Disclaimer: I do not own anything associated with the movie District 9, simply this plot, along with any original characters.

Warnings: language, violence

Please read: First off, I would like to thank you for taking the time to check out my story!

I was writing this chapter while mainly listening to soundtracks (District 9, In Bruges, Requiem For A Dream, How to Train Your Dragon, King Arthur, etc.), so it felt cooler writing it than it probably is.

I am aware that the alien species might not actually be called Poleepkwa; they were referenced as such in Blomkamp's short, Alive in Jo'burg, so it is unknown whether that is their real name, or simply what the South Africans call them. For the purpose of this story, they are actually Poleepkwa. It's barely mentioned anyway, so just go with the flow, I guess.

Concerning the anatomy of the aliens. I have taken the liberty to invent some information to suit the story, and to sate my curiosity towards the creatures. If anything is not one hundred percent physically possible/necessary, you can either pretend all is well, or politely let me know. :)

Enjoy!

(chapter revised July 2012)

The Odd Human Condition
By LaughableBlackStorm

PART I: District 9

I. (day four)

A habit he had picked up was to abruptly stop what he was doing and wonder where they were, out in space. It was an effortless pattern to fall into; Wikus now spent varying amounts of time every day thinking, contemplating their course on the ship, their speed through endless space (or was it velocity?)… How gravity felt on their planet, how hard the ground was beneath their feet… What it must feel like, travelling such a vast distance away from the area of space that humans had been able to map out... He knew the Prawns came from a galaxy Wikus' own species hardly understood, and to many humans that was threatening.

If he were better with figures and vectors and astrophysical knowledge (someone like Christopher), someone more mathematically and scientifically inclined, Wikus would have calculated the numbers to try to answer his thoughts. Gravity had pulled the massive ship towards the centre of the Earth, and yet, somehow, the Prawns had found a way to defeat it, perhaps through the adaptation to their own greater gravity on their larger home planet.

He wondered how fast the ship moved, if it perhaps rotated as it went along, and if it did how fast it would turn—but he could never begin an attempt to actually figure out the proper equations to give him some clues. Only beings such as Christopher Johnson could work that sort of magic, and Wikus believed his own hat of tricks had been flipped inside out to reveal an empty stage, the rabbit long since hopped away, the moment the black fluid had entered his nose and mouth. His last magical moment had been his promotion. What a lifetime ago.

Sometimes, he wondered if it was possible that Christopher and little Christopher Junior were travelling to an entire alternate universe. Tania had always loved the idea of other dimensions and universes, and Wikus had loved to hear her talk about it so passionately.

It would be so lonely, in such a large vessel with only one other being to speak with. Wikus doubted Christopher minded it, though. He had seemed to have isolated himself and his son from the rest of the district. It had probably been for the better; they had remained under MNU's sensitive radar, only coming into trouble when Wikus himself was sent to evict them.

The back of his neck, at the base of his skull, gave a profound throb as blood rushed to his head. He winced as white specs littered his vision and then gingerly sat down on his small, makeshift bed. With his arms spread out for balance, he went down on his left knee first, then his right, and finally pressed his elbows into the pile of random assortments he called a mattress. He laid his forehead on his right arm, which was almost completely alien now. It was one of the few parts of his body that was not yet fully transformed.

He had been suffering from migraines and these odd rushes of blood for several hours, now, though nothing seemed to be coming of it. He knew his head would begin to transform shortly. His right eye was already an orange-tinted hazel to match his left, the iris larger than any human's, and small scabs of exoskeleton had begun peeking through his scalp onto his forehead and cheeks. The thought of his skull and face transforming terrified him the most. He was nervous that he would lose his memory, but hoped that since his human brain was controlling his alien limbs that perhaps the two brains would become one somehow…

His nose was slowly moulding with his upper jaw and would soon produce the strange tendrils, with the two on either side jointed at the middle. The tendrils closest to his mandible would be clawed at the end, for biting and chewing raw meat. He would begin to really enjoy uncooked cow meat and cat food.

The damned cat food made him feel like a tweaking teenager. Just the thought of consuming the slimy canned food made him simultaneously gag in repulsion and twitch with excitement.

He had closed his eyes to calm the dizzying white spots in his vision; now, he opened them again and sat back on his heels, and stared around the room. To his dismay there were some cat food cans—all of them empty—scattered about, though he had rigorously disciplined himself to one can a day, starting that morning. It took more effort than he cared to admit. He believed that with enough mantras in his head (I do not need it, I am strong, I am not addicted to fokken cat food, especially the tuna flavour), he could stop eating it altogether one day.

It made him feel better than the other Prawns stationed on planet Earth. They were neither strong willed enough nor terrified enough to check their addictions; every time he had caught sight of one in District 9, crushing a can and gulping down the contents (normally ten to twenty times a day, sometimes the same Prawn multiple times), Wikus had nodded to himself and reminded himself that he was different than the other Prawns. He was not a real Prawn himself, he was more of an imposter than anything. He was still human beneath the growing amounts of exoskeleton plates. Even though his second pair of arms were fully grown and his waist was a widened, meaty backbone, he was human.

He was not a Prawn. You are not a Prawn. I am not a Prawn.

II. (day zero)

After Christopher and Oliver had gone and MNU had gone and Wikus' hopes of returning to his normal life had gone, he lay on the street for approximately seven and a half minutes, breathing harshly and sobbing to himself. He then crawled back to Christopher's shack, only to realize it was not there anymore and had been blown apart when the little ship had emerged from the ground. Sitting in the dirt, staring at the hole and the rubbish rolling and blowing around the site, Wikus scratched his head, swore to himself, then swore at the Prawns who were watching him.

"Fok you, Christopher," he whispered into his good hand, as he rubbed his face. "You and your fokken little brat."

He dragged his heels through the sand until he sat cross-legged. He watched as some small clouds of dust attached to his shoes and pant legs while others wandered off in the slight breeze that was rolling through District 9 that day. He heard clicks sounding behind him. He turned his head to the side, but did not see an alien. Answering it anyway:

"Go away, Prawn."

A resounding click, along with a sound similar to "pffcht." God knew what it meant. The aliens were notorious for making random noises that weren't in their vocabulary. They probably enjoyed listening to themselves speak.

Two legs appeared in front of him, one of which had a pale green scarf wrapped around the ankle and calf. Wikus spent a moment staring at the thing and wondering why there was a Prawn standing in front of him. His vision swam in loops of colours.

Dragging his gaze up the creature's body, he stared into its large orange eyes. Its expression was curious, its antennae waved about. He watched those for a while as well, mesmerized.

"What, uh…" He swallowed, his mouth dry. "You're here for…Christopher Johnson's house? His shack, yes?" He pointed ahead of him, to where the shack used to be, and where a mound of uplifted dirt now stood with scraps of tin. And computer parts.

The Prawn said "pffcht" again and glanced at the remains of the shack. Tilting its head to the side, the creature made a motion with its left hand that could have been considered circular.

"Er…no."

"What?"

"I don't know, Prawn," he ground out. "Why are you here, okay, what do you want?"

It made the same motion with its hand. "How is it?" It glanced briefly at Wikus' Prawn arm.

"My—my arm?" Lifting the thing to his face, Wikus flopped it up and down a few times to see the remaining two fingers wiggle. "W-Why does that matter, eh Prawn? What does my arm mean to you, you fokken filthy creature!"

With strength beyond his battered body, Wikus stumbled to his feet and backed away from the alarmed alien.

"It isn't anything!" he exclaimed. He pointed at the alien creature with his alien hand. "Nothing to you! Leave—leave me alone, all—all right, Prawn? Will you back away, please, before I…I hurt you, you got it, I will hurt you, if you do not…give me space!"

It occurred to him that he wasn't breathing, at least not normally. The Prawn had raised its arms in a gesture of peace, but the body language was beyond Wikus' understanding at this moment. "Go back! I don't need you, and you aren't getting my fokken arm, you low fok."

"Sorry."

"Yeah," he muttered, dizzy, swaying. "Yeah. All right, now, all…right."

The Prawn lowered its arms. "Sit down?"

"W-What? No, you fokken—"

He sat down, but only because his legs liquefied underneath him. His lower back went numb. Surprised that he no longer possessed any natural balance, Wikus fell hard on his shoulders, which were covered in protruding plates of exoskeleton and swollen flesh. "Holy…shit," he wheezed. Above him the Prawn scuttled over so that their faces were parallel, albeit seven feet apart.

"Okay?"

"Fokken—" He stopped, searching for the proper adjective, and settled with, "jubilant."

"Joo-ball-unt."

Wikus closed his eyes and tried to relax his tense back muscles. "Yes, close enough."

"Up?"

Exhausted, dizzy and surprisingly comfortable on the dusty ground, Wikus replied quietly, slurring his words, "No, you simpleton Prawn."

"Fuck you," and then claws were under his neck and knees and he was being carried away whilst the last of the MNU personnel fled District 9.

III. (day zero)

The Prawn offered him a jug of water that looked as though it were home to many, many species of bacteria, most of which Wikus figured had probably travelled with the Prawns off the diseased ship. By the time the Prawn had carried him to the shack Wikus could no longer form words, his throat was so dry and his head so muddled, so he merely made a noise in response.

The mattress he was lying on was rotting in several places, and he had a flattened cardboard box for a pillow. Several pairs of folded flannel pyjamas knotted together served as his blanket. Even Wikus had to admit that compared to the ground, which at the time had seemed like an adjustable king sized bed, this was a near godsend.

His eyes closed and he fell asleep for a moment. He was awakened by the Prawn clumsily trying to pour the contaminated water down his unconscious throat. Surprised, he shouted and the Prawn shrieked and nearly dropped the jug.

"What are you doing, man!" Wikus exclaimed, sitting bolt upright. "D-Don't touch me, you fokken…you fokken creature! I'm not having… I'm not going to… I said I didn't do it, I didn't do it… I didn't lie to Tania," he whimpered to himself, rocking back and forth, his hands gripping at holes in the mattress. "I would never do it with a Prawn, I'm not that fokken disgusting, I am turning into one but I am not that fokken disgusting…"

Hesitantly, the Prawn reached forward and pushed him backwards, returning him to the mattress. "Sleep, human."

Wikus' glazed eyes found the Prawn's wide ones. The alien's face appeared open. Nothing suspicious. Wikus' fears faded to the back of his feverish mind.

"Please?" he murmured, reaching out with his bad arm. The two Prawn fingers wrapped around the alien's wrist. "Tell her I love her, Prawn? Tell my Tania…that…"

A moment passed, and the hand released the Prawn's arm.

"Sleep, human."

IV. (day three)

How were the Prawn's throats designed, exactly, concerning their vocal chords? He wondered if, when he had a Prawn mouth and a Prawn head set on a Prawn neck attached to his now-Prawn shoulders, he wondered if he would still be able to speak English. Laughing would be missed, though he had not laughed in days. Tania always made him laugh; she was such a funny angel. He wondered how she was feeling, if she slept any less fitfully than he did.

The third day since Christopher had left, and Wikus was reaching the end of his horrid transformation. He had been suffering from a headache throughout the entire morning and his skin felt prickly, as though little needles were digging under his skin. It was a sign that his head would begin to transform soon, very soon. He was petrified. Even his right arm was still normal, for the most part. Only on his elbow and some of his upper arm were there plates of dark green exoskeleton poking through. All of his fingernails were gone, had disappeared two days before, during the first hours following Christopher's escape. Scabs had formed over the sensitive skin where his nails used to be, however the pain was fading as the sores quickly healed.

He heard movement outside and he stilled, waiting to pick up any sounds. The house door slid open then shut. He exhaled in relief, then leaned against the wall with his Prawn legs bent in front of him. Because of his modified body structure, his trousers no longer fit him properly, so he had found a piece of rope to tie around his waist. With rags left over from his shirt, which had been ripped apart by his widening upper chest and shoulders, he had fashioned a new shirt from a blanket back in District 9. That was back when his skin had simply been covered in armour plates, before his internal structure had started to change as well. The blanket successfully covered his arms, most importantly his alien one. In laymen's terms he was wearing a poncho.

Unashamedly he missed them. They were his allies, his friends, however brief their encounter had been. Most of all he missed Tania. His eyes roamed the plain walls surrounding him, imagining his beautiful wife sitting across from him, smiling at him with her beautiful lips and nose and soft hazel eyes. His eyes trailed the path that she crawled toward him, to sit beside him. She kissed the top of his head and smiled warmly at him.

"Wikus," she said quietly, "I miss you. I love you."

Her hand touched his cheek and his eyes automatically closed as warmth spread through his body. Her hair smelled of honey bell bushes. She went to weave her fingers between his, and his chest tightened in anxiety. How was he going to explain this to her? What would she say when she saw the two clawed fingers, the thick, plated arm, his legs, the alien parts of him—

"W-Wikus?" she asked hesitantly. Moving slightly away from him, she held his hand and wrist in both of her delicate, human hands. "What is this, baby?"

"N-Nothing, Tania," he stuttered. His eyes remained tightly closed. He couldn't let her see his alien eyes. She would get scared, he would scare her away. She had to stay with him, he could not bear her leaving him again. "It's nothing, just an infection, I'm—I'm getting it fixed real—really soon, I promise."

"It looks horrible, darling! It doesn't hurt, does it, Wikus?"

"No, not at all, my angel. I'm going to fix it for you, really soon, if…if you are willing to wait for me?"

"Wikus, I am scared." She was close to tears, she sounded terrified. He went to wrap his arms around her, but his eyes opened before he was able to touch her.

V. (day one)

"What's your name?" Wikus asked the Prawn when he awoke the morning after Christopher left. He had been slightly alarmed to see the alien's body lying just a foot away from his own on the dilapidated mattress, but after seeing that no harm had been done, and realizing that he was on the Prawn's bed, after all, there was not too much reason to panic. He had of course asked what the Prawn was doing, and after hearing 'kchlacticuh'—which as far as he knew was not a word—the alien had rolled off the mattress and simply told him, "My bed, so I sleep."

It had taken him several minutes to digest the fact that overnight, the rest of his molars had popped out of their cavities (one was nestled in his human hand, the rest presumably digesting in his stomach), and all of his fingernails were scattered on the mattress and cardboard pillow. When he had pulled the blanket back, he saw that his left leg now sported a Prawn foot, ankle and calf.

So, "What's your name?" he asked.

Sparing him a brief glance, as though it were perfectly normal to be hiding a human-alien hybrid in its house during a time of volatile MNU raids, the Prawn began rummaging about its makeshift kitchen. "Human is Matthew Smith." It found what it was looking for—a pan that was missing its handle—and placed it on a small, grimy table. "MNU is orig—or-ridge-in-ul."

"You have problems speaking or something, man? What's the matter with you."

The Prawn nodded. "Since growth." He ducked to scavenge through the shelves that lined the walls. Wikus hoped he wasn't searching for food. Nothing promising could come out from behind mouldy fruit peels and scraps of car tires.

"Why?" Wikus asked curiously, his brow furrowed.

"Axe-ee-dent." He pointed to a spot on his head. Wikus could make out an old injury on the creature's otherwise smooth outer skeleton.

"Ah." He smirked at the Prawn. "Did your mother drop you on your head?"

The Prawn glared at him and gestured angrily with its arms, shaking its head from side to side. "Not her! Don't speak!"

"Wait a minute, you actually had a mother?"

"What?"

"You Prawns, you're all both genders, you know, self-fertilizing machines."

"Crude," the Prawn remarked almost sadly, turning back to his shelves. "Pathetic."

"Your parent considered itself a woman?"

"I had two parents—for humans, a mother. And father, you bastard." He pulled a can out from somewhere after throwing empty ones on the floor. It appeared to be his last place to look, as he had become more and more agitated throughout the search.

"That is…so unheard of," Wikus marvelled. "I mean, we know that you are capable of having normal sex, but there is usually only one parent with the egg—"

"You kill us!" the Prawn clacked loudly, walking into Wikus' space. The man hastily moved back against the wall. "Some have b-both because..." He seemed to lose momentum after stuttering. "Human ways are ours now, some…times. Many stay away from young though. Only visit eggs. Keeps you from…raiding."

"I have never killed a parent!"

"Babies? Little Ones?"

Wikus fell silent, and thought of the shack he had ordered to be burned to the ground. He suddenly heard eggs popping directly behind him and jumped, spinning around, only to see a broken window with jagged edges that cut into the air.

"Human?"

"Shut up," he said thickly. Turning back around, he pulled his knees to his chest. "I feel sick, all right? I still feel bad from yesterday."

For the first time that day, he thought of Christopher and Oliver, the Little One who had said he and Wikus were the same.

VI. (day one)

While sleeping the night before, his shoulder and side had completely transformed, which meant his upper body was now half human and half spiky Prawn. Wearing a shirt felt uncomfortable and tears formed on it throughout the day as he moved about, but he was not ready to take it off. At midday, when Matthew had gone off to find some food (Wikus wondered if he would return, and if so, in what condition), Wikus sat down on the single chair at the rickety table and decided to really have a chat with himself about his situation.

It was the day after the mothership had left. Christopher was coming back in three years with Wikus' cure. That was a long time to be stuck in District 10 with the other Prawns—for that was his future home, he realized while rubbing his balding head. MNU may have backed off District 9 for a short while, but Wikus had no doubts whatsoever that soon enough, in perhaps a matter of hours, they would be back for the rest of the aliens. And Wikus. He wondered if they knew he was still there. Maybe they assumed that after tearing Koobus apart and eating him, the aliens had turned on him—finished him off so that they didn't have to. He entertained the idea for a moment—perhaps it would have been for the better?—but then he caught sight of an empty cat food can and reached for it. He turned it over in his hands, comparing the texture of it through human fingers and Prawn claws. Then he scooped up some left overs from the bottom, and sucked on his finger. Two minutes later he poked his head around the door and stuck the same finger down his throat to bring the food back up.

Shuddering and angry with himself, he sat leaning against the door, back inside the shack. His left secondary arm, which was growing crookedly because he had snapped it by accident, twitched out of his side. His breath shook at the feeling of having control over another limb.

He had to find a way to contact Tania. She was his priority now even more so than before; he knew that he would be cured. He would fix himself for her so that they could go back to normal—back before he had ever stepped foot in District 9. She was his world and if he had to he would climb over the barbed wire fences to see her again.

He was still turning into a Prawn, however. He imagined her reaction to seeing him half transformed. He imagined her eyes widening, but then her warm embrace as she accepted his illness. She vowed to still love him and wait for his cure with him. She told him that he was still her Wikus, still the man she had vowed to love forever on their wedding day, the happiest day of his life. He had felt so right, that day. She had truly looked like the angel that she was… He smiled and figured that God had allowed her, for that one day, to reveal her true beauty to the world.

Prawns passed outside, clicking to each other, arguing over a slab of meat. Wikus' eyes reopened and he stared blankly at the tin ceiling.

She may have been an angel, but he was still turning into a Prawn.

"No," he reminded himself, "I may look like a Prawn, but I am still me. Wikus van der Merwe."

He wished Christopher would return sooner. Only one day after the alien's departure, and Wikus was already losing his patience. He needed something to do.

Scrambling ungracefully to his feet when Matthew returned an hour later, Wikus followed him to the small kitchen. It was proving difficult to walk with two different legs; his Prawn one was transformed to his mid-thigh. The different movements confused him and Matthew made sure to unnecessarily point out the hilarity of the situation.

"Why don't you guys cook the meat?" Wikus asked Matthew. He'd carried through the front door ten cans of cat food and a skinned cow's head. The alien claimed to have bought twenty-five cans, but the food dealers had ripped him off and several Prawns had cornered him on the way back. Wikus sat down at the table while the Prawn fumbled about, in order to give his balance a rest. When Matthew looked around for a place to sit in order to enjoy his meal, Wikus quickly offered him the chair.

"Tastes better, like th-this," Matthew replied, a large chunk hanging out of his mouth. His clawed tendrils chewed it slowly, as the slice was slightly too thick. The alien's eyes were wide with friendliness.

"Oh." He vowed to never eat like that once he had a Prawn mouth. "Look, I… I am sorry, for the way I was acting earlier, to you. It was very rude for me to have said that. You've let me stay in your shack without asking anything in return, and that is very nice of you, and I have not returned it."

The meat shifted in Matthew's mouth and the alien nodded. "Okay. Thank you."

After a beat of silence, where Wikus fiddled with his fingers (on both hands), he asked, "Why do you help me, anyway? Matthew."

"You s-saved me. From MNU."

"What? When?"

"Yester-day. The ones with guns, they were poin-ting them at me. But you killed them."

"I don't remember that."

Matthew shook his head. "Doubt you me—men-t to do it."

"Yeah…" Wikus muttered. "I don't think it was on purpose, Matthew, you see I was running, I was trying to help my friend Christopher get to his son and the ship—"

"It's okay." The chunk of meat had finally disappeared, and Matthew's tendrils and antennae were moving about quickly, as though they were excited by his success. "Thank you still. I repay you."

"Well, er, you're welcome… and thank you, too, for this."

"You're welcome too."

Thank you for reading! By the way, I heart reviews and reviewers.