The Moles
Thanks, Jan. Hello, I’m Mags McNews, and these are your top stories tonight.
Our first story comes following the horrible tragedy that befell Parliament only yesterday. Now, for legal reasons, no one is allowed to say, or think, about what may or may not have happened to the government. Because nothing did happen. And Stock News did not report on those non-events that did not occur yesterday. I repeat, there was no tragedy. None.
If, by some unspeakable horror, you find yourself remembering stories that did not happen, do not panic. We here at Stock News have a simple remedy:
Go out across your well-furnished kitchen, down to that patch of mould, that you swore you’d see to but never did, and chisel a hole through it. Make it big enough for a fist — your fist — to reach through it. There you will find your Stocknamington-council-licensed firearm. Take the firearm in your hands. Feel its weight. It feels right, doesn’t it?
When you lay awake at night wondering if those sounds from beyond your fence would ever stop. The fence that sits outside your window beyond your grasp, its crisp white paint but a memory now. When the persistent moaning and groaning haunted your nightmares, and you lay awake never sure they were real because no one else heard them.
If those sounds would ever cease to be.
You imagined the gun. Now it rests in your palm and it feels right. Its metal cold yet soothing against your flesh.
Take the gun and place the barrel in your mouth.
Fire.
…
But let’s just say for argument’s sake that there was such a story. Though there definitely wasn’t. This would leave Stocknamington, along with the rest of Britain, without a government. No one to tend to our every whim. No one to watch our dreams.
What would Britain be without a government? If such an event were to ever occur — which it never has and never will — the following procedure would be carried out.
The recently deceased stiff corpse of the former Prime Minister would be placed upon a great wheel. This, as all you viewers know, is part of the Governmental Selection Program. Where the fifty-foot wheel is launched from the top of Big Ben across the country. Soaring gracefully across the beautiful sandy deserts that make up our great nation. Upon landing, our new leader is selected as whomever the rigidly pointed finger of the deceased former Prime Minister indicates.
But, of course, this never need happen. The government is forever, and Stocknamington’s citizens are but its humble servants.
We now go over to our Weather correspondent, Raine Day.
Thanks, Mags.
Well, there’s not much to say on the weather front today. The lack of rainfall has persisted for yet another gruelling day.
To look on the positive side, as I am known to do, the air is fresh and green for all of our gorgeous citizens. It may not be breathable — I repeat, do not leave your homes — but we can all marvel at the dynamic nature of flat swampy green. Green was always my colour.
Now, if our producers will permit me… [Muffled chatter] Okay, good. I’ve been getting sick and tired of watching those mole-people proudly marching across our town’s perfectly maintained ground. These moles — excuse me, mole-people are nothing but a nuisance to everyone they come into contact with.
All that dark fur, and those emotionless glass eyes… Creepy. Why can’t they just go back to where they come from? No one wants them here. I wish they’d take their podgy, fat bodies back into the underground hellhole they crawled out of. Why can’t they stop ruining mine, and everyone else’s lives, with their swarms?
Shame on you, moles — apologies, mole-people.
Shame.
Back to you, Mags.
Thanks, Raine.
And I just want to really reiterate that last point, Raine. Last night, I stared out of my government-sanctioned luxuriously spacious bedsit apartment’s windows. And what do I see? Those, excuse my language, moles scurrying about over my garden. Rummaging through the bins like animals.
But I won’t let my anger get the better of me. Not today, at least.
I’m getting through on my earpiece that there are reports of non-existent excitement over the impossibility of a “new” government. I want to remind everyone that these reports are false… Or maybe true. Whichever confirms that nothing, and I mean nothing, will change.
Because Stocknamington thrives on stability. On the never-ending, and ever-constant nature of our town. Of its green skies, toxic air, perfectly maintained house-prices, and its gorgeous citizens. Oh, and the mole-people. They count too.
To read other stories from October’s Dark & Weird Fiction Challenge, visit and follow The Mad River Literary Journal and 13 Days Pub.
