Match of the Day
II: The Big Match
by Michael S.
Collins
“I is
here in pieces!” For an intergalactic
visitor on his first visit to Earth, this was a
good first stab at English. It consulted the
tourist broacher once more. “Peace.
Uneventful, we are. OK! Shake hands is a now?”
It offered a claw.
The headmaster,
completely out of his depth, felt the best thing
to do was to accept this gesture of friendship.
After all, if he did not, he could have started
an intergalactic war, and that is not something
that history would look favourable on. The
headmaster took the claw, and dropped dead. The
first alien looked at him.
“They
seem to make a habit of that.” He said to
his companions in their own language.
“Falling
over must be a national sport.” Replied the
second.
“Let us
not dilly-dally around such creatures. We are
here for a reason. How far are we from our goal?”
said the first.
“I am not
sure. We got a bit lost.”
The first
youngster turned to his fellows. “Lost? How
did we get lost? I thought you said turn left at
Alpha Centauri and focus on the small island bit
next to Paris. Well, we got here. Now, let’s
go see Bobby Charlton and friends before our dads
find out we nicked their spaceship.”
His friend
decided to snarl up. “Finding Wimberley
stadium should be easy enough. It has two towers.
And Germany wins there a lot.”
They looked up
the quiet street, all four of them, watching in
amusement at the still humans who had all taken
to the peculiar pastime of collapsing to the
ground and staying still. Certainly escaping from
the dreary monotony of Apocalypse 7, the home
planet of the Cantalavoreans, was an added bonus,
but now at any second some angry parental
Cantalavoreans could appear in the mothership at
any second and punish their miscreant children.
And all for a little adventure!
(Cantalavoreans
omit natural gasses completely lethal to humans.
If you ever come across a child Cantalavorean,
remember to bring a trusty gas mask. This is not
needed for the adult Cantalavoreans, since they
are in fact omnivorous and will have already
devoured you. Just in case you find yourself in
the above situation. But please do not be put off
by this: the adult Cantalavorean is an equal
opportunist. Often, to punish a very bad child,
they will eat it.)
“Why are
we here again?” The youngest clearly had
doubts, and the eldest put them to rest.
“We are
here to watch an actual football match. And not
just a football match but THE football match, the
most important football match of all time, as
shown in the transmissions dad picked up at home.
England winning the World Cup at home, 1966.”
“And how
do we know this is the most important football
match of all time?”
“Because
we translated the creature who talks through it,
and he said so. We’re not dumb.”
A passing old
lady over heard this and dropped dead. To the
youngsters, this was but the latest sweeping of
this insane craze the humans partook in. Her
friend, a balding creature with glasses, looked
at the arrivals with horror.
“We have
come to see the World Cup. Tell me, where is
Wembley?” Well, in every pack of friends
there has to be the genius.
The man spoke.
“But ye’r late. The Cup final was last
weekend!” And then he fell over.
The aliens
took a second to confer amongst themselves. Last
week? All of this espionage and conference and
for all that, the tournament was already over.
They were risking cannibalism and for nought.
And with a
crash and a roar and an expletive, there came a
flash of lightening and a scream of drums. And
down from the heavens, ending the rain as swiftly
as fever, came trouble much fiercer than the
hazard suit wearing police, beginning to mill at
the end of the road. Worse than that. The
Mothership!
“Its dad!”
yelled the eldest, “Scarper!”
But it was
much too late for that.
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