Time: Sometime around last July.
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Location: Planet Silaph, in a galaxy far, far away.
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Setting: Five elite agents have been assigned a dire mission…

OBJECTIVE: DESTROY ALL HUMANS ON PLANET EARTH

With this mission seared into their minds, Silaphian agents Rodroo, Breea, Luuran, Arjaff and Larry slithered to their spaceship.

EARTHLING NOTE: Though a young Silaphian would see our heroes to be gorgeous specimens of their race, earthlings would see them as hideous. With three purple eyes, 4 burly tentacle-arms, and foot-long mouthsnouts (a protruding feature in the middle of the 3 eyes that’s used to both smell and eat) these agents would strike fear in their enemies, admiration and possible swooning in their fellow Silaphians, and fainting in humans with their 12-foot tall, blood red, oozing bodies.


“One question,” asked Luuran suddenly, “Why are we killing all humans on earth? I just got the orders nailed onto my door, but I didn’t receive the rationale behind our assignment.”
“Expansionism,” replied Rodroo. “Silaph’s population is now crowded. The purpose of killing these humans is so that we may take their territory for ourselves.”
“The government assigned us this, right?” asked Arjaff. “I saw their crest on the orders instead of the military’s.”
“Correct.”
“And has the government considered that there are still massive areas of land that we could expand to, which would make killing the billions of people on earth entirely unnecessary?”
“Land expansion would be costly, time-consuming, and would require developing new technology. It would also require making negotiations with other Silaphian tribes, which usually doesn’t end well. In the light of all these disadvantages, land expansion is stupid.”
“The government has poured billions upon billions of radlos (Silaph’s currency) into its weapons technology to blow other races and cultures to bits, and you’re saying that they can’t be bothered to sit down and talk with its own species?”
“It’s simply not what the government wants to spend time on.”
“So basically our government is composed of lazy, impulsive b******s who think that it’s okay to go around killing other people but can barely provide for its own?”
“Don’t forget egotistical,” piped Luuran. “Your remains wouldn’t be found if they heard you say that.”
“I think it’d be wise for you guys to shut up now,” interrupted Larry. “Security’s tight in spaceship ports; you could be overheard.”
“Fine.”
As this exchange ended, our noble agents were at the entrance of their spaceship.

EARTHLING NOTE: Contrary to earthling stereotypes, the Silaphian spaceship was NOT a creepy disk that emitted a phosphorescent glow (though a lucky few antique spaceship collectors possess that model.) The spaceship that our heroes were about to enter had the appearance of a silver, 5-pointed star (each point ended with a spherical cockpit for each pilot, thus maximizing, the amount of space that could be seen from within the spaceship by the 5 pilots.) that positively gleamed in the light of Silaph’s three suns.

“Aren’t these space ships made by Galactic Modules?” asked Luuran.
“Correct,” responded Larry.
“Didn’t they just go bankrupt? I just got back from a 2-month scouting expedition, so I’m a little out of the loop.”
“The government salvaged the company. They thought it was still worthwhile.”
“How much is Galactic Modules worth now?”
“Approximately negative 20 billion rodros.”
“So the government prefers to burden the people with a worse-than-worthless company than to drop it and rely on better spacecrafts made by our neighboring colonies?”
“The government’s a sucker for ads,” muttered Arjaff.
“Excuse me?”
“GM had really good ads.”
“I’m never going to understand politics,” muttered Luuran.
“Understandable.”
“This is getting irrelevant,” interrupted Larry. “We have a mission to fulfill. Let us depart.”
And with that, the discussion of politics ended, and agents Rodroo, Breea, Luuran, Arjaff and Larry silently boarded the ship.


After a 2-hour systems check that was too boring to force people to read, our heroes were warping through space at ludicrous speeds.
“We’re slowing down again,” said Larry into the voice transmitter.
“Breea, check the fuel supply,” said Rodroo.
“Empty again.”
“What?! It’s only been 23 light years!”
“It’s always nice to be reminded why Galactic Modules went out of business,” remarked Luuran dryly.
“Just go fill up the tank.”
“Alright,” replied Luuran.
“What does the Galactic Positioning System say?” asked Larry.
“We’ll make a right turn in approximately 25 seconds, then go straight for 2 light years.”
“Buckle up. Galactic Modules never did make good brakes.”
And after much lurching, swerving, and re-accelerating, our heroes arrived quite near Earth, dizzy but unhurt. Almost immediately they noticed something was wrong.
“The poison detector is spiking,” said Breea urgently.
“How bad is it?”
“I’ve never seen anything like it. It’s freaking out”
“Let’s get closer to earth,” ordered Larry. “It might be coming from there.”
The ship was silently guided until it was just outside earth’s atmosphere.
“Now it’s completely spazzing,” observed Breea. “It appears that Earth is surrounded by a wall of noxious fumes.”
“Send a probe in to collect a sample,” said Rodroo.
After a few buttons were pushed, a miniature star flew out of the mother ship and into Earth’s atmosphere. Once there, a compartment on the star opened, collected an air sample, and closed. The mini-star then flew back to its home, the entire process taking about half a minute.
“What are the readings?” asked Arjaff.
“I was right,” murmured Breea solemnly. “Earth is surrounded by a wall of noxious fumes that primarily contain carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, and methane.”
“Will it be safe to go through?”
“Yes.”
“But why is it there?”
“I assume the gasses are there to protect against an invasion,” remarked Rodroo. “It’s an ingenious defense. Right now it’s nothing much, but if it was refined it could be deadly. These earthlings may be tougher prey than we thought.”
“No kidding. The mission details said that humans were just a bunch of lazy idiots who sat around, developed primitive weaponry and watched bad TV shows.”
“We’ll see what happens. For now, let’s go on.”
“I’ll take us to the city that we’re supposed to destroy first,” chimed Breea helpfully.
“We’re destroying the country of America first, correct?” asked Larry.
“Right. China is second.”
“The two most powerful countries. Excellent.”
And with that, the ship flew into Earth for the first time, and stopped when it was in the clouds, above a certain sprawling metropolis. The streets were packed with cars and people, all of them going about, minding their own business. None of them noticed the dire threat over their heads.
“Ready the Death Field,” ordered Rodroo darkly.
“That strikes me as overkill,” remarked Arjaff. “Can’t we just use the plasma beam instead?”
“Plasma beams just fry things. Death fields instantly destroy all useful cells in bodies, which is much cleaner and MUCH more badass.”
“Good point.”
“Is it ready, Breea?”
“Yup.”
“Fire.”
A wide purple light blasted from the spacecraft, bathing the entire city in an eerie light. All the cars stopped; all the people looked up.
Nothing happened. After several minutes, the citizens began to go back to their business, thinking the light was some kind of prank.
Our intrepid heroes were dumbfounded.
“Why isn’t it working?” demanded Rodroo.
“All systems are fully functional,” said Breea. “The earthlings are somehow resisting.”
“Ridiculous. Abduct one,” ordered Larry. “Arjaff can have a look at him, and maybe we can figure out how these earthlings are defying us.”
A larger, Silaphian-sized star with the word ABDUCT-MOBILE shot out of the spacecraft and zoomed down to the city. A man who was eating a hotdog was surprised to see the machine zoom to him, spray a cloud of knockout gas into his face, and then extend a mechanical claw to grab him by the belt and fly him away. The man’s friend frowned, took a long look at his 10th beer bottle, then threw it away and closed his eyes to take a nap.
After Arjaff examined the earthling, he called his fellow agents to a meeting place in the center of the ship, with disturbing news.
“It’s lard,” he said.
“What?”
“Humans have developed a thick layer of lard around their vital organs. The death rays can’t get through the layer of useless cells, so it has no effect on the humans.”
“Impossible!” gasped Breea.
“Is that why he was so heavy?” asked Luuran. “The abduct-mobile almost broke down trying to carry him up here.”
“It’s absolutely brilliant,” muttered Larry. “To think that humans could anticipate our death rays and develop such a simple yet effective defense against it. It’s ingenious.”
“And the discipline required to develop the fat layer must be incredible,” remarked Rodroo. “I hardly think it would be pleasant to wear a thick layer of fat all day long. These humans are smarter and better trained than we anticipated.”
“So what do we do now?” asked Arjaff of the group. There was a long, awkward silence.
“Is there any food?” asked Luuran. “I think better on a full stomach.”
“Go check storage.”
Luuran oozed away. Soon after, the group heard a loud expletive come from the direction of the storage room. Luuran came back.
“We’re all out!”
“So we assumed.”

“I’m going to go get some!”
“How?”
“The probe.”
“You idiot, that’s not what it’s fo-“
But by that time, Luuran had already pushed the necessary buttons to send the probe out of the spaceship, into the city. The small, silver star blew through a gas station’s wall, collected several bags of food, and flew back to the ship.
At this point a few citizens of the city were beginning to think that something weird was happening. Our agents, however, had other things to worry about.
“Alright!” said Luuran triumphantly as he opened the probe’s compartment. “We got a massive bag of cheese puffs!”
“What the hell are cheese puffs?” inquired Larry.
“Why would I know? Cheese isn’t even one of the ingredients.”
“I wouldn’t eat that if I were you . . .”
“I don’t listen to common sense when I’m hungry,” said Luuran. And with that, he widened his mouthsnout to maximum capacity and emptied the entire bag of cheese puffs into his mouth.
“That is absolutely disgusting,” said Breea.
“How are th – oh, s***.”
Arjaff got foul-mouthed because he realized that something was dreadfully wrong with Luuran. Luuran stopped breathing, and began to convulse horribly, foaming at the mouthsnout with his three eyes rolling madly.
“Who knows first aid here?” yelled Rodroo frantically.
“Nobody!” cried Breea despondently. “The government didn’t think this mission would go so badly, so they didn’t make a medic come along!”
“Is there at least a first-aid kit around here?!”
“I have no idea!”
“Why not?! SOMEBODY needs to know where the first-aid kit is before we go on a mission! Didn’t you ever pay attention when you were a cadet?”
“Then why don’t YOU know where it is, smart guy?”
“Are you looking for a fight, punk?! I swear, I’ll-“
“SHUT UP, BOTH OF YOU! I found the first-aid kit!”
Alas, by that time Luuran had stopped twitching and was lying on the floor of the spaceship, motionless. A quick check by Larry revealed that he was dead.
“What could have happened?” asked Breea softly, to nobody in particular.
“There’s only one logical explanation,” said Larry. “Those were no normal cheese puffs.”
“I shudder to think what normal cheese puffs would do, then.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“You think they were poisoned?” asked Rodroo.
“Yes,” Larry responded. “It seems likely that the humans have tricked us again.”
“Indeed,” agreed Arjaff. “They wouldn’t stock their shelves with poisonous foods so that they could eat them. They were clearly intended for us. How could they have foreseen our weaponry and invasion so thoroughly, and make such cleverly disguised poisonous food for us to consume so easily? Moreover, how could we have fallen for their traps so easily?”
“Because Luuran was an idiot?”
“Never mind.”
“None of that matters now,” said Larry. “It’s time for plan b.”
“Being?”
“Land invasion. We simply destroy them with no room for error. Arjaff and I will go down with plasma cannons and lay waste to this whole cursed city.”
“What if the humans retaliate?”
“They should be too panicked to respond adequately to our assault. We should be fine.”
“Understood.”
“Let’s go avenge Luuran’s death.”
The spaceship was guided to the middle of a large street intersection. A compartment opened, and Arjaff and Larry slithered out, their huge red bodies gleaming and their eyes blazing. Enormous, black plasma cannons were in their hands, ready to be fired.
It was turning out to be a very strange day for the citizens of the city after all.
“What’s the reaction of the people?” Breea asked Arjaff via a radio transmitter.
“Nothing yet,” responded Arjaff. “They’re just staring at us.”
“Time to instill some panic,” growled Larry. He pulled a trigger, and a red beam blazed from his cannon, hitting a building and blasting it to smoldering pieces.
Larry’s plan worked to a degree. The act of blowing a building apart certainly drew a reaction from the people, but not the one that Larry anticipated or hoped for.
“How are they reacting?” asked Rodroo.
“They look scared,” said Larry uneasily. “But they aren’t running around and screaming, which is what I was expecting. Wait a minute.”
“What?”
“Every person that I can see is reaching into one of their pockets. Even the little kids are…”
“What are they reaching for?”
“I can’t tell yet. Wait – uh-oh.”
“What?”
“This can’t be happening. This isn’t possible. It doesn’t even make sense . . .”
“What’s wrong, Larry?”
“I think the humans even anticipated a land invas –“a massive blaze of gunfire cut him off.
“Larry?” yelled Rodroo into the transmitter desperately. “Larry?!”
“He’s dead, Rodroo,” said Breea hopelessly. “The humans beat us again.”
“How??”
“Evidently all humans are armed with lethal weapons, not just the military. That way even the ordinary citizens can repel a land invasion instead of having to wait on a trained force to do so.”
“That’s preposterous! If all humans were lethally armed, you would think that they’d just go around killing each other in petty conflicts and gang wars! The government here just lets people carry weapons around to repel a possible invasion?”
“Obviously, since Arjaff and Larry were both shot to death immediately.”
“Utterly insane,” said Rodroo, “yet utterly brilliant. Humans never cease to amaze me. I’m getting us the hell out of here!”
And amidst the blaze of gunfire, the star-shaped ship rose off the ground and shot into the sky, back to planet Silaph, and back to safety.
So ends the ill-fated story of agents Rodroo, Breea, Luuran, Arjaff, and Larry. Agents Rodroo and Breea undoubtedly reported what had happened on earth to their authorities who probably decided that Silaph should destroy the population of a different world to serve its own self-interests. However, even if planet Earth is attacked again we can sleep soundly, knowing that our defenses, deadly food, discipline and armaments will protect us from any alien invasion.

Over and out.