Beyond Danforth: Max and Eliza's Unstoppable Alien Adventure

“Max, can you get those packages to the shop before closing?” my mother asked, trying to keep her voice calm and level.

We were in the bakery, getting ready for the evening rush. It was already a long day, and it was only noon. My mother and I had been baking all morning, helping strangers who had suddenly found themselves hungry in our town. We didn’t know why they were here or where they’d come from; we hadn’t even known they were coming until they started showing up on our doorstep yesterday morning. At first, the whole town was shocked by their apparently instantaneous arrival. Then people started buying into their story, saying that the five-hundredth anniversary of Danforth meant something more than just another year for them to celebrate.

I’d tried to tell everyone that there wasn’t much to celebrate this year. The last time we had a celebration like this was when my father died three years ago. He had been the mayor at the time and he died doing his job for our town. No one had ever seen anything like what happened with him: aliens attacking a small town without warning. But…well, I guess it made sense that they would be bored of waiting so long between attacks if they were going to do this every five hundred years or so. Still, I couldn’t help but feel that it was wrong to celebrate such a thing when the last time they showed up, my dad was killed while trying to protect us all.

But that wasn't what my mother was asking me about right now. “I can handle things here while you take care of this package, Max,” she said to me again. “It's almost lunchtime and I don't want them to go home starving again today."

I sighed and nodded reluctantly; I knew she could handle it on her own well enough without me there to cause trouble for her today. I grabbed the box from behind me and headed out the door into the crowded street. We lived on Main Street, so there were always people walking around here all day long and at night too when everything is open late because of dinner hour. The streets were already packed with people today though because of the aliens' presence here in our city square. They'd set up some kind of big metal contraption in front of the clock tower in the center of town where they went back each night after roaming around all day long taking pictures and talking with people passing by them on Main Street or just outside their hotel rooms or wherever else they wanted to go during their stays here with us humans. They'd told us that they needed to stay near these machines at night so that whatever powers kept them alive back on their planet would continue working for them here on Earth too without losing power due to distance from their home planet or something like that; otherwise we would've never understood what any of them were saying anyway since none of us could understand them very well even though we'd been around each other for days now after their arrival here in Danforth yesterday morning.

As I passed by one corner store owner who was sitting outside his store eating lunch alone while reading a book through his glasses as he sat on one of those white plastic chairs with wheels on it which are supposed to make a person seem smarter than normal just by sitting down in one, I saw someone off in the distance who looked like my friend Eliza walking up Main Street towards me but not moving very quickly, probably because she could see how full up this street was right now with people jammed together everywhere in search of souvenirs related to their visit here today (since most people didn't live here in Danforth but instead traveled here from far away places just for this reason). She wore a bright yellow shirt today with blue jeans and black shoes as usual; her hair was pulled back into a ponytail underneath her black baseball cap with 'Danforth' written across its front face which she wore sideways as she always did so that it covered half her face whenever she walked by anyone else around here wearing something similar except that hers was always clean while theirs usually weren't from being worn daily like hers was.

Eliza had moved here from Tacoma ten months ago; no one knows why she had abandoned everything she knew there there for her new life here in Danforth except for maybe myself since we're best friends now since soon after she arrived last year during a big storm which saw a lot of unusual activity happening up north near Seattle while we saw nothing strange going on anywhere else nearby due to our proximity down south near Portland where Eliza has never gone visiting since then except maybe once or twice on holidays when my family traveled northward towards Tacoma where my father grew up before he moved down south towards Portland near our bakery where we still live today (and which Eliza helps run now with myself working alongside my mother every single day).

As Eliza approached closer towards me standing next to one man wearing a fedora hat who looked like he might be thinking about remembering what he looked like before going inside his hotel room later tonight after dinner so that he could see if he actually needed a haircut while looking at himself in front of some big mirror he kept sitting next to inside his hotel room all day long while speaking loudly whenever someone walked by him as if they could hear him as loud as he spoke even though he didn't realize that no one else but himself could hear him since no one else around him could understand whatever foreign language he spoke which sounded similar but different somehow from all the languages I've heard spoken around these parts over many years growing up watching peoples' mouths move whenever they talked without knowing what any of them said except for maybe English over the years because why wouldn't everyone speak English nowadays anyway?

It made sense that Eliza would end up staying here forever after hearing how quiet this place was compared to everywhere else she'd lived before moving down south near Portland (which also happened without warning without any reason everyone seemed able to give except for maybe myself since I'm able to speak with her more openly about most things than anyone else ever has including herself excepting myself), although there were times lately when I wasn't sure how happy she really seemed living somewhere so quiet compared to everywhere else we'd both been living before either (wherever either of us had grown up prior to meeting each other last year during an unusual summer storm). She sure seemed happy enough right now though as asked if I wanted anything from inside her bag where she kept carrying everything she owned these days whenever we went out together roaming around town together during our free time working alongside each other at my parents' bakery (where Eliza helps out more than myself doing most menial tasks involving cleaning while I mostly try not causing trouble whenever possible due mostly towards my own personal lack of interest in baked goods on account of having never learned much about baking things myself despite having grown up learning everything about running an entire family business alongside two parents who opened their own bakery twenty years ago upon marrying ten years earlier).