Grand Theft Planetary & other stories Read online

Grand Theft Planetary

  & other stories

  H L Jones

  Copyright 2013 H L Jones

  Find out more about H L Jones by visiting https://hljones.co.uk

  Cover image courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech

  Table of Contents

  1. Grand Theft Planetary

  2. My Life is Saved

  3. From Afar

  4. Technology Fails Me

  5. Modern Glass

  6. Man Alone

  7. Barriers

  8. Murve's Dog

  9. Bud and Rufus Play Dare

  10. I Rule

  11. A Theoretical Question

  12. Time and Punishment

  13. Farming

  14. A Visual Masterpiece

  15. Ticket

  Grand Theft Planetary

  The tiny starship Hasslehog crawled through space, towing an enormous planet behind it. Casper Dee, galactically-reknown Pretender and bored hyper-celebrity, hummed as he worked the controls of the tiny-but-priceless craft, ignoring the frantic messages from the planet. He didn’t need to steal the planet Happy 18th Birthday Sophia Love Daddy (probably the most unfortunate example of the lasting damage a hangover can do when trying to fill out official planetary documents and birthday cards at the same time), but there was simply nothing left to him to do in the universe. Gene therapy had made him immortal, and his Pretending career had made him a willionaire - a willion dollars being defined as the amount of money which, if calculated, would make any computer display #########.

  The communicator would not let-up its infernal chiming, so he checked his perfectly trimmed goatee, powdered his already flawless skin, and pressed the green button. A pompous-looking man, swathed in blankets and coats looked momentarily surprised to see none other than Casper Dee staring back at him.

  “Oh… I… are you…?” shivered the man.

  “I am he,” replied Casper with a flourish and launched into his pandering routine for the masses. “It’s simply amazing to be here, with my amazing fans. Eat fast food.” He waited for the usual applause and adulation, but then remembered he currently had an audience of one. “Oh right. What do you want?”

  “I was wondering, Mr Dee, why you’ve pulled us out of orbit and across cold space?”

  “Oh that! It’s…” he frantically thought back to the excuses his agent had used in the past, “…a wardrobe malfunction caused by stress, dehydration, and vicious rumours.”

  “Oh.” The man shivered violently. “It’s just that we’re detonating our nuclear weapons just to keep warm! If it’s not too much trouble, could you, y’know, put us back where you found us?”

  Casper dashed a wine flute at the monitor in an explosive rage. “For God’s sake, can’t you parasites leave me alone? All I want is my own life! Go bother someone else!”

  Outside the main window, the blankness of space suddenly erupted into red-and-blue strobes – it was the police! Casper felt the blood run from his legs; bad publicity beckoned, and with it a loss of money from his sponsors. Not good. Outside, the Sheriff and his deputy descended into view and beckoned him out, notebooks in hand. Casper sighed and suited up.

  “Good morrow officers,” floated Casper in his most respectful voice, “and what can I do for you?”

  “Name?” said the gruff Sheriff, his moustache filling half of his spacesuit’s visor.

  “Casper Dee,” he replied, waiting for the usual shouts of disbelief, handshakes, and the obligatory pictures to prove that these little people had actually touched a god.

  Surprisingly, the cop simply made a note, clearly unimpressed. “Can you explain to me, Mr Dee, why you’re towing an inhabited planet across deep space?” Behind them loomed the black sphere of the planet in question, the occasional nuclear fire blossoming across its frozen surface.

  “Planet? What planet?”

  “Say,” said the Sheriff’s deputy slowly, his jaw dropping open to display a mess of crooked teeth, “you’re Casper Dee! Wow!”

  “Hot dog,” mumbled the Sheriff, and stared closer at Casper. “Is that a tattoo on your forehead, Mr Dee?”

  “Sponsor’s logo,” corrected Casper. “As the biggest company in the universe, McWalFord ApSung-MicroPep pay me to be an ambassador for them.”

  “I do like their 400 horse-powered computer in a bun,” admitted the cop.

  “Don’t forget fries,” added Casper, remembering his contractual obligations.

  A pink buzzbot zipped up between the trio, its bug-eyes rolling crazily. “Dear valued consumers, I heard you mention a 400 horse-powered computer in a bun with fries! Would you like to purchase one?”

  “Yes please!” said the deputy, licking his cracked lips. A gigantic beige polystyrene box materialized next to him.

  “Anyway Mr Dee,” said the Sheriff, “you haven’t explained what you’re doing out here with a planet in tow.”

  “Nothing. I was just flying around and, er, the planet’s just flying around here too.”

  The Sheriff took notes, then opened up a commlink to the planet. “It’s the police. What are you guys doing out here?”

  “Freezing,” came the reply. “That madman has twocked us! Arrest him, Sheriff!”

  The Sheriff pulled his gun on Casper as the deputy finished riding his supercharged meal around. “Freeze scumbag! Don’t move or I’ll shoot!”

  “I’ll come quietly, officers,” started Casper, then pointed theatrically behind the cops, a look of mock-horror on his face. “Look! It’s a runaway giraffe going supernova!”

  Both officers turned, the deputy already screaming in preparation of this dangerous-yet-highly improbable event. Casper scooted back to his ship, disengaged the gravity beam, and the craft dropped into the planet’s atmosphere.

  Eventually, the two cops turned back. “There’s no giraffe,” said the deputy dumbly. “Hey, he’s escaped!”

  “He was Pretending,” replied the Sheriff, “and is now probably hiding somewhere on that planet.”

  “Well let’s go get him!”

  “We can’t,” replied the Sheriff, unwinding a long whip-like device, “because that planet is evidence. If we go down there after him, the courts will say that the police contaminated the planet and therefore all evidence will be rendered irrelevant.”

  “So now what?” asked the deputy.

  “Like all corporate celebrities, Mr Dee is contractually obliged to update his online Scratterbook profile at regular intervals for his emotionally-bereft fans. I have a hunch that escaping the police might prompt a small update, and with it, his location.”

  The deputy studied his hoop-shaped mobile phone. “You’re right! Casper’s just posted, Escaped the dumb police lol!” He typed like a madman. “Ha! I’ve replied fuck da police!” He showed the Sheriff, who programmed the tell-tale 84-digit Galactic Co-ordinate accompanying Casper’s insult into the whip, then flicked the tail towards the planet. The rope floated around lazily, then suddenly hammered off towards the black disk of the world, stretching impossibly. After what seemed like hours, it pulled taunt, then retracted quickly until Casper Dee hovered before the policemen. He looked absolutely looking terrified from the sudden trip through the planet’s atmosphere.

  “Casper Dee,” said the Sheriff haughtily, “You are charged with Grand Theft Planetary. You’re in for one long stretch.”