SUNDAYS WORDS

	I stare at the packaging in my hand. Carrot cake?! Ha. No. How silly of me. Parrot Cake. A lot has changed recently since God decided to show up and inform us of several things before disappearing again. Notably, vegetarians were wrong since it is actually vegetables that have feelings while animals, excluding humans and the less edible animals such as cats and dogs and other household pets, are insentient and, as a result, the notion of vegetarianism no longer exists. Everyone eats meat and solely meat. Hence the confusion at the concept of carrot cake. As if. Parrot out and out. I decide against it and place it back on the shelf. Where it belongs. The shock subsides and I am ridden with a fever that only vegetables can cure. I walk up to the counter following the service and departure of the last costumer and, in front of an empty shop, speak in code to the shop assistant. "Any...click click?" "Ahem...you want...orange click-click? green click-click? Re..." "Orange click-click. Please. Still caked in dirt preferably." "Perhaps you should come up to my office where we can...ehhh..." The shop assistant calls over a young girl by the name of Nicole. She is kindly asked to take duty of the register in his temporary absence and she is happy to oblige, relieved of her prior stock replenishment task. I am escorted passed the confectionary counter, passed the stand of budget, second hand DVDs of old and crap, unknown films and eventually passed the newspaper and magazine rack and led through a door (which read "authorised persons only") and up some tattered, disgusting looking stairs into a sizable office, reduced to only a few squared meters of space due to the quantities of stock inhabiting it. "You want the orange click-clik with the green hat?" "I do. Must we continue to speak in this horrible chit-chat?" "No. I just enjoy it. You want carrots?" "I do. How much a piece?" "A buck each for the first three, two for each thereafter." "That's a bit of an odd deal." "Yeah. I got it wrong. Two bucks each for the initial three, a buck for each thereafter." "Sounds fair. I'll take sixteen." He starts bagging them in a bag that simply has "MEAT" scribed in the side of it. "Makes it unsuspicious" he sites. The fat, balding, grey idiot; a true picture of bad health. I open my wallet and pull out a twenty-two dollar note, a note recently introduced by the government for a laugh. Or a "big giraffe" in rhyming slang, now a widely and legally accepted language thanks to it's introduction for the same reasons which gave birth to the aforementioned newly born note. That's predominantly how the government works nowadays under the leadership of children. "For a big giraffe". The abolishment of agism now applies to every part of life and, consequently, you can now find toddles in bars and pensioners in nursery. Though, society still tends to frown upon the latter. "What's a smart kid like you want with these vegetables anyhow? You know this could land you in a lotta trouble, right?" he audibly spews. "I know this. I have my personal reasons for wanting them." He continues to count out the goods, an act which takes an awful long time. It appears counting to sixteen is a difficult task which this man is not often faced with. Eventually, money and carrots are swapped. He hands me an application form for work. "A cover. If anyone asks, you was up here asking about a job." "Right." I say back, dawning a fetching, very smart suit which set me back a good few hundred dollars. I'm a professional footballer, earning thousands upon thousands per week, and it is horribly obvious to everyone, with the exception of this man, that applying for a job would be the last thing I'd be doing in this place. "Thanks." We reverse the trail we'd walked only a few minutes prior before I made my exit, out into the beautiful snow which lay thick upon the ground and continued to fall from the sky with great pace and glamour. Barely a car was to be seen; the snow had been so thick for days that vehicles were locked in place. Even snow ploughs. Children are having snow ball fights and couples are walking, embracing the cold, linked. A sight from a Disney film. A postcard from heaven. I proceed homeward bound with a mind full of thoughts. The suit I'm wearing. I had a meeting earlier with another team. They've expressed their desire to sign up my services for their team, and a fine team it is too. In the running for the title this year. Problem is, the wife and child are settled here. We're living close to be my parents and hers as well as our brothers and sisters and their families. Our child is attending a great school and is proving popular amongst his peers. Maybe once she hears the offer. The money. The house they'd like to buy us. The change of lifestyles. Vegetables may even be of such superior availability that she'd welcome the change. Though, I don't know why. My thoughts refocus and now I'm thinking of our car. It's only seven months old and already I have a desire for a new one. A faster one. And my current car is already pretty fast. I want something black. Something classy. The wheel is spun again and now I'm imagining our child all grown up. What he'll be. What he'll look like. I think he'll be a scientist of some sort. But a cool one. A scientist with groupies and glamour. A mixture of Patrick Swazye and Patrick Moore. I get home to my humble bungalow and enter the front door. My wife is sitting on the cough grinning sheepishly. "The little one's out at a friends" she says seductively. "He won't be back for a while." I know exactly what she means. She takes me gently by the hand, my other hand couriering the sixteen carrots still, and leads me carefully and slowly to the bedroom, my eyes locked on her hips the entire journey. We reach the room and near the bed. She turns to me with an expression of sheer exhilaration. We bypass the bed and open the curtains together, and gaze at the wonder outside. "Oh my..." I utter Sixteen snowmen, each without a nose.

SATURDAYS WORDS

Sundays are the worst. I'm treading carefully along the tightrope that separates utopia and dystopia. I know I should be happy but really I'm not and it is in these moments where I format my potential futures, both literal and metaphorical, as a film reel for my own viewing pleasure. You can still do more with the imagination than with a Hollywood film budget. Much, much more.

In the first, and perhaps worst case, scenario, I've given up. I've stopped what I love and I'm focusing solely on procuring money through whatever means possible. I'm working three jobs; Two delivering take away food (one chinese, the other indian) and the other in a small office typing up irrelevant articles about issues that do not interest me for some unknown magazine. Once a week, I'll go to the cinema with a friend or two then head out for a couple of drinks. At the weekends, I'll go out and get adequately drunk, more often than not on both nights. I've stopped doing the dumb things that I used to do but this is primarily because I'm no longer the person I was. I've lost my confidence. I've lost my spark. I was losing it all along but the new lifestyle just accelerated it's disintegration. It's a quite life and slowly but surely I fade into the wallpaper and die, young, unhappy and without any achievements, when a bus driver sees me crossing the road but decides it's easier to continue and mow me down than to apply the brakes and not traumatise the entire population of the bus, included three children (aged between four and seven), a clique of angry looking teenagers ("non-conformists they'll think themselves to be, no doubt), seven adults (in the twenty-four to fifty-size range) and more elders than the Cliff Richard fan club.

Fuck that. I'm not having my death printed on the memory of a bunch of strangers. I wouldn't allow them the story telling rights; "Oh, you'll never guess what happened on the bus today!..."

The next scene plays out and I'm a happy married man, with two wonderful kids and a dog that I've called Scrub. It's a shit name but it's only a dream. If this proves more a vision than a dream and I do indeed live out this scenario then I'll think of a better name. Perhaps Jeff. Jeff the dog. I like that. But that's not what the fantasy called it, so thus that is not what it shall be called for the purpose of this story. Scrub it is. The children go nameless, though again, should I have kids in future, they'll be named with magnificent names. My house is large, with sufficient space to breed dinosaurs and build an airport if it took my fancy. I choose to do neither due to the financial and extinction factors, amongst other things. Once a week, I take the family out to dinner. Once a week, I'll do something with friends. Bowling or football or something. Once every couple of weeks or so, I'll have a neighbour or relative look after the children while I treat the lady by taking her out to a fancy restaurant before taking her out to the dancing or the cinema or whatever activity takes her fancy that week. But just as the sun can prove troublesome, each life has its downsides and at this point that I discovered that although I am happy and married, I am not happy with my marriage. You see, the woman I am currently with is no longer my wife and the woman I am married to (but have since parted with) is no longer a friend. There is no future that will keep me happy. There is no past that can prepare me for this.

These revealing extremes part ways and leave me with a much more interesting and confusing vision. One of such grandiose importance yet incredibly gnomic. In it, I am not me, but a greater man. I am a gladiator. Strong in body and mind. Brave and noble. Widely respected and admired. A figure so intensely awe-inspiring and inconceivably rich in soul. Yet a man that has been pitted against an animal so fierce and so dangerous that no man nor animal has cared to name or even imagine it until now. It is in this fantasy that humankind is first weighted up against such an opponent and it is I who is standing in the corner for mankind. This is an animal much akin to a lion in appearance and ferocity yet with the strength and stamina of a bear. No-one knows where it came from or it's motive for being here but we've accepted what we've been dealt with and we're moving closer to resolving the issue. The crowd are massive and stentorian in this vast coliseum, with barely an inch to divide each person. The beast reflects the fear I'm clearly showing but is being rallied up by humans who wish to enrage it in hope for a better fight, despite their obvious bias towards mankind. In anger, it's baring it's large, sharp teeth and is starting to spasm. Were this vision in cartoon form, we'd see smoke bellowing from each ear of the beast, while its' cheeks turned a martian red. But it's not. So we don't. A bell goes affirming the start of the match officially as I find myself in the path of an enormous, infuriated cat of death. If I were to be struck in this collision, I'd almost certainly be killed. I'm lucky enough to move in time enough for the animal to miss me and crash into the backing wall, bewildering it slightly. It shakes off the blow and runs for me again, this time not so thoughtlessly. We wrestle out for a little bit and eventually I find myself on my back at the beasts disposal. A giant paw cocks back in the air before swooping harshly towards my face with such momentum that could potentially rip my head and neck from my torso. As it nears, it is met with my shield, knocking the animal off balance and on to its side, allowing me to force myself on top it of, my sword pressed against its neck. One thrust would prove fatal. Yet in this moment, I'm overwhelmed by an epiphany of stratospherical levels and decide that it is not the beast I want. I disarm and prepare as I am ruthlessly discarded from this world.

FRIDAYS WORDS

today i started a new project which involves writing a lot more than 1000 words a day and is a lot more substantial in the grand scheme, even if a little gnomic and irrelevant to anything that really should be worth paying attention to. so instead of giving you some improvised, pointless, rubbish fiction with the worst and perhaps most obscure (and not "obscure" in the cool sense) ideas, i'm just going to choose some words that i really, really like and copy and past them enough until i have reached the 1000 words milestone. including this sentence, the total amount of words only tallies up to 111 so prepare yourself! esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric esoteric substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial substantial philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia philophobia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia dystopia anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic anaphylactic 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THURSDAY WORDS

I would have said yes if she'd asked. I would have. Plain. Simple. Effective. A triumvirate of letters, coalescing to form a body of much greater significance. The meaning between doing and not doing. The meaning between war and not war. The meaning between God and not God. I would've said yes. I reply to her text. It's only been a matter of weeks since UniCom (meaning Universe Communication) was formed and already it's being used to it's potential. Intergalactic telecommunication. Speech, visual, textual amongst numerous other variations of telecommunication. Oddly enough, she is on venus and I, the male, am on mars; an expression that has survived the ages.

"idbflkjbadfljbdafkjlbdafda"

This isn't some form of Futuristic code or language, I merely want to rouse the anger inside her, just for a little while. Send. Goodbye text. Off you go. Interplanetary. When you return, bring me something angry. Angry angry angry.
I'm suddenly left wondering why I chose to come to Mars today. It's violently raining (they installed an Earth-like atmosphere here after conquering it in 2385 as to allow for humans to live here, thus decreasing the ever growing density of humans on Earth which would have soon proven fatal) and the shops are a bit shit, really. It's a half-arsed Earth. If even. Quarter-arsed at most I reckon actually. I'd never utter it allowed though. The silly bastards that took over Earth (yes, the majority of mankind) thought it'd be fun to keep a slightly dark and evil side about it and thus appointed a "dictatorship", a concept that didn't seem odd at all to them. I head toward the shuttle center to get back to Earth. The shuttle are driven by large Giraffe-like creatures.Or so they want you to think. It's actually just men in large costumes. But only men. Thanks to the regeneration of sexism, only men are allowed to drive these space shuttles. And planes. And trains. And tanks. And cars. Basically, women are allowed to drive horses and bikes, and even then, they've not made a bike in decades and horses are damn near extinction thanks to the discovery that, in fact, they're a culinary delight. I wait four minutes for the shuttle to arrive and embark.

My phone vibrates in my pocket.

"Fuck off" says the tiny little screen.

I reply asking if she wants anything brought home from Mars, knowing fine well I won't be there when she replies.

The shuttle is a cosmopolis and we're all cosmopolitans. Yet no one utters a word on the fifty-six minute journey back.

My phone vibrates in my pocket.

"Martian squid please!" says the tiny little screen.

Mars squid is a food that Mars is famed for. Oddly enough, Mars doesn't have squid. Pluto does. Mars simply imports it from Pluto and, inexplicably, the air in Mars (despite the Earth-like atmosphere, the air still has a unique martian quality about it) affects the icy-water based beast and turns it into some sort of incredible dish.

"Sorry. I've already left Mars, I'm afraid"

Send.

We land on Earth and I elate. Mars smelt way better. And was easier to breathe on. And less populated. Earth has become an over-sized twenty-first century London. And don't even think about what London has become. There's no point. "No one" knows and those that do know can't tell of it's interior. It's now a large dome used exclusively for business. We are not told what sort of business', despite the obvious Cola, McDonalds and KFBK; KFC having merged with Burger King to make fried burgers. None of us care really though, it's not like business is really our forte.

My phone vibrates in my pocket.

"Okay! I'll just bring back some Venusian hamster then!" says the tiny little screen.

Ostensibly, Venusian hamster is not, in fact, hamster, but rather rat. Yes. Humans eat rats now too. I reply informing her that I've turned vegetarian, a decision I've just taken upon myself instantaneously having received the text. Send.

I step off. New York at midnight. Our sleep cycles have shifted. No one starts works until midday now and most people are finished work by six o'clock. This is made possible by the Great Money Printing Error of 2649 whereby all the printers in the world went insane and perpetually printed off all this money. Homelessness is no longer an issue and every one in three people are millionaires. Debt, bankruptcy and poverty are no longer issues.

My phone vibrates in my pocket. I think she's just forwarded me the text she'd previously sent.

"Fuck off" says the tiny little screen.

I don't bother replying. There's no point. We live our lives in cycles. You know the phrase "The best ones are either gay or taken", or something to that affect? Well, towards recent decades, it became true. More so the gay part. The accelerated rise in homosexuality amongst men, however, didn't become such a problem for breeding as expect. As woman couldn't get hold of any handsome, intelligent or caring hetrosexual males, they began to lower their standards and sort of fell into the way of life that their new less handsome, intelligent and caring partners lived. Couples were having sex a lot more often with a lot less (ie no) protection. What we soon found was that dumber babies were being born. These babies would go on to have less intelligent babies and the ball kept rolling until we found ourselves in this hell on Earth scenario. Lower IQs. Inferior intelligence. Less attractive appearances. These are the people that reintroduced sexism to society. These are the people that forced London to become a private business center. These are the people that are lowering the tone of Earth. This is exactly why I've decided to take it upon myself to try save Earth, no matter who gets hurt or the extent of the actions I must take. I'm gay. But if she asked, I would have said yes. I would have.

WEDNESDAYS WORDS

I'd never seen a sky like it. Three moons, two planets, a multitude of stars pasted against a dark blue and red backdrop. Please don't for one minute think that the twist at the end here will be the very "Planet of the Apes"-esque "Oh, it was Earth all along!" because I'm afraid this really isn't. This place is a visual paradise. An amalgamation of beauty and splendor. Rather, I should say Beauty and Splendor. And I do use "amalgamation" literally. You see, Beauty and Splendor are companies each dealing in their namesake sectors. Beauty deals with beauty and Splendor with splendor. The former is a cosmetics company- that is they can give you everything from natural soap right through to cosmetic surgery- while the latter deals in all things happy- dealing out teddies, witty greetings cards and prozac, amongst a myriad other things.

I didn't choose to come to this place. I used to live on the aforementioned intolerable Earth and I barely remember any prolonged happy moments. Sure, I could be happy at points but these points were few and infrequent. It started taking its toll. At 12, I was peer pressuring kids into stealing bikes for us to slowly and very painstakingly melt with stolen lighters, thus making us pyromaniacs also. On hindsight, a 12 year old pyromaniac who steals bikes does sound pretty cool. At 14, if there was a pet in the street I disliked I'd simply make it "disappear". And I wouldn't make it easy for it too. Weapons in my arsenal to aids these disappearances included knives, baseball bats and sometime I even used the very unconventional set of garden shears. Though, whenever the garden shears were put to use, the animal wouldn't actually disappear. I'd lay it out there in the owners garden; half in the front and half in the back. I also figured that if I didn't like you (I'm really not that judgemental a character, and I ask that you judge me not back, for I am now a changed man) then you didn't much deserve to live anyway. At 17, I was gunning down old people my with BB gun. Tiny pellets, implanted quickly and precisely into the derriere of an elder. Actually, why I used this example after I spoke of literally cutting sentient beings in half with garden sheers dumfounds even me. It pales in comparison.
Eventually, they decided it had gone too far. And so, whilst "safe" in my slumber one evening, I was kidnapped, at the tender age of 19. They understood me. They understood that I was merely a depresses teen who chose the wrong outlets for it (yes, cutting animals in half, amongst various other sickening activities, get over it) and felt that my presence could be put to better use elsewhere. How bitter irony it was that they should then, just as I had done to many creatures before, simply just make me disappear. I heard later on they left a decoy; a well constructed model of myself, with my torso upwards in my front garden and my hip downwards in the back. This was a sight the postman would never forget.
The day I arrived here, I came to consciousness in a pitch black room. Confusion gripped my psyche; not one part of me understood this newfound environment, which really should have come to no surprise considering that all I could see was nothing.

"Hello" purred a low, comforting voice. "I hope you are well. You have been unconscious for quite some time, though we did not use violence or poison to take you. You should feel just as well as you did when you went to sleep that night."

"I do" I replied. "Where are you? Where am I?"

"You are here on the planet Ch-ch-ch-ch-ch!"

"Ch-ch-ch-ch?"

"Nope! Ch-ch-ch-ch-ch! Like the noise you'd make to grab the attention of a feline."

"Yes, but that could also be 'Ch-ch-ch-ch' dependent upon how many repetition of Ch you de,,,"

"Silence! There are five Chs, and may you not forget a single one!"

"I shall endeavor to make this the case. Why have you brought me here? And why aren't the lights on?"

"We've witnessed what you're capable of. We know that you do not wish to do the things you do yet you do them anyway. We know that you're not happy with Earth in its current state and you and us alike fear that it's only going to worsen. We brought you here, a planet created by Beauty and Splendor to be the wondrous paradise it is. Here, you will be happy. Here, you will be happy!" remarks the being, audibly grinning.

"Beauty and Splendor? Like the companies? Nice. So even if I don't want to be happy, they'll find drugs and a look that'll make it irresistible?"

"Oh, you can resist. It just won't work."

"That's what irresistible means."

"Oh. Sorry. I am of inferior intelligence. MEAOW!"

"Why did you just scream "meaow"?"

"I didn't. It must've come from elsewhere. The Beauty factory perhaps. Ever wondered what they really put in their face scrub before?"

I figured this was rhetorical.

"O...kay...So. Why have you brought me here? I know you've said you'd seen me and my ways but why me? There are plenty people in the world like me and there are plenty more worse off. Why me?"

"Those other people interest us not. You, my friend, link us all. You brought us to care about the world a great deal better. You forced us to learn of great pain but also of beauty and forgiveness. And it is in these reasons that you must live here. At peace, rest."

"Why do I link you? What links us? I know nothing about you! Please, please! Allow me some light and show me your face!"

"Very well then." replied the benevolent voice.

In that moment, there was lightness within a radius of perhaps fifteen or twenty feet around me, myself at the epicenter. And from the edges of the dark walked in every animal I'd ever made disappear.

TUESDAYS WORDS!

Hello. My name is Sammy The Seal. You'll notice I used capital letters at the beginning of each word there instead of abiding by the anticipated "Sammy the Seal" with the "the" starting off with a lower case "t". This is because Sammy The Seal is in fact my full name, "The" being my middle name. I am a sheep. A quaint animal, idiotic and oblivious. Or at least that's how we're viewed by humans. But we don't care. We know exactly what you're like. "Oh, I'm human. Top of the food chain. I can kill and eat anything I wanted. Oh, I think I'll have a sheep!". Filthy fuckers. I hope you rot. Nonetheless, I'm not here to bicker or quarrel with you. In fact, what I'm asking for here is your hand in friendship. I'll scratch your back, if you scratch mine and my god have i got my scratching hands on. Paws. Whatever it is we have. No, I speak of a greater foe. With humans, as sheep folklore goes, you're taken away and simply killed. Quickly, painlessly and without condemnation or humility. We then go on to fuel humans who, despite my early bitching, we really depend upon to feed us and to sheer us as to stop us overheating and getting sweaty in summer. That's right. I'll let you eat my fellow sheep as long as come June, I'm stripped of my coat. I digress. The problem here at hand is those dirty self obsessed, lazy slag cows. Dirty bovine bastards.

Did I mention I have a strong New York accent? 'Cause I do and it's something that you'll have trouble detecting through written word. And were you to actually hear me, it wouldn't matter. Humans can't hear sheep words, only sheep can hear sheep words. But we can hear human words. You dirty bastards. Also why is the plural of man men and the plural or woman is women yet the plural of human isn't humen? You fuck ups. Nonetheless, back to the cows.

Giant beasts so they are; snobby, arrogant bastards too. Each day as we arise from our slumber, feeling fresh and optimistic about the day ahead, we're looked down upon by those damn cows. As I said, only sheep can hear sheep words, and that's the same with cows and cow words. We talk telepathically. At least, I think we do. I can hear myself trying to talk to them. But they don't reply. Never any reply. All they do is sit there, the lazy lumps, and eat grass. Some might say that I'm hypocritical there but here's where my next bomb drop comes in. Us sheep are here for a deeper meaning.

Ever wondered where people go when they die? Heaven or hell many might say and, yes, they'd be right. But not immediately. You must've heard of judgement day, a day in between your passing and your entry into your next world. Good. Now where do you suppose this waiting room is? Bingo! It isn't! There is no extravagant, gloriously white, titanic room. You become a sheep. All sheep are dead souls. And you can tell bits about what we were in our previous lives as humans. For example, sheep that die young tend to have been young people. This is because the young human didn't get to experience much of life and is thus allowed to skip the queue for their appointment for judgement. Those who have a lot to prove (such as murderers, rapists etc) tend to have longer spells as sheep in shit conditions, ie they have to endure the cold more or they're geographically positioned where they're more likely to have golf balls fired at them. And they say every human has the right to a fair trial.

But cows! Cows do nothing! I once heard they were into black magic and abortion but these statement were pretty much unfounded and had no substantial evidence to back them up. But still I attempt telepathy.

"Oi! Cow!"

...

"Cow!"

...

"Daisy! MILK MILK MILK!!!"

"Christ! What the hell do you actually want?!"

Taken aback, I feel silent, shock gripping my heart.

"Well, what do you want?!"

"Well...I...why have you never replied before?"

"Before what? What are you talking about?"

"All those times I've been calling you. All those days. Why did you never reply?"

"You never did call before just then."

"I did!"

"You did not!"

"I did!"

"Then I'd never heard you."

Suddenly it occurred to me that we'd finally, after all this time, just broke through some sort of sheep-cow telepathic barrier.

"Oh God!" I squealed. "It's finally happening. It's finally happening!"

"What is?" asked Daisy (Yes, I got her name right when calling her.)

"Let's do it! Let's do it! Let's team up! Cows and sheep! We can take over man (Yeah, I know I was asking for the friendship of man earlier, but I've changed my mind) and let them know that animals reign supreme! Like in that film. Babe the pig."

"Yes! Only...I have an enemy much greater than man for us to over rule. A much greater species. A fine, pride specimen who trade for hundreds, and thousands of pounds yet aren't thought of as a traditional human food. A species that we must destroy, allowing cows and sheep to breed together to form the ultimate animal."

"Yes! Yes! Tell me more!"

"I speak, of course, of the horse!"

I gasp. Stunned yet again, a quality this cow has on me. No sound occurs for the next few seconds, I'm deep in thought concerning this situation and Cow (I can call her what I want, okay?) obviously respects this.

"Let's do it" I concur, "let's do it for the future and greater good of cows and sheep everywhere. I trust you have a plan."

"Of course. Come. Escape from your field, while I from mine and let's rendezvous on the road that separates our fields."

I silently agree and traverse towards the fence, and pass through it onto the road.

"Now here's my master plan."

BANG! BANG!

Both are shot dead by an eavesdropping horse.

MONDAYS WORDS

i was found lying there on the line, not directly on the middle, but rather a little off center. what i was doing there was unclear and slightly unsettling.

"Wake up" they said, "Wake up, boy!"

And awake I did, the blinding lights burning my retinas as it crept in to my heads and latched on to my brain. Disorientation can be a deadly, deadly thing. Confused, I simply lay there, taking in my surroundings and the sillhouettes that surrounded me.

"Who are you? How did you get here?"

Still, I just lay processing this odd data that was being fed to me from this strange surrounding. A football pitch in the winter, unmelted snow even at a hundred degrees. Barely anyone moves, barely anyone makes a sound. They daren't. They know not of who I am or what I'm capable of. He repeats his questions.

"Who are you? How did you get here?"

"I...I'm unsure" I reply.

Silence again. White lights, black figures. Whether we're in a tiny room or the great outdoors, I can't tell. This place seems massive, this place seems tiny. Perspective destroyed, sentience removed.

"Am I dead?" I ask.

"Of course, you are boy! How did you get here?"

"I...I don't know. I fail to remember what I was doing as my last living act."

"God Lord, boy! You don't remember? Would you like to know why that is?"

"Yes, sir." I reply sheepishly. "Please."

"Boy, you never existed. Like the eggs that don't make it, unfertilised spawn. You are the sperm that never made it to the egg in time. Your brother is forced into a world as brutal and as benevolent as earth. You, boy, get to stay here."

"Where am I, sir?" I question.

"You are nowhere, boy, you are nowhere. You are doing nothing and you are surrounded by nobodies who, akin to you, are also nowhere doing nothing. Physics denies our existence and biology denies our entities. We are in and of love, we are in and out of luck."

"I see" I mumbled back, engrossed in perplexity. "And there's no way you can explain what's going on a little bit better at all? In any way at all?"

"Stand, boy, stand and come with me."

I stand.

I'm dressed in a suit, one of the really fancy ones with tails. I have a monocle, a top hap, a very respectable pair of mutton chops and I'm speaking in a well toned, effervescent upper class English accent. I am not how I imagined myself though to be fair I've only known myself since awaking in this encounter, full of knowledge and full of confusion. We walk further and with each step, the lights dim a little. The hundreds of bodies that had earlier surrounded me are ceasing to be; disappeared or fading away with the light. Eventually, it's just the two of us.

"I'm 4. That's my name, not my age. As I, like you, didn't make it to the egg quick enough, I have no age, though let it be known that I've been around these parts for a lengthy spell. "

"Hi. I'm..."

"You're Gerard".

"Oh. Okay. Hi. I'm Gerard."

"I know, I just gave you that name. Gerard, why do you think you are here? Why do you think that, instead of dying off and fading into the ground, fading away to mere dust as science would have you believe, you are here seemingly alive and well?"

"Sir, I have no idea."

"Call me 4. Sir is a little too formal for these parts."

"What parts, sir?"

"4. These parts. Where you are. The place where you may spend the next 4 minutes or where you may spend the next 4 billion years. Why do you think you are here?"

"I think I'm here for The Grand Party"

"Good. And do you know what you mean by that?"

"I have no idea, 4, it just came to me."

"Just as I thought. Gerard, your name is now simply G. You've moved up a rank. Well done. Now let me tell you, this party will be spectacular. A tasteful party. You'll be surrounded by the healthiest and wealthiest people you will ever meet. People who have experienced a feeling much superior to love. People with a million happy and well bred children. The kid of people that can not exist in the real world."

I'm now young, tight red jeans wrapped round my legs, and a tight black t-shirt. My body is the way I'd want it to be were I physical and I have a pair of sneakers on that look like they'd cost me a weeks wages in a full time job. A top of the range mobile phone sticks slightly out my pocket. It looks simple on the surface yet capable of many, many things.

4 is now a dog. A talking dog. This is really the last thing I need but nonetheless we continue.

"You'll notice I'm a dog."

"I noticed."

"Good. I'm no longer called 4 either, I'm not called Cat."

"You're Cat the dog?" I ask.

"Yes. Look straight ahead of you. What do you see?"

A trampoline. I see a trampoline. A huge trampoline. I swear you could fit a few hundred kids on there.

"I see a trampoline."

"And what do you think this means?"

"Is it...a metaphor?...for how life is up and down? Uncontrollable to some degree? It can be fun but you can get sick of it, grow weary with it. Though it offers comfort and enjoyment, one slip could inevitably lead to a great deal of pain, perhaps even death?"

"Eh..."

"Yes! It is, isn't it! And you're a dog; You're also a metaphor! That I, as a human, should treat all animals equally, regardless of size, intelligence or back ground. And that even I as a hip, young, handsome man should not take my looks and my clothes and my gadgets for granted. I'm right, aren't I?"

"No. It means the party is here. If you'd have looked a little closer perhaps you'd have seen the buffet table beside it and the bouncy castle behind it."