“So,” continued Jack, “ten minutes to go. What stories do Rambosians use to terrify their children into behaving themselves, Ash?”

“Vertical stripes, mainly.”

“Why?”

Jack watched Ashley think. Due to the Rambosian physiology of a translucent outer membrane filled with a blend of gelatinous liquid, Jack really could see his mind working. “Amorous linguini” was how one unkind observer put it—but that wasn’t far wrong.

“It’s the linear uniformity in the vertical plane,” Ashley explained with a shiver, and turned a darker shade of blue. “We don’t much fancy bar codes, railings or pinstripe suits either. Mind you, horizontally we have no problem with any of them—which is why we like to wear our pinstripes perpendicular to the norm.”

“I always wondered about that,” replied Jack slowly. Conversation was never easy with Ashley. There really wasn’t much in common between humans and Rambosians—except for a passionate interest in order and bureaucracy. During his lunch hour, Ashley could often be found indulging in his hobby of “carspotting,” which is like trainspotting, only with cars. On the weekends Rambosians would cluster around one of the town’s many vehicle-number-recognition cameras, where they’d all get a bit tipsy reading the binary data stream. Other than that they lived their own lives and didn’t say very much. That was the thing about aliens that no one ever really expected. They’re a bit dull.

The walkie-talkie crackled into life. “Jack, are you there?”

It was Detective Sergeant Mary Mary, Jack’s number two at the Nursery Crime Division. They had been together since the Humpty affair, and although there had been a few hiccups in the early days, they now got on well. She didn’t know why she’d been allocated to the NCD but was glad that she was. Despite its being a career black hole and the butt of many station jokes, she felt somehow that she belonged. She didn’t know why.