J. Steven York is a master at writing some of the most twisted and fun stories being published. And this original one hits the voice perfectly of twisted and fun. And head-shaking.

Steve has been publishing novels and powerful short fiction for over thirty years now, and before that he worked writing in the gaming industry. Steve is also doing a really fun and off-the-wall Internet comic, one of which he has allowed me to put in each issue of Pulphouse on the back page.

“Drink me,” said the alien in the toilet.

“Drink me,” it said.

Meanwhile, in the living room, Myrtle the dog lay on her cedar-scented dog bed in front of the fireplace, dreaming of rolling, summer-green hills and chasing rabbits.

“Drink me,” said the alien, its voice echoing in the ceramic bowl.

It was a creature of complex molecules suspended in water, a liquid lifeform. As a cloud of vapor floating through interstellar space, it had traveled a thousand Earth years, and a dozen light years, following deduction, reasoning, and, at the last, radio signals, in order to find that toilet.

“Drink me,” it called.

It had plunged through the atmosphere as a cloud of steam, and rained into the planet’s largest ocean. It had wandered for years, decades, until it had realized that the intelligent, technological creatures of this world lived on land. So the alien had journeyed up rivers, streams, and finally through tanks and pipes, into the home of one of the intelligences it had come so far to join with.

“Drink me,” said the alien.

In the living room, Myrtle’s ears twitched. She lifted her head to look around the room. “Woof,” said Myrtle.

“Drink me,” the small voice echoed from down the hall.

“Woof,” said Myrtle, climbing to her feet after a small hesitation. She padded over to the window, nosed past the closed drapes, and looked out at the empty sidewalk. “Woof-woof,” she said as a precautionary measure.

But nothing moved. No people. No rabbits. The yard was empty. The walk was empty. The street was empty. “Woof.”

“Drink me,” said the voice.

Myrtle pulled her head out of the window and padded into the hall, nails clicking on the hardwood floor.

“Drink me!”

The voice came through the bedroom, but Myrtle didn’t recognize the voice, and she knew her people weren’t home. She lowered her head and sniffed the floor. Only her people, house dust, Lemon Pledge, and her own personal odor. She started down the hall to investigate further when she spotted her ball. It was a tennis ball, once fuzzy fluorescent yellow, now threadbare off-brown, still damp with drool.

She grabbed the ball, tilting her head back and chewing joyfully.

“Drink me,” said the voice.

Myrtle tried to woof, but with the ball in her mouth it came out more like “Arruoo.” She dropped the ball on the carpet just inside the bedroom door and immediately forgot about it. She sniffed the unmade bed, always a comforting source of people smells, or at least interesting laundry chemicals. Nothing strange.

“Drink me,” the voice echoed from the bathroom.

“Woof,” said Myrtle. “Woof.”

She walked cautiously into the bathroom, the tile floor cool under the pads of her feet. She looked around expectantly, but saw no one. She nosed aside the clammy shower curtain. It smelled of soap, sweat, shampoo, wet hair and, faintly, of mildew.

Empty.

“Drink me.”

She turned to stare at the toilet, intent on the sound of the voice.

“Drink me,” it said. “Drink me.”

Unfortunately, while Myrtle had a considerable English vocabulary, including “come,” “sit,” “heel,” and “No, dammit,” it included neither “drink” nor “me.”

Fortunately, while she didn’t understand much about English, Myrtle did understand about toilet bowls. Unable to find the invader, she surrendered to the call of the leaky float valve. Cool, fresh water hissed into the bowl. She dipped her muzzle into the toilet. There was an unfamiliar sweet smell, but it was pleasant enough. She hesitated only a moment, and began to lap.

The alien said nothing, at least in English, or words, or sounds, but it sent a chemical signal that would have been interpreted by another of its kind as “Wheeeee!”

Even before it had reached Myrtle’s stomach the alien became one with the fluids of her body, sensing the coursing of water through every vein, artery, membrane, and cell of her body.

The alien was overwhelmed, both with the mechanical crudity of the body and the complexity of its processes. Unable to analyze it all at once, the alien focused on the rapid, dynamic, complex systems that must control the intelligence.

Myrtle lifted her head and blinked. The water tasted strange, but something else was happening.

“Take me to your leader,” said the voice in her head.

That was strange.

“Take me to your leader!”

The voice spoke, and she understood. The voice wanted to find her people!

Good idea!

Excited at the realization, she trotted from room to room, looking for them, finding their smell in the laundry hamper, and under the kitchen table, and in the recliner, and in the office chair.

But her people weren’t there. In the excitement of understanding, she’d forgotten. She looked hopefully out the office window, but the driveway was still empty. Her people weren’t there. The excitement and urgency faded. She sat down and scratched at a flea behind her left ear.

By then, the alien knew something was wrong. As complex as this creature was, it was not the life form that had sent those radio signals. It seemed unlikely the creature had much technology at all. But it lived with those that did. It moved among them. It would do, for the alien’s purposes. It would get the alien where it needed to go.

Feeling its way through her brain, it modified the flow of molecules through certain cell walls, altered the flow of electrons from cell to cell.

Myrtle blinked. Voices. Somehow, she needed to hear people. She stared at the blank eye of the television with a comprehension she’d never had before. She remembered people touching the box, making it loud and bright.

In the past, the box had been annoying, not interesting. Her people paid attention to the box, and not to her. But now it somehow seemed important. She needed to make it loud and bright!

Myrtle bumped her nose against the box. It left a wet smudge on the cold surface.

Nothing.

She scratched at it with her front paw. One her claws caught on a rough spot. The box clicked and squealed, another reason she didn’t like it. But it became bright, and the voices came.

Myrtle sat, transfixed, noticing for the first time that the moving lights were pictures. It was like a poor version of seeing a thing, but now she understood. For an hour she watched, soap operas and talk shows and commercials. She’d never known the box was so wonderful. Then a woman came on the box. She looked out of the box and said, “The President of the United States will shortly address a gathering of high school students at Kent Patterson Park.” The words still meant nothing to Myrtle, but she felt something within her stir in response to them. She studied the pictures that splashed on the screen, of restless people sitting in rows of chairs, And a large machine settling out of the sky onto a grassy hilltop, disgorging a smiling, waving man and a crowd of other people.

Something inside Myrtle wanted to go to this place and see this man. She jumped with the excitement of it. She knew where he was. Her people took her to that park to play and walk. She could get there. But only if she could get out of the house.

She ran to the front door. Closed. She ran to the back door. Closed. She whined in frustration and scratched at the door. Then she looked at the knob. She’d always known it had something to do with opening the door. But now it seemed so much clearer. She took the knob in her mouth. It was hard and cold, and the metal tasted funny. But she bit down and turned. The metal slipped against her teeth, and it hurt, but she tried again. The knob turned. The door clicked. Myrtle released the knob and dropped to the floor.

The door slowly swung open, and a rainbow of outside smells wafted in. Myrtle whined and ran in circles. This was great.

She trotted down the driveway and down the street, past rows of houses, and sweet, soft lawns. Occasionally, she would be distracted by a smell, or a sound, or a child on a bicycle, or a foraging squirrel, but each time the strange feeling inside her pulled her back on track.

She walked for blocks. Past bakeries, schoolyards and gas stations, crossing busy streets and dodging traffic. The last few blocks cars and people seemed to be everywhere, making it difficult for Myrtle to recognize landmarks. She backtracked several times, sniffing and circling to get her bearings.

Finally, she found the playground at the edge of the park. It was empty except for strange restless men in dark clothes. None of them were playing, and none of them seemed playful. She kept her distance and none of them seemed to notice her.

She followed a trail through a patch of woods and up a hillside to where the big machine squatted silently. There were more of the dark men pacing around the big machine, but the smiling man was gone. One of the dark men saw her, and yelled. He chased her for a few steps and waved his arms as she easily trotted away from him. Down the other side of the hill she could see the rows of chairs filled with people, all watching a man who spoke in the loudest voice she’d ever heard. It was the smiling man.

Her tail beat the air furiously. She was so happy to see him, it was almost like he was one of her people. She trotted down the hill, steering wide of the dark men who surrounded the platform where the smiling man stood.

She crouched in a clump of bushes, tail beating the ground behind her. Only a few hundred feet of open space separated her from the stairs to the platform. The feeling inside her urged her on. She could see the smiling man, and she wondered what he smelled like. Then, from somewhere inside her, another, more familiar, urge. She ignored it.

She trotted across the grass, slowing to a fast walk as she crossed a closed-off street. As she crossed the far curb, a dog smell jerked her off the path. She followed it up the gutter, and over to a metal object surrounded by dozens of dog smells. The smiling man was forgotten as she sniffed around the fire hydrant. The feeling inside her tried to call her away, but this was more important. She backed up to the hydrant and squatted.

The alien wailed as it parted company with Myrtle. It had come so far, it had come so close. If there had been more time to study its alien host, it might not have allowed itself to be expelled. It might not have let the host be distracted. But it was too late now.

Myrtle blinked, as confused as she was relieved. She felt a vague dissatisfaction. She saw the smiling man, and wagged her tail. Maybe he would throw a stick for her. She trotted off to see.

Later, her owners would be amazed to see her being patted by the president on the evening news. They would be even more amazed when a Secret Service agent brought her home.

As for the alien, it dripped down the side of the hydrant and collected in a little puddle on the sidewalk, cooking in the sun.

“Drink me,” it called over and over again. “Drink me!”

But nobody did.