14. Leper Gnome

There was a leper gnome inside his head. Nobody believed him, but Shawn knew it was true. This leper gnome was a gnarled and twisted created. It lived inside his cranium, wandering around wreaking havoc with his thoughts. In a week, it might dance the macarenha deep inside his amygdala making his body pulse with anxiety or play the maracas  near his prefrontal lobe making his thoughts oddly distorted or perhaps take a nap, leaving his mind free to be optimistic. Shawn was absolutley sure his default state would have been preppy optimism had he not had his extra headmate. Worse were the days this gnome merrily chiselled his skull. The thuds reverberating into painful throbbing headaches.

Shawn at first kept silent about his strange condition, being picked on at school already for his low grades didn't help. In adulthood, he tried to ease the symptoms and after meeting a curiously interested and seemingly understanding doctor, he told the truth. Suddenly he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder or some suggested schizophrenia. "But i dont hear voices!" he insisted which was true enough. the Gnome didn't talk to him, but it did happily send him lots of images and thoughts, usually of the self-loathing and irritatingly repetitive variety.

Months of therapy and haze inducing medications later, Shawn was able to convince his doctors to treat him as an outpatient. He wasn't  dangerous and as far as delusions went, he was able to convince them that they had receded. They weren't delusions of course but he could lie if he needed.

Life back outside seemed to go on as usual except he had Xanax to dull the worst moments when his leper gnome decided to have a solo party inside his head.

Meanwhile, Shawn had no idea that he was indeed being watched. Not by government agents or spies or stalkers or ex-girlfriends (he didn't have any) but by aliens. For years, an alien species had been observing earth, curious about the planet but more importantly gathering intel for a possible invasion and subsequent enslavement. Humans might have been squishy but they seemed to be a fairly hard working species, attaining civilisation in a relative short span of time.

These aliens had for years been carefully abducting and experimenting on various specimen of the human species and now they had their sights on this short flaxen haired male called Shawn.

The abduction was meticulously planned. They waited for the cover of dark and used a drone to follow him silently. When he stepped out for his evening walk, they grabbed him, administering a quick sedative to control him.

It wasn't long before he was stripped and laid out on their table with their spirally and spinning surgical tools laid out beside him.

Unfortunately Shawn woke up just before they were to begin the vivisection. first he screamed wordlessly, then muttered and shrieked then laughed and cried. The aliens had never really seen one so vocal and awake and out of sheer morbid curiousity did not put him back under. Instead they turned on the universal translator.

"... What the fuck you guys? You aren't supposed to be in new york or LA or some major american city blowing shit up. If you want to abduct people, why aren't you in the mid-west like always? What the fuck man?! Why me? I'm fucked up! you don't want to probe me, i had a really bad burrito for dinner. seriously. you wanna rethink this, and hey .. hey... you can't go in my head, my Leper gnome's gonna get you bad!" Shawn droned on and the aliens began to tire. Truth was, they had heart similar from others abductees though non had talked of this "leper gnome".

The procedure went as planned except for a minor hiccupt when they probed him from behind, the resulting explosion was so dramatic and revolting, they wondered if this was some previously undocumented self defence mechanism. Fearing another posterior attack, the aliens switched to investigating his brain.

Carefully they sliced and drilled and finally opened his skull... and were attacked by a tiny little vicious creature. They had never seen anything quite so brutal yet tiny. It had claws and teeth and other sharp implements. It took three aliens to finally subdue this filthy monster and place it inside a specimen tube. They watched the creature writhe in bloody viciosness behind the glass. Clearly this creature had been a parasite living inside the head of this human specimen. They were well familiar with brain parasites. They were particularly susceptible to it. The fact that this human had survived so long and still was able to function seemed a good indication that they had underestimate this species. This was worrying news.

The aliens were apprehensive. They patched Shawn back up, microscopically stitching him up, putting him back in his clothes and plopping him back down on his porch before flying away. They took the gnome with them. They would have to report back to the mothership. Leave this planet alone. Brain altering parasites found.

Shawn woke up the next morning, groggy and slightly sore on his back end. He also had a very unpleasent dream concerning aliens. It was not until lunch that he noticed something astounding. He was not having to fight off intrusive thoughts. he had no headache. Of course it was many days before he began to think the gnome was gone but it would be weeks before he came up with a theory. Nobody believed him of course. Alien abductions and they took his gnome out, but this time he didn't care. All he cared about was that the gnome was done.