Jess, Hannah, Otto, Ben and Xander all followed Jess's non-biological father into the garden. It was quite a relief to everyone to be away from all the psychedelic colours of Sofaland, but when they got into the garden they saw things were in just as much turmoil.
"What the hell happened here?"
"It looks like a bomb has hit your garden," Ben told Jess, trying to give her a consolation hug, but Jess backed away from him. "They grow up far too quickly," sniffed Ben to Xander. "And then they don't want to know you!" He had practically burst into tears, when a random brick came flying through the air and knocked him on the head.
Jess's back garden was now a large muddy hole, and so was the field behind the garden. There were several hundred JCBs and workmen digging.
"Apparently they think it could be aliens!" Jess's non-biological dad commented.
"Aliens buried treasure in your garden," Hannah said, doubtfully.
"Incredible, isn't it?!" Jess's dad said in a non-biological way.
"Now I know where you get it from," Hannah said to Jess.
Ben leapt down into the pit that had been dug and crouched down by a depression in the earth.
"So, Steven Hawking," Otto scoffed. "Can you tell us the nature of that depression, the creature that made it, its name and the size of its shoes?"
There was a pause.
"Indentation of soil and vegetation by a possible extra terrestrial life-force by the name of Gregory; size 8 shoes," Ben rattled off suddenly.
There was a long silence.
"I don't WANT to go to Cambridge any more," Jess sniffed. "Look what they DO to you!"
"How in the name of PANTS did you know that?" Hannah asked Ben, aghast.
Ben pointed to the edge of the depression in the ground, where the words 'gregory woz ere' were scratched and a trail of footprints led off towards the compost heap. Ben placed only of his own feet in one of the prints. "Same size as me," he concluded.
"Let's follow the prints," Xander suggested.
"Hey, HERE'S an idea – why don't you take me back to God's sofa in Sofaland and let me stay with Peter Cook and company while you all risk your life with aliens?" Jess suggested.
"Forget it, Jess. They're DEAD," Hannah snapped.
"Dammit." Jess snapped her fingers in defeat.

"Nothing in here," Otto concluded, pulling his arm out of the compost heap.
"Eew…" Hannah held her nose and backed away from him. "Manky."
"Well, the footprints STOPPED here," Xander said, pointing.
"Well, whatever made them—"
"GREGORY," Hannah interrupted.
"GREGORY," Otto continued. "Didn't go into the compost heap." He sniffed. "And, personally, I don't bloody blame him."
"Well, what do we do now?" asked Ben. "We can't find this stupid al—"
"GREGORY!" Hannah and Jess corrected him.
"We can't find GREGORY," Ben said through his teeth. "So we're stuffed."
"Not quite stuffed, my friend," said Xander, pulling an odd metal contraption from the depths of his jumper.
"What the hell—"
"What's that?"
"THIS," Xander said, grandly. "Is an Alien Detector Machine."
"Oh, Jesus Christ…" Hannah buried her head in her hands.
"You don't have any food in there, do you?" asked Jess in fascination, trying to peer inside Xander's jumper.
"No, Jess – anyway, let me show you all how it works." He pulled a mini aerial out of the top of the remote. He sighed. "One of my more wise inventions, this is."
"I REALLY don't want to go to Cambridge…" Jess thought aloud.
"Well, don't then," concluded Otto, oblivious to the Cambridge Commitment problem Jess had contracted somewhere along the line. "I thought Oxford was higher-quality education anyway."
Everyone, apart from Hannah, gasped.
"I am NEVER talking to you again," Ben retorted.
"Come on, then!" Hannah jumped up and down impatiently.
"OK," Xander said, pleased to finally show off his brain capacity. "It works like this…" He pressed a few buttons, then pressed a few more. "OK… like this…" He pressed several buttons at the same time.
"He's forgotten," Hannah whispered to Otto.
Xander angrily shook the machine. "Come on, WORK!" He pressed a large red button and the machine self-destructed into 72 pieces on the floor.
Otto clapped for a while.
"Oh, well DONE, Xander," Ben said after a disappointed silence. "You've brought a premature climax to the proceedings." He paused for thought. "And it wouldn't be the first time."
Everyone looked at Ben.
"For Xander's sake, I hope that Ben is just using innuendo," Jess said, shuddering.
"How in the name of Silverchair are we going to find this alien now?" asked Hannah in despair.
"GREGORY!" Otto, Xander, Ben and Jess yelled at her.
"HE COULD BE CALLED FREDERICK PONCENBY THE THIRD – I DON'T CARE!" yelled Hannah. "The fact is," she continued, calming down. "We can't find him now, can we?"
"We could just follow that spaceship," suggested Otto, pointing.
"Good plan, batman," Jess said, running after the silvery craft hovering seven feet above the ground just over Jess's garden fence.
"Everybody is insane. YOU are insane—" Otto pointed at Hannah. "—I am insane, HE is insane, the little green man hanging onto my ankle is INSANE!" Otto screamed.
"Ooh, get you," Jess huffed as she stood underneath the spaceship.
"Don't you think that the little green man is a little more worrying, Otto?" Xander called over to Otto, who was staring at the alien lifeform attached to his leg.
"Possibly," Otto concluded.
The spaceship made a whirring noise and blinded all five of them for a split second, then disappeared.
The small alien looked up at Otto. "Dada?"
"Clearly not," replied Otto.
"Oh." The alien looked at the floor. "F*ck-nuts."
"Um…" Hannah stared at the small green creature. "Hi. I… AM… HANNAH. THIS," she indicated their surroundings. "IS… EARTH. WE COME IN PE—"
"Kindly omit patronising me," said the alien. "I read at the 17th grade level and know more about your planet than you EVER will."
Hannah was stunned. "I'm stunned," she said.
"Um… are you Gregory?" Xander asked the alien with as much politeness as he could muster – I mean, come on – this thing was GREEN. It was hard to take it seriously.
"Yes. May I venture to enquire as to YOUR names?" Gregory asked.
"This is TOO weird," said Ben, backing away.
"We've seen worse. We've seen MUCH worse," said Hannah, nostalgically.
"I know." The alien sighed. "Did I forget to tell you that I can see into and read your mind, randomly accessing memories…?"
"So THAT'S what RAM really stood for…" Jess inserted, thoughtfully.
"Wow," said Otto, taken aback. "You're like GOD."
"Ha-ha! Silly Earthlings," Gregory erupted. "There is no such thing as God."
"Ssshh!" Hannah cried. "Don't say that! We might have Christian fans… or some sort of religious freaks… somewhere!"
"Sorry to interrupt the general flow of chit-chat, but why are you still hanging onto my leg, Gregory?"
Gregory looked up at Otto. "My skin is stuck to the sheep's-wool material fibres in your trousers."
"Oh, right." Otto tried to shake him off.
"Please don't, you're ripping my skin," Gregory notified Otto politely.
"Oh, right, sorry." Otto stood still for a while.
"How can we get you off without hurting you?" asked Jess. Then, after thinking, "And why the hell did you land your spaceship in my garden and ruin my plants?!"
"We only landed in the centre of the lawn and made a LITTLE mark. Then the Earthlings came with their diggers and shovels and proceeded to dig up the rest of it." Gregory paused. "Idiots."
"What about this buried treasure?" asked Ben, hopefully.
"A cover up, so that our landing site would not be found," Gregory explained.
"It didn't work, did it?" said Otto, amused.
"No." Gregory tried to push himself off of Otto's leg unsuccessfully. "Stupid humans using animal products!"
"Are you saying what I think you're saying?!" Hannah exclaimed, highly excited.
"No," Gregory said.
"Oh, right." Hannah looked crestfallen. "So, why did your ship fly away without you?"
"It's programmed to do that. I'm left here to stand in as a human's pet whilst doing meteorological tests."
"Aah, cunning." Jess nodded.
"No, that idea came because I landed on one of your cats."
"Oh, right," Jess said. There was a silence, then Jess burst into tears.
"Oh, come on. I'll make a great pet," said Gregory.
"My cat was… furry," said Jess, wiping her nose on Ben's sleeve.
"If you tug me hard enough, I'll probably pull a load of this guy's trousers with me – THEN I'll be furry."
Jess sniffed. "I'd rather have a dog," she said, morosely.
"I can do that," said Gregory. He squeezed his eyes shut and clenched his fists so hard that he began to go red.
"Um… don't FORCE it, mate…" said Hannah in concern.
"Yes… in my experience it's best to let it come naturally," said Xander.
Everyone looked at him. There was a silence.
"Eew," said Hannah.
Suddenly there was a popping noise and Gregory turned into an Alsatian.
"WOW!" said Jess. "Can you wag your tail?"
"Yep," said Gregory, wagging the aforementioned appendage.
"Can you roll over?"
"Yes." Gregory rolled over.
"Can I call you Ian?"
"No."
"Peter?"
"No."
"How about—"
"NO, Jess."

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� Jess and Hannah 2002