The Thing

We still can't agree on who found it first.

It was a perfect spring day. The sky was so clear and the insects so insistent that you knew it was only a matter of time before the seasonal wheel turned and a nostalgia for open fires and steaming cups of tea would return. It was to be our first picnic of the season; one of our rituals of romantic recharge. The only problem being that we were both broke, so we had to have a cream cheese spread instead of Camembert, apples instead of stawberries, and some left over bottles of beer from last thursday's party instead of champagne. Still, the day was indeed spectacular and if the fare was a little modest, the seclusion of our secret glade would ensure that we were not.

A couple of timeless hours later we were lying on the blanket and staring up at the trees, trying to keep the dapply sun from our eyes. (At this point Henna and I have conflicting stories, but you're not reading her version so you'll have to just rely on mine - which is true, incidentally). I noticed a curious object wedged high up in the oak tree directly above us. At first I thought it was some kind of animal sleeping, a possum or something. Then I revised this impression, believing it to be manmade, a bag or some stray camping equipment. Henna and I discussed various possibilities, but it was too far up to verify our theories without climbing up to get it. The beer was caramalizing in my blood, composing a lazy lullaby for a post-meridian snooze, but Henna insisted I climb the tree and recover the enigmatic object.

"No way, I'm quite happy here. If you're burning with curiosity go up and fetch it yourself."

"It might bite me."

"I don't think it's alive. Probably the remains of a Japanese paratrooper."

My eye-lids drooped but I could sense Henna's mind was too restless to join me. I opened my eyes briefly to watch her scamper up the trunk like a ten year old tom-boy before she disappeared amongst the foliage.

"You'll never get down again," I said, more to myself than to her. I began to drift towards sleep but was suddenly yanked back to consciousness by a short startled noise from up in the tree. I sat up with a start and asked if she was alright but there was no answer. I repeated the question, more urgently, but still no reply.

"Henna, this isn't funny."

Shading my eyes I walked around the base of the trunk and peered into the luminous green canopy. I caught a glimpse of Henna's red dress and the lower half of her leg dangling from one of the branches. I thought I could hear whimpering noises which soon changed pitch into a kind of erotic moan.

"Are you doing something kinky up there?" I enquired

pathetically. "Because I should warn you I don't have the energy to climb up there even if you...."

A primal screech from my loved one struck me dumb. It was soon followed by a blue flash and some kind of silvery snowy fall-out which descended on my shoulder's like a giant's drandruff. Then a branch snapped and Henna dropped from the tree like a stone. Although I wouldn't go so far as to say I caught her, I maneuvered my body sufficiently to break her fall. She lay there limp and motionless. Despite the cloudless conclusion that a calm person would have come to my confused brain thought she'd been struck by lightning.

I listened for her pulse which was not only beating but pounding wildly. She was damp with sweat and her hair was all slimy. Her skin was laced with purple lines like neon cobwebs. All these details barely scratched my consciousness at this time, as all my credulity was concentrating hard on the object which had fastened itself around Henna's neck like one of those inflatable travel pillows. The thing itself looked like somekind of genetic experiment gone horribly wrong; a hybrid between a cauliflower and a squid, with a kind of umbrella exoskeleton shading her scalp. It was emitting a low whistle from some unseen orifice as it deflated in front of my eyes. I felt like my hands, which at the best of times had only a loose grip on reality, were being danced upon by a sadistic Fred Astaire of the paranormal.

Suddenly Henna's eyes flickered open and I saw a swirling void returning my silent but terrified inquiry.

"Henna," I pleaded. "Are you O.K.?"

A salacious smile stole across her glowing features as she said "WOW!"

* * * *

We were not very creative in naming this object, probably because we had no idea as to its purpose, function or ontological status. So we simply referred to it as "the thing." This thing was something of a catalyst, having the same effect on all those who came into contact with it as the ring in Tolkein's epic saga. Although it wasn't as convenient as a small gold band - nor rendered the wearer invisible - it was still our "precious," to be guarded with a vigilant jealousy.

After I managed to help Henna into a sitting position up against the tree, I spent more than five minutes trying to get the thing off. Henna was less traumatized than you would expect, even giggling occasionally, allowing me to fumble with the parasite.

After close inspection I decided that it was not alive, although parts of it may be organic. One tentaclesque thread turned out to act like a strap or belt which relinquished its hold around Henna's shoulders after some deft fingerwork. The thing fell onto the ground with a noise somewhere between a thud and a splat, tied together by a reedy whine. Altogether the effect was something like some bagpipes filled with spaghetti being dropped from above the head.

"Wow," repeated Henna in a fatigued whisper.

"What the hell happened?" I asked.

"My whole body is tingling...like pins and needles only.." she began to giggle again.."only nice." This was obviously not the kind of "nice" that you would ascribe to a toffee or Christmas pageant.

"What happened?" I repeated, realizing that this did not strictly qualify as an answer. After a few deep breaths she became a little more lucid, her natural wariness returning the same rate as the strange sensations ebbed away.

"Well, I picked it up and looked at it. I noticed the straps so I fastened it on me so I could climb back down again, but then it started to constrict around me and make this weird noise. I suddenly felt like I was in another world as something entered my brain." She swallowed hard at the all-too-vivid memory. "I was totally covered, absorbed, like I was swimming amongst a huge school of jellyfish only their stings were pleasure not pain. Pleasure like I could never believe was possible."

I found that I was regarding this object - which at this moment looked like some kind of reptilian cholostemy bag - with something akin to envy. I helped her to her feet, leaving two body shaped holes in the shiny pollen-like layer which had descended from the tree. We argued for a while about whether we should take the thing home, but when it became clear than Henna was not going anywhere without it I relented. We put it in the picnic basket and drove straight home.

* * * *

"The only reason undergraduates like us have trouble concentrating is because we subconsciously realize that we would learn a lot more about the world in one night with one of the other students than a whole year listening to the crusty old codger out the front."

This point was made by Ginny, my house mate and friend, who used toothpicks to eat instead of cutlery. She must think she looks cool, or maybe it helps her quit smoking. It certainly helps emphasize her hypotheses. She had been saving this one up for the ads so we would take more notice. "I'm not sure if it's that subconscious. We all realize it pretty consciously," I replied, not taking my eyes off the shiny tin can on the screen.

"My tutor's not crusty either," added Carolyn. "I'm sure I could learn something in bed with him."

There was a silence as everyone tried to think up some sophisticated double entendre, but the time-limit ran out as the program winked back seamlessly. Henna resumed digging her thumb into my thigh and making surreptitious neck movements towards the bedroom. This was not, of course, because the sight of my aerodynamic body bathed in the electric blue of the cathode rays turned her on so, but rather because the huge tumour in our room beckoned.

A day had passed and we had not told a soul about our discovery, nor even peeped at it in its hiding place with the food scraps and cling film. We had argued long into the night about what to do with it. I was all for alerting "the authorities." I had no idea who "the authorities" were, but years of movie-going had taught me that that was who you contacted in an emergency. Henna's eyes glazed over at the mere mention of this option. She had insisted that I experience what she had, and the persistent, grinding thumb indicated that I had stalled long enough.

Once in our bedroom I felt butterflies hatch in my stomach. I felt like I was about to undertake somekind of test; a rite of passage, like a young sailor being dragged by his mates into a brothel. Perhaps it was like LSD and I might have a bad trip, as terrifying as Henna's was titillating. I sat on the bed as Henna brought over the thing. Her movements were solemn, ceremonial. I thought I could detect an involuntary spasm of jealousy as she placed it on my head and fastened the squid-straps. She then sat cross-legged opposite me, held my hand, and stared into my eyes with a curious mixture of mischief and earnestness.

My apprehension began to be coated with embarrassment when I caught my reflection in the mirror. Here I was, waiting for some kind of erotic epiphany, with something even a middle-eastern butcher would throw to the dogs on my head. But then I felt a twitch. I thought I heard a noise like an asthmatic trying to gulp some air, and I saw Henna's eyes widen in wondrous triumph.

"Get ready," she said, but offered no instructions more specific. I began to panic as I felt the straps tighten around my neck and something warm and clammy slip into both ears.

"Help," I croaked, as I glanced back at the mirror, noting that the thing had inflated and spread like a post-holocaust turkey. It swirled. It hissed. It glistened. And then it happened!

I was wrenched out of all experience into a different subjective slot. I was no longer me. At least I was me in the sense that everything related back to my nervous system, but the way I sensed everything was ultimately enhanced and altered. I felt upgraded, as if I was a pocket calculator who suddenly became the central processing unit for all global communication networks.

Only it was organic, oh so incredibly so. I seemed to have twelve hearts, all racing, all pumping blood into each other. I can't describe the things I saw as images because they blossomed behind my eyes, completely bypassing the retina. Yet it felt like some kind of deified, omnipresence - a voyeurism which broke every taboo while promising a galaxy of others I couldn't even imagine. It was an amorphous, abstract angelic orgy. I was the lion and the Christian, the devourer and the devoured, in eternity's ever-erupting gynaceum.

I found myself swimming in the most heart-wrenching music I had ever heard, while simultaneously flying through the sweet streams of polymorphous perversity ....and then some. I felt a transcendent exquisiteness as my ego dissolved completely, like a sugar sculpture inside the mouth of a diabetic goddess. Stars jumped out of my skin like popcorn - a delicious explosion out of every pore....

Henna swears that my eyes spun in their sockets as I went supernova.

* * * *

When I came to, everyone in the house was standing over me with bemused expressions on their faces. Everything in my room was covered in silver powder, including Henna. I was too spent to care that it was no longer a secret.

From then on our generosity was severely tested. At all hours of the night and day our housemates and their various partners would knock sheepishly on our door and ask to borrow our precious. We could hardly refuse, although all our instincts screamed selfishly.

The next day our local drug dealer dropped around expecting his weekly dose of sycophancy for our weekly dose of stimulants, only to find a house full of indifferent Cheshire grins.

"I bet your new man - whoever the fuck he is - is not as tolerant as I am," he said, unfortunately sounding more wounded than malicious.

Every few hours the walls would vibrate with the orgasmic shrieks of carrion souls bringing back undecipherable messages from the libidinal stratosphere. It was more addictive than crack, sex, coffee or even television. We had to write out a roster to avoid hoarding. No-one seemed to think we had property rights for finding it.

The silver powder began to build up, getting into everything. It was worse than sand at the beach, and when our wheezing vacuum cleaner choked to death it became even more ubiquitous. We found the cat had eaten some and died quietly in a corner, but on the up-side it worked miracles as a washing powder, turning clothes into psychedelic masterpieces. The landlord's suspicion at not being allowed access was promising to become a problem in the not to distant future.

Within a week our house looked like the most depraved opium den in history. We lay around, naked, staring at the roof, simply waiting for our next turn with the thing. Previously bashful people had been reduced to debauched detritus by this enigmatic object. The thing acted like the world's most powerful laxative, ensuring that all moral fibre was expelled from our bodies. We had become empty vessels just waiting to be filled by some cosmic wet-dream. We forgot to eat. After the house-hold had first found me inflagrante delicto with the thing, we had sworn a pact to secrecy, but as we all know, secrets spread faster than scabies; each person itching to tell the next. Curious visitors flocked to our front-door, and those brave souls that did not flee at our appearance were granted access not only into the house but the mysteries of Orgone.

* * * *

Then it happened...an inevitability we dreaded. The thing went missing. Someone had managed to abscond with it, and when this horrible truth became apparent we went insane. Fingers were pointed, curses were spat, allegations were hurled and tears were cried. We must have looked like a brood of monstrous babies abandoned by the beastly breast which had nourished us. The withdrawal process was a nightmare. If the landlord had decided to visit those few days he would have been confronted with the ugly scene of haunted junkies writhing over each other like a nest of vipers.

Eventually time began to crawl out of the abyss and the movements of the sun were perceived and understood. We all had showers, ventured out for some food, and hid in our rooms. Slowly the skin of our souls, which had been flayed raw by pleasure, healed and hardened in response to the quotidian.

However relief had no role to play in our physical recoveries. A lack gnawed at our insides, as if our entire families had been wiped out in some catastrophe leaving us orphaned. As soon as we felt able, Henna and I put on our sunglasses and drove out to our picnic spot. Why hadn't we thought of that before? There might be more of the things, no need to share. We did not feel optimistic, but we had to try.

As we approached the oak tree we were taken aback by a suspicious figure standing by the trunk and staring up at the foliage. We hesitated, but continued when we realized he may hold the key to the mystery of the thing.

He turned at our footfalls, and I instantly realized that he was an alien. His assimilationist disguise was rendered ridiculous by the fact that his nose was beneath his mouth. Other than that it was a good job, especially the receding hair-line.

"You found it didn't you," he said, before we could even stutter a greeting. We nodded, dumbstruck.

"Oh well, finders keepers as I believe you people say. One less won't hurt me," he said pleasantly, and began to march off. We stood rooted to the spot, but soon realized the wisdom in chasing him. "Wait," we cried, pulling him up short. "One less what?"

"I'm sorry?" he asked, his misplaced mouth smiling in a puzzled manner.

"The thing we found...what is it?"

The middle of his face let out a hearty laugh.

"You mean you don't know?" he asked, somewhat unnecessarily.

We shook our heads in unison.

"Well you see," he began, "I am an interplanetary voyager from the other side of the galaxy. It can be exciting, but on the whole it is a tedious and lonely vocation. To... how should I say this... take the edge of this loneliness the ship comes equipt with a library of onanistic diversions. Oh there is a complete range of high art too I assure you, but sometimes..."

"Excuse me," I broke in. "Onanistic diversions?"

"Surely you understand. They are our equivalent of what you would call a pornographic video. The copy I misplaced and you subsequently found, roughly translates as Tharquon Schoolgirl Holiday. You are most welcome to it. It is a decidedly tacky and sordid production; one of those made in the mid-Zolgrove period. The age taste forgot, as they say. The lighting is poor, the narrative ludicrous and the protagonist really quite repulsive. On the whole more offputting than arousing. I was only looking for it because I was afraid my superiors would think I had appalling taste and stolen it."

He laughed again. "Shan't say I'll miss it." With that he bid us good day and walked off into a rip in the fabric of reality, and winked into another dimension.

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