R.T.F.M.

R.T.F.M. stands for "Read the Flakking Manual" and is a short story that is currently not in print.

C.M. Weller is trying to get it out on dead tree press.

Plot
Dave is possibly the unluckiest of human miners living on Hippo Mining station. For a start, he managed to break both of his arms in multiple places in a bar fight that he wasn't even involved in. Secondly, he had to share the flight back home with The Drongo, who was still blissfully drugged to the eyeballs with whatever he imbibed the night before.

And now...

He has to babysit some new technology. A gengineered helper animal known as Rael. And all he has to guide him is a wall-of-text manual with negligible understandability.

The good news is that he already knows the first rule: Keep it away from The Drongo.

The bad news is... it's showing signs of being more intelligent than its makers have let on.

When Rael starts giving orders with his limited vocabulary, the miners have a choice. Report it to the Cogniscent Rights' Committee, and get him shuffled to a new location, or secretly work against Rael's makers and find a way to blow this nasty secret straight out of the water.

And with the help of the JOATs, they choose the latter.