Fic idea I was struck with the other day and keep thinking about: a Vulcan adopts a cat.
Still thinking about this, even though I’m not writing the fic!
This Vulcan, I’m calling her T’Pen, goes to a shelter and gets a cat, and the shelter employees are like, a bit weirded out? But obviously they’re going to give her a cat, I mean, she’s a Vulcan, she’s Super Responsible, she takes all the pamphlets and listens attentively to all the advice the shelter employees give her, even though it is obvious she researched a lot on her own.
Then T’Pen asks the shelter folks what she should name the cat and runs into That Thing Humans Do Where They Confound a Vulcan With Their Weird Ways
Shelter Employee 1: oh, you can name a cat anything! That’s what’s great! People names, common nouns, whole phrases.
Shelter Employee 2: yeah, nothing sounds weird on a cat. Everything from Chad to Cupboard is fair game.
SE 1: yeah, I mean, you can’t call a dog Chad, that would be weird
SE 2: I wouldn’t fuckin’ trust anyone who named their dog Chad
SE 1: oh word
T’Pen:….
T’Pen: ….fascinating.
Later, in the interest of furthering her anthropological study of Earth, T’Pen has a houseparty and she invites her coworkers, many of whom are human, but others which are aliens, and are fascinated by T’Pen’s cat
Vulcan Co-worker: T’Pen, what have you named this small Earth feline?
T’Pen: I have named him Marmalade.
Vucan co-worker: Is that not the name of a type of Terran fruit preserve? I do not understand the logic behind this choice.
T’Pen: the logic is self-evident to a human.
Human Co-worker: T’Pen, omg, you have a cat! What’s his name?
T’Pen: thank you for your inquiry. His name is Marmalade
Human Co-worker: oooh! yeah, that makes sense, because he’s orange and sweet! lmao, great name
Vulcan Co-worker: …
Vulcan Co-worker: ….fascinating
Human: So, how’s Marmalade?
T’Pen: He has the peculiar habit of walking on my workstation.
Human: Aggravating, isn’t it?
T’Pen: We Vulcans do not feel human emotions. However, I would prefer it if Marmalade stayed off my workstation, particularly when I am working.
Human: Get a box.
T’Pen: Murdering Marmalade seems an overreaction.
Human: No, you need a box with interior dimensions approximately the same as Marmalade’s body, and set it on the floor next to your workstation. Marmalade will sit in the box.
T’Pen: Why do you believe that this will work for Marmalade?
Human: We don’t know. It’s just something cats do. If he fits, he sits.
T’Pen: … Fascinating.
Vulcan Commander: T’Pen, you are posting videos of your cat. Explain.
T’pen: My colleagues are amused and entertained by Marmalade’s interactions with his environment. I am amused and entertained by their reactions as reflected in the comments.
Vulcan Commander (reading): “U haz done me a startle”?
T’Pen: Some of them like to verbalize what they believe are Marmalade’s thought processes. He is a cat, so they imagine that he does not grasp human spelling and grammar.
Vulcan Commander: … Fascinating. As you were. (signs off)
T’Pen (returning to her meal): Now I can haz lunch.
arcticflakes
