The Spark - Carl's Interstellar Crisis

Chapter 1 - When the Stars Refuse to Align

           Carl's eyes paced the expanse of his abode. He told himself, I am a hard-working American, I deserve this. The TV screeched the guttural riff-raff of Jerry Springer, which came to Carl's ears as the sweet honey of some warmly-lit theme park at night, bustling with the camaraderie of the merry mob. Of course, Carl's senses were not exactly up to par with reality, as evidenced by the massive clouds of smoke that seemed to float from his lips, caressing a bright, baby blue bong bouncing to the rhythm of no song in particular. His mind moved in swirly, psychedelic waves, everything in existence seeming to slow to a halting cadence. He thought about the people in the world, the rich, the poor, the wise, the foolish and everyone in between. Who needs to be anything or anyone, he thought, when you can have this much happiness in your life? Although his mind undulated, it ended up circuiting around this one theme. At certain times, meaning times when he came down from his highs, he encountered a dark, dank despair over his low position in society and his archetypal persona as a "no-life" stoner. At these times he held great envy for anyone who, unlike him, had ever made a significant achievement, or committed a daring deed, in their lives. He probably didn't have much potential even without the pot, but with it, he ended up dropping out of an obscure community college after just a single semester. But, when he was at the top of the roller-coaster that is marijuana, all the failures and troubles of his life drifted away, for he was his own master, and there were none like him.

As he lifted his bong to his lips to receive another glorious hit, an abrupt, violent tremor seemed to slam the entirety of his crappy, little tract home into oblivion. The TV swung by its wires to the ground, as an Olympic diver to his mark. Carl wondered if this was real, or some hallucination induced by the killer grass he was toking. Once his vision was pierced by an intense, bright blue illumination, he confirmed to himself that it was all some horrid concoction mixed by his brain; after all, blue was his favorite color. And, yet, the show went on, for, as the light faded, he saw, out of his window, a small fire had been started in his backyard, and was burning his bush. Rushing out, he gingerly placed his beloved bong beside him on the couch, and opened the backdoor to his house.

Upon emerging into his backyard, he was seized with a mortification beyond description. Every muscle on his face was instantaneously overcome with a searing cramp, as his face attempted to contort into an expression worthy of a reaction to what was in front of him.

He saw, in his ill-maintained excuse for a backyard, an eerily uniform congregation of standing, humanoid figures, each bearing sundry shades of yellow upon the skins of their naked bodies. On closer inspection, Carl discovered parts of their bodies were occupied by exposed wiring, or circuits, as if they were partly machine.

In unison, they all released a booming chant, "Hello, world! My name is Albert."

As he lost consciousness, Carl tried to remember whether he left his bong on the couch, or if he was still holding it as he was falling.

Awakening from his forced slumber, Carl instinctively brushed dirt from his flowing mane of blonde hair. The sight that greeted him after that jarred him from all pretense of drowsiness: all the humanoids had welcomed themselves into his house and decided to wear the clothes from his dresser, all of which were too large for the smaller bunch, who all held identical statures. It might have looked comical, all of them standing in his house with baggy-ass pants and bong-hits-4-jesus T-shirts, one with his Carl's Jr. work uniform, if they weren't all standing rapt at attention, facing towards him with gleaming, cold eyes.

He got up shakily, and murmured weakly, "H-H-Hi . . . . guys?"

With only a brief hesitation, the intruding party responded all at once with perfectly smooth voices: "We require sustenance. Do you possess any items which we might consume? We would be bound to your service, in return."

Carl blinked fast, these yellow robots were using language that confused him, delivered in a monotone that grated against his instincts with an unforgiving sharpness; in other words, he was daunted by their collective demeanor. His mind addled by his recent session with Mary Jane, he dimly deduced, "Consume . . . . you mean, like, pot? If that's the case, I got some real chronic indica on my coffee table, like for real, you know?"

Recognizing the object of his suggestion, the robot-humans lined themselves up in front of the coffee table effortlessly, as if they could read each other's minds.

Carl now felt a bit more comfortable, despite the bizarre situation he was now in. If these weirdos wanted some of that good stuff, he knew he was in his element. Besides, to him the whole scenario could have still been some ongoing hallucination, or some cannabis-driven dream.

For the first time, one of them spoke by himself, without the echo of the group. "By visual analysis, I recognize this is a species of harvested plant. What instruments am I to use, in order to consume this 'chronic indica', as you have called it?" the cyborg in the front of the line queried.

A rapt, giddy sensation coursed through Carl, as this tableau reminded him of the times when he would introduce some newbie to the art of pot-smoking. These interactions were especially propitious for fortifying his self-esteem, as he came to realize that he really had invested his mind into an area of knowledge that not everyone could learn to the extent that he had, and that he could act as a seer of weed, a vast bank of knowledge. With much pride, he instructed the yellow-clad fellow on how to use his glass, how to use the lighter, and the appropriate method of inhaling to reduce the harshness of the smoke.

The meager robot, after absorbing all of Carl's instructions, took the bong in hand, and blazed a nugget like a seasoned veteran. Carl suddenly wondered if he should have regretted giving a fresh-faced alien like that such a potent strain right off the bat, for what happened after that could only be described as chaos personified . . .