Banshee

10. Alien Studies

What in the ancestors' names is he doing?

Karina looked curiously at Thomas as he rummaged around in the kitchen. Finally, he stood up with something of a triumphant look on his face and a flat baking dish in his hands. Next he placed the dish on the thermic plate and went back to rummaging, this time in the food containers. He found an egg, which he cracked on the edge of the counter before emptying the insides on the baking dish.

Why is he baking the egg?

Karina was no stranger to consuming eggs. The Silcarin had always had an appatite for eggs and she was no different. The only difference was that they considered the content of eggs to be a drink, and one simply did not bake a drink.

She kept looking at what Thomas was doing. After a few minutes of poking the egg around, he turned off the thermic plate and emptied the baking disc onto an eating disc. The insides of the egg had into a solid mass of white and orange, which the human cut into pieces and then began to eat...

HE IS EATING THE EGG!!! WHAT DEVILRY IS THIS???

Clearly these Humans preferred to eat their eggs instead of drinking them. Curiosity took over now. Karina had to know what had just happened. She stepped out in plain view; Thomas kept eating, whether he had noticed her or not.

"Are you eating an egg?" she asked him.

"It was the only thing I could find that looked familiar," he said. "Or did you want to eat it?"

"Eat it?" Karina asked in surprise with a hint of shock

Me eating an egg???

"What else is it for if not for eating?" was his equally surprised reply.

"We drink it... Don't Humans drink eggs?"

"Some do, but consuming raw eggs can cause death, so we bake or boil them to make it safe for us to eat."

"Why eat? Can't you drink it after you've baked or boiled the egg?"

"I can see that you've never done either of those things. But basically, when you heat up an egg by baking or boiling it, it turns from liquid to solid, meaning that it is only fit for eating, not drinking."

"But what if only eggs from your world turn solid?" Karina asked.

"Did this egg come from Earth?" Thomas asked in return.

"No..."

"Can you point out an egg that stays liquid when heated?"

"I cannot."

"Then I suppose that my explanation remains valid until proven otherwise," Thomas said with a smug look on his face.

Did he just outsmart me?

"But enough about me and whatever I eat," the Human continued. "Tell me something about you or your eating habits..."

It had been several weeks now since Karina and Thomas had arrived on the city-ship. For the former, living on her own without Okarron's supervision had been paradise. By now, she had already finished all but a few items on her list of things she had always wanted to do but had been afraid to act upon with the Kanarr around. The first thing she had done was to make a complete mess of her bedroom. Sleeping in total chaos had been wonderful the first few nights, but after a while it became something of a nuisance; constantly tripping over stuff, or having to look for a certain specific thing she wanted to wear. She had considered making Thomas clean up her mess, but this idea had quickly been shot down by the realisation that he would probably get to see her underwear as well. This led to another item on her list, namely to buy several sets of revealing underwear, just for the fun of it.