My Friend the Alien

by Zanib Mian

  Day 1

  I’ve landed. Not that you guys checked up on me or anything, but I’m fine. The spaceship is fine too, except for the Filandoo Sperk.

  That broke. It wasn’t my fault – I only just looked at it. It’s not important anyway, right?

  I landed right where you guys told me to. In the middle of nowhere, on some grass. But there were the things called cows around.

  They are animals, I remember from my training. I could see huge puffs of purple gas coming out from their behinds. Methane. Methane is purple. But you know that. By the way, how do you guys know so much about the animals here and almost nothing about the humans?

  I’m going to sleep now and will look for the humans tomorrow, to get on with the mission I came here to do:

  Find out how humans have feelings.

  Day 2

  Hey, guys, I’m in a city now, far away from the fields, where there are plenty of humans to watch. I ate my first human food today! It was the most delicious thing I’ve ever tasted. I got it from a building that was full of all sorts of different things. It’s brown and is called Milk Chocolate with Hazelnut Pieces Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference.

  Long name, but tastes awesome. I think I’ll be happy if I find nothing else to eat here on Earth other than Milk Chocolate with Hazelnut Pieces Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference.

  I made my first observation when I was inside that building. Humans release methane too. Though not as much as cows. The place was full of purple gas, which the humans released as they pushed around these metal cages and put things into them. Some of them shouted a lot at the little humans, who seemed to want to put things in the metal cage that the big ones didn’t want there.

  Then a couple of the little ones started making shrieking noises and had water coming out of their eyes. I guess those are feelings; one type of feelings.

  I haven’t seen the big ones showing many yet. Well, they haven’t made any of the shrieking noises. As instructed, I will use the thing called Google to find out more about feelings.

  By the way, nobody noticed me. Nobody thought I was strange.

  They don’t know I’m not from around here, because I look just like them.

  Day 3

  Google says these guys have a gazillion different kinds of feelings. And they can be so soppy, it’s unbelievable. The yuckiest one I read about was LOVE. Ewww.

  I need to get out there, to places where there are lots of humans, to find out how these feelings happen.

  In the afternoon, I hopped on a bus, which is an extra-long vehicle where humans sit and stand very close together.

  So close that I learned that some humans have not very nice smells coming from them. A nasty gas comes from their mouths and stinky water trickles from their armpits, and then obviously there is the methane. I did not enjoy being on that bus.

  Then I went to the park, where some of them were running around (extremely slowly) and some were walking with the little humans. I thought I’d run too, but some of them started looking at me and pointing, so I stopped. At the place I sat down, one human was showing its tiny little dog to another human. I guess it was a baby dog, but I forget the name for those.

  The human was saying, “Awww, isn’t he just the most adorable thing?” And her face was changing and she kept putting her hand on her heart.

  I felt nothing. It’s just a creature. What’s the big deal? But I think it might be something to do with the love feeling that this human was suffering from. Then she said, “He’s so fluffy and cute, I just want to eat him.”

  So I found out that feelings can happen by looking at things and humans want to eat things they think are cute. I got a bit closer to see how they smell, but the little dog started going crazy and showing me its teeth. It wasn’t speaking human, but it was pretty clear it wanted to eat ME. So I ran and it ran after me. It was nowhere near as fast as me, but to be safe, I dropped to the floor and became invisible. The dog ran on, confused.

  Sheesh, what just happened there? It seems even the animals here have feelings. I’m not sure I can complete this mission by myself. It’s colossal! Also, I haven’t heard a squeak out of you guys since I got here. Are you glad to be rid of me?

  Day 4

  I made friends with one of the humans today. Yes, yes, I know I am breaking the rules. I’m only supposed to look at them and not touch, blah, blah, blah. But it spoke to ME. And anyway, I need help. I can’t complete this mission by myself. It’s too much work for one Zerglid.

  It happened in one of those buildings full of all the things, where humans go to get the stuff they want. I was walking past the books and magazines – they have those just like we do! I saw one called ‘Aliens from Outer Space’. Hey, that must be about us! I thought, and then I couldn’t believe what I saw. They had drawn us green, with antennae! And we had no clothes on. Do they think we have no shame? And green? Who told them we are green?

  Basically, they think we’re pretty ugly and slimy-looking.

  So I was standing there, holding the book, gaping and gasping with disbelief, when the human came up to me. It was a medium-sized one, not big and not small and tiny.

  And it said, “Aliens are cool, right? But pretty ugly.”

  So I said, “No we’re not!”

  The human smiled and said, “We? Do you mean you are one or something?”

  And I said, “Yes and I’m not ugly. I look the same as you, actually.”

  The human laughed and said, “You’re funny. My name’s Jibreel. I’m named after an angel.”

  So I said, “My name, is Maxx. I don’t know what I’m named after, but it’s probably an alien.”

  The human laughed again. His eyes were sparkly when he laughed and his face looked nice. Better than humans look when they’re shrieking. Then he asked me if I’m going to the ‘All Things Alien’ exhibition in the library. I said of course I am, because I love aliens and he said he’ll see me there at lunchtime tomorrow.

  I think I’ll learn a lot from Jibreel.

  When I walked out of the building, I saw two male humans fighting about which one could put their vehicle in a space on the road. I guess they haven’t learned to zap shrink their vehicles to save space, like we do. This was an interesting thing to watch because it was the first time I saw the anger feeling.

  I didn’t know humans can change colour, but it happens when they get angry – both of these humans were going red! One of them threw their cup of brown liquid at the other one’s vehicle, which made him jump out and thump on the window of the first one’s vehicle. It ended up with both of them punching each other in their red faces, and they didn’t stop until a short, wrinkly human that moves extra slowly came and started whacking them both with her handbag.

  So basically feelings are flying around everywhere and humans don’t seem to be able to control them. And did I mention, they think we are green?

  Day 5

  Today I met Jibreel at the library for the All Things Alien exhibition. You’re not going to believe this… they think we have been stealing humans from Earth, just zapping them up whenever we feel like it, to experiment on. The whole exhibition was a complete abomination.

  I found Jibreel at the ‘Guess What Aliens Smell Like’ stall. Yes, you read that right. They’re the smelly ones, with their methane and their stinky armpit water and bad mouth gas. At the stall, they had seven pots of smells. Six of them were horrible and only one smelled nice. It was labelled ‘bubble gum’. I was quite impressed that Jibreel voted for the bubble gum, because forty-three other people voted for the really yucky one called ‘pond slime’.

  “I don’t actually smell of anything,” I told Jibreel. “Aliens have no smell. And no feelings.”

&nb
sp; Jibreel laughed and sniffed me. “Actually, you smell just like chocolate.”

  “What? What’s chocolate? I don’t smell of chocolate!”

  “What’s chocolate?” Jibreel laughed again. This human laughs a lot. “You smell very strongly of chocolate.”

  I patted myself where Jibreel had sniffed, and found my half-eaten Milk Chocolate with Hazelnut Pieces Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference.

  “Ah, yes. That. That’s my favourite Earth food.”

  Jibreel slapped his knee and laughed a lot more. “You’re really funny, Maxx. I like you,” he said and grabbed my arm. “Let’s get the lift upstairs. Come on, there’s lots to see!”

  We walked through a sea of balloons shaped like green aliens with antennae. Sheesh, these humans really need to have more of an imagination. Or better space scientists.

  But round the corner, Jibreel saw something that made his face change completely. It didn’t look like it does when he’s laughing. It went a different colour, but not red like the angry humans. It just looked like his normal colour was fading.

  I poked him. “Jibreel? Jibreel? Are you suffering from a feeling?”

  He looked like he wasn’t listening and as if he was trying to hide. So I poked him again and finally he said, “Yes… those boys are from my school and let’s just say they’re trouble.”

  “So what was the feeling you were having?” I asked, because this was a learning opportunity for me and for all Zerglids, thanks to me.

  “Worried. Anxious. Scared,” said Jibreel. “What a funny question, Maxx. You sound like one of those adults at school who take you into a room to talk about life and feelings.”

  “Wow, you have humans that do that? Is it because they don’t understand what feelings are, either?”

  “No, it’s because they want to help.”

  This was confusing, but I didn’t have time to ask more because we had to run away from the trouble.

  When we ran, I ran like a normal alien and saw that Jibreel had got left behind. When he caught up, he said, “What on earth? How did you do that? Do you have rocket shoes or something?”

  “Do what?” I asked.

  “Run so fast!”

  “It’s how I run,” I said. “Sixty miles per hour, like everyone else.”

  “Er, everyone else doesn’t run at sixty miles per hour. Usain Bolt is the fastest human on Earth and even he can only run at like thirty miles per hour.”

  “Yes, but I’m not human,” I said once again. And now I understand why everyone was staring at me in the park.

  “Ha ha, you’re going to stick to your alien story are you?” grinned Jibreel. And he took out a wrapped object and gave it to me.

  I opened the wrapper. It contained brown food. I took a bite, and oh my taste buds! I guess all wrapped-up brown food must be chocolate.

  Jibreel looked very happy to see me eating. His eyes were sparkly again. He had forgotten all about the trouble.

  I snapped off a piece of the chocolate and gave it to him. He took it happily. As if it hadn’t been his in the first place. He ate the chocolate slowly, in tiny bits. My brother would never have given me his whole tribus, which I think is the tastiest thing we have on Zerg.

  “Let’s go check out the alien costumes downstairs,” said Jibreel, and again he took my hand and started running. This time it was happy running. Jibreel was displaying all sorts of feelings, one after the other.

  We went through a door and then something crazy happened. The floor became a funny shape! Like downwards zigzags. Jibreel kept on without stopping, just walking on them like it was nothing. But not me. I fell over my feet on the zigzags and went head first right to the bottom of them, banging my head and my bottom lots of times on the way.

  “Oh my God,” said Jibreel. “Are you OK? Are you OK?”

  I jumped up. “Completely fine. Our bodies are used to going through worse than that. It was just a surprise.”

  Jibreel didn’t seem to believe me. He was grabbing my arms and checking them over. “But you fell down the stairs! All the stairs!”

  “Is that what you call them? They’re really annoying, what are they for?”

  “For going up and down, you crazy thing,” said Jibreel and he put his arms round me and his cheek against my cheek and stayed there. “Hugs always make people better.”

  Hugs. You guys, hugs are cool. They made me forget all about the annoying zigzags.

  P.S. When I return, I want a medal that says: ‘Colossal Mission Complete’.

  Day 8

  Sorry! I know I haven’t reported back for a few days, and I’m supposed to do it every day, but I’ve just been so busy hanging out with Jibreel. And anyway, I still haven’t heard from you guys.

  We’ve done all sorts of cool things. We went to the cinema to see Big Hero 6. There are some really great hugs in that movie. I’ll bring a copy home to teach everyone how to do them.

  I also discovered more Earth food that I like – popcorn, waffles and pizza.

  And Jibreel has finally believed me about being an alien.

  When we were queuing up to leave the cinema, those nasty boys from Jibreel’s school came up behind us. Jibreel immediately stopped moving. He went all quiet and still as a statue.

  “Oh look, it’s the alien!” said one of the boys.

  “Stinky, smelly alien. Go back to where you came from!” snarled another.

  What? How do they know I’m an alien? I was thinking.

  And Jibreel was shrinking further and further into himself.

  One of the boys released the purple gas and they all started holding their noses and pointing at each other to say who did it. Then they started throwing popcorn at us. Quite a lot of it. One bit hit me right in the eye, so I thought, Right, that’s enough of that, and I took Jibreel’s hand and made both of us invisible.

  “What? Where did they go? Where did they go?” said the confused boys.

  “They must have run off,” one of them decided.

  “It looked like they just disappeared,” said another.

  “Weird aliens,” added the third.

  I held my finger to my lips to tell Jibreel to stay quiet. He looked stunned. Then just for fun, I flicked one of the boys’ ears.

  He clapped his hand over it immediately.

  “Who did that?” he demanded.

  While they were arguing, we slid out the door and ran away. We ran out into the car park and then I made us both visible again. I let go of Jibreel, who had a look of mild panic mixed with thrill in his eyes.

  “What on earth just happened, Maxx?”

  “Not Earth. Well, I mean it’s not from Earth. The invisibility thing. It’s from Zerg.”

  “Zerg?”

  “Yes, Zerg. Where I come from. I keep telling you – I’m an alien.”

  Jibreel started laughing. But it wasn’t like the laughs he had done before when he was having the happy feelings. This was a laugh that made him look crazy. It was as if he had to laugh OR faint in disbelief. I guess it must be hard for a human to understand that aliens look like me and not like those ugly green things with antennae that they’ve been dreaming up.

  “I TOLD you the day we met.”

  “I thought you were kidding!” said Jibreel, finally looking at me. He poked me in the arm and watched carefully to see what would happen. “What are you made of?”

  “I don’t know. Stuff. What are YOU made of?” I said, poking him back.

  That made him laugh. The real kind of laugh.

  “How did those boys know I’m an alien?” I asked.

  “They didn’t… they don’t. They call ME alien.”

  “What? Are you an alien too? Then why do you run so slowly, and why do you release the purple gas? Which planet are you from?”

  “Not that kind of alien… They call me alien because I’m not from this country… I’m a refugee.”

  “A refugee?” “Yes. There was a horrible war in my country, so I had to come and live here.”


  “But you’re still a human? From Earth?”

  “Of course!”

  “So why do they call you alien?”

  “I don’t know… I guess cos they think I’m different to them.” Jibreel couldn’t even hold his shoulders up when he said this. Nor his head, which was flopped towards the ground. “They don’t like me because I come from somewhere else…”

  Guys, I don’t know what it was but I felt a speck. A teeny tiny speck of something new in my body. It was warm, like the toasted waffles I had eaten earlier.

  Day 12

  Yup. Since you guys aren’t EVEN BOTHERING to respond to me, I am not going to bother reporting every day.

  So let’s see. What have I been up to…?

  Mostly, I’ve been hanging out with Jibreel in the park.

  Jibreel is interesting. Did you know, in his country, before he came here, he won an award for making some high-tech science thing in his spare time. He reminds me of you guys, and by that I mean geeky with a touch of cool, or just geeky, which is the new cool anyway, so…

  Jibreel has been asking me lots of questions about people from Zerg. The first thing he wanted to know was what other ‘powers’ I have.

  “You know,” he said, with a mouth full of cheese puffs – a delicious orange food, which are so light, it hardly feels like you’re holding them. “You can make yourself invisible and run really fast. What else can you do?”