The unidentified adventures of Tink and Taylor

It’s generally assumed that UFO’s are a modern invention, more akin to the 20^th Century but, for Tink and Taylor, it was a first-hand experience nearly 100 hundred years earlier; it’s just that no one believed them.

This shouldn’t be too much of a surprise considering their reputation. Hindsight would surely label them as village idiots, which is ironic as that was how they saw themselves too. Not blessed with either erudition or wit they barely managed to scrape a living. Taylor was known for his ability to stitch a button but not much else and Tink was known as the odd jobs man –often with the emphasis on the word odd.

Often found in their cups, having figured a way to distil alcohol from almost any fruit, vegetable (or leaf for that matter) they were often full of tall tales and tattle; hence leading to their being named the Tattle Twins. Normally this mattered not because they were quite proud of their ability to yarn on.

However, this time it very much counted against them for the story that they recounted about being abducted by, what we now know to be, aliens was completely true. They were laughed out of the village and suffered greatly for no one would ever listen to them again.

In deference to history and to balance the scales we’re now going to peel back the curtains and see what really happened that fateful night.

The craft had travelled many millions of miles and had suffered greatly on the journey and entry into Earth’s atmosphere. This was a scout ship, purely on a research mission. Their planet was dying and they needed samples that they could cultivate; and of all the planets visited only Earth had conditions akin to their own. It must be stated that, from the start, they came in peace and actually wanted to sneak in and out without being noticed, but the best laid plans….

At this time Tink and Taylor were busy scrumping as it was the middle of the night and Farmer MacGreggor was fast asleep. His orchard was bountiful and made easy pickings for the pair; one they hit on often. They were always careful and only took enough apples to satisfy their alcoholic needs. They knew exactly which parts of the orchard they’d been to before and made sure to rotate their plundering allowing the tree’s chance to regrow.

So they were busy picking apples by moonlight at exactly the same time as the aliens; however their methods differed greatly. The Tattle Twins picked by hand whereas the aliens used an advanced form of matter teleportation; taking up the entire plot of land, soil and all, including both Tink and Taylor. Both were clueless as to what had happened as the spacecraft had none of the flashing lights that would be attributed to them later, and was completely silent in its approach.

In fact, it took the twins more than twenty minutes to realise that something was wrong; for when they had finished their petty thievery and tried leaving the orchard they were surprised to find, not wood and field, but something more akin to plasticised steel. Obviously neither of them had the remotest idea of what was happening; both initially put the experience down to bad cider. When the lights came on they were astonished to realise just how different their new environment was.

The room they now found themselves in was far larger than anything they had ever experienced before; far bigger than the village hall and so much lighter. In the age of electricity we tend to take it all for granted, but to the Twins it was almost blisteringly bright; so much so that it almost hurt to look up.

Torn between the desire to drink themselves to oblivion or explore they chose the latter. One can only imagine what might have happened should they have chosen blissful inebriation.

It was at this time that the aliens had realised that they had mistakenly picked up the two visitors. They were horrified at the thought of causing them such distress and sought to rescue and return them as quickly as possible; but they were tired and hadn’t thought through their actions. Had they been more alert then 1) They would have realised that there was no way of communicating with the humans and 2) they looked, to human eyes at least, quite horrific; they were immensely tall and thin, looking more like metallic stick insects. They had very soft and pliable bodies which made them extremely vulnerable to any external impact. On their own planet they thrived due to there being no natural predators; everything lived harmoniously.

It was agreed amongst them that, in order to alleviate the intruders stress and fear, only one of the crew would attempt to face and return them as quickly as possible.

Now Tink and Taylor, still in a state of shock and mild inebriation, could not have been more terrified if they tried. They were not God-fearing Christians but did fear the Devil and Hell, and as they were now caught stealing apples they felt that Hell was where they now resided. With each apple a sin, they felt weighted down and were just about put their sacks down and repent when the door upon which they were leaning against slid upwards. They fell on their backs and as they looked up they had their worst fears manifest for it could only be a fiend from hell that now faced them.

Both screamed and scrabbled back just as the alien did the same. It was nervous enough in its own mind, so it tried to over-compensate by making the universal gesture of peace: outstretched arms with fingers splayed. But having ten fingers on each hand and now lunging at the Twins, the gesture had them screaming louder in hysteria, their backs now against the far bulkhead.

It’s not clear who threw the first apple but it was the only thing that they could think to do to protect themselves. Like a bizarre mystery play they pelted the poor, unfortunate creature with apples and it took only one unlucky hit on the alien equivalent of the pineal gland to kill it outright. (it being the one weak place where the skull had not formed properly) The alien collapsed in a heap much to the Twin’s relief. They could also see the open door beyond and the corridor further beyond; so, with ammunition in hand, they resolved to find a way out of the hell they were in.

In the control room the aliens were beside themselves as well. Not only were they causing the humans no end of torment, but it had also led to the accidental death of one of their own. They knew that there was strength in numbers now; maybe they could herd them into a shuttle craft, for that was the only logical place the humans could be moving towards. So they left the bridge en mass to restore some sense of order to their ship.

Of course, Tink and Taylor were not looking for the shuttle bay; they had no conception of such a thing. They were heading upwards for they had reasoned that, being in hell , the only way place one could escape the Devil’s clutches was to walk towards the light: up; which was also where the bridge was.

There was only one alien looking after the controls. With so much damage to the thrusters and stabilisers it took every ounce of its concentration to keep the ship in the air. It didn’t help the alien’s nerves, which were already frayed, that the humans were at loose in the ship somewhere. So it was so totally ill-prepared for Tink and Taylor’s arrival; but the Tattle Twins were prepared as each had an apple in hand, ready to let fly like a vegetarian David. However neither had the chance to let fly the apples of war for the alien suddenly collapsed in fright just on sight of them. But with no one at the controls the ship suddenly realised its mass and crashed with the force of a tidal wave. It was less of a miracle that Tink and Taylor survived and more down to their inebriation but, alas, the rest of the aliens were not so lucky. All died, either being crushed by the shuttlecraft or in the fall itself.

The crash itself managed to rip a huge gash in the bridge area from which Tink and Taylor were able to extricate themselves; bemused and shaken up but otherwise unharmed –which was more than could be said for the aliens.

The Tattle Twins wasted no time in running for the village: they were under attack by Devils and no one was safe. If they had but looked behind they would have seen the ship’s self-destruct mechanism take effect. It was a localised explosion but very effective in reducing the ship to dust. The Twins saw only a flash of light behind them but it was just another thing to keep them running.

Suffice to say, no one believed the Twins for without any physical evidence there was nothing to substantiate their tale. The thought of being abducted by Devils who could be defeated by apples was daft in the extreme; so Tink and Taylor were ostracised and spent the rest of their lives alone.

Across the galaxy their images were known –the last transmission had been beamed to the home planet with a health warning: Earth was not to be visited again. Humans were now a species to be feared and for over a hundred and fifty years we’ve been left alone…. Until now….