originally published on 01.12.2018
I have tried to describe my protagonist as a strange and inscrutable being. Nevertheless it seems like a human alien.
Assuming that Professor Dr. Harald Lesch is right, the “extraterrestrial” is only a human being” (quote, but I am missing the source at the moment, I’ll pass it on). Last night I saw Robert Fleischer’s lecture (exopolitik.org) in Klausen on YouTube. (I’d like to embed or at least link this video here, but don’t know if I can, but I’ll ask). I liked the lecture, without question; what bothered me was the interview with the professor.
Dr. Lesch is without doubt an outstanding astrophysicist. But he also has an astonishingly high television presence and thus an enormous impact.
(One of the few worth seeing television pearls that I think you have to see before blessing the temporal is the discussion between Rangar Yogeshwar and then Dr. Lesch, where UFOs were discussed. Delicious to look at, although a long time ago, but can also be found on YouTube).
What kind of beings are they?
If one starts from the thesis that the extraterrestrial is really rather humanoid, further questions arise. Are “they” grey, small, smelly, scary? Or even more human-like, virtually indistinguishable from us? Do they eat small children? Do they mutilate cattle? Do they appear in our bedrooms at night? In my opinion the question is legitimate, because in the meantime the Greys, so they are called, are firmly anchored in the collective consciousness.
Preparation? No chance!
We as humans are not prepared for a contact with a civilization from “outside”. This was clearly addressed in Robert Fleischer’s lecture.
We are not equipped in any way. This is disconcerting, because according to Murphy exactly what can go wrong goes wrong. To say that obviously we have no idea what to do if a spaceship should really land somewhere in public. (The theme of the first contact from Hollywood’s point of view is not taken into consideration!) We assume that this civilization is far ahead of us in every respect, and that mankind will then be overwhelmed. Maybe so. But since man is extremely adaptable, I personally don’t see it that dramatically. (Amusing is the thesis of Stephen King, which he presents in his novel “Tommyknockers”: The aliens are portrayed there as a horde of incompetent bullies (just my point of view) who rage through space and crashed on Earth because they just had a fight. (This is steamed together in the most essential way). What happens when a horde of intergalactic hooligans land on this planet? The problem of excessive demands also arises in this case.
Stranded and persecuted
In my story I have tried to portray the situation of a stranded, persecuted alien. Persecuted, of course, by another alien species, but harboured by a human being. How does man deal with such a situation? To make the whole thing a little more complicated, I thought that a violet shining something with seven arms and nine eyes would not fit into our society and that it would be difficult to accommodate that something.
The good old archetypes…
I have decided to “create” a female human-like alien (with a triangular face (archetype) and pitch-black eyes (archetype)) that is found injured and then finds shelter with my protagonist. I have described the problem of communication from my point of view, I have also addressed the problem of food intake (this will be further explained in one of the following chapters), but I have asked myself when designing the story whether my protagonist copes with the fact that the alien mostly runs around naked. Can there be any kind of attraction between the two? It was also important for me to ask if a creature that comes from far away (and can’t go back) can feel something like homesickness. Does an extraterrestrial being have a longing for closeness and warmth and security? It has that in my story. Primarily out of the fact that it is alone and cannot “go home”. (Nudity will also be explained later.)
I chose Cologne as the setting for the story. It is a colourful, open city with, as I see it, a free, partly pragmatic attitude of mind. There, I thought, it is quite possible to have a beer with an alien. I found the thought amusing and will write something about it in my story.