Raymond

17

The sun rose and everything fell. The month was April and the year was 2065. The time was 6:45 PM. And, if I recall correctly, the soup of the day was Chowder.
Every newspaper was printing the same story using different words. Days earlier, U.S. President Richard Butchkins announced his infamous 'War on Aliens'. Billions upon billions of dollars were being spent on defenses against any outer-space life forms. Most of the country was bothered by his reasoning for declaring war, though President Butchkins continued to give the same answer:
“There is silverware missing in the White House and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let those slimy green bastards go unharmed because of it!” It should be noted that he’d forgotten to take his Flintstones Gummy Medication every day for the seven weeks leading up to the announcement. But the country was obligated to comply with his demands.
Meanwhile, in Southern Canada (which became U.S. territory in 2048), Alex Mitchell was rolled out of bed earlier that day, around noon. Alex, age 42, was not the brightest crop of the cornfield. No one could blame him, however. When he was three months old, his parents were killed in the park due to a kamikaze attack conducted by squirrels operating miniature helicopters.
He wandered off alone, and by the age of 8 months, he was a member of a small family of nine. All nine were human children being raised by a single mother, who was a poodle. Alex lived a difficult life and had no formal education. In fact, he didn’t have much informal education either. And beyond salivating on command, he had no skills whatsoever.
At this point, Alex was unemployed, though he received a huge cash settlement five years earlier from NASA, his former employer, after a freak-accident. He lost an arm, three ribs and a kidney while trying to use the office’s electric pencil sharpener. All ribs, the internal organ and the limb were replaced soon after, and Alex had enough money to never work again. These days, Alex Mitchell hadn’t a care in the world. Though the world he and everyone else knew was about to change forever.
On Mars, Alien Life got word of the Earthling-President’s declaration of war. They were offended that President Butchkins would assume they were responsible for his missing silverware. And this was not Butchkins’ first offence against Alien Life. He has launched warning missiles in Mars’ direction every time the remote control for his TV was missing. Or when he ran out of his favorite breakfast cereal. He would always blame Alien Life. And they had enough of it. They were prepared to retaliate this time.
On the aforementioned day, April 8th, 2065, at exactly 6:45 PM EST, every person on Earth fell asleep. Americans, Chinese, Russians, even the Eskimos. If they were on the couch, they laid down to sleep. If they were driving, they fell asleep at the wheel. If they were sleeping — well, take a guess, Einstein.
And exactly one hour later, at 7:45, all human life woke up. Their ankles had heavy metal bracelets around, which were chained to the person next to them. They sat at tables that were hundreds of miles long. And each person found themselves knitting socks. In a matter of 60 minutes, due to Alien hypnosis, every doctor and lawyer and stockbroker and human in the world was now an employee of the sock business.
Four sleepless days and about 263 Billion pairs of socks later, Aliens landed on Earth. All heads turned to witness what would be the first public appearance on Earth of Alien Life. The head of the species, whose name is spelled with a lot of symbols and silly drawings, stepped out of the spaceship. He said in a squeaky language that all humans understood: “We are here for the socks.”
They demanded 300 Billion pairs, as winter was approaching on Mars. They knew the humans would not have that many socks knitted in only four days.
“We don’t have that many. Come back on Tuesday! We’ll have ‘em for you!” said a desperate President Butchkins.
The Aliens laughed in response to his plead. “Well, if there are not enough socks here, I guess we’ll be taking you all up to our planet so you can knit us socks forever. For our children. And our children’s children. And so on.”
And as all humans panicked, one man entered the scene to save the day. And that man’s name was Alex Mitchell. Alex was not chained like everyone else, as he was the only human on the planet to have purchased 'Alien Hypnosis Protection' years earlier from Trojan.
“Hey, Mr. Alien. I know our President has been a little tough on you guys. And I get that you think of us as those stupid humans, over on Earth, obsessed with pot and sex. But look at us. We are simple people with simple problems. We’re not accustomed to having good things done for us, so we don’t understand happiness as much as we could. But I think forcing this planet to knit socks for four days straight, that punishment will help us realize our own happiness better than anything else ever could. And if you set us free, and allow us a second chance to enjoy our lives, we will have love for you, out neighbor, for the rest of time. As you will have taught us that we have had happiness all along.”
And it was in that moment when it was clear. Alex lost multiple parts of his body to that pencil sharpener. But his heart remained full. He understood that, sometimes, freedom and happiness has to be taken away from someone for them to realize how free and happy they truly are.
“Thank you, fine neighbor,” said the head of the Aliens. “Your people are now free. We would like for you to show us back to our spaceship.” And, becoming the first member of NASA to ever make contact with an Alien Spacecraft, Alex took the hand of his Alien neighbor, and walked him toward the ship. Alex stared at the door handle and slowly turned the knob.