From Small Beginnings

By Tom Koperwas

Joey Laboski sat at his desk next to the large classroom window. Sighing, he looked across the playground to the thick oak woods bordering the schoolyard, only half listening to Mr. Kay’s lecture on problem solving. The tall middle-aged teacher, slim and balding, stood at the front of the classroom, fiddling with his round wire-rimmed glasses as the students, engrossed in his message, listened intently.

“Consider the maxim,” Mr. Kay said, carefully enunciating each word with his deep monotone voice to emphasise the import of his message, “all big things come from small beginnings.”   

“What big things?” Joey thought absentmindedly. The skinny fourteen-year-old squirmed slightly in his chair and let his thoughts wander freely. “And what kind of small beginnings? How small?”

Looking down, he saw a tiny insect resembling a mosquito land on his arm. Joey tried to swat the insect away, but to his surprise, it stuck to the end of his index finger. Then the unmolested thing began to buzz loudly. Surprisingly, the steady buzzing sound turned into words inside his head. A tiny voice said, “The command craft has successfully crossed the barrier into the immense world. Our invasion plans can now proceed as originally conceived. All interdimensional craft will follow post-haste. Contact with water, a common compound here, will facilitate the rapid expansion of all ships and personnel.”

Joey couldn’t believe he was hearing a tiny voice inside his head. He studied the insect thing on his sweaty finger. It looked bigger now. Much bigger! It had expanded, and it was certainly no insect. It was a tiny vehicle standing on six skinny, crooked legs, with its proboscis looking like a long, wiry antenna. Joey shook the thing off his finger, and it remained hovering in the air.

Meanwhile, Joey could hear Mr. Kay’s voice droning inconsequentially in the background. “The great pyramids of Egypt and the Great Wall of China each began with a single stone. A great oak grows from a tiny acorn...”

“Water is common in this world: as vapour in the atmosphere, and as liquid upon and under the planet's surface,” interrupted the tiny voice in Joey’s head. “And the liquid exuded from the creature’s epidermal layer when it pressed its appendage against our ship was sweat. It is a most handy catalyst, being 99% water, 1% salt and fat. Once the fleet has fully expanded, it is calculated it shall take no more than 20 days to conquer this world.”    

Joey, sweating profusely, opened the window with one hand.    

The mosquito-like thing flew out the window, expanding into a much bigger thing on the asphalt surface of the playground. The smooth black vehicle, resembling an armoured mosquito, shimmered in the bright light of the afternoon sun. A sinister bug-like face glared out menacingly at Joey from the eye-shaped portal on the head of the fighting machine. Slowly, the enlarged ship rose up into the air.  

Joey’s bright, shiny eyes were drawn to the underside of the expanding machine, to its strange shadow, with its outline of a thick abdomen, six long, crooked legs, and wing-like panels. The boy stared at the viscous, oily silhouette as it expanded out across the asphalt, like a black light darkening the hard, hot surface. Small flickering flames rose from the steaming asphalt, as if the bitumen were aflame.

“Fourteen-year-old Napoleon played the role of a general commanding his friends in snowball fights before he grew up to command a great army and conquer most of continental Europe through dynamic conquests and alliances,” continued Mr. Kay’s voice. “His ambitions began small, and grew into big things too...”

Joey pulled his eyes away from the horror outside the window and closed them tight, shivering in his chair with fright.

“I’m sorry if my lecture has put you to sleep, Joey,” said Mr. Kay, noting that the boy had closed his eyes.

Joey's eyes popped open.

“Sorry, Mr. Kay,” said Joey, looking out the window for the interdimensional craft, which  had disappeared. “I must have fallen asleep.” Rubbing his eyes, the boy smiled with relief. “But I did hear what you said about big things coming from small beginnings. Is anything bigger than the end of the world?” he asked.

“I can’t imagine the end of the world as we know it,” replied Mr. Kay. “But it would certainly be a big thing. Perhaps the sun going nova, or a nuclear war...”

“And the end of the world,” continued Joey urgently. “Could it really start from a small beginning?”

“Of course, Joey. The bacteria that brought the Black Plague to Europe were the tiniest of entities. The people at the time must have thought that it was the end of the world. Either way, school is finished for the day. Class dismissed.”

The students stood and walked toward the classroom door.

Joey felt an urge to look back out the window.

A huge mosquito-like shadow drifted across the playground. The invader’s ship, high up in the sky, must have grown as big as a cloud. Down on the playground, in the ship’s eerie shadow, flames erupted from the blistering hot asphalt...

From Small Beginnings was first printed in Chewers and Masticadores July, 17, 2024 and reprinted in Masticadores Canada July, 17, 2024.

About the Author

Thomas Koperwas is a retired teacher living in Windsor, Ontario, Canada who writes short stories of horror, crime, fantasy, and science fiction.

His story "Vacation" won a Freedom Fiction Journal Top Crime Editor's Choice Award 2024.