‘Landing Night’

Florence Hoyle

8:11 PM - The Red Bell, London

‘To the Martians!’

The man to my right thrusts his beer into the air, peppering my forehead with flecks of froth.

‘Sorry mate,’ he grunts, without turning to me. His looming presence overwhelms me from a seat away. I clutch my drink, fighting against the mess of my fringe to take another sip.

‘They’re not Martians,’ his friend hisses.

‘Does it matter?’ The big guy dunks his moustache in more beer froth.

‘Listen,’ his friend continues, ‘we’d best be more polite with them. My cousin in the army reckons some of them have already landed.’

‘I’d spot them a mile off,’ the big guy scoffs, wiping his lip.

‘That’s the thing mate. Apparently, they can look like us.’

The men stop talking, consumed by a shared tension. It’s probably nonsense, I think to myself. It feels like every set of eyes in the pub are glued to me. I don’t need to worry about shapeshifters on top of th-

‘Is this seat taken?’

I pull myself out of my drink and turn to the voice. A tall girl with shaved sides and a leather jacket grins at me. She’s holding a Ribena with a straw in it. I don’t want her to sit with me.

‘Go for it,’ I croak. Damn it.

She sits down, loudly sipping her Ribena as if to declare her presence. I ignore her, focusing on the stream of

hypnotic bubbles in my glass.

‘What are you drinking?’ she asks.

‘Vodka and coke,’ I say after a long pause.

‘Nice! An earth classic.’

She looks probingly at me with silvery eyes. The men next to me get up from their seats and I feel much smaller. Apparently, they can look like us. My shoulders tense.

‘Are you gonna give me a name?’ she chirps.

She’s suspicious. Use a fake name.

‘Mo.’ Shit. At least it’s only my first name.

‘Well, greetings.’ She bounces her Ribena against my glass, making a graceless thumping noise. ‘I’m Winters....’ That has to be a fake name. Who calls themselves ‘Winters’? ‘...you don’t wanna know my first name.’

‘So… Ribena?’ I ask. That’s all I can think of.

‘Oh! Yeah,’ she chuckles, ‘it’s a fairly cheap mixer.’ She flags the bartender down and orders a shot to mix into her bottle.

‘Where do you work?’ I ask. This might get me answers.

Her smile falters for a second and she takes a long sip from her straw. ‘I, uh… drive. Buses. I’m a bus driver.’

Before I can respond, a sharp bang punctures the ambience of the pub. A boot kicks the door open and armed men flood through the doorway, stomping across the wooden floor.

‘Everyone needs to be out in five minutes! These premises are being seized as an emergency landing facility!’

The pub responds with silence. The soldier’s eyes narrow.

‘Move it!’

The pub erupts into a chorus of jeers, which gradually deflate into sulky muttering about ‘bloody aliens’ as they down their drinks and leave. I try to lose Winters in the crowd, but she skips along next to me, Ribena in hand.

‘This keeps happening - it’s the third time tonight! There must not be enough room to process them all.’

‘How many are there meant to be?’ ‘Must be thousands!’ she says, grinning. ‘You seem happy about it.’ ‘Who the hell wouldn’t be?’

9:03 PM - Oxford Street

Swarms of people have gathered in the street, and every sidewalk is packed with haphazard booze stalls eagerly serving the crowds. Green parade balloons and banners blot the sky as London prepares for new history. My cheeks hurt from smiling. Mo is dragging his feet behind me.

‘Do you want another drink?’

‘I need one,’ he grumbles, barely audible.

We stop at a stall, run by an elderly man wearing a pair of fuzzy green antennae.

‘Aren’t you worried that’ll come off as offensive?’ I ask him, ordering our drinks.

‘How could it? We’ve no idea what they look like!’ He winks at me, obliviously sloshing spirit into plastic cups. ‘That’s a fiver love.’

Christ. I just about manage to put the coins together for the man, before passing the drink to Mo. To the left of us, a group of teens are loudly sniffing something underneath a table. Mo is studying his trainers.

‘What’s up?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean why are you moping during the biggest night London will ever have?’

He pauses for a bit, giving his shoelaces another intense inspection.

‘You’re walking around with a total stranger. Aliens are landing in London. The whole city is either partying or hiding. Why aren’t you scared?’

‘Why should I be?’

‘Because we don’t know them! The government won’t even tell us where they came from! Why are we treating

this like it’s New Years?’ he shouts, earning several glares. ‘I just think people need to take this seriously,’ he whispers, recoiling into himself.

To the right of us, a man with posters on his front and back is drunkenly waving a bell. ‘THE ALIENS WILL SNATCH YOUR CHILDREN’ is proudly stamped on his front. I gesture to him.

‘Do you think he’s taking it seriously?’

‘I… no, I guess he isn’t.’ Mo sighs, sipping his vodka.

‘People have been sucking up beer and shitting out hope for years now. The change is scary, sure.’ I pause, realising the Ribena just hit. ‘But I’ll take something new over the concrete hamster wheel we trapped ourselves in any day.’

Mo chews on my words for a bit. Then he smiles. ‘Concrete hamster wheel?’

‘Hey! It’s all I could come up with in the moment.’

He smirks at me. ‘No, no. It worked.’

10:24 PM - The 73 Bus from Stoke Newington

‘You’re serious? Every bar is closed?’ Winters exclaims, wrapping a newly discovered necktie around her head.

‘Seems like it.’ The woman on the porch takes another drag of her cigarette.

‘Fuck.’

‘Howa we sposed to get drink now?’ I stammer, balancing against a streetlamp. I must be several vodkas deep.

‘Not my problem. Stay safe, loves.’

The stranger stamps out her cigarette and stares at the sky before hurrying inside. I swear Winters knows everyone – half the people on Oxford Street seemed to greet her. She skips up to me, looking like a wild schoolboy with that stupid tie on her head.

‘Any ideas?’

I prop myself up using the greasy streetlamp. A bottle shatters across the street as a man drunkenly swaggers out of a big red vehicle. A big red bus.

‘Winters, you’re a bus driver...’ I say, gesturing to it.

‘I’m drunk!’

‘There’s a curdle - a curfew. We’re breaking the law anyway,’ I stammer, heading towards the bus. The bus driver stops to smile and wave at us before continuing to puke into a drain. Winters reluctantly opens the driver’s door, staring at the empty seat. ‘I lied.’

‘Huh?’

‘I’m not a bus driver.’ I knew it! I knew she wasn’t hu-

‘I’m homeless. Have been for years.’ She slumps into the seat.

‘Why would you lie?’

‘You get this far by building a network of people to rely on. Fix someone’s telly, and they might feed you. Look after their dog, and they might let you stay the night. Eventually, a lot of people recognise you. Meeting you was like -’

‘- a chance to be someone else?’

‘Yeah.’ She fiddles with the wheel. Her smile is absent. With nowhere else to sit, I lean against the walls of the bus.

‘Fuck it,’ I murmur. ‘I worked at this factory, right? For robots?’

‘Ah, you’re the one killing all the jobs. Nice one.’ She chuckles faintly.

‘I guess so,’ I reply, breathing in to sober myself. ‘Thing is, I don’t like talking to people. I just can’t do it. It got so bad that I couldn’t even ask people for help. One day, some of the machinery went haywire. I needed to call for someone, but the words just hid in my throat. Eventually the malfunction became critical. ’ I pause, lifting my fringe. ‘Leaving me this scar.’

She winces as though someone sprayed her with lemon concentrate.

‘It didn’t hurt much, but I was asleep for a while after.’

‘How long?’

‘Two years.’

‘Christ! So, the aliens…?’

‘...were the first thing they told me about when I woke up last week.’

‘No wonder you’re paranoid.’ She chuckles awkwardly.

‘Everyone else got a head start with it. I feel left behind.’

We stare into the night.

‘Do you ever wonder how they feel about it?’ she asks.

‘Who, the aliens?’

‘Yeah. They must be terrified.’

‘Well… I guess they won’t be scared of you since you’re homeless.’

Her trademark grin returns. ‘And I guess they won’t be scared of recovering coma patients, either.’

Her laughter engulfs the dimly lit bus. It’s loud, and I realise it’s mixed with my own.

‘What’s your first name?’ I ask.

Her smile fades. The bus creaks slightly.

‘It’s Daphne,’ she mumbles.

‘Daphne?’ I snigger.

‘Don’t laugh!’

‘I won’t, I won’t. Promise.’

I ended up breaking that promise after two minutes.

11:48 PM - Russell Square

‘I can’t believe I’m doing this!’

‘Keep your hands steady!’

Mo guides my hands, sobered by the stress. The major roads have been blocked off by the military, so we cruise the red bus through empty backstreets at a snail’s pace. My assistant pilot checks his watch nervously.

‘Win- Daphne?’

‘Yeah?’

‘We’re going to miss the landing at this rate.’

I can see a park ahead of us. There’s a gap in the fence defended by flimsy wooden barriers and construction signs.

‘Hey, how do you reverse?’

‘I think you pull this?’

‘Thanks.’ I quickly reverse a good fifty metres.

‘What are you -’

I slam the accelerator and we hurtle into the park. Mo falls on his arse and I cackle as we reduce the construction barrier to splinters. The bus grinds to a screeching halt before Mo can move his hair out of his face. He dusts himself off, glaring at me.

‘You’re an idiot.’

‘I know.’ I wink, delicately swinging the driver door open and hopping out of the bus.

I shiver in the cold of the night, watching thin trails of smoke squeeze themselves out of the grille. The trees of the park glisten in the wind. Mo looks at the cracks in the windshield and grimaces.

‘Hey, it was your idea to steal the bus.’

‘Don’t remind me,’ he groans, pinching the bridge of his nose.

‘Come on.’ I pat his shoulder. ‘Let’s get a better view.’

We manage to climb onto the roof of the bus by wiggling our way through the top deck window. I sit with my back against his as we lose ourselves in the starless sky.

‘Are you still scared?’ I ask.

I feel his shoulders tense against mine. Then they loosen.

‘Not anymore. I just think… I think the world’s going to be crazier.’ He pats the roof of the bus. ‘Maybe I need more of that.’

The park is empty. Everyone is either on a rooftop or hiding in their living rooms. The sounds of sirens and barking military megaphones seem to have suspended themselves in the web of the moment.

‘I wonder if they’re looking at us,’ Mo says, softly.

‘If they’re anything like us… I think they are.’

‘I hope they like it here.’

‘Me too. Maybe we’ll get used to it.’

Mo laughs. ‘That’ll take some time.’

A flash of light spills across the sky. Mo squeezes my hand. The light fades to reveal shapes suspended in the inky black. Silver obelisks, twirling in the night sky like baubles the size of skyscrapers. At first, they hesitate. Then, ever so slowly, they descend towards the streets of London.

‘Welcome to Earth,’ we whisper.