Someone is here!

‘Welcome sir,’ a male British voice said behind me. ‘I’ve been expecting you today.’

‘Who- who are you?’ I stammered. ‘Where am I? What is this?’

‘My name is Atticus, sir,’ the disembodied voice told me. ‘I will be your caretaker from today.’

This threw me off. I had no idea what that meant, or where I was, so I focused on my surroundings first; I lay on a cold, flat surface. Upon further inspection, I noticed that it was a blue floor, made of glass. It felt even more cold, as I was still completely naked, the same way I had suddenly left my bedroom. All around me were computer screens, but not any variety that I recognized. They looked like they came straight out of a science-fiction movie. Very fake, but at the same time very real, like it was just something I didn’t comprehend yet.

I turned around, and saw a man standing there. Logically, I assumed this was the man who called himself Atticus. He was wearing a black tuxedo, with a red bowtie. He had grey hair and small round glasses in front of his green eyes.

‘Caretaker? What the hell do you mean? I don’t have a caretaker.’

The man presumably called Atticus sighed, a little tiredly. ‘You’re naked, sir. I have a blanket for you,’ he grabbed it from a chair behind him and put it around my naked, shivering body. ‘Better?’

I walked over to the chair, which swiveled comfortably. The blanket around me made me feel a little bit better, in fact, but I was not about to show that to this crazy stranger.

‘Where the hell am I?! What is this place?!’ I demanded. For some reason I couldn’t really stand this man. He seemed very patronizing.

‘You’re in the teleportation bay, sir. On the spaceship that you inherited.’

‘A… spaceship?’ I asked, perplexed.

‘Yes sir, Mr. Paul Ashcroft gave it to you, when he died, sir. Didn’t he explain all of this to you?’

‘Paul? I don’t have anyone in my family named Paul.’

‘Of course you do, sir. He was your grandfather.’

‘My grandfather’s name was Paul?’

‘Yes sir, at least it was name on Earth. His real name was Ashikatu Blarfagel, of course. But he couldn’t use that name on Earth obviously. He originally came from the planet Neblar. A very rich and interesting planet, if you one day like to explore it, sir.’ He bowed, humbly, but I could see in his eyes he was very irritated by all these questions.

‘Wait, what?’ I asked. ‘What do you mean, the planet “Neblar”? What the hell are you talking about?’

‘The original planet that your grandfather was born on, sir,’ Atticus told me. ‘This is all very well documented.’

‘Well, I don’t know anything about it,’ I told Atticus. ‘This is some kind of joke, isn’t it? Some very funny joke for my birthday or something.’

‘I understand this might come as a shock to you, sir, but I assure you this is not a joke. Your grandfather was a very well respected man in the galaxy. He saved billions of lives. Your grandfather was a hero to many. I didn’t know that he didn’t tell you anything about this, but this is all very serious. Definitely not a joke, sir.’

‘What the hell are you talking about, man?’ I shouted now. ‘He was just my grandpa. My nice, normal grandpa. Are you here to tell me he wasn’t my grandpa, but some adventuring alien?’

‘No, he was your grandfather, sir, that’s for sure,’ Atticus explained. ‘But he was what you would call an alien, yes.’

‘So, I’m an alien?’

‘Well, partially, sir, yes,’ Atticus said. ‘But your grandmother was, in fact, a human. So you’re part human, sir.’

‘But I’m human, clear as day,’ I desperately said. ‘And my grandfather didn’t look alien either. If he was an alien, wouldn’t he look like one?’

‘Well, yes, I will admit that he looked very similar to a human,’ Atticus said, a little apprehensively. ‘But a lot of aliens do, sir, with some subtle differences of course.’

‘What do you mean, “subtle” differences?’ I asked, a little angry. ‘I don’t have any “subtle” differences.’

‘Well, sir, maybe you do,’ Atticus said, looking me up and down. ‘Do you work out at all, sir?’

‘Well… no, but what does that have to do with anything?’

‘If you are human, then it would seem to me that you would need to work out, sir.’

‘But I’ve always been muscular,’ I told him.

‘Yes, and that’s exactly what I mean, sir,’ Atticus said, a glint in his eye. ‘You have the Neblar genes, sir. They look to humans like they are always in extremely good shape. And I’m sorry that I’m saying this sir, as it’s a little awkward, but I saw that your penis just now. And honestly, it’s also extraordinarily large for a normal human. These things indicate that you’re not just a human, sir. Which means you are meant for great things, as your grandfather would have wished.’

I adjusted myself in my chair a little uncomfortably, a strange man complimenting my penis was not something I expected to happen today.