Ardurian Scouts

By Andrea Tillmanns

Illustrated Lannie Pihajlic

I had always suspected that there was something different about me. Neither my siblings nor my parents were interested in philosophy, astronomy, or botany. In fact, they didn’t even read. I, on the other hand, devoured every newspaper and especially every book I could find. Provided, of course, that no one noticed. I had realized early on that people didn’t understand cats reading.

So, it seemed obvious that, despite my outward resemblance to my siblings, I might be adopted. This was not so unusual among humans, as I had learned from various newspapers and magazines. When, out of sheer boredom, I occasionally lay down in front of the TV where my mistress usually watched undemanding programs after work, I realized that adoptions were part of every good early evening series.

Once I had clarified this question to my satisfaction, I could have lived a quiet life. Unfortunately, I had many more questions, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that neither my mistress nor my adoptive mother could answer them, not to mention my siblings. The latter were perfectly content to chase balls of yarn, groom their paws, and scratch at the ground. I, on the other hand, always wanted to learn more.

Unfortunately, there weren’t very many books in my mistress’s house, and most of them weren’t very scientific. I was able to learn a few things about human reproductive habits, but hardly anything about the rest of the world. However, I soon learned what TV programs to watch at what times while my mistress was at work. Apparently, television was also an acceptable form of leisure activity to my adoptive mother and my siblings; at least they bothered me much less than when I was reading a book or the daily newspaper. In this way, I learned mathematics, biology, a little English and Spanish… but I was most interested in programs about astronomy and astrophysics. I learned how the solar system and the universe were structured, what theories there were about black holes and dark matter, how the Big Bang was imagined, and what interpretations the general theory of relativity allowed. And when I wasn’t sitting in front of the TV or reading a book to learn more about the world and the people in it, I would sometimes look up at the sky from the garden and imagine what it would be like if cats could fly through space and visit the moon, the nearest planets, or even more distant destinations.

What can I say—on my very first birthday, I learned that this was actually possible. Well, maybe not for cats in general, but for me. That day, my biological parents came to pick me up.

But first things first: my birthday started just like any other day, except that my siblings and I got an extra treat for breakfast and our mistress promised to bring us a real gift in the evening after work. Since it was probably not a book on string theory, which I really wanted to understand better, I found this announcement far less exciting than my siblings, who still only understood fragments of human language but reliably recognized the word “gift.” That’s why my brother and my two sisters were very excited all day long, when, as on every day with nice weather, they opened the garden gate to romp around outside. They weren’t supposed to do that, but they were still young and boisterous… and I was pretty sure our owner knew they did, too. She must have noticed long ago that we were usually already in the garden when she came home briefly at lunchtime to let us out. Even if she didn’t read scientific books, she was certainly smarter than my siblings.

Normally, I would have taken the opportunity to watch a documentary about different animals or even space. Today, however, I felt like lying down on the lawn and staring at the sky. That’s why I was the first to see the spaceship slowly approaching. My siblings were so engrossed in their game that they didn’t notice it until it had already landed. And even then, they were more irritated than interested. My brother and my adoptive mother even ran back into the house as a precaution, while my sisters just moved a little away from the unknown object and hissed at it suspiciously. You never know…

When a hatch opened, I was the only one who jumped straight in and looked around. The spaceship wasn’t particularly large, but from my eye level, some things seemed too high, as if it had been built for small people or very large cats.

And just a moment later, I saw why. “Mom? Dad?” I asked, even though I was actually sure. You can sense something like that. Even if the two of them didn’t look quite as I had expected. I didn’t mind that their nostrils were on the sides of their heads and that their circular mouths revealed many rows of pointed teeth, but the third eye on their foreheads seemed to look straight into me—I had never experienced that feeling before. On Earth, I had never encountered a creature with such a special eye.

“Oh, how big you’ve grown!” Mom—or Dad, I wasn’t quite sure—bent down to me and hugged me tightly. “And how we missed you…”

“You could have stayed here,” I replied dryly.

“But we have a job to do!” Dad objected, and I thought I saw his three eyebrows raise in alarm. “Ardurian scouts have the most important job in the world. You can’t take a break just because you’ve had a baby.”

“And it didn’t occur to you to take me with you?” I asked.

“But child, that would have been far too dangerous,” Mom replied. “In our first year of life, we Ardurians don’t tolerate radiation in space as well as we do when we’re older. That’s why we’re here now—to finally bring you to us.”

That sounded good—even though it would certainly take me quite a while to get used to their appearance. Which brought an important question to mind… “Tell me, why do I look so different from you? And will I stay this way… or will I change as I get older?”

“It’s just for your protection,” explained Dad. “The Ardurian ambassadors haven’t made contact with the population of this planet yet; that’s not supposed to happen for a few Earth years. With such uncivilized planets, we always make sure that our offspring look like the population. But don’t worry, that will change as soon as you fly home with us. On Arduria, the best doctors will make sure that you soon regain your natural form—and lose this uncivilized fur,” he said, now furrowing his outer eyebrows and raising only the upper one.

Two instances of “uncivilized” in one sentence, and one directly referring to me—that wasn’t quite what I would have expected from my first contact with my biological parents. Not to mention the three eyes… “If you want to make contact with humans in a few years, you might want to choose a different form,” I said defiantly. “They would probably be afraid of your current form.”

My biological parents looked at each other, and I could see their confusion, even though their faces still irritated me. “Humans?” Dad finally asked. “What are we supposed to do with them? We wanted to make contact with the masters of this world, and they’re dogs and cats.”

Now I was baffled. How could they be so wrong? “Dogs and cats believe that,” I finally said, “but it’s the humans you need to talk to. They think about space, about the theory of relativity… and, of course, string theory.” I didn’t need to tell them that I still didn’t understand the latter because my mistress simply didn’t have a decent book on the subject. “Dogs and cats are really only interested in food and play—and grown-up stuff.” At least I had read quite a bit about that.

“Oh.” The two looked at each other again. “But that doesn’t really change anything. In a few Earth years, we’ll send an ambassador to Earth and offer humans a seat on the Galactic Trade Council. The main thing is that they sell us spices that aren’t available anywhere else.”

I shook my head and laughed. “If the ambassador looks just like you, then it won’t work. You’d better send someone whose appearance is familiar to humans, someone they don’t fear…” The idea took shape without me even trying. “For example, someone who looks like a cat.”

Well, what can I say—I still look like a cat, and when I’m not alone, I try to behave like one too. Every time I look out of the window at the sky in the evening, I imagine my biological parents continuing to explore space and finding new species, and maybe I already have more biological siblings who all look completely different. Maybe I’ll meet them someday. In the meantime, I’m trying to learn more and more about Earth and its inhabitants, and I’m preparing myself to slowly accustom humans to the idea that they are not alone in the universe as an ambassador for my home world in a few years. After all, who better to do this than a cat, man’s greatest source of comfort?