“But Mrs. Waldorf couldn’t have done it!” gasped Dr. Henry. “She was over a hundred and fifty miles away at the time of the murder.”
“Yes,” said Detective Watson, “But she’s the only one with a motive. Who else would have so brutally murdered poor Mr. Waldorf besides the tortured woman who has had to live with him for forty-five years?”
“I can’t answer that,” admitted Dr. Henry, “I don’t know. I just don’t know...but wait a minute! Have you talked to the butler Jenkins?”
“Of course we have!” barked Watson.“That’s the first person we check!”
He turned around as if to cough and whispered into his police walkie-talkie, “Clemonts! Check out the butler!”
“That’s a good idea, Chief,” Clemonts replied.
“Thanks,” Watson whispered, “I just thought of it. Over and out.”
He finished clearing his throat, politely excused himself, and continued his discussion with Dr. Henry.
“I’d almost lay money it was the butler,” the doctor said.
Watson didn’t reply. He was too busy convulsing. His eyes rolled back into his head and his entire body began to quiver violently. His mouth dropped open and his nose spouted blood. And then he spoke.
“People of earth, do not be alarmed. We are an alien race capable of remotely inhabiting the bodies of humans. However, this is generally not something we prefer to do. We chose to inhabit your President’s body at this time so that we could communicate effectively to a large number of people. In time, all your questions will be answered.
“First I would like to say...”
Suddenly Watson stopped and appeared to be listening intently to something or someone. When he began again, he was very angry.
“You have got to be kidding me! Who let Schmelnoz run the Consciousness Projector again!?”
He shook his head and noticed a stupefied Dr. Henry standing before him.
“You,” he said, “are not important.”
Those were his last words.
Watson fell to the ground, a puddle of fleshy pulp. Dr. Henry examined him. It appeared he had been brutally murdered in the exact same manner as Mr. Waldorf. What was Dr. Henry going to tell the authorities? They wouldn’t take kindly to a dead detective and a crazy story about aliens taking over people's bodies. Dr. Henry chose the only option he had.
Detective Watson’s broken body was found in various pieces beneath the fortieth story window from which he had apparently jumped.
The controversy raged. Had Dr. Henry committed the murders? There were rival theories.
And then one day the world’s attention was drawn to the President, who seemingly had been taken over by an alien presence. The Secret Service looked upon the possession as a hostile act and immediately fired several rounds of ammunition into the President/alien ambassador, both of whom fell dead.
The aliens in turn, being quite upset at the death of their ambassador, fired a nuclear doomsday device upon the earth, ridding it of its pesky inhabitants.
Except, that is, for the butler Jenkins, who was secretly one of them all along.
© 2007 Randy Bone