Aliens seeing and hearing lyrebird. That's it. That's the whole prompt. -- Anon Guest
The rocket thrust engines sounded at full throttle. They sounded from the throat of an otherwise grey and ordinary-looking bird with an ornate tail. After it was done rumbling, it imitated the sound of a few imager trigger sounds. Then it replicated precisely the zoo closing warning.
"Bing bing bong. The zoo will be closing in fifteen minutes. Please make your way towards the exit. The zoo will be closing in fifteen minutes. Visitors in the gift shop, please finalise your purchases."
The bird stopped to preen, fluffing its feathers and twitching its tail. Thereafter it launched into a series of far more recognisable bird calls, one after the other. Grux was impressed, as many visitors were. It was a non-cogniscent avian from the deathworldiest part of the Deathworld appropriately known as Terra.
Australia is full of mimics. There's a lizard that impersonates the prickly desert rocks. There are large numbers of lizards that imitate bark, as well as a seemingly equal number of moths that do the same. There's an owl that, whilst resting in the daylight hours, perfectly mimics a stump. It should be no surprise to anyone that the biggest mimic of them all comes from the same island-continent.
This show appeared to be over. The bird tucked away its impressive tail and went about its environment looking for food. With it's tail down, it looked like any other boring grey bird designed to fit, more or less, seamlessly into a monochromatic landscape that any predator would see.
Considering that this animal came from Australia, a place so legendarily deadly that it became a shorthand for what Deathworlds were, Grux had one question for the keepers.
"How many ways is this creature capable of killing an adult cogniscent?"
[Image (c) Can Stock Photo / kozyrevaelena]
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