A Sapphire Fly

Woofred proudly sat beside his royal blue turd and waited for his master to return from work. The turd, or specifically its colour, was a bad omen in their house. His master, however, was a patient man and understood its colour and position in the middle of the lounge were beyond the dog’s control.

           He sat a while on the sofa observing the now routine hubris of his dog and let out a sigh and reached for the phone. ‘They must have come through again’ he said without introduction. There was a pause as a rustled okay I’ll be right over ended the call.

‘What you have to realise’ said the owner of the rustled voice as he offered the man a piece of chewing gum, ‘is these doorways, passageways, whatever you wanna call them’ he sucked down a shot of saliva, ‘I can close them up, but eventually cracks form and things seep through again’. The man looked unconvinced. ‘You see’ he continued, talking through a second wave of spit, ‘it is in essence a portal… if we ripped the whole cover off, which we probably couldn’t do, mind, then whatever is on the other side would be able to come through unobstructed’

‘Yes, I understand that’ said the man a little taken aback by the obviousness of his visitor’s comments. ‘but the doorway, was blocked by you, not 3 weeks ago… is he going to be okay?’ he said signally towards the dog. ‘I mean will this cause any long term damage? I mean, I don’t understand how something that large can fit through the doorway… it looks sealed.’

           As if on cue, a giant blue fly landed on the table between them. The pair fell silent to watch the ungainly insect shuffle about the table. Ungainly it may have been, but its wings were not. They were of a perfectly woven golden lace and sat between them was what appeared to be the most enormous blue sapphire.

           The light dancing off its back jolted a clumsy but delicate cobalt beam about the room. ‘What you have to realise’ said the visitor, bending down to the same level as the fly, ‘is this fly is just reacting to the change in environment, maybe searching for an ideal physical form? It didn’t enter this world or side, what have you, as a fly, but just became a fly once through the…’ But before he could say the word the reluctant owner of the portal brought the back of frying pan down hard onto the magnificent fly.

 ‘What you have to realise’ said the man, ‘is when my dog eats these flies he shits blue for a week. He has no control, just goes anywhere and it’s getting worse... When I bought the place, they mentioned this portal but said it had been adequately blocked and shouldn’t cause me any issues and now you’re here for the third time in 6 weeks and the dog…’

‘Sod your dog!’ shouted the visitor who quickly regained his composure. ‘I’m sorry… but from what I can tell this is a passageway to a category 2 spiritual realm… meaning that everything on that side of the portal is without matter… meaning anyone trying to come from that side to ours would by definition be able to fit through the smallest cracks in even the most professional seal.’

‘So, you can’t seal the passageway completely?’

The visitor sighed and went to take a chair but reconsidered on seeing the large globule of sapphire goo running down its back. ‘Nothing of this kind can be done perfectly and it’ll always need repair... the issue is not whether they continue coming, it’s you and your dog massacring them the moment they cross over! We, or rather YOU, have no way of knowing who that fly was! That is why you have been asked now by the estate agent, the council and me to kindly put anything that comes through into a breathable container and drop it off at the local police station. Then it’s out of your hands, they will sort out who it is and where it needs to go back to…’

The man continued rinsing the back of his saucepan, poking the hard bits of blue shell-like sinew with a knife. ‘Look, I really don’t have time to…’

‘Shhh’

The well patched small metal door in the corner of the kitchen began to vibrate. After 30 seconds or so the vibrations grew into a long protracted moan. The visitor, the man and his dog came together behind the safety of the kitchen table. Then from out of the seemingly well-sealed doorway, popped a tiny blue fly that promptly began to swell, and within moments, was something like the former size of clumsy creature still glued to the base of the pan.

‘Get a hold of that dog, we can’t lose another!’ But Woofred had already abandoned the safety of the table and was playfully swiping and yapping at the unsuspecting blue fly. ‘Stop him!’

           But as the man made to take control of his dog, four more flies popped out of the sealed passageway and then shortly after another 6.‘This is what I meant… You don’t know who has come through! The flies on the underside of your pan and blended into your dog’s turd could have been anyone! Important spirits maybe! With other entities that would care when they go missing!’

It remained, for now, hard to tell what calibre of spirits were making their way across the threshold, but a steady stream of bugs had been coming through for a minute or so. Some of the bulbous insects were exploring the new world, but in equal measure many were desperately trying to get back through the portal, flying mindlessly into the sealed metal door. The rest were being savagely mauled by Woofred and a growing patch of blue mucus was beginning to pool about the feet of the men.

‘Stop the dog!’ bellowed the visitor. Turning to implore its owner for help. But the man was not ready to listen, himself saucepan in hand hammering the sapphire flies.