more “aliens being surprised by humans” stuff
our ability to belt out one entire three to five minute long song if we’re familiar with it like. suvi starts singing “hallelujah” to fill the quiet and is answered by liam all across the room in a p decent harmony. cora walks past and starts humming it enthusiastically even tho she can’t stay very long. gil joins in for the third refrain. ryder finishes it off with a passionate solo.
when they look around every alien is staring at them. vetra blinks and knocks her hands together. “that’s what you’re supposed to do when humans make those sounds right?” she asks kallo beside her, who mirrors her. everyone is a little stunned at the coordination and emotion in the performance and they all look equally moved. jaal might be crying. none of them know what a ‘hallelujah’ is, but they feel like they’ve come to understand it through this melody
they’re all extremely confused when all of the humans still continue on on their tasks without pause
edit; other songs include but are not limited to: bohemian rhapsody, mr. brightside, single ladies, no scrubs, and i will always love you
a good predictor of whether a species will end up being compatible with humans on long journeys is whether they are capable of understanding that ‘singing along’ is optional and humans do it because it’s fun. species that insist on assigning some biological or ceremonial importance to it will inevitably clash with their human crews sooner or later.
whereas species like the mertrans, who have their own infectious expressive behaviors, can integrate with humans indefinitely. on long-haul ships, a sort of hybrid culture evolves, where mertrans will thrum their throat sacs to provide percussion for human singalongs, and humans develop dance steps for mertran scratch/thumping episodes.
smart pirates avoid attacking ships where this has happened. despite being clownish, these species are also some of the most warlike, and offering violence to a closeknit mertran/human group provokes a reaction that is not only well-coordinated and heroic but prone to very bloody pranks.
there still are parts of the outer reaches where a mertran hand-signing “yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker” can clear a bar in seconds.
(via bonehandledknife)
