From The Idea Hole: The Visitors (AKA Greetings From Outer Space)

See, occasionally I do still have ideas that aren't derived from me just stealing two movie ideas and combining them into one admittedly much more awesome one. Case in point, The Visitors, or possibly Greetings From Outer Space, I haven't decided on the title yet. I'm not sure what form this particular idea would take, but somehow I don't actually imagine it as a movie. I originally intended it to be a novella, specifically one done in the epistolary style, like Stephen King's Carrie, a series of fake articles brought together to form a narrative. Then I remembered I would have to write that and do research on how various styles of non-fiction writing are structured, and I'm lazy as shit, so if I ever do it, it will probably just be a standard short story.

The idea was inspired by an article I read about the original moon landing, and how due to the need to be as lightweight as possible when leaving back to Earth, the astronauts had to leave the poo bags from their suits behind. I guess its not surprising that when reading about this amazing achievement of science, engineering, and the human spirit, the thing that inspires me the most is the thing about poop, but there ya go. Anyway, it always fascinated me thinking about that stuff just sitting there frozen on the surface of another planetoid, maybe just a few feet away from the American Flag meant to symbolize a much different stamp on this celestial body by our species. What would the Moonians think when they came out of their underground caves and found this great gift left to them by their nearest neighbors?

The story would begin with the discovery of a mysterious capsule clearly of alien origin discovered somewhere in the Midwest of America. The government studies the objects and finds it to be made of materials not of this Earth, with a message in alien writing scrawled on its side that they put their best translators to the task of deciphering. When the container is finally opened, it contains a strange green gelatinous substance that is extracted for further tests. Foreign satellites picked up the alien craft dropping off the capsule, so the government can't keep this find under wraps, and the public reaction is predictably massive.

Headlines all around the world declare "Aliens Land In America" and everyone has their own theories about what this gift from the stars is and why it was left here. Our entire human civilization begins to change overnight as we must reconcile who we are as a species with the definitive proof of life on other planets having visited us. This mysterious thing becomes a symbol of something larger than ourselves, renewing interest in space exploration, and the U.S. government wastes little time using the event as propaganda, declaring that these amazing aliens have chosen America as the greatest nation in the world, and subtly suggesting that they have already made many amazing and militarily applicable discoveries based on their analysis of the object.

And then the message on the side of the object is translated, and try as they might to conceal the translation, it gets leaked. The message is a warning, to any intelligent life, to dispose of this waste product safely should it land near any populated area. The capsule and its contents are the extra-terrestrial equivalent of the frozen masses of feces dropped from planes in mid-flight. Instantly, the international headlines change to "Aliens Shit On America," and our renewed interest in space exploration has become vindictive, as we are now intent on finding the aliens who left this with us and shitting on their world out of revenge.

I don't really have an end for it, and I will probably never write it anyway, so I figured I might as well post it here so I can get some use out of it. Hope you enjoyed it.