2/3 Human

Origin Point (The Gremlin)

The forests on Earth were very different from the ones Gerine knew back home. The trees were placed farther apart, leaving large patches of parched grass between serviceable hiding spots; there were barely any bushes to be found, and what few existed were covered in coarse spines in lieu of leaves. There were no streams, or lakes, or even puddles, an absence that the dry air made all the more apparent.

Gerine's expertise lay in quickly darting in and out of cover, leaving prey and pursuer alike in constant doubt of her true position. But not only were these trees too far apart to zigzag between, their trunks were so wide she couldn't even wrap her arms around them to climb up!

On a positive note, the trees were just large enough that there wasn't any need for Gerine to keep switching places; she could just hunker down behind one and pray that Obano would pass her by.

She pressed her body against the bark and listened closely for any signs of danger. Nothing, besides the far-off sea breeze rustling through the tall grass. So Obano hadn't realized anything was amiss yet. Either that, or he was an even more covert hunter than Gerine could ever hope to be!

A disturbance in the branches above nearly sent the poor girl into the throes of a heart attack. The sound was only Kuku swooping down from the treetops to greet her. He hung upside down like a bat roosting on the roof of a cave, his face a fraction of an inch from her's, pressing his battered bowler hat firmly to his head with one bony hand.

"You scared me!" Gerine exclaimed with a hint of outrage, but smiling all the same.

Kuku dropped from the tree and twisted his body in mid-air to land right-side up.

"I didn't think you felt fear after watching you challenge Obano like that! What was you thinkin', doll?"

"To be honest, I wasn't thinking much of anything, it was all instinct."

"Well those instincts are gonna get 'ya killed! You really don't know squat about lions, do 'ya?"

"N-No, I've never even been to this planet before."

"Really?" he said suspiciously. "Because you look awfully familiar."

"Sorry, you must have me confused with another human."

Kuku took a step back, as though Gerine had just proclaimed herself the carrier of some exotic illness.

"S-So Obano was right, you really are a human!"

"Of course I am! What else could I be?"

"I thought you said you were an alien!" Kuku cried in outrage.

"I was raised on another planet, but my momma was born and bred right here on Earth!"

"So you're a human, but you've never been to Earth before..." Kuku muttered thoughtfully. "I guess that explains it then..."

"Explains what?"

"How you're still alive."

The Great Death Of All Humans was a selective extinction event which took place in the year 3190 -almost an entire year before Gerine's birth as it would have been calculated by Earth's calendar- which marked the end of the Anthropocene era and the start of the Hereditane era. Nobody knows exactly what became of the affected humans, although the prevailing theory among modern historians suggests that stealth-oriented alien invaders are to blame; a "quiet genocide".

None of the Earth's enduring species gave the matter much thought in the moment; humans were notorious for getting themselves into trouble, so when all the cats and dogs awoke one morning to find their masters had up and abandoned them; when mice and rats peeped out from their hiding places to find their greatest threat silently exterminated; when the countless monkeys, elephants, giraffes and zebras held captive in zoos concluded that their handlers wouldn't be coming to feed them without explanation, they did the only thing that made sense for survival; they stood up on two legs and took control of the comfortable society left behind.

Incidentally, the day this mass extinction took place was also the day a strange ring appeared around the Earth. Those who subscribed to the "alien invasion" theory believed the ring was a gift from the guilty party, as either an apology for accidentally annihilating the planet's dominant race, or as payment for the pilfered persons.

This was the extent of Kuku's knowledge on the subject.

"You're lying." Gerine said simply.

"And why do 'ya think that?"

"Because I'm alive."

"Weren't you listenin'? It was a worldwide event. You had to be here, and you weren't. So congrats, you're the last human left!"

Gerine was at a loss. She'd only come to this planet under the impression that she would finally meet more people like her, and now she was hearing that her fellow homo-sapiens had been snuffed out before she was even born!

But the Earth wasn't completely empty, there were still people living here. Sure, they weren't human, but did that really matter? They could communicate with her just the same, they lived in a society descended directly from humanity, and although she'd met a few meanies since landing here, the green man was being nice to her, so maybe other people would be too. Still, a small part of her -a gross, petty parasitic bug squirming deep within her soul- insisted it just wasn't the same.

She needed to ignore it; there was nothing else she could do.

"So what kind of animal does that make you?" she asked.

"Oh, I'm a gremlin. Kuku Gremlington's the name!"

He bowed lightly and tipped his flattened hat to her.

"I'm Gerine. What's a gremlin?"

"We're little green men who play tricks on people. My ancestors had a bad habit of tampering with aircrafts, so the humans forced 'em underground, and we became the stuff of legend to people on the surface. When the humans died off, we were finally free to come outta hiding!

"Not to say I'm glad they're all gone," he quickly added. "But I wouldn't be one to deny the benefits of their disappearance."

"Tamper with aircrafts..." pondered Gerine. "Hang on, are you the reason my ship crashed?!"

"Crashed? Whaddya mean? That was a perfectly good water landing from what I saw!" Kuku rebutted.

"I thought your face was covered?"

He certainly wished he were hiding his face right now; Gerine had caught him red handed, and it was showing in the form of the third blush to have tainted his cheeks that day.

"Well...I saw the shadow of your ship passing overhead when I was dozing on the beach..." he explained. "And I spotted you through the porthole and thought you looked kinda cute so...I sorta...manipulated your landing protocol so I could...say hi."

Gerine was speechless.

An ear splitting scream echoed through the jungle, sending flocks of the winged creatures resting in the treetops soaring up into the high heavens to escape the sound. "HUMAAAAAN!!!"

Gerine and the gremlin turned to face the direction that heart-stopping roar erupted from.

"Obano doesn't sound too happy with 'ya." Kuku conferred in a quivering little voice.

"You never know, he could be talking about another human."

"You'd better amscray if you know what's good for 'ya!"

Gerine did just as she was instructed, pausing only briefly when she realized Kuku wasn't coming with her.

"I'll stay here and hold him off. Obano may wallop me somethin' fierce, but he wouldn't risk inflicting any lasting damage. There'd be no one left to lick his boots if he did."

Gerine tried to think of something to say that might change Kuku's mind, but knew deep down that this was the best shot at escape she was going to get, and in the end, her own survival instincts won the day. She ran, leaving the coming confrontation for Kuku to handle.

He was certain he'd told Gerine the truth; the odds that Obano would actually beat him within an inch of his life when his attention was being called to other matters seemed fairly low, so he was guaranteed to survive this particular pounding, and as such, would live to meet the young human again someday. Still, this was going to hurt big time.

No matter, this "noble sacrifice" would surely earn him a spot in Gerine's good books.