‘Hmm, ‘onus.’ That’s quite an intelligent word for me,’ Eric thought to himself. Technically, Azleev had been the one who used it, but given that the G.O.T. had drawn the word from Eric’s brain he consequently felt quite impressed with his apparent expansive vocabulary.
The receptionist considered Azleev’s words for a moment. “Yes, I think that would be acceptable, sir,” she eventually decided, and she began looking up Hank’s details on her computer.
“Ar, class!” Eric exclaimed. He had been starting to worry that all of their efforts at decommissioning the central telecommunications processor were going to go to waste. However, Eric’s newly acquired hope was soon crushed when the receptionist rang the abductee only to get his answering machine.
“I’m sorry, sir,” she apologised, “but he isn’t picking up right now.”
“Well could you keep trying,” Eric suggested.
“I’m sorry sir, but I have other work besides…”
“That’s okay,” Azleev interrupted. “We’ve already imposed upon your time more than is polite.”
“Yeah, thanks for your help,” Jixyl agreed, “but we’ll be on our way now.”
“Eh? What are yous on about, man?” Eric questioned, confused by their lack of persistence. “Just try one more time.”
“No, really. That’s fine,” Azleev smiled, and he began walking out of the reception.
“Come on, Eric. We haven’t got time to waste,” Jixyl remarked, cajoling Eric to follow him.
“I know. That’s why I’m trying to…” He suddenly realised that Jixyl and Azleev’s behaviour was slightly strange and therefore suspected that there was something they weren’t telling him. His curiosity soon got the better of him and so he followed the pair of them outside. “So how come you don’t want to contact this abducted dude any more?” he asked.
“We do,” Azleev explained. He began typing a number into his mobile phone. “That’s what I’m doing now.”
“Eh? How d’you know his number, like?” Eric inquired.
“Well the woman typed it out right in front of us,” Jixyl shrugged. “Did you not see her?”
“Well, yeah,” Eric acknowledged. “But his number’ll be, like, about eleven digits long, like.”
Jixyl looked at Eric as if this information was totally irrelevant. “And?” he shrugged.
Eric suddenly realised that Jixyl and Azleev possibly had far superior short term memories than humans. “So can you remember eleven digits easily, can you?”
“Well of course,” Jixyl confirmed. “Can you not, like?”
Eric was about to answer when Azleev gave them an update on his call to Hank Truman.
“He’s still not answering,” he revealed.
“Leave a message on his voicemail, then,” Eric suggested. “And we’ll have to hope he checks his voicemail before they get the central telecommunications processor up and running again.”
“No need,” Azleev remarked. “We can just follow the signal. It’ll lead us to his phone and hopefully to Hank.”
“Hey, your phones are class, like,” Eric praised. The more he learnt about Jixyl and Azleev’s planet and technology and way of life, the more he sort of half told himself that it wouldn’t be the end of the world if mankind did get destroyed. Well obviously literally it would be the end of the world, but metaphorically he wouldn’t be too bothered. Well actually, no, he would be totally gutted for everyone if they all got killed, but on the other hand, every cloud has a silver lining…
“It’s coming from Las Vegas,” Azleev revealed.
“So Las Vegas here we come,” Jixyl announced.
“Ar, class! Vegas!” Eric exclaimed. “I’ve always wanted to go to Vegas!”
“It’s not a sight-seeing trip,” Azleev reminded him.
“Ar, I know,” Eric acknowledged. “I just meant it’s good cos … well, you know, like … Vegas is in the middle of the desert so it should be easy to find a landing spot for the spaceship.”
Jixyl and Azleev weren’t convinced by Eric’s quickly concocted explanation for his enthusiasm, but they weren’t in the mood to discuss the point further and so they headed straight to their spaceship and then set a course for the city that never sleeps.
Chapter Twelve – ‘It Can’t Be A Barrel Of Laughs…’
Eric sat in the alien spaceship pondering on what to do regarding the text message he had received from Jeemia. The one about ‘shagging a black guy.’ When he had first read it he had to admit that he didn’t feel too much sympathy for Jixyl, what with his probable intentions to destroy mankind and all that, but since then his opinion of Jixyl and Azleev had changed dramatically. Even before he had seen the video of the Grand Emperor of Fem delivering his ’Quality Of Life’ speech, he had been starting to trust them, but since seeing the video he was virtually convinced that they were telling the truth.
Which meant he should probably tell Jixyl that his girlfriend was cheating on him. Eric’s main concern though, was ‘shoot the messenger’ syndrome, i.e. he suspected that if he told Jixyl about his two-timing girlfriend then Jixyl might then decide to take out his anger on Eric.
So to avoid this possibility Eric convinced himself that it was therefore okay to withhold the information from Jixyl for a little longer. Just until a suitable opportunity to discuss it presented itself.
In anticipation of this suitable opportunity presenting itself, Eric decided it was a good idea to subtly quiz Jixyl and asses his psychological characteristics in order to allow him to break the bad news in a way that Jixyl would find most palatable.
And so Eric decided to start up a conversation about lasses in general and then gradually work the conversation towards the direction he wanted.
“So what do you reckon of the lasses on Earth, then?” he asked.
“That woman at the Jerry Springer offices was a bit of a nightmare,” Jixyl answered.
“Nar, man. I’m not on about that woman at the Jerry Springer place,” Eric explained. “I mean in terms of fitness.”
“Well she wasn’t very fit, like,” Jixyl remarked.
“No, man. I know that,” Eric responded. “I was talking about, like, fit lasses.”
“Ar, fit lasses? Ar, right. Yeah, fit lasses are fit,” Jixyl sarcastically replied in his most sarcastic tone of voice. On this occasion G.O.T. managed to correctly convey his sarcasm, although this wasn’t strictly necessary as Eric picked up straight away that he was mocking him, albeit in a good natured manner.
“Nar, man. I don’t mean, like, do you think fit lasses are fit?” Eric clarified. “Cos obviously fit lasses are fit … hence the expression ‘fit lasses.’ I mean not including daft old women like that woman at the Jerry Springer place. Like, normal non-old lasses … how do they compare to lasses on your planet?”
“If I’m being objective I’d say the cream of Earth is a match for lasses on Fyra,” Jixyl replied, “…but it’s just that the cream on Fyra is more to my specific taste.”
“Yeah, I’d go along with that,” Azleev agreed, with a smirk on his face.
“And do you get to taste much cream?” Eric asked, continuing the metaphor. He was pleased that the conversation seemed to be going in the direction he wanted.
“You can’t ask that,” Azleev replied, defensively.
“Why not?” Eric quizzed, although he already suspected the answer. He guessed that it was similar to his reason for being uncomfortable discussing his top five fantasies, namely that he had never completed a top five fantasy to his total satisfaction. In all probability Eric assumed that likewise the reason Azleev was uncomfortable discussing the regularity with which he got to taste cream was because he got to taste cream a lot less frequently than he would like.
“Because I don’t want to discuss cream,” Azleev asserted.
“What about you, Jixyl?” Eric queried. “D’you get to taste a lot of cream?”
“Yeah, but unfortunately it’s always from the same carton,” Jixyl sighed.
Eric took a few moments to translate this metaphor into plain English and couldn’t help thinking that a future version of G.O.T. could perhaps incorporate this feature. “Does that mean you’re seeing someone?” he inquired, already knowing the answer. “But you’d ideally prefer a bit of variety?”
“Yeah,” Jixyl confirmed. “Well …no. I’m just joking about the variety bit, I suppose. But yeah, I’m seeing someone.”
“A lass or a lad?” Eric joked.
“A lass, you cheeky git,” Jixyl retorted. I should probably apologise for Jixyl’s reply which will no doubt be interpreted as homophobic by some readers. However, it should be noted that this is the way that at least ninety five percent of heterosexual males (both alien and Earth based) will respond when asked such a question, and I am merely reporting Jixyl’s response, not condoning it (nor condemning it). Basically, all I’m saying is don’t shoot the messenger, but feel free to shoot the message, even though I personally would promote a greater tolerance of unpolitically correct comedy when no malice is attached.
“What’s she like, then?” Eric asked.
“Alright,” Jixyl shrugged. Eric couldn’t help noticing that there didn’t appear to be much enthusiasm in Jixyl’s voice, nor in his body language. Eric was quite pleased about this as it meant Jixyl would hopefully be less upset when he discovered his girlfriend had shagged a black dude.
Eric then proceeded to ask one or two more gentle questions about Jixyl’s girlfriend but Jixyl didn’t seem particularly keen to answer them so Eric decided this would be a good point to drop the conversation. For some reason Jixyl seemed more keen to finalise the details of how they were going to approach Hank Truman.
After a brief discussion they all agreed that it would be best if Eric was the one that spoke to Hank and told him they needed his help. Given Hank’s inevitable distrust of all things alien this was altogether the most logical approach. So they fixed up Eric with Hank’s address and then agreed to follow a suitable distance behind to keep an eye on things.
Although their spaceship was equipped with light refraction displacement technology, as previously discussed the technology was only effective from twenty metres and upwards, which prevented them from parking right outside Hank’s house, so they instead decided to park up in the Nevada Desert just a little way out of Vegas. They then proceeded to follow the mobile phone signal towards Hank’s home. Eric was hoping Hank would live right at the centre of the main strip, but as they made their way into Vegas, Eric couldn’t help noticing that it seemed that Hank actually lived in a particularly scummy area of town and the further they followed the signal the scummier the locale became.
“This is starting to get a bit dodgy now, like,” Eric observed.
“Yeah, I was thinking that as well,” Azleev agreed.
“I don’t know why you’re worried,” Jixyl declared, directing his comment towards Eric. “You totally chinned[33] Azleev no problems when we first met you. I thought you were totally solid. Like, I know some of the people we’ve passed look like dodgy characters but I would have thought you’d be able to look after yourself.”
“Well I can in general,” Eric confirmed, “but that doesn’t mean I want to deliberately put myself in a dodgy position. The first thing our Tae Kwon Do teacher taught us was that if you’re ever in a dodgy position then the best form of defence, like, better than anything else you can do, is to run away as fast as you can.”
“It’s a pity you didn’t follow that advice when we first met,” Azleev reflected.
“Aye, well I was in a confined area, wasn’t I?” Eric pointed out. “I had no choice but to fight. Anyway, all I’m saying is do yous fancy walking a bit quicker? Just cos it feels like there’s some dodgy characters around here, like.”
“Yeah, no worries,” Jixyl concurred. “If you’re scared I don’t mind walking a bit faster.”
Eric smirked at Jixyl’s sly little comedy dig, but in any case it was only a couple of minutes before they arrived at Hank’s home and they encountered no trouble on the way. Jixyl and Azleev waited around the corner while Eric walked up Hank’s driveway and rang the bell. Within a few seconds Hank answered the door.
He looked at Eric but didn’t speak.
“Alright,” Eric greeted, nodding his head. “I saw you on Jerry Springer the other week and I need to, like, talk to you cos I’ve been abducted as well.”
Hank continued to look at Eric, his face expressionless. He still didn’t speak, which made Eric feel as if he had to explain himself further.
“Like, well basically the aliens that abducted me weren’t the same ones that abducted you, but my aliens know about your aliens and they reckon if you tell them everything you know about your aliens then they might be able to think of a plan to save the Earth from getting destroyed.”
Hank continued to stare at Eric. He was looking him over in the style that you would examine a car before deciding whether to buy it or not.
“So, like, do you reckon you could tell uz everything you know about their plan to kill us all?” Eric requested. “Just cos then I could tell the friendly aliens and they might be able to help us.”
It has to be said that Eric didn’t feel like it was going too well so far. However, after a few more moments Hank finally spoke, which raised Eric’s hopes just as they were about to hit rock bottom. “Come inside,” he instructed.
Eric did as he was told and stepped into Hank’s hallway. Hank then ushered him into the living room. It was a fairly standard looking room, with a settee, TV, table and not much else. Eric turned around expecting to be offered a seat, but instead he couldn’t help noticing that Hank was instead pointing a gun at his head.
“Flip!” he exclaimed. “What are you doing!?”
“I’m pointing a Magnum revolver at your alien ass,” Hank replied. “So you better make darn sure you give me straight answers when I ask you a few questions!”
Eric couldn’t help noticing that Hank’s gun was quite clearly pointing at his head and not his ‘ass’ like Hank had claimed, but he decided that this possibly wasn’t the most appropriate moment to give Hank an anatomy lesson and so instead he replied, “Yeah, definitely. No worries. Honestly, I’ll totally tell you the truth and all that … but I promise you, I haven’t got an alien ass, like. I swear down, it’s a human ass.”
Hank took a couple of menacing steps towards Eric. “I’ll be the judge of that,” he threatened.
“Ar, yeah. Definitely,” Eric agreed. “But I’m just saying, like … my ass is definitely of the human variety.”
“Put your hands up!” Hank ordered. Eric immediately did as he was told.
Eric had made an agreement with Jixyl and Azleev that if things weren’t going too well he would press the ‘help’ button on his mobile phone to warn them to come and help him, but the one flaw with this plan was that he hadn’t expected Hank to be pointing a gun at his head. The gun pointing at his head probably meant it wasn’t such a good idea to reach into his pocket and start pressing buttons, in case this annoyed Hank. Eric now realised that the plan was more tailored towards a situation where Hank engaged in a friendly chat, rather than a situation where Hank pointed a gun at his head. On reflection Eric realised that it was a fundamentally flawed plan, given that if Hank was engaging in friendly conversation there wouldn’t be much need to press the ‘help’ button. Eric made a mental note to make better plans in future.
Hank took another step towards Eric. By now the gun was right in front of Eric’s nose and was making him go a bit cross-eyed.
Eric had only once before had a gun pointed at him[34] and on that occasion he had been extremely frightened. He now discovered that it wasn’t an experience that became less scary the more you encountered it.
“Why are you really here?” Hank demanded.
Eric suddenly glanced wide-eyed over Hank’s right shoulder towards the door, then raised his eyebrows and let out a surprised “Flip!” Hank instinctively half-glanced in th
e same direction. Eric in turn instinctively grabbed Hank’s gun-holding hand in a hooking block with his right hand, then quickly placed his left hand over Hank’s elbow, then powerfully thrust Hank’s forearm backwards towards his shoulder. Well actually, significantly beyond his shoulder to be accurate. In any case, further than the human body was designed to bend without suffering damage.
It takes quite a while to explain the whole process of what Eric did but it didn’t take very long at all to action. Less than half a second probably, which was why Hank was lying on the floor in agony well before he had a chance to fire his gun.
“Argh! You’ve broke my freaking arm!” he exclaimed.
“I haven’t, man. I’ll have just damaged your ligaments,” Eric reassured him, as he calmly picked up Hank’s gun and tossed it well out of reach into the corner of the room.
If this was a movie Eric might have instead pointed the gun at Hank’s head in a menacing manner to create a bit of tension, but Eric had only fired a gun once in his entire life[35], whereas he had sparred hundreds of times, so he understandably had a lot more confidence in his unarmed sparring abilities than he did in his gun-firing abilities.
Plus, he didn’t particularly want to kill Hank as that would significantly reduce his chances of getting Hank to tell him what he knew about the Femlings’ plans.
“Argh! My arm! My freaking arm! It’s broken!” Hank meanwhile insisted.
“Look, man! It’s not,” Eric assured him. Eric’s patience wasn’t the most resilient in the world and by now he was becoming a little bit irritated by Hank’s scepticism. “Trust uz … I know the consequences of my self-defence moves.”
“Argh! Argh! It definitely feels broken,” Hank cried, placing greater trust in the absolute agony he was feeling than in the assuring words of Eric, even though they were confidently delivered.
How To Save The World: An Alien Comedy Page 13