Purple Furry Monsters From The Moon 1

The spacecraft hovered over England.  The purple creatures saw the big grey blob that can be seen on a satellite photograph which is London.  
"That looks like one of the alien cities," said Suki.
"We'll fly towards it," said Teachy.  The old Zybox 3 looked like a giant top hat.  It slowly descended into one of London's parks.  A crowd of people gathered around.  Magnox got out of the ship.  His thick purple fur and huge protruding eyes terrified a small child who started screaming,
"Mummy, Mummy!  Monsters!"  Magnox spoke to the child.  He had seen a lot of American films.
"We come in peace.  Greetings Earthling, take me to your leader."  The child wailed even more loudly.
"He's five years old!" shouted the mother.  "You're scaring him."  She led the child away.  A man pulled out a mobile phone.  It was showing a picture of the Houses of Parliament.
"Our leader lives here."  
Five minutes later the giant top hat touched down outside the Houses of Parliament.  Magnox had a strangely shaped metal object in his hand.  The security guard stopped him.
"What's that?"
"It's a present for your leader."
"What does it do?"
"It contains books, songs and films about my planet."
"Really?"
"Yes.  It contains so many books, songs and films a human could spend a whole lifetime studying it."
"Can he plug it into his laptop?"
"Oh.  We hadn't thought of that."  Magnox was playing a game of distracting the security guard while two other aliens had gone into the Houses of Parliament behind him.  The Chancellor was making a speech.  This stopped suddenly as the aliens entered.
"Is this some sort of Socialist Worker Party protest?" asked the Chancellor.
"Brilliant costumes.  Where did you get them from?" asked a woman MP.
"These people have come to see me," said the Prime Minister.  "They're making a film.  Could the Minister of Culture come with me, please?"  

The Prime Minister and the Minister of Culture sat down with the purple creatures in a small office.
"I don't believe you're making a film," said the Prime Minister.  "For the sake of my colleagues I was lying.  I've always believed in aliens but my Press Officer said, 'We don't do UFOs.'  I have waited patiently for this moment.  What do you want to say to me?"
"I have much to say to you," said Magnox, holding the strange shaped metal object in his hand.  "50,000 hours of audio and video and a million pages of text are recorded on here.  But first I must work out how to connect it to your computer."
"Take this old lap top computer," said the Prime Minister, lifting it off the shelf.  "The Chancellor uses it to do his accounts.  It's worth nothing.  We bought it from a second hand shop for £99.  I'll buy him another.  Get your technicians to study it so that you'll know how to connect that thing to one of our computers.  Have you come far?"
"We've come from the moon," said Suki.
"That's strange.  Our people sent several manned missions to the moon.  They never saw you there."
"The moon is hollow," said Magnox.  "We live inside."
"Hmm.  That's possible."
"One little crater is the entrance to our world," said Suki.  "Your astronauts just never found the right one."
"Wow!  How did you get there?  Did you evolve inside the moon?"
"The moon is a spaceship," said Teachy.  "Billions of years ago our planet was threatened by a comet that was going to wipe us all out.  We selected one of our planet's moons which had a solid core and decided to mine it out.  Inside we built a complete ecosphere, oceans, atmosphere, plant life, farms, cities."
"Then we constructed a suitable engine for the spaceship," said Magnox.  "It travels at 90% of the speed of light.  It takes a whole century to reach that speed or we'd be crushed by the force of the acceleration.  We have travelled through space for billions of years searching for another planet that would be suitable for life."
"How long do you live?"
"Not long.  About five hundred years," said Teachy.  "We are distant descendants of the purple creatures who built the spaceship."  The Minister of Culture laughed.
"The moon has always been there," he said.  "They had the moon when they wrote the Bible.  What about the moon worshippers in the desert?  They lived thousands of years ago."
"We only really know that the moon has been there for a few thousand years," said the Prime Minister.  "Perhaps not millions of years or billions of years."
"Rubbish.  There are no aliens," said the Minister of Culture.
"If they aren't aliens, what are they?"
"Actors in costumes.  Clever costumes, yes they are.  It's a million pound budget 21st century movie.  But they're costumes, I tell you, costumes, nothing more."  The Minister of Culture grabbed ahold of Suki's fur and tried hard to pull off her mask.
"It doesn't come off," she said.  "You're hurting me."
"Do you believe in aliens now?" asked the Prime Minister.
"Aliens don't exist but I don't deny that something is going on.  Something else we can't explain is certainly going on."
"Or they could just be telling the truth."
"Prime Minister," explained Teachy, "we have been orbitting your planet for 10.000 years, waiting for your technology to become compatible with ours."
"Fascinating," said the Prime Minister.
"We believe that your society is ready to evolve into socialism."
"Evolve into socialism?" the Prime Minister looked worried.  "I thought it was going the other way.  They had communism when I was a child but it collapsed.  They had strong trade unions in this country when I was a child but they're gone to.  How can our society be about to evolve into socialism?"
"Real socialism has never been tried," said Magnox.  "If the poor could just be content with the necessities of life, if the rich could just share their wealth with the poor."
"We would end absolute poverty," said Suki.  "We would end the idleness that you call unemployment."
"Do you think unemployed people should work in return for their benefits?  Do you think I should put up income tax?"
"You understand very well," said Teachy.
"I understand very well how to lose an election.  I personally woudln't mind my society evolving into socialism but I don't think I could persuade a third of the electorate to agree with me.  I think they'd vote me out."
"I'll get back to the spaceship with the computer equipment," said Magnox.  "Maybe people will change their minds about evolving into socialism when they see more of our planet's history."
"I'd like them to.  I'll give you some advice.  Don't try to change the governments of this world.  Lead by example.  Do you know much about medicine?"
"More than you could possibly imagine," said Magnox.
"Then set up a hospital in Africa.  Do you know much about agriculture?"
"We could increase the productivity of one of your farms ten fold," said Suki.
"Go to Africa.  Set up training courses for African farmers.  What sort of machines do you use?"
"We don't use machines," said Suki.
"Even to pump the water?"
"We don't use irrigation either," said Magnox.  "Simply use the right variety of seeds.  Some of them are adapted to an arid tropical climate."
"Go to Africa.  Immigration isn't as strict over there.  Set up hospitals and agricultural colleges.  When you become experts, known all over the world for your expertise in your specialist subjects, they'll let you emigrate to England."

Six months later the aliens had built a clinic and an agricultural college in Namibia.  The clinic wasn't quite like an ordinary hospital.  There were no huge wards full of beds.  It was more like a doctor's surgery where people called in for treatment.  It didn't take the aliens more than a few minutes to heal any kind of disease.
"Broken arm?" the alien doctor would say.  "I'll soon atomise it with my atomiser and reset it for you.  Leprosy?  I'll just give you an injection.  It'll be gone in half an hour."  The teachers in the agricultural college taught the farmers how to dig deep trenches that held the water better and also gave them seeds that had a higher yield per acre.  This allowed a wider variety of crops to be grown, giving the same kind of yield per acre as a crop like millet, which is hardy and can grow on the side of a volcano, but the alien seeds had a higher nutritional value.  Over the next few years medical clinics and agricultural colleges spread across the whole of Africa, Asia and South America.  The NHS began sending people to India for treatment.  The cost of a daily chartered British Airways flight from Heathrow was a lot less than the cost of treating all these people in Britain.
"My doctor wants to send me to India to have my heart condition treated by the Moon Monsters in the Moony hospital," Frank told his wife Mathilda.
"Don't you think that's better?  It's easier than having an operation."
"They're Moon Monsters.  They steal people's children and extract all their organs."
"That's only when the children are brought to the hospital dead, Dear."
"I don't like the thought of having my heart atomised with that atomiser.  All my molecules would be torn apart."
"It's better than having a surgeon cut into you with scalpel, Dear."
"I'm scared of the Moon Monsters.  They might eat my body and sell all the organs on Ebay."
"Don't be silly Dear."  Frank came back from the Indian clinic with his heart perfectly fixed and feeling wonderful about his health and about the creatures from the moon.  So did millions of other people.

Ten years later the aliens came to visit the Prime Minister again.
"I'm delighted," he said.  "I've heard about everything you're doing in Africa and India.  We might be able to let some of you into the country now."
"That's not why we're here," said Karla.  "We don't want to emigrate to the UK."
"We want to build a teleport," Magnox explained.  "You won't have to charter a whole aircraft to get people to India for their appointments anymore."
"Is that possible?" asked the Prime Minister.
"It's possible all right," said Teachy.
"You need a transmitter and a receiver," said Magnox.
"Is a teleport very big?"
"You could get a whole teleport and six pads into this office," said Magnox.
"Excellent idea," said the Prime Minister.  "We could have one in every doctor's surgery."

The next week there was a debate on teleports in the House of Commons.
"Islamic State intend to send 50,000 terrorists to this country using teleports," said a UKIP MP.  "In World War 2 this country was sheltered from invasion because it is an island.  It would not be sheltered any more.  It would be easy for an entire army of terrorists from anywhere in the world to teleport themselves straight here.  The same atroicities that are committed in the Middle East would be committed on our streets."  Another MP stood up.
"My right honourable friend is simply racist and xenophobic," he said.  There was uproar.
"Order, order!" commanded the Speaker.  Another MP stood up to speak.
"The vast majority of English people have no dislike of immigrants.  They are simply concerned about the number of immigrants.  Their fears are not imaginary.  Our country has an irresistable lure to people in much poorer parts of this world.  If these teleports enabled people to travel directly from anywhere in Africa, Asia or South America to the UK in seconds, do we imagine that no one would do this?  Millions of immigrants would arrive by the end of next week.  How would we cope?"  The Prime Minister stood up to speak.
"This proposal is for the creation of a teleport building at Heathrow Airport.  This is the only teleport in the UK that would allow people to teleport to or from other countries.  It will be surrounded by soldiers and armed policemen and anyone using it will be subject to rigorous passport and security checks.  Across the airport there would be another teleport station that allowed people to teleport to or from railway stations on the British mainland.  People could go to their local railway station and teleport either to another railway station anywhere in the UK or, if they wanted to travel abroad, they would teleport to Heathrow."  The Health Minsiter stood up to speak.
"This would save the NHS millions of pounds in air fares.  The NHS already sends hundreds of people every day to be treated in clinics in India which are run by aliens. An international network of teleports will be very much cheaper than chartering aircraft.  This will be convenient for the patients as the entire journey would take minutes rather than hours."

A big crowd of demonstrators stood outside the House of Commons waving Union Jacks.
"EDL!  EDL!  EDL!" they chanted together.  "Moon Monsters Eat Babies," said one of the signs.  A reporter came up to one of the demonstrators with a camera and asked,
"Why are you doing this?"
"We are the Earth Defence League.  Moon Monsters can't be trusted.  They have no respect for humans.  They think we are animals.  We will be the laboratory rats in their experiments."
"What do you think about the transporters being built?"
"Have your whole body blown into particles?  No thanks.  Transporters kill you, and then another person walks out the other end who is not you, they just look like you."

Five years later.  John is on the phone to his mother.
"Hello Mum.  I'm coming to see you in the next couple of days."
"How are you going to get here?"
"I'll catch a train."
"Trains don't exist anymore.  You'll have to use the teleport."
"I'll get a coach then."
"Coach companies have gone out of business.  Nobody uses them anymore."
"I'll hire a car."
"Who wants to drive for hours?  Teleport to Chester-Le-Street Railway Station.  Your Dad'll give you a lift."
"Mum I'm scared.  My body will be stripped to atoms and put back together at the other end.  Will my soul die in transmission?"
"We've all used the teleport and we've still got souls."
"But Mother how do you know that you're still you?"
"Don't be ridiculous.  There's no other way to travel now.  The buses only run to Chester-Le-Street Railway Station.  If you want to go to Durham you teleport.  If you want to go to Gateshead or Newcastle you teleport."  John's father joined in the conversation.
"I imagine you'll be quite nervous the first time Son.  I know I was.  Now I teleport all the time.  It's good.  On a sunny day you can teleport to Cullercoats.  The bus runs every ten minutes."
"But Dad you don't know if you're the same person.  You have the same memories but how do you know you're the real you?"
"I can remember going through the teleport.  I fade away into darkness in one place and, as soon as I'm not there, I'm fading into reality somewhere else.  So I'm pretty convinced I'm the same person."  Mother spoke again.
"In 2 years time the council are getting rid of the bus service.  Every bus stop will be replaced by a teleport."
"No!" screamed John.