Tuesday 27 May 2008

Invasion!


The lights went out.

"Not again!", complained Sal. "Just when I was about to win!"

"Well, I wouldn't want to lose my unbeaten status.", joked Jon. "Did you hear a thump just then? As if something hit the ground."

"Oh, I'm not sure. Now that you mention it, I think I did."

"I'd better go outside and have a look. Someone might be hurt."

"Do you have to? It's an awful night, and I can't imagine there's anyone out."

~

Jon got ready and went outside. He immediately knew something was wrong, when he saw a strange glow in the distance. He headed towards it.

~

The Army's Commander squinted at the chart, finding it difficult to see by the dim emergency lights. "It's finally come - ", he announced, "the day when the Venusians have decided to invade. Let's go and give them a welcome they won't forget!"

~

Jon had nearly reached the light source. Whatever it was that had landed in that crater, it wasn't anything natural like an asteroid. It looked metallic! He came to the edge of the crater and peered in. It consisted of a large multi-sided box with several metal legs. It could only be a visitor from outer space!

Just then he heard a sound behind him. He swung round and came face to face with a party of soldiers. "You'd better go home Jon, this is no place for a scientist.", warned the Commander, leading Jon out of his soldiers' line of fire.

"But this is precisely the place for me!", argued Jon, "We have an alien visitor. You're going to need me to analyse..."

"There'll be nothing to analyse when we're finished.", said the Commander. "We're going to blow this thing back to Venus!"

"Don't be so hasty!", Jon pleaded, "The Venusians might be friendly. Can't we at least examine the, erm, thing before you destroy it? I mean, I can't see any weapons."

The Commander looked closely. "Hmm. Digging tools, cameras... you know, you might be right. It also looks robotic. Okay, I'll keep lookouts posted. In the meantime no-one is to go near it. Not even in the interests of science. And if it even looks threatening, we'll neutralise it. Agreed?"

~

The lookouts were instructed to keep behind the cameras at all times, so that they wouldn't be detected. Over the next few days and months, the robot dug some holes in the ground, but otherwise seemed harmless. The soldiers even started to enjoy their regular game of hide-and-seek with the robot, which never saw them.

The area was kept sealed off for years by the military (who of course denied all the rumours about aliens), until eventually the robot stopped moving. Then Jon was allowed to take a look at it.

~

One day, Jon returned home in a state of great excitement. "Sal!", he shouted, "Listen to what I've discovered!"

Sal looked somewhat less enthusiastic - she was sure that whatever it was would be beyond her limited scientific understanding.

"We were wrong!", said Jon, "The alien robot didn't come from Venus. I checked it's rockets and fuel tanks against the relative positions of the planets at the time of its journey, and..."

"Then where is it from?", interrupted Sal.

"The Blue Planet. Earth. Who'd have thought there'd be life there as well?"


NASA's Phoenix probe landed successfully on Mars on Sunday, and the first pictures were received yesterday. The probe's aim is to look for signs of life on the Red Planet.

22 comments:

Bee said...

first!!

Bee said...

Great story! It's funny how I never thought about it from their point of view!

Brian o vretanos said...

Bee:

Thanks. I just liked the idea that the probe wouldn't spot any Martians because they'd duck out of site every time the camera moved in their direction.

Similarly in Area 51 or whatever it's called, there could be a Martian probe looking around and not seeing anything but uninhabited desert ;-)

Brian o vretanos said...

"out of sight" of course...

Jean Knee said...

Brian, you really have to learn to spell. it's distracting me from your post. :)

Tracy Rambles On And On said...

Why do they always go outside? I would go away from the noise not towards it! They always do that!
I liked your story. I wasn't expecting it to be from their point of view.

Jean Knee said...

area 51 is the most awesome game ever invented. that's true, yo.

Tracy Rambles On And On said...

Well, hi there Jean Knee!

Brian o vretanos said...

Jean Knee:

Since when did you start worrying about spelling? ;-)

Tracy:

Scientists and military always want to find out what's going on. Everyone else is usually running the other way...

Dan said...

All that space stuff seems like a huge waste of money for me. People in the US are loosing their homes, people are still homeless because of Katrina and we're spending millions on stupid space programs !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Fuck all the Aliens !!!!!!

So after millions of dollars we discover that there was like on Mars or Venus millions of years ago so fucken what!!!!
What are we doing with this info?
What is it good for?

Fuck the Aliens, Fuck anyone who is authorizing spending all the tax payers money !!!!!!!

I'm going to kick them in the nuts !!!

Dan said...

ELEVENTH !!!!!!!!!!!

Fuck E.T. too !!!!

Dan said...

"there was life on Mars....

Dan said...

Fuck Alf and Mork and Mindy !!!!!

Dan said...

Fuck that Martian from the Flintstones !!!!!!!

Jean Knee said...

I know you probhably don't realize this but I agonize for hours over my spelling, punctuation, word tense, compound words etc.

for hours

Jean Knee said...

wowsa. tracy and I had a threeway at 21.40

I meant three way

something

Brian o vretanos said...

Dan:

So, if the government cancelled the space programme and gave the taxpayers their money back, do you think they'd spend it on hurricane relief?

It's taxpayers like you who spend millions a year on Mariah Carey. Personally I'd rather see travel photos from Mars ;-)

Jean Knee:

My speeling's fine, it's my tie pin that lets me down...

Brian o vretanos said...

Dan:

I do agree with you, though, that housing people should have a higher priority than speculative space exploration...

Brian o vretanos said...

... though some people think that it might be a good idea for us to colonise Mars. If some terrible disaster kills all the people on Earth, then the human race would still be able to survive.

Jean Knee said...

don't you think we probably deserve to become extint?


weird but true: I have never read War of the Worlds although I've seen several film versions, hmmmm

Brian o vretanos said...

Jean Knee:

I'm not sure we "deserve" it, but it will probably happen at some point...

Brian o vretanos said...

I had a go at reading the WOTW, but it really is rather dated - I preferred the film version.