L.C. An Alien Planet or The Hidden World of the Fairies?

In a region of space still unknown to Earth-dwelling humanity, there exists a world with other people on it that is approximately eight times larger than our own much loved and familiar world.

Arnold Evins jumped in shock so suddenly and involuntarily after detecting it that his elbow knocked over his favourite and much loved ‘Best Dad’ mug which fell to the floor and smashed, spilling his tea.

He was a reclusive and highly unsociable man. He had one son and one daughter who were both grown up and living their own lives.

After decades of looking into outer space using a non-visual device that would send code rather than images back to his self-designed and self-built ‘Code Reader,’ he finally hit upon an object peacefully orbiting a star in an unknown galaxy and at an unknown distance that began feeding him the unbelievable data about a massive planet that was teaming with all sorts of life. It was a stunningly beautiful planet that he would later name ‘L.C.’ which stood for ‘Loop Closer,’ because to him, the discovery of this planet would definitively mark the end of the discussion about whether alien creatures lived, breathed and walked in other parts of the universe.

But after gathering more information on the life forms themselves, he discovered that the highest and presumably intelligent ones were potentially frightening and if he were to break the news of his discovery, people might try to put a stop to his probing around in case the inhabitants of planet L.C. would discover us and turn out to be unfriendly and dangerous to the human race. Besides this, he didn’t really want his study to be interrupted by endless noise and fuss from all kinds and departments of people.

And so, he kept his discovery to himself for a long time.

It was only after another seven years of research and much trial and error that the quiet, highly intelligent and mysterious Arnold finally got through to an alien from L.C. and taught him how to construct the same device he had made himself so that they could talk to each other through a headpiece which was called a Superverbal Conveyancer. It enabled a form of communication that was superior to all language, transcending it, and enabling thoughts to be exchanged in such a way that Arnold’s thoughts would be interpreted in the alien’s language when it reached him, while the alien’s thoughts would be deciphered and filtered out into English when they reached Arnold.

It would be quite painful to use the headpiece for extended periods of time because it drew out a lot of mental energy which in turn affected physical wellbeing. So often, Arnold was propped up on a bean bag with many cups of strong black coffee surrounding him, doing his best to stay awake while the seemingly expressionless alien talked and talked and talked to him about all kinds of things. It would then give the headpiece to its family members. Names were more tricky, but he gathered that the alien’s daughter’s name was something rather odd: Mercy. Who calls their daughter ‘Mercy?’ Perhaps he had got it wrong.

As for the alien whom he first made contact with, his name was something he couldn’t break down into English but with a little guess work, it seemed to come out as something like ‘High-hand.’

Arnold lay on the bean bag one evening after having been outside on his wooden deck enjoying a cigar. He was in such an isolated location that he often neglected to lock his door.

His daughter Rachael Hoven, who was a prominent and top-class scientist walked into his house after knocking in vain. She had long given up on trying to call or text Arnold and by the time she knocked, he was already lost in communication with High-hand and his family once again.

Racheal managed her own company: Exoplanet Enterprise, an independent organisation that focused on gathering data from known exoplanets that had already been discovered by NASA. It also did some research on distant galaxies observed by the James Webb Telescope. The ultimate dream of everyone at Exoplanet Enterprise, including Rachael herself of course, was to discover life on another world.

Rachael came into the man cave of her father who looked absolutely drained of energy and in a terrible state with large bags under his strange eyes and plastic cups and aluminum mugs all over the place as well as a stale smell and coffee stains all over the floor.

“Dad! What are you doing?!”

He slowly looked over at her. “Rachael?”

She looked very angry. “Get to bed dad! Now! Or even better, I should take you to hospital right away! Now give me that thing!”

She then grabbed his headpiece.

“No Rachael!” he shouted and tried to get up, but flopped down again in exhaustion. “Don’t Rachel! That’s dangerous! Once you start listening to it, you won’t be able to stop!” But she ignored him. He then watched in dismay as his daughter put the device on her own head and began to listen carefully and intently.

Her back was turned to him for a while as she listened to the disturbingly mysterious signals that first arrived in her mind and then began to seem like nonverbal English words, but clear enough words all the same – they were very intelligible. They said, “what just happened friend? We love you and are happy to reaffirm that your endearing species continues to interest us deeply.” A very strange but also very real feeling and emotion came with the communication. Rachael suddenly felt terrified as her mind began doing a freakishly impressive job in trying to convince her that she wasn’t listening to a human.

The reason she felt terrified was because she suspected that this device might be driving her poor father insane. And she might be next if she wasn’t careful. Her logical mind told her that there was no way she could possibly be speaking to an alien. That just wasn’t possible for a thousand reasons.

She kept listening and all too quickly began to feel that addiction to hearing what the entity or whatever it was had to say. Wow! It was terribly convincing. The voice then said, “I sense you are on the verge of unintentionally destroying yourself Arnold. Get help immediately.”

She then turned around as her mouth dropped open and her face went deathly pale. Her eyes were full of wonder and shock and were so wide open that her father jumped with fright and alarm. “Stop Rachael!”

She shouted back at him while the headpiece was still on. “Arnold!! What the hell?! Who is this?! Who am I listening to?!”

He yelled back at her, “it’s an alien my daughter! Now take the headpiece off before it steals too much of your energy! It’s like a drug! I can’t stop listening and talking back to it! And now you’re going to take it away from me!” He then burst into pitiful tears. “Oh, my dear High-hand! My dear Mercy! My dear friends!”

Rachael took the headpiece off and decided she should do her best to be calm. She then spoke calmly and sincerely to her father, “uh, okay dad, listen. This obviously needs to be looked into. And I’m sorry to say it but you are clearly not in your right mind at the moment. Just get some rest and we’ll discuss this tomorrow. I’ll hold on to this device while you rest.”

Her father’s head then dropped and he fell into a deep sleep on the bean bag.

Rachael looked down at the device and wondered whether it should be carefully studied over at Exoplanet Enterprise, possibly with the help of her reclusive father or whether it would in fact be wiser to keep quiet about it and have it destroyed then and there. She could then perhaps have her old father sent to a care home for the rest of his days.