“I take your point,” Steve said. “But not being able to make generalizations is a bit restrictive, given that making generalizations is what theorizing is all about. I probably won’t need to refer to anyone else’s story in a specific sense, but I will have to refer to the general themes that keep cropping up.”
“What sort of general themes?” Walter asked.
“Well, the fact that all the stories I’ve heard are interpretable in terms of the aliens being time-travelers rather than space travelers, and the fact that, if you look at them collectively, they do add up to a vague image of what the future will be like: a long series of adaptive radiations, producing very different kinds of climax communities, punctuated by large-scale extinction-events.”
“You haven’t been coming to the group very long, Steve—just since the beginning of September, if I remember rightly, and we’re only at the beginning of December. I’m not sure that you ought, as a good scientist, to be generalizing on the basis of such a small sample.”
“Fair comment,” Steve said. “I’d love to have a broader perspective, if you’d care to share your own observations with me. It wouldn’t necessarily harm my theory, though, to find out that the time travel theme is fairly recent and fairly localized, because the sort of process I’m envisaging is a dynamic one. It would be entirely expectable, for instance, that all experiences of alien sightings and excursions would have been interpreted in terms of space travel back in the 1960s, because that was the dominant idea of the day—a key notion in our attempt to interpret our situation in the universe and our prospects for the future. Things are different now—the idea that we can see the future as the pioneering of new frontiers in space is more-or-less dead and buried, and all our calculations regarding future social progress have been confused and confounded by global warming and the unfolding ecocatastrophe. It’s not surprising, in those historical circumstances, that we should be interpreting our abduction experiences—and, more importantly sharing our abduction experiences—with the aid of different hypothetical reference-points. Do you see what I’m driving at?”
“Oh yes,” Walter said, earnestly. “I may be an old fool, but I’m not an idiot. I’ve read Jung too, you know—and a lot of books you probably haven’t. I’ve heard other theories, remember. They come and they go. That’s not what AlAbAn is for, Steve. AlAbAn’s purpose is to lend support to people who have these experiences, who couldn’t get that support from anywhere else—not from their families, or their workmates, or their friends. It’s for people to tell their stories in a non-skeptical environment, where no one will laugh at them or accuse them of deluding themselves. I don’t want to violate that principle here and now by questioning your theory or suggesting that you shouldn’t have a theory. I’m delighted that you’ve found that means of getting to grips with your own experience, and you have my full support in extrapolating it as far as you can and as far as you need to. I don’t want to censor what you might want to say to the meeting, be it next Thursday or some time in the new year. All I’m asking you to do is think about it, and try to make sure that you’re continuing to offer us the kind of support you want and expect from us. We’re not scientific investigators, and we’re not educators—we’re just a group of friends, trying to help one another out. If I’ve learned one thing in forty years of chairing the local branch of AlAbAn, it’s that we all have to come to terms with our own experiences in our own way.”
“We’re all unique,” Steve said. “Yes, that’s part and parcel of my theory. Even though we’re all unique, though, we’re also all parts of something greater. AlAbAn is a collective as well as a set of individuals. The communication aspect is important.”
“Yes it is,” Walter said. “It’s very important. That’s why we have to be so careful. That’s why we have to be supportive, and non-judgmental, and accept one another for exactly what we are, instead of trying to fit one another’s experiences into our own way of seeing. I think you know well enough what can happen to a group of friends when that kind of supportiveness breaks down.”
Steve started slightly at that, although he realized that he had no call to be surprised. Even if Janine hadn’t taken Walter Wainwright into her confidence by telling him everything, the old man wasn’t blind, and he was certainly no fool.
“You must have formed general impressions of your own,” Steve said, “in more than forty years. You must have ideas of your own as to what’s really going on.”
“Of course I have,” the old man agreed. “I even used to formulate theories, once upon a time. Then I gave it up—not just for the reasons I’ve just given you, but for another. You might not be as sympathetic to that one, given that you’re a teacher, but I’ll tell you anyway. Theorizing is, in essence, a matter of telling other people what to think, telling them how to interpret their own experiences Even if the theories are right—in fact, especially if the theories are right—they don’t like it. They resent it. Even if they need it, the way your pupils need the substance of the national curriculum, not just in order to pass their exams but to function as thinking individuals, they still resent it.
“Running AlAbAn and its predecessors has taught me that people like listening to stories. They’re prepared to be interested in things that happened to another person, and sometimes become quite enthusiastic to know what happened next. Because of that, they’re prepared to take an interest in how what happened made the storyteller feel, and sometimes in what it made the story-teller think—but mostly, they just want to know what happened next. What they’re not interested in, and won’t thank a story-teller for, is telling them how it’s supposed to make them feel, and what it’s supposed to make them think. When I realized that, I made my own decision as to what was important, and what my groups could actually do for people—people like you, Milly and Janine.
“I want to give people space and time to come to terms with their own experiences in their own way, whatever that might be. I’ve been lucky enough to find other people to help me do that— especially Amelia. I’ve been friends with Amelia for more than fifty years. I’d like to think that we’d both been lucky in that respect, and that we’d shared our luck with our other friends. It’s up to you, Steve. You can say anything you want to at the meeting. All I ask is that you think about it first—about all our mutual friends, even the absent ones, and whether you can support them as well as supplying your own needs. It’s not easy, sometimes, as you well know.”
“I get it,” Steve said. “Thanks, Walter—I think that’s what I needed to hear. At any rate, it’s a judgment worthy of Solomon, and I certainly don’t think that you’re an old fool. I never did. I think they’re setting up for the quiz now, so I’d better leave you to it. Thanks for slotting me in.”
“Actually,” Walter said, “you could return the favor if you’ve nothing better to do. We’re a man short tonight. Our history specialist had to go into hospital for a hernia operation.”
“I’m a science teacher,” Steve said apologetically.
“I know,” Walter told him. “We rarely get science questions, unfortunately, but it doesn’t much matter. We rarely win, even when we’re at full strength. Our combined ages usually add up to far more than three hundred, which is a lot of experience, but our memories aren’t what they used to be and we’ve lost touch with modern fashions in just about everything. If you can bear the thought of spending Saturday night with four old men, we’ll be glad of your company as well as your input—unless, of course, you’d feel happier teamed with people of your own age. There are always a few strays around to form up new teams, and you might do better playing against us than for us. The prizes aren’t up to much, though.”
Steve looked around, to watch the other teams forming up. Janine, he observed, was the only young person in a team of older people, although her father and his three companions weren’t nearly as old as Walter and the other old men who were shuffling over to join him now that he’d signaled them to do so.
“T
hey won’t let you on to that team, I’m afraid,” Walter said, following the direction of Steve’s forlorn gaze. “They’re frequent winners, so there’s always a queue to join them. It put one or two noses out of joint, I can tell you, when Janine got in ahead of their regular reserves—but family always counts for more than convention, and rightly so. She pulls her weight, mind—very good on geography, I understand. We get a lot of geography questions, since the budget airlines made foreign tourism so cheap. Not our forte, alas—Stan and Keith haven’t been out of the country since they came back from National Service in the Far East in the fifties. Different generations, different attitudes.”
“I don’t travel abroad myself,” Steve admitted, “but if you’ll have me, I’m in. Maybe we’ll get an unexpected glut of science questions and give Janine’s Dad a run for his money.”
No such glut materialized, alas, and Walter’s team came a poor seventh in spite of Steve’s heroic assistance in the well-trodden field of popular culture. Unfortunately, the Royal Oak had no shortage of experts in that area, whose knowledge of television shows was far greater than Steve’s. He was able to take some comfort, though, from the fact that Janine’s father’s team hadn’t won either, perhaps because their new star player had been distracted by the necessity of looking daggers at Steve all night.
Milly phoned him, as usual, on Sunday afternoon. “I phoned three times last night,” she said, “but you had your mobile switched off.”
“I had to,” Steve explained. “Rules of the game. I went to see Walter Wainwright to check up on lines I might be in danger of crossing if I tell my story on Thursday, and got drafted into playing for his team in his local pub quiz. No ring-tones allowed.”
“Would that be the quiz night at the Royal Oak in Codford, by any chance?” Milly asked, her suddenly-icy tone seeming to freeze the phone in Steve’s hand. “The one that Janine’s father always wins?”
“He only came third last night,” Steve said, feebly. He waited for the deadly question, but it never came; Milly, it seemed, already knew—or was prepared to take it for granted—that Janine must have been there.
“I just wanted to ask Walter about group protocol,” Steve insisted. “I thought, with your father being at death’s door, that you might not make it Thursday and I’d have to do my thing instead, as I’d sworn on oath.” He figured out a moment too late why that had been an extremely unwise thing to have thought, let alone said.
“You mean,” Milly said, “that you were planning to tell your story while I wasn’t there!”
Steve’s explanations, which had to do with promises made and anxieties formed and a general tendency to thoughtlessness, stuck in his throat, while Milly added; “Well, you don’t have to worry. Dad’s still stable, and seems likely to remain that way for some time to come. Come hell or high water, I’ll be there.”
She kept her promise, although Steve didn’t see her until she phoned after school had packed up on Thursday to tell him to pick her up at the railway station at seven. Their conversation on the way out to East Grimstead was entirely dominated by the subject of her father’s health and her mother’s response to its deterioration. Steve couldn’t help noticing that Milly seemed to be suffering more considerably than was strictly necessary in sympathy with her parents; she didn’t seem to be herself at all.
“You’re in no condition to tell your story,” he observed, as he parked the Citroen, although he knew there was some risk in saying so. “Far better to let me go first.”
“It’s just talking,” Milly replied. “I can do talking. I don’t have panic attacks when I relive my experience.” When Steve opened his mouth to reply, she immediately added: “Just leave it, will you. Let’s get inside. I’m dying for a cup of tea and a biscuit.”
She seemed to be telling the truth—at least, once they were inside, she paid far more attention to her tea and biscuits than she paid to Steve, or anyone else.
When the time came for Walter Wainwright to call for volunteers to tell a story, they both stuck up their hands immediately, as agreed. As expected, Walter chose Milly.
<
* * * *
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Road Rage Incident
I’ve been coming here a long time and I want to apologize for having taken so long to tell you my story. I’ve known for a long time that it’s no more bizarre than most other people’s stories, and that you’d be perfectly polite about it, but I just wasn’t ready. There were times when I thought I’d never be ready, but I think I am now. I think I can tell it without fainting or breaking down in tears. The memory of nearly being eaten by six different sorts of dinosaurs, shot dead by leering lizards with comic-book blasters and blotted out by shadows from the other side of time, all in the space of a couple of hours, doesn’t seem nearly as frightening now I’ve done a few shifts as a traffic warden in school run territory.
As far as I can tell, the whole thing was a chapter of accidents. I think it was supposed to be a standard abduction—the little guys with the silvery skin and the almond-shaped eyes had me strapped down to an operating table when I woke up, and they were standing around me with the usual assortment of giant hypodermics and probes.
One of them was already leaning forward with a face-mask to give me another dose of anesthetic gas, and if he’d completed the action I dare say I’d have been out for the count until I woke up next morning feeling slightly nauseous and wondering whether I’d had a bad dream. He didn’t manage to get the mask over my nose and mouth, though, before there was an almighty bang and the whole ship lurched.
The little guys went down like so many skittles. I suppose they must have been screaming in pain and howling in anger, although they sounded more like a flock of seagulls arguing over the last sardine, with a few rusty buzz-saws thrown in for good measure.
The lurch was only the beginning. I don’t know whether flying saucers are supposed to be able to loop the loop, but the little guys certainly weren’t ready for it when it happened—and after doing a further somersault we started spinning and swaying like crazy, tilting every which way. The aliens were tumbling like dice, but I was okay because I was securely strapped down—or sometimes up, and more often sideways than either. My head was spinning even worse than the ship, of course, and I blacked out a couple of times from vertigo and the after-effects of the anesthetic, but I’ve been to Alton Towers more than once, so my stomach’s had a chance to get used to roller-coasters.
Everything settled down for a moment or two, and some of the aliens began to pick themselves up off what was now the floor— they were obviously tougher than they looked—but then there was another crash and off we went again, spinning and cartwheeling worse than the first time. This time, when we finally came to a stop, the ship was upside-down, and only a couple of the little guys were still capable of getting to their feet.
They didn’t pay any attention to me, hanging upside-down in my straps. The ones who could still move quickly scuttled out of the room, and the ones who could only move slowly crawled after them at their own pace. The three they left behind weren’t moving at all.
All of the restraints had held, and it took me several minutes to work my right hand free, but I managed to slip it out eventually. I was able to work the other waist-strap loose then, but I didn’t actually unfasten it until I’d loosened the ankle-straps and the strap on my left wrist as well. Then, very carefully, I extracted myself from the restraints and let myself down. I didn’t pay any attention to the injured aliens—I just wanted to get out of the crashed spaceship before its nuclear reactors exploded, or whatever.
It wasn’t easy to find my way around, with the corridor and all the doors being upside-down, and some of them being more than a little caved in. The fact that none of it was really built for human-sized people didn’t help. In the end, I managed to find a great gash in the side of the ship. I was a little thinner in those days, because I still had a problem with food and my self-image and so on, and I jus
t about managed to squeeze out. I was so intent on the business of getting out that I didn’t really take much notice of what was outside until I was actually out. I suppose I’d been subconsciously expecting Salisbury Plain, or maybe the New Forest, but what I found certainly wasn’t anywhere in Wiltshire or its neighboring counties.
The first thing that hit me was the heat; it was like stepping into a sauna—and by that I mean that it was humid, sweltering heat. It wasn’t actually raining, although the sky was solid with murky cloud, but it was as if the air were saturated with steam. There was enough vapor around, at any rate, to cut visibility to twenty or thirty yards, even where there were gaps in the trees. I say trees, but they weren’t the sort of trees you see in Wiltshire. Some of them looked a bit like coconut palms, but most of them looked like giant ferns or monstrous cannabis plants. It wasn’t just the serrated leaves that brought cannabis plants to mind—the air reeked with all kinds of nasty perfumes, some of which only had to be inhaled to send me as high as a kite. That’s what it felt like, anyhow, as I tried to stagger away from the crashed saucer.
Alien Abduction - The Wiltshire Revelations Page 30