The Realignment

by Harriet Alsop

2055

35th November

The Beginning

04:62 am

The televisions in every home across the world blared like searchlights. The people of Earth were scared.

"Havoc wreaked across cities..."

"Thousands dead, injured, homeless..."

"These extraterrestrial grenades, known as E.Gs, are baffling scientists...

"The Realignment will come..."

"...out of our control..."

"...the aliens..."

"...Inevitable..."

"... Just the beginning."

2056

36th November

The Realignment

07:34 pm

Farmer Parson stood at the window and watched as the smoke cleared on the horizon.

The world was ending, so they said. The Realignment was here.

Rubbish.

Yes, the planets might be pushed out of alignment and yes, that may be potentially devastating to, well, humankind... But that wasn't the point! All these scientists were overcomplicating things. They should stick to the simple things in life.

Crunchy apples on a crisp autumn daybreak.

White clouds against a lilac sky.

The moon refusing to fade away, even come morning.

And chickens. Oh, how he loved his chickens.

He liked the calm they brought, liked their soothing quiet clucking. He watched them now, auburn feather catching the evening Suns and glinting like flame, wildfire among the trees. His breath froze in a glittering white nebula in the air and mingled with the delicate mist that hung above the dewy grass. It was sad, Farmer Parson decided, that this quiet balance was being destroyed.

He himself had once been a man of science. Very much so, in fact. But Farmer Parson didn't hold with this... this... pessimism that passed for fact these days. "We are all in the gutter," he mumbled, "but some of us are looking at the stars."

He quickly realised that the stars probably weren't the best place to be right now. Stupid extraterrestrials, ruining everything.

His attention turned back to his chickens. They were all filing back into their coop. Farmer Parson looked on with amusement in his eyes at how orderly they seemed. He wondered, for a moment, what is must be like to be a chicken. Relaxing, perhaps? Quiet? They didn't worry themselves with Realignments or war or the End Of The World. Yes, Farmer Parson decided, it would be nice to be a chicken.

The Kotopoulo HQ

36th November

The Realignment Launch

07:36 pm

This was it.

The dawn of a new race.

The Realignment had come.

The President of the Kotopoulos moved slowly down the stone corridor. Deafening echoes ricocheted around the polished walls with each calm and deliberate step. She was the cause of all this human suffering, and she wallowed in it. She was a knife in the shadows, from Earth, not Space.

The Grand Hall fell silent as she entered. She took a deep breath in, and one last look in the mirrored walls.

Her feathers shone. Her beak gleamed. Satisfied, she straightened her comb.

This was a momentous moment for chickenkind.

Her auburn wing hovered above a button, to excited clucks from her fellow birds, watching with yellow eyes.

"Operation Realignment," she squawked, "is go."