Non-human Trans Characters Who Use Different Gender Signifiers From Us Is Sooo Underrated. Transfem Bird

So I am a really big fan of animal point-of-view fiction (or xenofiction as it's sometimes called), but I can't help feeling that the genre has so much wasted potential, and writers in this genre have fallen into so much laziness. Animal stories have been a part of human culture since pretty much the beginning of time, and the more you read of these old animal fables and tales, you realise how clever and unique a lot of these stories were. And even more recently, we've had stories such as Jungle Book, Call Of The Wild, Animal Farm.But it seems since the release of Watership Down in, that the animal fiction genre has fallen into a sort of generic mould that every story has to follow. Don't get me wrong, I ADORE wds and I've read it so many times that the pages are falling out of my copy, but I've lost count of how many books I've seen that have the same "animals live in a tribal society with their own language, culture, and religion have to escape the clutches of The Evil Humans" narrative. While there are a few recent books that don't follow this exact mould (Felidae for example) the genre has seemed so stagnant for the past 50 years or so. And one thing that bothers me about these kinds of stories is how easily they fall into these really disturbing ideas. (I don't know if "ecofascit" is the appropriate term here, but it sounds very similar) They just all seem to drone on and on about "all the humans are evil and cruel and destructive and only the animals and untouched nature are pure bla bla bla" in such an embarrassingly misanthropic way. I read Garry Kilworth's Hunters Moon (the one about foxes) last year, and I could take none of the plot seriously because the writer couldn't go a single chapter without having a laughable Humans Bad rant. I don't know. Animal stories have meant so much to global human culture throughout history, and it makes me slightly sad to see the genre become stagnant and unoriginal over the past few decades.

(and I'd love to hear any book recommendations if you have any)

id wreak mayhem for a really good scifi where sight was considered as exotic and numinous as telepathy by the protag species

As A Velociraptor Should Do

Wrote this for an English project, can't believe I forgot to post it here!

Summary: A velociraptor makes a daring escape from a research facility! Freedom is all hers, if she wants it.

Rating: E Length: 1500 words CW: blood mention, animal death (raptor goes hunting)

The smell of grass and wildflowers lingered for longer than Sierra expected. In spite of her artificial surroundings, the raptor knew the scent well; her researcher/caretaker liked fresh air while he worked, so long as Sierra was secure in her enclosure. This time, however, the smell of the outside world persisted even after Avi left the surrounding room. Sierra put the pieces together: the scent meant an open window, an open window meant a passage to outside, to the forest she’d seen only through glass, and the forest meant hunting, and freedom, and very clever ambushes. And without Avi to catch her before she bolted, that left only one obstacle between her and that sweet, unrestricted freedom.

Sierra knew how the door to her enclosure worked, after seeing Avi open it so many times. The handle, chest-height for him, was still too high for her biting range, even if she stretched up as tall as she could go. For a brief moment, she nearly chirped a loud help call, to try to get the human to open it for her, but the thought of having to evade him on the way to the window quashed that idea. Instead, Siera crouched, took aim, and leapt at the door, landing with a crash of talons on metal. Her claws hooked into the holes in the mesh, and she grabbed the handle in her jaws and yanked down. With a click, the door slowly swung open. Success.

After some effort to disentangle her claws from the door, Sierra once again stood on the floor of her enclosure. She ruffled her feathers, took a step out, and froze. Surely she wasn’t going to escape without her beloved stuffed raptor! Quick as she could, she turned, grabbed Nevada in her jaws, and dragged him away. The steady sound of fabric sliding on tile accompanied the rhythmic click of dino claws, as Sierra searched for the open window, following her nose. Finally, a gentle breeze wove through her feathers, and she found herself and Nevada in front of a small cabinet. It felt familiar to her, and when the raptor drew close enough to see the dent in the metal, Sierra recognized it with a wince.

It had been a few months earlier, just after finishing a round of measurements. Sierra had spotted a curious, bright red bug zipping around in front of her. Naturally, such things must be caught. However, no matter how sharp her turns or how quick her sprint, the strange insect evaded her grasp. Avi was helping, in his own way: he did not run much, himself, but with some tool in his hand, he pointed out to her where the bug was with enviable speed and precision. With her natural hunting skills and Avi’s guidance, she remained hot on its trail until it sped under the cabinet, and Sierra did not, instead slamming into the metal hard enough to dent it. The noise must have scared it off, because it was another month before she ever saw another of its kind. And at least Avi was always there to help whenever one did show up.

Recalling the thrill of the hunt invigorated Sierra; she crouched once again, clamped down firmly on her toy, and leapt at the top of the small cabinet… but came up short and fell back to the floor. Undeterred, the raptor issued a low, warning trill at the furniture and tried again. And again. After the third failure, she let go of Nevada for one last attempt. This time, without carrying around a large stuffed toy, she cleared the jump with ease. And at last, the window was right in front of her. Sierra spared a glance back down at the floor-bound doll, but soon turned away. Freedom, it seemed, held a hefty price. She felt the wind ruffle her feathers - real wind, not just the building’s ventilation - and hopped outside, flapping her arms to slow her descent.

Across the field stood a forest of deep green. Sierra’s mind filled with outrunning and outwitting foes, as well as cornering or baiting them with another raptor. Surely, she resolved, that was where she would begin that liberated life, far from tests and researchers. She walked slowly, revelling in the feel of grass under her feet. Suddenly, movement! A pair of mice picked their way through the field, apparently unaware of how easily Sierra could see them.

A rush of energy coursed through the dinosaur’s body as she stalked her newfound prey. Slowly, quietly, and with utmost focus, she crept nearer and nearer. The wrong blade of grass rustled, and the mice shot off, with Sierra in hot pursuit. With her head tucked down, her body cut through the air as her legs propelled her around the field. A well-timed lunge split up the mice, sending one back closer to the building; Sierra stayed steady on the other, but inwardly congratulated herself on the trick. If she had been hunting with a partner, that other mouse would have just become easy pickings!

At last, the mouse misstepped, or maybe simply grew tired. It hardly mattered to Sierra, who slammed a clawed foot down onto its little body. The raptor picked it up in her jaws and quickly gulped it down. She felt giddy. Her first hunt! And she could only get better. The forest was closer now, and drew closer still with each step. Soon, she would vanish from the view of that building, and truly begin her life as a free, wild dinosaur!

Just before the first trees, the ground dropped away at a sharp ledge. Sierra was not foolish enough to fall, but instead hesitated at the drop. She looked back at the building she had come from. Just one more jump, and she may never see it again. No more tests, no more wire mesh enclosure, no more stale air. The raptor crouched and readied her arms to manage her descent, but more thoughts came. No more sleeping next to Nevada. No more hunting those red bugs with Avi. The little dinosaur stood back up. No more Nevada. No more Avi. She took a step back, then shook her head, as though she could physically shake the thoughts out of it. Surely, she was not in for solitude, just something different. In fact…

Sierra took a deep breath,screeched a call into the woods, and waited for a response.

Nothing.

Just idle birdsong and the rustling of leaves and branches in the wind.

She drew in another breath, and chirped as loud as she could, calling any raptors for help. And again, in case they hadn’t heard the first time.

No response.

Sierra shivered, and her feathers stood on end. She hadn’t thought of this, when she dreamed of hunting, wild and free, that she might do it all alone. There was always a second or third raptor in her thoughts, to share food with, to protect and be protected by, to play with. The more she thought of it, the more she realized she disliked the idea of it. She knew what she would do, then. Nevada wasn’t technically alive, and Avi wasn’t a dinosaur, but they were both infinitely better than nothing. Sierra turned around; real raptors or no, she was going to live with her pack.

…right after she chased down that rabbit she just saw move.

One quick meal later, Sierra found herself staring up at the windowsill she had first leapt from. To her dismay, it was too high to jump onto, as she discovered with several failed attempts. Determined to break back into the place she had just escaped from, she looked along the wall, and soon found a lower windowsill. Even better, once she had leapt up and peered through the glass, she saw Avi sitting at some kind of machine.

Sierra chirped for help, then tapped her muzzle against the window. Avi looked her way, then turned back. An instant later, he whipped his head around again and stood up fast enough to knock his chair backwards. Avi ran over to the window, unlocked it, and pushed it open.

“Sierra, how did you get out?” he asked. Sierra ducked inside, hopped onto the floor, and trotted back to the research and testing area. Avi followed, trying to look her over. “Is that blood? Not yours, I hope.”

Paying little heed to the noises Avi made, the raptor quickly found Nevada where she had left him, grabbed him in her mouth again, and dragged him to Avi. He finally noticed the open window, closed it, scooped up Sierra and her toy, then carried her to a small basin with a water spout.

“I’m gonna have to get an actual lock now, huh,” Avi muttered as he watched Sierra splash herself clean.

Sierra responded to his sounds with a happy trill. It was settled, then: the next time she escaped, she’d have to take Avi with her.

Eve figuring out how to communicate with The Autumn Man. Magic can translate language quite well, but The Autumn Man has a hard time with mimicking, so speech doesn’t come naturally to him. But poking things? Sure, he can do that.

oh my god two words in that just UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE

“The female Utahraptor doesn’t have a name for herself. Her brain doesn’t operate with words, not even with silent, unspoken syllables. It works with images, colorful bursts of memory that make up a dreamlike history the brain constantly updates. Every day new experiences and new associations from her senses rearrange the symbolic registry. In her own brain the raptor identifies herself with the symbols she learned as a chick: ‘me… raptor… red.’ We can call her Raptor Red, because that’s how she labels herself in her own mental imagery.”

— -Raptor Red, Robert T. Bakker

overslept

I've been watching some videos about xenofiction for... reasons... *glances at my recent writing projects* AHEM yeah and this guy mentioned something that... vaguely got me to understand my friends more.

I'm (unfortunately) friends with lots of people who think a lot of the things I'm interested in are "too weird" for them. They can't watch The Last Unicorn because they find the unicorn as well as the art style creepy. They can't watch Watership Down because they can't wrap their head around talking rabbits who haven't advanced to Wind in the Willows levels of society yet. Or maybe they can't watch or read animal xenofiction or consume anthro art whatsoever because animals don't talk or do those things and they think that it could have been as good with human characters. It's like their brain does all of these gymnastics that I haven't in all my life considered. I just liked these pieces of media as a kid because I thought they were... cool... I've never found it hard to understand that the rabbits in this story talk, even though they don't in real life. That objective/subjective concept has never crossed my mind whatsoever.

This guy talked about verisimilitude and suspension of disbelief. Verisimilitude is pretty much just continuity and rules in a story. Firebenders in The Last Airbender cannot bend water. Rabbits in Watership down can talk to each other, vaguely understand other animals, and cannot understand humans. They're fabricated rules of reality that exist within a narrative.

Suspension of disbelief is basically your capacity to understand and believe those fabricated rules. This can swing wildly in two directions. You can either be just wholely unconvinced of anything that doesn't follow normal rules of life or be totally gullible to the point of disregarding plot holes and crappy deux ex machina. I feel like I lean more toward disregarding plot holes lmao.

Not sure where I was going with this post but it felt sorta nice to hear another fan of xenofiction describe this... weird thing when you read a book or watch a movie that changes your life and you recommend it to a friend and their first reaction is "uh... how is she able to understand the wolf?" and that stuff is too weird for them to even consider picking up a masterpiece of art. I guess it makes me feel less like my friends are intentionally withholding understanding to be mean to me and more that this is just... how some people are and some people just seem incapable of understanding certain stories and media.

New special interest alert