I hate this job, I really do. At least- that was what I used to think. Before I got sucked up into the sky and shoved into a rinky dink pawn shop in the rear end of literal nowhere, I thought my job sucked and that my day was already the worse it could get. I mean shoved in a cubicle 9 hours a day doing work I could have easily done from a home computer, buddied with a team of seemingly soulless staff with no capability for cooperation. App glitches, customer complaints and bored bosses reassigning work from other departments so they . I always thought I couldn't find anywhere worse to work and despite my best efforts I couldn't seem to find anywhere better. Forget employment benefits, forget water cooler conversation- I mean we worked in a 40 year old office space and we didn't even have a water cooler! I really did think I had the worst job on the planet, and you know what maybe I was right. But worse job ever? It turns out, I just wasn't thinking big enough.
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The alien strode into the shop with a gait that spoke to self assuredness. Their confident steps however were cumbersome and lopsided. A lack of grace no doubt the fault of the hastily patched hole in their left thigh. The attire of the wounded alien was a mix between some sort of gladiatorial armor and outdated trench coat. Black leather straps and plated metal fading into flowing black robe and tattered jacket. The door closed behind it before softly chiming open again. The alien's presumed companion stumbled forward through the opening dragging some sort of cargo container behind them. It breathed heavily through its gaping maw and wrapped its tentacled arm more tightly around the rectangular box. Its greenish friend spared a brief judging glance over its shoulder before continuing to meet Jim at the front desk.
'jiggerpoling hosjtamin-opinote'
Jim's blank look spoke enough of his understanding for the alien to vent air with soft flatulence out of its mouth holes before speaking again "ji-we have items for sale".
Jim delivered a soft wack to the machine that translated for him as it began to work in order to make the English words properly legible. "And so do I." Jim responded glibly. He added an awkward smile as his words came out of the translator in order to soften their blow and keep his brief response from coming across as rude. He seriously considered why he could never greet anyone who entered his store with an ounce of charisma, and why he had not yet developed a simple greeting that would make the people who came into his store want to buy his stuff.
Luckily, the alien did not seem overtly offended. Instead the skin over one of its large eyes simply quivered as if the thing had just raised an eyebrow. Its stumbling partner caught up to it at the counter, somehow undamaged despite seeming prone to accidentally fall into the jaws of a sleeping monster on every planet it visited; It wasn't that the alien looked unthreatening, in-fact it seemed much the opposite. Its skin was a very inky black and its head resembled that of an angler fish- or that dog from the first Despicable Me movie. Its eyes waved on their eyestalks constantly and its battle armor seemed to blend seamlessly into into its thick form. It was the general aura of clumsy-ness that fell around it, punctuated by the fact it's back feelers had knocked over a few items on Jim's shelves in its journey to his countertop.
The wounded alien gestured to its friend to place the box on the table and they complied. Chittering excitedly the clumsy one flipped the latches on the container before swiveling it to face him and asking him to open it. It was clear that from the energy these two exuded they were eager to see his reaction to their find. Jim flipped open the lid and kept his expression stoic as he felt golden rays wash over him. What he was looking at was the no-doubt grave robbed goods of an alien civilization.
Jim put on his gloves to examine what they'd brought him. They had lost their lovely sheen after he'd washed off that stubborn green blood but they would do for this 'inspection' and had the added benefit of making him look like he actually knew what he was doing. 'hmm' Jim muttered as he turned over a golden orb item, examining the blue gem stones within. He did the same with the wolf-like animal statue and gave out a longer hmmm as he examined the frog/lizard creature with a plethora of legs and an assortment of gems in its' mouth. He attempted to remove one of the red gems from the mouth and muttered expressively when it wouldn't come free, the gems appeared to be all fused together. The adventurous friends shared a glance as some of the excitement faded and they hoped what they'd found had been worth the near death encounters.
The angler alien went to speak and then thought better of it, closing his toothy maw.
"So how much do you want for them?" Jim's words caught them off guard as both adventurers had begun to deeply study the totems they had brought him, trying to find any of the errors in them he seemed to be seeing.
'Well we have some id-"
"We haven't really decided on a pri-"
Both aliens began speaking at once, their words lapping over each other. The green one glared at the other, and they both took a beat to recover from their nervousness. Jim decided at this point he really needed to decide on names for these two gentlemen before his mental labeling of them drove him crazy. The green one (Glob) seemed to have recovered control of the situation and spoke before his friend (Glib) decided to.
'Well how much do you think it's worth?"
Jim grimaced.
"I don't think you really wanna hear my answer"
"surely it's not lower than 10,000?"
Jim grimaced harder.
"I don't know what to tell you buddy, but whichever planet they mined these from wasn't prime grade for sure. And this gem fusion? Speaks to the quality to me, technique is pretty advanced. They're antiques I'm sure, but with rapid aging technology these days who can really tell? Look buddy If I wanted to be harsh I'd offer you 6000 and if I wanted to be really harsh I wouldn't buy these at all. Could be glumkash pretty easily"
Glob recoiled as if stricken, his body remaining perfectly still as his head jolted backwards in what must of been one of his species shock responses. Glib looked at him worriedly, his eyes stalk twisting anxiously atop his head. If there was one word Jim had learned that was universal it was glumkash, and it certainly didn't mean anything good.
"But I'm not in the mood to be cynical and severe. In fact, an honest shopkeeper like myself wouldn't be so badly cynical on a poor day! What I can generously offer you guys is 7,500, a price much more fair then you'd get from the other moneygrubbers of the galaxy."
Shaking his head Glob replied swiftly.
"No no no, that price is not more than fair, we went through quite an ordeal to get these artifacts and we won't be shortchanged on the prices. 15,200 is a much more 'honest' price for our goods'"
The quivering skin above Glob's eyebrows proved just how poorly he would respond to any attempts to discount the effort they'd gone through and it seemed as if his air of haughtiness was the only thing that stopped him from lifting his leg and showing Jim the slowly healing hole in it.
"I'm sure you did in fact go through an ordeal obtaining these but I'm only able to go off what I see in front of me and the quality of this merchandise is not worth such a prize. In fact my original offer seems more than genuine, 8000 is a very tentative offer."
"I won't settle for less than 10000"
"Yeah." Glib added, nodding seriously- the effect somewhat ruined by his flopping eyestalks.
"Really?"
"Yes and not a credit lower" Glob stated confidently.
'Well then, my last offer is 8,200 and I wish you the best of luck getting out of this galaxy and back into civilized space. there's not any fuel for what seems like universes out here but I'm sure you two can make it-you seem very capable" Jim gave the two his most wining smile as he delivered his final offer, seeing through Globs paper thin blanket of confidence.The pair seemed to deflate a little as he gave it, the reality of the situation sinking in.
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Glib moaned and Glob quietly tooted out a sigh
"9500?"
"8500 boys and the first jet of halx is free"
Defeated Glob nodded his head in defeat and Glib followed suit a moment later. A cube quickly formed on the desk before splitting and flying into each man's clothing. Jim swiftly moved each object into a trough that was reveled in the hard section of his counter off to the right, locked away safely until his visitors left him.
'why don't you two take a seat and I'll get you something to eat and drink to celebrate this big sale?'
Their countenances somewhat brightening the two agreed and Jim came from behind his desk to guide Glib and Glob to a small table that lay concealed at the side of the room by two conjoint units of shelving. Once the two were seated in the doughy ultrachairs that shaped around them as they pushed in body and appendages Jim went to prepare some nutrition. His hope was to coax the story out of these two dudes of how they'd no doubt plundered an ancient tomb somewhere.
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"Deep in the jungle we cut our path. The ferns thick and overgrown. Orange speckled grincos swarmed over the trees, drawn to the sent of sweet sap from the trees disturbed by our landing. We had found merchant texts describing a city that used to exist in this area, their psychical documentation portraying their advanced age. We trudged through the abundant greenery in a plotted line from our vehicle, our screens limited to simple translocators due to the low energy potential of the world. We had lost main signal 3 jumps ago and were struggling to locate the galaxy this tablet originally came from. The items we obtained clearly came from a world abundant in both tropic jungle and varied life forms, the key was just to find such a planet that both matched the material composition from the tablet we had obtained and had the acquired tropic environs and inhabitants described by its text. Turns out the tablet originated from a desolate moon that belonged to a neighboring planet full of the lifeless outposts of a merchant outfit, and that the jungle was located on a different world altogether."
"probably anyways."
"Yes, yes probably. We didn't waste the time to land and check"
Jim was struck by the fact they had left the potential gold mine of an age old merchant outpost unexplored and unverified because a dubious tablet hinted at a city of ancient riches. Adventurous sorts like these ones never came across as the brightest- then again, anyone this far outside of inhabited space was bound to have a few components missing from some of their brain departments.
"So we continued on the plotted path, trying to not disturb or overly agitate the vibrant forest. The trip seemed uneventful enough, and the tide of grincos had dissipated somewhat."
"What are grincos sorry?" Jim interjected
"Type of lizard from his homeworld." Gilb answered
Jim nodded and sipped his soup to indicate his willingness for them to continue.
"So I figured the dispersing tide was a sign of a calm jungle to come. The path we were following became increasing hard to stick too. The trunks seemed to draw even closer together as we passed and the ferns that had filled the space not covered by thick trunk had grown more tactile and resistant to ward off other potential self producing organisms from taking their resources. Finally light began to fall more clearly on the way forward, our struggle and constant reorienting through the greenery bearing fruit. Before we could celebrate however a deep growl could be heard behind us.” In response to Glob's words Glib let out a low growl of his own, clearly reliving the event in his mind. “The beast was a deep purple without eyes or disagreeable sensing organs. Instead the beast was furred and hunched over on four legs, its voice vibrating out from its long oval jaws. The real identifiable feature of the creature was its prolonged head that amounted to nothing more than a big long mouth filled with a thousand teeth and a powerful tasting tongue. Its growling was joined by another's hidden in the undergrowth behind it.
Glib taking the advantage and definitely not enraged by the size and maintained deadliness of the creatures' superior maws raced forward, long yillish blade at her side. As fast as the blink the first beasts head rolled down onto the ground. Snarls erupted from the lower plant level as three more beasts erupted from in front of us and I heard the stealthly but hurried approach of two more behind us. My blade was clapped onto my side as I unholstered my rifle. I then burnt a hole in the upper chest of a beast that jumped towards arkostatosh's neck as she strafed to engage the leftmost beast in melee.
Knowing she could handle the other two I flexed my legs and dove forward. My boots activated and jets propelled me enough to dodge the pounce of the stealthed mutts behind me. I rolled in the air and came to rest on my back, rifle poised to take out my targets. The jagged fur of one beast stood on end, pointed away from it as if a mane of broken quarts. Behind it its friend scrabbled and attempted to right itself after its lunge, having lacked its companions graceful landing. I hit the proud beast's head dead center and it swiftly crumbled, its fur going flat again as it fell to the ground and left me a much clearer shot at its companion. The mutt attempted to leap on my prone form but my rifle was ready. A burn bolt kicked out and felled the creature, a slice from arkostatosh's sword ending its convulsions."
'Nice shot on that one’ she commented while pointing at the body of the protective monster 'right between the eyes' Of course the mutts clearly didn't have any eyes and pointing that out is what caused me to get this burn on my leg, 'cause as a final beast jumped on me and went to bite off my leg arkostatosh just stood there and watched it!"
"Shouldn't have insulted me."
"You insulted yourself you cretin, I almost burned my leg off shooting the thing!"
arkostatosh simply shrugged and went back to digging into the soup they'd been provided.
"So the treasure?" Jim prompted, interrupting Glob's glowering.
"Yes yes the treasure. Where was I? We continued through the jungle after taking samples of the aggressive creatures. Arcanie genomes with only olfactory sensing organs are rare species and we meant to get them logged. Although she wouldn't let me take teeth samples cause she was jealous they had more impressive jaws."
"They did not!"
"Butt out I'm telling the story! So after harvesting our samples we quickly came to the edge of the treeline, finding an abrupt end to the jungle in the form of a sheer cliff face. Frowning I checked our scanners and sure enough this was the area we'd triangulated from our research. The merchant account of the city and its location said it should be in this swath of world. looking down to the bottom of the crevice we couldn't see much more than dark air. It took a few minutes of searching before we found some remnants of a wooden composite laying rotten on an uneven section of the opposite cliff face. Any other markers of civilization were absent and it was at this point I had to consider the possibility that some sort of disaster had caused the city to end up swallowed by the earth. But then again what we could actually read of the tablet suggested the city was surrounded by stone anyways so it could just as easily have been located at the bottom. Knowing we hadn't done all this not to check we put stakes in the ground and prepared to abseil."
"Wait a minute there. You said the tablet translation wasn't complete, how much of it was actually legible?"
"Uuuuhhhhhh." The skin next to Glob's eyeballs recessed in two thin lines, making his large eyeballs look positively huge in his bulbous head. "We'd seen enough to know what we were looking for."
Jim pegged the weird expression as embarrassment and internally sighed in disbelief. I thought aliens were supposed to be smarter than humans, not stupid enough to embark on a wild goose chase halfway across the universe in search of buried treasure. Can't argue with the results though- well I mean they've gathered three artifacts so maybe I can argue a little.
"So uh, we uh descended down the cliff face and almost made it what must of been a quarter way down before arkostatosh disappeared from my sight"
"That's right!" arkostatosh looked up after having slurped up all of their remaining soup and energetically rejoined the conversation. "One moment I was easing down the crevice and the next I was swinging feet first into the void, darkness swallowing me like I'd jumped into the jaws of oblivion itself."
"It turns out the civilization we were looking for had hidden themselves in a cave." Glob ceased yapping in order to scrape food into his own mouth holes, having recovered his spirits throughout the story telling and now feeling his appetite awakening. Taking this as their que arkostatosh jumped in to finish the story.
"So there we were, standing in the opening with a stretch of unexplored cave before us. We closed in on our target. Our steps echoed through the dim space, the light generated from our devices doing little to pierce the darkness. The hall or corridor we were in was massive and the scale of it spoke well of the treasures we might find within. After some time walking through the nothingness our lights began to reveal something big. The steps of a great monolith appeared before us, and their great might filled the cavern entirely, the hewn stone encompassing the space from one wall to the other. Feelers almost fluttering I thrust the wellsource into place. The machine locked and then spread open. The still air in the chamber shifted as the machine pulled the energy from the air, the faded breeze entering from the ravine nothing compared to the stirring of life that filled the cavern. Me and Yilllititytgkgfdfdsugsofsg covered our eyes as light flooded the chamber, the blight flash of the wellsource fading as it activated, working to provide a steady illumination that could fill the whole space. Me and Yi quickly ascended the stair case to escape the brightness of the wellsource and it wasn't until we were a few steps up that we stopped and were finally able to open our eyes fully. The structure disappeared into the abyss above and when greeted with that stretching vista I realized our mistake. There was no city here. The great monolith that filled up this monstrous cavern, was a temple."