CCC #88 - Voting Thread

-Do not be alarmed, Oliver, we mean you no harm-

This was hard for Oliver Atasil to fathom as he hovered horizontally above his bed in a semi prone position as several dark liquidy figures surrounded him.

"I'm dreaming, ain't I?" Oliver stammered as he looked around. The creatures looked as if the night sky had taken basic human shape. The glided silently around him.

-No, Oliver, you are very much awake- The reply seemed to come from all around and dropped directly into the back corner of his brain.

"DON'T PROBE ME!" Oliver shrieked as he tried to move.

-Oliver. We have no need to penetrate you in your rectum, despite the deep fears you have- The creatures all bleed into one single being. -We are simply cleansing you-

"Why? I had a shower last night! I'm clean!" Oliver struggled to no avail.

-We have chosen you, Oliver, as you are popular on this planet. Others listen to, watch, and follow your advice as you play video games and make...is it gifs or jifs?-

"G-gif."

-One hundred and four million people on daily basis. That IS less than one percent of the global population of seven billion, but your reach is wider than any political, movie star or religious figure. You speak and people listen and pass on the information.-

"I don't understa..."

-It is a hard concept to grasp from such a primitive mind evolved from bacterium via reptiles via apes. But you will tell the world about us via your platforms.-

"Tell the world? Who are you?! WHAT IS GOING?!" Oliver thrashed but he didn't move.

-There are no words in your limited vocabulary for what we are. So we will be called Aquan, based on our appearance and its easy ability to be said.-

"Sure, Aquan...let me go and I'll tell everyone. The police, the army..."

The creature looked at Oliver with hollow sockets and placed a hand over his mouth. -We only need your shell and your platform, Oliver. You are the first to meet us and you will introduce us to the world. Beyond that...-

Oliver tried to scream but the black liquid gushed down his nose and esophagus slowly filling him like a balloon.

Our first contact with 'the Others' as they would come to be known wasn't quite first contact.

You see they'd been watching us for awhile and as such it was more them deciding to reveal themselves to us rather than making any attempt at longstanding interaction.

It was in the winter of 1964 when they arrived and a very cold winter it was when I, Isaac Trishuffle lost all semblance of my sanity. On that day in that cold December I was in my office in a bunker located 400 feet below the White House. My job was and still is to investigate any sightings of extraterrestrial life and confirm any truth to the sightings. At that point all the sightings I'd investigated had been nothing more than rumors and speculation, though that wasn't necessarily true for the other investigators at the Agency.

God, I miss working at that place. I earned over 100.000 dollars a year along with bonuses, benefits and health care. My receptionist January was the nicest person I've ever met and there were more than a couple reasons that I liked having her around. Obviously once the Others showed up there wasn't much need for people like me anymore so the government gave me the boot so let me clarify: I still investigate alien activity. I just do it in a manner that's less than official.

The call came in about 9:30 in the morning, thankfully just after I'd finished my second cup of coffee. January passed the phone to me and some yokel from Boston filled my ear with what was going on in that sunny little part of the world. Some of the locals had seen, or at least thought they'd seen something that vaguely resembled a flying saucer. I got the address from them as was our policy and promptly slammed the phone down.

Mornings should be for waking up and nothing more.

"Who was that?" January had asked from her desk with that same perky little smile she always wore.

"Just some nut." I answered before moving onto coffee number 3. A few minutes later and the phone rang again, only this time it wasn't mine. Across the hall Agent Clark picked up, listened and took the address. Funnily enough it was the same as the one I'd just picked up. Another phone rang. Same address. Then another one with the same outcome. So after about five minutes of this I stood up, grabbed my coat and was surprised to find Clark doing the exact same thing.

"Coming along big fella?" I asked him. He gave a smile and adjusted the big pair of glasses sitting on his nose.

"Course I am, Shuff. I'll bet this one's the big one."

He said that before every investigation the poor guy. Back then in the field we used to call him Agent Krypton like the comic book character and the name stuck. Even he ended up using it... but the man from Krypton always brought a positive energy to the job that I felt was sorely needed and it's a shame things went the way that they did.

We rented a company car and made the 7 hour drive to Boston working in three hour shifts. We made stops along the way and I didn't really think much about the job after the first stop largely because I was thinking about the blueberry pie Clark had picked up and whether or not he'd be willing to share a piece. It was only during Clark's turn at the wheel that the potential of the case began to dawn on me. That many phone calls about one incident simply hadn't happened before and unnerved me slightly.

The Agency as we called it received dozens of phone calls regarding alleged alien sightings every day. Every now and then we'd get a couple of calls regarding the same incident but the events of today were simply unheard of and, following this cold December day would never be heard again.

We pulled into Boston 8 hours after departure and soon came to the haunting realization something was quite wrong. The city's lights were out casting the place in total blackness save for a strange blue light hovering over the city. Clark and I said nothing to acknowledge this. Instead the man from Krypton stepped hard on the accelerator and we whizzed to our destination.

The drive through Boston was a dark one with barely even a street lamp shining. Normally in such a crisis you'd expect to see the worst of humanity, people rioting and such but it seemed the blue light shining from afar had kept the population quiet and eerily content as they simply stood in the streets gazing up. At my suggestion Clark slowed the car right down to avoid turning any pedestrians into mulch but thankfully the city park where the craft had allegedly landed was nearby and didn't take long to travel to. A crowd had formed in the street so we were forced to disembark and several news crews had arrived in the time it took us to get there. I can't say I blame them really as the space craft hovering above that park was a true sight to behold.

"Holy god..." Clark muttered gazing up to the metal craft, his eyes wide like a blowfish. I, myself regarded the circular hover craft in a sort of shocked silence and tried to pull my eyes away, something that I was unable to do for a good few seconds.

"Come on." I finally managed. "Let's do our jobs." Reluctantly Clark nodded and began to follow my lead as I headed towards the nearby police barricade.

The police that were there were miserable souls who'd probably been in this quiet dark for a good few hours. Their eyes widened watching us approach and I realized they'd been expecting us. January was always very good at her job.

"Skip the pleasantries, K." I whispered to Clark. "I wanna get this thing over and done with." Thankfully the man did as he was asked and instantly whipped out his badge showing it to the nearest officer.

"Agent Krypton and Agent Shuffle." He said in a calm, collected voice. "We're from the Agency, here to investigate whatever that thing is." He nodded up to the flying disc. The officer he was talking to sniffed his nose in an unimpressed manner. "How long's that thing been up there?" Krypton asked.

"Too long." The officer sighed looking tired as he did. "Showed up here this mornin' just hoverin' over the park like a vulture. 'Bout an hour later all the power went off everywhere and that thing stayed perfectly still."

"So it hasn't landed yet?"

"Nah."

Krypton cast a quizzical eye. "Has anyone approached it?" The officer shook his head.

"Couple people got scared outta the park when it showed up. Since then we've kept everyone out.

For some strange reason that made me smile. "Then I guess we're first contact." Was all I said.

Our walk through the park was a silent one as neither of us what it was we would be facing. If it was a prank as I remember thinking it was at the time it was a scarily elaborate one. Now being under the craft I could hear the sound it was making, something resembling a metallic screech that ever so slightly began to grate at my eardrums. The officer hadn't been wrong about people leaving in a hurry either, across the ground lay several abandoned picnic baskets that must have been left behind in the mad scramble.

After a couple minutes of walking Clark and I found ourselves beneath a bright, glowing light emanating from the craft directly above us. Looking up to the ship I remember thinking about how cheap it looked, like a plastic prop used in a bad Sci-Fi flick. It almost made me laugh... but then I looked back to the ground and all my thoughts of laughter ceased.

Stood across from us just out of the light was one of the Others.

In my mind I'd imagined the beings aboard the craft above us as being some ind of squid faced, tentacled monsters, yet the creature ahead of us had none of those features. The creature looked disarmingly human and as it stepped into the light we were met with a thing from another world we could have easily walked past in the street. It was dressed in a sharp, black tuxedo that somehow seemed to be alive given how the fabric shifted and moved. The creature himself resembled a man of average height and build, he had dark hair and held a cigarette in his fingers that we never saw him smoke.

I looked to Clark and saw that he'd grown deathly pale and I nervously placed a hand on the pistol holstered under my coat.

"Identify yourself!" I commanded in a voice not meant to give commands. The Other simply stared and smirked. Clark was still staring. "Identify yourself!" I repeated, and this time the creature spoke.

"Meat." He said, his eyes not moving as his lips did. "You're just a world of screaming meat."

"What do you want?" I asked, hands trembling fiercely. Somehow the creature's smile grew to the point where I could see his teeth.

"We've been watching your kind for a while, Mister Trishuffle." He said, somehow knowing my name. "Seeing mankind's endeavors and misfortunes. After awhile we wanted to see how you'd all react to the truth." He said all of this with a sort of nasty snarl, cigarette still smoking. To my surprise Clark returned to life and asked in a fearful tone:

"What truth?"

The Other snapped his fingers sending out a shock wave that turned the whole world silent.

"To the fact that none of you are real." He answered, and with that he vanished. He simply flicked out of existence along with the ship that had started this thing leaving Clark and myself with nothing but the silence and his words.

We had to report what we encountered, that was our job. The information remains confidential but the damage was done. None of us are real. I've been thinking about this for some time and the sole conclusion that I can make is that somehow this world, this entire universe is merely designed for the entertainment of some sort of dark creatures that live beyond.

Poor Clark turned to drink and became an alcoholic. Turns out he shot himself last year, couldn't stand the truth that he'd heard. As for myself? Why do you think I'm writing all this down? This is my statement on that cold day in December and it's the last thing I'll ever write.

Alien Life As We Know It (S1:E1)

The smooth baritone voice of a station announcer calls out, "You're watching ISPN: The International Super Person Network!"

In HD where available

The voice of a male narrator says, "Welcome to Alien Life As We Know It."

Serene music starts to play.

"Earth. For thousands of years, we thought we were alone in the universe. Now, we know we were wrong. After all of our searching for intelligent life in the universe, aliens finally came to us- The Accord. We thought they were the first, but again, we were wrong. The Accord had long been preceded by Hyper-Parasites, or Parasitoids. You might know them by another name."

SUPERBUGS

"We first became aware of the Superbugs when Superblonde, the daughter of Osmosis, attacked Supermodel at the Richmond Rotunda, and revealed them to the world. With this revelation, other information soon came to light."

A clip of the U.S. President addressing the United Nations plays.

"The governments of the world have been aware of the existence of Superbugs for decades, and have worked actively to not only keep them a secret, but to wipe them out wherever they find them. They are considered a threat to public safety. They are attracted to fecal matter, and are easily destroyed if they're not bonded to a host. We have had measures in place to trap and destroy them since the Eighteen Nineties. As evidenced by Supermodel, Superblonde, and others like them, these measures are not one hundred percent foolproof."

"Not only are they 'not foolproof,'" continues the show's narrator, "but some are not sure that they can be wiped out, because it's believed that every meteor crater on the planet is a potential spawning ground for the Superbugs. Going all the way back to the oldest crater on Earth: the Vredefort Dome, created in South Africa some two-point-oh-two-billion years ago.

"However long ago they really appeared on Earth, our introduction to them was through Superblonde. We soon realized that many of the world's superpowered people were bonded with Superbugs. Through these people, Superbugs have irrevocably changed our lives- our very way of living. They're super strong... virtually impervious to harm... and they breathe fire. It's this last trait, and one of their most famous, that has gained them their best known moniker."

The Dragon Men

"There are easily a hundred Dragon Men across the planet, and that's just the ones we can put a name to. Here's just a brief list of some that have had world shaking impact:"

Special Agent Heironymous

"Before Superbugs were common knowledge, Special Agent Heironymous covered his secret with the claim that he was actually a dragon in human form. Although he's never spent time as a superhero, he was in Detroit on the Day of the Dragon Men, where he fought against The Accord. He was reportedly dispatched by the President of the United States himself, as Heironymous is a member of the U.S. Secret Service. Interestingly, there are rumors that he has been in the Secret Service for longer than humanly possible, and he's probably the only one of the Dragon Men who still sticks to his cover story. He stubbornly insists that he is a dragon, and not just a man empowered by a Superbug."

Hyperman (aka Super-American)

"Hyperman is the founder of the Super Corporation. Whe he started the company, he started going by the name Super-American, after the long-thought-lost World War II hero. He's responsible for the creation of The Sponsors, and Hyper-Parasites got their name from him once their existence had been revealed, as Hyperman had arguably been the most famous of the Superbug-powered people before the Day of the Dragon Men.

"On that fateful day, once the Accord was defeated, Super-American was killed by the Black Sultan, who had long been his arch-enemy."

The Black Sultan (aka Turkeyman)

"The Black Sultan is probably the one that best sheds a light on our darkest fears- a Dragon Man bent towards evil. Once empowered by a Superbug, The Black Sultan- quickly dubbed Turkeyman by the press- used his power to become enemy to Super-American, whom he saw as the very symbol of America and capitalism. This enmity found its culmination on the Day of the Dragon Men when Turkeyman fought Super-American for the final time, killing him. This quickly led to his death at the hands of another of the Dragon Men."

Supremacist (aka The Grand Dragon, aka The True American)

"Supremacist is sometimes called 'the biggest racist on Earth.' Once empowered by a Superbug, he took leadership of the Ku Klux Klan. That and his ability to breathe fire quickly earned him the moniker The Grand Dragon. Supremacist has always referred to himself as The True American. Bent on race war in America, Supremacist, like the rest of the planet's Dragon Men, put that aside long enough to battle The Accord. Once that war was won, Hyperman was killed by Turkeyman, and Turkeyman was in return killed by Supremacist who looked up to Super-American - a fact that Hyperman found detestable. Ironically, it was this act that heralded the return of the real Super-American who battled and defeated Supremacist."

Supermodel

"Supermodel was Hyperman's girlfriend, and the promotional face of the Super Corporation. After Hyperman's death, she took over the leadership of S-Corp. Her name is forever intertwined with the history of the Superbugs, as it was her fight with Superblonde that revealed them to the world."

Superblonde (aka The Blonde Bombshell, aka American Beauty)

"Her debut to the world not only revealed the existence of the Superbugs, but resulted in the death of several people, and the injury of many more when she fought Supermodel at the Richmond Rotunda. Indicted, she was convicted, and sentenced to work with the Major League. She served her time, eventually joined the Sponsors, and later moved to England where she joined The Protectorate, and became known as American Beauty."

Lord Protector

"Speaking of The Protectorate, they get their name from their leader, Lord Protector, although there have been two Lord Protectors so far. With exactly the same powers as American Beauty and any other Dragon Man, Lord Protector's impact on the world stage comes from the fact that he enforces the will of England's monarch, Iron Liege."

Ankara (aka Odalisque, aka The Sweet Sultan)

"After the death of Turkeyman, Ankara took the sultanate of Turkey for herself in order to fill the vacuum of power there. Strategically, she offered asylum to The Accord refugees stranded on Earth after the Day of the Dragon Men, and used Superbugs in her possession to transform the Black Sultan's former harem into The Harama. Despite all of this, and although Turkey is a closed state, Ankara has become known to the world as The Sweet Sultan."

The Harama

"Feared the world over should they ever step outside Turkey's borders, The Harama are the women who had been trafficked to Turkey by The Black Sultan. In revenge for their 'treatment at the hands of men,' The Harama embarked on a genocidal swath across Turkey that killed all but about eight percent of the Turkish male population."

Heavyweight (aka Champion of the World)

"Not much is known about Heavyweight. He became known to most on the Day of the Dragon Men. Wearing gloves that somehow increased his strength, he launched himself at the Accord ship like a missile, bringing it down, but destroying Detroit in the process. He currently resides there, monitoring the Motor City that has built itself on the ruins, and is dedicated to rebuilding it."

Idol

"Before we knew about the Superbugs, Richard Idol claimed to be empowered by the old gods of the Mayans. He was worshiped by some, and took over a good portion of the Yucatan jungle. It is believed that he wiped out much of the drug trade there, but also rumored that he took over the drug trade himself. He fought alongside the rest of the Dragon Men to defeat The Accord. Once that battle was won, he went back to the Yucatan."

Cassiopeia

"Leader of The Accord, it was Cassiopeia's will that the Accordian hive mind centered on. The computer intelligence known as Crayniac nearly took over The Accord, but it was the combined effort of Cassiopeia and Doctor Boom that pushed Crayniac out, and led to it merging with Doctor Boom. Cassiopeia initially took asylum in Turkey with the rest of the Accord refugees, but was made persona non grata a short time later. Her current whereabouts are unknown."

The Accord Refugees

"Although hive-minded, The Accord was not a single race, but many races that had been convinced to 'be in accord.' Most are in Turkey, adding to that country's might. In addition to Cassiopeia, a few of the known members of The Accord are: Antarmada, Aquila, Centaurus, Corvus, Draco, and Lupus. There are others of course, but these have become the most known."

Newsman and Cameraman

"And then there's me," says the narrator as he appears onscreen. "You've come to know me as Newsman- the Dragon Man who's willing to follow the stories wherever that may lead me. And my Cameraman- also a Dragon Man- who films the stories I report. And thanks to ISPN, whether Dragon Men or some other extraterrestrial, I'll be reporting them to you here, on Alien Life As We Know It. Thanks for joining us, and we'll see you next time."