The Watterson Test
8/6/14
By Ray Daley
He’d been in the room a little over eleven minutes before I decided to check my theory.
The hair had been standing up on the back of my neck and arms from the moment he’d walked in and sat down.
“So, these gun emplacements. Where are we going to put them?” he asked me.
“Never mind that for now, Major. Look at this for me please?” I tossed him the piece of paper, which he snatched out of the air deftly.
“What’s this then? New orders?” he asked.
“Just read it.” I said.
I could hear him reading the lines out to himself, someone else had mentioned that to me a few days ago. “He talks when he reads, you know?” she’d said. Apparently, I didn’t. Know, that is.
He finished and looked up at me. “So what is this then? Some kind of test?”
“Did you think it was funny?” I asked.
“Funny?” he raised his eyebrows. “The kid thinks the stuffed tiger is real, in his mind, I assume? How does it attack him though? Is he beating up himself? Because that’s just weird, not funny. What was it?”
I looked him right in the eye. The dividing shield was already raised, the panel behind him slid open, revealing the blaster. “That’s Calvin and Hobbes. And it’s fucking hilarious. But being an alien, you wouldn’t know that, would you?”
He looked down at the table for a second then tried to launch himself out of the chair at me. The phased bolt vaporised him before he even touched the shield.
I punched up the data-log. “Log entry fourteen. Major Huarez terminated. As suspected, he was an alien infiltrator. Another one weeded out by the Watterson Test.”
THE END.
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Authors Notes:-
Inspired by an article on IO9 posted by Charlie Jane Anders (that’ll be the 2nd story you’ve inspired me to write!) about the Bechdel Test. No, I didn’t read it.
It was merely the name of the test that set something off and made me write this.
That and reading Bill Watterson had been making new comic strips.
Bill, if you read this? I love your work. I’m a MASSIVE Calvin and Hobbes fan.
It’s the only comic strip that can make me laugh, cry and think.
You make me a better person Bill. Thankyou sir.
raywriteswrongs 