The Mission

Flash fiction from Christine C. Hsu

Christine C. Hsu is a a short story writer, essayist, poet, and playwright based in San Francisco. She has been published by The Bold Italic, xoJane, KQED, ABC News Radio Online, Yellow Arrow Journal, Lunchbox Moments, Slipform Poetry Anthology 2020, Mixed Mag, DropOut Literary Magazine, NonBinary Review, Nonwhite and Woman Anthology, and Red Ogre Review. Her plays have been performed by the Negro Ensemble Company, Crafton Hills College, Houston Community College - Stafford, The Pear Theatre, Enterwine, and The Playwrights’ Center of San Francisco. The Writers Grotto of San Francisco selected her as a 2022 Rooted and Written Fellow for Screenplay.

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42.2673 degrees north, 79.9569 degrees west. 1900 hours. It’s a new moon, so I’ll have perfect cover in the darkness Commander. It will look like a murder-suicide with my body discarded by the creek, along with a gunshot wound to Joshua’s heart and his penis chopped off with a machete. We need to make it look as gruesome as possible. Basic love story gone wrong. Of course, I will remember to bring his head back in the accelerated vacuum sealed storage unit, which I hid in the woods when I arrived on Earth. I know you wanted a young spawn to dissect, but Joshua made dinner reservations at a romantic French restaurant for our human anniversary. He has his mother babysitting the female infant. Audrey cries incessantly and is not as mature as the bacterial spawn that we carry and nurture back home. I will never be human-pregnant again for the sake of science. I will be happy to be rid of the high heels, the lipstick, and the worst contraption: the bra. I hope my fellow comrades will be more successful on their missions on this deplorable planet. 

Be home soon to give my full report. It would be a kindness to obliterate all of humanity. Signing off. GLORP.