir had reattached his leg and was watching the oldest brother, a sudden grin split his face and that was the only warning as the man leaped from his sitting position tackling his brother to the floor quickly dominating him one on one and with all his limbs attached.

Krill was forced to duck under the table once more as the wrestling turned to knocking over chairs with flailing feet and fists.

The wrestling grew so violent that they nearly toppled a shelf holding a couple of picture frames.

"ADAM, JEREMY, I swear to the dear LORD, that if you two break my pictures, I will put you over my knee!"

As the two pulled away from each other climbing back to their feet, Krill emerged from under the table. Interesting, it seemed if you were going to discipline a human you had to call them by their full name.... they appeared to have three. A new development since he had always just assumed the captain's name was Vir.

It seemed that was actually a family name.

"GAH the HELL is that!"

Krill nearly tripped over himself as the three humans surrounded him eyes wide with curiosity poking and prodding at him. He squealed and tried to hide under the table again, but they wouldn't let him.

"Where do you think you're going?" The shortest human asked bending down to examine his antennae.

Thank goodness Captain Vir came to his rescue stepping in between him and the three humans, "Hey, go easy, he isn't used to humans. And he especially isn't used to your ugly mugs."

One of the humans peered over his shoulder, "He? Can it talk?"

"Of course he can talk jackass."

"ADAM! Don't make your father get the soap."

Captain Vir cleared his throat, "Uh sorry, mom."

Krill quickly hid behind Vir's leg staring up at the three curious, and intimidating humans. He waved an arm, "Hi..."

The human's eyes widened and they stepped back before rushing back in again with exclamations of wonder.

***

Turned out the captain had only brought him here because the crew was due for some leave, and he hadn't wanted to leave Krill alone on a human colony. Krill honestly wasn't sure how he felt about all of this. The weather made it pretty clear why everyone called it a death planet. If he were to step outside he would die within minutes, though the humans seemed far less worried. A few of them even admitted to enjoying the weather.... Crazy

Still it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to learn about the human social structure.

From wat he had learned, humans were usually born only one at a time with years between them. The oldest tended to claim seniority over the younger though all of the brothers complained that the youngest received special treatment by the mother.

The mother was the human female that seemed to the alpha of the household, she took care of most everything including the making and preparing of food. She had power over the male alpha who only really stepped in when his offspring were out of line. Additionally he doted on the human female and was often sent out to perform tasks in the cold. He was responsible for discipline when one of the offspring did something that the human female really did not like.

All of the offspring were old enough to be out of the house, but they had returned to their den for a "Holiday" And to see their younger brother who rarely had time to make it home when everyone else did. They had a sister too, but she was married with a toddler and another on the way, so she would only be able to visit once.

They all seemed very interested in krill, where he came from, what he did, and how he did it. They very much scared him. These humans had never been off-world and so were not used to interacting with species that weren't used to humans. Compared to Captain vir, they were aggressive, emotional, and quite volatile. Captain Vir constantly had to remind them that humans were considered dangerous toth rest of the universe, and that it might be best for them to tone themselves down.

They had trouble with that.

Turns out the blizzard outside wasn't even that intense for this time of year, and they expected a worse one within the week.

Krill very much felt that he was about to die, or that he would die on this visit.

If it wasn't from exposure to the elements than it would definitely be exposure to the untamed humans.

The mother was very nice, upon asking him what he ate and him responding with photosynthesis, she had ordered one of her children to bring a specific type of lamp up from the basement. It was sweet in the way that humans are, or the way that this human was. She was aggressively worried about his health, wellbeing and needs, and made sure that her boys didn't bother him too much. He found himself hiding behind her legs.... A lot.

He was about 95% sure he was going to die here.