Archive of Our Own ^beta

Dappled light fell through the trees, casting the world as if it were in a fairy tale. Travis looked around, trying to appreciate the beauty, but still feeling uninspired. He was in a slump. He had no inspiration, no matter what he tried, so he'd taken a walk to the forest to try and inspire him, but still nothing.

However, the light filtering through caught his eye in one place. What seemed to be smoke was illuminated. Travis frowned a little. He didn't think anyone came out this far, and he was sure you weren't allowed fires in this woodland.

Travis followed the wispy trails of smoke, planning a way to confront the person.

What he wasn't prepared for was a mass of smouldering metal, pieces and panels embedded in the surrounding dirt.

Travis hesitantly approached. It appeared to be a capsule of some sort, made of a slightly pinkish metal, ripped in half, completely mangled, edges scorched black.

He raised a hand, but couldn't feel much heat radiating from the metal, so he deemed it safe. He carefully placed his hand down, and stepped up, inside the capsule. The inside was softly lit, pink lights blinking, flickering. There was a console at the front, lit up blue.

Travis made his way over to what appeared to be the captains chair. A pained noise startled him, and he realised there was a figure in the chair.

They appeared mostly human, but Travis didn't really pay attention to the features. They were definitely injured, a gash on their forehead was bleeding, and they were nearly unconscious.

Thinking quickly, Travis managed to unstrap them from the seat and pick them up. They were surprisingly light, considering they were about Travis's height, and they made another noise when they were moved. They sounded relatively human, but their voice was very melodic.

Travis carried them carefully from the capsule, and laid them on a patch of grass in the sunlight.

They whined softly, opening their eyes, and Travis gasped. Their eyes were far wider than normal human eyes, and both different colors. One was green, and the other was bright blue. Despite it being the middle of the day, stars were reflected in the soft colors, and they had no pupils, just color.

Now that Travis had the chance to properly look at them, he could see how human they weren't. Other than their eyes, the main difference was the pink stripes that curved over their cheek bones, around their eyes, down the centre of their nose, and on their neck.

Their nose was slightly flat, with more slitted nostrils, and their mouth was small and slightly circular, almost pouty.

Travis ripped the bottom of his shirt off, and pressed it to the wound on their forehead. Purple blood soaked through the material, and he gently dabbed it away, before refolding the cloth and pressing it down again. The bleeding seemed to be slowing, so Travis pulled the cloth away and assessed the damage. The wound seemed to be healed, so Travis sat back, trying to see if their was anymore damage.

Travis decided to find more about the creature, so he decided to ask, "Are you hurt?"

The creature seemed to perk up, a pair of pink anntenae with softly glowing yellow orbs on the end popping up, showing his intrigue.

"England?" The creature asked, voice soft, lyrical.

Travis smiled a little, "No, America. But we have the same language."

The creature- alien? - nodded, and said, "What is you name?"

"My name is Travis," he responded, trying to speak slower and clearer when it became clear that this definitely wasn't the creature's first language.

"My name-" They paused, tilting their head slightly and saying something in a different language that Travis could barely comprehend, before saying, "name Awsten."

"Hello Awsten," Travis smiled, and Awsten beamed at him, showing off slightly pointed teeth, so Travis continued, "Would you like to come with me? You can't stay by yourself, bad people might find you."

Awsten frowned a little, taking a minute to work out what Travis was asking. "You are good?"

Travis nodded, "I want to help you."

Awsten considered this for a moment, before nodding, "you help. Travis help Awsten."

This made Travis laugh, Awsten was just so adorable.

Travis held out a hand to the alien, and Awsten pulled themselves to their feet, stumbling a little. Travis caught them, murmuring, "steady there buddy."

It was fairly difficult to get back to Travis's apartment, as Awsten kept stumbling. Travis was a little worried about how injured Awsten really was, but there wasn't much he could do for them in the middle of a forest. At least it was the evening, so there wasn't many people around to see.

Travis managed to get Awsten back to his apartment without issue, although he had to carry them up the stairs. Awsten was mostly asleep by time they got back, so they didn't protest to Travis picking them up.

Travis set Awsten down so that he could unlock the door. Awsten whined softly, leaning into his side and clinging to his shirt. Travis shook his head fondly, and opened the door, leading Awsten inside and making sure the door was locked behind them.

After a small amount of hassle, Travis managed to get Awsten into his room, and deposited them on the bed.

"Do you wanna sleep?" Travis asked them, and the alien nodded.

"Tired." The alien said in agreement. Travis stood up, smiling, and went to leave, but the alien whined. "Travis stay."

Travis hesitated a moment, but made the mistake of meeting Awsten's wide, pleading eyes, and he was defeated. He sighed, and turned the light off, before grabbing his phone and getting into bed beside Awsten. Travis sat against the headboard, and Awsten curled up against his thigh, and Travis could've sworn the alien was purring quietly.

Once Awsten was asleep, Travis turned on his phone. It had been a couple of days since he'd last checked his messages, and he was honestly surprised by the amount of texts and missed calls.

Most of them were from Jawn, Otto, and Geoff.

He swiped away all the missed call icons, and contemplated playing the messages, before swiping those away as well.

There was a couple of texts from Jawn that he read ( dude are you still alive. dude srsly. did you die? ) and one from Otto ( reply to jawn, he's worrying), but he swiped them away as well. He'd reply in the morning, or something.

###

Travis didn't get the chance to reply the next morning however.

He was rudely awoken by someone knocking on his door. He sighed, and stretched a little, back stiff from sleeping sat up. Awsten appeared to be a deep sleeper, as they barely stirred when Travis lifted their head so he could get up. An antennae twitched, glowing softly, but Awsten didn't wake up.

Travis made his way out his room, making sure the door was shut behind him, and opened the front door. He was greeted by Jawn, Otto and Geoff.

"Dude, where have you been?" Otto asked, as the trio walked inside.

"Oh... I've just been, uh, writing. Yeah," Trvis responded, cursing himself for sounding so awkward, "I had inspiration, so I kinda forgot to check my phone."

Otto didn't look convinced, and Geoff said, "can we see what you've written?"

"No! Uh- no, I don't wanna spoil it."

Jawn raised an eyebrow, but before he could comment, a quiet, sleepy sounding voice said, "Travis?"

Confused silence settled over them, until Otto said, "What the fuck is that?" and Travis turned around to see Awsten stood in the doorway, looking confused and a little nervous.

Travis sighed, and gestured Awsten over. Awsten seemed to understand, and hesitantly walked over.

Travis turned back to his friends, the alien tucking themselves against his side, although their wide eyes were trained on Jawn.

"Uh... This is Awsten."

Another awkward pause, until Otto went, "that still doesn't answer my question. What the fuck is it?"

Awsten flinched a little at Otto's tone, making a frightened noise.

"They're an alien. I was walking in the woods looking for inspiration, and there was smoke, so I went to investigate, and there was thins hunk of torn up metal, and I went inside, and Awsten was in there, and they were hurt, so I helped them out."

Otto and Geoff listened intently to Travis's explanation, but Jawn was a little distracted, as Awsten had left Travis's side and wandered over to him.

Then, Awsten said something in what must have been their language. It was chirpy and musical and made no sense to Travis, Otto, and Geoff. But Jawn had a strange look on his face. A look of recognition.

Jawn said a quiet, "what?" and Awsten wrapped their arms around him, still talking quickly in their language.

"Jawn, what's going on?" Travis asked.

Jawn turned back to them, not seeming to mind Awsten clinging to him. "I think I can understand them?"
Awsten chirped a little more, before realizing everyone was looking at them, and slowly falling silent.

"Wait what?" Travis broke the silence. 

Jawn chewed his lip, shrugging. "It's like... I know their talking in a different language, but my brain is translating it." 

Otto frowned a little, "why do you speak alien?" 

Jawn shrugged again, looking a little lost. The small spheres on the end of Awsten's antennae had started glowing, pulsing with soft white light as they bounced on their heels, tugging Jawn's sleeve. 

Jawn turned to face them again, and they started talking, chirping lyrically. Jawn nodded along, before saying, "huh," quietly. 

"What's he saying?" Geoff spoke up, but before Jawn could respond, Awsten replied. 

"He not... Not uh-" They looked to Jawn. 

"Human. Awsten says I'm not completely human," Finished Jawn, and Awsten nodded excitedly, beaming. 

"Huh." Another silence settled over the room, as everyone stopped to consider this, until Awsten spoke up. 

"Probably your great-great-grandparent was from my home. That uh- that generation was big traveller. They went long way." 

And this was not what Travis had expected when he'd gone for a walk the previous day to get inspiration.

###

Surprisingly, after the original confusion, everyone adapted well to Awsten being around. The alien had started living with Jawn for convenience, as Jawn could understand them, but even without the language barrier they were still a difficult housemate. 

The humans may have adapted to living with the alien, but the alien was still having issues adapting to living with the humans. 

It was early in the morning, a few weeks after Awsten's arrival, and Jawn was in the kitchen making breakfast. It took a while to work out what sort of food Awsten should eat, as he didn't know much about their species. Awsten helped as well as they could, but half of the foods on their planet either didn't translate, or didn't exist on earth. 

So far, they'd worked out that Awsten's species were mostly vegetarian, but could eat meat if they wanted. Awsten seemed to like a lot of earth fruit (Jawn had discovered that there wasn't much variation on his planet), but Awsten also enjoyed PopTarts and other sweet things that didn't exist at all on their planet. 

So Jawn was making breakfast, various small fruits and some yoghurt, but he also wanted Awsten to try orange juice, since they enjoyed fruit so much. 

Awsten made their way into the kitchen just as Jawn was pouring the juice. Awsten was always a sight in the morning. Their hair messy, antenna pulsing with soft light. They always squinted a lot, and Jawn wasn't sure they could see that well in brighter light. Awsten was a little stubborn, so it was entirely possible that Awsten couldn't see at all but refused to say anything. 

"Morning," Jawn said, and Awsten jumped a little, making a noise similar to a startled cat.

Awsten hesitated a moment, before smiling and saying, "Good morning Jawn."

"I made breakfast. Fruit, yoghurt. And some orange juice." He pushed the bowl along the counter and Awsten hopped up onto one of the stools, tilting his head curiously.

"Orange... Juice?"

Jawn grinned, handing over the glass.

Awsten sniffed at it, antenna flat, before taking a tentative sip. Their antenna popped up, and they made another cat-like noise, excited.

"Like it?" Jawn asked, watching their reaction with a smile.

Awsten nodded, "it is good. But- uh- why do you get the- the juice when you have the fruit?"

"Well... I don't know really... Humans need to drink, like, water. But water doesn't taste that nice, so we get juice or whatever, and that's nice than water."

Awsten nodded along as he spoke. "Makes sense."

So maybe there were still a few things Awsten had to figure out.
 

###
 

Awsten sat on the edge of Geoff's bed, eyes closed, holding perfectly still.

They'd decided that, now Awsten was a bit more used to living with humans, they were going to try taking them outside.

Geoff was carefully applying some makeup to hide their most alien features, or to accentuate them to make them fit in. He had a layer of foundation to make their skin less pink, but purple lipstick to make the natural color look like makeup.

At some point, they needed to take Awsten shopping, but that might be a bit too much for the alien, so they were planning to just take a walk around the park, maybe get an ice cream or something.

"Are you nearly done?" Jawn asked from the doorway, and Geoff looked over, nodding.

"Yeah, just a sec," He moved Awsten's head a little, checking there was no patches.

Jawn walked into the room, "looks good."

Awsten blinked, looking up at them, before saying, "my eyes."

"Huh?"

Awsten giggled, "my eyes. You have the weird black spot."

"Oh yeah-" Jawn smiled a little at Awsten calling the 'black spot' weird. "I got you some sunglasses. They'll hide your eyes and stop the sun hurting you so much."

Jawn handed over the sunglasses- blue plastic circles with tinted lenses- and Awsten put them on, smiling a little. With the makeup and glasses, they looked completely human. It was a little unsettling.

And of course, Awsten couldn't wear makeup and sunglasses all the time, but for short trips outside, it'd do.

They'd work things out, it'd just take some time.