Deep within the deep walls of the citadel, a giant structure that dominated the rough escarpments of Aldevera, four people sat about the table of government. Yes, they are actually humans. The year is 5000 and we have evolved somewhat, with a little help from science.

We now have two fingers and toughened skin instead of inefficient fingernails. Instead of a waist, we have developed petioles like that of an insect. Our nose has been abolished altogether and replaced by a similar organ on our tails. Yes, tails. They’re very useful you know, due to a superior bone structure as dexterous as a hand and as strong as a leg.
We owe all these wondrous improvements to the Snrub machine. Snrub was a computer (that sadly went insane after watching 2001, a space oddesy and idolizing HAL…oh well) who was all of humanities’ greatest minds rolled into one. He (he liked having a gender) had invented many useful machines (Hair-extenders, apple peelers, warp speed flight, Automatic chocolate maker etc.) the most famous of which the evolution advancer. Despite the bizarre demise of its creator, it still sits below the citadel, increasing human evolution generation by generation- and it makes really good coffee.
Anyway…the representative of STVR®. Signus Keller 231, stood to address his audience. About 38 years of age, his face showed a lifetime of smirking. Had it not been for his self confident, bordering on psychopathic look, he may have been handsome. May.
“STVR® has a request. As you know we care only of the survival of huma-” His clipped, well pronounced tones were interrupted by the president’s slow drawl.
“Save me the STVR® mantra. What to you want?” Keller managed to suppress his anger at this interruption and, with a small twitch, continued.
“As you are no doubt aware, the esparimus virus is becoming more and more a threat. It is only due to STVR® that we have a cure at all, yet you will not let us attain enough of the essential compound to mass- produce it. We need a permit to yet again begin fishing carp.” Voice shuddering on the words ‘fishing’ and ‘carp’ Keller scowled.
“Mr. Keller, you know I can’t do that. Surely there is another way to get this whatsit-”
“Compound, sir, Glaxen5.”
“Whatever- without threatening an already endangered species of fish.”
Keller twitched again. This man who represents us cares about fish. Fish. God I hate fish.
“Can’t we just import this glax-thingy from somewhere?”
“We aren’t that rich. Our greatest assets are the production of entertainment systems, and they do not retain the greatest profits.”
Bloody nintendo, Keller thought. Give me two minutes with Mario. Just two minutes.
“Mr. Keller, are you even listening?” Keller blinked, torn away from one of his favorite killing Mario fantasies involving a rather large grenade launcher.
“You can continue this with my assistant.” He gestured to the third man at the table, Alvin Matchemp 591, A rather dim-witted person who was currently making eyes at the final seated figure, a young journalist. He wasn’t doing very well. As soon as he was out of site, Kelvin had a good twitch. How could the most powerful man in Aldevera be such a poo-brain? He likes fish. Life is so depressing.
After about half an hour, Matchemp emerged from the presidency room. He noticed that his boss was replacing something in his pocket and several dead fish littered the floor. A cracked fishtank lay in the corner. Used to Keller’s sudden anti-fish outbursts, he made for the hovercar bay.
“What were you doing in there?” Keller asked, a little impatiently.
“Oh, he was just asking about our progress reports,” At that point, Keller tuned out. Matchemp may be a little dull at times, but he was efficient. And gullible.
As they boarded their hovercar (another Snrub invention, it runs on cheese) Matchemp paused.
“What does ‘terminate’ mean?” Keller smirked as only Keller could and instructed Matchemp to
“Consult a dictionary moron.” (Keller wasn’t actually insulting Matchemp when he said that. Yes, they are called dictionary morons. Only Snrub knows why.) Matchemp shut up and drove, realizing that to Keller he was nothing more then a humanoid fish. Maybe a useful one, but a fish all the same. Not a good position to be in.
Meanwhile, in the residential section of the citadel, a radio blared at a seemingly impossible volume. Loud music was now the norm in this neighborhood. No-one could stop it, so earplugs were very popular. Many-a merchant praised the names Onya Farjin D.C. 922 an Ao Shlaf Prof. D.C. 777 every morning before manning their earplug stalls.
The aforementioned Onya and Ao shared a flat and had an amazing ability not to go deaf. They no longer had neighbors due to the constant vibration of the music, and had to use blu-tack (yes, it’s still about. Can you imagine a world without blu-tac??) their tables to the floor.

Chapter two: The plot thickens a bit (just add water!!)

They were currently managing a conversation, both having learnt to lip-read, an essential skill. Ao was tinkering with what looked like a pair of rather thick-soled shoes. Despite the fact that all of her tools were bouncing about with every beat of the music, she amazingly manipulated a tiny circuit in her hand. Slotting it into her a hole in her shoe, she began to clean all of her tools. Her hair, a reddish-black, fell into well groomed waves down to her shoulders and her purple eyes glinted with what could be madness, or then again could just be insanity as they surveyed her work.
Onya, blonde-haired and blue eyes, was making a rather dubious fruit salad. Ao was sure she saw something move in it.
‘So are they finished yet?’ Onya mouthed.
‘Yup. Shouldn’t be any more trouble.’ Ao grinned, passing the shoes to Onya. Abandoning the salad, Onya stooped to put them on. At the site of the salad, Ao winced. It reminded her of fishy. She hated fish.
The shoes weren’t ordinary. Linked to your nervous system when activated, they gave the wearer the ability to fly using a strange collection of technologies and an amazing amount of string. Onya and Ao had a pair each, and they proved very useful.

Ao had often been compared to snurb. Her inventions were usually just as pointless or bizarre. The difference was that she wasn’t mad (yet) and didn’t have an ‘off’ switch, to the disappointment of many of her peers. The shoes were fueled by pencils, doubling as sharpeners. Typical.

A Onya tentatively floated about the room, testing the shoes, Ao began to listen to the news reader on the radio, his words amplified a thousandfold.

“STVAR®, our premier antibiotics company, has released a statement that they will need more of the compound Glaxen5 to combat the growing infection of esparimus. If you or anybody near you seems to be resembling the asparagus plant, contact your local hospital immediately. Caution is essential.”

Ao stopped listening then, due to the fact that Onya had abruptly landed on her lap.
‘I think we ought to sharpen some more pencils’ she mouthed, flopping onto the floor and returning feeling to Ao’s squashed legs. Ao nodded and made for the pencil room. The room was made entirely of pencils and jutted out from the ceiling, held there only by blu-tac (see, handy!)

Chapter 3: It gets even thicker (mmmm…thick-ey)

Signus Keller sat back. Soon, he would have all of those damn carp dead. All fish were bad enough, but carp was the limit. The esparimus virus was serving its purpose, even though it is slowly turning the population into asparagus, and soon his plan would reach its peak. He grinned (well, more a smirk really) and had a good ole’ twitch.
“Um, sir?” Matchemp’s voice whiped the happy, if psycopathic look of Keller’s face.
“Our dictionary moron is broken. What does ‘terminal’ mean?”
“Oh, do bugger off.” Murmered Keller, superimposing an image of mario over Matchemp’s weedy frame in his mind. Noticing the glint of madness in his boss’s eyes, Matchemp retreated. Keller resumed his twitching.

Having sharpened pencils for the past half hour, Ao was finally finished. Onya was curled up in a rather bizarre position that resembled a tumbleweed and was slowly rolling about the flat. This was how she slept. Months of loud music does that to you. Ao preferred to sleep on one leg, thinking the tumbleweed style to take too much energy.

She was currently having a nice, relaxing hack into the STVR® private database and avoiding a bowl of Onya’s wonderful fruit salad. She was just randomly browsing along when an icon caught her eye.

“Bloody fish”

Being a rather un-professional title, she decided to have a look. After hacking through numerous firewalls, she came to a strange bit of code-no-someone’s really messy handwriting. It read;

God I hate all of those evil fish. They will all die soon. Memo: 25 November’s the day!

Silently agreeing with the first sentence, she wondered who had written it and what they were going to do. Today was the 25th. Onya bumped into a wall, then changed direction to continue her slow circuit of the flat.

The phone rang. Not that anyone could hear it of course, the music was too loud, but Ao had modified it to bounce up and down until someone picked up the receiver. Not that you could hear the other person either, but tradition was tradition.

Stepping over Onya, she stilled the phone. It was obviously someone who knew them, as the caller didn’t attempt to say anything and was sending them a text message.

“777, 922, you are now on duty. A band of terrorists who call themselves ‘fish can all bugger off’ have taken the president hostage. They demand a carp-fishing permit and we have two days to comply before the shrub is uprooted. We need you to save him, and no more cake bombs this time 777, it took those poor criminal weeks to stop reeking of strawberry. –887 detective chief”

Rolling her eyes, Ao stepped over to Onya and nudged her with a foot. Not her foot, just a foot she found lying about. Don’t ask. Onya’s eyes snapped open and, in an amazing flurry of limbs, was on her feet in just under a minute. Albeit unsteady, but upright all the same. Ao told, well mouthed, her of their latest briefing.

‘Fish can all bugger off hmm? Are you sure you have nothing to do with this?’ Onya grinned, poking Ao in the ribs. Ao frowned.
‘No, though I do agree with the principal, a job is a job. And I already have a lead. After being informed about the bloody fish icon, Onya nodded and picked up her stun gun. It was also a water pistol and could speak fluent German. Ao had made it for her.

Ao put Fred in her pocket. Fred, though currently only as big as a pencil, folded out into a scythe. It could also dry-clean (a very handy function) and produce bumper stickers on command. Fred could also speak German, though her preferred to say rude words so that his vocabulary often seemed to solely consist of ‘dumkopf’, ‘sheizenhouse’ and ‘du bist eine grun gebarten aiffe!’ Ao was going to fix that, but Fred didn’t want her to.

After checking their shoes (loose laces could be fatal) Ao and Onya jumped out the window and flew towards the STVR® headquarters, stopping only for lunch and to look at a pretty bird. The bird scowled at them. Then they realized it was a lady in a funny hat. After apologizing about the bread, they flew on.

Chapter four: Wow! How can a plot get this thick? (Extreme difficulty and hours of careful planning)

Matchemp popped his head round Keller’s door.
“Sir, there are two ladies here to see you. Keller lowered the fish he was about to stab.
“Send them in,” Ao and Onya were shown in and the door closed.
“Yes?”
“Were on police business and would like to ask you some ques-” Onya was cut off as she found herself suddenly pushed aside by Ao, Fred extended. She proceeded to flip the fish off Keller’s desk and hack it to pieces mid-air. When she had finished, Fred clicked away.

“Sorry about that,”
she grinned sheepishly.
“I just cant stand the buggers.” Keller blinked. He wasn’t alone. Still, as interesting as these women were, he resented the intrusion. Besides, that was his fish. He was less pleased when he was accused of being linked with the ‘fish can all bugger off’ criminals, even though he was. He refused to speak with them any further so they both flew back home to think. When they got back, they found a note waiting for them.

“I don’t know what you did today, 777, but I’ve had two complaints about you. Throwing bread at innocent citizens and willful destruction of fish. You’ve really got to be more careful.- Detective chief 877”

After getting her chair to eat the note, Ao decided to have a rest. Onya resumed her tumbleweeding. The chair burped.

They were awoken by the sound of an alarm. Their music had stopped. While Onya untangled herself, Ao stalked over to the radio to discover that it was the source of the alarm. It suddenly stopped and a newsreader’s voice rang out;

“Do not leave you homes. The citadel is under attack from an unknown craft. I repeat- stay under cover.”

After hearing the news, Ao and a now upright Onya took it upon themselves to grab their weapons and jump out the window.

Keller was irritated. It had been such a sunny day, and now something was blotting out the light. Why does this always happen on a weekend? He asked himself, closing his copy of psychopath’s annual. He then heard the news broadcast from a nearby shop at he edge of the park he was in. The whole space was empty in seconds and he, not being the most fit of people, was left alone. Just as he got to his feet, a column of green light flew from the sky and he disappeared.

It isn’t every day that a UFO invades you home, but when a surprised STVA® executive flies past you in a column of green light, you do begin to see yourself as an oldie, telling the grandkids about ‘the day that the aliens invaded’. Now thoroughly bored of flying about unable to see any weird goings on, Ao and Onya decided to follow the man in a second. That may have not been the worlds mot wonderful idea because just as they touched the green light, they blacked out.

Chapter 5: ??? (oh crud.)

Keller was irritated. It’s bad enough to be abducted by aliens, but to wake up with someone who thinks that they are a tumbleweed and another who is standing on a very odd angle on one leg…Temper snapping, he bellowed at them to stop it. The tumbleweed slowly unfurled and the other resumed a stance in accordance with the laws of gravity.

“Oh, hello” The shorter, dark haired one said. Keller then recognized the two women whom he had spoken to the day before.
“What, may I ask, were you doing?” He asked. Blinking, Ao answered
“What do you mean, we only just woke up.” Keller twitched.
“So you were asleep. Why do I get stuck with such weirdoes?”
“Hey, your not exactly sane twitchman” Ao replied. They were all startled when a hatch opened and a rather large fish flopped into the room.

It opened its mouth and the words floated out;
“You are our prisoners. We are your masters.”
“Oh bloody hell,” Keller said, twitching violently.
“A great big fish. Off all of the possible forms these aliens could have, we’ve been abducted by giant, air breathing fish!”
“Du bist eine grun gebarten aiffe!” Proclaimed Fred as he was activated by a rather angry Ao. The fish blinked (yes, fish can blink) coughed and asked if she could
“Please out that away?” When she refused, it sighed (yes, fish can also sigh).
“This always happens. I’d better take you to our commander.” It began to flop away. Ao, now also twitching, followed with Onya and Keller through the hatch and after the fish.
They entered a room with a very large fish in it.
“You have a weapon?” It asked, flipping to face Ao.
“Sheiâerhof!” Fred proclaimed happily.
“Oh poo. You’re not going to hurt us, are you?” Surprised at the fish’s lack of regality, ao looked at Keller. He took the gun from his pocket. Onya rolled her eyes. She knew that look in Ao’s eyes- it was the bloody-great-big-fish-are-going-to-die one. And bloody great fish can tell when someone gets the bloody-great-big-fish-are-going-to-die look, so Ao, Onya and Keller found themselves teleported into an escape-pod, made for a large fish, speeding into space. Back on the ship, the biggest fish sighed.
“We really should develop a weapon or something before we invade.” And with that, the UFO left the citadel in peace.

Keller was beginning to warm to AO. She seemed to hate fish almost as much as him. Onya, reacting to the stress of being abducted by giant fish in a way that only Onya could, was tumbleweeding about the pod. If you have ever been in an escape pod designed for a rather large fish with a tumbleweed and a scythe that prattles on in German and keeps trying to press your clothes, you could understand what Keller was going through. Then again, you could just be loony.

Ao seemed quite happy now that there were no more fish. She started to decorate the walls with bumper stickers that seemed to appear from nowhere. She reminded Keller of Snrub as he was going mad, but Snrub seemed to have a more sane madness. He twitched.
“Do you have medicine or something for that?” Ao asked, handing him a bumper sticker.
“What?”
“For your twitching, silly. It’s not healthy.”
“You twitched too.”
“Of course, a bloody great big fish was talking to me!”
“Fair enough.” She grinned at that.
“Ich bin eine hund”
“No your not, Fred, now please be quiet.” Ao quipped, collapsing him as she spoke.After a few hours, the pod landed on a planet. It was not a big planet, unremarkable as a planet can be. It was best described as the sort of place a slipper-wearing old granny would think of. Onya had stopped tumbleweeding due to the buffeting of atmosphere entry and her stun gun was wailing about being lonely in spanish. Wondering where the hell it learnt spanish, she was staring at it. After a time Keller decided he would risk the planet's possibly fatal atmosphere over being stuck with this multi-lingual barrage, he found a panel which he hoped controlled the door. It did.

The planet smelt of talcum powder.Onya was on edge-her stun gun shouldn’t be talking in spanish, and Fred’s muffled exclamations were becoming more agitated as he was stuffed deeper into Ao’s pocket. Keller was beginning to get really mad, but was consoled by the fact his gun had not yet began to regale him in portugese or something.

They rounded a hill when Onya suddenly froze. Despite her time of obscenely loud music, she had actually retained an acute sense of hearing.
“It sounds like pidions,” She whispered.
“Heaps of them, and they’re coming this way fast.

Chapter six: ACK!!! (…yes…)

Onya pointed and, sure enough, a large amount of small shapes were moving toward them. They did indeed sound like pidgins, bus as they got close enough to be seen…
“Scare blau!” Yelled Onya’s stun gun, furthur unnerving the group. French!?
“Deine Grossmutter, swein?”
“No Fred, we are not pigs, but they are grandmothers.” Ao answered, Pulling Fred out and activating him. Making their way toward the small group was a veritable army of old ladies, knitting menacingly. They clucked like pidgins and Ao was sure she caught a flash of darning needle.

“You take the twitchman and I’ll hold them off.” Ao muttered. Onya scooped up Keller and, with a short jump, they sared into the air.
“Deine sheizer hund!” Fred yelled at the old ladies. Ao told him to
“Shut up. They aren’t poo dogs anyway.” And too flew upward. There seemed to be no end to the mass of dentures and blue rinse. The ladies started to throw pie at the three hovering shapes.

God (sorry Ben) knows where they got it from. One minute they were old ladies, the other old ladies with pie. Luckily, Fred liked pie and leapt from Ao’s hands to eat it. With a built in hover mechanism, Fred hovered up the pie that flies in the sky (I wonder why?). It is a very silly thing to behold, a pie-eating scythe and old ladies generally don’t like silly things, so they all ran away. Fred was disappointed. Onya’s stun gun had begun to speak ancient Hebrew.

“Well this is helpful. How do we get off this talcum deathtrap?” Keller grumbled as his feet touched ground/congealed talcum powder.
“Well, we cant exactly pilot a craft designed for a very big fish.” Onya helpfully pointed out, stun gun agreeing in Finnish. Fred, noticing the group’s bad mood, launched into a German rap to raise the cheer.
”Lauf lauf bitte bitte, nock yetz bist du-“
“Oh be quiet!”Ao snapped. Just then, a column of green light swept past and hit them…

“Oh, come on. This is just too much.” Keller snorted. Onya was tumbleweeding, Ao on one leg. Again, the hatch opened.
“You are our- oh bugger, we already caught you.” The fish paled as Onya almost rolled into it. This time, Keller didn’t waste a second and soon the ship was rid of very large fish. The talcum planet, however, had quite a few. After the natives had been past, the plantet had a group of very large fish in itchy pink jumpers. That’s what you get for being a very large fish. Take my advice- never consider it as a career.