Third Loch From the Sun: A Scottish Sci-Fi Adventure by Rex Burke

Author:Rex Burke [Burke, Rex]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-09-19T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 22

The revelations changed everything for Jake, but at the same time they brought a period of normalcy and routine to his time on Elsay.

There was a wonder about the presence of the little aliens. He saw that now. He understood why Strang and Alva had invested everything in hiding and protecting them.

Even so, he still couldn’t fully get his head around the magnitude of what he’d been shown. One of the great questions for humankind – is anyone out there? – answered by the appearance of a tiny, technologically advanced species in a remote Scottish loch.

Out there – or rather, here – they certainly were, with a culture and a story of their own, and powers that he couldn’t comprehend. Only three people on Earth knew that aliens incontrovertibly existed, and he just happened to be one of them. The responsibility was immense.

On the other side of the balance was the fact that he was a student who had come to Elsay for a summer job. He didn’t belong here, and it wasn’t the job he had been promised – on some days, it was barely a job at all – but there was enough in it to keep him busy. Which gave him enough cover to still be on the island.

Plus, both Duncan and Jimmy were convinced that he was only sticking around because of Alva, so that gave Jake even more of a purported reason to stay on Elsay. Although it did mean putting up with Jimmy giving him the eye-V-sign, pointy finger, ‘I’m watching you’ routine, every time he left the hotel bar.

Even Mrs Dunmore at the shop seemed to be in on it. After dispensing her usual cry of “Tally ho!” at him one day, when Jake came in to buy teabags and milk, she said, randomly, “Lovely girl, Alva, don’t you think?”

“I suppose,” he said carefully, wondering who she’d been talking to.

“Suppose, tish tosh, I’ve seen the way you look at her.”

Warily, tinged with apprehension, like the way you’d eye an active volcano, mostly, though Jake still blushed.

He did look at her, of course he did. No one ever said she wasn’t attractive. That whole Emma Stone vibe – you couldn’t help but notice. Especially thrown together on an island where the next person in age was about fifty.

“I don’t know what you mean,” he said, thinking that was the safest response.

“Course you don’t, dearie.” She nodded sagely. “Honestly, young men, staring them in the face and they still don’t know when someone’s sweet on them.”

Sweet? Alva? Really? On what planet?

“I don’t think so,” he said. But what did he know? He was no good at this sort of stuff.

“I wouldn’t be too sure, English. I’ve known Alva Fraser since she was a baby, and while her mother chose an idiot, young Alva has got her head screwed on. Knows what she wants, that one.”

This was all headline news, as far as Jake was concerned – not least that Duncan was confirmed as the island idiot – but he couldn’t imagine for one minute that Mrs Dunmore had got it right.

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