Author: Alexander Fawn

As far as alien spy-craft goes, it can be interesting.

Although this particular entity has its doubts about whether humankind is actually worth infiltrating. Its masters seem to think so. Shambolic is the only word that comes anywhere close to describing the state that these lifeforms have got themselves into. From their very beginnings their development as a species has been nothing short of scattered. All broken up, no coming together to get anything organised. What are we learning from these people, anyway? Did body-hosting here ever provide useful intelligence? When it considers the fact that its own species is so much more advanced than anything it had seen on this planet, it does make it wonder.

What would its superiors think if they knew it considered that going to all this trouble of spending time, spying on humans by inhabiting bodies, was a complete waste of resources? It often wondered whether others that plied the same trade felt the way it did.

Ah! Well… it’s just a job, it supposes.

It probably feels this way because it considers its current mission to be especially boring.

Besides, it really hates being a dormouse!

As a single mother, she was happy with the way her life had unfolded.

Her daughter was sitting at the kitchen table, drawing. She had always loved drawing and her mother was often amazed at just how good she was. She certainly had talent. In fact, she was extremely bright for her age. In private moments, she had often wondered where she got it from. She came into the kitchen and looked over her shoulder. She pointed at one of the figures and asked, “Who’s that?”

Her daughter’s head went to one side. “I’m not sure,” she said. “It’s a man. I’m just not sure yet.” She said, and went back to her drawing.

It was quite a while later, when her mother was at a work surface preparing vegetables that her daughter suddenly piped up, quite unexpectedly.

“Mummy. I don’t have a Daddy, do I?”

“No. That’s right, dear, you don’t.”

“Why is that?”

“That’s because I found you, pet.”

“Did you? Did you really find me?”

“Yes, love,” she replied, trying to sound as casual as possible.

Still moving her crayon around, she asked, “Where? Where did you find me?”

“On a railway station, my love.”

“How did I get there?”

“I suppose somebody just left you there. It happens sometimes.”

“Do you know who it was that left me there?”

“No, sweet. I don’t know who it was.” At this point her eyes became wet, as she thought of him.

“Didn’t you ask somebody?”

“No, dear. I couldn’t, there was no one around.”

“Why?”

“It was late… and dark.”

“Was it cold?”

“No, pet, it was summer.” She took a deep breath, feeling as though she had just run a marathon. “I just need to check the washing,” she said, and went out into the back garden. Looking at the empty clothes line, she just hoped her bright little kid didn’t notice. She was so bright, so inquisitive. She blew her nose and went straight back in, this time standing behind her, she wrapped her arms around her.

“…and before you ask any more of your questions, I have to tell you that I really didn’t want to ask anybody anything. I just knew that I had found you, and that’s the way it was meant to be.”

Her daughter climbed down from her chair and gave her mother a hug.

Before she could say more, her daughter went back to her drawing.

She makes her way through the place as though she owns it.

She watches leaves and blades of grass as they twitch and writhe in the gentle breeze, sees rainbow-hued droplets hanging precariously in the bushes above. She takes in the muted colours of the garden, and the fragrance of the warming foliage, the air no longer densely humid. Droplets still hang in the air, slowly dissolving into emptiness with the rising of the sun. Its rays bringing slivers of colour, effervescent splashes made to her immediate world.

The long walk has left her limbs aching. The ground is poor here. Great cavernous chambers pit the place, some seeming to be so deep as to leave one unable to return to the surface. She is aware that some of her friends have been transported to places where vast sparkling oceans lap the shores. She reflects sadly on the notion that she may well never see such a thing for herself, nevertheless she pauses briefly to wonder at the complex constructions all around her. The wind suddenly whips dead leaves like a spinning top. How lucky she is to be privy to the joys of savouring the nectar of the gods.

She listens to the long dead echoes of past events. She seems transfixed in some ethereal moment as she sifts through treasured memories. She feels the world around her in a way so few of her kind do. She bathes for a while in an ethereal moment. From this pleasant state of repose she slips, as so often happens, helter-skelter into a state of overwhelming analysis. How much value does she add to those around her? Are her experiences really objective? How much free will does she really have? How real is the universe, as she knows it? She wonders why it has fallen to her to have such a window, a window to look through, to view that which others cannot, and to never share her unknowable pondering of ‘I think, therefore I am’.

Such is the life of this particular insect.

They couldn’t believe what he did.

The husband found him. He was sleeping rough in an abandoned shop front. He would walk across to the newsagent’s early each morning as soon as they opened, to buy a newspaper. That’s when he first spotted him, huddled under a thin blanket. He stopped and chatted with him a few times. He was homeless, around twenty and from a distant town. He had worked on and off, but he’d had health problems. He had no desire to go back to a broken home, where he wasn’t wanted. He said he preferred the life he was living rather than returning to that. Well, the upshot was, that for no reason he could ever explain, with his wife’s agreement, they took him in. The husband was retired and his wife only occasionally did a bit of charity work. They’d never had children and they had a spare room.

He settled in very well at first. He repeatedly told them how grateful he was. Initially, he kept very much to his room, only sitting and eating with them. As time went on he slowly blended into his new life and became part of their family. In turn, they looked on him as the son they never had. He made an effort to find work a number of times, but there was little around. They told him it didn’t matter. They said that they had enough to support them all as a family.

Everything was going well… that is, up to the point when they found out what he had done. They couldn’t believe it. He had voted for that multi-billionaire guy with the puffy hairdo!

When they threw him out, for old times’ sake, they gave him a thicker blanket.

He stands silently looking down at the colours.

He remembers it all, word for word.

Him: Are you still in town?

Her: No. Meeting over. Have to go to shops.

Him: Will you be home before six?

Her: It’ll be busy around this time. Why?

Him: I’ll hang around until six, before I go out.

Her: Sorry, forgot! Your squash night. Will you…

How short that was, their final time together. There was no game of squash that night, or any night since. There was no food coming into the house, save for that which he bought himself. He hated shopping! Was that a selfish thing to think? It was the truth. Food took second place to drink now. Strong drink. The sort of drink that allowed you to forget. He wouldn’t have got through the last few weeks without it. It was necessary. People didn’t understand. Why should they? They hadn’t been through what he had. He comes here every day.

He stands silently looking down at the colours.

They try hard to add beauty to such an ugly place. He had often thought that they don’t belong together. For him, graves and flowers don’t mix, just like texting and driving.

She was baking it because it was his favourite.

It was for that reason she always got a kick out of preparing it. All up it only took her around an hour. Then, half an hour in the oven, let it settle and cool for a bit and voila! She knew how much he enjoyed the mix of chocolate and orange flavours. The two oranges were nice and fresh. She gathered the rest of the ingredients; cocoa powder, caster sugar, softened butter, eggs, self-raising flour, icing, baking powder, plain chocolate in pieces, double cream, and just a little dollop of apricot conserve. She set to.

Finally, it went into the oven and she spent time choosing the colour of the candles she would place on top.

He would have been eight.

It was getting dark as he got off the bus.

At the same time, he remembered that he hadn’t shopped in town. He decided that he would just walk an extra block before getting home. There was a quiet little corner shop nearby, he’d call in there. When he thought about it, he’d never needed to go there before. As he approached, the notion that it was rarely busy with customers, was reinforced by the fact that it was obviously empty. When he entered, he immediately noticed the silence. There was nobody behind the counter. After confirming that there was no bell to ring, he stood looking around. To his surprise he found a face, staring at him through a rack between two packets of cereal. It was when it broke into a smile that he saw the gun, pointed at him from the shelf below.

With a start, he mumbled, “Oh! I just popped in for a…”

“Yes, of course,” came a voice, “let’s see what we can do for you.” he went on, as he came out from behind the rack and made his way around the counter, all the time keeping the gun trained on his customer. From behind the counter he said, “Now then, how can I help you?”

Trying hard not to look at the gun, he said, “I only came in for a packet of cigarette papers. Do you stock them?”

“Yes. Just a moment.” He flicks the safety off and quickly takes a box from under the counter, with the gun still pointing at his customer.

He pushes the box forward. “I only have this brand,” he explained, using the barrel of the gun to briefly point at the box.

“Yes. They’ll do fine thanks.” He took one out. When he went for his wallet in an inside jacket pocket, he saw the gun being raised. “My wallet… I’m just taking out my wallet.”

The owner nods, but holds the gun steady.

After paying, with a sense of relief, he made his way cautiously towards the door, not being too comfortable about turning his back. As he reached the door, he turned and said, “Thanks. Goodnight.”

The shop owner smiled as he reset the safety catch. Then, with an almost apologetic look, he said, “I’ve been held up twice.” He tapped his gun. “I’ll be ready next time.” With a broad grin he added, “Don’t want to make it a hat-trick!”

As he made his way home, he thought, now I know why it’s always so quiet in there.

It was just another day in the workplace.

Like so many others, the cubicle farm occupied one corner of one floor in the city’s high-rise building. In cubicle 4, a junior technical writer had just completed a piece of work. Across the section, in cubicle 9, a woman was secretly eating a Twix, against company rules, of course. The piece of work he’d finished was an improved, yet still complex, step by step description of a process for loading specific items onto the company’s website. The aim of it was to update the job of performing a series of actions, in a particular sequence, making the whole process quicker and the instruction easier to follow. His friend, an older man from finance, two floors below, was passing by the section and stopped to say hello.

Finance: Said, “What’s new?”

Twix: Stopped eating, momentarily.

Junior: Pointed to his screen, “This.”

Finance: Peered at the screen of text and said, “OK.”

Junior: Smiled and said, “It’s an improved loading process that I had to produce a description for.”

Finance: “Improved?”

Junior: “Yes. Better and quicker.”

Finance: “Really?”

Junior: “Yep. I proved it by doing it myself, while timing it. He looked around and dropped his voice. “I hate timing things.”

Twix: Stopped typing to listen,

Finance: “You do?”

Junior: “Yes. Especially myself.” He sat back, looking out of the window at the city, he whispered, “The metropolis.”

Finance: “What about it?”

Junior: “Oh! I don’t know… I sometimes think we are too obsessed with timing things.”

Finance: “Oh really, why’s that?”

Junior: Lets out a long sigh. “Well, it kind of goes against the whole point of being alive!”

Twix: Goes quiet again.

Finance: Eyebrows go up. “Really! Does it?”

Junior: “Oh yes, no doubt.”

Finance: “Are you sure about that?”

Junior: Looks out of the window again. “Yes, I am. I’m not sure anybody else understands that.”

Finance: “What is this, then, some kind of transcendentalism?”

Junior: “You know, to be honest I have no idea. All I know is timing things just seems to take the edge off it somehow. Like I said, I think too many of us are obsessed with time. I mean, at the end of the day you’ve either got time to do something or you haven’t. You really have to ask yourself, what’s more important, how long did it take or how right it is.”

Finance: “Wow!”

Twix: Smiles.

Junior: “I often wish I had the time to stop and think about it.” He looked up and grinned.

Finance: Shook his head. He looked around and said, “You guys have all the fun.” On his way out, he said, “See ya.”

Junior: Looking back at his screen, said, “See ya.”

Twix: Opened the drawer quietly and took out another Twix.

Despite his youth, he set great store in the notion of individuality.

He was laying on his back, arms and legs spread wide, soaking up the afternoon sun. He was told not to lay here too long. The fact of the matter is that he had never been good at following the rules… about anything!

Both his parents were worried about him. His mother would get so frustrated with his carrying on. His father insisted that there was nothing to worry about, saying he’d grow out of it. His endless frustration with his younger sister moaning about her leg wasn’t going to stop any time soon. Despite them trying to keep it from him, he knew that his sister would never walk properly again, after the crushing incident. There was nothing he could do about that either.

He dreamt of having companionship outside of his immediate family. It had always been that way with him. Sticking together seemed to be the unspoken mantra. But his dreaming of setting off on his own was never far from his thoughts. As he lay, allowing the heat to warm his whole body through, he ruminated on the feeling that his parents were less patient with him of late.

Of course, their attitude about him was that his erratic nature and foolhardy behaviour were entirely inappropriate for that of a stag beetle.

The day started well with him looking forward to the school excursion.

The party of thirty or more young school children entered the museum. The teacher led the way into the main hall where all kinds of exhibits were on display. He was upset from the moment he saw the glass cabinets filled with displays of fossils. Then, when the noise of excited children grew, and with all those hands on the glass cases, he became really distressed. He couldn’t understand how the kids in his class could be so thoughtless. Most of his class mates were nice enough most of the time, he thought. He hardly heard the explanation given by the teacher about how these buried plants and animals had gone through a process of water evaporation with only minerals remaining.

When the teacher saw how distraught the boy had become, with his continually complaining about the noise, he arranged for him to sit the time out in the school bus.

Owing to the generally quiet nature of the boy and the fact that he rarely said anything anyway, it was quite some time, and completely by accident, that he was found to have a big misunderstanding with the meaning of the word ‘petrified’.