The Goldfish from Outer Space: Part 1
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  ...Meanwhile, in a universe much like the one Fred inhabits, on an Earth much like her own, only with the absence of goldfish visitors from outer space. In a rundown apartment in a poor neighborhood, a thin redhead sits, hunched over her laptop, furiously typing away. The room is mostly silent, except for the frequent clicks and clacks made when her long, bony fingers would make contact with the well worn keys. She rarely looks up from the screen, only pausing to readjust her thick glasses, which continuously slide down her large, prominent nose. Nearly an hour passes before she sits up, stretches, lightly sighs, and reaches for her cup of coffee, taking a sip while scooting her chair away from her desk.   She was thankful for caffeine, it along with a manic energy that had recently been coursing through her veins had been the only thing keeping her going for the past week or so.    “Hm, now that this essay is out of the way, I should relax a bit, take my mind off of things,” the redhead says to herself, or maybe to her calico cat, curled up in a box in the other side of the room. Her cat looks up at her, blinks, and then resumes bathing itself. It was of no matter, as the redhead didn’t acknowledge her furry companion, and had instead opened up another word document on her laptop. Her eyes skimmed over the document, she lightly shook her head.    “What the fuck was I even thinking here?,” she mutters to herself. Her right pinky finger once again reunites with its lover, the delete key on her MacBook Air, and a few paragraphs disappear. She then stands up, walks over to her dresser, and takes out a small tin. She opens it, removing a plastic baggie with a small amount of weed, and a small wooden pipe. She loads the bowl, grabs her lighter off the side of the desk, and takes a hit.    “Inspiration, fill my veins and take over my mind,” she says shortly after inhaling. Her posture instantly relaxes, she sinks into her chair, grabs a pencil and a notebook, and starts to write, humming happily to herself, enjoying her creative release that she'd type out later once she'd sobered up...
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   ...Back in Fred’s universe, on her Earth, which is currently being visited by extraterrestrial fish, Fred suddenly is confused as to how she got where she was. Nor could she figure out why she was so upset just seconds ago. These gaps in her memory frightened her, and were rather common, however everyone she spoke to seemed to experience similar things. This didn't seem normal.    However, she was aware that she had started to have serious problems separating her imagination from reality, an issue stemming from roughly ten years ago. Perhaps there was no goldfish from outer space. Perhaps none of this was real at all. Maybe she had passed away when she was 9 years old, and the events that followed were the afterlife. No fluffy clouds and harps, no fire and brimstone, just alien goldfish demanding her to stop an oncoming invasion of alien cats. Or maybe instead she’d suffered a psychotic break, and was locked up in a mental institution, her family mourning the loss of their little girl, all of this simply a figment of her imagination. Or perhaps she was in a coma, her family not wanting to pull the plug, hoping one day she’d regain consciousness and come back. She didn’t know, but she just couldn’t stop thinking abou-    “EARTH TO FRED LADYPERSON, ARE YOU STILL THERE?” The cold, robotic voice of the the goldfish, well, technically the translating device it used to communicate with her snapped Fred out of her introspective moment. “WE MUST PUT A HALT TO THE ALIEN CAT INVASION.” Â
