In the Name of Earth

Chapter 7: Midnight Snack

For weeks on end, Qui’Mal had been the center of all attention from the students of EDS. Every young diplomat, administrator, soldier and engineer wanted to talk to the strange, pink-furred creature. Some of the girls were even developing a suspicious obsession with him. Marvin himself would eventually make use of the opportunity of interacting with his first alien in depth, but first he took advantage of the distraction Qui’Mal generated to have a quality breakfast with Alexa.

He had not needed to ask Ludwig twice before the young engineer hurried to pester the interchange student, leaving Marvin by himself with Alexa. The meal had been pleasant, despite them not talking about much more than their respective courses and sharing curiosities about the ESD and the Milky Way. No matter how many months or years each of them had been in that station, there was still much for them to learn, and it was fun learning it together.

From that day on, Alexa and Marvin would eventually share meals, slowly growing closer to each other and giving Marvin his first true friend in the Administration. Now the only branch with which Marvin had no contact on a daily basis was the military, who usually kept a separate meal schedule. Maybe it was because of their protein boosted diet or the timesheet disposition of their 0-G drills (never a good idea on full stomachs), but Marvin failed to shake the feeling that there was more to it. That the men and women in black uniforms were purposefully kept apart from the rest of the crew. He refrained from sharing any theories or rumors with his friends, and only once approached the subject with his father, only to be quickly dismissed. One way or another, concerns stemmed exclusively from curiosity, and whatever the military’s purpose was, it was none of Marvin’s business.

All he could do for the time being was appreciate his multidisciplinary breakfasts. Breakfasts that would grow even more interdisciplinary as another figure gravitated towards Marvin and Ludwig. Qui’Mal himself.

Once the collective fascination with the alien started wearing off, it fell on Marvin, the unofficial prince of the academy, son of the big man upstairs, to play host for the alien. Learning about his unique pantless culture and history was fascinating, even if the pink fur managed to somehow get everywhere and if his smell. There was also the fact that, being an adolescent, Qui’Mal would exhale a get-wrenching stench every five days as results of a hormonal overload. Still, based on Marvin’s readings on xenobiology, there were species with far worse puberty symptoms, so stinking was the least of the possible evils.

It had also been interesting to learn that Qui’Mal was already destined to be a Pact-Sealer, the Nikal equivalent to a diplomat, as a bloodline inheritance. His parents and their parents and their parent before them had all been Pact-Sealers, and—as the firstborn of the next generation—so would Qui’Mal.

Some whispered that Marvin’s proximity to the alien was a power move from his father to grow closer to a key member of the Nikal elite, but the truth was that Marvin and his friends genuinely liked the pink dude’s company.

“Okay, check this out,” Marvin jumped from his bed to get Ludwig and Qui’Mal’s attention while they basked on the spoils of Lud’s last raid on the galley. “I’ve been practicing a Rampav Death-Duel Summoning! Ready?”

Once his friends’ three eyes were focused on him, Marvin spread his pajama-clad legs, puffed his chest, stretched one arm pointing up and one arm pointing back, and shouted:

“HAEEYE!” he spun his arms once and kicked the air, dropping to a wide crouching stance immediately after. “Arme-kama-arme-kama-YE!” he jumped in a 180-degree turn. “A-hay-NA! Hay-a-NA! A-A-Hay-a-NA!”

For another twenty seconds, Marvin sung with all his lungs and flayed his arms, legs and neck in a whirlwind of confusing dance moves. When he was finished, the room fell silent for a second, then erupted in laughter.

Lud was clutching his belly and rolling on his bed. Qui’Mal bangged the floor with his large hairy hands while emitted the hoarse growls that passed for a laugh.

“Yeah, keep laughing you two!” Marvin said, and keep laughing they did.

“Why do you even need a Death Dance, man?” Lud asked between cackles.

“It’s not a dance, it’s a summoning! An important part of Rampav culture, okay?” Marvin said. “Several wars have been avoided throughout Rampav history by replacing battles with honorable duels!”

“Do you expect to prevail against mighty Rampav champion?” Qui’Mal asked.

“Hopefully, they’d rather submit without a fight,” Marvin mumbled. “Okay, I’ll leave that as a last resort.”

“Hey, do you think that’s why we have so many soldiers around?” Lud asked, calmer now and sipping a beer. “To represent humanity in trials by combat or whatever?”

Returning to his bed, Marvin pondered about the suggestion. “I’ve never heard of humanity engaging in rituals of the kind, but that would make sense. Several militaristic species have one-on-one combat traditions as a diplomatic alternative.”

“That would be futile,” Qui’Mal chipped in. “Even in technological parity, humans display severe physiological inferiority to most species.”

“Hey!” Lud was evidently offended.

“He’s not wrong, though,” Marvin shrugged, then approached Qui’Mal with a closed fist. Marvin was tall and muscular. Generally, a large man for human standards. Still, his closed fist paled in comparison to Qui’Mal’s. Under all the fur, they knew, laid even larger arms and legs, and the pink hunchback was actually composed of hyperdeveloped muscles. Marvin was very aware of that. “In general we are slower, weaker, less resistant and more susceptible to natural hazards than most other species.”

“Nikal great climbers that can resist ice and sun thanks to glorious coat!” Qui’Mal shook his body, a pink cloud rising around him. “Humans bad climbers and bald!”

“We’ll see when someone pokes that big eye, dummkopf!” Lud snapped back.

“On that subject, I will be required to terminate you in twenty minutes, Ludwig.”

Lud choked on his beer and pounded his chest to force the drink down. “What?”

“We made Pact this morning. I surrendered tasty dessert meal. In exchange, you promised human delicacy… burrito, at night. In twenty minutes, it is no longer night, and Pact is broken. Your life shall be claimed in reparation.”

“You’re kidding, right?” Lud turned to Marvin. “He’s kidding, right?”

“Dude, you shouldn’t have made a Pact with a Nikal.”

“It was a handshake deal!”

“Pact!” Qui’Mal interjected. “Spiritual obligation demands reparation.”

“Sorry, Lud, but it’s their thing,” Marvin shrugged. “Deals are sacred to these guys, you break them, they need to kill you to save their souls. You better get this man a burrito or teleport back to Earth asap!”

“Scheisse! You’re serious!” Lud stood up and ran for the door. “I think I can get to the kitchen in time. We have burritos on the lunch menu for tomorrow.”

“Eighteen minutes, Ludwig.”

“Stop pressuring me!”

“You’ll never be there and back in time Lud,” Marvin intervened.

“Then I shall accompany,” Qui’Mal stood up himself. “I wish not to harm friend.”

“Oh, thanks for the sentiment, Barney! Keep your voice down and follow me!” Ludwig led the pink alien into the corridor, leaving Marvin alone in the room. It took a while for the facts to sink in, but it eventually downed on him that if the two men failed to get to the galley in time they could be looking at major political crisis. Either because a Nikal heir murdered a human in human soil or because humanity would be harboring a fugitive whose life could cost Qui’Mal his alien equivalent to a soul.

All over a f*****g burrito.

They would need a diplomat with them!

Before following the two on their midnight fridge raid—which just so happened to have galactic stakes—Marvin grabbed his infopad. There was someone he needed to message before that adventure!

***

“Okay, keep quiet!” Lud hissed to his roommate and the alien watching him unscrew the maintenance hatch from the wall. The main atrium of the Educational Center, often bustling with activity, was now deserted and only illuminated by faint emergency lights and the distant starlight. The only people present were the three man. Hopefully everyone else was sleeping and not afflicted by nocturnal wanderlust.

 “What the f**k what you doing?” Alexa Hilburn asked coming down the stairs in the darkness, her white fluttering nightdress resembling an apparition.

“What the…?” Lud looked at the woman, then back to Marvin. “You called her? Really?!”

“Admin needs to document this!” Marvin whispered.

“My untimely demise?!”

“What’s going on?” Alexa, at least, was now whispering too.

“The first human engagement in a sacred Nikal Pact!” Marvin explained. “Isn’t that fantastic?”

“Because it’s not your ass on the line!” Lud hissed back.

“We have eleven minutes, Ludwig,” Qui’Mal informed. “Haste would be wise.”

“Fine! Scheisse!” the human yanked the maintenance grid out of the wall and squeezed into the crammed access. “Try not to leave your pink hair all over the place, it’ll clog up the filters!”

“I should definitely report this…” Alexa said, sliding into the engineering tunnel after the three men, still unclear on what exactly was happening, but unable to resist seeing it through.

***

Given how the maintenance access passed right next to the staff quarters ventilation system, speaking would be excessively risky, leaving no time for Marvin to even try and explain the situation to Alexa.

“There!” Marvin pointed as they snuck through a cluster of pipes and panels. The kitchen was in sight, just past a bulky generator powering the freezers.

“We can’t sneak through,” Lud continued moving. “Need to reach the auditorium antechamber, from there to the cafeteria and then the kitchen through the power grid.”

“We have only two minutes!” Marvin warned.

Cracking his massive fingers, Qui’Mal tackled the generator blocking the way to the kitchen, lifted it and pushed the thing until a passage wide enough was open.

“Or we do that…” Lud scratched his blonde hair and hurried into the kitchen, dashing straight to the fridge, from which he removed every packed food in a reckless search. “Come on, come on. Where is it?”

Qui’Mal and Marvin wasted no time and started looking too.

“What are we looking for?” Alexa asked with a calm notoriously contrasting the rest of the group.

“A burrito!” Marvin almost yelled the response.

“What? Why?”

“One minute and fifteen seconds!” Marvin did yell this time.

“Okay, geez!” throwing her hands up, Alexa walked across the kitchen, opened the freezer door and immediately paced to the back of the third of seven shelves of boxed foods. She reached for an unmarked box on the second shelf and pulled a frozen burrito from it.

“This works?” she asked, leaving the freezer and offering the frozen cylinder to the pink alien.

“No!” Marvin hurried and intercepted the burrito.

Fifteen seconds!

Ripping the burrito’s off the woman’s manicured hands, Marvin lobbed it to Ludwig.

Ten seconds!

Ludwig fumbled the slippery delicacy and hurried to pick it from the ground.

Five seconds!

Sweating his butt off, Ludwig ran for the awaiting Nikal and pushed the meal into his huge hands.

“Ludwig Weber, the Pact is fulfilled,” Qui’Mal said and, while Ludwig breathed in relief, the alien took a huge bite of the frozen burrito. “It is delicious indeed!”

“It’s frozen, man!” Lud said, still a bit out of breath.

“Is it not meant to be?”

Watching as the engineer and the alien bickered, Marvin sighed. His first crisis control. Not bad for a first time.

“How did you know where to find the burrito?” Marvin asked Alexa as the adrenaline wore off.

“The food doesn’t stock itself, Grant. Too much for appreciating Admin work.”

“You just saved a man’s life, you know that?” Marvin smiled. “Maybe stopped a war.”

“So you’ll tell me what just happened?”

“Sure… Let’s just get out of here first.”

“One sec,” Alexa stepped back towards the freezer and winked at Marvin. “I just so happen to know where they stash Globian Ale too!”