MYSTERY STORIES CONTEST (THE FLY)

For @belenguerra & @fendit contest

Boy, this is a big fly! Huge actually. I’ve never seen fly this big in my life! That is... if I could evaluate its size from where I am, correctly. Sizes seem to deceive when you lay on your back in the bed and look up the ceiling.

It is hot and humid in my hotel room and I feel myself sweating and wanting to get up and get a drink of water from the bottle of "Perrier". I recall it is still in the refrigerator. But I also feel lazy and somewhat apathetic, and in the struggle with thirst these feelings, for the time being, succeed.

I watch how the fly travel over the ceiling surface upside down, then stops, lifts two of its front legs, and rubs them against its head, the movement that reminds me of washing one's face.

How in the hell is it holding itself like this by using only four legs? Instantly, though, I realize the irrelevance of such a thought. Explain to me how it holds itself on the flat surface upside down using six legs. How it uses four legs is a problem of a much lesser degree.

Come to think of it … Yeah, flies are light, but still. Do their legs just stick or create temporary suction inside them, or what?

Strange. Such abilities and yet flies are completely useless animals. I understand about flies being food for birds and stuff, but still. Birds could eat butterflies, dragonflies, or seeds. Why were flies created? Only God knows.

My mind drifts for a while captured by this thought when suddenly I was taken off of my drift by a foreign presence. It manifests itself in the form of a voice, or at least, the voice is the closest analogy I can come up with. Even though I couldn't hear it literally pronouncing words the phrase somehow materialized inside my mind.

"Aptitude to receive the correct answer is greatly amplified by one's ability to ask the correct question."

Huh? Excuse me? I beg you a pardon… Who was that? The voice was initiated definitely from inside my head, but it wasn't mine. It was a distinct other voice, not just my alter ego or the voice of reason that always argues with me in the moment of making a decision.

I could feel the presence and the personality of the interlocutor.

"Have you ever heard of telepathy?"

"I heard of it", I muse, "but I never thought…It was possible" I add.

"That's what we are doing," The voice continued.

"Mmmmm…." I am surprised, but not as surprised as I would think I could have been."Mmmmm… May I, at least, inquire who am I speaking with, or should I say 'telepathing width' if this is, actually, a word?"

"You are looking at me for five minutes already."

"You mean?" I look at the fly now with some new chilling curiosity.

"Yes."

"But, but…" my ability to analyze stalled, overwhelmed by the multitude of thoughts marched concurrently through my mind like the cockroaches appear through the wall crack.

"There is no need to jitter and fidget. Yes, you're talking to a fly."

"Are you some kind of a special fly?" I finally compose myself.

There was a considerable pause.

"It's a loaded question. You'd have to be more specific. In my appearance and physiological functions, I am but an average fly. Well, I am a horsefly to be specific. In some way, though, I am special. But I don't think you know enough about flies, in general, to appreciate my non-mediocrity. Your frame of reference is hopelessly shifted. In other words, the spectrum of things I pride myself on could only be appreciated by a fly. At the same time, not just any old fly can appreciate me. There are plenty of flies who are only born to accomplish not more than create more flies. Thus, my originality could only be appreciated by the group of special, more delicately organized, intelligent flies."

"But your ability to communicate. This is simply amazing, revolutionary, and mind-blowing. I can't even express to you how much I am impressed, bewildered, I can't even find words. It's… It's against everything that we as people know."

"Oh, that's what you are talking about. You are such a typical human. You are not impressed with my manners, the preciseness, and certainty of how I clean my beak, with the elegance that I put food in my mouth, with the complexity and taste of the ornaments on my wings. What are you interested in…is how we communicate telepathically – the generic ability of every fly, just like the ability to attach themselves to the ceiling."

"But if so," I wonder, "why is it that flies and people, who live for such a long time side by side, have never been involved in the contact similar to ours?"

"Never been in contact? It's not that they never been in contact, as much as there was no record of such contact. And the reason for this is..." The fly pauses. The pause is significant, so significant that for a moment I think we lost the contact at all. And yet I feel it wasn't just a pause caused by the search for "a proper wording".

"The reason for this," the fly finally continues, "is that there was no person who survived such an encounter."

"What exactly do you mean?" I feel how my back covers with sweat and my breathing becomes heavier.

"Quite simply, most of the humans do not possess the ability of telepathy, unless one of us injects them with the astrinogen – a special hormone that opens up their telepathic communication channel, but that at the same time it has a detrimental side effect on people. If you know what I mean."

Now the hot sweat seems to become cold, as slowly the realization of the situation I was in arrived at my consciousness. Now I try to get up but realize that I am paralyzed and could activate neither of my muscles.

"But who? But when?" My mind didn't want to accept the inevitability of the situation.

"Yes, that was me. And yes I did it while you were asleep. And no this is not immoral or as you might put it inhumane, although as you might agree, my belonging to the fly species doesn't specifically obligate me to behave humanely."

Although there is no demonic laugh that follows this statement, its absence is even more sinister.

"That brings me back to your original question, or rather to the absence of it, which is if you'd allow me to quote you, 'Why were flies created?' and which, as you also might remember I categorized as incorrectly stated."

The fly now flows down from the ceiling and sits on my nose. The gentle touch of its legs on my skin made me feel incredibly itchy. I had an immense desire to lift up my hand and swipe it away. The only problem is my muscles aren't obedient. And boy oh boy, from a close distance the fly appears huge and disgusting indeed. Although as much as I can I try understandably not to reveal my thoughts to it.

"The correct question is not 'why were flies are created', the fact of creating flies is self-evident and doesn't require explanation, but 'why were humans created?' To which there is a very simple and comprehensible answer. And the answer is: 'Humans were created as a source of food for flies'

With this fly elongates his beak, pokes through the skin on my nose, and starts sucking my blood. The itching sensation increases and becomes almost unbearable to the point that I started crying from my helplessness.

Fly finishes, pulls out its beak, and starts to carefully wash its muzzle, the activity it administers with such self-proclaimed elegance. While doing it I see it looking into my eyes and now I almost sense the meaning behind this look.

"So," I ask, "how long it would take you to completely drink me up?"

"Just for me alone, it would take about three months, because considering your size, you have about five liters of it."

"Three months," I smile, "I don't think I will last that long. I think I'll die much earlier than that. So, sorry to burst your bubble, buddy, but you won't have it all."

"I know that, human." The fly responds, still looking into my eyes. "That's why I commented about consuming you just by myself. But, we, flies are not so selfish. We are more intelligent than that. And if you have no unassisted ability to communicate telepathically, then we, flies, do. Also, don't think that all we can use of your body is blood. Human flesh is very nutritious and we prefer human flesh to any other fresh or even better not so fresh meat."

And that's when I heard the buzz. Making a great effort I slant my eyes and see the whole bunch of flies through the open window.

That's it then. I clench my teeth and close my eyes shut. This was the last willful act I can undertake.