Empyrean Iris

Chapter 10

Dr. Krill struggled valiantly to keep up with the human's impossibly long strides. From his vantage point, behind and slightly to the side of the human, he watched in great fascination the rolling lines of muscle flexing throughout the human body making him very aware of his own disjointed scuttling in comparison.

His fluidity shouldn't have been possible, considering his center of gravity was just below the chest making him top heavy, and mechanically likely to fall flat on his face with all the grace and poise of a rockslide. However, observing the human with a more scientific eye, he could see how the entire body worked to balance itself, from the tendons of the feet to the swinging pendulum of the arms. He was so focused on his observation that he nearly concussed himself on an exposed pipe as they rounded a corner.

Hearing him falter, the human turned to look, "You should probably avoid braining yourself on the first day of work, you see I got this new doctor, and he's a bit of a novice when it comes to neurosurgery. I wouldn't trust him."

Krill stared at the human in puzzlement trying to piece together the facial expression that cross the human's face: one of the fuzzy lines above his eye raised, the mouth pulled tight tilted upwards at one corner, a slight rotation of the head, "Wait, Human, I thought you just said I was the new doctor."

The human regarded him with one fuzzy line raised.

When the human finally spoke his voice was slower than normal, which confused Krill even more. "Yes, doctor, that was the point."

Krill stared blankly on, "I don't understand."

"I was kidding..... joking.... jesting.... messing with you.... utilizing verbal irony to make light of a situation."

When Krill simply continued to stare, the human rattled his head back and forth in ... frustration? "Honestly, doc, your planet is as comically dry as the Sahara Desert. What do you do for fun there, pull teeth?"

"We don't have teeth, and you said desert twice."

The expression the human made this time involved a slight parting of the lips, the tilting of the head and the scrunching of the muscles around the eyes, "Sahara..... right." He turned and continued walking.

Krill struggled to catch up.

"Doc, if you are going to remain aboard this ship with humans, I think your first lesson is going to have to be on humor because my friend yours is severely lacking. It's honestly a crime against humanity."

Krill almost ran into another pipe.

"I don't mean like a real crime doc, and stop walking so close to the wall, you're making me nervous. Lesson number one for living with humans is the use of irony or humor."

"What is this word...irony...it does not translate."

The human hummed deep in his chest rubbing slowly at the back of his neck, "There are different kinds of irony, but the most important one is verbal. Verbal irony is when you say one thing but mean something else."

Krill looked at him incredulously, "Why would you do something like that? The confusion and misinterpretation in communication would lead to disorder and confusion."

The human waved a dismissive hand at him, "Cool your jets doc, most humans know when you're using irony. Let's dissect my earlier joke. First, I talked about you as if you weren't you, and then I implied you were bad at brain surgery even though you aren't, since you performed mine, before finishing off by pointing out that you are the only doctor on this ship and probably wouldn't be able to help yourself if you were injured.... make sense?"