Flash fiction – or How I Got with the Programme!

I suppose you could say I came to writing via a circuitous route.  I started the first Aten Sequence book a few months before I went travelling in 2007 around Australia, with all good intentions of having it finished by the time I returned. Well that never happened – too many beaches, kangaroos, outback trails, excellent restaurants and fun to be had!

On my return I discovered an American website called Hubpages and started writing articles and earning money online, so fiction writing was firmly on the back burner.  After several years, I turned back to my original project and the first two Aten Sequence books were completed and self-published

But like all things, if you are passionate about what you do, you want to learn, you want to improve, and want your writing to be the best it can be. So how to do it?  Of course, one of the best ways is to keep on writing, so I started writing short stories as well as starting on the third Aten book.  I also started reading everything I could on composing stories, structuring novels, marketing and how to get book reviews.

But the thing that always puzzled me was the amount of people who wrote flash fiction. Why?  What was the point of it?  Flash fiction, if you have never come across the term before, is a very short, complete story of under 500 words or so.  There is even micro fiction, which is generally accepted as a story of 300 words or less.  But if you have novels to write, why spend your precious time crafting these stories?

I finally learned the benefit of flash fiction and how I could use it to improve my writing skills when I joined a writers group.  Again this was something I had thought about for around three years before I plucked up the courage to attend one of the Monday night meetings, where regular flash fiction competitions are held. These stories have to be 300 words excluding the title and the theme is chosen by the group.

So how did starting to write flash fiction help to improve my writing?

·                   It made me start to consider every word I used and weigh up how important it was to the story.  Writing full length novels makes it very easy to fall into the trap of using too many words and indulging in long, rambling sentences.

·         If using adjectives and adverbs is the cardinal sin of writing, then flash fiction helps you eliminate them and forces you to find ways of conveying your meaning without using too many descriptive words.  If you have only got 300 to use, you want to make sure each one counts.

·         It helps bring clarity.  You have a story to tell, ideas to get across, points of view you want to share.  You have to get rid of all the waffling, rambling and going around the long way.  For a complete story you still need a beginning, middle and end, so you need to strip out all the unessential elements and get on with it.

·         This stripping out also means ditching characters, too much scene setting, and any dialogue that does not add to the plot.  The ‘KISS’ principle reigns supreme; to tell your story in so few words you have to keep it as simple as possible.

·         You need to wrap the story up with a decisive last line. It is too easy with so few words to leave a story hanging and not give your readers an ending that satisfies them.

·         Flash fiction poses a new challenge every time.  You are given a theme, a word count and you have to produce a piece of writing in set time period. Challenges can be scary but they push us out of our fur-lined writing ruts and test us to think differently about what we are doing and write on topics we would usually avoid at all costs.

.·        Writing flash fiction gives you the opportunity to have a long, hard look at the bad writing habits you have gotten into. What words do you habitually overuse? Do you have certain phrases or expressions that creep into every piece you write, whether they are appropriate or not?  In these very short stories, there is no place for your writing ‘comfort blankets’. They have to be discarded to crisp up your story and let it be told within the word limit.

I am no great expert in writing flash fiction and am relative newbie in producing these very short stories.  But I am already beginning to see the benefits and am starting to bring what I have learned to my longer projects.

So, if like me, you are sceptical about how writing flash fiction can help you develop as an author, why not give it a go?  There are competitions and sites online where you test out your skill or you can join a local writers group, where you will receive useful feedback and critiques.

Here is an example of flash fiction.  It is a story I wrote on the theme of 'beyond the gate' for the Watford Writers Group, which I am very proud to say won the third prize.  I hope you enjoy it.

The Darkest Hour

The shadows lengthened as the moon slipped behind the mountain.

Maren knew it was time to wake the American.  The wounded flyer would only get one chance and, if he didn’t get it right, they could both be dead by the time the sun rose.

He reached out and shook the sleeping man’s shoulder, shoving his other hand over his mouth to stop him calling out.

‘Time to go,’ he whispered. ‘The moon’s just set, so it’s as dark as it’s going to get. You need to keep low and make as little noise as possible.  I haven’t seen or heard one of their patrols in a couple of hours, but it doesn’t mean they’re not out there waiting for us to make a move.

Maren took the top off his water bottle and thrust it at the American, who took a few thirsty mouthfuls.

The young flyer gave the old Basque guide a grateful look as he handed back the bottle.

‘Won’t you come too?  Someone tipped the Nazis off, those patrols were waiting for us? It’s too dangerous to stay.’

Maren shook his head.

‘My family is here.  If I don’t go back I’m putting them all under suspicion.  Besides, Todor is only expecting one package.’

‘How can I thank you for what you’ve done for me?  You’ve risked so much?’

‘By not getting caught.  The Spanish border is over there by that stand of pine trees.  Get beyond the gate and you should be safe.’

At that moment a light flashed three times in the trees, the signal Maren had been waiting for.

‘You must go now,’ he said pushing the American out of the barn door, watching as he stumbled into the dying night to be swallowed by the darkness.

Flash Fiction - A Jolly Good Catch

This is a short story I wrote for a flash fiction competition at Watford Writers.    It was my first evening at the writing group and my first entry.  I was very proud my story was voted into second place.

A Jolly Good Catch

We’d always thought of Edmunds as a good catcher and usually we applauded him for it.

It was a good thing until that night.  A good chap to have fielding on the rutted, makeshift pitches we used for battalion cricket matches.  He could catch any ball that came at him, however fast. He’d always manage to wrap his fingers around it and throw it back in one rapid, seamless movement.

That night was bitterly cold.  There was an iron frost and the sky was full with the cold sparkle of stars.  The half moon threw shadows over No Man’s Land, turning shell holes into pits of stygian hell. Moonlight glinted off the rifles and bayonets of the dead, strewn like random, broken puppets across the frozen mud.

We huddled on the fire step waiting for a German raid. The frigid air carried every sound we made, so each cough, foot stamp and curse must have carried to the German lines.

All we could hear was crackling frost, distant shelling and a machine gun chattering down the line.  Every time a Very light briefly lit up the dark night we expected to see the raiding party creeping towards our wire.

We were so lost in our waiting that at first we paid little heed to the dark object that flew with a faint hissing noise over the parapet.

Edmunds, acting on his famous reflex, stuck out a hand and caught it.

‘Jolly good catch,’ cried one of the men as another Very light lit up the sky.

Edmunds looked down and seemed confused by what he’d caught.

‘Throw the bloody thing back over the wire.’ I screamed before scrambling to get as far away from him as possible.

But Edmunds didn’t move.  His usual faultless follow-through was gone.

The thing went off.  Ears ringing, I turned to see Edmunds explode into a human fire ball.  I saw his lips move, but could hear nothing over the roar of the flames.  His catch had probably saved us, but the price he paid was a hideous death by fire.

 

'I Was Really Going Places You Know' - The Lament of Tuy

Tuy is one of the important female characters in The Aten Sequence Books, efficiently looking after the practical side of Aten's life at the villa, while at the same time being a sarcastic thorn in his side.  But she too has her story and her dreams, and being stuck on Earth with Aten had very definitely never been part of her plans.

‘I was really going places you know,’ Tuy gulped, as two fat teardrops formed in the corner of her eyes and slowly tracked their way down her flushed cheeks.

‘I had plans, I had dreams, I was really going places.  And now look at me?  Stuck here in this hot, dusty hellhole that doesn’t even have a proper power supply.’

The guard cat broke off from his morning ablutions to fix her with his enigmatic feline stare.

‘Don’t look at me like that.  It’s not my fault that the only thing I’ve got to talk to is a cat.  At least you don’t answer back, which is more than I can say for some of them round here.’

Tuy flung the onions she had been peeling into the bowl with unnecessary vigour and turned around to fetch the goose that was hanging on the wall behind her.

‘And don’t think that I don’t know what you are up to?  If you put so much as one paw on this goose carcass, you’ll be going into the pot with it.  Don’t think I don’t know where that stuffed carp went last week.’

The guard cat looked mildly offended at this insinuation and returned to lovingly licking his front leg.

‘See, even you don’t take me seriously,’ Tuy wailed, as fresh tears started tumbling down her face.

‘But you don’t know; none of you know. I was really going someplace, someplace special.  I was the only one out of my clutch to even make it external processing and do you know how many get through and are given an exit permit? Only 2%!  I was in the top 2% of my clutch and look at me now?  A single mother stuck on a backward planet I don’t even know the name of.  Motherhood was never what I wanted, especially not at my age. And what am I going to do with him? There aren’t any opportunities for a young Galasian here and it’s no life for him stuck in that shed all day.’

The guard cat switched to cleaning his other front leg without even looking up to acknowledge Tuy’s distress.

‘He needs to be out in the fresh air, running and playing with the other youngsters. Not shunned for being different and locked away as if he were a monster.’

These words did cause the guard cat to temporarily interrupt his washing and look up at Tuy with an air of disbelief.  His sensitive nose could detect the rank odour of Piy locked up in his shed, even this far away in the kitchen, despite the strong tang of onions that was in the air and the gamey scent of a goose that had been hanging for a long time.

‘And it wasn’t just the exit permit I got.  I was one of only seven hundred and twenty females to be admitted into the Galactic Cocktail Shaking School on Mildorium 27.  Can you even begin to imagine what an achievement that was?’

The guard cat yawned delicately and turned around to lick his nether regions.  When would the tedious woman shut up?  At this rate she would never turn her back, so he could get at that goose.  She might think she had a hard life down here, but really she had no clue as to what he had to go through just to get the odd mouthful of food occasionally.  And cocktails? Really? She would have been better off going to a good mousing academy, though god knows how many small rodents she would have to kill every day to keep that malodorous turnling of hers fed.

‘It’s bad enough that you ignore me when I’m trying to talk to you, but do you have to wash your private parts on my kitchen table?” she asked him irritably.  ‘And how come you can’t talk like those royal cats can?’

If the guard cat had eyebrows he would have raised them in disbelief. Why on earth did the woman think he would talk to her? Having to listen to her rants as he was waiting for food was bad enough.

‘I was great at the cocktail shaking school; one of their fastest learners ever.  By the time I graduated I could mix over fifteen hundred cocktails from fourteen different planetary systems.  And did you know that I was one of only eight thousand graduates ever licensed to use slieppel juice from Grandorminian 75?  That stuff can fell a Lotkair Sloth with just two drops.  I had my pick of jobs.  I really thought that bar in the mining belt was going to be the first step in a glittering career.  It was just oozing with rich miners and droids, all with plenty of cash in their pockets and out for a good time.  The tips were fabulous.  Did I tell you the story of the night that tulsphate miner dropped a 560 carat diamond in my cleavage?

The cat elegantly stretched and then curled up into a ball of mackerel striped fur.  Was the woman going to rant all night?  What he really wanted was to have a quick nap, but he could almost guarantee that as soon as his eyes were closed that goose would be put in the baking pot and he would have lost his chance. But it couldn’t hurt to let the woman think he was asleep.

He could hear that Tuy had started plucking the large bird.  Time was running out and, in the mood she was in, he wasn’t sure he wanted to be around when she started to chop it up with her cleaver.

‘You can ignore me if you want, but I’ve still got my story.  That tulsphate miner loved me you know.  Said he’d take me on his next prospecting trip and buy me anything I wanted. Oh why did Aten have to come into my bar that night?  There were seventy five others on that strip. I mean it’s not like I ever fancied him or anything, but I’d never met one of the immortal ones before.  It’s not often a girl gets a chance to party with a member of the First Families.  He offered to show me his space ship and the next thing you know we’ve run out of fuel in the middle of nowhere. ‘

The guard cat curled up even tighter in the hope the woman would take the hint and stop talking.  Tuy, however, was just getting into her stride.

‘I mean how does one of the immortal ones do something that stupid?  They’re supposed to be role models for us, right? People we can look up to, not incompetent idiots who run out of fuel and then don’t know how to fix the problem.  If I’d known that I was going to be stuck sweeping and cooking in a scratchy linen robe and too much eye make-up I would have just stayed on the home planet.  I could have raised several clutches by now, not just one turnling.’

The guard cat could feel himself gradually dozing off.  His was so sleepy he felt like his head had been stuffed with cotton wool.  The woman’s voice now just sounded like a constant drone in his head and she wasn’t showing any signs of stopping any time soon.  If he wanted that goose he would have to do something drastic.

There was only one thing he could think of that was guaranteed to get her out of the kitchen in a hurry, leaving his coveted prize unattended.  So he slowly reached out his mind, probing until he found the wooden door of the shed Piy was locked in.  He could sense the Galasian turnling impotently hammering at the rough wooden slats trying to get out, so he pulsed some energy into the stout piece of rope that was holding the door closed.  After a few seconds it ignited in a blaze of hot, blue flames that rapidly burned through the rope. The next time Piy’s fist hit the door it swung abruptly open.

Any time now thought the guard cat smugly, as he started counting down from ten.  Ten, nine, eight, seven ....... Suddenly, a loud female scream, followed by the guttural roar of a Galasian turnling shattered the late afternoon silence that had been hanging over the villa.  More screaming and the sound of running feet followed.

Tuy, her tearful rant rudely interrupted by the commotion, angrily slammed the half-plucked goose back down on the table in a cloud of grey and white feathers.

‘Not again,’ she screamed. ‘How did he get out this time?  And why are those stupid girls screaming, it’s not like he’s anything to be scared of. I suppose I’m going to have to go and sort it out.  Not like anyone else is going to.’

She quickly wiped her hands clean on the scrap of linen she used as a towel and ran out of the room in the direction of the screaming.

The guard cat waited until he could hear her footsteps pounding down the verandah, before he lifted his head and looked at where the goose was now lying on the kitchen table.

These humans think they are so clever, he thought as he dragged the large bird off the table and out into the courtyard.  Now he could have his dinner in peace in his special hiding place behind the dung heap, have another leisurely wash and a good long sleep.

Before Aten there was ......... ‘Ghosts and Other Really Big Surprises’

Pharaoh’s Gold – The Aten Sequence 1 took a long time to write and edit, so during that time I also started writing articles on the web and short stories.  I was keen to dip my toes into the indie publishing water before I released Aten and his friends out into the big wide world, so I compiled the short stories into an ebook and called it ‘Ghosts and Other Really Big Surprises’.

'Ghosts and Other Really Big Surprises' Book Cover

The book title is a bit of a give away  so it is perhaps not surprising (no pun intended!) that these are spooky tales of ghosts, the supernatural, unexpected events and hard choices that need to be made. After all, how do we know that what we perceive as reality is really the truth?  There are so many layers to our world, so many shadowy corners where anything could be lurking and all is possible.

In 'Best In Show' elderly Harold has been gardening and growing prize winning vegetables for many years.  So he is confused and a little bit angry that his cucumbers aren't growing as big as the neighbours and he is scared that he won't win the trophy at the local fete. So should he try the new 'wonder' fertiliser being sold at the market?

'A Beer at the Consulate' follows the adventures of the two young Egyptologists Rupe and Wilf as they uncover sinister goings on at their dig in the ancient Theban necropolis. They start asking questions, wondering if what the team is searching for should be left undisturbed. Disturbing events lead to chaos in the camp, threatening to allow an ancient evil to escape into the outside world.

'Eloise' is a heart warming Christmas ghost story for children. When two young Victorian children move into the big old stately home, they soon notice that their new home is haunted by another child, one who is long dead. But why does she haunt them and what is she trying to tell them?

'Consolamentum' is a story of the last days of the siege of Montségur, when the beleaguered Cathars were preparing to surrender and had hard choices to make. They could either choose their freedom or to lose their lives in the flames. So will one young girl choose the life that she is yearning to live to the full or follow her beliefs? 

'Mam Says' is a bleak post apocalyptic story set in a Britain that has been swept by a disfiguring new disease that also destroys victim’s humanity. The economy and social order are in total disarray as the authorities struggle to prevent the contagion spreading.  One family struggles on in a run down northern bar, a place where it is wise to listen to what Mam says.

What would you do if you were haunted by a vengeful dead lover?  'The Scent of Roses' is the tragic and romantic story of a young bridegroom who betrayed his marriage on his honeymoon journey through Europe. So now that his young son is ill with scarlet fever, will his spurned lover be able to gain her revenge from beyond the grave?

Have you ever been fixed up with a date by a friend? 'First Date' is a cautionary tale for all of you who, having been disappointed in love, go for the safe option. You know the guy that has always been lurking in the background that you have always ignored while you hung out for somebody more exciting?  But be very careful if you do accept that date because, after all, how do you know what 'Mr Sensible' really has planned for you?

Hazel is the last girl you would ever think that would enjoy a bird watching weekend, having to dress in wellies and unflattering rain wear   So, not surprisingly, she totally miffed when her best friend lies to her and takes her to a twitcher’s convention in remote country pub. It is soon apparent that it is actually the group leader Robin who is the main attraction for her friend, so as the weekend unfolds will Hazel be able to fight her growing attraction to the charismatic bird watcher and also find out what secrets is Robin hiding?

So why not visit Amazon and download a copy of 'Ghosts and Other Really Big Surprises' today?  Don't worry if you haven't got a Kindle, because you can download a free Kindle app onto your PC or laptop.  Enjoy these spooky tales and make sure that you lock the doors, check in the wardrobe and keep all the lights burning while you read!

Character Interview - Ronalda Bauxneitner from the Interplanetary Daily Gossip Talks With Druitt

Ronalda Bauxneitner reporting from the Interplanetary Daily Gossip

Modern Gurneh and the Ramesseum

“Stulfano, can you adjust the lighting over here?  I think we need to get a better angle, all that linen is just getting in the way?”

“Best we can do Ronalda.  Ready to roll in 3,2,1.....”

“Hi, this is Ronalda Bauxneitner from the Interplanetary Daily Gossip broadcasting from Planet Earth as part of our remote worlds and alien diversity programme. We have come here today as we have received a tip off that a member of the First Families is currently sojourning here.  Does this mean that after millennia in isolation and obscurity that Earth is finally to be opened up to inter dimensional tourism? Or is this an unauthorised visit that is, in fact, a breach of Galactic Protocols?”

“I am currently standing outside a charming rustic villa in Ancient Egypt, where I have been lucky enough to secure an interview with one of the entourage of First Family member Aten, who will hopefully be able to give us the inside scoop on why he is here, the purpose of his visit and whether or not he was given special authorization by his father’s High Council to visit a designated ‘primitive’ world.”

“Ah, here he is now.  Say hello to our millions of viewers Mr Montague.”

(Camera pans on to large bulky figure with its face and head covered by a linen shawl.)

“Druitt, my name is Druitt.”

“Oh, well welcome Mr Druitt Montague.”

“No, no Montague Druitt.”

“Mr Druitt, I am having trouble hearing you.  Do you think that you could take that linen shawl off your face?”

“I would prefer not to Miss Bauxneitner, as I would not like to alarm your viewers.”

“Come, come, I am sure that you are a very handsome man.”

“Well, mother always used to tell me that I had inherited all the looks in the family, but that was before.”

“Before what?”

“Before I met Aten!”

“You are intriguing me?  I have come across many different responses to having met Aten in my time, but having to cover their face afterwards was not one of them?”

“Well it was the spell that went wrong.....then not changing me back...Oh I’m not sure I should be telling you any of this!”

“You can tell me Mr Uittmon. Everything that you say on the Interplanetary Daily Gossip is totally confidential.”

“But I thought you said that you had millions of viewers?”

“Yes, but as they are all at least eighty six light years away they don’t really count do they?  So tell me some more about this spell that went wrong?”

“It’s all a bit embarrassing, so I would rather not.”

“Come, come Mr Montru, we are all friends here. It helps to talk you know.”

“Well, his intentions were good, you know.  He wanted to catch that murderer, but it just all went a bit wrong. Maybe the fog and the police whistles distracted him or something?”

“I am going to take a wild guess that you are not from this time frame?”

“Eer yes, I think. This was in London in 1888. You know London in England?”

“I have just been told through my ear piece that this was in a time period called ‘Victorian, is that correct ?”

“I think so, from things I have read from a later date.  Certainly Queen Victoria was ruling our mighty empire at that time.”

“So what was Aten doing there and how did you meet him?”

“Well we didn’t meet as such; it was just an unfortunate coincidence that I got in the path of that spell.  All very irregular of course, not having been formally introduced or anything. Deuced awkward in fact.  I have never forgiven myself for not being able to say farewell and explain to mother.”

“But you still haven’t told us what Aten was doing in Victorian England and why he is now here in Ancient Egypt?  Where is Aten, by the way?  We would really like to talk with him.”

“Aten is out, paying calls. And I really don’t feel that it my place to disclose his social arrangements to a complete stranger.”

“Well, I think you’ll find that Aten and I go back a long way Mr Montague. I’m sure that he remembers me fondly.”

“Mr Druitt.  My name is Druitt!  I can’t recall him ever having mentioned you. But it is all so strange here, that it might have slipped my memory.”

“But this looks like such a charming old villa. So very quaint!  How does living here differ from your lifestyle in Victorian London?”

“Oh it is dreadful!  You can get none of the little necessities that you need in order to live like a civilised gentleman.  There is no running water, the dust gets everywhere and don’t get me started on the food!  The food is nothing like what I used to enjoy at home.  Mother understood my delicate constitution so perfectly and would have cook prepare just the right kind of little delicacies that my poor stomach could tolerate.  Here all I get is bread, onions and that filthy cloudy stuff that they call beer. Can you imagine what it is like to have to start the day without even a decent cup of tea inside you?  At least when we lived on the ship, the computer would always have a pot of Earl Grey, a lightly coddled egg and two slices of white toast ready for me when I arose.”

“So Mr Montuitt, why has Aten moved you here into the villa and away from the home comforts of the ship? After all, it can’t be particularly comfortable for him either?”

“Druitt, woman!  My name is Montague Druitt. Well he lives in a completely different style to the rest of us you know.  Waited on hand and foot by that Tuy woman, servants to pour water for his baths, all the best foods and wine.”

“You sound a bit bitter there Mr Dr.... oh never mind.  Do you feel that Aten is not treating you well?  Would you like to give us a full exposé?”

“Well, no, I mean, I wouldn’t go that far!”

“So why are you living in the villa exactly?”

“Oh it is all too embarrassing and I don’t think that Aten would be best pleased if I told you anything?”

“Well Mr....., whatever your name is, we have millions of viewers here who are just dying to hear the full story about what Aten is doing on this planet.  Did he get a special dispensation to visit do you know?  Can you show us the certificate?  And why is he staying so long?  Is he putting together a plan to open up Earth to inter dimensional tourism?”

“I don’t know what you are talking about.  It’s nothing like that.  But I don’t feel that it is my place to discuss Aten’s circumstances.”

“Are you scared of him Mr Drumont?”

“No, no of course not.  But he can get very tetchy, you know.”

“Well you seem to be very tense.  Are you feeling tense? You are scared of him aren’t you?”

“Look I don’t have to tell you anything. Please go away.”

“Oh but you do.  When we arrived you signed a full disclosure contract, which includes full access to seeing your face.  Failure to comply can lead to prosecution and nine years hard labour in the titanium mines of Sthundalor. So who are you most frightened of now?”

“You can’t do that?  You never said that all those funny alien squiggles meant that?  You said that it was just a formality, something to satisfy your producers?”

“You should never sign anything without reading it and having it checked out by your own lawyers Mr Monty.  If you had read down a few pages you will have seen that The Interplanetary Daily Gossip is legally obliged to provide you with a translator and a lawyer, but by signing you have waived any rights that you had.  We have translators in over twenty six million languages and dialects you know, quite the most comprehensive translating service in this quadrant of the universe.”

“Does nobody speak English anymore?”

“Quite frankly Mr Monuitt, you are exceedingly lucky that we have a translator that does speak English and who was able to programme my earpiece.  It is not designated a ‘rare, obscure archaic language’ for nothing you know.  Only a handful of scholars in any given millennium choose to major in it.”

“Druitt, the name is Druitt.  If you are going to prosecute me, you can at least get my name right.”

“Come, come Mr Druitt did you say?  Things have taken an unpleasant turn. All you have to do is tell us why Aten is here on planet Earth and show us your face.  Then we will go away and leave you in peace. Promise!”

“You really mean that?”

“Sure and would it help you make your mind if I told you a little secret?  Bread and onions would be regarded as luxury gourmet cuisine in the titanium mines. You would also never see sunlight for nine years and would be working back to back, non-stop shifts.  I hear that they find the whip to be very useful in encouraging lazy workers.  Why you are trembling, are you feeling alright?”

“If I tell you will you promise not to let Aten know that I told?”

“Of course, as I said before, everything you tell us is just between us and my millions of viewers.  But first, let us have a look at your face?  Stulfano, take that cloth away with the long tongs.  You don’t want to be touching it, it looks filthy and in this backwater could even be lousy.”

“I say, that’s a bit rude.  Owww, you’ve got my ear with those things. Please let it go, you are hurting me. I’m going to howl.”

My, my you really don’t look much like a Victorian gentleman, do you?  More like some kind of dog?”

“A basset hound, there I said it, I now have the features of a basset hound.  Good solid breed.  Could have been much worse.”

“So to all our viewers who are just tuning in, we are here on planet Earth interviewing a member of First Family Aten’s entourage, who has just very kindly just exposed his face to us.  Shockingly, this human has the features, fur and claws of some kind of dog.  Should this kind a thing be allowed in a modern galaxy?  Please vote now on the poll that you will see flashing up on your screen.”

“I’m not sure it was allowed exactly.”

“So have you always looked like that Mr Drumont?”

“Of course not, I told you before; people used to think me rather handsome, especially the young ladies I have been told.  Can I please cover up again, this is rather too embarrassing.”

“So Aten got a change spell wrong again?”

“No, yes, I mean....  I mean I’m sure he never meant it to happen. Please give me my shawl back?

“Not until you tell us what Aten is doing here?”

“Oh give me that, stop dangling it just within reach and then jerking it back.  I’m sure that your viewers are not enjoying the sight of my face or my obvious discomfort.”

“I think that you will find that our viewers are a broad-minded crowd. Just tell us what he is doing here and it will all be over.”

“He’s stuck.  There, I told you. He’s stuck!”

“Stuck?  How very curious.  And how exactly did such a prominent member of galaxy society get stuck on a rock like this?”

“I have already told you too much.  Please go away?”

“Just answer this question and I promise that we will leave you in peace.”

“And never come back?”

“Never. We promise.”

“Well if you promise.  He ran out of fuel.  He forgot to fill up at the last inter galactic filling station and so he is stuck here until he can get more fuel.”

“For our viewers just tuning in, this is possibly the scoop of the century.  First Family member Aten has fluffed yet another change spell, leaving this poor human looking like a dog.  Will he finally be censured this time by the High Council?  But most shockingly, he is here on Earth because he is stuck.  That’s right folks, you heard it here first.  The great Aten is stuck on Earth.”

“Oh I say, that’s a bit harsh.”

“We now have to be moving on  to our next segment, bringing you the interplanetary gossip that you crave every minute of every day. But before I go I would like to thank Mr Drutly for his kind co-operation and for giving us this amazing scoop.  How will the news that Aten is stuck go down on his home planet?  Stay tuned as I try and track down a family member to interview. And as a gesture of our appreciation Mr Truitgue, I would like to give you this complimentary flask of fuel.  I think that you will find that it is just enough to get you some hot water to bathe in and make yourself a cup of tea.  You will really have to improve hygiene around here if you want to pull the tourists in you know, people expect decent amenities these days.  You can’t just rely on the back to primitive crowd to turn a profit.  Stulfano, get us out of here.

(Low sobs coming from Druitt can be heard and then the rattle of chariot wheels turning into the courtyard.)

“Druitt, why are you standing out in the sun like an idiot?  Are you crying?  And what’s that you’re holding?”

“It’s a complimentary flask of ship’s fuel.”

“Where the devil did you get that?”

“Some reporter, Ronalda something or other from the Interplanetary Daily Gossip gave it to me.”

“Ronalda Bauxneitner was here?  What did you tell her?  How did she know I was here?”

“I told here as little as I could, but she threatened me.”

“She beat you or hold your paws over hot coals?”

“No, no she threatened to prosecute me and send me to some titanium mines where they wouldn’t feed me for years.”

“And you believed her?”

“Well she said it was in the thing she made me sign.”

“Give me strength. Druitt what did you say?”

“Only that you were stuck and she guessed about the change spell when she saw my face.”

“You told Ronalda Bauxneitner that I was stuck?  You told Ronalda Bauxneitner that I got the change spell wrong?  So the whole universe including Uncle Lucie and my father now know I’m stuck on this sorry planet with a loser like you? How do you think that makes me look? And did another teensy little thing not occur to you?”

“Like what?”

“Like that to get here she would have had to have come in a ship that had fuel in it? Those roving reporter vessels never carry less than five spare canisters. If you had had the sense to keep her here until I got back, we could all be on our way home by now?”

“But I thought that you just would have wanted her to be gone as soon as possible.”

“Please don’t think Druitt, just do as you are told occasionally.  Give me that flask before you do something stupid with it.  Do I have to do everything around here?  What have I done to deserve being stuck here with a bunch of losers like you?”

“But she said that I could use the fuel to heat water for a bath.”

“In your dreams, Druitt I have much better uses for this!”

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You can follow Aten and Druitt’s adventures in Pharaoh's Gold - Aten Sequence 1.  You can get it on Amazon:  http://amzn.to/13GNgPF or from the itunes bookstore, Sony, Kobo, Barnes&Noble, Copia, eBookPie, Gardener’s and eSentral. You don't even need a Kindle because you can download an app for free from Amazon.