Pip's Ophidian Book 1: Beatlebug & The Provider

Chapter 7: Crickets, Maybe

"Oh, it was banana slices. With this shit that tastes like cinnamon on them, too. Mel went all out with the human food for you," Jesse said, munching on some kind of gelatin bar that was also on Pip's plate, on his lap, that he'd been scared to touch. "They are literally everywhere, around here. Bananas, I mean."

"How?" Pip asked, flabbergasted. He remembered Lil desperately trying to grow a banana tree, once. It had flopped over and died without ever bearing fruit, right in the entry to the greenhouse. She'd tried to resurrect it for way too long. His Ma had actually gotten angry about it, telling her shortly to give it up.

Jesse shrugged. "They just grow really well, down there. It's actually kinda a problem. Too many bananas, not enough folks eating them, you know?"

"Down there?"

She stared at him like he was an idiot. "On the homeworld. I can't translate it to anything but that, and I don't know what you call it-"

Heven, Mel's thought unfurled softly across the cot, and Pip jumped.

"Whoa," Jesse chewed thoughtfully, and then said shortly, "Y'all really are just such a cult. I don't get it. My Mama was Christian like you; she didn't name someone else's planet. She didn't attempt to 'contain' the local population, or colonize anything. She just wore a necklace with a lowercase t on it and gave me presents every year and told me a fat man had broken onto Beatlebug to give them to me."

Pip picked at his food. It was mostly greens and berries, but there was also the strange gelatin brick and a skewer of what was, frankly, bugs. Maybe crickets. Maybe. He found himself oddly curious about it. "Yeah," he said, "yeah, we don't do that part."

He lifted the skewer. Nibbled at a leg. Yup, that tasted like how he expected a bug to taste. Dropped it halfway back to his plate.

Mel reached forward and plucked the skewer out of his hand. He looked pointedly at Pip, and then gingerly picked up the gelatin. Pinched off a bit, put it on the bug, and then bit down with a squelch and a crunch. Handed the skewer back to Pip.

Delicious, Mel thought at him.

Pip awkwardly did the same. It still tasted like a bug. The dense gelatin was frankly amazing, though, and it wasn't until he had bitten down that he realized he was starving. He ate quickly. Mel watched him eat, a soft, dizzying kind of energy coming off him.

Disgusting, Sharp thought hard at them, across the cot. Pip looked up. He was staring at Mel, who stiffened. Looked away.

Pip felt an odd swoop of defensiveness.

He's right about the food, he thought as out loud and brave as he could, it is better with... whatever this is.

That is not what I meant and he knows that. Sharp retorted. He hadn't touched his own food, and stood now and then to pace, slouched and glaring through the great window. Pip tried not to look at him, or it.

They had brought in these strange squat stools and crowded around his cot for the meal, so he didn't have to move. Pip found himself oddly touched. They were, as kidnappers went, pretty good ones. He wondered if he was getting Stockholm syndrome.

What's that? Mel thought at him.

It's like... he paused. Mel caught his hand like he might be missing something, and his fingers tingled, and he shivered. Never mind. He thought quickly.

I want to know! Mel seemed frankly offended. I will understand. I am not as dumb as most Oranges.

This sentence made Pip laugh. Just–oranges, lined up. Mel in the middle, doing math or something. Being better at math than most of them.