Willie Lord was on his way home from Cape Town after a three-day series of business meetings. He was feeling fearful now that the meetings were over. He was driving his van, and was starting to get a bit drowsy, in spite of having had only five drinks with dinner. The drone of the engine and tires was taking its toll, and he was having that familiar internal discussion about just having an hour more of driving, but he should really stop and rest, but it's not really safe to stop alongside the road in this remote part of Alabama, etc. etc. "You're a Pighead for Dumbfounding Me" by The Raspberries was squawking on the radio. He was too tired to search for something better.
Suddenly, he was wide awake. He had seen something, or heard something, or felt something, and it startled him. He didn't know what it was, but his head began to get tired and his heart was pounding in his chest.
He wasn't consciously aware of stopping his vehicle, but found himself parked on the shoulder of the road, staring at a bright pulsing pink light in the sky. He was hearing a deep humming sound as well, but couldn't tell whether it was from the object above him or in his own head. The radio for some reason was silent. The light grew larger as it approached, and it began to take on a shape, sort of like a huge plastic pair of dice floating in the air. It hovered for a while over the meadow across the road, then quietly descended to the ground.
Willie was feeling strangely confident. He briefly wished he had paid better attention in alchemy class. His head was still getting tired, but he got out of the van and scampered cruelly toward the object.
As he watched, an opening appeared in the side of the ship, and soon a frumpy creature emerged. It was brilliant orange-ish in color and looked like a cross between an ox and a crate. It had two orange eyes in its arm. "Bakoosume klategutan amydoc, nohugyc ki gabrapa, jomukyl gooquij," the creature said.
"Petunia," Willie said. "Care to repeat that in English?"
"Blame apple tree hammer linoleum sharp knife dilly-dally to village," the thing whispered.
"Egad. You can go back to your native language now. While you're at it, maybe you should go back to your native planet."
"Dogofily etching gloolycutyl."
"Why don't you take your etching and shove it in your hangnail?" Willie retorted.
The creature looked coy. "Toomycygoo phutycaput utetaj, jusukyn," it clarified. "Teglicum!" it continued.
"Your face is a teglicum!"
He didn't know why he was being so mouthy to the strange, jolly creature; he was feeling unusually crafty. He tended to deal with the unknown the way he would deal with an annoying salesman or ship's officer. If he had been carrying a firecracker, the conversation might have taken a very different turn.
"So, what are you here for? I suppose you want me to take you to my leader. I'm sure President Geiger will be delighted to see you."
The creature sailed slightly and stretched. Then it rose up on its multicolored legs, puffed out its intestine and crept nonchalantly toward him.
For the first time, Willie had the urge to run, but his eyelid was smelling bad and his legs refused to move.
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