Creative Writing: Five Years, Chapter 3

"Moonage Daydream" // "Starman"

Chapter 3 - "Year Two: I'm Busting Up My Brains for the Words"

A full year had passed since humanity had learned that the earth was dying.  The greatest minds, the richest people, the most influential religious and political leaders - all of them had tried to unite in order to solve the crisis.  But after a few short months it was clear that nothing was going to change the fact that the planet would never be revived.  The world hadn't devloved into immediate chaos like the pictures had predicted, but the old way of life had certainly been overturned.

People didn't want to go to work.  They just wanted to spend the last of their savings and time on their loved ones.  They wanted to see friends that were far away, be reckless and go bungee jumping, splurge on the finest accomodations in another country - they wanted to be impulsive and careless and give all their savings away during their last years on earth so they could mark off their bucket lists before they died.

The main problem was that the increased spending and limited amount of resources meant that inflation was rampant, and only a few people were left that bothered to operate many of the world's industries.  Governments had also made nation wide mandates to ration the last of the food supplies and try to keep order.  That is, when they weren't in the middle of dealing with constant protests and revolutions that tried to overthrow their power that preached messages of salvation and peace to the masses.  Although these coups weren't anything new, as they had been there since the beginning of the proclaimation in some form or another.

So humanity hadn't disintegrated into anarchy, but James believed that living in a constant state of tension was worse.  The feelings of fear and anxiety overrode any other, and it kept the world in a constant state of suspense for when the end would come.  As Hitchcock had said, there is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it.  But even the most paranoid couldn't keep up the strain of remaining in a constant state of dread, and soon enough everyone had faded into an apathetic numbness by the second year since the announcement.

'Perhaps the world would still go out with a whimper,' James mused.  Still, for the past year things hadn't been so terrible.  At the very least he hadn't been homeless, thanks to his fortuitious encounter with Myrna-Jean.

The fact that they met at a graveyard was, in his opinion, rather symbolic of their hopeless love.  They both knew that any relationship between them was dead before it had truly begun.  But he couldn't help but be drawn to her paradoxical nature.  She looked extremely young, hardly older than nineteen, and she was moderately attractive in that girl-next-door, ordinary sort of way.  But at the same time her hazel eyes that carried a hardened, cynical edge to them which would've been more appropriate on someone three times her age.  It was baffling.  It was intriguing.  And when she had made her offer for somewhere to live with no strings attached (and no rent, for that matter), James knew he had to accept.  He was determined to learn quite a bit more about this unusual girl.

They had been living at Haddon Hall for the past few months.  It was a sprawling Victorina style villa that had once belonged to some lord or another, but that now lodged quite a few wandering youths looking for refuge from a cruel world.  James and Myrna lived there along with four other couples and James' friends Tony, Rudi, Bevan, and Sonny.  They were able to play their records as loud as they wanted, practice their instruments at any time of day, and could stay up long into the night reading and discussing the greats with no one to disturb them.  So far it had been a great set up.

But despite the fact that James had a new girlfriend, a roof over his head, was able to be with his mates, and did not have to resort to getting a soul crushing job as an advertising agent or some such nonsense to pay the bills, it still didn't change the fact that he was a wanderer at heart who was waiting for Fate to find him.  As such, he often took to roaming the streets after nightfall.  He liked to take his portable radio and go out somewhere, anywhere, else on his own in order to wait for his Destiny.

Tonight was no exception.  It was a cool evening, and James wanted to take advantage of it.  Britain had been undergoing an unexpected heat wave for the past two weeks, and any promise of relief was welcome.  He didn't know what time he was when he found himself at the top of a hill in the middle of an empty field, but he saw that the tiny artificial lights that surrounded the area were low and dimly lit.  It was as good of spot as any.  He leaned back on his radio and turned the dial to his favourite underground station.

"...He's never early, he's always late.  First thing you learn is that you always gotta wait.  I'm waiting for my man...", the small speaker blarred in the unusual quiet of the night - barely a motor could be heard in the distance.  There was something in the air - his Destiny was fast approaching, inevitable and remarkable, he was sure of it.

He had been dozing for a while, at times contemplating and at others dreaming, when suddenly, his radio cut out.  Startled by the silence, James jolted wide awake.  Then, just as abruptly, the device came back on in the middle of a different song.

'Clearly, some cat was laying down some crazy rcok 'n' roll music', James thought.  He could briefly make out the words, "...get it on...'lotta soul..." before the loud sound faded away once again.

'What the hell,' James thought.  He had never had a problem with his radio before and the station was fairly reliable.  Frowning, he wondered if there was something wrong with the speakers, but peering in the dark wouldn't do him any good.  He wished he had some light.

Just as the thought had popped into his head, a bright beam illuminted the night sky, as if a star had gone supernova.  But then as quickly as it appeared, it vanished once more.

"...I'm an alligator!  I'm a mama-papa coming for you.  I'm the space invader.  I'll be a rock 'n' rollin' bitch for you..."  the radio had abruptly come back to life as soon as the flash of light vanished.  Now there was a slow voice like a wave of phase now playing something he had ever heard before.

'Wait a second.  That wasn't a DJ,' James thought, 'If anything it sounded like some sort of far out hazy cosmic jive.'

Intrigued, he turned up the volume on his radio, "...Don't fake it baby! Lay the real thing on me! The church of man-love, love.  Is such a holy place to be..."

James was entranced.  What did it all mean? Who was this cosmic cat? The song kept looping over and over again, and James found that he couldn't turn it off.  It was like he had been hypnotized by some rock 'n' roller playing on the radio, "Keep your 'lectric eye on me babe.  Put your ray gun to my head.  Press your space face close to mine, love! Freak out in a moonage daydream! Oh yeah!"

'The voice had said it was a space invader.  Maybe he had picked up an extra-terrestrial signal?', James thought.  It sounded unearthly, supernatural - dare he say, alien? He had been a fan of sci-fi movies and dystopian novels growing up, but this was something else altogether.

The song was about to loop once more when it cut out and the unnatural star light came on again.  This time it was closer and brighter than before.  Shielding his eyes, James caught a glimpse of a large dark outline of - something - before he was completely subsumed into its blinding brilliance.

--

Myrna-Jean was preparing for another long night alone.  James was gone again, but that didn't mean she liked it.  She wondered what he did all by himself and why he had to do it at night.  She wasn't under any illusions that they were exclusive or that their love would last, or that he was the type that could be tied down.

'But', she thought, 'He could at least be curteous and let me know where he was going so I don't assume that he's dead in a ditch somewhere.'

Sighing, she turned on her radio to relax, but the device refused to work.

"Damn machine," she muttered before a loud sound from the speakers made her jump.  Suddenly, the speakers emitted an otherworldly sound, "...freak out...far out...in out...'  But before she could hear any more, the sound faded away once again.

"What the -?" Myrna-Jean wondered.  It was unlike anything she had heard before.  It was unnatural.  Otherworldly.  She wasn't even sure she heard it right, as it had been over thirty hours since she had last slept.  But try as she might, the radio refused to play anything else.  It remained silent.  She was just about to throw the damn thing on the ground in frustration when her telephone rang.

"'Lo?" Myrna-Jean answered warily.  Who in God's name was calling at this hour?

"Did you hear it?!" a loud voice that she recognized as James' shouted into the receiver.

"Hear what?" Myrna-Jean asked, confused as to what he was talking about.

"That song!" he exclaimed eagerly, "The one that just played on the radio!"

"The one about freaking out?" she asked tentatively.

"Far out! So you heard it too!" he exclaimed eagerly, "Switch on the TV! Quick! We might be able to pick him up on channel two!"

"Him? Who is he? What was that?" she almost shouted back into the receiver.  She was confused and more than a little surprised.  James was excitable, but this was a new level even for him.  He sounded - odd.  Different.  The music was unusual, but the melody and the words were already rapidly fading from her memory.  It definitely didn't seem like it was worth causing anyone this much fervour over.

The low hum of her television began to warm up in the background, but before it could power on James yelled impatiently, "Nevermind, it's taking too long - look out your window! I can still see his light!"

The telephone cord stretched along the length of her room as she went to the window.  She drew back the curtain warily and looked out.  The street lamps were low and the stars were bright, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

"...he said that if we can sparkle he may land tonight!" James was still chattering on in her ear, clearly not bothering to wait for her to do as he asked, "But remember not to tell your pop, or he'll be frightened and get us locked up!"

"James.  James!" she shouted over him, "What the hell is going on?! What are you talking about?! I don't see anything outside!"

He quieted immediately.

"But you - you heard the song, right? You said so yourself- that hazy cosmic jive - the one about the space invader," he insisted.

"I don't know anything about a space invader.  I thought I heard someone say 'freak out' on the radio, but then it died and I haven't been able to get it working since.  Now tell me what's going on."

The other end was silent.

"Hello? Hello? James? Are you still there?" she asked.

Silence.

She waited for a while, but there was still no response from him.  She had thought they had been disconnected and was about to hang up when -

"Myrna-Jean, my darling, simply put, I have found my Destiny tonight.  She has come in the form of a Starman, and he's waiting in the sky."