James Field's Blog, page 20
May 30, 2021
Sci fi series: Evil Portent
If you like a good chuckle, dim-witted heroes, and larger-than-life villains, then you'll love this fascinating series. On Wednesdays and Sundays, I’m blogging nibble-sized chunks of new ‘
Life in the Clouds
’ stories. You can check in regularly and read them for free, or wait to buy the entire story when published.
Life in the Clouds #4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 16 - 19…
“Open up,” they heard voices cry.
The alien father closed his eyes and summoned a deep breath, holding it in. Turning his head a fraction, as though straining to understand the voices, he uttered a soft curse and tutted. “I feared the Guardians were here, but it’s simply the villagers.”
Bert’s stomach growled, he noticed a headache coming on, and if he didn’t eat something soon he worried he'd lose his powers of reasoning. The crowd’s urgent mumbling outside and the loud thudding on the door drove him crazy. “Can’t you see what they want?”
“They sound panicky,” said the alien father.
“Well, at least they ain’t hungry, so I don’t see what else they’ve got to fret about. Are you going to tell them to go away, or shall I?”
The alien father squeezed past Bert, rushed to the door, and tore it open. “What is it?” he asked, a quiver in his voice.
Bert peered over his head and narrow shoulders and saw the whole yard swarmed with little people. As far as he could see, the entire village had gathered. The Elder headed the group, his fist still raised and ready to bash against the door. “The Guardians are coming in their hundreds,” he said, and his knees rattled in his baggy shorts. He pointed to the citadel on the mountain. “They’re firing cannons and hurling death rays in every direction.”
The alien father stopped to listen, then darted out to see for himself. Bert pressed his shoulders through the opening, rose to his full six-foot and five-inches, stretched his back, and let out a groan of relief. The villagers must have seen him as an overgrown gorilla because they yelped and scuttled to a prudent distance.
Even on Earth, Bert had the same effect on people, so he ignored their reaction and peered across to the distant hill with its citadel. In that direction, the heavens had turned black with the bruise of thick angry clouds. The darkening sky rumbled like Bert’s empty stomach and jagged silver flashes jabbed at the coming night. A cool breeze caressed his bare arms and a lone drop of rain kissed his bald head. “It’s only a storm.” Bert could see his new friend was uncertain.
“It could be thunder and lightning,” said the alien father, “but it could also be a new offensive by the Guardians. In times like this, when we’ve opened another port, who can tell?”
“We take no chances,” said the Elder. “This house has an underground shelter," he called to the crowd. "We take refuge here.”
Like a bunch of frightened mice, the villagers surged to the alien father’s house. The alien father stood in the entrance, arms stretched, blocking them out. “Not so fast,” he said.
The crowd bowled the alien father aside and stormed in. He tried to protest, but nobody took any notice. Outside, the distant rumbling grew louder. “It’s only a storm,” said the alien father. “More violent than normal, but that’s all it is.”
“No,” insisted the Elder. “You have angered the Guardians by hiding the children and opening a tunnel to another planet. They're amassing in large numbers, and soon they'll be here to kill us all.” He jabbed a finger in the alien father’s chest. “You brought them, you shelter us.”
It would have been easy for Bert to stop them from occupying the alien father's house. All he'd needed to do was sit in the doorway, and if the Elder had dared to poke him in the chest, he would have snapped his finger off. It wasn't exactly his intuition that told him not to interfere, more his hunger that had made his brain too sluggish to react.
Bert peered in at them through the open door. The house was so crowded that everyone sat side by side on the floor, leaving no room for him. They’d even occupied the bedrooms. The underground shelter was nothing more than a cool pantry, already filled with sacks of bamboo shoots.
“Anybody got anything decent to eat?” called Bert. It was soon clear that nobody had food with them. In their hurried fright, they’d forgotten to bring any.
The intruders hadn’t been sitting long in the alien father's house before a cry went out for drink, and another for food. “We eat what we find,” called the Elder, and all cheered in agreement. “We can’t starve to death in this hour of refuge.”
They opened cupboards, placed a huge pan on the heater box, and prepared bamboo tip porridge in vast quantities. Bert would have settled for a bucket of popcorn, or a raw carrot or even boiled spinach to make his muscles grow like Popeye. Anything but that disgusting porridge.
The alien father tottered out of his house and sat next to Bert. He spoke through his teeth with forced restraint. “Am I not master in my own home,” he said. “This is how we are. We flock together when frightened, and with the enemy out of sight and hearing, all we think about is food. My food.”
Bert patted him on the arm. “It’ll be okay, you’ll see.” It occurred to him this was the first physical contact he’d made with any of them, and the tough little guy didn’t react worse than stiffening and going still. “If you let me go home, I’ll bring some seeds with me too. You could grow corn and oranges and potatoes and all sorts of stuff that tastes delicious.”
With a probing gaze, the alien father cast a glance into Bert’s face. He wet his lips and swallowed hard. “I’ll think about it.” Then, with hesitant steps, he went back into his house.
Part 20:
In this post: Bert hurls a boulder…
With everybody slurping at their porridge, conversation settled to a mumble. Bert sat outside, and many thoughts came and went in his sluggish brain. Thunder still rumbled up on the mountain, and he didn’t understand how the little people mistook the storm for an invasion. The idiots were so hysterical that he couldn’t imagine how to convince them otherwise.
Such behaviour irritated Bert. Wasn’t there ever a time in their past when they had more guts? The only one who showed signs of bravery was the alien father, and even that didn’t amount to much.
A hard smile came to his lips. He needed release for his frustration, and the little people needed shaking up. Glancing about, he singled out a large boulder and tested its weight. He guessed eighty kilos and was about the size of a briefcase.
Far too light, he could have juggled three that size. Then he noticed one as big as a suitcase and almost pooed himself lifting it above his head. With his teeth gritted, and muscles cramping under the strain, he stumbled the few steps back to the house and with a last supreme effort tossed the boulder against it with all his might.
It pummelled the building like a cannonball, and inside he heard plaster and cement fall from the wall and ceiling. “Yeah, now the weedy little runts have something to think about other than porridge and water.”
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by pen_ash from Pixabay
Life in the Clouds #4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 16 - 19…
“Open up,” they heard voices cry.
The alien father closed his eyes and summoned a deep breath, holding it in. Turning his head a fraction, as though straining to understand the voices, he uttered a soft curse and tutted. “I feared the Guardians were here, but it’s simply the villagers.”
Bert’s stomach growled, he noticed a headache coming on, and if he didn’t eat something soon he worried he'd lose his powers of reasoning. The crowd’s urgent mumbling outside and the loud thudding on the door drove him crazy. “Can’t you see what they want?”
“They sound panicky,” said the alien father.
“Well, at least they ain’t hungry, so I don’t see what else they’ve got to fret about. Are you going to tell them to go away, or shall I?”
The alien father squeezed past Bert, rushed to the door, and tore it open. “What is it?” he asked, a quiver in his voice.
Bert peered over his head and narrow shoulders and saw the whole yard swarmed with little people. As far as he could see, the entire village had gathered. The Elder headed the group, his fist still raised and ready to bash against the door. “The Guardians are coming in their hundreds,” he said, and his knees rattled in his baggy shorts. He pointed to the citadel on the mountain. “They’re firing cannons and hurling death rays in every direction.”
The alien father stopped to listen, then darted out to see for himself. Bert pressed his shoulders through the opening, rose to his full six-foot and five-inches, stretched his back, and let out a groan of relief. The villagers must have seen him as an overgrown gorilla because they yelped and scuttled to a prudent distance.
Even on Earth, Bert had the same effect on people, so he ignored their reaction and peered across to the distant hill with its citadel. In that direction, the heavens had turned black with the bruise of thick angry clouds. The darkening sky rumbled like Bert’s empty stomach and jagged silver flashes jabbed at the coming night. A cool breeze caressed his bare arms and a lone drop of rain kissed his bald head. “It’s only a storm.” Bert could see his new friend was uncertain.
“It could be thunder and lightning,” said the alien father, “but it could also be a new offensive by the Guardians. In times like this, when we’ve opened another port, who can tell?”
“We take no chances,” said the Elder. “This house has an underground shelter," he called to the crowd. "We take refuge here.”
Like a bunch of frightened mice, the villagers surged to the alien father’s house. The alien father stood in the entrance, arms stretched, blocking them out. “Not so fast,” he said.
The crowd bowled the alien father aside and stormed in. He tried to protest, but nobody took any notice. Outside, the distant rumbling grew louder. “It’s only a storm,” said the alien father. “More violent than normal, but that’s all it is.”
“No,” insisted the Elder. “You have angered the Guardians by hiding the children and opening a tunnel to another planet. They're amassing in large numbers, and soon they'll be here to kill us all.” He jabbed a finger in the alien father’s chest. “You brought them, you shelter us.”
It would have been easy for Bert to stop them from occupying the alien father's house. All he'd needed to do was sit in the doorway, and if the Elder had dared to poke him in the chest, he would have snapped his finger off. It wasn't exactly his intuition that told him not to interfere, more his hunger that had made his brain too sluggish to react.
Bert peered in at them through the open door. The house was so crowded that everyone sat side by side on the floor, leaving no room for him. They’d even occupied the bedrooms. The underground shelter was nothing more than a cool pantry, already filled with sacks of bamboo shoots.
“Anybody got anything decent to eat?” called Bert. It was soon clear that nobody had food with them. In their hurried fright, they’d forgotten to bring any.
The intruders hadn’t been sitting long in the alien father's house before a cry went out for drink, and another for food. “We eat what we find,” called the Elder, and all cheered in agreement. “We can’t starve to death in this hour of refuge.”
They opened cupboards, placed a huge pan on the heater box, and prepared bamboo tip porridge in vast quantities. Bert would have settled for a bucket of popcorn, or a raw carrot or even boiled spinach to make his muscles grow like Popeye. Anything but that disgusting porridge.
The alien father tottered out of his house and sat next to Bert. He spoke through his teeth with forced restraint. “Am I not master in my own home,” he said. “This is how we are. We flock together when frightened, and with the enemy out of sight and hearing, all we think about is food. My food.”
Bert patted him on the arm. “It’ll be okay, you’ll see.” It occurred to him this was the first physical contact he’d made with any of them, and the tough little guy didn’t react worse than stiffening and going still. “If you let me go home, I’ll bring some seeds with me too. You could grow corn and oranges and potatoes and all sorts of stuff that tastes delicious.”
With a probing gaze, the alien father cast a glance into Bert’s face. He wet his lips and swallowed hard. “I’ll think about it.” Then, with hesitant steps, he went back into his house.
Part 20:
In this post: Bert hurls a boulder…
With everybody slurping at their porridge, conversation settled to a mumble. Bert sat outside, and many thoughts came and went in his sluggish brain. Thunder still rumbled up on the mountain, and he didn’t understand how the little people mistook the storm for an invasion. The idiots were so hysterical that he couldn’t imagine how to convince them otherwise.
Such behaviour irritated Bert. Wasn’t there ever a time in their past when they had more guts? The only one who showed signs of bravery was the alien father, and even that didn’t amount to much.
A hard smile came to his lips. He needed release for his frustration, and the little people needed shaking up. Glancing about, he singled out a large boulder and tested its weight. He guessed eighty kilos and was about the size of a briefcase.
Far too light, he could have juggled three that size. Then he noticed one as big as a suitcase and almost pooed himself lifting it above his head. With his teeth gritted, and muscles cramping under the strain, he stumbled the few steps back to the house and with a last supreme effort tossed the boulder against it with all his might.
It pummelled the building like a cannonball, and inside he heard plaster and cement fall from the wall and ceiling. “Yeah, now the weedy little runts have something to think about other than porridge and water.”
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by pen_ash from Pixabay
May 25, 2021
Sci fi series: Evil Portent
If you like a good chuckle, dim-witted heroes, and larger-than-life villains, then you'll love this fascinating series. On Wednesdays and Sundays, I’m blogging nibble-sized chunks of new ‘
Life in the Clouds
’ stories. You can check in regularly and read them for free, or wait to buy the entire story when published.
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 15 - 18…
The alien father visibly shook in his boots.
“Why not let me go home and come back with a pile of weapons?" Bert drew his knife, the eight-inch blade flashing in the light. "I only use this as a toothpick. With a few bazookas we’ll soon stop those pesky Guardians. Then we can all live happily ever after.”
“I’d give anything to be as big and strong as you, Bert. Then I wouldn’t be so frightened of them.”
“Does that mean you’ll let me fetch some dynamite and stuff?”
“How can I trust you’ll return?”
That was a good question. The answer was simple. He'd return because it was the right deed to do. If it came to a fight, he’d die for his buddies, even new buddies like these kindly little people who ate nothing but repulsive grunge. He had his moral values, too. He’d never allow bullies to lay a finger on children or animals, and he wouldn’t let space invaders continue to ravish this fine world for all the money in China. “If I didn’t come back to help you, I’d never forgive myself.”
“No, forget it. It can never be. Our people are not warriors. In our millions of years of evolution, there has never been a war. Beside, the Guardians would follow you and ravish your planet.”
That was a problem Bert would sort out if and when it should happen. Right now, he needed the little man on his side. “You were brave enough to go against the Elder’s rules and open a new tunnel to my planet.”
“Yes, and look what trouble I’ve caused. The Guardians are keeping an extra eye on us when all we want is inconspicuous peace.”
“Don’t look so glum, you saved the lives of all your children.”
“No, I didn’t. The guardians will come again, and when they see you, they’ll punish us. Oh, woe is me.”
Just then, a hammering of fists erupted on his door, and the poor man almost fainted.
“Open up,” they heard voices cry.
The alien father closed his eyes and summoned a deep breath, holding it in. Turning his head a fraction, as though straining to understand the voices, he uttered a soft curse and tutted. “I feared the Guardians were here, but it’s simply the villagers.”
Bert’s stomach growled, he noticed a headache coming on, and if he didn’t eat something soon he worried he'd lose his powers of reasoning. The crowd’s urgent mumbling outside and the loud thudding on the door drove him crazy. “Can’t you see what they want?”
“They sound panicky,” said the alien father.
“Well, at least they ain’t hungry, so I don’t what else they’ve got to fret about. Are you going to tell them to go away, or shall I?”
The alien father squeezed past Bert, rushed to the door, and tore it open. “What is it?” he asked, a quiver in his voice.
Bert peered over his head and narrow shoulders and saw the whole yard swarmed with little people. As far as he could see, the entire village had gathered. The Elder headed the group, his fist still raised and ready to bash against the door. “The Guardians are coming in their hundreds,” he said, and his knees rattled in his baggy shorts. He pointed to the citadel on the mountain. “They’re firing cannons and hurling death rays in every direction.”
The alien father stopped to listen, then darted out to see for himself. Bert pressed his shoulders through the opening, rose to his full six-foot and five-inches, stretched his back, and let out a groan of relief. The villagers must have seen him as an overgrown gorilla because they yelped and scuttled to a prudent distance.
Even on Earth, Bert had the same effect on people, so he ignored their reaction and peered across to the distant hill with its citadel. In that direction, the heavens had turned black with the bruise of thick angry clouds. The darkening sky rumbled like Bert’s empty stomach and jagged silver flashes jabbed at the coming night. A cool breeze caressed his bare arms and a lone drop of rain kissed his bald head. “It’s only a storm.” Bert could see his new friend was uncertain.
“It could be thunder and lightning,” said the alien father, “but it could also be a new offensive by the Guardians. In times like this, when we’ve opened another port, who can tell?”
“We take no chances,” said the Elder. “This house has an underground shelter," he called to the crowd. "We take refuge here.”
Like a bunch of frightened mice, the villagers surged to the alien father’s house. The alien father stood in the entrance, arms stretched, blocking them out. “Not so fast,” he said.
The crowd bowled the alien father aside and stormed in. He tried to protest, but nobody took any notice. Outside, the distant rumbling grew louder. “It’s only a storm,” said the alien father. “More violent than normal, but that’s all it is.”
“No,” insisted the Elder. “You have angered the Guardians by hiding the children and opening a tunnel to another planet. They are arriving in large numbers, and soon they will be here to kill us all.” He jabbed a finger in the alien father’s chest. “You brought them, you shelter us.”
It would have been easy for Bert to stop them from occupying the alien father's house. All he'd needed to do was sit in the doorway, and if the Elder had dared to poke him in the chest, he would have snapped his finger off. It wasn't exactly his intuition that told him not to interfere, more that it had made his brain too sluggish to react.
Bert peered in at them through the open door. The house was so crowded that everyone sat side by side on the floor, leaving no room for him. They’d even occupied the bedrooms. The underground shelter was nothing more than a cool pantry, already filled with sacks of bamboo shoots.
“Anybody got anything decent to eat?” called Bert. It was soon clear that nobody had food with them. In their hurried fright, they’d forgotten to bring any.
Part 19:
In this post: Bert offers a seed of hope…
They hadn’t been sitting long before a cry went out for drink, and another for food. “We eat what we find,” called the Elder, and all cheered in agreement. “We can’t starve to death in this hour of refuge.”
They opened cupboards, placed a huge pan on the heater box, and prepared bamboo tip porridge in vast quantities. Bert would have settled for a bucket of popcorn, or a raw carrot or even boiled spinach to make his muscles grow like Popeye. Anything but that disgusting porridge.
The alien father tottered out of his house and sat next to Bert. He spoke through his teeth with forced restraint. “Am I not master in my own home,” he said. “This is how we are. We flock together when frightened, and with the enemy out of sight and hearing, all we think about is food. My food.”
Bert patted him on the arm. “It’ll be okay, you’ll see.” It occurred to him this was the first physical contact he’d made with any of them, and the tough little guy didn’t react worse than stiffening and going still. “If you let me go home, I’ll bring some seeds with me too. You could grow corn and oranges and potatoes and all sorts of stuff that tastes delicious.”
With a probing gaze, the alien father cast a glance into Bert’s face. He wet his lips and swallowed hard. “I’ll think about it.” Then, with hesitant steps, he went back into his house.
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth.
-
Image by OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 15 - 18…
The alien father visibly shook in his boots.
“Why not let me go home and come back with a pile of weapons?" Bert drew his knife, the eight-inch blade flashing in the light. "I only use this as a toothpick. With a few bazookas we’ll soon stop those pesky Guardians. Then we can all live happily ever after.”
“I’d give anything to be as big and strong as you, Bert. Then I wouldn’t be so frightened of them.”
“Does that mean you’ll let me fetch some dynamite and stuff?”
“How can I trust you’ll return?”
That was a good question. The answer was simple. He'd return because it was the right deed to do. If it came to a fight, he’d die for his buddies, even new buddies like these kindly little people who ate nothing but repulsive grunge. He had his moral values, too. He’d never allow bullies to lay a finger on children or animals, and he wouldn’t let space invaders continue to ravish this fine world for all the money in China. “If I didn’t come back to help you, I’d never forgive myself.”
“No, forget it. It can never be. Our people are not warriors. In our millions of years of evolution, there has never been a war. Beside, the Guardians would follow you and ravish your planet.”
That was a problem Bert would sort out if and when it should happen. Right now, he needed the little man on his side. “You were brave enough to go against the Elder’s rules and open a new tunnel to my planet.”
“Yes, and look what trouble I’ve caused. The Guardians are keeping an extra eye on us when all we want is inconspicuous peace.”
“Don’t look so glum, you saved the lives of all your children.”
“No, I didn’t. The guardians will come again, and when they see you, they’ll punish us. Oh, woe is me.”
Just then, a hammering of fists erupted on his door, and the poor man almost fainted.
“Open up,” they heard voices cry.
The alien father closed his eyes and summoned a deep breath, holding it in. Turning his head a fraction, as though straining to understand the voices, he uttered a soft curse and tutted. “I feared the Guardians were here, but it’s simply the villagers.”
Bert’s stomach growled, he noticed a headache coming on, and if he didn’t eat something soon he worried he'd lose his powers of reasoning. The crowd’s urgent mumbling outside and the loud thudding on the door drove him crazy. “Can’t you see what they want?”
“They sound panicky,” said the alien father.
“Well, at least they ain’t hungry, so I don’t what else they’ve got to fret about. Are you going to tell them to go away, or shall I?”
The alien father squeezed past Bert, rushed to the door, and tore it open. “What is it?” he asked, a quiver in his voice.
Bert peered over his head and narrow shoulders and saw the whole yard swarmed with little people. As far as he could see, the entire village had gathered. The Elder headed the group, his fist still raised and ready to bash against the door. “The Guardians are coming in their hundreds,” he said, and his knees rattled in his baggy shorts. He pointed to the citadel on the mountain. “They’re firing cannons and hurling death rays in every direction.”
The alien father stopped to listen, then darted out to see for himself. Bert pressed his shoulders through the opening, rose to his full six-foot and five-inches, stretched his back, and let out a groan of relief. The villagers must have seen him as an overgrown gorilla because they yelped and scuttled to a prudent distance.
Even on Earth, Bert had the same effect on people, so he ignored their reaction and peered across to the distant hill with its citadel. In that direction, the heavens had turned black with the bruise of thick angry clouds. The darkening sky rumbled like Bert’s empty stomach and jagged silver flashes jabbed at the coming night. A cool breeze caressed his bare arms and a lone drop of rain kissed his bald head. “It’s only a storm.” Bert could see his new friend was uncertain.
“It could be thunder and lightning,” said the alien father, “but it could also be a new offensive by the Guardians. In times like this, when we’ve opened another port, who can tell?”
“We take no chances,” said the Elder. “This house has an underground shelter," he called to the crowd. "We take refuge here.”
Like a bunch of frightened mice, the villagers surged to the alien father’s house. The alien father stood in the entrance, arms stretched, blocking them out. “Not so fast,” he said.
The crowd bowled the alien father aside and stormed in. He tried to protest, but nobody took any notice. Outside, the distant rumbling grew louder. “It’s only a storm,” said the alien father. “More violent than normal, but that’s all it is.”
“No,” insisted the Elder. “You have angered the Guardians by hiding the children and opening a tunnel to another planet. They are arriving in large numbers, and soon they will be here to kill us all.” He jabbed a finger in the alien father’s chest. “You brought them, you shelter us.”
It would have been easy for Bert to stop them from occupying the alien father's house. All he'd needed to do was sit in the doorway, and if the Elder had dared to poke him in the chest, he would have snapped his finger off. It wasn't exactly his intuition that told him not to interfere, more that it had made his brain too sluggish to react.
Bert peered in at them through the open door. The house was so crowded that everyone sat side by side on the floor, leaving no room for him. They’d even occupied the bedrooms. The underground shelter was nothing more than a cool pantry, already filled with sacks of bamboo shoots.
“Anybody got anything decent to eat?” called Bert. It was soon clear that nobody had food with them. In their hurried fright, they’d forgotten to bring any.
Part 19:
In this post: Bert offers a seed of hope…
They hadn’t been sitting long before a cry went out for drink, and another for food. “We eat what we find,” called the Elder, and all cheered in agreement. “We can’t starve to death in this hour of refuge.”
They opened cupboards, placed a huge pan on the heater box, and prepared bamboo tip porridge in vast quantities. Bert would have settled for a bucket of popcorn, or a raw carrot or even boiled spinach to make his muscles grow like Popeye. Anything but that disgusting porridge.
The alien father tottered out of his house and sat next to Bert. He spoke through his teeth with forced restraint. “Am I not master in my own home,” he said. “This is how we are. We flock together when frightened, and with the enemy out of sight and hearing, all we think about is food. My food.”
Bert patted him on the arm. “It’ll be okay, you’ll see.” It occurred to him this was the first physical contact he’d made with any of them, and the tough little guy didn’t react worse than stiffening and going still. “If you let me go home, I’ll bring some seeds with me too. You could grow corn and oranges and potatoes and all sorts of stuff that tastes delicious.”
With a probing gaze, the alien father cast a glance into Bert’s face. He wet his lips and swallowed hard. “I’ll think about it.” Then, with hesitant steps, he went back into his house.
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth.
-
Image by OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay
May 23, 2021
Sci fi series: Evil Portent
If you like a good chuckle, dim-witted heroes, and larger-than-life villains, then you'll love this fascinating series. On Wednesdays and Sundays, I’m blogging nibble-sized chunks of new ‘
Life in the Clouds
’ stories. You can check in regularly and read them for free, or wait to buy the entire story when published.
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 14 - 17…
“Many hundreds of years ago, our people dominated Ewepiter in their billions. They drove almost all other species to extinction. Food was short, pollution was high, and our world was dying. We needed to find a new planet to live on, so we built the...” he scratched his head, concentrating, then shrugged, “the doodads.”
“The gadget that makes the tunnel between planets?”
“Yes. When we activate a tunnel, we only have a limited control over where it opens. The planet must be hospitable: breathable atmosphere, comfortable temperature, compatible gravity, and so on; but we cannot tell what life forms live there. When we pass through the tunnel, we anchor the other end by placing a doodad there too. Unfortunately, our first and only attempt opened on the Guardian’s planet. They invaded us, confiscated our technology, and farmed us for the meat of our bodies.”
“Why did you come to my planet then?”
“On all Ewepiter, we have just two doodads left. We’ve kept them hidden all these years and never used them. When the Guardians came to our village a few days ago to round up the young, I ordered the mother of my children to gather all the infants in our village and take them through the tunnel to safety. If lucky, she might have found a planet where we could all escape. Alas, this time also, it opened on a useless, hazardous world, and now you are here and can never return.”
“Why not?”
“We closed the tunnel and hid the doodad again.”
“What about the one that's left behind on my world, in number-three Flintstones Terrace?”
“Lost forever.”
Bert shook his head slightly. “We know where it is, so it ain't lost." He scrunched his eyebrows together. "What about if you turned the doodad on again at this end?”
“The tunnel would open, but you will never find it and use it, and neither must the Guardians. The next time it opens, the Guardians will find it easily and invade your world, and the fate of the Berts will be the same as Ewepitarians." He spread his dinky legs, rested his hands on his hips, and gave Bert a harsh squint. "The destiny of your planet is in your hands.”
Cogs swirled in Bert’s brain. “What about if you smash the Guardian’s doodad? The one that opens to their world?”
“That is why we call them Guardians. They guard the doodad in their citadel on the hill. Nobody dares go there.”
“What?”
“I tried to organise a surveillance group once, but everyone said I was mad.”
“So you just let them piss all over you?”
“What else can we do?”
“Fight back.”
The alien father visibly shook in his boots.
“Why not let me go home and come back with a pile of weapons?" Bert drew his knife, the eight-inch blade flashing in the light. "I only use this as a toothpick. With a few bazookas we’ll soon stop those pesky Guardians. Then we can all live happily ever after.”
“I’d give anything to be as big and strong as you, Bert. Then I wouldn’t be so frightened of them.”
“Does that mean you’ll let me fetch some dynamite and stuff?”
“How can I trust you’ll return?”
That was a good question. The answer was simple. He'd return because it was the right deed to do. If it came to fight, he’d die for his buddies, even new buddies like these kindly little people who ate nothing but repulsive grunge. He had his moral values, too. He’d never allow bullies to lay a finger on children or animals, and he wouldn’t let space invaders continue to ravish this fine world for all the money in China. “If I didn’t come back to help you, I’d never forgive myself.”
“No, forget it. It can never be. Our people are not warriors. In our millions of years of evolution, there has never been a war. Beside, the Guardians would follow you.”
“You were brave enough to go against the Elder’s rules and open a new tunnel to my planet.”
“Yes, and look what trouble I’ve caused. The Guardians are keeping an extra eye on us when all we want is inconspicuous peace.”
“Don’t look so glum, you saved the lives of all your children.”
“No, I didn’t. The guardians will come again, and when they see you, they’ll punish us. Oh, woe is me.”
Just then, a hammering of fists erupted on his door, and the poor man almost fainted.
“Open up,” they heard voices cry.
The alien father closed his eyes and summoned a deep breath, holding it in. Turning his head a fraction, as though straining to understand the voices, he uttered a soft curse and tutted. “I feared the Guardians were here, but it’s simply the villagers.”
Bert’s stomach growled, he noticed a headache coming on, and if he didn’t eat something soon he worried he'd lose his powers of reasoning. The crowd’s urgent mumbling outside and the loud thudding on the door drove him crazy. “Can’t you see what they want?”
“They sound panicky,” said the alien father.
“Well, at least they ain’t hungry, so I don’t what else they’ve got to fret about. Are you going to tell them to go away, or shall I?”
The alien father squeezed past Bert, rushed to the door, and tore it open. “What is it?” he asked, a quiver in his voice.
Bert peered over his head and narrow shoulders and saw the whole yard swarmed with little people. As far as he could see, the entire village had gathered. The Elder headed the group, his fist still raised and ready to bash against the door. “The Guardians are coming in their hundreds,” he said, and his knees rattled in his baggy shorts. He pointed to the citadel on the mountain. “They’re firing cannons and hurling death rays in every direction.”
The alien father stopped to listen, then darted out to see for himself. Bert pressed his shoulders through the opening, stretched his back, and let out a groan of relief. The villagers must have seen him as an overgrown gorilla because they yelped and scuttled to a prudent distance.
Even on Earth, Bert had the same effect on people, so he ignored their reaction and peered across to the distant hill with its citadel. In that direction, the heavens had turned black with the bruise of thick angry clouds. The darkening sky rumbled like Bert’s empty stomach and jagged silver flashes jabbed at the coming night. A cool breeze caressed his bare arms and a lone drop of rain kissed his bald head. “It’s only a storm.”
Bert could see his new friend was uncertain.
“It could be thunder and lightning,” said the alien father, “but it could also be a new offensive by the Guardians. In times like this, when we’ve opened another port, who can tell?”
“We take no chances,” said the Elder. “This house has an underground shelter," he called to the crowd. "So we take refuge here.”
Like a bunch of frightened mice, the villagers surged to the alien father’s house. The alien father stood in the entrance, arms stretched, blocking them out. “Not so fast,” he said.
Part 18:
In this post: Villagers shelter in the alien father's house…
The crowd bowled the alien father aside and stormed in. He tried to protest, but nobody took any notice. Outside, the distant rumbling grew louder. “It’s only a storm,” said the alien father. “More violent than normal, but that’s all it is.”
“No,” insisted the Elder. “You have angered the Guardians by hiding the children and opening a tunnel to another planet. They are arriving in large numbers, and soon they will be here to kill us all.” He jabbed a finger in the alien father’s chest. “You brought them, you shelter us.”
It would have been easy for Bert to stop them from occupying the alien father's house. All he'd needed to do was sit in the doorway, and if the Elder had dared to poke him in the chest, he would have snapped his finger off. It wasn't exactly his intuition that told him not to interfere, more that it had made his brain too sluggish to react.
Bert peered in at them through the open door. The house was so crowded that everyone sat side by side on the floor, leaving no room for him. They’d even occupied the bedrooms. The underground shelter was nothing more than a cool pantry, already filled with sacks of bamboo shoots.
“Anybody got anything decent to eat?” called Bert. It was soon clear that nobody had food with them. In their hurried fright, they’d forgotten to bring any.
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by Maruf Rahman from Pixabay
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 14 - 17…
“Many hundreds of years ago, our people dominated Ewepiter in their billions. They drove almost all other species to extinction. Food was short, pollution was high, and our world was dying. We needed to find a new planet to live on, so we built the...” he scratched his head, concentrating, then shrugged, “the doodads.”
“The gadget that makes the tunnel between planets?”
“Yes. When we activate a tunnel, we only have a limited control over where it opens. The planet must be hospitable: breathable atmosphere, comfortable temperature, compatible gravity, and so on; but we cannot tell what life forms live there. When we pass through the tunnel, we anchor the other end by placing a doodad there too. Unfortunately, our first and only attempt opened on the Guardian’s planet. They invaded us, confiscated our technology, and farmed us for the meat of our bodies.”
“Why did you come to my planet then?”
“On all Ewepiter, we have just two doodads left. We’ve kept them hidden all these years and never used them. When the Guardians came to our village a few days ago to round up the young, I ordered the mother of my children to gather all the infants in our village and take them through the tunnel to safety. If lucky, she might have found a planet where we could all escape. Alas, this time also, it opened on a useless, hazardous world, and now you are here and can never return.”
“Why not?”
“We closed the tunnel and hid the doodad again.”
“What about the one that's left behind on my world, in number-three Flintstones Terrace?”
“Lost forever.”
Bert shook his head slightly. “We know where it is, so it ain't lost." He scrunched his eyebrows together. "What about if you turned the doodad on again at this end?”
“The tunnel would open, but you will never find it and use it, and neither must the Guardians. The next time it opens, the Guardians will find it easily and invade your world, and the fate of the Berts will be the same as Ewepitarians." He spread his dinky legs, rested his hands on his hips, and gave Bert a harsh squint. "The destiny of your planet is in your hands.”
Cogs swirled in Bert’s brain. “What about if you smash the Guardian’s doodad? The one that opens to their world?”
“That is why we call them Guardians. They guard the doodad in their citadel on the hill. Nobody dares go there.”
“What?”
“I tried to organise a surveillance group once, but everyone said I was mad.”
“So you just let them piss all over you?”
“What else can we do?”
“Fight back.”
The alien father visibly shook in his boots.
“Why not let me go home and come back with a pile of weapons?" Bert drew his knife, the eight-inch blade flashing in the light. "I only use this as a toothpick. With a few bazookas we’ll soon stop those pesky Guardians. Then we can all live happily ever after.”
“I’d give anything to be as big and strong as you, Bert. Then I wouldn’t be so frightened of them.”
“Does that mean you’ll let me fetch some dynamite and stuff?”
“How can I trust you’ll return?”
That was a good question. The answer was simple. He'd return because it was the right deed to do. If it came to fight, he’d die for his buddies, even new buddies like these kindly little people who ate nothing but repulsive grunge. He had his moral values, too. He’d never allow bullies to lay a finger on children or animals, and he wouldn’t let space invaders continue to ravish this fine world for all the money in China. “If I didn’t come back to help you, I’d never forgive myself.”
“No, forget it. It can never be. Our people are not warriors. In our millions of years of evolution, there has never been a war. Beside, the Guardians would follow you.”
“You were brave enough to go against the Elder’s rules and open a new tunnel to my planet.”
“Yes, and look what trouble I’ve caused. The Guardians are keeping an extra eye on us when all we want is inconspicuous peace.”
“Don’t look so glum, you saved the lives of all your children.”
“No, I didn’t. The guardians will come again, and when they see you, they’ll punish us. Oh, woe is me.”
Just then, a hammering of fists erupted on his door, and the poor man almost fainted.
“Open up,” they heard voices cry.
The alien father closed his eyes and summoned a deep breath, holding it in. Turning his head a fraction, as though straining to understand the voices, he uttered a soft curse and tutted. “I feared the Guardians were here, but it’s simply the villagers.”
Bert’s stomach growled, he noticed a headache coming on, and if he didn’t eat something soon he worried he'd lose his powers of reasoning. The crowd’s urgent mumbling outside and the loud thudding on the door drove him crazy. “Can’t you see what they want?”
“They sound panicky,” said the alien father.
“Well, at least they ain’t hungry, so I don’t what else they’ve got to fret about. Are you going to tell them to go away, or shall I?”
The alien father squeezed past Bert, rushed to the door, and tore it open. “What is it?” he asked, a quiver in his voice.
Bert peered over his head and narrow shoulders and saw the whole yard swarmed with little people. As far as he could see, the entire village had gathered. The Elder headed the group, his fist still raised and ready to bash against the door. “The Guardians are coming in their hundreds,” he said, and his knees rattled in his baggy shorts. He pointed to the citadel on the mountain. “They’re firing cannons and hurling death rays in every direction.”
The alien father stopped to listen, then darted out to see for himself. Bert pressed his shoulders through the opening, stretched his back, and let out a groan of relief. The villagers must have seen him as an overgrown gorilla because they yelped and scuttled to a prudent distance.
Even on Earth, Bert had the same effect on people, so he ignored their reaction and peered across to the distant hill with its citadel. In that direction, the heavens had turned black with the bruise of thick angry clouds. The darkening sky rumbled like Bert’s empty stomach and jagged silver flashes jabbed at the coming night. A cool breeze caressed his bare arms and a lone drop of rain kissed his bald head. “It’s only a storm.”
Bert could see his new friend was uncertain.
“It could be thunder and lightning,” said the alien father, “but it could also be a new offensive by the Guardians. In times like this, when we’ve opened another port, who can tell?”
“We take no chances,” said the Elder. “This house has an underground shelter," he called to the crowd. "So we take refuge here.”
Like a bunch of frightened mice, the villagers surged to the alien father’s house. The alien father stood in the entrance, arms stretched, blocking them out. “Not so fast,” he said.
Part 18:
In this post: Villagers shelter in the alien father's house…
The crowd bowled the alien father aside and stormed in. He tried to protest, but nobody took any notice. Outside, the distant rumbling grew louder. “It’s only a storm,” said the alien father. “More violent than normal, but that’s all it is.”
“No,” insisted the Elder. “You have angered the Guardians by hiding the children and opening a tunnel to another planet. They are arriving in large numbers, and soon they will be here to kill us all.” He jabbed a finger in the alien father’s chest. “You brought them, you shelter us.”
It would have been easy for Bert to stop them from occupying the alien father's house. All he'd needed to do was sit in the doorway, and if the Elder had dared to poke him in the chest, he would have snapped his finger off. It wasn't exactly his intuition that told him not to interfere, more that it had made his brain too sluggish to react.
Bert peered in at them through the open door. The house was so crowded that everyone sat side by side on the floor, leaving no room for him. They’d even occupied the bedrooms. The underground shelter was nothing more than a cool pantry, already filled with sacks of bamboo shoots.
“Anybody got anything decent to eat?” called Bert. It was soon clear that nobody had food with them. In their hurried fright, they’d forgotten to bring any.
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by Maruf Rahman from Pixabay
May 19, 2021
Sci fi series: Evil Portent
If you like a good chuckle, dim-witted heroes, and larger-than-life villains, then you'll love this fascinating series. On Wednesdays and Sundays, I’m blogging nibble-sized chunks of new ‘
Life in the Clouds
’ stories. You can check in regularly and read them for free, or wait to buy the entire story when published.
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 13 - 16…
Irritation flared in Bert. Rather than do or say something he might regret, he crawled out of the Elder’s hut on hands and knees. He wanted to go home to Olive, to his Chums the Alsatians, and his horse, Big Foot.
The doodad that opened the tunnel between their planets was in the Elder’s hut. In his younger days, Bert had been thief, good at it too. Someway or another, as sure as his name was Bert, he’d snitch the doodad and transport himself back to Earth. As soon as he re-entered number three Flintstone Terrace, all he needed to do was turn the doodad off. End of problem.
The alien woman who'd kidnapped him waited outside. “Don’t be angry,” she said. “Stay here while the Elder dishes out my punishment. Then I’ll take you to my cottage.”
Two minutes later, she was out again, her face ashen. “Come.”
“What’s the punishment?”
“Food rationing for three days. Half measure.”
“That ain’t so bad. You can have my share.”
They trekked through the village of well-spaced bamboo huts and arrived at another stone-built house, not as large or austere as the Elder’s, but inviting and cosy. It also had a proper, solid door. Inside, a small man greeted the woman with a big hug, and tears flowed easily. Bert crouched, but could still feel the ceiling scrub his bald head.
“This is the father of my children,” said the alien woman.
“Welcome,” said the alien father. “Are you hungry?”
Unlike the Elder, he appeared unafraid of Bert. For an Ewepitarian he was tall, almost reaching Bert’s belly button. The horny nodes on his forehead were more prominent than the woman’s, and his features hinted at a strong character. There were no chairs big enough for Bert, so he sat cross-legged on the floor, his head on a level with the alien father’s head. “Depends what you 're offering,” he said.
“Bamboo porridge. There is nothing else.”
“Then I ain’t hungry.”
“Sit!” said the alien father.
"I am sitting."
The alien father stared down at the floor, hands clasped. “You are here through no fault of your own.” He reached out to touch Bert, then pulled back as if not worthy, or perhaps nervous. “I owe you an explanation.”
“Too blinking right you do.”
“Many hundreds of years ago, our people dominated Ewepiter in their billions. They drove almost all other species to extinction. Food was short, pollution was high, and our world was dying. We needed to find a new planet to live on, so we built the...” he scratched his head, concentrating, then shrugged, “the doodads.”
“The gadget that makes the tunnel between planets?”
“Yes. When we activate a tunnel, we have no control over where the other end opens. When we pass through, we anchor the other end by placing a doodad there too. Unfortunately, our first and only attempt opened on the Guardian’s planet. They invaded us, confiscated our technology, and farmed us for the meat of our bodies.”
“Why did you come to my planet then?”
“On all Ewepiter, we have just two doodads left. We’ve kept them hidden all these years and never used them. When the Guardians came to our village to round up the young, I ordered the mother of my children to gather all the infants in our village and take them through the tunnel to safety. If lucky, she might have found a planet where we could all escape. Alas, this time also, it opened on a useless, hazardous world, and now you are here and can never return.”
“Why not?”
“We closed the tunnel and hid the doodad again.”
“What about the one that's left behind on my world, in number-three Flintstones Terrace?”
“Lost forever.”
“We know where it is, so it ain't lost. What about if you turned the doodad on again at this end?”
“The tunnel would open, but you will never find it and use it, and neither must the Guardians. The next time it opens, the Guardians will find it easily and invade your world, and the fate of the Berts will be the same as Ewepitarians." He spread his dinky legs, rested his hands on his hips, and gave Bert a harsh squint. "The destiny of your planet is in your hands.”
Cogs swirled in Bert’s brain. “What about if you smash the Guardian’s doodad? The one that opens to their world?”
“That is why we call them Guardians. They guard the doodad in the citadel on the hill. Nobody dares go there.”
“What?”
“I tried to organise a surveillance group once, but everyone said I was mad.”
“So you just let them piss all over you?”
“What else can we do?”
“Fight back.”
The alien father visibly shook in his boots.
“Why not let me go home and come back with a pile of weapons?" He drew his knife, the eight-inch blade flashing in the light. "I only use this as a toothpick. With a few bazookas we’ll soon stop those pesky Guardians. Then we can all live happily ever after.”
“I’d give anything to be as big and strong as you, Bert. Then I wouldn’t be so frightened of them.”
“Does that mean you’ll let me fetch some dynamite and stuff?”
“How can I trust you’ll return?”
That was a good question. But he would because it was the right deed to do. If it came to fight, he’d die for his buddies, even new buddies like these kindly little people who ate nothing but repulsive grunge. He had his moral values, too. He’d never allow bullies to lay a finger on children or animals, and he wouldn’t let space invaders continue to ravish this fine world for all the money in China. “If I didn’t come back to help you, I’d never forgive myself.”
“No, forget it. It can never be. Our people are not warriors. In our millions of years of evolution, there has never been a war.”
“You were brave enough to go against the Elder’s rules and open a new tunnel to my planet.”
“Yes, and look what trouble I’ve caused. The Guardians are keeping an extra eye on us when all we want is inconspicuous peace.”
“Don’t look so glum, you saved the lives of all your children.”
“No, I didn’t. The guardians will come again, and when they see you, they’ll punish us. Oh, woe is me.”
Just then, a hammering of fists erupted on his door, and the poor man almost fainted.
“Open up,” they heard voices cry.
The alien father uttered a soft curse and tutted. “I feared the Guardians were here, but it’s simply the villagers.”
Bert’s stomach growled, he noticed a headache coming on, and if he didn’t eat something soon he was certain his strength would bleed away. The crowd’s urgent mumbling outside and the loud thudding on the door drove him crazy. “Can’t you see what they want?”
“They sound panicky,” said the alien father.
“Well, at least they ain’t hungry, so I don’t what else they’ve got to fret about. Are you going to tell them to go away, or shall I?”
The alien father squeezed past Bert, rushed to the door, and tore it open. “What is it?” he asked, a quiver in his voice.
Bert peered over his head and narrow shoulders and saw the whole yard swarmed with little people. As far as he could see, the entire village had gathered. The Elder headed the group, his fist still raised and ready to bash against the door. “The Guardians are coming in their hundreds,” he said, and his knees rattled in his baggy shorts. He pointed to the citadel on the mountain. “They’re firing cannons and hurling death rays in every direction.”
Part 17:
In this post: Bert sees a storm coming…
The alien father stopped to listen, then darted out to see for himself. Bert pressed his shoulders through the opening, stretched his back, and let out a groan of relief. The villagers must have seen him as an overgrown gorilla because they yelped and scuttled to a prudent distance.
Even on Earth, Bert had the same effect on people, so he ignored their reaction and peered across to the distant hill with its citadel. In that direction, the heavens had turned black with the bruise of thick angry clouds. The darkening sky rumbled like Bert’s empty stomach and jagged silver flashes jabbed at the coming night. A cool breeze caressed his bare arms and a lone drop of rain kissed his bald head. “It’s only a storm.”
Bert could see his new friend was uncertain.
“It could be thunder and lightning,” said the alien father, “but it could also be a new offensive by the Guardians. In times like this, when we’ve opened another port, who can tell?”
“We take no chances,” said the elder. “With its underground shelter, this is the safest building in the village. So we better take refuge here.”
Like a bunch of frightened mice, the villagers surged to the alien father’s house. The alien father stood in the entrance, arms stretched, blocking them out. “Not so fast,” he said.
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
- [image error] Image by mohamed Hassan from Pixabay
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 13 - 16…
Irritation flared in Bert. Rather than do or say something he might regret, he crawled out of the Elder’s hut on hands and knees. He wanted to go home to Olive, to his Chums the Alsatians, and his horse, Big Foot.
The doodad that opened the tunnel between their planets was in the Elder’s hut. In his younger days, Bert had been thief, good at it too. Someway or another, as sure as his name was Bert, he’d snitch the doodad and transport himself back to Earth. As soon as he re-entered number three Flintstone Terrace, all he needed to do was turn the doodad off. End of problem.
The alien woman who'd kidnapped him waited outside. “Don’t be angry,” she said. “Stay here while the Elder dishes out my punishment. Then I’ll take you to my cottage.”
Two minutes later, she was out again, her face ashen. “Come.”
“What’s the punishment?”
“Food rationing for three days. Half measure.”
“That ain’t so bad. You can have my share.”
They trekked through the village of well-spaced bamboo huts and arrived at another stone-built house, not as large or austere as the Elder’s, but inviting and cosy. It also had a proper, solid door. Inside, a small man greeted the woman with a big hug, and tears flowed easily. Bert crouched, but could still feel the ceiling scrub his bald head.
“This is the father of my children,” said the alien woman.
“Welcome,” said the alien father. “Are you hungry?”
Unlike the Elder, he appeared unafraid of Bert. For an Ewepitarian he was tall, almost reaching Bert’s belly button. The horny nodes on his forehead were more prominent than the woman’s, and his features hinted at a strong character. There were no chairs big enough for Bert, so he sat cross-legged on the floor, his head on a level with the alien father’s head. “Depends what you 're offering,” he said.
“Bamboo porridge. There is nothing else.”
“Then I ain’t hungry.”
“Sit!” said the alien father.
"I am sitting."
The alien father stared down at the floor, hands clasped. “You are here through no fault of your own.” He reached out to touch Bert, then pulled back as if not worthy, or perhaps nervous. “I owe you an explanation.”
“Too blinking right you do.”
“Many hundreds of years ago, our people dominated Ewepiter in their billions. They drove almost all other species to extinction. Food was short, pollution was high, and our world was dying. We needed to find a new planet to live on, so we built the...” he scratched his head, concentrating, then shrugged, “the doodads.”
“The gadget that makes the tunnel between planets?”
“Yes. When we activate a tunnel, we have no control over where the other end opens. When we pass through, we anchor the other end by placing a doodad there too. Unfortunately, our first and only attempt opened on the Guardian’s planet. They invaded us, confiscated our technology, and farmed us for the meat of our bodies.”
“Why did you come to my planet then?”
“On all Ewepiter, we have just two doodads left. We’ve kept them hidden all these years and never used them. When the Guardians came to our village to round up the young, I ordered the mother of my children to gather all the infants in our village and take them through the tunnel to safety. If lucky, she might have found a planet where we could all escape. Alas, this time also, it opened on a useless, hazardous world, and now you are here and can never return.”
“Why not?”
“We closed the tunnel and hid the doodad again.”
“What about the one that's left behind on my world, in number-three Flintstones Terrace?”
“Lost forever.”
“We know where it is, so it ain't lost. What about if you turned the doodad on again at this end?”
“The tunnel would open, but you will never find it and use it, and neither must the Guardians. The next time it opens, the Guardians will find it easily and invade your world, and the fate of the Berts will be the same as Ewepitarians." He spread his dinky legs, rested his hands on his hips, and gave Bert a harsh squint. "The destiny of your planet is in your hands.”
Cogs swirled in Bert’s brain. “What about if you smash the Guardian’s doodad? The one that opens to their world?”
“That is why we call them Guardians. They guard the doodad in the citadel on the hill. Nobody dares go there.”
“What?”
“I tried to organise a surveillance group once, but everyone said I was mad.”
“So you just let them piss all over you?”
“What else can we do?”
“Fight back.”
The alien father visibly shook in his boots.
“Why not let me go home and come back with a pile of weapons?" He drew his knife, the eight-inch blade flashing in the light. "I only use this as a toothpick. With a few bazookas we’ll soon stop those pesky Guardians. Then we can all live happily ever after.”
“I’d give anything to be as big and strong as you, Bert. Then I wouldn’t be so frightened of them.”
“Does that mean you’ll let me fetch some dynamite and stuff?”
“How can I trust you’ll return?”
That was a good question. But he would because it was the right deed to do. If it came to fight, he’d die for his buddies, even new buddies like these kindly little people who ate nothing but repulsive grunge. He had his moral values, too. He’d never allow bullies to lay a finger on children or animals, and he wouldn’t let space invaders continue to ravish this fine world for all the money in China. “If I didn’t come back to help you, I’d never forgive myself.”
“No, forget it. It can never be. Our people are not warriors. In our millions of years of evolution, there has never been a war.”
“You were brave enough to go against the Elder’s rules and open a new tunnel to my planet.”
“Yes, and look what trouble I’ve caused. The Guardians are keeping an extra eye on us when all we want is inconspicuous peace.”
“Don’t look so glum, you saved the lives of all your children.”
“No, I didn’t. The guardians will come again, and when they see you, they’ll punish us. Oh, woe is me.”
Just then, a hammering of fists erupted on his door, and the poor man almost fainted.
“Open up,” they heard voices cry.
The alien father uttered a soft curse and tutted. “I feared the Guardians were here, but it’s simply the villagers.”
Bert’s stomach growled, he noticed a headache coming on, and if he didn’t eat something soon he was certain his strength would bleed away. The crowd’s urgent mumbling outside and the loud thudding on the door drove him crazy. “Can’t you see what they want?”
“They sound panicky,” said the alien father.
“Well, at least they ain’t hungry, so I don’t what else they’ve got to fret about. Are you going to tell them to go away, or shall I?”
The alien father squeezed past Bert, rushed to the door, and tore it open. “What is it?” he asked, a quiver in his voice.
Bert peered over his head and narrow shoulders and saw the whole yard swarmed with little people. As far as he could see, the entire village had gathered. The Elder headed the group, his fist still raised and ready to bash against the door. “The Guardians are coming in their hundreds,” he said, and his knees rattled in his baggy shorts. He pointed to the citadel on the mountain. “They’re firing cannons and hurling death rays in every direction.”
Part 17:
In this post: Bert sees a storm coming…
The alien father stopped to listen, then darted out to see for himself. Bert pressed his shoulders through the opening, stretched his back, and let out a groan of relief. The villagers must have seen him as an overgrown gorilla because they yelped and scuttled to a prudent distance.
Even on Earth, Bert had the same effect on people, so he ignored their reaction and peered across to the distant hill with its citadel. In that direction, the heavens had turned black with the bruise of thick angry clouds. The darkening sky rumbled like Bert’s empty stomach and jagged silver flashes jabbed at the coming night. A cool breeze caressed his bare arms and a lone drop of rain kissed his bald head. “It’s only a storm.”
Bert could see his new friend was uncertain.
“It could be thunder and lightning,” said the alien father, “but it could also be a new offensive by the Guardians. In times like this, when we’ve opened another port, who can tell?”
“We take no chances,” said the elder. “With its underground shelter, this is the safest building in the village. So we better take refuge here.”
Like a bunch of frightened mice, the villagers surged to the alien father’s house. The alien father stood in the entrance, arms stretched, blocking them out. “Not so fast,” he said.
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
- [image error] Image by mohamed Hassan from Pixabay
May 16, 2021
Sci fi series: Evil Portent
If you like a good chuckle, dim-witted heroes, and larger-than-life villains, then you'll love this fascinating series. On Wednesdays and Sundays, I’m blogging nibble-sized chunks of new ‘
Life in the Clouds
’ stories. You can check in regularly and read them for free, or wait to buy the entire story when published.
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 12 - 15…
Bert stopped eating, set the porridge bowl by his side, pinched his nose, and swallowed. He grimaced and coughed, then smiled and smacked his lips. The Elder watched him closely. It pained Bert to see the little man so frightened. “Look, I ain’t going to eat you. Not any of you aliens. It’s true I eat meat where I come from, but they’re only farm animals.”
“To the Guardians, we are only farm animals.”
There it was again, a reference to the Guardians. “What do you mean? Who are these Guardians?”
A new wave of terror made the Elder shake. “The evilest monsters in the universe. They are from a different planet, and they have an open tunnel like the one you came through. They farm us and eat us.”
“Can’t you close the tunnel?”
“We could, easily, but they guard the doodad.”
“Where?”
“In a tower they erected on a hill near to here.”
Bert nodded. “The Citadel I could see when I got here?”
“Yes.”
Bert held a palm up to stop the Elder from piling on more misery. “Look, as soon as I’ve finished this delicious porridge I’ll pop back to me own planet and leave you in peace.”
“You can never leave.”
It took a moment for Bert’s brain to register what the Elder had said. Even then, he thought he must have heard wrong. “Did you say 'never leave'?”
"Yes."
"Why?"
“Because the Guardians know we have opened a tunnel to another planet: your planet. If they find the doodad, they will open the tunnel and invade it.”
A sharp, disgusted snort broke from Bert. “Our people aren’t passive like you lot. If those Guardians come to our world, we’d clobber them good and proper.”
“Perhaps, but their weapon technology is awesome." He made a snide gesture to the knife hanging in Bert's belt. "They have a hand-held ray gun that destroys anything it touches. One sweep would wipe out this entire village.”
Bert raised his eyebrows and gave a glassy stare. “Listen, mate, I can’t live here. I’ll starve to death.”
“My friend,” said the Elder, “I am sorry and will punish the woman who kidnapped you.” He offered a deep sigh. “The day the Guardians discover you they will kill you. But isn’t that better than they follow you back to your planet and kill or enslave your entire population of Berts and Vegans?”
Irritation flared in Bert. Rather than do or say something he might regret, he crawled out of the Elder’s hut on hands and knees. He wanted to go home to Olive, to his Chums the Alsatians, and his horse, Big Foot.
The doodad that opened the tunnel between their planets was in the Elder’s hut. In his younger days, Bert had been thief, good at it too. Someway or another, as sure as his name was Bert, he’d snitch the doodad and transport himself back to Earth. As soon as he re-entered number three Flintstone Terrace, all he needed to do was turn the doodad off. End of problem.
The alien woman who'd kidnapped him waited outside. “Don’t be angry,” she said. “Stay here while the Elder dishes out my punishment. Then I’ll take you to my cottage.”
Two minutes later, she was out again, her face ashen. “Come.”
“What’s the punishment?”
“Food rationing for three days. Half measure.”
“That ain’t so bad. You can have my share.”
They trekked through the village of well-spaced bamboo huts and arrived at another stone-built house, not as large or austere as the Elder’s, but inviting and cosy. Inside, a small man greeted the woman with a big hug, and tears flowed easily. Bert crouched, but could still feel the ceiling touch his bald head.
“This is the father of my children,” said the alien woman.
“Welcome,” said the alien father. “Are you hungry?”
Unlike the Elder, he appeared unafraid of Bert. For an Ewepitarian he was tall, almost reaching Bert’s belly button. The horny nodes on his forehead were more prominent than the woman’s, and his features hinted at a strong character. There were no chairs big enough for Bert, so he sat cross-legged on the floor, his head on a level with the alien father’s head. “Depends what you 're offering,” he said.
“Bamboo porridge. There is nothing else.”
“Then I ain’t hungry.”
“Sit!” said the alien father.
"I am sitting."
The alien father stared down at the floor, hands clasped. “You are here through no fault of your own.” He reached out to touch Bert, then pulled back as if not worthy. “I owe you an explanation.”
“Too blinking right you do.”
“Many hundreds of years ago, our people dominated Ewepiter in their billions. They drove almost all other species to extinction. Food was short, pollution was high, and our world was dying. We needed to find a new planet to live on, so we built the...” he scratched his head, concentrating, then shrugged, “the doodads.”
“The gadget that makes the tunnel between planets?”
“Yes. When we activate a tunnel, we have no control over where the other end opens. When we pass through, we anchor the other end by placing a doodad there too. Unfortunately, our first and only attempt opened on the Guardian’s planet. They invaded us, confiscated our technology, and farmed us for the meat of our bodies.”
“Why did you come to my planet then?”
“On all Ewepiter, we have just two doodads left. We’ve kept them hidden all these years and never used them. When the Guardians came to our village to round up the young, I ordered the mother of my children to gather all the infants in our village and take them through the tunnel to safety. If lucky, she might have found a planet where we could all escape. This time also, it opened on a useless, hazardous world, and now you are here and can never return.”
“Why not?”
“We closed the tunnel and hid the doodad again.”
“What about the one on my world?”
“Lost forever.”
“What about if you turned the doodad on again at this end?”
“The tunnel would open, but you will never find it and use it, and neither must the Guardians. With the next opening, the Guardians will find it easily and invade your world, and the fate of the Berts will be the same as Ewepitarians. The destiny of your planet is in your hands.”
Cogs swirled in Bert’s brain. “What about if you smash the Guardian’s doodad? The one that opens to their world?”
“That is why we call them Guardians. They guard the doodad in the citadel on the hill. Nobody dares go there.”
“What?”
“I tried to organise a surveillance group once, but everyone said I was mad.”
“So you just let them walk all over you?”
“What else can we do?”
“Fight back.”
The alien father visibly shook in his boots.
“Why not let me go home and come back with a pile of weapons?" He drew his knife, the eight-inch blade flashing in the light. "I only use this as a toothpick. With a few bazookas we’ll soon stop these pesky Guardians. Then we can all live happily ever after.”
“I’d give anything to be as big and strong as you. Then I wouldn’t be so frightened of them.”
“Does that mean you’ll let me fetch some dynamite and stuff?”
“How can I trust you’ll return?”
That was a good question. But he meant it because it was the right deed to do. If it came to fight, he’d die for his buddies, even new buddies like these kindly little people who ate nothing but repulsive grunge. He had his moral values, too. He’d never allow bullies to lay a finger on children or animals, and he wouldn’t let space invaders continue to ravish this fine world for all the money in China. “If I didn’t come back to help you, I’d never forgive myself.”
“No, forget it. It can never be. Our people are not warriors. In our millions of years of evolution, there has never been a war.”
“You were brave enough to go against the Elder’s rules and open a new tunnel to my planet.”
“Yes, and look what trouble I’ve caused. The Guardians are keeping an extra eye on us when all we want is inconspicuous peace.”
“Don’t look so glum, you saved the lives of all your children.”
“No, I didn’t. The guardians will come again, and when they see you, they’ll punish us. Oh, woe is me.”
Just then, a hammering of fists erupted on his door, and the poor man almost fainted.
Part 16:
In this post: The villagers fear an attack by death rays…
“Open up,” they heard voices cry.
The alien father uttered a soft curse and tutted. “I feared the Guardians were here, but it’s simply the villagers.”
Bert’s stomach growled, he noticed a headache coming on, and if he didn’t eat something soon he was certain his strength would bleed away. The crowd’s urgent mumbling outside and the loud thudding on the door drove him crazy. “Can’t you see what they want?”
“They sound panicky,” said the alien father.
“Well, at least they ain’t hungry, so I don’t what else they’ve got to fret about. Are you going to tell them to go away, or shall I?”
The alien father squeezed past Bert, rushed to the door, and tore it open. “What is it?” he asked, a quiver in his voice.
Bert peered over his head and narrow shoulders and saw the whole yard swarmed with little people. As far as he could see, the entire village had gathered. The Elder headed the group, his fist still raised and ready to bash against the door. “The Guardians are coming in their hundreds,” he said, and his knees rattled in his baggy shorts. He pointed to the citadel on the mountain. “They’re firing cannons and hurling death rays in every direction.”
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 12 - 15…
Bert stopped eating, set the porridge bowl by his side, pinched his nose, and swallowed. He grimaced and coughed, then smiled and smacked his lips. The Elder watched him closely. It pained Bert to see the little man so frightened. “Look, I ain’t going to eat you. Not any of you aliens. It’s true I eat meat where I come from, but they’re only farm animals.”
“To the Guardians, we are only farm animals.”
There it was again, a reference to the Guardians. “What do you mean? Who are these Guardians?”
A new wave of terror made the Elder shake. “The evilest monsters in the universe. They are from a different planet, and they have an open tunnel like the one you came through. They farm us and eat us.”
“Can’t you close the tunnel?”
“We could, easily, but they guard the doodad.”
“Where?”
“In a tower they erected on a hill near to here.”
Bert nodded. “The Citadel I could see when I got here?”
“Yes.”
Bert held a palm up to stop the Elder from piling on more misery. “Look, as soon as I’ve finished this delicious porridge I’ll pop back to me own planet and leave you in peace.”
“You can never leave.”
It took a moment for Bert’s brain to register what the Elder had said. Even then, he thought he must have heard wrong. “Did you say 'never leave'?”
"Yes."
"Why?"
“Because the Guardians know we have opened a tunnel to another planet: your planet. If they find the doodad, they will open the tunnel and invade it.”
A sharp, disgusted snort broke from Bert. “Our people aren’t passive like you lot. If those Guardians come to our world, we’d clobber them good and proper.”
“Perhaps, but their weapon technology is awesome." He made a snide gesture to the knife hanging in Bert's belt. "They have a hand-held ray gun that destroys anything it touches. One sweep would wipe out this entire village.”
Bert raised his eyebrows and gave a glassy stare. “Listen, mate, I can’t live here. I’ll starve to death.”
“My friend,” said the Elder, “I am sorry and will punish the woman who kidnapped you.” He offered a deep sigh. “The day the Guardians discover you they will kill you. But isn’t that better than they follow you back to your planet and kill or enslave your entire population of Berts and Vegans?”
Irritation flared in Bert. Rather than do or say something he might regret, he crawled out of the Elder’s hut on hands and knees. He wanted to go home to Olive, to his Chums the Alsatians, and his horse, Big Foot.
The doodad that opened the tunnel between their planets was in the Elder’s hut. In his younger days, Bert had been thief, good at it too. Someway or another, as sure as his name was Bert, he’d snitch the doodad and transport himself back to Earth. As soon as he re-entered number three Flintstone Terrace, all he needed to do was turn the doodad off. End of problem.
The alien woman who'd kidnapped him waited outside. “Don’t be angry,” she said. “Stay here while the Elder dishes out my punishment. Then I’ll take you to my cottage.”
Two minutes later, she was out again, her face ashen. “Come.”
“What’s the punishment?”
“Food rationing for three days. Half measure.”
“That ain’t so bad. You can have my share.”
They trekked through the village of well-spaced bamboo huts and arrived at another stone-built house, not as large or austere as the Elder’s, but inviting and cosy. Inside, a small man greeted the woman with a big hug, and tears flowed easily. Bert crouched, but could still feel the ceiling touch his bald head.
“This is the father of my children,” said the alien woman.
“Welcome,” said the alien father. “Are you hungry?”
Unlike the Elder, he appeared unafraid of Bert. For an Ewepitarian he was tall, almost reaching Bert’s belly button. The horny nodes on his forehead were more prominent than the woman’s, and his features hinted at a strong character. There were no chairs big enough for Bert, so he sat cross-legged on the floor, his head on a level with the alien father’s head. “Depends what you 're offering,” he said.
“Bamboo porridge. There is nothing else.”
“Then I ain’t hungry.”
“Sit!” said the alien father.
"I am sitting."
The alien father stared down at the floor, hands clasped. “You are here through no fault of your own.” He reached out to touch Bert, then pulled back as if not worthy. “I owe you an explanation.”
“Too blinking right you do.”
“Many hundreds of years ago, our people dominated Ewepiter in their billions. They drove almost all other species to extinction. Food was short, pollution was high, and our world was dying. We needed to find a new planet to live on, so we built the...” he scratched his head, concentrating, then shrugged, “the doodads.”
“The gadget that makes the tunnel between planets?”
“Yes. When we activate a tunnel, we have no control over where the other end opens. When we pass through, we anchor the other end by placing a doodad there too. Unfortunately, our first and only attempt opened on the Guardian’s planet. They invaded us, confiscated our technology, and farmed us for the meat of our bodies.”
“Why did you come to my planet then?”
“On all Ewepiter, we have just two doodads left. We’ve kept them hidden all these years and never used them. When the Guardians came to our village to round up the young, I ordered the mother of my children to gather all the infants in our village and take them through the tunnel to safety. If lucky, she might have found a planet where we could all escape. This time also, it opened on a useless, hazardous world, and now you are here and can never return.”
“Why not?”
“We closed the tunnel and hid the doodad again.”
“What about the one on my world?”
“Lost forever.”
“What about if you turned the doodad on again at this end?”
“The tunnel would open, but you will never find it and use it, and neither must the Guardians. With the next opening, the Guardians will find it easily and invade your world, and the fate of the Berts will be the same as Ewepitarians. The destiny of your planet is in your hands.”
Cogs swirled in Bert’s brain. “What about if you smash the Guardian’s doodad? The one that opens to their world?”
“That is why we call them Guardians. They guard the doodad in the citadel on the hill. Nobody dares go there.”
“What?”
“I tried to organise a surveillance group once, but everyone said I was mad.”
“So you just let them walk all over you?”
“What else can we do?”
“Fight back.”
The alien father visibly shook in his boots.
“Why not let me go home and come back with a pile of weapons?" He drew his knife, the eight-inch blade flashing in the light. "I only use this as a toothpick. With a few bazookas we’ll soon stop these pesky Guardians. Then we can all live happily ever after.”
“I’d give anything to be as big and strong as you. Then I wouldn’t be so frightened of them.”
“Does that mean you’ll let me fetch some dynamite and stuff?”
“How can I trust you’ll return?”
That was a good question. But he meant it because it was the right deed to do. If it came to fight, he’d die for his buddies, even new buddies like these kindly little people who ate nothing but repulsive grunge. He had his moral values, too. He’d never allow bullies to lay a finger on children or animals, and he wouldn’t let space invaders continue to ravish this fine world for all the money in China. “If I didn’t come back to help you, I’d never forgive myself.”
“No, forget it. It can never be. Our people are not warriors. In our millions of years of evolution, there has never been a war.”
“You were brave enough to go against the Elder’s rules and open a new tunnel to my planet.”
“Yes, and look what trouble I’ve caused. The Guardians are keeping an extra eye on us when all we want is inconspicuous peace.”
“Don’t look so glum, you saved the lives of all your children.”
“No, I didn’t. The guardians will come again, and when they see you, they’ll punish us. Oh, woe is me.”
Just then, a hammering of fists erupted on his door, and the poor man almost fainted.
Part 16:
In this post: The villagers fear an attack by death rays…
“Open up,” they heard voices cry.
The alien father uttered a soft curse and tutted. “I feared the Guardians were here, but it’s simply the villagers.”
Bert’s stomach growled, he noticed a headache coming on, and if he didn’t eat something soon he was certain his strength would bleed away. The crowd’s urgent mumbling outside and the loud thudding on the door drove him crazy. “Can’t you see what they want?”
“They sound panicky,” said the alien father.
“Well, at least they ain’t hungry, so I don’t what else they’ve got to fret about. Are you going to tell them to go away, or shall I?”
The alien father squeezed past Bert, rushed to the door, and tore it open. “What is it?” he asked, a quiver in his voice.
Bert peered over his head and narrow shoulders and saw the whole yard swarmed with little people. As far as he could see, the entire village had gathered. The Elder headed the group, his fist still raised and ready to bash against the door. “The Guardians are coming in their hundreds,” he said, and his knees rattled in his baggy shorts. He pointed to the citadel on the mountain. “They’re firing cannons and hurling death rays in every direction.”
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay
May 12, 2021
Sci fi series: Evil Portent
If you like a good chuckle, dim-witted heroes, and larger-than-life villains, then you'll love this fascinating series. On Wednesdays and Sundays, I’m blogging nibble-sized chunks of new ‘
Life in the Clouds
’ stories. You can check in regularly and read them for free, or wait to buy the entire story when published.
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 11 - 14…
“Sit!” said the Elder.
“I am sitting,” said Bert.
The Elder’s eyes swivelled this way and that as if wondering how he could squeeze around Bert if he needed to escape. Bert felt sorry for the timid little wise man and offered his friendliest smile.
“You are confused?”
Bert wasn’t sure if it was a statement or a question. “I don’t know where I am if that’s what you mean.”
“You are on a planet called Ewepiter, in a village called Lambdon.”
Careful to keep the smirk on his face, Bert shook his head. “Never heard of them.”
A slow grin softened the Elder’s panic, and his posture slumped. “Are you hungry, Bertling, thirsty?”
“I’m starving and me throat’s parched. A pint or two of beer would work wonders.”
The Elder lifted the lid of a large saucepan that balanced on a flat metal box. “I’ll make some porridge for you.” He scooped a handful of dry bamboo tips from a sack and tossed them into the pan. Then he added another handful, turned to glance at Bert, and added two more. After filling water and a handful of white powder Bert assumed was salt, he put the lid back on and tapped the side of the metal box with a finger. “Two minutes,” he said.
All the while, the Elder kept one eye on Bert, the other on the pan. “There’s water in the barrel by your right elbow,” he said.
A ladle hung on the barrel with cups of various sizes stacked neatly on a low table by its side. Bert chose the largest and gulped four cupfuls before his tongue came unstuck from the roof of his mouth. The metal box peeped, and when the Elder lifted the saucepan lid, steam belched out.
“Blimey, mate, how did you cook that?” Bert scratched his bald head. He didn’t see any flames beneath the pan or electric wires anywhere.
“It is part of the remnants of our technology, like the translator you wear on your T-shirt, and this cooker, and those doodads. Only a few of us retain the wisdom of how these contrivances work. I am not one of those, so I cannot explain.”
“Got any cream and sugar?” asked Bert as the Elder nudged a bowl of porridge in his direction and edged away again.
“No.”
Bert blew on his spoon and, careful not to burn his tongue, took a nibble. He shuddered and gagged. The porridge was the most disgusting he’d tasted in his life: earthy, woody, like mild water chestnuts but with a bitter tang. “Blimey, mate, you’ve got to be joking. Ain’t you got nothing else?”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no? Is this all you eat?”
“Yes.”
“No wonder you’re all so small. Sorry, but I can’t eat this.”
Terror filled the Elder’s face. “You’re just like the Guardians. You crave meat. You prefer to eat us.”
“No,” said Bert, and hurriedly spooned porridge into his gob, his cheeks blowing out like balloons. “Look, I’m eating this yummy stuff.” He found it almost impossible to swallow and spat globs of the creamy sludge as he spoke, but he kept spooning it in. “Mmm! lovely.”
Bert stopped eating, set the bowl by his side, pinched his nose, and swallowed. He grimaced and coughed, then smiled and smacked his lips. The Elder watched him closely. It pained Bert to see the little man so frightened. “Look, I ain’t going to eat you. Not any of you. It’s true I eat meat where I come from, but they’re only farm animals.”
“To the Guardians, we are only farm animals.”
There it was again, a reference to the Guardians. “What do you mean? Who are these Guardians?”
A new wave of terror made the Elder shake. “The evilest monsters in the universe. They are from a different planet, and they have an open tunnel like the one you came through. They farm us and eat us.”
“Can’t you close the tunnel?”
“We could, easily, but they guard the doodad.”
“Where?”
“On a tower they erected on a hill near to here.”
Bert nodded. “The Citadel I could see when I got here?”
“Yes.”
Bert held a palm up to stop the Elder from piling on more misery. “Look, as soon as I’ve finished this delicious porridge I’ll pop back to me own planet and leave you in peace.”
“You can never leave.”
It took a moment for Bert’s brain to register what the Elder had said. Even then, he thought he must have heard wrong. “Did you say 'never leave'?”
"Yes."
"Why?"
“Because the Guardians know we have opened a tunnel to another planet: your planet. If they find it, they will invade it.”
A sharp, disgusted snort broke from Bert. “Our people aren’t passive like you lot. If those Guardians come to our world, we’d clobber them good and proper.”
“Perhaps, but their weapon technology is awesome. They have a hand-held ray gun that destroys anything it touches. One sweep would wipe out this entire village.”
Bert raised his eyebrows and gave a glassy stare. “Listen, mate, I can’t live here. I’ll starve to death.”
“My friend,” said the Elder, “I am sorry and will punish the woman who kidnapped you.” He offered a deep sigh. “The day the Guardians discover you they will kill you. But isn’t that better than they follow you back to your planet and kill or enslave your entire population of Berts and Vegans?”
Irritation flared in Bert. Rather than do or say something he might regret, he crawled out of the Elder’s hut on hands and knees. He wanted to go home to Olive, to his Chums the Alsatians, and his horse, Big Foot.
The doodad that opened the tunnel between their planets was in the Elder’s hut. In his younger days, Bert had been thief, good at it too. Someway or another, as sure as his name was Bert, he’d snitch the doodad and transport himself back to Earth. As soon as he was back at number three Flintstone Terrace, all he needed to do was turn the doodad off. End of problem.
The alien woman waited outside. “Don’t be angry,” she said. “Stay here while the Elder dishes out my punishment. Then I’ll take you to my cottage.”
Two minutes later, she was out again, her face ashen. “Come.”
“What’s the punishment?”
“Food rationing for three days. Half measure.”
“That ain’t so bad. You can have my share.”
They trekked through the village of well-spaced bamboo huts and arrived at another stone-built house, not as large as the Elder’s, but cosier. Inside, a small man greeted the woman with a big hug, and tears flowed easily. Bert crouched, but could still feel the ceiling touch his bald head.
“This is the father of my children,” said the alien woman.
“Welcome,” said the alien father. “Are you hungry?”
Unlike the Elder, he appeared unafraid of Bert. For an Ewepitarian he was tall, almost reaching Bert’s belly button. The horny nodes on his forehead were more prominent than the woman’s, and his features hinted at a strong character. There were no chairs big enough for Bert, so he sat cross-legged on the floor, his head on a level with the alien father’s head. “Depends what you 're offering,” he said.
“Bamboo porridge. There is nothing else.”
“Then I ain’t hungry.”
“Sit!” said the alien father.
"I am sitting."
The alien father stared down at the floor, hands clasped. “You are here through no fault of your own.” He reached out to touch Bert, then pulled back as if not worthy. “I owe you an explanation.”
“Too blinking right you do.”
“Many hundreds of years ago, our people dominated Ewepiter in their billions. They drove almost all other species to extinction. Food was short, pollution was high, and our world was dying. We needed to find a new planet to live on, so we built the...” he scratched his head, concentrating, then shrugged, “the doodads.”
“The gadget that makes the tunnel between planets?”
“Yes. When we activate a tunnel, we have no control over where the other end opens. When we pass through, we anchor the other end by placing a doodad there too. Unfortunately, our first and only attempt opened on the Guardian’s planet. They invaded us, confiscated our technology, and farmed us for the meat of our bodies.”
“Why did you come to my planet then?”
“On all Ewepiter, we have just two doodads left. We’ve kept them hidden all these years and never used them. When the Guardians came to our village to round up the young, I ordered the mother of my children to gather all the infants in our village and take them through the tunnel to safety. If lucky, she might have found a planet where we could all escape. This time also, it opened on a hazardous world, and now you are here and can never return.”
“Why not?”
“We closed the tunnel and hid the doodad again.”
“What about the one on my world?”
“Lost forever.”
“What about if you turned the doodad on again at this end?”
“The tunnel would open, but you must never find it and use it, and neither must the Guardians. With the next opening, the Guardians will find it easily and invade your world, and the fate of the Berts will be the same as Ewepitarians. The destiny of your planet is in your hands.”
Cogs swirled in Bert’s brain. “What about if you smash the Guardian’s doodad? The one that opens to their world?”
“That is why we call them Guardians. They guard the doodad in the citadel on the hill. Nobody dares go there.”
“What?”
“I tried to organise a surveillance group once, but everyone said I was mad.”
“So you just let them walk all over you?”
“What else can we do?”
“Fight back.”
Part 15:
In this post: Bert offers a dynamite explosion…
The alien father visibly shook in his boots.
“Why not let me go home and come back with a pile of weapons? We’ll soon stop these pesky Guardians. Then we can all live happily ever after.”
“I’d give anything to be as big and strong as you. Then I wouldn’t be so frightened of them.”
“Does that mean you’ll let me fetch some dynamite and stuff?”
“How can I trust you’ll return?”
That was a good question. But he meant it because it was the right deed to do. If it came to fight, he’d die for his buddies, even new buddies like these kindly little people who ate nothing but repulsive grunge. He had his moral values, too. He’d never allow bullies to lay a finger on children or animals, and he wouldn’t let space invaders continue to ravish this fine world for all the money in China. “If I didn’t come to help you, I’d never forgive myself.”
“No, forget it. It can never be. Our people are not warriors. In our millions of years of evolution, there has never been a war.”
“You were brave enough to go against the Elder’s rules and open a new tunnel to my planet.”
“Yes, and look what trouble I’ve caused. The Guardians are keeping an extra eye on us when all we want is inconspicuous peace.”
“Don’t look so glum, you saved the lives of all your children.”
“No, I didn’t. The guardians will come again, and when they see you, they’ll punish us. Oh, woe is me.”
Just then, a hammering of fists erupted on his door, and the poor man almost fainted.
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by Able Lingo from Pixabay
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 11 - 14…
“Sit!” said the Elder.
“I am sitting,” said Bert.
The Elder’s eyes swivelled this way and that as if wondering how he could squeeze around Bert if he needed to escape. Bert felt sorry for the timid little wise man and offered his friendliest smile.
“You are confused?”
Bert wasn’t sure if it was a statement or a question. “I don’t know where I am if that’s what you mean.”
“You are on a planet called Ewepiter, in a village called Lambdon.”
Careful to keep the smirk on his face, Bert shook his head. “Never heard of them.”
A slow grin softened the Elder’s panic, and his posture slumped. “Are you hungry, Bertling, thirsty?”
“I’m starving and me throat’s parched. A pint or two of beer would work wonders.”
The Elder lifted the lid of a large saucepan that balanced on a flat metal box. “I’ll make some porridge for you.” He scooped a handful of dry bamboo tips from a sack and tossed them into the pan. Then he added another handful, turned to glance at Bert, and added two more. After filling water and a handful of white powder Bert assumed was salt, he put the lid back on and tapped the side of the metal box with a finger. “Two minutes,” he said.
All the while, the Elder kept one eye on Bert, the other on the pan. “There’s water in the barrel by your right elbow,” he said.
A ladle hung on the barrel with cups of various sizes stacked neatly on a low table by its side. Bert chose the largest and gulped four cupfuls before his tongue came unstuck from the roof of his mouth. The metal box peeped, and when the Elder lifted the saucepan lid, steam belched out.
“Blimey, mate, how did you cook that?” Bert scratched his bald head. He didn’t see any flames beneath the pan or electric wires anywhere.
“It is part of the remnants of our technology, like the translator you wear on your T-shirt, and this cooker, and those doodads. Only a few of us retain the wisdom of how these contrivances work. I am not one of those, so I cannot explain.”
“Got any cream and sugar?” asked Bert as the Elder nudged a bowl of porridge in his direction and edged away again.
“No.”
Bert blew on his spoon and, careful not to burn his tongue, took a nibble. He shuddered and gagged. The porridge was the most disgusting he’d tasted in his life: earthy, woody, like mild water chestnuts but with a bitter tang. “Blimey, mate, you’ve got to be joking. Ain’t you got nothing else?”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no? Is this all you eat?”
“Yes.”
“No wonder you’re all so small. Sorry, but I can’t eat this.”
Terror filled the Elder’s face. “You’re just like the Guardians. You crave meat. You prefer to eat us.”
“No,” said Bert, and hurriedly spooned porridge into his gob, his cheeks blowing out like balloons. “Look, I’m eating this yummy stuff.” He found it almost impossible to swallow and spat globs of the creamy sludge as he spoke, but he kept spooning it in. “Mmm! lovely.”
Bert stopped eating, set the bowl by his side, pinched his nose, and swallowed. He grimaced and coughed, then smiled and smacked his lips. The Elder watched him closely. It pained Bert to see the little man so frightened. “Look, I ain’t going to eat you. Not any of you. It’s true I eat meat where I come from, but they’re only farm animals.”
“To the Guardians, we are only farm animals.”
There it was again, a reference to the Guardians. “What do you mean? Who are these Guardians?”
A new wave of terror made the Elder shake. “The evilest monsters in the universe. They are from a different planet, and they have an open tunnel like the one you came through. They farm us and eat us.”
“Can’t you close the tunnel?”
“We could, easily, but they guard the doodad.”
“Where?”
“On a tower they erected on a hill near to here.”
Bert nodded. “The Citadel I could see when I got here?”
“Yes.”
Bert held a palm up to stop the Elder from piling on more misery. “Look, as soon as I’ve finished this delicious porridge I’ll pop back to me own planet and leave you in peace.”
“You can never leave.”
It took a moment for Bert’s brain to register what the Elder had said. Even then, he thought he must have heard wrong. “Did you say 'never leave'?”
"Yes."
"Why?"
“Because the Guardians know we have opened a tunnel to another planet: your planet. If they find it, they will invade it.”
A sharp, disgusted snort broke from Bert. “Our people aren’t passive like you lot. If those Guardians come to our world, we’d clobber them good and proper.”
“Perhaps, but their weapon technology is awesome. They have a hand-held ray gun that destroys anything it touches. One sweep would wipe out this entire village.”
Bert raised his eyebrows and gave a glassy stare. “Listen, mate, I can’t live here. I’ll starve to death.”
“My friend,” said the Elder, “I am sorry and will punish the woman who kidnapped you.” He offered a deep sigh. “The day the Guardians discover you they will kill you. But isn’t that better than they follow you back to your planet and kill or enslave your entire population of Berts and Vegans?”
Irritation flared in Bert. Rather than do or say something he might regret, he crawled out of the Elder’s hut on hands and knees. He wanted to go home to Olive, to his Chums the Alsatians, and his horse, Big Foot.
The doodad that opened the tunnel between their planets was in the Elder’s hut. In his younger days, Bert had been thief, good at it too. Someway or another, as sure as his name was Bert, he’d snitch the doodad and transport himself back to Earth. As soon as he was back at number three Flintstone Terrace, all he needed to do was turn the doodad off. End of problem.
The alien woman waited outside. “Don’t be angry,” she said. “Stay here while the Elder dishes out my punishment. Then I’ll take you to my cottage.”
Two minutes later, she was out again, her face ashen. “Come.”
“What’s the punishment?”
“Food rationing for three days. Half measure.”
“That ain’t so bad. You can have my share.”
They trekked through the village of well-spaced bamboo huts and arrived at another stone-built house, not as large as the Elder’s, but cosier. Inside, a small man greeted the woman with a big hug, and tears flowed easily. Bert crouched, but could still feel the ceiling touch his bald head.
“This is the father of my children,” said the alien woman.
“Welcome,” said the alien father. “Are you hungry?”
Unlike the Elder, he appeared unafraid of Bert. For an Ewepitarian he was tall, almost reaching Bert’s belly button. The horny nodes on his forehead were more prominent than the woman’s, and his features hinted at a strong character. There were no chairs big enough for Bert, so he sat cross-legged on the floor, his head on a level with the alien father’s head. “Depends what you 're offering,” he said.
“Bamboo porridge. There is nothing else.”
“Then I ain’t hungry.”
“Sit!” said the alien father.
"I am sitting."
The alien father stared down at the floor, hands clasped. “You are here through no fault of your own.” He reached out to touch Bert, then pulled back as if not worthy. “I owe you an explanation.”
“Too blinking right you do.”
“Many hundreds of years ago, our people dominated Ewepiter in their billions. They drove almost all other species to extinction. Food was short, pollution was high, and our world was dying. We needed to find a new planet to live on, so we built the...” he scratched his head, concentrating, then shrugged, “the doodads.”
“The gadget that makes the tunnel between planets?”
“Yes. When we activate a tunnel, we have no control over where the other end opens. When we pass through, we anchor the other end by placing a doodad there too. Unfortunately, our first and only attempt opened on the Guardian’s planet. They invaded us, confiscated our technology, and farmed us for the meat of our bodies.”
“Why did you come to my planet then?”
“On all Ewepiter, we have just two doodads left. We’ve kept them hidden all these years and never used them. When the Guardians came to our village to round up the young, I ordered the mother of my children to gather all the infants in our village and take them through the tunnel to safety. If lucky, she might have found a planet where we could all escape. This time also, it opened on a hazardous world, and now you are here and can never return.”
“Why not?”
“We closed the tunnel and hid the doodad again.”
“What about the one on my world?”
“Lost forever.”
“What about if you turned the doodad on again at this end?”
“The tunnel would open, but you must never find it and use it, and neither must the Guardians. With the next opening, the Guardians will find it easily and invade your world, and the fate of the Berts will be the same as Ewepitarians. The destiny of your planet is in your hands.”
Cogs swirled in Bert’s brain. “What about if you smash the Guardian’s doodad? The one that opens to their world?”
“That is why we call them Guardians. They guard the doodad in the citadel on the hill. Nobody dares go there.”
“What?”
“I tried to organise a surveillance group once, but everyone said I was mad.”
“So you just let them walk all over you?”
“What else can we do?”
“Fight back.”
Part 15:
In this post: Bert offers a dynamite explosion…
The alien father visibly shook in his boots.
“Why not let me go home and come back with a pile of weapons? We’ll soon stop these pesky Guardians. Then we can all live happily ever after.”
“I’d give anything to be as big and strong as you. Then I wouldn’t be so frightened of them.”
“Does that mean you’ll let me fetch some dynamite and stuff?”
“How can I trust you’ll return?”
That was a good question. But he meant it because it was the right deed to do. If it came to fight, he’d die for his buddies, even new buddies like these kindly little people who ate nothing but repulsive grunge. He had his moral values, too. He’d never allow bullies to lay a finger on children or animals, and he wouldn’t let space invaders continue to ravish this fine world for all the money in China. “If I didn’t come to help you, I’d never forgive myself.”
“No, forget it. It can never be. Our people are not warriors. In our millions of years of evolution, there has never been a war.”
“You were brave enough to go against the Elder’s rules and open a new tunnel to my planet.”
“Yes, and look what trouble I’ve caused. The Guardians are keeping an extra eye on us when all we want is inconspicuous peace.”
“Don’t look so glum, you saved the lives of all your children.”
“No, I didn’t. The guardians will come again, and when they see you, they’ll punish us. Oh, woe is me.”
Just then, a hammering of fists erupted on his door, and the poor man almost fainted.
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by Able Lingo from Pixabay
May 9, 2021
Sci fi series: Evil Portent
If you like a good chuckle, dim-witted heroes, and larger-than-life villains, then you'll love this fascinating series. On Wednesdays and Sundays, I’m blogging nibble-sized chunks of new ‘
Life in the Clouds
’ stories. You can check in regularly and read them for free, or wait to buy the entire story when published.
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 10 - 13…
Apart from his widespread eyes, the Elder had squished his facial features into a tight knot, making him look like an amazed chipmunk. “What are you?” he asked.
“Me name’s Bert. Pleased to meet you.” He held his hand out and the little man cringed even further into the corner. “I ain’t going to hurt you.” Tired of bending his head, Bert flopped to the floor and leant back on his arms.
The alien woman stepped from behind Bert’s back. When the Elder saw her, his expression flitted between relief, joy, confusion, and anger. “Troublemaker. What have you done?”
“I bring you a Bert. He witnessed the tunnel, so I kidnapped him.”
“Is a Bert safe?”
“The Berts are violent meat-eaters, but I believe this one is peaceful.”
“Why do you keep saying we’re meat eaters,” said Bert. “Some of us are vegans. They only eat leaves and seeds and stuff.”
“I say you are meat eaters,” said the woman, “because your eyes are close together and focused to judge distance. All hunters of meat share that trait. Our eyes move independently of each other. A common trait of all hunted animals, forever on the watch for the hunters.”
“Vegans must be the superior species on your planet,” said the Elder. “Do Vegans have the wide-spread eyes of the hunted?”
Bert shook his head. “No, but they fart a lot.”
“Go then!” said the Elder, his finger jabbing at the woman. “Leave the doodad here. I will talk with this Bert and reprimand you later.”
The woman bowed and hurried away.
“Sit!” said the Elder.
“I am sitting,” said Bert.
The Elder’s eyes swivelled this way and that as if wondering how he could squeeze around Bert if he needed to escape. Bert felt sorry for the timid little wise man and offered his friendliest smile.
“You are confused?”
Bert wasn’t sure if it was a statement or a question. “I don’t know where I am if that’s what you mean.”
“You are on a planet called Ewepiter, in a village called Lambdon.”
Careful to keep the smirk on his face, Bert shook his head. “Never heard of them.”
A slow grin softened the Elder’s panic, and his posture slumped. “Are you hungry, Bertling, thirsty?”
“I’m starving and me throat’s parched. A pint or two of beer would work wonders.”
The Elder lifted the lid of a large saucepan that balanced on a flat metal box. “I’ll make some porridge for you.” He scooped a handful of dry bamboo tips from a sack and tossed them into the pan. Then he added another handful, turned to glance at Bert, and added two more. After filling water and a handful of white powder Bert assumed was salt, he put the lid back on and tapped the side of the metal box with a finger. “Two minutes,” he said.
All the while, the Elder kept one eye on Bert, the other on the pan. “There’s water in the barrel by your right elbow,” he said.
A ladle hung on the barrel with cups of various sizes stacked neatly on a low table by its side. Bert chose the largest and gulped four cupfuls before his tongue came unstuck from the roof of his mouth. The metal box peeped, and when the Elder lifted the saucepan lid, steam belched out.
“Blimey, mate, how did you cook that?” Bert scratched his bald head. He didn’t see any flames beneath the pan or electric wires anywhere.
“It is part of the remnants of our technology, like the translator you wear on your T-shirt, and this cooker, and those doodads. Only a few of us retain the wisdom of how these contrivances work. I am not one of those, so I cannot explain.”
“Got any cream and sugar?” asked Bert as the Elder nudged a bowl of porridge in his direction and edged away again.
“No.”
Bert blew on his spoon and, careful not to burn his tongue, took a nibble. He shuddered and gagged. The porridge was the most disgusting he’d tasted in his life: earthy, woody, like mild water chestnuts but with a bitter tang. “Blimey, mate, you’ve got to be joking. Ain’t you got nothing else?”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no? Is this all you eat?”
“Yes.”
“No wonder you’re all so small. Sorry, but I can’t eat this.”
Terror filled the Elder’s face. “You’re just like the Guardians. You crave meat. You prefer to eat us.”
“No,” said Bert, and hurriedly spooned porridge into his gob. “Look, I’m eating this yummy stuff.” He found it almost impossible to swallow and spat globs of the creamy sludge as he spoke, but he kept spooning it in. “Mmm! lovely.”
Bert stopped eating, set the bowl by his side, pinched his nose, and swallowed. He grimaced and coughed, then smiled and smacked his lips. The Elder watched him closely. It pained Bert to see the little man so frightened. “Look, I ain’t going to eat you. Not any of you. It’s true I eat meat where I come from, but they’re only farm animals.”
“To the Guardians, we are only farm animals.”
There it was again, a reference to the Guardians. “What do you mean? Who are these Guardians?”
A new wave of terror made the Elder shake. “The evilest monsters in the universe. They are from a different planet, and they have an open tunnel like the one you came through. They farm us and eat us.”
“Can’t you close the tunnel?”
“We could, easily, but they guard the doodad.”
“Where?”
“On a tower they erected on a hill near to here.”
Bert nodded. “The Citadel I could see when I got here?”
“Yes.”
Bert held a palm up to stop the Elder from piling on more misery. “Look, as soon as I’ve finished this delicious porridge I’ll pop back to me own planet and leave you in peace.”
“You can never leave.”
It took a moment for Bert’s brain to register what the Elder had said. Even then, he thought he must have heard wrong. “Did you say 'never leave'?”
"Yes."
"Why?"
“Because the Guardians know we have opened a tunnel to another planet: your planet. If they find it, they will invade it.”
A sharp, disgusted snort broke from Bert. “Our people aren’t passive like you lot. If those Guardians come to our world, we’d clobber them good and proper.”
“Perhaps, but their weapon technology is awesome. They have a hand-held ray gun that destroys anything it touches. One sweep would wipe out this entire village.”
Bert raised his eyebrows and gave a glassy stare. “Listen, mate, I can’t live here. I’ll starve to death.”
“My friend,” said the Elder, “I am sorry and will punish the woman who kidnapped you.” He offered a deep sigh and troubled expression. “The day the Guardians discover you they will kill you, but isn’t that better than they follow you back to your planet and kill or enslave your entire population of Berts and Vegans?”
Irritation flared in Bert. Rather than do or say something he might regret, he crawled out of the Elder’s hut on hands and knees. He wanted to go home to Olive, to his Chums the Alsatians, and his horse, Big Foot.
The doodad that opened the tunnel between their planets was in the Elder’s hut. In his younger days, Bert had been thief, good at it too. Someway or another, as sure as his name was Bert, he’d snitch the doodad and transport himself back to Earth.
The alien woman waited outside. “Don’t be angry,” she said. “Stay here while the Elder dishes out my punishment. Then I’ll take you to my cottage.”
Two minutes later, she was out again, her face ashen. “Come.”
“What’s the punishment?”
“Food rationing for three days. Half measure.”
“That ain’t so bad. You can have my share.”
They trekked through the village of well-spaced bamboo huts and arrived at another stone-built house, not as large as the Elder’s, but cosier. Inside, a small man greeted the woman with a big hug, and tears flowed easily. Bert crouched, but could still feel the ceiling touch his bald head.
“This is the father of my children,” said the alien woman.
“Welcome,” said the alien father. “Are you hungry?”
Unlike the Elder, he appeared unafraid of Bert. For an Ewepitarian he was tall, almost reaching Bert’s belly button. The horny nodes on his forehead were more prominent than the woman’s, and his features hinted at a strong character. There were no chairs big enough for Bert, so he sat cross-legged on the floor, his head on a level with the alien father’s head. “Depends what you 're offering,” he said.
“Bamboo porridge. There is nothing else.”
“Then I ain’t hungry.”
“Sit!” said the alien father.
"I am sitting."
The alien father stared down at the floor, hands clasped. “You are here through no fault of your own.” He reached out to touch Bert, then pulled back as if not worthy. “I owe you an explanation.”
“Too blinking right you do.”
Part 14:
In this post: The destiny of our planet is in other's hands…
“Many hundreds of years ago, our people dominated Ewepiter in their billions. They drove almost all other species to extinction. Food was short, pollution was high, and our world was dying. We needed to find a new planet to live on, so we built the...” he scratched his head, concentrating, then shrugged, “the doodad.”
“The gadget that makes the tunnel?”
“Yes. When we activate a tunnel, we have no control over where the other end opens. When we pass through, we anchor the other end by placing a doodad there too. Unfortunately, our first and only attempt opened on the Guardian’s planet. They invaded us, confiscated our technology, and farmed us for the meat of our bodies.”
“Why did you come to my planet then?”
“On all Ewepiter, we have just one doodad left. We’ve kept it hidden all these years and never used it. When the Guardians came to our village to round up the young, I ordered the mother of my children to gather all the infants in our village and take them through the tunnel to safety. If lucky, she might have found a planet where we could all escape. This time also, it opened on a hazardous world, and now you are here and can never return.”
“Why not?”
“We closed the tunnel and hid the doodad again.”
“What about the one on my world?”
“Lost forever.”
“What about if you turned the doodad on again at this end?”
“The tunnel would open, but you must never find it and use it, and neither must the Guardians. With the next opening, the Guardians will find it easily and invade your world, and the fate of the Berts will be the same as Ewepitarians. The destiny of your planet is in our hands.”
Cogs swirled in Bert’s brain. “What about if you smash the Guardian’s doodad? The one that opens to their world?”
“That is why we call them Guardians. They guard the doodad in the citadel on the hill. Nobody dares go there.”
“What?”
“I tried to organise a surveillance group once, but everyone said I was mad.”
“So you just let them walk all over you?”
“What else can we do?”
“Fight back.”
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by Anja□#helpinghands #solidarity#stays healthy□ from Pixabay
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 10 - 13…
Apart from his widespread eyes, the Elder had squished his facial features into a tight knot, making him look like an amazed chipmunk. “What are you?” he asked.
“Me name’s Bert. Pleased to meet you.” He held his hand out and the little man cringed even further into the corner. “I ain’t going to hurt you.” Tired of bending his head, Bert flopped to the floor and leant back on his arms.
The alien woman stepped from behind Bert’s back. When the Elder saw her, his expression flitted between relief, joy, confusion, and anger. “Troublemaker. What have you done?”
“I bring you a Bert. He witnessed the tunnel, so I kidnapped him.”
“Is a Bert safe?”
“The Berts are violent meat-eaters, but I believe this one is peaceful.”
“Why do you keep saying we’re meat eaters,” said Bert. “Some of us are vegans. They only eat leaves and seeds and stuff.”
“I say you are meat eaters,” said the woman, “because your eyes are close together and focused to judge distance. All hunters of meat share that trait. Our eyes move independently of each other. A common trait of all hunted animals, forever on the watch for the hunters.”
“Vegans must be the superior species on your planet,” said the Elder. “Do Vegans have the wide-spread eyes of the hunted?”
Bert shook his head. “No, but they fart a lot.”
“Go then!” said the Elder, his finger jabbing at the woman. “Leave the doodad here. I will talk with this Bert and reprimand you later.”
The woman bowed and hurried away.
“Sit!” said the Elder.
“I am sitting,” said Bert.
The Elder’s eyes swivelled this way and that as if wondering how he could squeeze around Bert if he needed to escape. Bert felt sorry for the timid little wise man and offered his friendliest smile.
“You are confused?”
Bert wasn’t sure if it was a statement or a question. “I don’t know where I am if that’s what you mean.”
“You are on a planet called Ewepiter, in a village called Lambdon.”
Careful to keep the smirk on his face, Bert shook his head. “Never heard of them.”
A slow grin softened the Elder’s panic, and his posture slumped. “Are you hungry, Bertling, thirsty?”
“I’m starving and me throat’s parched. A pint or two of beer would work wonders.”
The Elder lifted the lid of a large saucepan that balanced on a flat metal box. “I’ll make some porridge for you.” He scooped a handful of dry bamboo tips from a sack and tossed them into the pan. Then he added another handful, turned to glance at Bert, and added two more. After filling water and a handful of white powder Bert assumed was salt, he put the lid back on and tapped the side of the metal box with a finger. “Two minutes,” he said.
All the while, the Elder kept one eye on Bert, the other on the pan. “There’s water in the barrel by your right elbow,” he said.
A ladle hung on the barrel with cups of various sizes stacked neatly on a low table by its side. Bert chose the largest and gulped four cupfuls before his tongue came unstuck from the roof of his mouth. The metal box peeped, and when the Elder lifted the saucepan lid, steam belched out.
“Blimey, mate, how did you cook that?” Bert scratched his bald head. He didn’t see any flames beneath the pan or electric wires anywhere.
“It is part of the remnants of our technology, like the translator you wear on your T-shirt, and this cooker, and those doodads. Only a few of us retain the wisdom of how these contrivances work. I am not one of those, so I cannot explain.”
“Got any cream and sugar?” asked Bert as the Elder nudged a bowl of porridge in his direction and edged away again.
“No.”
Bert blew on his spoon and, careful not to burn his tongue, took a nibble. He shuddered and gagged. The porridge was the most disgusting he’d tasted in his life: earthy, woody, like mild water chestnuts but with a bitter tang. “Blimey, mate, you’ve got to be joking. Ain’t you got nothing else?”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no? Is this all you eat?”
“Yes.”
“No wonder you’re all so small. Sorry, but I can’t eat this.”
Terror filled the Elder’s face. “You’re just like the Guardians. You crave meat. You prefer to eat us.”
“No,” said Bert, and hurriedly spooned porridge into his gob. “Look, I’m eating this yummy stuff.” He found it almost impossible to swallow and spat globs of the creamy sludge as he spoke, but he kept spooning it in. “Mmm! lovely.”
Bert stopped eating, set the bowl by his side, pinched his nose, and swallowed. He grimaced and coughed, then smiled and smacked his lips. The Elder watched him closely. It pained Bert to see the little man so frightened. “Look, I ain’t going to eat you. Not any of you. It’s true I eat meat where I come from, but they’re only farm animals.”
“To the Guardians, we are only farm animals.”
There it was again, a reference to the Guardians. “What do you mean? Who are these Guardians?”
A new wave of terror made the Elder shake. “The evilest monsters in the universe. They are from a different planet, and they have an open tunnel like the one you came through. They farm us and eat us.”
“Can’t you close the tunnel?”
“We could, easily, but they guard the doodad.”
“Where?”
“On a tower they erected on a hill near to here.”
Bert nodded. “The Citadel I could see when I got here?”
“Yes.”
Bert held a palm up to stop the Elder from piling on more misery. “Look, as soon as I’ve finished this delicious porridge I’ll pop back to me own planet and leave you in peace.”
“You can never leave.”
It took a moment for Bert’s brain to register what the Elder had said. Even then, he thought he must have heard wrong. “Did you say 'never leave'?”
"Yes."
"Why?"
“Because the Guardians know we have opened a tunnel to another planet: your planet. If they find it, they will invade it.”
A sharp, disgusted snort broke from Bert. “Our people aren’t passive like you lot. If those Guardians come to our world, we’d clobber them good and proper.”
“Perhaps, but their weapon technology is awesome. They have a hand-held ray gun that destroys anything it touches. One sweep would wipe out this entire village.”
Bert raised his eyebrows and gave a glassy stare. “Listen, mate, I can’t live here. I’ll starve to death.”
“My friend,” said the Elder, “I am sorry and will punish the woman who kidnapped you.” He offered a deep sigh and troubled expression. “The day the Guardians discover you they will kill you, but isn’t that better than they follow you back to your planet and kill or enslave your entire population of Berts and Vegans?”
Irritation flared in Bert. Rather than do or say something he might regret, he crawled out of the Elder’s hut on hands and knees. He wanted to go home to Olive, to his Chums the Alsatians, and his horse, Big Foot.
The doodad that opened the tunnel between their planets was in the Elder’s hut. In his younger days, Bert had been thief, good at it too. Someway or another, as sure as his name was Bert, he’d snitch the doodad and transport himself back to Earth.
The alien woman waited outside. “Don’t be angry,” she said. “Stay here while the Elder dishes out my punishment. Then I’ll take you to my cottage.”
Two minutes later, she was out again, her face ashen. “Come.”
“What’s the punishment?”
“Food rationing for three days. Half measure.”
“That ain’t so bad. You can have my share.”
They trekked through the village of well-spaced bamboo huts and arrived at another stone-built house, not as large as the Elder’s, but cosier. Inside, a small man greeted the woman with a big hug, and tears flowed easily. Bert crouched, but could still feel the ceiling touch his bald head.
“This is the father of my children,” said the alien woman.
“Welcome,” said the alien father. “Are you hungry?”
Unlike the Elder, he appeared unafraid of Bert. For an Ewepitarian he was tall, almost reaching Bert’s belly button. The horny nodes on his forehead were more prominent than the woman’s, and his features hinted at a strong character. There were no chairs big enough for Bert, so he sat cross-legged on the floor, his head on a level with the alien father’s head. “Depends what you 're offering,” he said.
“Bamboo porridge. There is nothing else.”
“Then I ain’t hungry.”
“Sit!” said the alien father.
"I am sitting."
The alien father stared down at the floor, hands clasped. “You are here through no fault of your own.” He reached out to touch Bert, then pulled back as if not worthy. “I owe you an explanation.”
“Too blinking right you do.”
Part 14:
In this post: The destiny of our planet is in other's hands…
“Many hundreds of years ago, our people dominated Ewepiter in their billions. They drove almost all other species to extinction. Food was short, pollution was high, and our world was dying. We needed to find a new planet to live on, so we built the...” he scratched his head, concentrating, then shrugged, “the doodad.”
“The gadget that makes the tunnel?”
“Yes. When we activate a tunnel, we have no control over where the other end opens. When we pass through, we anchor the other end by placing a doodad there too. Unfortunately, our first and only attempt opened on the Guardian’s planet. They invaded us, confiscated our technology, and farmed us for the meat of our bodies.”
“Why did you come to my planet then?”
“On all Ewepiter, we have just one doodad left. We’ve kept it hidden all these years and never used it. When the Guardians came to our village to round up the young, I ordered the mother of my children to gather all the infants in our village and take them through the tunnel to safety. If lucky, she might have found a planet where we could all escape. This time also, it opened on a hazardous world, and now you are here and can never return.”
“Why not?”
“We closed the tunnel and hid the doodad again.”
“What about the one on my world?”
“Lost forever.”
“What about if you turned the doodad on again at this end?”
“The tunnel would open, but you must never find it and use it, and neither must the Guardians. With the next opening, the Guardians will find it easily and invade your world, and the fate of the Berts will be the same as Ewepitarians. The destiny of your planet is in our hands.”
Cogs swirled in Bert’s brain. “What about if you smash the Guardian’s doodad? The one that opens to their world?”
“That is why we call them Guardians. They guard the doodad in the citadel on the hill. Nobody dares go there.”
“What?”
“I tried to organise a surveillance group once, but everyone said I was mad.”
“So you just let them walk all over you?”
“What else can we do?”
“Fight back.”
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by Anja□#helpinghands #solidarity#stays healthy□ from Pixabay
May 5, 2021
Sci fi series: Evil Portent
If you like a good chuckle, dim-witted heroes, and larger-than-life villains, then you'll love this fascinating series. On Wednesdays and Sundays, I’m blogging nibble-sized chunks of new ‘
Life in the Clouds
’ stories. You can check in regularly and read them for free, or wait to buy the entire story when published.
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 09 - 12…
Bert noticed his palms sweated and wiped them on his T-shirt. “Where the heck are we?”
The woman’s two eyes swivelled in all directions, as if uneasy. “I think we’re safe for the moment.”
“Yeah, that’s good, but where are we?”
“I must take you to the Elder’s house. He’ll explain everything.” Without further word, the woman bent to pick up a doodad similar to the one they'd left behind and set off down the hill, heading for the village on her dumpy little legs.
Bert tagged along beside her, taking advantage of the sluggish pace to absorb his new surroundings. Temple bells chimed through the mystic, potent sunlight; frogs croaked in muddy ditches; dwarf-sized women came from the fields, with a song on their thin red lips and wicker baskets laden with bamboo tips on their heads.
They glared at Bert as if he were a monster, taking a wide berth or darting into their hovels.
The villagers had built most of their huts from thick bamboo canes. There were no vehicles and only hard-packed dirt paths. It reminded him of pictures he’d seen of undiscovered tribes in South America’s rain forests, except here it looked as though they’d cleared most of the forest to cultivate fields of bamboo.
A handful of stone-built constructions, twice as large as the huts, were sprinkled haphazardly throughout the village. They headed for one of these.
Bert ducked inside and wiped his feet on a mat made of fibres. Doors and windows were simple open gaps with cloth hanging across the doors. Bamboo shutters in the windows did little to keep the sun out. After the sweltering heat outdoors, the cool cave-like room made Bert shove his hands in his pockets.
A little prune of a man sat cross-legged on the dirt floor. When he caught sight of Bert, squeezing through the door and standing with his head and shoulders bent beneath the low ceiling, he leapt effortlessly to his feet and backed into a corner.
Apart from his widespread eyes, the Elder had squished his facial features into a tight knot, making him look like an amazed chipmunk. “What are you?” he asked.
“Me name’s Bert. Pleased to meet you.” He held his hand out and the little man cringed even further into the corner. “I ain’t going to hurt you.” Tired of bending his head, Bert flopped to the floor and leant back on his arms.
The alien woman stepped from behind Bert’s back. When the Elder saw her, his expression flitted between relief, joy, confusion, and anger. “Troublemaker. What have you done?”
“I bring you a Bert. He witnessed the tunnel, so I kidnapped him.”
“Is a Bert safe?”
“The Berts are violent meat-eaters, but I believe this one is peaceful.”
“Why do you keep saying we’re meat eaters,” said Bert. “Some of us are vegans. They only eat leaves and seeds and stuff.”
“I say you are meat eaters,” said the woman, “because your eyes are close together and focused to judge distance. All hunters of meat share that trait. Our eyes move independently of each other. A common trait of all hunted animals, forever on the watch for the hunters.”
“Vegans must be the superior species on your planet,” said the Elder. “Do Vegans have the wide-spread eyes of the hunted?”
Bert shook his head. “No, but they fart a lot.”
“Go then!” said the Elder, his finger jabbing at the woman. “Leave the doodad here. I will talk with this Bert and reprimand you later.”
The woman bowed and hurried away.
“Sit!” said the Elder.
“I am sitting,” said Bert.
The Elder’s eyes swivelled this way and that as if wondering how he could squeeze around Bert if he needed to escape. Bert felt sorry for the timid little wise man and offered his friendliest smile.
“You are confused?”
Bert wasn’t sure if it was a statement or a question. “I don’t know where I am if that’s what you mean.”
“You are on a planet called Ewepiter, in a village called Lambdon.”
Careful to keep the smirk on his face, Bert shook his head. “Never heard of them.”
A slow grin softened the Elder’s panic, and his posture slumped. “Are you hungry, Bertling, thirsty?”
“I’m starving and me throat’s parched. A pint or two of beer would work wonders.”
The Elder lifted the lid of a large saucepan that balanced on a flat metal box. “I’ll make some porridge for you.” He scooped a handful of dry bamboo tips from a sack and tossed them into the pan. Then he added another handful, turned to glance at Bert, and added two more. After filling water and a handful of white powder Bert assumed was salt, he put the lid back on and tapped the side of the metal box with a finger. “Two minutes,” he said.
All the while, the Elder kept one eye on Bert, the other on the pan. “There’s water in the barrel by your right elbow,” he said.
A ladle hung on the barrel with cups of various sizes stacked neatly on a low table by its side. Bert chose the largest and gulped four cupfuls before his tongue came unstuck from the roof of his mouth. The metal box peeped, and when the Elder lifted the saucepan lid, steam belched out.
“Blimey, mate, how did you cook that?” Bert scratched his bald head. He didn’t see any flames beneath the pan or electric wires anywhere.
“It is part of the remnants of our technology, like the translator you wear on your T-shirt, and this cooker, and those doodads. Only a few of us retain the wisdom of how these contrivances work. I am not one of those, so I cannot explain.”
“Got any cream and sugar?” asked Bert as the Elder nudged a bowl of porridge in his direction and edged away again.
“No.”
Bert blew on his spoon and, careful not to burn his tongue, took a nibble. He shuddered and gagged. The porridge was the most disgusting he’d tasted in his life: earthy, woody, like mild water chestnuts but with a bitter tang. “Blimey, mate, you’ve got to be joking. Ain’t you got nothing else?”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no? Is this all you eat?”
“Yes.”
“No wonder you’re all so small. Sorry, but I can’t eat this.”
Terror filled the Elder’s face. “You’re just like the Guardians. You crave meat. You prefer to eat us.”
“No,” said Bert, and hurriedly spooned porridge into his gob. “Look, I’m eating this yummy stuff.” He found it almost impossible to swallow and spat globs of the creamy sludge as he spoke, but he kept spooning it in. “Mmm! lovely.”
Bert stopped eating, set the bowl by his side, pinched his nose, and swallowed. He grimaced and coughed, then smiled and smacked his lips. The Elder watched him closely. It pained Bert to see the little man so frightened. “Look, I ain’t going to eat you. Not any of you. It’s true I eat meat where I come from, but they’re only farm animals.”
“To the Guardians, we are only farm animals.”
There it was again, a reference to the Guardians. “What do you mean? Who are these Guardians?”
A new wave of terror made the Elder shake. “The evilest monsters in the universe. They are from a different planet, and they have an open tunnel like the one you came through. They farm us and eat us.”
“Can’t you close the tunnel?”
“We could, easily, but they guard the doodad.”
“Where?”
“On a tower they erected on a hill near to here.”
Bert nodded. “The Citadel I could see when I got here?”
“Yes.”
Bert showed a palm up to stop the Elder from piling on more misery. “Look, as soon as I’ve finished this delicious porridge I’ll pop back to me own planet and leave you in peace.”
“You can never leave.”
It took a moment for Bert’s brain to register what the Elder had said. Even then, he thought he must have heard wrong. “Did you say 'never leave'?”
"Yes."
"Why?"
“Because the Guardians know we have opened another tunnel and they are looking for it. If they find it, they will invade your planet.”
A sharp, disgusted snort broke from Bert. “Our people aren’t passive like you lot. If those Guardians come to our world, we’d clobber them good and proper.”
“Perhaps, but their weapon technology is awesome. They have a hand-held ray gun that destroys anything it touches. One sweep would wipe out this entire village.”
Bert raised his eyebrows and gave a glassy stare. “Listen, mate, I can’t live here. I’ll starve to death.”
“My friend,” said the Elder, “I am sorry and will punish the woman who kidnapped you.” He offered a deep sigh and troubled expression. “The day the Guardians discover you they will kill you, but isn’t that better than they follow you back to your planet and kill or enslave your entire population of Berts and Vegans?”
Part 13:
In this post: Bert is shown to a cosy family cottage…
Irritation flared in Bert. Rather than do or say something he might later regret, he crawled out of the Elder’s hut on hands and knees. He wanted to go home to Olive, to his Chums the Alsatians, and his horse, Big Foot. The doodad that carried him here was in the Elder’s hut. Someway or another, he’d snitch it and transport himself back to Earth.
The alien woman waited outside. “Don’t be angry,” she said. “Stay here while the Elder dishes out my punishment. Then I’ll take you to my cottage.”
Two minutes later, she was out again, her face ashen. “Come.”
“What’s the punishment?”
“Food rationing for three days. Half measure.”
“That ain’t so bad. You can have my share.”
They trekked through the village of well-spaced bamboo huts and arrived at another stone-built house, not as large as the Elder’s, but cosier. Inside, a small man greeted the woman with a big hug, and tears flowed easily. Bert crouched, but could still feel the ceiling touch his bald head.
“This is the father of my children,” said the alien woman.
“Welcome,” said the alien father. “Are you hungry?”
Unlike the Elder, he appeared unafraid of Bert. For an Ewepitarian he was tall, almost reaching Bert’s belly button. The horny nodes on his forehead were more prominent than the woman’s, and his features hinted at a strong character. There were no chairs big enough for Bert, so he sat cross-legged on the floor, his head on a level with the alien father’s head. “Depends what you 're offering,” he said.
“Bamboo porridge. There is nothing else.”
“Then I ain’t hungry.”
“Sit!” said the alien father.
"I am sitting."
The alien father stared down at the floor, hands clasped. “You are here through no fault of your own.” He reached out to touch Bert, then pulled back as if not worthy. “I owe you an explanation.”
“Too blinking right you do.”
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-.
Image by Clker-Free-Vector-Images from Pixabay
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 09 - 12…
Bert noticed his palms sweated and wiped them on his T-shirt. “Where the heck are we?”
The woman’s two eyes swivelled in all directions, as if uneasy. “I think we’re safe for the moment.”
“Yeah, that’s good, but where are we?”
“I must take you to the Elder’s house. He’ll explain everything.” Without further word, the woman bent to pick up a doodad similar to the one they'd left behind and set off down the hill, heading for the village on her dumpy little legs.
Bert tagged along beside her, taking advantage of the sluggish pace to absorb his new surroundings. Temple bells chimed through the mystic, potent sunlight; frogs croaked in muddy ditches; dwarf-sized women came from the fields, with a song on their thin red lips and wicker baskets laden with bamboo tips on their heads.
They glared at Bert as if he were a monster, taking a wide berth or darting into their hovels.
The villagers had built most of their huts from thick bamboo canes. There were no vehicles and only hard-packed dirt paths. It reminded him of pictures he’d seen of undiscovered tribes in South America’s rain forests, except here it looked as though they’d cleared most of the forest to cultivate fields of bamboo.
A handful of stone-built constructions, twice as large as the huts, were sprinkled haphazardly throughout the village. They headed for one of these.
Bert ducked inside and wiped his feet on a mat made of fibres. Doors and windows were simple open gaps with cloth hanging across the doors. Bamboo shutters in the windows did little to keep the sun out. After the sweltering heat outdoors, the cool cave-like room made Bert shove his hands in his pockets.
A little prune of a man sat cross-legged on the dirt floor. When he caught sight of Bert, squeezing through the door and standing with his head and shoulders bent beneath the low ceiling, he leapt effortlessly to his feet and backed into a corner.
Apart from his widespread eyes, the Elder had squished his facial features into a tight knot, making him look like an amazed chipmunk. “What are you?” he asked.
“Me name’s Bert. Pleased to meet you.” He held his hand out and the little man cringed even further into the corner. “I ain’t going to hurt you.” Tired of bending his head, Bert flopped to the floor and leant back on his arms.
The alien woman stepped from behind Bert’s back. When the Elder saw her, his expression flitted between relief, joy, confusion, and anger. “Troublemaker. What have you done?”
“I bring you a Bert. He witnessed the tunnel, so I kidnapped him.”
“Is a Bert safe?”
“The Berts are violent meat-eaters, but I believe this one is peaceful.”
“Why do you keep saying we’re meat eaters,” said Bert. “Some of us are vegans. They only eat leaves and seeds and stuff.”
“I say you are meat eaters,” said the woman, “because your eyes are close together and focused to judge distance. All hunters of meat share that trait. Our eyes move independently of each other. A common trait of all hunted animals, forever on the watch for the hunters.”
“Vegans must be the superior species on your planet,” said the Elder. “Do Vegans have the wide-spread eyes of the hunted?”
Bert shook his head. “No, but they fart a lot.”
“Go then!” said the Elder, his finger jabbing at the woman. “Leave the doodad here. I will talk with this Bert and reprimand you later.”
The woman bowed and hurried away.
“Sit!” said the Elder.
“I am sitting,” said Bert.
The Elder’s eyes swivelled this way and that as if wondering how he could squeeze around Bert if he needed to escape. Bert felt sorry for the timid little wise man and offered his friendliest smile.
“You are confused?”
Bert wasn’t sure if it was a statement or a question. “I don’t know where I am if that’s what you mean.”
“You are on a planet called Ewepiter, in a village called Lambdon.”
Careful to keep the smirk on his face, Bert shook his head. “Never heard of them.”
A slow grin softened the Elder’s panic, and his posture slumped. “Are you hungry, Bertling, thirsty?”
“I’m starving and me throat’s parched. A pint or two of beer would work wonders.”
The Elder lifted the lid of a large saucepan that balanced on a flat metal box. “I’ll make some porridge for you.” He scooped a handful of dry bamboo tips from a sack and tossed them into the pan. Then he added another handful, turned to glance at Bert, and added two more. After filling water and a handful of white powder Bert assumed was salt, he put the lid back on and tapped the side of the metal box with a finger. “Two minutes,” he said.
All the while, the Elder kept one eye on Bert, the other on the pan. “There’s water in the barrel by your right elbow,” he said.
A ladle hung on the barrel with cups of various sizes stacked neatly on a low table by its side. Bert chose the largest and gulped four cupfuls before his tongue came unstuck from the roof of his mouth. The metal box peeped, and when the Elder lifted the saucepan lid, steam belched out.
“Blimey, mate, how did you cook that?” Bert scratched his bald head. He didn’t see any flames beneath the pan or electric wires anywhere.
“It is part of the remnants of our technology, like the translator you wear on your T-shirt, and this cooker, and those doodads. Only a few of us retain the wisdom of how these contrivances work. I am not one of those, so I cannot explain.”
“Got any cream and sugar?” asked Bert as the Elder nudged a bowl of porridge in his direction and edged away again.
“No.”
Bert blew on his spoon and, careful not to burn his tongue, took a nibble. He shuddered and gagged. The porridge was the most disgusting he’d tasted in his life: earthy, woody, like mild water chestnuts but with a bitter tang. “Blimey, mate, you’ve got to be joking. Ain’t you got nothing else?”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no? Is this all you eat?”
“Yes.”
“No wonder you’re all so small. Sorry, but I can’t eat this.”
Terror filled the Elder’s face. “You’re just like the Guardians. You crave meat. You prefer to eat us.”
“No,” said Bert, and hurriedly spooned porridge into his gob. “Look, I’m eating this yummy stuff.” He found it almost impossible to swallow and spat globs of the creamy sludge as he spoke, but he kept spooning it in. “Mmm! lovely.”
Bert stopped eating, set the bowl by his side, pinched his nose, and swallowed. He grimaced and coughed, then smiled and smacked his lips. The Elder watched him closely. It pained Bert to see the little man so frightened. “Look, I ain’t going to eat you. Not any of you. It’s true I eat meat where I come from, but they’re only farm animals.”
“To the Guardians, we are only farm animals.”
There it was again, a reference to the Guardians. “What do you mean? Who are these Guardians?”
A new wave of terror made the Elder shake. “The evilest monsters in the universe. They are from a different planet, and they have an open tunnel like the one you came through. They farm us and eat us.”
“Can’t you close the tunnel?”
“We could, easily, but they guard the doodad.”
“Where?”
“On a tower they erected on a hill near to here.”
Bert nodded. “The Citadel I could see when I got here?”
“Yes.”
Bert showed a palm up to stop the Elder from piling on more misery. “Look, as soon as I’ve finished this delicious porridge I’ll pop back to me own planet and leave you in peace.”
“You can never leave.”
It took a moment for Bert’s brain to register what the Elder had said. Even then, he thought he must have heard wrong. “Did you say 'never leave'?”
"Yes."
"Why?"
“Because the Guardians know we have opened another tunnel and they are looking for it. If they find it, they will invade your planet.”
A sharp, disgusted snort broke from Bert. “Our people aren’t passive like you lot. If those Guardians come to our world, we’d clobber them good and proper.”
“Perhaps, but their weapon technology is awesome. They have a hand-held ray gun that destroys anything it touches. One sweep would wipe out this entire village.”
Bert raised his eyebrows and gave a glassy stare. “Listen, mate, I can’t live here. I’ll starve to death.”
“My friend,” said the Elder, “I am sorry and will punish the woman who kidnapped you.” He offered a deep sigh and troubled expression. “The day the Guardians discover you they will kill you, but isn’t that better than they follow you back to your planet and kill or enslave your entire population of Berts and Vegans?”
Part 13:
In this post: Bert is shown to a cosy family cottage…
Irritation flared in Bert. Rather than do or say something he might later regret, he crawled out of the Elder’s hut on hands and knees. He wanted to go home to Olive, to his Chums the Alsatians, and his horse, Big Foot. The doodad that carried him here was in the Elder’s hut. Someway or another, he’d snitch it and transport himself back to Earth.
The alien woman waited outside. “Don’t be angry,” she said. “Stay here while the Elder dishes out my punishment. Then I’ll take you to my cottage.”
Two minutes later, she was out again, her face ashen. “Come.”
“What’s the punishment?”
“Food rationing for three days. Half measure.”
“That ain’t so bad. You can have my share.”
They trekked through the village of well-spaced bamboo huts and arrived at another stone-built house, not as large as the Elder’s, but cosier. Inside, a small man greeted the woman with a big hug, and tears flowed easily. Bert crouched, but could still feel the ceiling touch his bald head.
“This is the father of my children,” said the alien woman.
“Welcome,” said the alien father. “Are you hungry?”
Unlike the Elder, he appeared unafraid of Bert. For an Ewepitarian he was tall, almost reaching Bert’s belly button. The horny nodes on his forehead were more prominent than the woman’s, and his features hinted at a strong character. There were no chairs big enough for Bert, so he sat cross-legged on the floor, his head on a level with the alien father’s head. “Depends what you 're offering,” he said.
“Bamboo porridge. There is nothing else.”
“Then I ain’t hungry.”
“Sit!” said the alien father.
"I am sitting."
The alien father stared down at the floor, hands clasped. “You are here through no fault of your own.” He reached out to touch Bert, then pulled back as if not worthy. “I owe you an explanation.”
“Too blinking right you do.”
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-.
Image by Clker-Free-Vector-Images from Pixabay
May 1, 2021
Sci fi series: Evil Portent
If you like a good chuckle, dim-witted heroes, and larger-than-life villains, then you'll love this fascinating series. On Wednesdays and Sundays, I’m blogging nibble-sized chunks of new ‘
Life in the Clouds
’ stories. You can check in regularly and read them for free, or wait to buy the entire story when published.
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 08 - 11…
Ahead of him, Bert saw the woman and her twelve children melt into clouds of powder and the tunnel inhale them. It was the weirdest sensation Bert had ever experienced. The front edge of his bulk crumbled into dust and vanished into the tunnel as if dragged along by a tornado. Instinctively, he held his head back, watching, but in the same instant his vision blurred and a wall of soft foam in his back drove him forward. There was a sharp sting of pain as if blunt needles stabbed every nerve in his body. Before he had time to cry out, his flesh and bones gained substance again, as if he'd just woken from a nightmare and realised all was right with the world.
Except he wasn't lying in bed, but wobbling on his feet on the top of a green hill.
Below the hilltop, a village of flimsy huts and cabins nestled beside a rushing river. In every direction, Bert noted forests and fields of bamboo. A warm breeze, laden with the scent of tobacco, chafed the bamboo's feathery leaves, wavering between rest and motion.
"What's that?" asked Bert, pointing to a distant hill higher than the others. A black tower dominated its summit. It looked alien and out of place.
"Can you see the Citadel from here?"
"Can't you?"
Both the woman's eyes focused in that direction. "No, it is too far away."
"And what's that?" Bert pointed to another construction of grey stone on a ridge on the village's other side."
"That is the abbey where the terror-stricken monks live."
Bert noticed his palms sweated and wiped them on his T-shirt. “Where the heck are we?”
The woman’s two eyes swivelled in all directions, as if uneasy. “I think we’re safe for the moment.”
“Yeah, that’s good, but where are we?”
“I must take you to the Elder’s house. He’ll explain everything.” Without further word, the woman bent to pick up a doodad similar to the one they'd left behind and set off down the hill, heading for the village on her dumpy little legs.
Bert tagged along beside her, taking advantage of the sluggish pace to absorb his new surroundings. Temple bells chimed through the mystic, potent sunlight; frogs croaked in muddy ditches; dwarf-sized women came from the fields, with a song on their thin red lips and wicker baskets laden with bamboo tips on their heads.
They glared at Bert as if he were a monster, taking a wide berth or darting into their hovels.
The villagers had built most of their huts from thick bamboo canes. There were no vehicles and only hard-packed dirt paths. It reminded him of pictures he’d seen of undiscovered tribes in South America’s rain forests, except here it looked as though they’d cleared most of the forest to cultivate fields of bamboo.
A handful of stone-built constructions, twice as large as the huts, were sprinkled haphazardly throughout the village. They headed for one of these.
Bert ducked inside and wiped his feet on a mat made of fibres. Doors and windows were simple open gaps with cloth hanging across the doors. Bamboo shutters in the windows did little to keep the sun out. After the sweltering heat outdoors, the cool cave-like room made Bert shove his hands in his pockets.
A little prune of a man sat cross-legged on the dirt floor. When he caught sight of Bert, squeezing through the door and standing with his head and shoulders bent beneath the low ceiling, he leapt effortlessly to his feet and backed into a corner.
Apart from his widespread eyes, the Elder had squished his facial features into a tight knot, making him look like an amazed chipmunk. “What are you?” he asked.
“Me name’s Bert. Pleased to meet you.” He held his hand out and the little man cringed even further into the corner. “I ain’t going to hurt you.” Tired of bending his head, Bert flopped to the floor and leant back on his arms.
The alien woman stepped from behind Bert’s back. When the Elder saw her, his expression flitted between relief, joy, confusion, and anger. “Troublemaker. What have you done?”
“I bring you a Bert. He witnessed the tunnel, so I kidnapped him.”
“Is a Bert safe?”
“The Berts are violent meat-eaters, but I believe this one is peaceful.”
“Why do you keep saying we’re meat eaters,” said Bert. “Some of us are vegans. They only eat leaves and seeds and stuff.”
“I say you are meat eaters,” said the woman, “because your eyes are close together and focused to judge distance. All hunters of meat share that trait. Our eyes move independently of each other. A common trait of all hunted animals, forever on the watch for the hunters.”
“Vegans must be the superior species on your planet,” said the Elder. “Do Vegans have the wide-spread eyes of the hunted?”
Bert shook his head. “No, but they fart a lot.”
“Go then!” said the Elder, his finger jabbing at the woman. “Leave the doodad here. I will talk with this Bert and reprimand you later.”
The woman bowed and hurried away.
“Sit!” said the Elder.
“I am sitting,” said Bert.
The Elder’s eyes swivelled this way and that as if wondering how he could squeeze around Bert if he needed to escape. Bert felt sorry for the timid little wise man and offered his friendliest smile.
“You are confused?”
Bert wasn’t sure if it was a statement or a question. “I don’t know where I am if that’s what you mean.”
“You are on a planet called Ewepiter, in a village called Lambdon.”
Careful to keep the smirk on his face, Bert shook his head. “Never heard of them.”
A slow grin softened the Elder’s panic, and his posture slumped. “Are you hungry, Bertling, thirsty?”
“I’m starving and me throat’s parched.”
The Elder lifted the lid of a large saucepan that balanced on a flat metal box. “I’ll make some porridge for you.” He scooped a handful of dry bamboo tips from a sack and tossed them into the pan. Then he added another handful, turned to glance at Bert, and added two more. After filling water and a handful of white powder Bert assumed was salt, he put the lid back on and tapped the side of the metal box with a finger. “Two minutes,” he said.
All the while, the Elder kept one eye on Bert, the other on the pan. “There’s water in the barrel by your right elbow,” he said.
A ladle hung on the barrel with cups of various sizes stacked neatly on a low table by its side. Bert chose the largest and gulped four cupfuls before his tongue came unstuck from the roof of his mouth. The metal box peeped, and when the Elder lifted the saucepan lid, steam belched out.
“Blimey, mate, how did you cook that?” Bert scratched his bald head. He didn’t see any flames beneath the pan or electric wires anywhere.
“It is part of the remnants of our technology, like the translator you wear on your T-shirt, and this cooker, and those doodads. Only a few of us retain the wisdom of how these contrivances work. I am not one, so I cannot explain.”
“Got any cream and sugar?” asked Bert as the Elder nudged a bowl of porridge in his direction and edged away again.
“No.”
Bert blew on his spoon and, careful not to burn his tongue, took a nibble. He shuddered and gagged. The porridge was the most disgusting he’d tasted in his life: earthy, woody, like mild water chestnuts but with a bitter tang. “Blimey, mate, you’ve got to be joking. Ain’t you got nothing else?”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no? Is this all you eat?”
“Yes.”
“No wonder you’re all so small. Sorry, but I can’t eat this.”
Terror filled the Elder’s face. “You’re just like the Guardians. You crave meat. You prefer to eat us.”
“No,” said Bert, and hurriedly spooned porridge into his gob. “Look, I’m eating this yummy stuff.” He found it almost impossible to swallow and spat globs of the creamy sludge as he spoke, but he kept spooning it in. “Mmm! lovely.”
Part 12:
In this post: Bert discovers there's no way out…
Bert stopped eating again and set the bowl by his side. It pained him to see the little man so frightened. “Look, I ain’t going to eat you. Not any of you. It’s true I eat meat where I come from, but they’re only farm animals.”
“To the Guardians, we are only farm animals.”
There it was again, a reference to the Guardians. “What do you mean? Who are these Guardians?”
A new wave of terror made the Elder shake. “The evilest monsters in the universe. They are also from another planet, and they have an open tunnel like the one you came through. They farm us and eat us.”
“Can’t you close the tunnel?”
“We could, easily, but they guard the doodad.”
“Where?”
“On a tower they erected on a hill near to here.”
Bert nodded. “The Citadel I could see when I got here?”
“Yes.”
Bert showed a palm up to stop the Elder from piling on more misery. “Look, as soon as I’ve finished this delicious porridge I’ll pop back to me own planet and leave you in peace.”
“You can never leave.”
It took a moment for Bert’s brain to register what the Elder had said. Even then, he thought he must have heard wrong. “Never leave? Why?”
“Because the Guardians know we have opened another tunnel and they are looking for it. If they find it, they will invade your planet.”
A sharp, disgusted snort broke from Bert. “Our people aren’t passive like you lot. If those Guardians come to our world, we’d clobber them good and proper.”
“Perhaps, but their weapon technology is awesome. They have a hand-held ray gun that destroys anything it touches. One sweep would wipe out this entire village.”
Bert raised his eyebrows and gave a glassy stare. “Listen, mate, I can’t live here. I’ll starve to death.”
“My friend,” said the Elder, “I am deeply sorry and will punish the woman who kidnapped you.” He offered a deep sigh and troubled expression. “The day the Guardians discover you they will kill you, but isn’t that better than they follow you back to your planet and kill or enslave your entire population of Berts and Vegans?”
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 08 - 11…
Ahead of him, Bert saw the woman and her twelve children melt into clouds of powder and the tunnel inhale them. It was the weirdest sensation Bert had ever experienced. The front edge of his bulk crumbled into dust and vanished into the tunnel as if dragged along by a tornado. Instinctively, he held his head back, watching, but in the same instant his vision blurred and a wall of soft foam in his back drove him forward. There was a sharp sting of pain as if blunt needles stabbed every nerve in his body. Before he had time to cry out, his flesh and bones gained substance again, as if he'd just woken from a nightmare and realised all was right with the world.
Except he wasn't lying in bed, but wobbling on his feet on the top of a green hill.
Below the hilltop, a village of flimsy huts and cabins nestled beside a rushing river. In every direction, Bert noted forests and fields of bamboo. A warm breeze, laden with the scent of tobacco, chafed the bamboo's feathery leaves, wavering between rest and motion.
"What's that?" asked Bert, pointing to a distant hill higher than the others. A black tower dominated its summit. It looked alien and out of place.
"Can you see the Citadel from here?"
"Can't you?"
Both the woman's eyes focused in that direction. "No, it is too far away."
"And what's that?" Bert pointed to another construction of grey stone on a ridge on the village's other side."
"That is the abbey where the terror-stricken monks live."
Bert noticed his palms sweated and wiped them on his T-shirt. “Where the heck are we?”
The woman’s two eyes swivelled in all directions, as if uneasy. “I think we’re safe for the moment.”
“Yeah, that’s good, but where are we?”
“I must take you to the Elder’s house. He’ll explain everything.” Without further word, the woman bent to pick up a doodad similar to the one they'd left behind and set off down the hill, heading for the village on her dumpy little legs.
Bert tagged along beside her, taking advantage of the sluggish pace to absorb his new surroundings. Temple bells chimed through the mystic, potent sunlight; frogs croaked in muddy ditches; dwarf-sized women came from the fields, with a song on their thin red lips and wicker baskets laden with bamboo tips on their heads.
They glared at Bert as if he were a monster, taking a wide berth or darting into their hovels.
The villagers had built most of their huts from thick bamboo canes. There were no vehicles and only hard-packed dirt paths. It reminded him of pictures he’d seen of undiscovered tribes in South America’s rain forests, except here it looked as though they’d cleared most of the forest to cultivate fields of bamboo.
A handful of stone-built constructions, twice as large as the huts, were sprinkled haphazardly throughout the village. They headed for one of these.
Bert ducked inside and wiped his feet on a mat made of fibres. Doors and windows were simple open gaps with cloth hanging across the doors. Bamboo shutters in the windows did little to keep the sun out. After the sweltering heat outdoors, the cool cave-like room made Bert shove his hands in his pockets.
A little prune of a man sat cross-legged on the dirt floor. When he caught sight of Bert, squeezing through the door and standing with his head and shoulders bent beneath the low ceiling, he leapt effortlessly to his feet and backed into a corner.
Apart from his widespread eyes, the Elder had squished his facial features into a tight knot, making him look like an amazed chipmunk. “What are you?” he asked.
“Me name’s Bert. Pleased to meet you.” He held his hand out and the little man cringed even further into the corner. “I ain’t going to hurt you.” Tired of bending his head, Bert flopped to the floor and leant back on his arms.
The alien woman stepped from behind Bert’s back. When the Elder saw her, his expression flitted between relief, joy, confusion, and anger. “Troublemaker. What have you done?”
“I bring you a Bert. He witnessed the tunnel, so I kidnapped him.”
“Is a Bert safe?”
“The Berts are violent meat-eaters, but I believe this one is peaceful.”
“Why do you keep saying we’re meat eaters,” said Bert. “Some of us are vegans. They only eat leaves and seeds and stuff.”
“I say you are meat eaters,” said the woman, “because your eyes are close together and focused to judge distance. All hunters of meat share that trait. Our eyes move independently of each other. A common trait of all hunted animals, forever on the watch for the hunters.”
“Vegans must be the superior species on your planet,” said the Elder. “Do Vegans have the wide-spread eyes of the hunted?”
Bert shook his head. “No, but they fart a lot.”
“Go then!” said the Elder, his finger jabbing at the woman. “Leave the doodad here. I will talk with this Bert and reprimand you later.”
The woman bowed and hurried away.
“Sit!” said the Elder.
“I am sitting,” said Bert.
The Elder’s eyes swivelled this way and that as if wondering how he could squeeze around Bert if he needed to escape. Bert felt sorry for the timid little wise man and offered his friendliest smile.
“You are confused?”
Bert wasn’t sure if it was a statement or a question. “I don’t know where I am if that’s what you mean.”
“You are on a planet called Ewepiter, in a village called Lambdon.”
Careful to keep the smirk on his face, Bert shook his head. “Never heard of them.”
A slow grin softened the Elder’s panic, and his posture slumped. “Are you hungry, Bertling, thirsty?”
“I’m starving and me throat’s parched.”
The Elder lifted the lid of a large saucepan that balanced on a flat metal box. “I’ll make some porridge for you.” He scooped a handful of dry bamboo tips from a sack and tossed them into the pan. Then he added another handful, turned to glance at Bert, and added two more. After filling water and a handful of white powder Bert assumed was salt, he put the lid back on and tapped the side of the metal box with a finger. “Two minutes,” he said.
All the while, the Elder kept one eye on Bert, the other on the pan. “There’s water in the barrel by your right elbow,” he said.
A ladle hung on the barrel with cups of various sizes stacked neatly on a low table by its side. Bert chose the largest and gulped four cupfuls before his tongue came unstuck from the roof of his mouth. The metal box peeped, and when the Elder lifted the saucepan lid, steam belched out.
“Blimey, mate, how did you cook that?” Bert scratched his bald head. He didn’t see any flames beneath the pan or electric wires anywhere.
“It is part of the remnants of our technology, like the translator you wear on your T-shirt, and this cooker, and those doodads. Only a few of us retain the wisdom of how these contrivances work. I am not one, so I cannot explain.”
“Got any cream and sugar?” asked Bert as the Elder nudged a bowl of porridge in his direction and edged away again.
“No.”
Bert blew on his spoon and, careful not to burn his tongue, took a nibble. He shuddered and gagged. The porridge was the most disgusting he’d tasted in his life: earthy, woody, like mild water chestnuts but with a bitter tang. “Blimey, mate, you’ve got to be joking. Ain’t you got nothing else?”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no? Is this all you eat?”
“Yes.”
“No wonder you’re all so small. Sorry, but I can’t eat this.”
Terror filled the Elder’s face. “You’re just like the Guardians. You crave meat. You prefer to eat us.”
“No,” said Bert, and hurriedly spooned porridge into his gob. “Look, I’m eating this yummy stuff.” He found it almost impossible to swallow and spat globs of the creamy sludge as he spoke, but he kept spooning it in. “Mmm! lovely.”
Part 12:
In this post: Bert discovers there's no way out…
Bert stopped eating again and set the bowl by his side. It pained him to see the little man so frightened. “Look, I ain’t going to eat you. Not any of you. It’s true I eat meat where I come from, but they’re only farm animals.”
“To the Guardians, we are only farm animals.”
There it was again, a reference to the Guardians. “What do you mean? Who are these Guardians?”
A new wave of terror made the Elder shake. “The evilest monsters in the universe. They are also from another planet, and they have an open tunnel like the one you came through. They farm us and eat us.”
“Can’t you close the tunnel?”
“We could, easily, but they guard the doodad.”
“Where?”
“On a tower they erected on a hill near to here.”
Bert nodded. “The Citadel I could see when I got here?”
“Yes.”
Bert showed a palm up to stop the Elder from piling on more misery. “Look, as soon as I’ve finished this delicious porridge I’ll pop back to me own planet and leave you in peace.”
“You can never leave.”
It took a moment for Bert’s brain to register what the Elder had said. Even then, he thought he must have heard wrong. “Never leave? Why?”
“Because the Guardians know we have opened another tunnel and they are looking for it. If they find it, they will invade your planet.”
A sharp, disgusted snort broke from Bert. “Our people aren’t passive like you lot. If those Guardians come to our world, we’d clobber them good and proper.”
“Perhaps, but their weapon technology is awesome. They have a hand-held ray gun that destroys anything it touches. One sweep would wipe out this entire village.”
Bert raised his eyebrows and gave a glassy stare. “Listen, mate, I can’t live here. I’ll starve to death.”
“My friend,” said the Elder, “I am deeply sorry and will punish the woman who kidnapped you.” He offered a deep sigh and troubled expression. “The day the Guardians discover you they will kill you, but isn’t that better than they follow you back to your planet and kill or enslave your entire population of Berts and Vegans?”
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
April 28, 2021
Sci fi series: Evil Portent
If you like a good chuckle, dim-witted heroes, and larger-than-life villains, then you'll love this fascinating series. On Wednesdays and Sundays, I’m blogging nibble-sized chunks of new ‘
Life in the Clouds
’ stories. You can check in regularly and read them for free, or wait to buy the entire story when published.
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 07 - 10…
It occurred to Bert the woman might be a loony, escaped from an asylum somewhere. Time to phone Florence for help; she possessed almost as much gumption as his best friend, Alf. "When did you last eat?" he asked as he plucked his smartphone from his back pocket.
The woman flinched and drew her children to her breast. "Don't shoot," she whimpered. "We're so small, there’s hardly any meat on us."
Bert scratched his head. No doubt. Loony. "This is a phone," he explained, drawing the words out and holding it to his ear to demonstrate. "I'm going to call for help."
A wave of relief washed over the woman’s face, but only enough to give her the courage to speak calmer. "A phone. Can I see it?"
"Yeah. Take a look. It's harmless." He held it at arm's length and the woman snatched it from his hand. "Hey," he said, "Don't do that." But it was too late. She tore the back cover from the phone, ripped out the battery, prodded at its workings with what resembled a crochet hook until her palm contained a jumble of fragments.
"It weren't a gun," said Bert, dejectedly. "You didn't have to ruin it, and if you didn't want me to call for help, all you had to do was to say."
The woman didn't answer. Instead, she sifted through the bits as if hunting for lice. Then she pinched up one black piece, dumped the rest of his ruined phone on the carpet, and picked up the doodad. With the doodad in one hand and the part from his phone in the other, she slipped the part into the doodad. Immediately, the gadget's harsh light stopped throbbing.
All held their breath and stared at the doodad. Pricks of various coloured pinpoint lights danced and ticked. Then it peeped and the purple goo settled into a soft, faint, glow.
With a jubilant cheer, the woman bounced to her feet and clapped her hands. "It works," she said.
"What works?"
"Can't you see? The doodad. We can go home to our own world."
The children danced and pranced with as much boisterousness as a pack of excited Billy Goats.
"Wait and watch," said the woman. Bouncing from foot to foot, eyes gleaming, she placed the gadget back on the floor.
Without warning, the air above it warped, like a heat haze, even though the room was freezing. Looking into the haze was like peering into a fire while daydreaming. Only there were no flames, just the vague impression of a black hole.
Bert stared at the patch of distorted air. It grew larger and more distinct, and he spotted odd translucent shapes eddying within it. A dull pressure made his ears ache, and a drop of sweat slid down the hollow of his throat, leaving a cold track.
The hazy hole had no outer boundary; it simply hung in midair, the entrance to a tunnel leading to an unearthly distance. Every muscle in Bert's body seized, pressure built in his ears, and the hiss of piercing static made his teeth cringe. The tunnel's depth pulsed like a black gulping throat, and the static hiss grew louder, wavering in pitch.
"Come," said the woman, suddenly by his side and tugging on his hand. "Come with us."
"Where?"
"To our world."
Bert, still hypnotised by the tunnel and fascinated by the notion of other worlds, staggered along beside her. They stepped inside, its depths shrinking and widening like the gullet of a black snake.
Ahead of him, he saw the woman and her twelve children melt into clouds of powder and the tunnel inhale them. It was the weirdest sensation Bert had ever experienced. The front edge of his bulk crumbled into dust and vanished into the tunnel as if dragged along by a tornado. Instinctively, he held his head back, watching, but in the same instant his vision blurred and a wall of soft foam in his back drove him forward. There was a sharp sting of pain as if blunt needles stabbed every nerve in his body. Before he had time to cry out, his flesh and bones gained substance again, as if he'd just woken from a nightmare and realised all was right with the world.
Except he wasn't lying in bed, but wobbling on his feet on the top of a green hill.
Below the hilltop, a village of flimsy huts and cabins nestled beside a rushing river. In every direction, Bert noted forests and fields of bamboo. A warm breeze, laden with the scent of tobacco, chafed their feathery leaves, wavering between rest and motion.
"What's that?" asked Bert, pointing to a distant hill higher than the others. A black tower dominated its summit. It looked alien and out of place.
"Can you see the Citadel from here?"
"Can't you?"
Both the woman's eyes focused in that direction. "No, it is too far away."
"And what's that?" Bert pointed to another construction of grey stone on a ridge on the village's other side."
"That is the abbey where the terror-stricken monks live."
“Where are we?” asked Bert.
The woman’s two eyes swivelled in all directions, as if uneasy. “I think we’re safe for the moment.”
“Yeah, that’s good, but where are we?”
“I must take you to the Elder’s house. He’ll explain everything.” Without further word, the woman bent to pick up a doodad similar to the one they'd left behind and set off down the hill, heading for the village on her dumpy little legs.
Bert tagged along beside her, taking advantage of the sluggish pace to absorb his new surroundings. Temple bells chimed through the mystic, potent sunlight; frogs croaked in muddy ditches; dwarf-sized women came from the fields, with a song on their thin red lips and wicker baskets laden with bamboo tips on their heads.
They glared at Bert as if he were a monster, taking a wide berth or darting into their hovels.
The villagers had built most of their huts from thick bamboo canes. There were no vehicles and only hard-packed dirt paths. It reminded him of pictures he’d seen of undiscovered tribes in South America’s rain forests, except here it looked as though they’d cleared most of the forest to cultivate fields of bamboo.
A handful of stone-built constructions, twice as large as the huts, were sprinkled haphazardly throughout the village. They headed for one of these.
Bert ducked inside and wiped his feet on a mat made of fibres. Doors and windows were simple open gaps with cloth hanging across the doors. Bamboo shutters in the windows did little to keep the sun out. After the sweltering heat outdoors, the cool cave-like room made Bert shove his hands in his pockets.
A little prune of a man sat cross-legged on the dirt floor. When he caught sight of Bert, squeezing through the door and standing with his head and shoulders bent beneath the low ceiling, he leapt effortlessly to his feet and backed into a corner.
Apart from his widespread eyes, the Elder had squished his facial features into tight knot, making him look like an amazed chipmunk. “What are you?” he asked.
“Me name’s Bert. Pleased to meet you.” He held his hand out and the little man cringed even further into the corner. “I ain’t going to hurt you.” Tired of bending his head, Bert flopped to the floor and leant back on his arms.
The alien woman stepped from behind Bert’s back. When the Elder saw her, his expression flitted between relief, joy, confusion, and anger. “Troublemaker. What have you done?”
“I bring you a Bert. He witnessed the tunnel, so I kidnapped him.”
“Is a Bert safe?”
“The Berts are violent meat-eaters, but I believe this one is peaceful.”
“Why do you keep saying we’re meat eaters,” said Bert. “Some of us are vegans. They only eat leaves and seeds and stuff.”
“I say you are meat eaters,” said the woman, “because your eyes are close together and focused to judge distance. All hunters of meat share that trait. Our eyes move independently of each other. A common trait of all hunted animals, forever on the watch for the hunters.”
“Vegans must be the superior species on your planet,” said the Elder. “Do Vegans have the wide-spread eyes of the hunted?”
Bert shook his head. “No, but they fart a lot.”
“Go then!” said the Elder, his finger jabbing at the woman. “Leave the doodad here. I will talk with this Bert and reprimand you later.”
The woman bowed and hurried away.
Part 11:
In this post: Bert eats disgusting porridge…
“Sit!” said the Elder.
“I am sitting,” said Bert.
The Elder’s eyes swivelled this way and that as if wondering how he could squeeze around Bert if needed to escape. Bert felt sorry for the timid little wise man and placed his friendliest smile.
“You are confused?”
Bert wasn’t sure if it was a statement or a question. “I don’t know where I am if that’s what you mean.”
“You are on a planet called Ewepiter, in a village called Lambdon.”
Careful to keep the smirk on his face, Bert shook his head. “Never heard of them.”
A slow grin softened the Elder’s panic, and his posture slumped. “Are you hungry, thirsty?”
“I’m starving and me throat’s parched.”
The Elder lifted the lid of a large saucepan that balanced on a flat metal box. “I’ll make some porridge for you.” He scooped a handful of dry bamboo tips from a sack and tossed them into the pan. Then he added another handful, turned to glance at Bert, and added two more. After filling water and a handful of white powder Bert assumed was salt, he put the lid back on and tapped the side of the metal box with a finger. “Two minutes,” he said.
All the while, the Elder kept one eye on Bert, the other on the pan. “There’s water in the barrel by your right elbow,” he said.
A ladle hung on the barrel with cups of various sizes stacked neatly on a low table by its side. Bert chose the largest and gulped four cupfuls before his tongue came unstuck from the roof of his mouth. The metal box peeped, and when the Elder lifted the saucepan lid, steam belched out.
“Blimey, mate, how did you cook that?” Bert scratched his bald head. He didn’t see any flames beneath the pan or electric wires anywhere.
“It is part of the remnants of our technology, like the translator you wear on your T-shirt, and this cooker, and those doodads. Only a few of us retain the wisdom of how these contrivances work. I am not one, so I cannot explain.”
“Got any cream and sugar?” asked Bert as the Elder nudged a bowl of porridge in his direction and edged away again.
“No.”
Bert blew on his spoon and, careful not to burn his tongue, took a nibble. He shuddered and gagged. The porridge was the most disgusting he’d tasted in his life: earthy, woody, like mild water chestnuts but with a bitter tang. “Blimey, mate, you’ve got to be joking. Ain’t you got nothing else?”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no? Is this all you eat?”
“Yes.”
“No wonder you’re all so small. Sorry, but I can’t eat this.”
Terror filled the Elder’s face. “You’re just like the Guardians. You crave meat. You prefer to eat us.”
“No,” said Bert, and hurriedly spooned porridge into his gob. “Look, I’m eating this yummy stuff.” He found it almost impossible to swallow and spat globs of the creamy sludge as he spoke, but he kept spooning it in. “Mmm! lovely.”
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by Nina Garman from Pixabay
#4: Evil Portent ® James Field.
Previously from posts 07 - 10…
It occurred to Bert the woman might be a loony, escaped from an asylum somewhere. Time to phone Florence for help; she possessed almost as much gumption as his best friend, Alf. "When did you last eat?" he asked as he plucked his smartphone from his back pocket.
The woman flinched and drew her children to her breast. "Don't shoot," she whimpered. "We're so small, there’s hardly any meat on us."
Bert scratched his head. No doubt. Loony. "This is a phone," he explained, drawing the words out and holding it to his ear to demonstrate. "I'm going to call for help."
A wave of relief washed over the woman’s face, but only enough to give her the courage to speak calmer. "A phone. Can I see it?"
"Yeah. Take a look. It's harmless." He held it at arm's length and the woman snatched it from his hand. "Hey," he said, "Don't do that." But it was too late. She tore the back cover from the phone, ripped out the battery, prodded at its workings with what resembled a crochet hook until her palm contained a jumble of fragments.
"It weren't a gun," said Bert, dejectedly. "You didn't have to ruin it, and if you didn't want me to call for help, all you had to do was to say."
The woman didn't answer. Instead, she sifted through the bits as if hunting for lice. Then she pinched up one black piece, dumped the rest of his ruined phone on the carpet, and picked up the doodad. With the doodad in one hand and the part from his phone in the other, she slipped the part into the doodad. Immediately, the gadget's harsh light stopped throbbing.
All held their breath and stared at the doodad. Pricks of various coloured pinpoint lights danced and ticked. Then it peeped and the purple goo settled into a soft, faint, glow.
With a jubilant cheer, the woman bounced to her feet and clapped her hands. "It works," she said.
"What works?"
"Can't you see? The doodad. We can go home to our own world."
The children danced and pranced with as much boisterousness as a pack of excited Billy Goats.
"Wait and watch," said the woman. Bouncing from foot to foot, eyes gleaming, she placed the gadget back on the floor.
Without warning, the air above it warped, like a heat haze, even though the room was freezing. Looking into the haze was like peering into a fire while daydreaming. Only there were no flames, just the vague impression of a black hole.
Bert stared at the patch of distorted air. It grew larger and more distinct, and he spotted odd translucent shapes eddying within it. A dull pressure made his ears ache, and a drop of sweat slid down the hollow of his throat, leaving a cold track.
The hazy hole had no outer boundary; it simply hung in midair, the entrance to a tunnel leading to an unearthly distance. Every muscle in Bert's body seized, pressure built in his ears, and the hiss of piercing static made his teeth cringe. The tunnel's depth pulsed like a black gulping throat, and the static hiss grew louder, wavering in pitch.
"Come," said the woman, suddenly by his side and tugging on his hand. "Come with us."
"Where?"
"To our world."
Bert, still hypnotised by the tunnel and fascinated by the notion of other worlds, staggered along beside her. They stepped inside, its depths shrinking and widening like the gullet of a black snake.
Ahead of him, he saw the woman and her twelve children melt into clouds of powder and the tunnel inhale them. It was the weirdest sensation Bert had ever experienced. The front edge of his bulk crumbled into dust and vanished into the tunnel as if dragged along by a tornado. Instinctively, he held his head back, watching, but in the same instant his vision blurred and a wall of soft foam in his back drove him forward. There was a sharp sting of pain as if blunt needles stabbed every nerve in his body. Before he had time to cry out, his flesh and bones gained substance again, as if he'd just woken from a nightmare and realised all was right with the world.
Except he wasn't lying in bed, but wobbling on his feet on the top of a green hill.
Below the hilltop, a village of flimsy huts and cabins nestled beside a rushing river. In every direction, Bert noted forests and fields of bamboo. A warm breeze, laden with the scent of tobacco, chafed their feathery leaves, wavering between rest and motion.
"What's that?" asked Bert, pointing to a distant hill higher than the others. A black tower dominated its summit. It looked alien and out of place.
"Can you see the Citadel from here?"
"Can't you?"
Both the woman's eyes focused in that direction. "No, it is too far away."
"And what's that?" Bert pointed to another construction of grey stone on a ridge on the village's other side."
"That is the abbey where the terror-stricken monks live."
“Where are we?” asked Bert.
The woman’s two eyes swivelled in all directions, as if uneasy. “I think we’re safe for the moment.”
“Yeah, that’s good, but where are we?”
“I must take you to the Elder’s house. He’ll explain everything.” Without further word, the woman bent to pick up a doodad similar to the one they'd left behind and set off down the hill, heading for the village on her dumpy little legs.
Bert tagged along beside her, taking advantage of the sluggish pace to absorb his new surroundings. Temple bells chimed through the mystic, potent sunlight; frogs croaked in muddy ditches; dwarf-sized women came from the fields, with a song on their thin red lips and wicker baskets laden with bamboo tips on their heads.
They glared at Bert as if he were a monster, taking a wide berth or darting into their hovels.
The villagers had built most of their huts from thick bamboo canes. There were no vehicles and only hard-packed dirt paths. It reminded him of pictures he’d seen of undiscovered tribes in South America’s rain forests, except here it looked as though they’d cleared most of the forest to cultivate fields of bamboo.
A handful of stone-built constructions, twice as large as the huts, were sprinkled haphazardly throughout the village. They headed for one of these.
Bert ducked inside and wiped his feet on a mat made of fibres. Doors and windows were simple open gaps with cloth hanging across the doors. Bamboo shutters in the windows did little to keep the sun out. After the sweltering heat outdoors, the cool cave-like room made Bert shove his hands in his pockets.
A little prune of a man sat cross-legged on the dirt floor. When he caught sight of Bert, squeezing through the door and standing with his head and shoulders bent beneath the low ceiling, he leapt effortlessly to his feet and backed into a corner.
Apart from his widespread eyes, the Elder had squished his facial features into tight knot, making him look like an amazed chipmunk. “What are you?” he asked.
“Me name’s Bert. Pleased to meet you.” He held his hand out and the little man cringed even further into the corner. “I ain’t going to hurt you.” Tired of bending his head, Bert flopped to the floor and leant back on his arms.
The alien woman stepped from behind Bert’s back. When the Elder saw her, his expression flitted between relief, joy, confusion, and anger. “Troublemaker. What have you done?”
“I bring you a Bert. He witnessed the tunnel, so I kidnapped him.”
“Is a Bert safe?”
“The Berts are violent meat-eaters, but I believe this one is peaceful.”
“Why do you keep saying we’re meat eaters,” said Bert. “Some of us are vegans. They only eat leaves and seeds and stuff.”
“I say you are meat eaters,” said the woman, “because your eyes are close together and focused to judge distance. All hunters of meat share that trait. Our eyes move independently of each other. A common trait of all hunted animals, forever on the watch for the hunters.”
“Vegans must be the superior species on your planet,” said the Elder. “Do Vegans have the wide-spread eyes of the hunted?”
Bert shook his head. “No, but they fart a lot.”
“Go then!” said the Elder, his finger jabbing at the woman. “Leave the doodad here. I will talk with this Bert and reprimand you later.”
The woman bowed and hurried away.
Part 11:
In this post: Bert eats disgusting porridge…
“Sit!” said the Elder.
“I am sitting,” said Bert.
The Elder’s eyes swivelled this way and that as if wondering how he could squeeze around Bert if needed to escape. Bert felt sorry for the timid little wise man and placed his friendliest smile.
“You are confused?”
Bert wasn’t sure if it was a statement or a question. “I don’t know where I am if that’s what you mean.”
“You are on a planet called Ewepiter, in a village called Lambdon.”
Careful to keep the smirk on his face, Bert shook his head. “Never heard of them.”
A slow grin softened the Elder’s panic, and his posture slumped. “Are you hungry, thirsty?”
“I’m starving and me throat’s parched.”
The Elder lifted the lid of a large saucepan that balanced on a flat metal box. “I’ll make some porridge for you.” He scooped a handful of dry bamboo tips from a sack and tossed them into the pan. Then he added another handful, turned to glance at Bert, and added two more. After filling water and a handful of white powder Bert assumed was salt, he put the lid back on and tapped the side of the metal box with a finger. “Two minutes,” he said.
All the while, the Elder kept one eye on Bert, the other on the pan. “There’s water in the barrel by your right elbow,” he said.
A ladle hung on the barrel with cups of various sizes stacked neatly on a low table by its side. Bert chose the largest and gulped four cupfuls before his tongue came unstuck from the roof of his mouth. The metal box peeped, and when the Elder lifted the saucepan lid, steam belched out.
“Blimey, mate, how did you cook that?” Bert scratched his bald head. He didn’t see any flames beneath the pan or electric wires anywhere.
“It is part of the remnants of our technology, like the translator you wear on your T-shirt, and this cooker, and those doodads. Only a few of us retain the wisdom of how these contrivances work. I am not one, so I cannot explain.”
“Got any cream and sugar?” asked Bert as the Elder nudged a bowl of porridge in his direction and edged away again.
“No.”
Bert blew on his spoon and, careful not to burn his tongue, took a nibble. He shuddered and gagged. The porridge was the most disgusting he’d tasted in his life: earthy, woody, like mild water chestnuts but with a bitter tang. “Blimey, mate, you’ve got to be joking. Ain’t you got nothing else?”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no? Is this all you eat?”
“Yes.”
“No wonder you’re all so small. Sorry, but I can’t eat this.”
Terror filled the Elder’s face. “You’re just like the Guardians. You crave meat. You prefer to eat us.”
“No,” said Bert, and hurriedly spooned porridge into his gob. “Look, I’m eating this yummy stuff.” He found it almost impossible to swallow and spat globs of the creamy sludge as he spoke, but he kept spooning it in. “Mmm! lovely.”
To be continued…
The real world:
Rather than miss an instalment, it’s easy to follow my blog on bloglovin ’. They’ll give you a friendly nudge as I release new parts.
Like to know more about Alf, Bert and the rest of the gang? You can read their chaotic history in What on Earth .
-
Image by Nina Garman from Pixabay
