"So, Mr. Vicchady," I said. "Do you dye your fabrics on-site? Or is that done at a different location?"

"Come, come," Vicchady leaned back in his chair. "Enough of this charade. Who are you?"

"As I said before," Henry said. "We're attorneys, from the firm of Zerk and Zerk –"

"Ha! Zerk and Zerk. That was really what tipped me off, you know," Vicchady put his elbows on giant oak desk. "That's all the damn thing says! Just gibberish, clicks and whirrs – and then something that sounds like 'Zerk Zerk.' Oh, and 'azodii' – that's another one it says all the time."

Vicchady hunched his shoulders and did a horrifying, mocking impression: "Uh, Zerk! Azodii! Zerk Zerk! Duh…" He burst out laughing.

"We really should talk!" Antonio Vicchady started to speak quickly, his thoughts running together. "You know, compare notes. Is yours blue like a blueberry also? How do you restrain it? Where do you keep yours? Indoors? Outdoors? Mine seems to like the outdoors. But I really have no idea if I'm taking care of it properly."

I stood and smoothed the front of my wrinkled suit. "It's true, Mr. Vicchady," I said. "We have come here under false pretenses. There is no Qwazler Paint Factory. There is no color called 'Azodii,' and the law firm of 'Zerk and Zerk' doesn't exist."

"Do you want to sell me yours?" Vicchady's eyes sparkled. "Is that why you came?" He didn't wait for an answer, but the notion seemed to tickle him. "I suppose we could use another one… mine does get tired, after all."

"We would very much like," Henry also stood and buttoned his jacket. "To see this special goat of yours. Then we can discuss business."

"Have we established that level of trust?" Vicchady examined his fingernails. "I don't think so, gentlemen. Besides, if you have one of your own, then why do you need to see mine?"

"The creature you have is an Azodii," I said. "His name is Zerk."

"Ah," Vicchady said. "That would explain why he pounds his chest and says 'Zerk Zerk.'"

"He's from the planet Azodii," I continued. "An ice-planet on the edge of the Zaprath Belt. The planet is part of the Intergalactic Territories of the Slatt Empire –"

"We hope," Henry mumbled. "If we can still close the deal-"

"My god, so it really is an alien?" Vicchady was standing now as well, positively giddy with excitement. "I mean, I had my suspicions. Blue skin, extra fingers and everything. But I thought maybe it was some kind of freak, a mutant or a lab experiment or something. But it's a real E.T.? Wow!"

"Yes. Zerk is an alien," I said. "And it is imperative that we see him. And speak with him."

"Speak with him?" Vicchady squinted. "You mean, you can communicate with it? How's that? Are you guys aliens also?"

"No, we're human. We have translator chips implanted in our back-right molars," I opened my mouth and pointed. "The device automatically translates alien languages into something we can understand."

"Zerk likely has a translator implant as well," Henry said. "Almost every alien inside the Zaprath Belt gets some sort of translation device installed as a child. Pretty standard. So whatever you've said to Zerk, he certainly understood. Even if you couldn't understand him."

"If I take you to him," Vicchady said slowly. "You can translate what it says to me?"

"Of course," I said. "Talk through us, and you can have your first real conversation with Zerk."

Antonio Vicchady paused, scratching just above the thin moustache. He seemed hesitant, but eventually excitement and curiosity got the better of him. He opened a desk drawer and grabbed a ring of keys.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

"Come," Vicchady marched toward the door and gestured for us to follow him. "Let's go."

Instead of using the elevator, Vicchady took us to the adjacent stairwell and we walked down four flights of stairs. He spoke non-stop the entire time:

"It was around the end of last year, I was on a hike close to my home - a wooded area, a few kilometers from here. I was in the middle of the trail, when I saw something flash in the corner of my eye. Something bright orange.

"The color drew me in, and I stepped off the path to take a look at the orange thing on the ground. It just was a small piece of cloth, a rag. But the color - I'd never seen anything like it! Pulsing, rippling at me in the midday sun - the most vivid, dynamic orange I had ever seen!

"And I know a thing a two about fabric dye – maybe I'm no expert, but my family has been in the suit-making business for three generations. I've seen garments cut and dyed and manufactured – but the orange scrap I saw on the side of the trail looked different. It looked… wrong. It was vibrant and energizing, hypnotic even, but still something about the color was wrong. I couldn't quite place it.

"When I picked up the scrap, I found it was wet with paint or dye. The orange was coming off in my hand.

"Then I saw another glint of orange, on a tree ahead of me. And a little ways beyond that, I found another piece of fabric, also soaked with what I assumed was orange paint. I followed the trail to figure out the mystery – was someone painting something orange in the middle of the woods? Where did this color come from? Why did it look so unnatural?"

We reached the ground floor of the office building. Antonio Vicchady opened a set of emergency doors that led to the back lot, where there was a parking area and a small paved courtyard. Beyond that were two industrial buildings with dented metal sides, broken and missing panes of glass.

Vicchady spoke louder once we were outside, raising his voice above the noise of machinery from the back buildings:

"Eventually," we followed Vicchady as he started toward the farthest building. "I followed the trail of orange goop until it led to a person, lying passed out on the ground under a bush, wrapped in a blanket. At least, I thought it was a person. Then I rolled the little guy over, and saw his skin was the color of a navy-blue blazer! God, I screamed like a little girl! I thought he was dead."

We stopped in the middle of the courtyard. Antonio Vicchady paused in his story to give us an abridged tour of the facilities:

"That's the main offices, where we just came from," Vicchady pointed behind us, then to a dilapidated building opposite. "Over there is the sewing and manufacturing shop. On the ground floor, the ties are manufactured, cut and sewn, then upstairs the Vicchady Orange is applied by our splatter-artists. We have a team of three - real Jackson Pollocks. Ha! Of course, they have no idea what the 'paint' actually is. They've never asked. I guess only a poor artist questions his materials, right?"

Vicchady pointed to the other building. "We're heading over there," he said. "That's our most secure building. It's where we store the finished product. And it's where I keep, uh," he winked, "Mister Zerk Zerk."

Vicchady chuckled and continued walking, Henry and I in tow. "Anyway, so there I was in the middle of the woods, with a dead blue little person. I thought, maybe they died of asphyxia? Then I looked a little closer at the body, and I saw the orange fluid trickling from its nose. Orange blood, blue skin, funny looking face… I thought, Wait a minute. That's not a human! That's some kind of exotic animal, or something.

"Then it made a noise like a groan, and I realized the damn thing was still alive! But it was hurt. And unconscious. So, I decided to help it out. I dressed some of the wounds, the orange cuts, to make sure it wouldn't bleed to death. Then I hog-tied it, dragged it back to my car, loaded it into the boot. And I brought it back here."

We reached the door of the building, and Vicchady opened it with a key from his key ring. Inside was a small foyer, then a heavy security door with an electronic lock. Vicchady punched a few numbers into a keypad.

"Can't be too secure, right gentlemen?" Vicchady winked and pressed his thumb into a thumbprint scanner. "Vicchady neckties are worth thousands of Euros. Each one is an original work of art. I'm even auctioning off a special edition next month at Sotheby's. Ridiculous, isn't it? A splattered necktie, going to auction alongside a Ming Vase and an original Warhol."

The light on the keypad changed from red to green. Vicchady opened the door and led us inside.

The front of the warehouse was filled with numbered racks and shipping crates. I recognized the small, fancy boxes on the shelves as the packaging for Vicchady Ties. Each one contained a Certificate of Authenticity, numbered and stamped, alongside the valuable neckwear.

"You know, now I don't feel so bad about our pricing," Vicchady said. "Now that I know it's actual alien blood. Geez! It seems like a fair amount to pay for such an extremely rare commodity. Ounce-per-ounce, Azodii blood has to be more valuable than diamonds, or rare metals. Think of the transportation costs alone!"

As I listened to Vicchady speak, I thought of Rolex on my wrist. It was tracking our location, recording us, and sending a live feed back to the Klargung Cruiser down the block, which contained members of the Azodii Militia who were armed to the teeth and determined to rescue their beloved Zerk.

Henry and I neglected to tell Antonio Vicchady about the micro-camera in the Rolex. This was not an oversight.