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Objective: To write a Science Fiction short story of 750-1500 words about aliens or alien invasion. Submission date Friday 5th May 2017 . There are 30 marks for the story, and 10 marks for research and 10 marks your oral presentation.

For the research part of the project you need to write a review of movie you have watched and one story you have read about aliens.

The review should contain the following information:

• Title of Movie, Date of Release & Director [½]

• Principal Actors and roles [1]

• Brief plot outline [1]

• Your opinion of the movie [1]

• Why you would/would not recommend this movie to others [1]

• Your star rating out of 5 [½]

The review should contain the following information:

• Author and Title of the Story [½]

• Brief plot outline [1]

• Brief outline of main characters [1]

• Your opinion of the story [1]

• Why you would/would not recommend this story to others [1]

• Your star rating out of 5 [½]

Further Research Some other Alien themed movies you might like to see are:

The ‘Alien’ series

The ‘Predator’ series The Alien vs Predator series

Transformer series Men in Black Series

Battleship

Invasion of the Body Snatchers

1956 & 1993

The Day The Earth Stood Still

1951 & 2008

War of the Worlds 1953 & 2005

The X-Files Avatar The Abyss Signs

Battle Los Angles

Cowboys & Aliens

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What was the first ‘alien’ you can remember seeing in a movie or on TV? Write down what you remember about it and how you reacted when you saw it. Were you scared or were they a friendly creature?

Starter Draw The Alien Here

Question Your Answer Images

1.What is the Gravity like on

your Alien’s Homeworld?

Earth Standard? Greater or

lesser? Would lesser make them

tall & thin, greater short &

Squat?

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2. What does your alien eat?

Are they omnivorous like us or

vegetarian or carnivores.

Vegies are generally regarded

as peaceful, carnivores

warlike.

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How does your creature move

through Space? What sort of

spacecraft do they have? How do

they move, faster than the speed

of light or between dimensions?

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How does your creature

communicate? Vocally, by

telepathy or by machine?

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Now turn over and invent your alien.

Use this page to show me what your alien looks like. You can use it as a ‘mood board’ or just to draw your alien.

1. What is going to happen in your story? Or what are your first ideas for your story?

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2. What is the narrative Point of View for your story,

1st or 3rd person.

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3. Who are your central Characters? You should try to limit your story to no more than three or four characters, one of which will probably be an alien. Write a brief description of your first ideas for your characters below:

Character 1

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Character 2

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Character 3

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Character 4 ___________________________________________

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5. Setting. Where and when is your story set? If on Earth, in which country/city; if in space… where? If on another planet, where is that planet, near Earth, in our Galaxy or like Star Wars is it “A long time ago in a galaxy far away”?

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The Day the Sky Went Black

Summer of 2012 was going bad from the start, natural disasters

everywhere. Earthquakes in the most random of places, volcanoes were

erupting and hurricanes everywhere. The world started to believe that the

Mayan predictions about 2012 were actually coming true. And they almost

were. This is a journal of what actually happened after the invasion. If

someone is reading this then we survived.

December 20th, 2012 the day before the end. My family and I were

watching the news. A report came on saying that another earthquake has hit

New York city and the Chrysler Building has fallen. No confirmed deaths but

a number of workers were missing. "What a shame, I really liked that

building." My father said in a sad tone. "My father and I visited it in the 80s,

before I met your mother." The TV started to flicker after that. I changed the

channel but the flickering didn't stop. I opened my phone hoping to find an

answer online but I had no signal. The flickering stopped but now we were

watching static…….

Only Me

Saturdays are always my favourite day of the week. Brunch at

Lonnie’s, my local diner, is always something to look forward too. However,

this Saturday felt different, different in a good way. While I was on my way

driving to Lonnie’s I could not help but admire the beautiful weather, the sun

was shining really bright and there were barely any clouds in sight.

Surprisingly, there was absolutely no traffic on the way there. Even more

surprising there was no one at Lonnie’s, the door was open but the place was

empty. I opened my cell phone but there was no signal.

Franticly I ran to my car and drove downtown, not a person in sight.

It’s as if everyone just left town overnight. I turn on the radio and it just a

beeping noise on all the stations. Could that be the emergency tone? The only

logical thing for me to do at this point is to just go home and wait for

something to happen. At home I decided to turn on the T.V. and see if there

was anything on the news. It was the same thing on every channel; aliens have

crash-landed on Earth, in my town. That explains the evacuation, but what

about me ?.........

You should be in a position now to begin writing your story, but if you still

need some ideas, below are some starting points for story that you can adapt

and finish in your own way; and, on the next few pages are examples of

some 750-1500 word Alien themed short stories, some of which have been

written by former students who completed this project.

Story Starters

Zalzar and I

White. White. Everything was white. I could hear the sound of

footsteps coming towards me. Closer and closer, and suddenly it stops. I felt

like something had touched me on my back. I turn around only to find a 9

foot tall, blue creature that had huge eyes and slithery lizard-like skin. I turn

to the other direction and start running away from the creature. I run and run

but there is nowhere to go. All I could see was white. Hyperventilating, I

stop to take a breath. Out of nowhere the creature appears in front of me

with what looked like a weapon. He swings the weapon at my head and I

blackout….

It was the first day of Ramadan. Everyone was fasting. Everyone was

happy. After Maghreb prayers my family and I sat down to watch some TV.

We were randomly flipping between the channels but something caught my

father’s eye. It was a big “Breaking News” sign on one of the news

channels. A reporter was live from the capital, saying that an “An unknown

object has landed in the center of the city” …….

Gladiator

I sit in the cage waiting my turn to die. In front of me lies the headless

corpse of the sacrifice who fought last. At least he died a quick clean death,

a reward for his valiant efforts to stay alive, unlike the poor soul whose

remains lie scattered around the arena in a bloody mess. Three of his four

arms still hold the weapons he could not, or would not use and each arm was

hacked off in turn as he stood there refusing to fight or defend himself. As a

human and something of a novelty, I have been kept till last.

Such is the unfortunate fate of those of us unlucky to be caught by our

new alien overlords. We thought we were the lucky ones, those of us who

survived the invasion. But we weren’t. The lucky ones were those who died

a quick, clean death that first day. Better that than being hunted for sport and

if captured forced to fight to the death for the amusement of our new

masters…….

"First it wants to talk to us. Then I imagine it wants to explore the Universe, contact other

sentiences, swap ideas and information. The usual."

"We're supposed to talk to meat."

"That's the idea. That's the message they're sending out by radio. 'Hello. Anyone out there.

Anybody home.' That sort of thing."

"They actually do talk, then. They use words, ideas, concepts?"

"Oh, yes. Except they do it with meat."

"I thought you just told me they used radio."

"They do, but what do you think is on the radio? Meat sounds. You know how when you slap

or flap meat, it makes a noise? They talk by flapping their meat at each other. They can even

sing by squirting air through their meat."

"Omigod. Singing meat. This is altogether too much. So what do you advise?"

"Officially or unofficially?"

"Both."

"Officially, we are required to contact, welcome and log in any and all sentient races or

multibeings in this quadrant of the Universe, without prejudice, fear or favor. Unofficially, I

advise that we erase the records and forget the whole thing."

"I was hoping you would say that."

"It seems harsh, but there is a limit. Do we really want to make contact with meat?"

"I agree one hundred percent. What's there to say? 'Hello, meat. How's it going?' But will this

work? How many planets are we dealing with here?"

"Just one. They can travel to other planets in special meat containers, but they can't live on

them. And being meat, they can only travel through C space. Which limits them to the speed of

light and makes the possibility of their ever making contact pretty slim. Infinitesimal, in fact."

"So we just pretend there's no one home in the Universe."

"That's it."

"Cruel. But you said it yourself, who wants to meet meat? And the ones who have been

aboard our vessels, the ones you probed? You're sure they won't remember?"

"They'll be considered crackpots if they do. We went into their heads and smoothed out their

meat so that we're just a dream to them."

"A dream to meat! How strangely appropriate, that we should be meat's dream."

"And we marked the entire sector unoccupied."

"Good. Agreed, officially and unofficially. Case closed. Any others? Anyone interesting on

that side of the galaxy?"

"Yes, a rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence in a class nine star in G445

zone. Was in contact two galactic rotations ago, wants to be friendly again."

"They always come around."

"And why not? Imagine how unbearably, how unutterably cold the Universe would be if one

were all alone ..."

They're Made out of Meat Terry Bisson

"They're made out of meat."

"Meat?"

"Meat. They're made out of meat."

"Meat?"

"There's no doubt about it. We picked up several from different parts of the

planet, took them aboard our recon vessels, and probed them all the way through.

They're completely meat."

"That's impossible. What about the radio signals? The messages to the stars?"

"They use the radio waves to talk, but the signals don't come from them. The

signals come from machines."

"So who made the machines? That's who we want to contact."

"They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Meat made the

machines."

"That's ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You're asking me to believe

in sentient meat."

"I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. These creatures are the only sentient race

in that sector and they're made out of meat."

"Maybe they're like the orfolei. You know, a carbon-based intelligence that

goes through a meat stage."

"Nope. They're born meat and they die meat. We studied them for several of

their life spans, which didn't take long. Do you have any idea what's the life span

of meat?"

"Spare me. Okay, maybe they're only part meat. You know, like the weddilei. A

meat head with an electron plasma brain inside."

"Nope. We thought of that, since they do have meat heads, like the weddilei.

But I told you, we probed them. They're meat all the way through."

"No brain?"

"Oh, there's a brain all right. It's just that the brain is made out of meat! That's

what I've been trying to tell you."

"So ... what does the thinking?"

"You're not understanding, are you? You're refusing to deal with what I'm tell-

ing you. The brain does the thinking. The meat."

"Thinking meat! You're asking me to believe in thinking meat!"

"Yes, thinking meat! Conscious meat! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. The meat

is the whole deal! Are you beginning to get the picture or do I have to start all

over?"

"Omigod. You're serious then. They're made out of meat."

"Thank you. Finally. Yes. They are indeed made out of meat. And they've been

trying to get in touch with us for almost a hundred of their years."

"Omigod. So what does this meat have in mind?"

Treahans were over 300 cm tall, except for their bearded queen who was only 100 cm.

Eventually, all the humans stopped working while the Treahans farmed.

Meanwhile, back on Earth, the situation became severe. Nuclear bombs were

exploding almost every day. Absolutely everything was destroyed. The great cities that

grew bigger and bigger in the 21st century were now unrecognizable in heaps of rubble.

Fires raged and huge clouds of smoke blocked out the sun. All the vegetation on the planet

died within the two years of darkness that followed. This caused a chain reaction up the

entire food chain so that the only beings that survived were pockets of humans that

managed to avoid the nuclear explosions and fallout and the insects that can live anywhere.

The humans on planet Earth eventually turned cannibalistic, but with an ever-dwindling

population, the birth rate could not keep up. Mothers had no milk for their children, and

with life on Earth so dangerous, humans eventually ceased to exist. The only human beings

left in the world were those that had escaped to Treah ten years before. Of course, children,

the humans on Treah had no knowledge of what had happened on Earth, as they had not had

contact since they left the Milky Way as they decided not to return to Earth, as promised, to

retrieve more of their kind.

Over the years, since the humans’ arrival, Treahans changed their view of the

world. They no longer had time to spend with their families because they were working so

hard for the humans. For their hard work, they got nothing in return, which made them

jaded and bitter. They were no longer supporting their neighbors, and the first ever case of

crime occurred that shocked everyone: a Treahan’s pie disappeared. (However, they seemed

convinced that it was a human who stole it.) That was the last straw!

Queen Nashida called all her subjects to arms, for the female Treahans were even

more fierce soldiers than the men since they were protecting their young. They used clubs,

spears, bow and arrows and shields to massacre every last human as they slept in their beds.

This dreadful experience changed the Treahans forever, for never had a Treahan used

violence against another creature before. No one likes to talk about this dark period in our

history, children, but as your History teacher, I feel that you need to know. And, that is why

Treahans are xenophobic now.

“Alien” Arrival

By Khalid AlRashed

Now children, please sit down as I tell you an important story that

happened many, many moons ago when the aliens arrived. The year was 2,121.

By that time, planet Earth was all but destroyed: there were far too many

people by then, so everyone was constantly at war. Clean water was hard to

find; there was little oil, so all their fancy technology and machinery lay where

it stopped. Disease was extensive as sanitation was poor; there was little clean

water, and food had been so genetically modified that it contained little

nutritional value. This desperate situation led to a top-secret mission to find

another planet to save mankind.

This planet – Treah – was eventually found. It was once a glorious,

colorful planet: it was pink with lush jungles, mountains and valleys, emerald

green with vast oceans packed with aquatic life, chocolate-colored and -

scented ground, and a golden, peaceful population of Treahans, ruled by a

purple, bearded Queen Nashida. The entire population of the planet lived in

peace and harmony. Every Treahan helped his neighbor, worked hard to

provide for his family and benevolent queen, and had no concept of greed,

gluttony, or even crime. These days, children, are now called the “Glory

Days”. You may have heard your great grandparents talk about these times.

Well, all that changed when the humans arrived on Treah. The Treahans,

of course, welcomed the humans, as was their custom. The humans did not

know how to survive in their new environment with strange plants and climate.

The odd vegetation could have been poisonous to the human beings if the

Treahans did show them how to cook it properly. The Treahans often came

bearing gifts for the new creatures to make them feel at home. They helped

them build shelters and grow their first crops. All these gestures made the

humans strong, and it is likely that without the help of the Treahans in these

first few months, the humans would have surely died!

Little did the Treahans know that the humans had plans for their new

home. Seen as inferior, the humans thought that they could conquer their kind

hosts to control the wonderful, new planet. They secretly plotted to overthrow

Queen Nashida and her friendly, compassionate subjects. They wanted to own

the lush gardens and valleys that didn’t belong to anyone in particular but each

and every Treahan! Slowly, they started to build up a surplus of food and did

not share it with the Treahans, as was their custom. For the Treahans, this was

unusual. They could not understand why the humans didn’t want to share.

Still, the Treahans continued to work with the humans, as their help

was still needed. However, the Treahans noticed that the humans seemed to be

working less and less. “We need to organize the food stores,” they would say,

or: “We need to rest since we are so much smaller than you Treahans,” for the

How I Saved Planet 2493, and it's “Humans”

By Nayef AlSabhan

Day one: This my first day orbiting Planet 2493, Named “Earth” by its

most developed inhabitants, They call themselves “Humans” according to their

world wide wireless communication and information system which they call

“The Internet”. Earth seems fairly similar to its nearest planet which supports

advance life, Planet 2492, except Earth is much more advanced in technology

and science. They have many types of non-natural transportation which seems

to be limited to a distance of the nearest body orbiting them called the moon

(distance - 41345 pilms)

Day two: The humans seem unaware of my existence, they have not yet

developed the technology required to see my ship, I shall not attempt to make

contact until I further extend my knowledge of this strange planet.

Day three: After reading all the information on their so called “World

Wide Web” I find myself confused because of all the contradictory

information, first I found out that all humans are angry, but then some appear

to be happy, then I saw that humans did actually land on the moon, but then I

read that it was fake, after many other instances like that I concluded that the

internet is not a reliable source of information, I must interact with its

inhabitants to find out more about them.

Day four: After landing on earth, I transformed myself into a human,

immediately discovering that humans have a rather uncomfortable body,

perhaps that is why they are always disagreeing with each other.

After walking across a large crater in one of their countries called

“America” I found a prison full of different inhabitants waiting to be eaten, I

walked up to one of the prisoners, called a cow by the humans. This species

seemed to be their main source of food for the humans, and I greeted it with

the most common greeting used on this planet “hi”. The cows didn’t seem to

respond. “HI” I repeated, this time a bit louder, but still no response. I looked

around and saw a group of chicken, which were flightless birds, and walked up

to them and said “hi”, but all they did was run away, so I yelled “HI” from a

distance. They still didn’t respond. The horses perhaps would be the first to

greet me, so I walked up to them, and whispered “hi” because I didn’t want

them to run like the chickens did, but it was a hollow victory because. although

they didn’t run, they barely looked up. After talking to all the prisoners, the

thought struck me that they didn’t respond because they were scared of being

eaten. Therefore I would need to find the species that are higher than humans

on the food chain, and there was only one.

Day five: I finally found them, the only creatures that were higher than humans on

the food chain, after a day of searching for a highway, I found cars! A creature with a hard

outer shell, found in a variety of colours and shapes. It seems that their outer shell changes

as they grow up. At a young age they are small and only have three mouths, then as they

grow older they become wider and shorter, until they reach their prime which appears to be

when they are able to reach their fastest speed, after that point they start to decline, the gain

and additional two doors and slowly get thinner and rustier, They stay that way until their

death.

Day six: I made contact with several cars and they finally responded, although only

those with humans in their digestive track seem to respond. I walked in front of a moving

car yelling “hi”. It roared and just moved past me. After repeating that process several

times, I started to notice the looks on people’s faces as they were being eaten, It was

horrible, every time a car ran past me I saw the grins and anger on people’s faces.

Day seven: After studying cars, I found out that not only are they eating one of earth's

most intelligent species, but destroying it's environment, and drinking the remains of its

dead. There seems to be no reason for this creature to live any more. Tomorrow I shall

board my ship and send missiles to destroy every car on earth, which will help the

environment, and lead to peace among earth's inhabitants once and for all.

Games

by James Valvis

The alien sat, if you called it sitting, in my tree house as I tried to explain the

game of Monopoly to him.

"No, no, no," I said. "You're stupider than Billy Ailes and he's been left

back twice. Boardwalk is yours. You bought it and you own it. You just can't give

it up. Maybe you can sell it, but if you hand over all your properties you'll lose

the game."

The alien said, "Losing the game is bad?"

I rolled my eyes at him. I'd already told him three times losing was bad.

The alien smiled. At least I think he was smiling. "We keep Boardwalk

then?"

He was cool, very friendly, but his voice was kind of creepy. It didn't

sound like one voice but like many, millions of them, not loud but like an echo.

And echoes with echoes. As I understood it, every alien in the ship above was

connected to the alien in my tree house. When he spoke, they all spoke. What he

heard, they all heard. What he learned, they all learned. And they had a lot to

learn. Even the idea of money was weird to them. He started off trying to eat the

Monopoly bankroll I gave him. I had no idea how such a race was smart enough

to travel all those light years to get here, but I also had to admit it was impressive

how quickly he picked up my language.

"The object of the game," I went on, "is to get everything."

"Leave nothing for anyone else?"

"Right."

"Interesting," the alien said. He paused there, like there was a commotion

in his mind, like the aliens back on the ship were arguing. It seemed a lot of

bother over nothing.

"Are you ready to roll again?" I said.

"We come to share," said the alien. He looked something like a mini-

Predator, minus all the epic gear. He was about my height, but I got the feeling he

was a grownup. I mean, he gave off that vibe. "We have much to share, but we

now learn sharing not desired. We learn now about properties. Waterworks.

Railroads. We like to own. Owning better than jail. Don't like jail. Have to roll

doubles to get out of jail."

"Right," I said. "But, you know, Monopoly kinda sucks. A game can take

forever, and I guess you don't have forever. How about we play some chess?"

So we played chess. I had to teach him that as well. This alien (these

aliens?) didn't seem to know much of anything. I thought by starting them off on

board games it would be easier, but no dice. Still, he caught on eventually. The

hardest part for him wasn't learning the moves but understanding that one piece

had to take out the other piece.

"Why they cannot share space?"

"Because, dummy," I said. "It's no fun just moving pieces around the

board. Someone has to win and someone has to lose."

"Maybe black knight likes white bishop."

"They can't like each other!" I yelled. "They're different!"

More murmuring in the background, more discussion, and perhaps a wince

of pain in the face of the alien.

"Attacking is good?" he said finally.

"Attacking is terrific," I assured him. "It's the only way to win. It's the only

way to make the game fun."

We played some, and he wasn't very hard to beat.

“Checkmate," I said. "It's the end of the game. I won. I made the right

moves and you lost."

"We play again?"

"Sure."

We played about twenty games, during which I learned his ship was as big

as our moon but invisible, and by the twentieth game he was way out of my

league. It made sense. One sixth-grader against the collected minds of all those

aliens working together was a bit unfair.

I was bored with chess anyway, and so I pulled out my iPad and we played

some video games. That started out as disastrously as the board games.

"No," I said, frustrated. "You have to blast the people dead. God, you

aliens are so ridiculous. You just want to walk around with your lasers and talk to

people and heal them and everything. It doesn't work that way. You gotta shoot

or you die and your score is terrible. Here, let me show you how to fry those

people."

"Frying people is good?"

"Epic. Coolest game on Earth."

There was another conference in his brain. Then he said he had to go. He

was happy to have met me before he met anyone else. I had given them a lot to

think about and they would talk about things for a time and then come back in a

week. He said it would be a good idea if the people on our planet got ready to

play games. He was sure after the talk and the manufacturing of some game

pieces, there was going to be a lot of fun when he came back.

That was six days ago and I can't wait until tomorrow. It gets boring

around here having no one to play with.

The End

their greater force to steal our sculptures, our film reels, our paintings and our tribal masks and

put them all into one great museum for their own enjoyment, they have instead used their robot

slaves to take detailed holographic records of these treasures, never disturbing or displacing the

originals.

And they are not just interested in old artifacts. They have encouraged progress in art,

learning, literature, and science. Their clean power generators have dramatically increased

access to schooling for low-income youth in underpopulated areas. Their robot slaves have

taken on the most dangerous jobs in our societies, and yet the workers they replaced have been

carefully relocated to jobs in other fields, all ones furthering science and art.

Though they have enforced our nonviolence, our alien overlords have never asked us to

take up other aspects of their culture. They have not forced their alien customs upon us. They

have not forced their religion (if they have one--or many, for that matter) upon us.

They did, I concede, implant the identification microbes, which appear as long number-

strings on our lower backs when viewed under ultraviolet light. The microbes were transmitted

that first week through what acted very like a painless airborne virus, and are now

communicated genetically to our offspring, who are born with their unique number-strings--

which seem to indicate lineage, birth order, and a few other factors we have yet to identify. We

thought the numbers signalled the death of our humanity, and yet it has been over thirty years

now and my ID string has had less effect on my day-to-day life than my Social Security number

ever did.

The misconception came from the fact that we were imagining what it meant for

humans to tie identification symbols to the bodies of other humans. We were imagining camp

tattoos and the branding of slaves. And yet I have never been asked to identify myself using my

ID string. I do think, however, that our Machine Lords have a way of 'reading' the strings, and

through these readings, can perform a regular, automated census of our global population.

We have been denied freedoms and powers that as a species we once took for granted. I

am not saying that the Machine Lords created a paradise here. But I do think that the Machine

Lords have given us a world that we must acknowledge is in many ways an improvement over

the one they once conquered.

Tensions have risen lately. The massive spaceships that hover above us have lessened

in number and changed formation. The militants say that the first wave of the long-lived

Machine Lords was just a vanguard, and that they are now leaving to regroup with their main

force. They say that the Machine Lords are preparing for a second attack in an attempt to quell

the lingering murmurs of human resistance, solidifying their position as the undisputed masters

of our world.

I say that there was never a first attack. I say that our Machine Lords are not

regrouping, but leaving. This is because they are not a military vanguard, and they never were.

They are conservationists.

This is a tag and release program. And it's the "release" part that worries me most. The

Machine Lords are giving us back our freedom.

God help us all.

The End

An Open Letter in Defense of Our Alien Overlords

by Katherine Heath Shaeffer

Our alien overlords meant us no harm.

I understand the frustration and resentment that this sentiment will no

doubt inspire.

I know that none of us who were alive then will ever forget the

devastation that we experienced in the long, bloody weeks that followed first

contact. And yet it was a relatively bloodless conquest. This may sound like a

contradiction, but I ask you, just for a moment, to put emotion aside and think

about the time that followed our conquest logically. How many of the deaths that

we suffered were actually a result of the Machine Lords' aggression? How many

more did we lose to suicide and the riots? The independent militias who took up

arms after our surrender lost many of their number, that is true. But as we learned

much later (to our great cost), the aliens' machines--the giant robots we initially

mistook for the Machine Lords themselves--had built-in defensive capabilities

designed to prevent tampering. It was our own assault upon the lumbering towers

of metal that transformed them into engines of war.

You will tell me that who fired the first shot does not matter, that it was

nonetheless the Machine Lords' presence that acted as the catalyst for one of the

greatest disasters in our world's history. You will tell me that they were still

aggressors, that they were and are to this day an occupying force. You will tell me

that they simply had no business being here.

And I agree. We do have a prior claim to this world.

But were we good to it?

I am not just making the environmentalist rationalization, though that

theory gained some credibility in the early years of occupation due to our

overlords' clean air, clean water and forest restoration initiatives.

I am asking if we took our responsibilities seriously. Did we always try

communication before turning to violence? Did we respect each other? Were we

able to look past our own self-interest, to value each other's differences, to protect

those creatures, human or otherwise, who could not protect themselves?

If we use these criteria to measure effective mastery of this planet, then I

must say that the Machine Lords are doing the better job.

Not because they have forced upon us a strained world peace, though even

the bitterest dissenters cannot begrudge them that achievement. (Or at least, they

should not.)

But because, if we examine the actions of the Machine Lords, it becomes

clear that they do, in fact, value our differences, both amongst one another and

from themselves. They have done everything in their power to preserve the

histories and arts of our varied cultures, and though it would be easy for them with

the table and his head wide open, he grinned. "You're mistaken. My heart led me to

volunteer for this because of my wife--my mate--and my two young daughters. Although it

might not make logical sense to you, I felt I could protect them by coming to your ship."

"Your feelings are irrelevant. We've already moved out of orbital range of your

planet's weapons. Your heart has misled you... your presence here will not save your family.

Besides, when I speak of your heart, I speak of biological interest, not metaphorical

nonsense."

Eastwood clucked his tongue. "You have not investigated it thoroughly yet. Do you

see a small black mark on the superior vena cava?"

More clicking. The alien said something about the ancient sign of aggression when he

bared his teeth, and Eastwood found that to be funny, too. He knew this probably meant that

the time-released pharmaceuticals from the Earth United forces were finally kicking in. The

alien said it had found the mark. Eastwood directed him to follow in nine millimetres down

and to the left.

The creature gasped. "What is that?"

"I told you, we control our own evolution now. We don't have to wait to be

dominated by galactic overlords, adapt to them over millennia, and then find a way out from

under their thumbs generations later. Assuming you even have thumbs. We make our own

adaptations now."

He heard a tapping as the creature touched the casing with a claw or scalpel. "And

what is this particular organ?"

"It's called a pocket nuke."

"Ah. And what is its function?"

Sgt. Eastwood grinned and said a silent prayer. He activated the timer. "I'm glad you

asked."

The End

The Vivisection of Sgt. Shane Eastwood by Matt Mikalatos

"I believe we have found your temporal lobe, which means you should

be receiving translation now."

"We call that Wernicke's area," Sgt. Eastwood replied, wondering if the

translation went both ways.

"Excellent. The contra lateral neural control slowed our search." There

was a clicking sound, apparently untranslatable. "You've evolved a moderate

intelligence, but we're baffled by the rest of your development. No defensive or

offensive capabilities to speak of, other than standing erect and binocular

vision."

Eastwood couldn't see them. No one had seen the aliens yet. They had

arrived and eradicated Mumbai as an anti-resistance warning. Then they

demanded a volunteer, to familiarize themselves with human biology. A

willing subject was necessary, as they intended to vivisect him, and previous

attempts had shown that the human aversion to vivisection contaminated their

data.

Sgt. Eastwood had volunteered. "Our own scientists have wondered

about the evolutionary stall in humans. Our best guess is that the opposable

thumb and superior intellect removed a need for adaptation. We can create

tools faster than Nature. We control our own evolution."

The alien voice hummed to itself. "Question. You show an enormous

capacity for violence as a race, but it appears you have attempted to self-select

this trait out of your DNA?"

"True," Eastwood said. "We've not been successful."

"On the contrary, you are surprisingly docile. When we arrived in your

system with our tiny scout ship--scarcely a fourth the size of your moon--your

people rolled over without complaint. You will make an ideal slave race. This

vivisection is merely the last formality before sending the all clear to our battle

cruisers."

"Glad I could help," Eastwood said. "What's next?"

"Let's move on to the pulmonary system. You have a four-chambered

heart with a limited lifespan, perhaps in the three to five billion beats range.

Nothing unique."

"On the contrary, the human heart sets us apart from the other animals of

the Earth."

The alien made a disgusted sound. "You speak in metaphor. We have a

similar metaphor in reference to our spleens. The spleen is the seat of the

affections. Biologically speaking, however, there is nothing of interest,

Sergeant."

Eastwood laughed at that, and even though his chest was splayed out on

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