He could feel his own heart squeezing his chest, stabbing it with a million needles of fear every second he stood before this creature- this was a fucking alien, a alien that was now going into his phone, he brought a live alien into his house and they're going into his phone, he's, he's, he's-

He places a hand on his chest, taking deep breaths In and out as he calmed down, the cyborg of the red lights before him didn't seem to notice the panic attack he was having- did they even know what a panic attack was? Or did they assume this was normal human behavior? Out of everyone in this goddamn place he was the last pick to be receipt of… this

The robot raises their gaze suddenly, raising their clawed finger in realization- that move is enough to push him more against the door he was putting his weight against, but they don't go towards him, instead they quickly scoot towards a place underneath his small wall TV- his router, they begin looking around it with almost desperate curiousness… are… are they looking for the password?

Telling himself and again and again the facts of this situation he gathered courage- if they wanted to harm him, they would have done so some minutes ago with the door, after all, he put his entire damn weight into pushing it back and he was being overpowered regardless by this small creature.

He walks by their side, the cyborg creature holding the fully connected router a bit too roughly for his taste as he gently takes it from their hands, watching those bright digital eyes blink and look at him puzzled as he simply rotates the thing a bit forwards, pointing at the small sticker underneath it with a slender shaky finger "This what you searching for? The password?" He doesn't know if they can understand him still, but the nervousness in him makes him speak anyways.

He can see something fluffy brushing the floor behind them, a fuzzy white tail the same color of most of their fur as they take the router from his hands… 'just like a dog' he thinks, it was almost enough to brush off the fear in his chest, almost.

The cyborg sets the router down, thank god, and places a semi metallic hand underneath her 'visor', her digital eyes now closed as she begins slowly pacing around the room with calm steps, the sound of their metallic (?) claws touching against his tile floor making the back of his neck all wiggly and nervous….

Then they turn around suddenly, getting closer to the dude with several steps as they put their hands together in front of their chest, the dude takes steps backwards in response raising his open hands defensively [Czy mo?esz ze mn? jeszcze porozmawia?? Musz? znale?? twój aktualny j?zyk] The alien creature speaks again while looking up at him with gentle red, digital eyes- and he confirms that for some reason its speaking a human language, he just doesn't KNOW which one it could be, arabic? russian? french!?

“I-I don't know what you're saying man! god! what's going on!?- I don't UNDERSTAND WHAT'S GOING ON!" the guy sputters out as he shakes his head, not only out of fear but sheer confusion. another step back and the machination returns to thinking, its gaze returning to the ground for five silent seconds.

Then the alien raises their head with a raised finger, Words coming out from them with a synthetic, professional voice tone “[English, that's the name of this language, yes?]

A single sentence, some questions answered, a thousand more being planted into his mind such as: What in the hell was he supposed to say that to that? Why did it sound like a middle aged woman? Why did it have an accent?

he should stop calling it 'it' now, but for that he's got to gather his bearings again and try to say something to the concerned machination, he can't at the moment for some reason ["...it's not it then?, huh, whichever else language could it be then?"]

More and more words, that accent is so weirdly human, he swallows a lump in his throat as the question just stays in his mind for now, he needs to do something… "No no! It's right! It's the… it's the right language miss" He manages to say as he waves a hand, his mouth gaping and the corner of his lips twisting as he finds more stuff to say "uh…"

["Oh that's great- really great!"] the wolf-like machination exclaims with clear happiness, for a broken face made of light and whatever-else-is everything was even alluring to see there… he got afraid when she suddenly stepped forwards, one hand behind and one hand extended towards him in a handshake, dark and looking like a sci-fi gauntlet, almost too alien to be trusted with touch unlike the other one ["It's great to know we will not be struggling with this one thing at least!"]

The guy raises his own hand, moving his fingers and balling it with a twist of his mouth as he hesitated, well damn he couldn't be rejecting a first contact handshake… "Yeah… it's- it's great yeah" He semi-mutters as he takes the other's hand in a nervous, gentle grip, feeling the larger strength of the machination with a raised brow as the shake was done "I'm Edward, by the way uh…" his other hand comes up just to point at her broken 'face', if he can call it that really "you er… don't look really well…"

The alien blinks, reaches for her face after letting go of his hand and hums ["i guess i don't… In fact, That's the main reason i needed proper communication, Edward, this is something I need you to help me with"]

The guy's eyes widen, slightly waving both hands on front of her "Woah woah woah miss don't-even-know-your-name, m-maybe some presentations are needed right now i-"

And the alien interrupts, this time visibly embarrassed ["O-Oh right! Yes yes yes, I'm sorry I'm just- hehe, a bit out of signal after having crash landed without previous preparations…"] and his theory proves right, he thinks with a raised brow, he's not happy at all about it of course, by the expression of the cracked visor she's more ashamed over it than overly stressed.

"... that's… fine, don't worry 'bout it then" He tries to reassure the alien amidst a bit of sweat accumulating on his forehead… reassuring is a weird word to use in this situation.

["...t-thank you… okay so, Edward, Presentations, my name is…."]

He watches her 'mouth' hang onto that last word for several seconds, then she blinks, touching the front of her 'face' with a furrowed 'brow', was something wrong?
“...iiiis?" Ed repeats with confusion

["...Well, my identification code is-"] And right after that, four differently pitched beeps came out from her: that was a odd weird name to have, he thought ["But your vocal chords don't allow you to say that, right?"]

the dude twists his mouth, shifting the weight of his hips side to side "Well i- uh, i could ahem…. EE-nope, no i can't, sorry" that comes out nastily, not usual from him as he was at least a bit versed in the realm of music.

A laugh comes from her, a nice synthetic noise. it's a bit awkward all of this, yes, he knows that, but he prefers for this conversation to evolve into awkwardness than fear or horror ["You'll have to call me by my initials then, I'm Morri, It's nice to meet you Edward"] Morri?, That's a more pronunciation-friendly name than he thought ["...Now, if it's not of much issue, could you help me with my visor? I swear it won't take more than some moments of your time"] 'visor', they call their faces visors, that's something he's gotta remember "...y-yeah, i could, what do I need to do?"

From there, it doesn't take long for her to set herself up. She takes a small welder-like tool from the red bag he had brought alongside her (good thing that wasn't filled with weapons or something) and she moves herself on top of the couch, sitting cross legged and silently looking at the man with perked up ears in silence…

Was that an invitation? impossible to know for him, being socially inexperienced enough to not know about these simple social cues, but he sat down by her anyways, always looking at the odd screen she had for a face until she handed him the welding tool.

His brow furrows and his eyes watch the thing he was given- red coloured with sharp aesthetics without glow and with a clear handle where to grip it tightly, there were no cables or any visible battery that could be powering this up- it must be inside, the grip is noticeably larger than the rest of the contraption.

"[... You use the tool by pulling the trigger and following through the cracked lines of my face, you must do it close to my visor for it to have the full effect, How good is your aim?"] She instructs patiently with the knowledge that he's being presented with too much at once

Ed looks at her at the question, then at the gun, then at her, then at the gun again… he's having second thoughts "...not as good as a robot's that's for sure, i uh… might do a mistake or sixteen, not gonna lie"  if this situation is as important as he thought he couldn't afford lying at the moment.

She sighs, clasping her hands and grasping them together with closed eyes ["I'll have to trust that it will be enough- Now, if you make a mistake while doing this I won't die, but it'll hurt… i don't like being hurt, alright?"]

She's holding up a finger as she says this and he, for some reason, feels like that's a very legitimate threat "...a-alright alright" she nods at the nervous confirmation of him and she scoots closer to him, enough so her back is facing him as her tail curls on her lap.

The man cleans his throat, with her looking away he has a moment to reflect over what was happening… it was crazy, shit was all crazy, he was half hoping to get smacked in the head by an invisible force and wake up in this same couch on a pool of his own saliva… but at the same time, a part of him wanted this whole thing to be real.

As he shifts his own position on the couch he presses the trigger twice in the air, a bright light coming from the tip of the welder confirms that this won't hurt his eyes that much…

"... Just for confirmation, you're alright with me touching you yeah?" He asks before trying to put a hand on her shoulder, that same hand now in the air as he didn't want to come off as too bold or brash or anything.

She's silent for some moments, then she turns her head enough so a single cracked eye can see him, her brow raises ["...Yeah?"] And she says this with a pretty confused tone, as if this wasn't obvious enough already.

"...okay" he can place his hand on her shoulder now and when he does he can notice how odd it feels, it's part of her 'jacket' and squishy to the touch, it's something he's never felt before on his fingertips… how odd

He cleans his throat to pull himself back into reality, leaning forwards a little as he can see the damaged visor with more detail than before, swallowing back any doubt he had at the moment he nods to no one in particular and puts the tip of the welder close to one of the top-most cracks… And just to check, he pulls on the trigger and slowly follows along onto the trail of the crack before pulling back.

There's no damage there now, he notices, not even a mark of heat being used or an excess of whatever material was being used at the moment, the heat on the welding tool is apparent however and he notices that the battery was indeed there.

He continues after a moment of pondering, squinting his brow and focusing as much as he could into the task he was given as he follows along the cracks with the welding tool

"...so uh, what happened?" Too general of a question, something smaller "i mean- ah, why did you land here?, In this little corner of the universe?" …Better

He can't see her face clearly, nor can he see whatever her hands are doing… but the tone she uses has a clear weight to them, maybe this was the wrong question to ask ["...i certainly didn't want to, by the way, but i had to, what occurred is that I was forced to crash land into the safest nearby planet"]

'forced'... Like someone did it? Did this race have conflicts so far from earth that no human has ever detected them before? That was a wild little detail "...you got attacked, you mean? by what? by whom?" He's genuinely curious now despite his hands and eyes being overly focused on closing up the cracks of her face at her request.

Morri searches for a better term to use for these people- but she can't, seriously, that's what she has to call them? Doesn't sound proper at all.

["...Pirates"] "space pirates?" The guy repeats, pausing for a moment in the fixing as his brow now raises in surprise, space pirates exist? ["...yes… space pirates, if you want to call them that"] it's a bit dumb to be calling them that yeah- but what else could he call them? Sounds as good as any other name he could give them.

There's silence after that, no, it's not right to ask for more at the moment- whoever, whatever this robotic creature was, they or she had clearly enough sapience to be pretty emotional…

He continues silently from now on, carefully watching his own pulse as he fixes the cracks and spots he can see, the welder feels pleasantly hot at this point and at no moment he feels like he has to take a break.

Then he's done "Got everything i could see, uh, anything else you feel wrong there? I can't see very well from here…"

As he asks he can see her hands raise up to her visor, softly feeling and touching different parts of it as he can see that 'face' react appropriately to the touches, moving a little, shifting and even compressing a bit as she checked her own head.

["... No, that's it?, Oh, you did a  spectacular job with it, you didn't even made me spark me once"] She semi mutters softly as she rubs the sides of her visors a little, turning to look at the dude with a clear satisfaction as she scuttles closer to him

"Did i?, Well damn, that's good" he sighs with relief setting down the welder on the small table before him, the heat of it still stuck on his palm as he leans back on his seat just to be interrupted by her again 

"[Okay, my turn now- get those clothes out of the way]"

WHAT

"WHAT!?" 

The small machination blinks and leans away a little at the outburst, watching how the lanky dude stared down at her with some remarkable surprise… then she places a finger on front of her visor in thought and silence, two seconds passing by before she gasps and gives a amused, electric chuckle “[Oh! Oh no, nothing like that dear, You sustained wounds that you didn't properly treat not so long ago, right?"]

Oh yeah, bit of a ruffling he got, surviving a crash landing that wasn't that far away from him… how much luck must he have to have no more than a few bruises “ouh… yeah, i did, but i cleaned them with water and some paper towels" he says with dull confidence  “that's fine right?"

She really couldn't offer more but a tilt of her head and a soft rubbing of her own hands at that… to not tell him that wounded fleshlings needed a bit more than just water to heal open wounds “[Did you disinfect it?"]" She asks expectantly “yeah that's… that's what the water is for" “[No Edward, even clean water won't fully disinfect a wound- would you mind showing them to me?]"

He seems a little taken aback by her bluntness, if it weren't because he was a hopeful man he would have thought she was one more mistake away from calling him something “...alright, just- be careful please?" the man begs softly with tensed up fingers  “[I will, you fixed up my visor perfectly, it is the least i can do]"

He sniffs, still a little untrusting of the first-contact alien from touching his wounds, but… she looked super smart, for some reason, maybe because she was a living supercomputer.

He raises his leg, lifting it up enough so it rests on the couch and he can pull back his right pant leg upwards. She looks at his leg expectantly until she sees the ugly area- out of the entire leg his knee was the most damaged, the kneecap is in a recovering state from yesterday, cuts and lacerations surrounding it as red could still be seen in its dry state, it did burn a little but it was nothing compared to the hurt that caused this.

["See? You got a bit of an contaminant in this one wound, it's already swelling out with your blood"] Edward's brow raises and he leans a bit to see the small cut she was pointing at… yes yes, he could see it, but without her literally telling him where it was, he probably wouldn't have found out "...ah… yeah, it is, damn" "[Simple stimulus to your repairing systems should help you in this case]" She sternly says as she brings her dark hand close to his knee, a single finger literally opening up like a peeled orange being torn apart from the middle, revealing a small nozzle that begins spreading a cold spray around his wounds both there and the rest of his leg 

"woaH OH!, that's COLD!" He shrieks as he grips the couch's fabric tightly, being unable to dart his eyes away from her ministrations "[This mixture performs better when its cold and applied to warm surfaces, it won't harm you, calm down"] that blunt gentleness is what strikes him the most- Even most doctors would have the slightest bit of annoyance at his constant fear anfidgeting…

Huh, he has to ask himself- Why the red crosses all around her? Yes he understood the meaning of them completely but not the logic behind it, there had to be more than one universal sign for health in the entire universe.

After she's finished she steps back and, without asking, pulls his other leg onto the couch, shuffling aside the pant leg to begin spraying the smaller bruises and wounds there- it makes him twist his mouth in discomfort, but avoids saying more that could bother the helpful cyborg doing… whatever she's doing.

["So, tell me Edward, i haven't been to earth in Fifty years"] She strikes up conversation, most probably to calm his anxious heart and the revelation that this is her second time coming here clears up a few things… just a few ["How's humanity been faring?, despite your constant wars and conflicts, you have always managed to progress one way or another"]

The question makes him open his mouth and then close it, looking at her as she now puts the pant legs back to where they were and pushes them back to the floor, the guy doing nothing to stop her as he's moved around like a playhouse doll "...I'm… I'm not the right guy to be getting asked those questions ah- i know jackshit about our story" he half stutters as his mind is confused as to what to actually say.

She glares at him, those digital eyes screaming curiosity as she hops up to the couch ["Take off this thing, there's more from this side"] He quickly nods as he begins doing just that, throwing the dark jacket as the other grabs him by the arm almost right away, scanning his bruised elbow with focus ["Now, I'm not asking you for a full recapitulation, i am asking what you know, nothing else"]

She speaks as she sprays more of that cold liquid on his semi recovering bruises, making him hiss as he bites his lip for a second "No no- seriously, you're far better investigating yourself, I'm not very knowledgeable…"

After finishing up with the bruised up elbow, she stops working for a second to stare up at him with clasped hands- she's frowning now, those blank red eyes looking at him with an understandable mixture of concern and confusion, as if she thought he was withholding information from her… ["I see, don't worry about it then"] she dips her head softly before continuing, blinking away her concern quite quickly in his eyes.

She continued up to his head, both furry and metallic fingers searching around on his scalp for the recovering skin tissue that he still had there, he couldn't see anything  that was anything but he sure could feel the cold liquid going directly onto the scab, at the very least it didn't hurt.

"...what are you?" That was such a rude question to make, he thought, but he's been holding onto the question since she first spoke English to him.

["The ones of my race are known as Protogen]" She answers quickly, not even a tinge of offense in her tone as she continued to check around for further wounds on his head and face- it felt pretty weird, very damn weird, hopefully this part would be over soon ["We are spacefarers, travelers, scouts, scientists, and we all have been watching the advancements of the human race ever since they landed their first ship on their natural satellite"]

Now that's an uncomfy thought, just for what reason have these robotic creatures watched humanity for so long? Did they want to do something for them? Were they protecting them?... there was no way to know yet, at least for Edward there was not, the man was once again afraid of what she might do or say.

[“Done, All of your wounds have been properly checked, sanitized and treated"] She says with confidence, stepping back from him as her finger turns back to normal and she sits once again on the couch, cross legged as she looks up at the guy.

He feels around his head, his legs and his arms to check and… what the hell?, not even a scab is there!, not even a mark or a scar, or the feeling of touching something healing its all… its all healed up, wow.

“huh… technology…" He mutters softly in absolute wonder, widened eyes and a grin of awe making his face turn into the most pleasant expression he's had since the whole alien-crash shebang… and the machination notices, making her twitch her ears and softly swish that fluffy tail side to side…

After that, he sighs, content, but also, a bit clueless on what to do next, He turns his sights to her and she seems to be tapping her own fingers in thought, as if there was nothing else to be done between the two- there actually was a lot, but none just… wanted to take the first step to ask.

“...wanna watch the news? this whole thing travels faster than the light" He casually says as he holds up the remote he just dig up from the side of the cushion, smiling as he could as he waggled it a little on the air

[“...that's impossible Edward, even we can't have such a stable information network"] she says with a tilt of her ears and a smug tone on her synthetic voice, turning his head towards him with disbelief.

“no no, really, seriously, i bet i turn on this, put on a news channel and the crash landing is gonna be the one thing talked about twenty four seven" He leans forwards and points at the TV with his remote as he says this, chuckling a little as he just fucking bet it would be like this


She tilts her head to the left and to the right, leaning against the backrest as she simply blinked and turned towards the screen [“alright… show me your human communicative skills, then"]

He turns towards the screen too, turning it on and switching from the more young adult-oriented channels to the news, taking a second to do so until the voice and news of the woman doing the report don't give him relief, but absolute terror.

“ We have been given more reports of the occurrences of Last night. The meteorite that has fallen and shaken our entire city has been, by now, examined several times by scientists, physicists and even the heads of some of our local, religous groups with the protection and security of our Military… and while the Government, The senate and the mayor have told the citizens that a speech will be given as soon as possible, we have all reached the same conclusion- We are not alone in the universe… but a question that we haven't answered, and we must answer has been in our minds for the last seven hours: where are the occupants?"

Edward audibly hisses, making him placing both hands on his head as his hair rises up at the action, his fearful brown eyes staring at the screen and how two pictures came up- one of them, had the fallen escape pod surrounded by tents and security tape, a large amount of people being seen around it as they all saw from afar or from up close the beauties of alien technology… and the other one,  a picture of tire tracks on moist ground.

“Police have given their own opinion upon the discovery of this- Saying that it is very probable that someone, most likely human too, has taken its occupants for personal reasons, it would not be too far fetched to say that the alien might have attacked the driver of the car, taking the vehicle for itself, but there are no bodies, nor the sign of a struggle around the zone"

The cyborg shakes her head softly at the assumption, tightening her clasped together hands as she watches the news go on through [“i would have never, what are they saying?"]

“Testimony of nearby Witnesses have several times mentioned the appearance of the car- no one has been able to give true specifics, but by several descriptors, we can assume that this is a white coloured, vintage car from a russian manufacturer"

The dude smacks his lips in defeat, digging his fingers deeper into his scalp “ah shit"

“Any tips about the user of a car like this can be sent to the number shown below- From a personal standpoint, If this is a kidnapping, then it could sever our future communications with an alien race we haven't even been able to introduce ourselves to…"

An uncomfortable silence sits after that, and Morri can't help but be absolutely bedazzled at those words.

“...Advancements on the crash landing will be done as soon as possible, For now, We follow onto other news: Religious groups around the world raise their voices at the closest we've been to prove alien life exists, I can say at least, that the reactions are very, very mixed"

Edward turns off the TV after this, just letting the remote fall to the couch as his jaw now is absolutely slack at how he was called- he was a kidnapper now!? God please no! He just wanted to help man! He couldn't have left the broken alien right there and then right? that'd be so much awful!

[“Hey Edward?"] HUH EH- GAH, he doesn't notice just how struck he is, with his tense posture and his tight fingers, and the gentle voice of the alien besides him returns him into a calmer state as he now turns his gaze at her [“...you know none of this is your fault right?"]

Is it not?, would it be better if he went straight up to the military with her on her backseat? maybe if he went to a hospital?... there'd be so many people there, the chances of him being left out of the whole issue would be high.

“YEah… yeah… I know, just a bunch of shit happening yeah?" He says while laughing in SO much despair that the cyborg doesn't buy his words at all, and she stands up suddenly on the couch, placing a hand on his shoulder and his arm as she suddenly got way closer than before -did she? or was this show of affection making him feel defensive?- [“I promise i'll do my best to get out of your hair as soon as i can"] He widens his eyes, suddenly she sounds thoroughly disciplined, heroic even before his eyes [“and i promise that i will do what i can for you to avoid the punishment of your own laws"]

Hahah… now that he thinks about it, its kinda really funny, just trying to be a decent guy has now targeted him as a kidnapper… damn, stuff couldn't get worse right now, no way it could.

but then a fucking knock at his door discards that thought quickly, making his head rise up in a flash alongside Morri's, leaning enough to the side for them to watch the closed door with cautious fear.

[“...i think i should hide"] She whispers right on his ear
“that'd be awesome" he whispers right back

And she hops off the couch to go right into his bedroom, closing the door behind as Edward stood up and stretched around a little, shaking this one arm, this other arm, getting his neck all warmed up and…

wait, that's red on his pants…
HOLY SHIT HE STILL HAS THE BLOOD FROM LAST NIGHT ON THEM.

“Edward?" That's a voice he could recognize anywhere

FUCKING SHIT!

“Wait up dude! you caught me changing me fuckin pants!!"

“dude, not even gonna ask"

phew, now he's got time for that…
now, he doesn't got the TIME to fucking plan what to do!