Celeste passed out.
__________
The signal came.
The ships caught it, and those on board whose job it was to move the moment the signal came did their job. They moved.
The ships engaged their drives, and disappeared down a multi-coloured tunnel that hadn’t been there but suddenly was.
The space of the Milky Way continued about its business as if nothing had happened.
__________
The Gardenfolk looked up as the beam of multi-coloured light shot into the night sky.
They kept looking up as giant, round hunks of metal popped into existence above them, making plenty of ears pop too. They seemed not to stop until they almost filled the sky. The slick Astarian fleet of spaceships had arrived.
There are lots of them, thought Alditha. This is not going to be easy.
As they watched, a hatch on the underside of one of the ships slid open, and what looked for all the world like a giant frying pan began a slow, stately drift down to earth, like the last exhausted snow of winter.
Eventually, it landed outside the square, not far from where Celeste had found the test tube.
Peridot woke Celeste, and they went to greet the new arrival. Mali-Juna and Rhodon marched Zirca along too. Alditha and Harper tagged along, because although no-one had asked them or invited them, Alditha was a witch and needed nobody’s permission to be nosy.
When a slab of blackness opened in the side of the frying pan, it was remarkable how few of the welcoming party were surprised. And when four teenage-looking figures—three females and a male—with spectacularly-coloured hair and almond-shaped eyes of vivid glistening shades stepped out in long, ceremonial robes, nobody was surprised about that either.
‘Commander,’ said Celeste, ‘I present the Sleepers. Well, most of them, anyway. One’s still underground, probably arguing with himself about the right way to argue with himself.’
The commander, a female named Numiia, whose hair had the warm tones of amber, looked beyond her. ‘Life?’ she asked. ‘We understood from Commander Zirca this was an uninhabited world.’ She paused, to admire the frying pan-shaped exterior of the spacecraft, then gave a little smile. ‘Nevertheless...life here would explain a lot of things.’
‘Yes,’ said Celeste. ‘About that-’
‘Scuse me, Your Commanderness,’ said Alditha, pushing to the front with the self-possession of witches everywhere. ‘Good evening, welcome to our planet...erm, Garden. My name’s Alditha and I’m a witch, but don’t let that worry you. Fact is, there’s life here. All sorts of life, and there has been for generations now. I know you lot were hoping to find an empty planet, and I know why. I can respect anyone who wants to keep themselves to themselves and doesn’t want the business of warring with other folk in their lives. But I need to tell you that we don’t wage war to the point of extinction on this world, so before you get any ideas of wiping us all out and startin’ again, you don’t need to be doin’ that. We’re happy to have you if you want to be here, and if you don’t, we’ll wish you well and bid you so long. We’ve only met some of you so far—your Sleepers and Celeste here. But this day, Astarians and Gardenfolk—that’s us—have worked together to save this world from danger. So we know that we can do it, and we know that you can do it an’ all. You need to know that. You need to know what we’re all capable of.’
Numiia stared at Alditha, as if expecting her to pass out from lack of oxygen. When she didn’t, Numiia simply said ‘Thank you, Alditha. But is there someone who can update me on the circumstances of this “danger” that has brought our people together?’
‘I can do that, Your Commanderness. You see-’ Alditha began.
‘Perhaps I might be allowed to address the Commander,’ said a voice from behind them. Celeste gasped—it was a voice she’d know anywhere, no matter how many times people told her that all bio-mechs sounded the same. ‘You’re alive,’ she said.
‘Conclusion rational, if obvious,’ said Alpha.
‘How?’ Celeste gasped.
‘Chemical only permanently harmful to creatures containing significant concentrations of Melazoidin. Explanations will follow,’ he advised, making his way up to Commander Numiia.
The new arrivals huddled with the bio-mech for a few minutes, during which the Gardenfolk began to mutter about missing their normal Hallowe’en festivities, complete with dancing, eating, drinking and the customary midday and midnight fireworks. Then the Commander came forward again and the crowd tuned back in.
‘We have heard the account of the events that led to the Sleepers’ discovery. We would be prepared to entertain negotiations with your representatives to establish peaceful co-existence on this planet.’
They’re a bit full of themselves, thought Alditha, but they’re already getting the idea. That’s the Garden doing its thing to ’em. I have a feeling that something amazing and wonderful is about to happen.
‘Bring Commander Zirca to me,’ said Numiia. ‘And we will be prepared to talk to this Skoros, King of the Garden, whenever he is ready.’
‘Begging your Pardon, Your Commanderness, but Skoros has been deposed. We don’t have no kings in the Garden. We’ve never needed ’em, and we don’t propose to start now.’
The Gardenfolk raised a cheer at that.
‘Very well, then. Choose your ambassadors and send them to us at your convenience.
Well, thought Alditha, they’re here now. The challenge is to make it work.
22
It was on the news and everything. Reports of spectacular lights in the sky, going down a funnel of colour, hitting the earth. Hitting my garden.
That’s the thing about people these days, they’re all on their phones, and enough people record things to make them undeniable.
Of course, I don’t know what happened. It was like being at the end of a rainbow, and for a while, I thought about digging in my garden for a pot of gold—well, you never know.
But then I thought about that little owl I sometimes see. And I thought perhaps I didn’t need a pot of gold that badly after all. Perhaps there are more important things than gold.
Maybe one day I’ll go and do the Thing, and see what all the light and colour was about.
But not today.
__________
Alditha sighed as she stirred a pinkish mixture on her stove. It had been a busy week.
She and Celeste had been nominated as ambassadors, Commander Numiia preferring to negotiate through an intermediary whenever possible.
Already, the framework was coming together—the Garden was big, and although there were a lot of Astarians, they were by no means all the same. Some were content, for the moment, to stay in their communities, and settle in spaces where most of the Gardenfolk had taken one look and said ‘Nah, let’s keep going, y’never know what’s round the next bush.’ Others, many others, were inquisitive about their new home and the people who had lived in it before them, keen to learn everything—history, socialization, food, everything. They brought their point of view and their technology, but were keen to experience the Garden and its people on their terms.
Some said it would never work, and stayed in their ships, trying to decide whether or not to wait until the next Hallowe’en and move on, looking for their perfect, uninhabited home, or even their lost planetary system.
Things that had never made sense before began to take a shape in the minds of the Gardenfolk. The story of Ven Tao the Gardener was given its details, its history. Alditha chuckled. Even she hadn’t realized about Jasper, not even when she’d seen him in Ven’s hand in her Tarot Wheel. After Ven’s death, the great ‘Manual of the EngineSeers’, Jazper 5-9—once an ordinary, all-purpose reference booklet used by the Astarians—had become an intelligent being, living as a hermit in his ramshackle cottage since the beginning of sentient life in the Garden, and no-one had ever realized. No wonder the book had been lost for so long. Though many years ago, Jasper had displayed a red star with wings on an ol
d welcome sign outside his cottage—and that’s where both she and Skoros had originally seen the symbol. Of course, like a raspberry seed stuck in her gums, the Tarot Wheel image of Ven throwing the manual clear of the scout ship had haunted Alditha’s subconscious daily until she had understood its significance. And now, Dramm—her little Dramm—had become the new Manual, just as, much to her surprise, Celeste had become the Garden’s new Gardener, whatever that meant.
Poor Jasper, he knew he didn’t have the strength to see in the Astarians’ return she thought to herself, stirring philosophically. He was such a character and I’ll always miss him. I do hope Dramm is up to the job. Only time will tell.
The Gardenfolk were beginning to see their history as something intertwined with the Astarians’. Some people were even starting to vaguely worship the Astarians as their ‘creators’ at which Alditha rolled her eyes.
It would be a long journey, bringing the Gardenfolk and the Astarians together properly, but between them, Alditha was confident they’d manage it. Big Red, Sagar, Gunkin, and the Green Man had volunteered to be Garden Marshals and do their bit for the ‘new order of things’. Though what a giant blue dragon and a temperamental red demon could realistically do for a race of advanced space beings remained to be seen.
Odiz had been found, of course. The Convocation of Mages had plans to give him the biggest and best funeral in their history—but, as yet, they couldn’t lay their hands on quite enough beer to do him justice.
Mistress Fazackerly and Timmoluk had both been buried, returned to the Garden to begin the cycle of life again, feeding the worms and the insects.
Skoros had not been found. That was a worry.
So was Harper, who still wore his visor because, he said, the sky was full of worms and beetles and horrid things waiting to break through and eat them all. But Alditha reasoned she had too much to actively worry about to do much about dimensional hoojamaflips that weren’t, it seemed, about to endanger them any day soon.
There was a loud knock on the door of her cottage.
Alditha frowned.
‘Don’t-’ she called, but there was a ZZZAP and her door disappeared.
‘Mr. Alpha, how many times,’ she snapped. ‘Knocking is so much easi-’
Something grabbed her round the back of the neck. Something squeezed.
‘Don’t make a sound, witch,’ said a voice that was half human and half bio-mech. ‘Guess what? I’m here to kill you—quite painfully.’
‘Well, of course you are.’ Alditha grunted, trying her best to escape. ‘Wondered what had happened to my favourite wizard.’
The hand let go of her, and Alditha turned to face her assailant.
It looked like an ordinary bio-mech.
Ordinary, she chided herself. It had been a really busy week.
She folded her arms. ‘Well, what do you want, wizard?’
‘To kill you. Naturally.’
‘It’s been tried—many times.’
‘Listen, witch—I’ll soon be gone from here,’ Skoros screamed, though the voice of Gamma. ‘I don’t need the Garden anymore, I’m destined for greater things.’
‘I’m not stopping you leaving.’
‘No-one can stop me.’
‘Well go on, then. Go, if you’re going.’
‘Ah, but I want to hear you scream before I leave, you meddling witch.’
Alditha blinked.
‘Well, that’s clearly not going to happen, now is it?’
The bio-mech advanced again. Alditha raised an eyebrow at it. She knew that escape was futile, unless....
‘Would it help if I said I was sorry?’ she said, stepping back.
The bio-mech stopped. ‘Sorry? Sorry for what?’
‘For that whole “wet blanket” thing. I mean, I knew you liked me, but you just dithered about so much. I didn’t mean for it to become a thing. And then you got all stroppy and dark wizardy, and I never got a chance to tell you I was sorry. So...I’m sorry.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me before?’ Skoros asked, half little boy, half bio-mech.
‘You never gave me the chance,’ Alditha replied, with a sincerity that surprised even her. ‘You just never gave me the chance.’
There was a thoughtful sigh from Skoros which seemed to lessen the bio-mech’s menace for a second. However, any intended thoughts of eleventh-hour romance from the wizard quickly disappeared as the sigh turned into a frustrated, blood-curdling scream, the likes of which hadn’t been heard in the Garden for many a long year.
‘AARRRRRRRRHHHHHHHHHH.’
Suddenly, the bio-mech lunged, then lunged again—but then was silent for a long moment. Alditha took the opportunity to move out of its way.
Then it hummed with power. ‘Bio-mech Gamma-Omega-Delta, reporting. Location anomaly. How did I get here?’
‘That’s all right, Mr. Gamma. I...I don’t think you were yourself.’
__________
It hadn’t taken Alditha long to confirm her suspicions. Minutes after her run-in with Gamma-Skoros, a shuttle had left the Garden for one of the big Astarian ships. Minutes after that, the big ship had broken orbit. It had punched a hole in reality without a dimension drive or a Stone Hedge or a Gardener to help it along.
Good riddance, she thought. Skoros leaving was a weight off her shoulders, but it had given her a whole new set of things to worry about.
When Skoros left, his ship caused a rupture of the dimensions above the Garden. Nobody knew about it until a giant worm dropped out of the sky to land in Spooky End and quickly burrow its way under the surface of the Garden. Celeste had explained what it meant—the barriers between the dimensions were thinner than they’d suspected. That meant the Astarians who had returned to their ships and hoped to leave couldn’t be allowed to go—at least not until more was understood about the damage that could be caused by their popping through dimensions willy-nilly. It also meant that when a brave, if sometimes melodramatic little owl told you the sky was full of worms and beetles, occasionally—just occasionally—you’d better listen.
Alditha looked up at the sky, which still looked like any other Garden sky she’d ever seen. She couldn’t see the other dimension up there, not with all her witchcraft. It was only Harper who could see it, and people were starting to listen to him more and more and labelling him ‘The Seer of the New Garden.’ Well, he was an unusual owl, for sure.
Anyway, Harper certainly did have aliens in his Garden now. And, in many ways, maybe it was his garden after all.
It’ll go to his head, she thought, smiling softly.
The road that lay ahead of them would be harder now that the Astarians who didn’t want to be there had no option but to stay. They’d come an immeasurable distance to find a home.
Now they’ve got to live in it, for better or worse, thought Alditha. She pondered, then stopped it and shrugged. That’s what home means, after all.
THE END
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Did you love Aliens In My Garden? Then you should read Gray Hawk of Terrapin by Moss Whelan!
Gray Hawk of Terrapin is a heart-wrenching Y/A fantasy by Moss Whelan that introduces Melanie (Mool) Fraser.Ever since her father's death, Mool has been talking with an imaginary green lion named Inberl. When Mool's mysterious uncle gets sick, she and her mother take the train from Vancouver, Canada to the inner world of Terrapin, where Inberl is arrested because he's looking for Gray Hawk. Springing into action, Mool sets out to rescue Inberl.Mool's know-it-all cousin, Olga, helps track down family friend Parshmander who might know how to save Inberl. They corner Parshmander at home, where they overhear mention of Gray Hawk, but the girls are captured and interrogated. Upon release, Mool feels success when she sees a secret map
, finds a hidden bridge and crosses it with Olga. On the other side of the bridge, they find a secret city that keeps Terrapin at war. Prepare yourself for a wrenching journey laced with evil, chronicling histories of cruelty, kidnapping, and false imprisonment in search of meaning and justice."Gray Hawk of Terrapin is a backhand in the mouth parading as the smartest, sharpest fantasy you'll read in 2018, twisting the true-life horrors inflicted on a family and beast in the name of justice―and selling us cheap trinkets―into a wrenching story of friendship, loss, and terrible revenge."—Book Review Concierge
Read more at Moss Whelan’s site.
About the Author
Jude is a musician and lives in the UK with his family.
Read more at Jude Gwynaire’s site.
About the Publisher
The HistoryProdigy Publishing Group was founded in 2009 and has been steadily publishing distinguishable trade paperback fiction since. Its new flagship imprint Prodigy Gold Books spearheaded its journey in 2017, releasing Project Terror, One Day You Will, A Butler Christmas, and Gray Hawk of Terrapin, a line up that delighted readers and other authors. Prodigy Gold Books has grown exponentially and is dedicated to publishing a variety of must-read books on a wide array of topics and genres. The MissionOur mission is to showcase established voices and to introduce emerging new ones—both fiction and nonfiction.
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