by Joel Stottlemire

Created on: June 13, 2007   Last Updated: January 20, 2012

Verder recognized the song. It was old and he couldn't remember the words but with three hundred years of digital technology behind humanity, more for some races, there were a lot more old songs than there were new ones.

He bobbed his head and tried to swing to the beat a little as he sidled up to the bar. The place wasn't smokey like some Urtin bars were but it smelled very strange. Someone, probably a Wikit walker was outgassing through its skin making the whole bar smell like a cross between a bakery and an ammonia factory.

He put his elbows on the high end of the sloping bar and asked for a drink. You didn't usually find many humans in multi-species bars. Between the smells, spores and species that killed each other during mating, humans tended to stick to their own. Not Verder.

He considered himself a romantic adventurer. It was his opinion that most, not all, warm blooded life forms were fun to rub up against. It was a constant adventure; what psudopod did they have, how likely were they to leave red sucker marks on your face. There were enough life forms from other races with a like mind set that he seldom went home alone.

The bar was looking likely that night. A pair of Gree Grasis were blowing puffs of green smoke out there noses at each other and giggling. There were also some lightly furred Pughs playing pool in the corner. He couldn't tell whether they were male or female. It didn't really matter. In the inter species mating game, you had to be sort of open minded. Lifflies could change gender during intercourse. Always a surprising turn of events.

He took his drink and sidled over to see who was plugged into the scanner-games. There was a new species there. It looked like a female something or other. It had a basically humaniod body with long folds of skin down its sides; wings maybe.

He punched the call button on creature's console and waited to see if it would respond. A minute or so later, the creature lifted up the head piece on the scanner and looked up at Verder. It had a short oval head with wide eyes on either side of a small, lipped mouth. Verder took the lips as a good sign. He liked lips.

"Hey." He said. "What's a beautiful creature like you doing in a dingy space port like this?" He smiled. He found parodying himself was as successful as trying to find a good line.

"I'm playing a scanner game." The creature said. Actually, it chortled in its throat and the translator around its neck said, "I'm playing a scanner game." in a pleasant, woman's

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