by Peter Ness
‘No. Where to—?’ I responded, without thinking, ‘— to church?’
‘Probably, but most people who have imaginary friends go to the funny farm, you silly,’ she added with a laugh, shoving me. ‘Anyway, I got too many other things on my mind. Like my doll’s house. I’m sure things are gonna turn out okay anyway. That pendant of yours — it sure is magic. I’m just starving hungry.’ She yawned loudly. ‘Oh — darn!’
My eyes followed Jo as she leant down on the front of her bike, and then kicked the front tire in disgust. Leaning her bike against mine, Jo whacked me on the shoulder in frustration and anger.
‘Look! My front bike tire’s almost flat. Can you pump it up for me Heni?’ Jo asked.
‘Not now,’ I replied.
‘If you don’t pump it up right now,’ Jo threatened indignantly, ‘Dad’ll be mad. He’ll make you chop the wood — again.’
‘Awe, cripes—. Do I have to fix it — like right now?’ I asked.
‘Yeah, and you’re gonna fix it right now — or I’m gonna tell the whole school about your new girlfriend Amanda!’ Jo threatened further. ‘And, I’ll tell Mom and Dad!’ she added laughing. ‘Where’s Mom?’ Her eyes darted around, teasing me. ‘I’ll tell her right now.’
‘What? Hey, you keep your little trap shut, or I’ll leave your bike tire flat — and you can carry your own bag,’ I said angrily. Watching Jo kick at the ground, in a huff, I somewhat reluctantly added, ‘Okay. I guess I have no choice. And, it’ll only take a few minutes anyway. Pass me the bike pump and I’ll pump it up for you now.’ I plumped our bags down. ‘But, you owe me one and that other is our secret.’ I zipped my hand across my mouth. Jo passed me the bike pump then watched menacingly, hands on hips, while I pumped up the tire. She acted rather bossy at times.
I pumped up and down a dozen times or so.
‘Are you satisfied now?’ I asked her. ‘It was just a leaky valve by the looks.’
‘Yes—. Finally,’ she made a relieved sound and yawned, to make a point.
‘And—? What do you say when someone helps you?’
‘Thanks, so very much,’ Jo replied haughtily. She stomped off into the house wiping her shoes on the old hessian bag outside the door, pleased as punch.
I desperately needed to pee, so rushed around the side of the house. After coming back and picking up our bags, I caught a fleeting look of Jo bending down to pat the cat out the corner of my eye. Then, I headed for the door. Jo gave a devilishly sneaky smile towards me as she opened the screen door and danced inside.
#
London: Mid-August, 2012
‘Well Peter. That was enjoyable. Wasn’t it?’ Andrea said. ‘It wasn’t at all scary.’
‘It was too,’ he retorted. ‘But, it was also real funny.’
‘Well. It looks like the other person is writing the next three or four pages,’ Andrea said, flipping the page.
‘Won’t Mommy be back from Indya soon?’ Peter asked.
‘Yes, she should have arrived at Heathrow an hour or so ago. As soon as we hear the front door we can close the book and be out of here in a jiffy.’
‘I hope she bought me some lollies then,’ Peter said.
‘I was hoping for an Indian Saree,’ Andrea replied.
‘Well, come on then Andrea. Hurry it up. I wanna hear more!’ Peter said, pushing Andrea and almost knocking the book out of her hands.
‘It doesn’t say here but looks like it’s the same day,’ Andrea said. ‘Okay. Where were we?’
#
Close to sun-set. Bus stop, Near the Henton’s:
The panel van bounced down the dusty dirt road spewing up tears of dust amongst fragments of lateritic gravel. In front, the blood red sun began draping down over the tree line on the western ridges. An intersection rapidly approached and the van slowed down, kicking gravel up as it veered off a side road to the right. The dust billowed, catching up with the vehicle as it drew up to a sudden halt.
The driver’s eyes eagerly surveyed the mail boxes. The first mail box was just an old gasoline fridge. The name painted on the fridge door in bright blue read: J.K. & J.J. Hani — Cassiopeia Ranch. The word Cassiopeia was in rough cursive print. The driver, Lance Abbott, read it out loud with a grunt. His eyes darted across in-turn to survey the other mail boxes.
A quick glance — a square mail box stuck on top of a star-shaped iron dropper hammered into the ground through an old car tire with W.J. & J.S. Thomas — Norlinga Estate, written on it. His eyes swung across to the other side of the road. An old hollow and partly rusting 44-gallon drum hung on a pole: A.J. & R.J. Hani — Cassiopeia. The last word was new blue paint, again in painted in cursive print. The dripping botched paint job implied an amateur painter, a young child perhaps?
Clatter! Bang! The wind rose bouncing a rusty old drum that hung off the side of a tree from side to side, the rusty wires somehow managing to halt its inevitable demise. Lance smirked. Large gaping rusted holes told the history of a slow death by children pelting stones at the enemy camp.
‘J.J. & D.J. Henton — Baracuta Holdings,’ he read aloud.
The panel van clunked into gear and puttered up the road. After some five hundred meters, and approaching the first bend in the road, it abruptly stopped. A house ahead some distance off the road, on the top of a small ridge to the left, caught the driver’s attention but only for an instant. Climbing out Lance now slammed the front door shut. He limped ungainly to the back of the vehicle. Dragging open the squeaking back doors he pointed his palm towards the small blue orb.
The orb rose, hovering, and then it floated out of the vehicle. It halted mid-air, levitating above the middle of the road. Lance hobbled across and depressed several buttons on the top of the orb, with a sharp click. A small blue conical vertical beam of light shot abruptly out the top of the orb. A remote controller device gradually appeared on top, as if teleported. It levitated there, supported by the conical light. Grasping it now Lance turned and pushed the back panel van doors shut with a clank. His hands flashed a metallic color as his body rapidly vibrated and he morphed into a translucent, bi-pedal, man-sized grey-green praying mantis-like creature, and then back into Goto. As he shape-shifted, he grew, and then shrunk in size to accommodate the different body proportions. Goto shrugged his shoulders and then clicked his neck.
‘Ah! That feels much better.’ He pulled the skin of his face and then let it go, like one does to an elastic band. Twang! The skin snapped back, drawing itself taught over the face.
A slightly smaller man now, Goto backed away from the orb and turning pointed the remote controller device at the panel van. The panel van splashed from a metallic to a clear transparent color and then flashed back to normal again. Grunting now, Goto pointed the controller again. The panel van’s sharp outline blurred into multi-overlapping dimensions — like double vision. The panel van flipped end-on-end, so the front and back met in the middle. It then turned inside out, back the right way again, then inside out — so the inside of the car was the outside, then the inside.Transforming, the van emitted the noise flip, zao, zao, flip, zao, zao!
The panel van flipped inside out several times in rapid succession, each time followed by a dull clunking zao, zao. All of a sudden, with a sharp clunking the panel van shrunk in size. It rose above the ground, levitating, spinning horizontally in a slow clockwise direction.
Goto abruptly stopped. He recoiled sharply, aware of the gaze of an unwelcome onlooker. Then he depressed the remote control device. A green web-like ray extended from the orb. The panel van faded, becoming almost completely transparent. The fence line trees shone through it.
‘Huh? What’s that?’ Goto focused carefully, scanning through the transparent vehicle with his telescopic eyes at the vague form of a man squatting behind a fence in the distance. Chuckling to himself now Goto opened his mouth, revealing a small robotic bee-like insect AI perched on the tip of his tongue. The insect flapped its little wet wings, lifting off, exiting. And then, hovering
in front of Goto its beady pale blue eyes awaited an unsaid command. Turning now, the artificial intelligence fluttered towards the fence line in pursuit of its victim.
The panel van slowly shrunk to a small transparent object the size of a basketball. Goto pointed the remote controller towards the orb. Clap! Zap! With a sharp clap of thunder, the green web-like ray of light sucked the transparent panel van into the top of the blue cone at the top of the orb. The panel van turned to spaghetti entering the conical singularity. It disappeared with a flash of light. Zap! Then, it was gone.
Moving across now, Goto placed the remote controller back onto the blue conical light. The object levitated and then slowly rotated clockwise. As Goto stepped backwards several paces the blue cone of light slowly engulfed the remote control device. Both the light and the device were sucked into the top of the orb, disappearing with a yellow spaghetti-like splash.
Meanwhile, the solitary insect fluttered over the fence, hovering behind the lone intruder. Bouncing like an unstable helicopter it landed on his back. Then, retracting its wings it crawled mechanically up towards the nape of the neck.
The blood red sun draped down over the ridges to the west, slowly sucked down, soon gone in a gulp. The stars flickered in the night sky. Dusk turned to twilight, then to darkness. A large dark triangle-shaped spacecraft five hundred meters wide swooped down like an eagle, flying low and whipping over the escarpment in the distance. Other than the whooshing of wind as it passed overhead, it emitted no other sound. Approaching in stealth mode it gradually rose until four small lights flew in formation high in the night sky above. The man by the fence glanced up at them and then his eyes again transfixed securely on the orb.
Goto also flashed a look up towards the triangular shaped spacecraft. Watching the object swoop past overhead, he made churning, gurgling and clicking noises. Moving forward now, he tapped the top of the orb and then stepped back several paces. A strong beam of green, web-like, light suddenly shot out of the top of the orb with a flash. It scanned his body up and down. A hologram screen appeared above the orb and a series of digital codes flashed up and down the screen in rapid succession. Goto held out his hand, palm first, towards the light. The top hemisphere of the orb emitted a pulsating beacon of blue light. The bottom hemisphere whirled rapidly on the spot, levitating. It slowed down and stopped spinning, made clunking and whizzing sounds and began to expand in size. The base of the orb transformed to a whiskey-glass shape. A door etched itself, forming on the side of the orb. It flipped open upwards revealing two chairs inside the small, now one meter high, translucent orb. Clunk! Clunk! Clunk! Thud! A screen, digital displays and a rainbow of translucent lights lit up the interior. The two chairs merged as one.
Goto climbed into the glassy-colored blue orb, sat down and began to morph back into his insect alien form, from his legs upwards. His leg nearest the door transformed to the greenish-red hue of a bi-pedal praying mantis, growing slightly longer, cockroach-like. The door of the orb dropped and closed, with the outline sealing the door. Vibrating compound eyes and a small pointed humanoid mouth and wagging writhing tentacles shone through glassy side of the orb.
The blue, translucent, orb rose several meters off the ground where it hovered for a few seconds, rotated some 90-degrees, and then shot off in a blinding white flash of light into the sky towards the large triangular-shaped object. It made absolutely no sound. As it caught up with the larger craft, the small orb slowly turned a reddish-orange hue. With a rapid half-orbit of the craft the orb merged into the nose of the triangle. Five lights now flashed below the craft. The red light disappeared with a blip. Then there were four. A bright flash of blue-white light opened up in front of the large craft. The bright light closed up like a singularity in a flash, the spacecraft deleted from this world in a blink.
The middle-aged man squatted by the fence post, shot-gun in hand. He ducked to avoid detection, as the orb flashed overhead. Robotic insect-like wings floated down and bounced in slow motion off his shoulder. The insect stood upright, several flanges opening up on its sides. Rotating rapidly and drawing blood, it tore into the flesh at the back of the man’s neck. The burning sensation piercing his neck, his head jerked backwards and he let out a piercing scream. Sliding forward against the fence post now, the man fell unconscious.
Crack! The noise echoed in the air with a loud retort as the shotgun went off.
The outside lights of the house on the ridge flickered on. A thin, good looking, thirty-five year old sandy haired woman appeared at the screen door. She opened the door, leant out and began to call his name.
‘Jack! Jack! Are you okay?’ Denny (Denise) Henton called. ‘The kids are getting ready to go spotlighting!’ She walked out onto the verandah rubbing her hands on her cooking apron and called his name again.
#
That same night, near the Ghost House at Cassiopeia Farm:
A group of five hooded men clustered around the bonnet of Martin Dunbar’s Jaguar. He had parked it off the side road to Bill Thomas’s property, hidden in a thicket of trees.
‘Okay chaps. We all know our jobs. Let’s go and put some fear of god into the locals,’ Martin Dunbar spoke. ‘We’ll split into two groups. Jimmy Arsenic you and Guy Porter can come with me. Rich, you can take Rodney Vance and Jeremy O’Neil. Stick together. Keep your voices down. Aliens don’t speak English.’
Rich Dunbar looked at his wrist watch, pointing at it.
‘Okay. It is 8:06 p.m. We’ll meet back here at 10:00 p.m.,’ he said. ‘Those late back are walking home.’
‘And no weapons,’ Martin snapped at them. ‘Chuck all your guns in the boot of the car. Now! I don’t want to be accidently killed by one of you loose cannons shooting at things that move and go bump in the night. I want to buy their land cheaply, not get buried on it. We want to scare the shit out of them, not kill them. And Jimmy, that includes the pistol tucked into your jeans behind your back — and you can lose the one strapped to the side of your leg. That goes for you too Rich! And—, can someone turn off the blasted car headlights?’
Chapter 16: Meat and Potatoes
The same evening, at Our Place on Cassiopeia Farm:
Mother’s eyes flicked up at Jo’s reflection in the kitchen window.
‘Hi Mom,’ Jo said smiling, waltzing over behind her towards the sink.
‘Hi Pudding,’ Mother turned. Jo rushed to hug her.
‘Heni has a girlfriend, but I never told you!’ Jo whispered excitedly, pushing away from Mom and laughing slyly, dragging her finger across her lips.
Mother nodded silently, did the same with her finger and made a zipping sound. She shot a quick glance at the door. The full force of the door caught my face as the door slammed into it.
‘Crappers! That hurt like hell,’ they heard through wooden door.
‘Stop being mean to Heni,’ Mother glared at Jo, raising her eyebrows and finger and then nodding at the door. Seeing the disapproving look on Mom’s face Jo shuffled uneasily. ‘Amanda Thomas is it?’ Mother added, her scowl changing to a smile. Jo nodded broadly. My secret was out. ‘Well, that’s a good choice! Tell me more later on then cutie pie,’ she whispered, tapping Jo’s forehead.
Rubbing my nose, I followed Jo inside, the door clicking shut behind me. My eyes scanned the kitchen. At the other end of the room Mother looked up from peeling potatoes. She held a knife in one hand and a half-peeled potato in the other. My eyes focused on the bandage on her thumb. Mom was holding it tenderly, careful not to bump or knock it. She finished peeling the potato now and then diced it into large chunks, all the time humming away cheerily. Washing several chunks under the tap now, she stacked them neatly onto a ceramic plate. Then she turned to look at me, wiping her hands on her smudged apron.
‘Hi Mom,’ I said walking over, waiting for her to acknowledge me.
‘Hi, young serial-ant killer, and how are you today?’ Mom replied, hand on one hip, and with some disdain. The other hand flashed a knife in the air.
; ‘Serial — ant killer—?’ I looked at the reflecting sharp knife blade, speechless.
‘Yes! Stop peeing on the ant heaps,’ Mother added, flaying the knife around.
‘Duh!’ I looked horrified. ‘You — you were watching me pee?’
Her eyes still on me, she motioned with the knife towards the window. The bedroom window curtain and blind were wide open. I suddenly felt exposed.
‘Ooh! How gross! How — Yuk! Oh, come on!’ I complained.
‘Not as gross and disgusting as what you were doing! Please. Don’t do it anymore. Okay?’ she said pointing the knife blade at the bedroom. The light reflected off the sharp edge.
‘Yes Mom.’
‘Promise,’ Mother brandished the knife in her hand above her head in a warning.
‘Okidoki Mom, I heard you!’ I said, catching a reflection of Jo’s guilty face in the window. ‘I’ll bet Mouth Trap told you everything,’ I scowled back at Jo.
Jo looked away sheepishly as I followed her into our bedroom, tossing my bag onto the bottom bunk bed. Yes, you guessed correctly. We shared the same room.
‘Take your bag off my bed Heni,’ Jo said rudely as she hurled her own bag onto the floor near the bottom bunk. ‘We already agreed that yours is the top bunk bed. This is my space. And I’m not swapping. No way! Don’t even think about it.’
‘Wow! What’s up with you today, bossy britches?’ I asked. She scowled back.
Diced chunks of potato plopped into an empty metal saucepan, and the tap gurgled as Mother began adding hot water to it. The saucepan ground its way across the cast-iron top of the slow-combustion wood stove. Metal scraped metal as the round plate on top of the oven was dragged open. An iron bar stirred down through the hot red coals now. I clambered onto the top bunk and lay there on my back staring at the ceiling for some time. The crumpling of a paper bag and a hiss jerked me awake as Mother picked up a pinch of salt between her fingers and flicked it into the saucepan. Some missed and hit the open flames. The round metal plate clunked back into place. Cold water passed through a pipe in the combustion wood stove and flowed back to the sink. Boiling water gurgled out of the sink tap as Mother washed a cup. Clatter! Placing the cup upside down on the bench Flip! Clank! Mom picked up an empty metal milk bucket.
