Alone in a London flat.

I was alone in a London flat, and I was dying. Tongue-dry, like sand. Hands-frail, gnarled and cracked. Eyes-eyes closed to the piercing shoots of the sun, closed to the world. Brain-pulsating. There is, I think, an alien in the living room. What? Where? Why? I do not know. But I cannot leave. I cannot face it. It started about two weeks ago, I believe, with a drip. That one singular droplet, dropped from the sky, falling, miles and miles and miles down through the freezing air, unswerving through wind and rain, and onto my roof; from there, trickling gently, but purposefully, down the sloped glass pane and through a thin crack in the shoddily-applied sealant of my conservatory (which was, handily, also the living room).

Drop. I remember it well. I had been watching it hang there, tantalizingly, for several minutes. Waiting. Waiting as it had waited for a thousand years, most likely. Waiting to drop, ever so definitely, onto my floor. I watched it-and, with increasing surety, I realized that it watched me. One three-dimensional eye, reflecting, absorbing. Plotting, scheming, conniving, conceiving-conceiving ways to reach its target. Conceiving ways in which to unload its unholy cargo-a small alien life form. A small alien life form that would grow, undoubtedly, into a monstrous aberration. Like an innocent vine plant, it creeps gently, expanding slowly; softly muffling dissenting cries with its shiny green leaves as it creeps ever further, covering all in its path with an unstoppable tread. That droplet was impregnated with something very dangerous, and it was trying to infiltrate my flat. But still, I dared not look away, lest it should make its move.

“Why are you here?” I asked, but there was no response. It continued to stare, reflecting, absorbing. Why was it here? Because it had been created-as all creatures in a galaxy far, far away surely are-for this exact purpose. To infiltrate, evaporate and relay its sinister findings to the Mothership. But what if it stayed? What if it grew-as it surely would? Surpassing its remit, growing wildly, violently, out of control: much greater than the sum of its component parts. Monstrously spreading its welted, ultra-green tentacles vociferously across the living room; slithering around the small, outmoded television, sinisterly snaking its slimy sensors ever so certainly around the lamp, strangulating the fridge-the cheese!-consuming, rendering, reforming, regurgitating its putrid contents into something very much like itself. Another vessel, another sordid base from which to spread wildly, violently, out of control-beyond the comprehension of its creators. Into the kitchen, the toilet, out the door, and up, up, up to the Danes who lived above. Spreading, irrepressibly; consuming, rendering, reforming and regurgitating, gently nestled in its central nexus within the sofa-a place I have not presumed to disturb for over a year.

But this was all conjecture. For there the drop remained, hanging resolutely, and here I remained, shaking. And until it fell no one could know what might happen. I prayed for resolution and for one brief moment I hoped that several government agents in metallic white overalls would burst in, cordon off the whole area with yellow and black tape, and isolate the droplet-citing health-and-safety reasons. But that was only for a very brief moment. Time seemed to narrow. The entire history of the world in all its endless, unceasing glory was squeezed by two large hands into this one moment: this narrative, this matted, grey sofa, this overworked ashtray in the corner, me, myself and the droplet, would, so it seemed, decide the course of the future here and now... Drop.

That was, of course, all in the past. Seventy-six hours and thirty-two minutes into the past. The world has changed, the future channelled into its fixed tunnel going where I know not. I cannot know. I cannot leave. There is an alien in my living room.