Cutting The Fat

Hi everyone. This is a sequel to an earlyer extra terrestial related story I wrote on ATS called - "Bringing Home The Bacon" ...I recommend you read that first, so that you can follow this one with a better understanding.

eee.

Cutting The Fat.

Six years later...

Zaine sat alone in the pub. One hand on the pint glass infront of him, the other sorting out the coins that he had placed on the table. "£3.00, still not enougth to get a pint"

Tax increases in recent years had put the price of alcohol up to a new high... Or at least a new low in Zaines mind.
He couldnt even get 3 pints of Beer for £10 in his cheap local.

Forgetting the coins and looking at the papers infront of him, he adjusted his thoughts to the real reason he was here... The place where it had all started 6 years ago. A friend shared a video with him that had apparently been made using some very expensive animation software.

Although, truth be told, the video had been examind by real experts and also many other 'self-proclaimed' internet experts, all had various opinions about the truth of the video.

At the time. It had been an amusing prank... But since then, things had changed.

His friend, Alex, had vanished of the face of the Earth. Alex, who was a life-long friend of Zaine's had no family to contact, had apparently never lived in his flat in Fulham and had never worked in the movie industry.

Zaine's world was turned upside down.
Three and a half years in prison and a hundred thousand pound fine. Obviously he also lost his job at the BBC too..

There was no chance of a job in the media industry, and in general, no chance of a job at all. It was as if he was blacklisted. Victimisation? Maybe, but who could he go to? His probation officer recommended pherapy, and his pherapist recommended tablets, which in turn, left Zaine permanently drowsy and somehow, rather forgetfull.

Continued ~

After he stopped taking the tablets, he found his feet again. In the sense of being in the correct state of mind.

Eventually he found a job... Well, more like the job found him. He had started work for an On-line magazine that dealt with the great "unknown" and other various conspiracys.

His background haunted him in this new career as he was labled a hoaxster aswell as mentally unstable.
Everything he wrote was questiond and came under scrutiny.
Also being sent on the frequent wild goose chase didn't do anything to help his credibility.

And now, sitting alone staring at a half-full glass hd was waiting for his next deluded story to walk in through the door...

For the past two-weeks, Zaine had been swapping E-mails with somebody who called their-self John. This John had stated that he moved to the UK 16 years ago.
He had been working for some goverment agency that "slightly" resembled the C.I.A, although, that was just Zaine's asumption.

Zaine's editor encouraged the meeting to go ahead as John only wanted to speak to him.

The glass was now empty and Zaine stretched.. "2.30pm.. Great, another no show" he thought, getting up and making his way towards the door.

"Excuse me, but are you Zaine?" some old man had grabbed his arm. He hadnt noticed this person in the pub earlier. "You are, arnt you? I recognise your picture" the old man then showed him an old newspaper clipping, that had a picture of Zaine being led into court in hand cuffs, with the headline above saying, "Alien video jacker gets probed!"

"another witty headline thought up by some clever journalist"Zaine thought to himself.
"Yes. Im Zaine. And im presuming from your accent your John?"Zaine asked.

"Yes sir, I am. I apologise about my reluctence to aproach you but I just wanted to build a profile" jhon said, ushuring Zaine to a seat.

"Build a profile?"

"Yes, ive been looking at your body language and your actions. But dont worry, its something ive always done." John reply'd.

.."great, another nut-job. Ive got to get this over with quickly.." Zaine thought.
Two pints of Beer where placed infront of them as John paid the waitress.
John looked at Zaine and said, "you've got untill I finish my drink to ask me questions, since I can see your eagerness... to continue"

"Right," zaine said "straight to the nitty gritty... Do Aliens exist?"

"Ofcourse" John replyed...


continued~

"Well... Can you elaborate? How many, where are they from? What do they look like..?"

"Well.." John sighed, "That can be a tougth question to answer. Theres a huge diversity of life out there. Look at our planet Earth for example.
Recent scientific surveys suggest that there is 2.5 million diffrent species that have been identifyed on our planet.
Where as theres an estimated 5 to a 100 million on the planet.
Imagine that figure for a moment... Thats just Earth. Now think of another planet. Now is that planet bigger than Earth? What is its atmosphere like and under what conditions could life exist on said planet?.. Now think again, and ill quote what an old school teacher used to tell me, 'That there are more stars out there, than there are grains of sand on the planet. And most stars have a system of planets. Some similar to Earth, some very, very diffrent.
Also, you have to take into account some planets have moons. And those moons maybe able to sustain life.
So if you put that together you get a number thats impossible to even think about... Now your pressumed question... How much of that life is intelligent..?"

"John" Zaine interrupted, "I hope the next few words you resite arnt, next we must define intelligence.."

"Ha, Ha.. Maybe they where. And I guess I can waffle on a-bit...
So, I'll give you a figure. My previous employers where in contact with over 1000 diffrent races"

"A Thousand?" zaine questiond. "seems like a round number. Is that rounded up or down?"

"Its.. rounded down. Each race has diffrent ethnicitys, similar to Earth. Some of those ethnic groups wish to be defined diffrently to other inhabitants of their planet.. But since I can see that your still a bit dumb-founded, the more commenly known "Gray" has 56 identified variants. Be it, height, colour or language etc. Yet, the agency I worked for summerised it as one. One race."

"Ok John, so what can you tell me about the agency you worked for?"

"My agency is something similar a-kin to the story of the boogyman. Eyes and ears everywhere." John reply'd.

"um.. You where A Man In Black then?" Zaine questiond.

"HAA, I laugh at that, but I suppose it could be called that, at the asumption that we are not as pervasive as presumed through society as projected by the media... And movie industry."

"What can you tell me about them then?" Zaine asked, his curiosity screaming for an answer.

"Well using morden conseption of our... agency, the public would probably get 1% of our.. mission statement correct. In truth, the very depth of my previous job even escapes me. My own personal role being the security of infomation and procurement of knowledge gained through cooporation."

"Co-oporation..? So what do you mean? Do you suggest that rumours of a.. Grey - US military allience are true?"

"Dont put words into my mouth Zaine. The 'Gray' - US thing is a misconception pounced upon by conspiracy theorists in the sameway that conspiracy theorists say that reptilians are evil by affiliation to the devil due to the pre-concived Adam and Eve, snake, original Sin story, Bible fairy-tale. Under the assumption that the Gray - US agenda as an agreement that went sour resulting in Thousands of abductions is wrong. The context of this story paints a bad picture for a race that as a whole should be Highly respected.."

"ok John.. Slow down. What you said there, I could question for hours.." zaine remarked.

"Well you only have half a pint left to ask me more.."

continued~

"Right.. You hinted at religion just now. Is there any truth in ancient alien theory?" Zaine asked..

"Well.. Theres a double sided answer for that too. Religion is contrived of a belife system put together by a group of people who dont understand the bigger picture. Yes, some charecterisations are the result of extra terrestial life, whilst some is contrived by religious nuts who wanted their Epic... More Epic.
What im saying is Alien life existed before humanity, and will exist past the end of humanity. And to make humanitys existence longer, that is why theres the current, and im sure you know this, intervention of alien life. Yes, rumours are true. Mankind, left to its own devices will destroy its-self and no matter how corney it sounds that is an inevitable fact. Hence their guidence." Johns answer was pretty long winded, but made more questions.

"So.. There is some kind of other-worldly intervention?"

"Yes. But not in the take over the world sense. Its more of a helping hand, to push us through a door thats been opend."

Zaine's mind was full of more questions. What he had learnd was nothing new. Nothing helpfull in proving to the masses that there was indeed alien life out-there in the universe, and that it was in contact with ''certain'' forces on Earth. He looked as John finished his pint and stood up.

"Before you go, why did you want to speak to me?" Zaine asked.

"Well" John said, dipping his hand into his pocket and pulling out another photograph, "Tell me Zaine" he said putting the photograph face down on the table, "Are you familiar with the game called chess?" he asked.

"chess..? Yeah, whats that got to do with anything?" zaine questiond.

"Your nothing more than a pawn in this black and white checkerd world... Think that through" John said exiting through the pub door.

Zaine picked up his pint and took a sip.
That was one of the most weirdest interviwes he had.
Putting the glass down, he picked up the photo that John had left.
Before turning it over he noticed it said in a small scribble,

"YOUR friend Alex has been recruited... Like in that MIB movie.. Regards, John."

Zaine turned the photo over.
There was a familiar face on it, and below another small bit of writting which said
"Me aged 32."

Zaine's mind exploded. The picture was of the man that was on the supposedly "fake" alien interviwe video that had got Zaine into all this trouble in the first place...

~end.


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