This is my entry for the
Australian Writers' Centre's June Furious Fiction competition. Rather than moulder away on my hard drive, I decided to let this blog take another detour from the film writing and put it up here, in case anyone fancies a read . It's a bit of a departure for me in terms of concept as it's basically just a straight romance tale - albeit one with alien insects and the ever present spectre of narcissistic genetic enhancement.
In addition to 500 word maximum and a three day window to write it, the rules for June were:
Each story’s first and last words had to begin with J.
Each story had to include a game being played.
Each story had to include the phrase MISS/MISSED THE BOAT.
EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL DATING
Just hear me out on this. Extra-terrestrial dating is as hard as
terrestrial dating. Several friends mentioned they thought it’d be easier, that
I’d be spoiled for choice. Fact is, whether you’re using a paid app or a free
one, they’re always the same. Always inundated with horny bipeds. But I’ve been
working on Earth for several months and we all have needs, so I figured I’d
give one of ‘em a shot.
The humanoid was waiting in the pub and he looked like
his picture, more or less, which is a small victory. He’d made an effort but
didn’t want it to look like it. He
was cosmetically free from cybernetic enhancement, although the signs were
there that someone in his family tree had undergone Aesthetic Sub-Atomic
Redesign.
Before making my way over, I sneaked a look at the
dating app. I was relieved to discover his humanoid vapour was universally
compatible. Which made the following all the more annoying. As I sat down at
the table, my spore pouch burst. I know, right? Total nightmare. No idea how it
happened. One minute we’re raising appendages in greeting, the next a brilliant
explosion of glittering dust illuminates the whole pub and my Spore Cloud
blossoms into dazzling, beautiful, pollinated life. Of course, seconds later it’s
vacuumed up into the air conditioning system and syphoned off to a medical
waste vat. I mean, it’s not like you can just put Spores back, but it would’ve
been nice to feel their euphoria for more than 8 seconds.
The humanoid looked surprised. His eyes were big. They
appeared rounder than usual. I didn’t know they could do that.
“Was that your…”
“Spore pouch? Yes. Can you believe that?”
“Was that supposed to happen?”
“No. It’s meant to deploy at coital zenith, when my
fluid strands are at their highest tensile strength and my gills are primed to
receive them. So as you can imagine, this is quite mortifying.”
The humanoid’s face started to crinkle. His eyes went
from wide to narrow quite suddenly.
“I should be running from the building in total
embarrassment, except there’s no point. Spore deployment means I’ll be entering
an eighteen month chrysalis stage in about an hour. Like the old saying goes:
you can’t be embarrassed in a pupal stage.”
“Huh?”
“Don’t worry, I think it loses something in the
translation. My point is that by the time I hatch, no one will care. Plus, I’ll
also have wings.”
The humanoid said he was confused.
“I’m confused”
“It means we’ve missed the boat on our date, I’m
afraid”
The humanoid’s face was doing all sorts of weird things
by this point. So in order to salvage something from our night I pointed to
the stack of boardgames on the shelf behind him.
“Fancy a game of Monopoly?”
We played until my carapace hardened and I couldn’t
roll the dice. Then he rolled for me. It was really quite romantic. And I let
him win, just.
END.
Lake Of Death (De Dødes Tjern) is a Norwegian horror movie from writer / director Nini Bull Robsahm. It is based on the 1958 Norwegian horror film, also called of De Dødes Tjern, which went by Lake Of The Dead in English.
