Warren Fahy - Fragment

With his three free arms, Hender shook some jars which held insect-like creatures, and their agitated glow filled the shadowy room with a flickering light.

“He catches fresh drill-worms and wasps by putting a piece of meat in each jar,” Andy explained. “You should see his rat trap.”

The glass vessels glowed green as Hender shook them, casting orbs of light. Nell could see scraps of what looked like trash or beach litter tacked to the walls and ceiling.

Hender’s guests seated themselves on crates inside the B-29 fuselage, some of which were lined up like a bench against one wall with an old rubber raft draped over it. Stenciled on the raft in faded black letters was a name.

“Electra?” Nell said in excitement. “This couldn’t really be Amelia Earhart’s raft, could it? That was the name of her plane, wasn’t it?”

Geoffrey stroked the cracked rubber, shaking his head as if nothing could surprise him now. “It seems old enough.”

Hender brought out a gourd of some sort.

“Andy, how did you survive six whole fucking days here, man?” Zero asked.

“That first day, Hender came down from the tree next to the lake and grabbed me,” Andy answered. “I thought I was dead. But I woke up here. I wasn’t dead and he had fixed my glasses with something like masking tape. See?” One arm of his glasses was bandaged at the joint.

The creature served them something in cups of cut-off plastic soda bottles and they were stunned by the dexterity of its multiple hands.

“It’s tea-time,” Andy said.

“Tea-time!” the creature sang.

Thatcher curled a lip as the creature served him a cup.

It handed Nell a cup.

“Thank you,” she nodded. “What is this?” she asked Andy.

“It’s OK. It’s actually pretty good. I call it Henders tea. But it’s more like chili, though. And it has meat in it. Rat meat. It tastes like lobster!”

Nell hesitated, crinkling her nose. Then she sipped, and found the “tea” was more like a tangy salsa than chili and, after the initial surprise, it was good. “Tastes like cherry lobster cinnamon gazpacho… with a hint of curry!”

“Thank you.” Geoffrey accepted a cup as he observed the anatomy of the creature’s two-thumbed hands, longing for a sketchpad or a camera to document them.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” the creature hummed.

Nell and Geoffrey looked at each other, trembling with amazement.

Cane accepted a cup with undisguised dread. It was clear that the soldier would be happier when his mission was over and Henders island was in ashes.

“Thank you!” the creature said, making Cane jump.

“Thanks, dude,” Zero nodded, setting down his camera and taking his cup.

The creature held its head cocked at Zero for a beat. “Thanks, dude,” it echoed.

Geoffrey sipped the “tea” and scrunched his face at the strange taste.

“He makes it from eggs that grow on this bonsai plant he feeds rat-meat to,” Andy explained.

“Not bad,” Zero decided cheerfully, chugging the contents. “Oh hey! I almost forgot!” He unzipped a pocket in his cargo pants. “This is for you!” He presented a still-sealed plastic bottle of Diet Coke to Hender.

“Oh hey,” the creature trilled, its arms unfolding in an “X” of delight.

Thatcher sneered as Zero twisted off the top and handed Hender the Coke.

“It’s a little warm, but here ya go,” Zero told the creature.

They watched as the creature tasted the soft drink. Its coat scintillated as it guzzled the sweet liquid down. Both of its eyes pointed at Zero and Cane’s hand tightened on his gun. Then it belched loudly, smiling wide and smacking its lips.

Zero chuckled. “He likes it!”

“Yes,” Thatcher said drily. “I can see the ad campaign already. He’ll make Coca-Cola a fortune.”

Zero gave Hender a thumbs-up. “Cool, dude!”

Hender gave Zero twelve thumbs-up. “Cool, dude!”

“It’s extremely good at mimicry,” Thatcher observed.

Hender swiveled his head to look at Thatcher. “It’s extremely good at mimicry,” it said in a perfect imitation.

“Hender’s good at everything,” Andy declared.

Thatcher cast his eyes around nervously at the oddball collection of recovered objects decorating the walls. The trash seemed crudely grouped by the various alphabets used in the labels- Mandarin, Japanese, Arabic, Thai, Cyrillic, and Latin. “Not much sign of a culture. Aside from our own garbage,” he remarked.

“I think we’re his hobby.” Andy finished his tea. “I think he’s been collecting our junk for a long, long time.”

Thatcher pursed his lips dismissively “Magpies collect human refuse. And mynah birds mimic our speech.”

Nell leveled her eyes at Thatcher. “Dr. Redmond, there is obviously profound intelligence in this being.”

“Oh, I certainly believe we must consider intelligence as a factor in determining what kind of organism we are dealing with here, Dr. Duckworth,” Thatcher retorted. “This creature may prove to be as deadly as we are, though I sincerely hope not.”

“Whatever Hender is, it’s certainly deadly to your theory, Thatcher,” Geoffrey remarked. “Your perfect ecosystem seems to have produced intelligent life, after all. And it managed not to wipe out an environment that’s lasted longer than any other on Earth. Hender here is living proof that you’re wrong, old boy! Looks like you might not get that Genius Grant, after all.”

Thatcher’s face turned deep red. “There is absolutely no shred of proof that this organism has intelligence equivalent to human beings! It-”

“Wait, wait!” Zero interrupted. “Look!”

Hender had been scratching the burnt tip of a thorn on the back of what appeared to be a candy bar wrapper.

Hender handed it to Sergeant Cane.

The wrapper trembled in the soldier’s hand as he read what appeared to be a scrawled word: “Signal.”

When Hender heard Cane read the word out loud, his head bobbed up and down, and his coat flushed with kaleidoscopic patterns of color. Hender grabbed the wrapper from Cane’s unresisting hands. With one of his eyes looking at the wrapper and one focused on Cane, the creature said: “Sig-nuhl?”

Startled, Cane recoiled.

Hender grabbed the charred thorn and with it, wrote on the inside of a clamshell.

He thrust the shell at Nell.

She looked at it in astonishment, then read the word out loud: “‘Coke.’”

She showed the shell to Geoffrey.

The creature gestured to his mouth and then to her mouth, then to Cane’s mouth, and then to the shell, excitedly.

Nell nodded. “Coke,” she said again.

Hender’s fur burst with colors as he took the shell from Nell and sounded out the syllable. “COKE!”

The creature rose on his bottom legs, pressing his back against the roof and making a variety of high-pitched noises. Then, with all four extending hands, he pointed at various items of litter tacked to the walls and ceiling of the fuselage.

Nell laughed in delight at the first item Hender pointed at on his wall.

“Tampax!” she and Geoffrey exclaimed simultaneously.

The creature extended all four arms in an asterisk of excitement over them. “Tampax!” Hender echoed, indicating a foil condom packet.

Nell, Geoffrey, Andy, and Zero yelled, “Trojan!”

“Wonderful.” Thatcher rolled his eyes. “I see our garbage has already exposed our most intimate biological details to this creature.”

Hender pointed to other items.

The scientists called them out: “Kodak! Yoo-Hoo! Vegemite! Bactine! Fresca! Fanta! Nestle Quik! Wrigley’s! Milk Duds! Milky Way! Purina Cat Chow! Orange Crush! Thera-Flu! Mylanta! Zagnut!”