Hell Hath No Fury

A lighthearted story about an ornery french woman who must save the entire human race.

Helena Eleanor Cates lived a comfortable life. In the morning she took the train to the park, it cost her two francs. In the evening she went shopping at Merlot’s, she never went over budget. Her apartment was one of concision and extreme order. She spent three weeks battling cobwebs in her foyer before calling the exterminator for a fumigation. It was a pricy procedure. She received her checks every week in the mail at exactly 2pm. The mailman was expressly told to bring it to her door, she had bolted her mailbox shut to prove her point. This had not made her any friends in the postal service, but Helena was a woman who got precisely what she wanted.

In fact, in her long eighty eight years and two months Helena Eleanor Cates had rarely been let down. She was often waylaid, sometimes thwarted, but very often she outlasted even her toughest opponents. For example, her botany professor had insisted that roses could only be certain colors and the shades between. Helena had decided her roses would have petals of multiple colors, Professor Fleur and Mother Nature be damned. She had spent six months tirelessly combining different families of roses, every failure only fueled her unquenchable desire to be right. It was a sunny day in mid-May when she kicked open Professor Fleur’s door. She sidled through the busy classroom and dropped a large ceramic pot on his desk, scattering papers and soil samples in every direction. In the pot were six roses, each had red and yellow petals, four of each. She simply shrugged, smirked and left without a single word.

She never left home without her yellow and red rose pin.

It was a cloudless day in August when Helena decided she needed a walk, the blossoming garden on her fire escape had been pruned, watered, trimmed, and fertilized to the point of perfection. Her bookcase had been reorganized by both color and size. Her cat had been petted and fed cream until it waddled contented into a sunbeam to doze. She had little to do, and so much world to fix. She pulled on her nicest pair of loafers, a wide straw sunhat, and went out into the world. “Morning, miss Cates!” Said her mailman, out of breath. He had ran up the six flights of steps to make her strict two o’ clock deadline. It was two minutes past, but Helena was in a grand mood and only fixed him with an icy stare as she walked by, rather than her usual verbal lashing. “Sorry Ms Cates.” He said to his shoes.

Marseille was a busy city. It seemed made of warm ice on days like this, the streets and the walls of the homes were solid ivory sheetrock, and it hurt the eyes of tourists to stare at them. French men and women flowed down the twisting avenues with a liquid grace, their cars hummed and their bodies danced. It was perhaps a perfect day if such a possibility existed. Helena walked quickly, with no cane or walker to aid her unusually spry legs. She saw a dark shadow pass over the street. “What an unusually large bird that must be.” she said to no one, she decided she must call the mayor before sunset and have something done about it.

She decided to save the two francs and walk to the park today. It was for the benefit of the entire human race that she did so. She had smiled softy, admiring the tuft of a chubby bluebird when a wobbly bike messenger crashed into the wall. She ambled over to his shaking form and yanked him to his feet, three children and twice the amount of grandkids had taught her how to deal with injuries. “You’re fine!” she yelled at him, and he suddenly realized he was, the new gash on his knee was still unknown to him. “What did you go and do a silly thing like that for?” she demanded of him. He suddenly seemed sheepish as he pointed a finger skywards. “Mademoiselle, I thought I saw a shape in the sky.”

She grinned and slapped his shoulder, “my son is a daydreamer too, I’ll give you his number.” Her son Jean Claude had recently divulged his sexual preference to her in a long handwritten letter. He had stated repeatedly that he would not change his ways for her, and if she was unhappy with his taste, then was allowed to leave his life forever. Jean Claude had never understood his mother. Instead of leaving his life, she had become an even larger monolith in it. Well dressed men showed up to his door at all hours of the night, he found his face plastered on billboards and posters with the caption “looking for love?” He had never regretted anything more than telling his mother he was gay, because she was rapturously pleased to be his matchmaker.

After giving her son’s number to an unsuspecting bike messenger, she continued on her way. More shadow shapes darted over the white Marseilleian sidewalk, but Helena couldn’t be bothered to look up. She passed an electronics store full of brand new glass televisions, their bubble displays showed frantic newscasters speaking French and English with white, terrified eyes.

She got to the park and was slightly annoyed to see that everyone in sight was staring up the sky, pointing, and taking pictures with their Polaroids. Always resentful to be a follower, Helena Eleanor Cates looked up. The sky was full of black triangles, a thousand at least, they moved like a school of birds, quickly and aflutter with a single mind. They slowly made their way to the large grassy park, hovering many thousands of feet above the crest of a green hill. Each triangle must have been the size of a small house, the sky over the park was dark.

Babies cried, traffic lurched to a dead stop as drivers leaned out, gawking at the alien invaders. A thousand people gathered around the green hill, muttering amongst themselves, trying to understand what was happening. A single triangle descended, larger than the rest. It landed on the hill with stubby black legs. A large door slid open on the front of the craft. There was a tense moment, heavy with the weight of possibility, where not a single Marseilleian soul drew a breath. From within the craft came a large and cumbersome creature, it was green and blue, and where it wasn’t a mess of tentacles, it was gray and made of wires. It slithered out onto the grass smoothly, like a pile of noodles onto a countertop. Helena Eleanor Cates would have none of this.

She pushed aside the frozen gawkers, nearly running towards the spacecraft and its pilot. “Hey!” she yelled, her brow making a sharp “v”. When she got within ten feet, she heard a guttural clicking, a smooth series of chirps and whirrs, and finally a soft “parlez-vous français?” came from within the vile creature. Its voice was quiet, and it was firmly rounded like a television anchor. “Yes I do, you miserable loaf of bread, and you’re going to forget how in a heartbeat.” The creature spasmed momentarily and clicked several times. Then it said: “we have come for resources, our planet is…” it seemed to think for a moment, “dry” Helena rubbed her forehead with frustration. “So you want our water?” It whirred and clicked for a moment. “Yes, your deaths will be painless, we are a merciful species. We will not let you die of thirst, as so many of my people have.” The crowd behind her gasped, and they whispered to each other the news of what the creature had said.

Helena ran right up the slithering mass of tentacles and wires and shouted with the vitriol of a much younger woman: “you will do no such thing, you idiotic pile of worms!” The creature convulsed again, screeching and retreating from the fury of Helena. “Your race must be sacrificed, our work in the cosmos is too important. I’m sorry.” Helena rolled her eyes. She got as close as she could to the pulsating, shivering creature and poked it in a bundle of nerves and wires “Get off my planet now, or so help me I will destroy you.” she growled with more malice and hate than she’d ever felt before. The creature seemed to melt into a puddle. The spot she’d poked sparked and crackled loudly, the creature wailed as it lost shape and flattened out on the ground. Two more aliens slithered out of the ebony craft and retrieved their fallen comrade. They retreated back with their captain. The triangle shot up quickly and was followed by the rest of the swarm.

Helena straightened her yellow and red rose pin and carried on her with her walk. The ships above her boomed as they broke the sound barrier.

Reviews

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Mrs Cates is a very interesting character and amusing to read. And I liked the humour in your story *thumbs up*