#8

"I've always thought that there is something very unusual about mittens." I said, eyeing off Dawson's baby blue hand-warmers. "Unusual and infantile." I added. We were walking briskly towards the station in the dying light of the day; the cars on the road beside us at an aggravated peak-hour standstill.
"Only a man who hasn't experienced the sheer, unbridled warmth and cosiness that mittens afford would say such a thing. Here," Dawson said, while slipping off his left mitten, "give it a go."
Reluctantly I took hold of it, "This seems somewhat intimate... Like, holding hands almost?"
Dawson flashed me an amused smile as I imagined how we would look to the people in the cars beside us: two grown men walking down the street, sharing mittens.
With a shrug I pulled the mitten over my hand and managed to withhold from reacting audibly to the blissful sensation of comfort. It was still warm from Dawson's hand.
Suddenly the world seemed more beautiful - a white dove made the sound a dove makes from a nearby tree, a light breeze gently scattered some leaves across the footpath, and I'll be damned if a shooting star didn't make its way across the darkening sky. We both stopped walking.
"Did you see that?!" Dawson remarked lowering his head from the sky back down to my eye level.
"Yeah I... I think I did," I responded, realising that Dawson had placed his hand on the small of my back.
"It sure was something, wasn't it?" he asked, looking fondly, yet somewhat uncomfortably, at me. I started to feel like something wasn't quite right.
"You... are you okay, Daws?" his hand still lingered.
"Never been better, my man," he started to lean in.

[I feel like this is as good a time as any to point out that neither Dawson or myself are gay.]

Confusion and panic danced across each of our faces as the distance between our mouths lessened. Something was forcing us to do this, to play out this scenario. Something... or someone! We were literally moving in slow motion, and the sound of a string quartet drifted over to us from a car radio nearby. And then our lips touched, ever so lightly. Instantly the music stopped, the world seemed cold and dreary again, and Dawson and I jumped back from each other.
"What the faaa??" Dawson exclaimed, wide-eyed.
I took a moment. "It's the project... it must be. It's Dale Stephens."
"How is that even possible?"
"I don't know," I replied. "But we need to stop him before his mind gets out of control."
"Or before he turns the whole world gay..." Dawson added contemplatively.

#7

There was not much going on inside Dale Stephens' mind... "We all know frogs go, ladi dadi da, ladi dadi da, they don't go croak! croak! croak!"

Dale was well aware that he was in an unusual state of quasi-consciousness and that he had been for some time. He was disinterested in contemplating why, or even how to break out of the jail that was holding his imagination hostage. He'd been strapped to a table for several days - yes, a table! The people around him had absolutely no regard for his comfort. Or they were just cruel sons of bitches. I mean really, who puts someone on a table? It's possible his posture would benefit from this in the long run, but present Dale cared little for future Dale. "Sucker," he sniggered (mentally).

His mind wandered back to frogs. Giant, tall ones that stood on their hind legs, and had a strange obsession with Arnold Schwarzenegger movies. In his imagination they were generally happy go lucky creatures, but they lacked a few key social skills.

A lightness invaded his imaginings suddenly, and he felt oxygen against his eyeball. The distraction broke his reverie momentarily and he was thrust into the midst of a painful memory he'd been long suppressing.

"Shit."

His mind hunched over in pain as though it were his stomach and had just been buffeted by a battering ram.

#6

“What's going on peeps?” I said as I strolled into the lab. “I just had a very freaky experience with an alien and a bogus begger.”

“Bogus begger?” said Dawson. “Nice alliteration.”

“Thanks big D,” I replied, bumping fists. Dawson's my man. He's awesome. But he's not The Man that's...

“Where the hell have you been!?” a deep booming voice yelled at me from some stairs leading up to an office on the other side of the lab. Yep, 'The Man', Rose Dario.

“Meant to warn you, dude. She's on the warpath,” Dawson whispered in my ear. I gave him a thank you pat on the shoulder and made my way over.

“Hey Rose – sorry, I was...”

“I'm tired of your excuses. I don't want to hear it...”

“I think you'll want to hear this,” I said interrupting. No one interrupts The Man. “I just ran into a bogus beggar and an alien outside,” I blurted before she could explode at me.

The expression on her face instantly changed. She raced down the stairs to the body strapped to the examination table, took out a small flashlight from her coat pocket and started to examine his eyes.

“You think it's because of the project?” I asked the obvious question.

“What do you think?” she barked back at me. “There was always a chance,” she continued almost to herself. “In this state his imagination is backed up. It has no escape. With no outlet, it's starting to manifest physically.”

“Sort of like a wet dream when you don't...” Yep, wish I had of kept that thought to myself. Dawson laughed.

“We need to find a way to get his imagination flowing again,” The Man continued, ignoring us. “If we don't find a way to unblock his mind, it could be the end of us.”

I looked down at the body. He seemed so peaceful. Hard to believe that his imagination now held our lives in the balance. I never expected the apocalypse to be named Dale Stephens.

# 5

I turned around and found myself staring face to chest with an eight foot, green, slightly transparent, slug-like creature wearing a cowboy hat.
“Oh hello there,” it said to me in a perfect North American accent. “I was wondering if you could help us.”
I stared up at the creature with my mouth agape. Finally I managed to get out an, “Ok.”
“Well, you see we've been receiving transmissions from your planet for decades now. We do quite like your TV and movies, but we had a query about one particular one. In The Terminator series, why don't the terminators travel further back in time to before humans had any real weapons and simply kill John Connor's great, great, great grandfather. Don't you think it would be much simpler?”
“I, ah, I hadn't thought of that,” I mumbled. “But it wouldn't be as good a movie, would it?”
“Ah, so Greg was right. Well, thanks for you help.”
I closed my eyes and when I re-opened them, the creature was gone, as was the bogus beggar.

I knew this couldn't be a good sign. Things were already in motion. I needed to get to The Man. And fast.

# 4

No! The hell with deep breaths. Who are they to judge me? Why should I feel guilty? I pay taxes. Not always on time, but I pay them. Those taxes provide help for the homeless - I've done my bit.

And what's so great about having a home? It's just a place to store bills. Phone bills. Electricity bills. Pay TV bills. The one time I'm lucky enough to find a fifty dollar note on the ground I'm supposed to hand it over to some homeless hobo? Well excuse me for changing the punchline to that sick joke! You may tsk tsk me, but we both know he'd just spend it on booze. Yes, it's wrong to think that, but it's not like I'd blame him. It's what I'd do if I didn't have so many bills. Although I guess I don't really need cable...

Great, now I'm actually starting to feel guilty. Stupid social experiment! Never mind, I'll make up for it. Some way, some how, I'll put this fifty dollar note to good use. I'll make it count.

I decided to take one last look back at the bogus beggar. And that's when something really weird happened.