Dragor groaned. "Shit." He tried sitting up. "Fuck." Unable to cope, he fell back down into his cot. "My head hurts."
  The bonsai tree chuckled from its place on the window sill. "New Year is hangover and bugger."
  "Tell me about it. You got any Resolve tucked away in your pot?"
  "You must needing a cure? Like a headache with upset stomach?"
  "Yes," Dragor muttered quietly, still finding his voice too loud. "You got anything to help me?"
  The tree's leaves rustled, and something flew across the room, hitting Dragor on the arm.
  "That's just a boiled sweet!" he squeaked, instantly regretting raising his voice.
  "Boiled sweet must be miracle cure. Like a common cold, or hangover, or fractured skull."
  Dragor started to raise an eyebrow. It got half-way up before it ran out of energy and dropped back into place. "You're serious aren't you? OK, I'll give it a try." He popped the sweet into his mouth. It made his tongue tingle where it touched it, and in less than a minute had dissolved. A couple of minutes later, he felt fine. "I don't believe it. The hangover's gone."
  "You must believing me about miracle and cure."
  "I believe you, I believe you."
  The door bell rang.
  "I s'pose the others have gone to Grimsby already," Dragor grumbled, going to get the door.

  Mutley stood on the doorstep, carrying a small cardboard box. "I thought you might be able to do something with these." he said to Dragor, opening the box.
  Dragor peeped inside. The box contained two small spider plants. They looked almost exactly the same. "What am I supposed to do with them?"
  "Well," Mutley replied, "You've got that bonsai thing, I figured you were good with plants."
  Dragor sighed. "OK, I'll see what I can do. Maybe the bonsai can give me some ideas how to look after them." He took the box, and turned to go inside. He turned back briefly. "Happy New Year, by the way."
  "And to you." Mutley grinned slightly, then returned to his car.

  Dragor returned to his room and put the two spider plants on his desk. "Some friends for you, bonsai."
  "Oh shit!" the little tree piped, "other plants must be all shite. And bugger."
  "I'm sure they're not that bad. Do you think these can talk like you can?" Dragor asked, poking one of the spider plants as he did so.
  "Oh yes, we can talk," the plants said in unison. "We're Melton and Welton, identical twin spider plants, at your service."
  "Oh no!" said the bonsai tree, shaking, "Spiders can eating other plants. I must scared."
  Dragor tutted at his tree and poked the spider plants around again. "They don't look like herbivores to me. Which one of you is Melton, which is Welton?"
  "We're not sure," said one.
  "We can't tell each other apart," said the other.
  "Hahaha that's bugger!" said the bonsai tree.
  "Ah. Typical bonsai tree. Very rude," one of the spider plants muttered.
  "Don't start arguing now," Dragor said, "I'll just go downstairs and get some water. Try and behave until I get back." He left the room.

  When Dragor returned to the room, the first thing he did was drop the two pint glass jug of water he was carrying. It smashed on the floor next to him, depositing a large amount of its contents on his foot. The second thing he did was look at the spider plants accusingly. "What have you done with my bonsai tree?" he asked, pointing at the spot on the window sill where the tree had been only moments before.
  "We didn't do a thing," said one of the plants.
  "There was a bright light, then it was gone," The other muttered.
  "You expect me," he almost spat, "to believe that?"
  "It's the honest truth!" they chorused.
  "So you're asking that, rather than jump to the obvious conclusion that you've done something nasty to my tree because it took an instant dislike to you, I believe some story about aliens kidnapping it or something?"
  "We never mentioned aliens," said the spider plant Dragor had now decided was Melton. As far as he could tell it wouldn't matter if he had got it wrong.
  "We just said there was a bright light," said Welton.
  Dragor's foot suddenly reminded his brain that it was wet. "Oh bollocks. I'd better clear this up." He went to the kitchen again and returned with a dustpan and brush. He didn't look up until he'd swept up most of the broken glass. "Bonsai! You're back. Where have you been?"
  "I've been to Wolf 359"
  "Oh, did you meet Rene Auberjonois?"
  "I mean I've been to the Wolf 359 system."
  "Are you saying you were kidnapped by aliens?"
  "Oh yes. Kidnapped, analysed, returned, all in a matter of minutes. The wonders of modern technology."
  "You're talking normally too!" Dragor exclaimed, sweeping up the last of the broken glass.
  "I am?" the tree asked, "Oh yes, so I am. Side effect probably. Alien Analyses can be a bugger for that sort of thing."
  Melton muttered something.
  "Pardon?" Dragor asked, turning to face the spider plant.
  "It's not him. It's an alien substitute."
  "And how do you know that? For all I know you were the aliens who kidnapped him. Bonsai? Were these the plants that took you?"
  "I didn't see who took me. There was a bright light," the tree replied, "Then these shapes were looking at me, then another light, and I was back here."
  "What sort of shapes? Could it have been these two?"
  "I suppose so. I couldn't see too well."
  "Hmmm," Dragor said to himself, leaving the room with a dustpan full of broken glass. As he emptied the dustpan outside, he saw a strange man standing across the street. He was wearing a long grey coat, a broad, flat hat, and had most of his features obscured by the smoke that was billowing out of his sleeves, the bottom of his trousers, and the front of his coat. Dragor was rather peturbed by this, and ran back in. "I just saw a smoking man outside!" he announced as he entered his room.
  "Are you sure?" the bonsai tree asked.
  "Yes, he's right out there," Dragor said, running to the window and pointing. "Shit! He's gone."
  "Are you sure you're not hallucinating?"
  "Oh for fuck's sake! What's going on here?" Dragor shouted, "There's too much wierd shit going on today, it's New Year's Day not Hallowe'en"
  "You are very calm," the tree said.
  Dragor suddenly found that he was. This did not strike him as odd.
  "You will listen to me."
  Dragor listened.
  "Don't listen!" one of the spider plants piped up, "He's trying to hypnotise you!"
  "You ARE listening to me," the tree insisted.
  "DON'T LISTEN!" both of the spider plants shouted. Dragor didn't hear them.
  "I am listening to you," he said to the bonsai tree.
  "You will take the spider plants elsewhere. They are inferior. We do not need them."
  Dragor couldn't hear the shouts from Melton and Welton as he picked them up and walked out of the house.
  The bonsai tree grinned.

  "Dragor," Fizban began, a worried tone in his voice, "you're not making any sense. Why do you want me to look after these plants?"
  "They are not needed," Dragor replied in a flat, unemotional voice.
  "Needed for what?"
  "The plan will succeed. They will not be needed."
  Fizban suddenly found himself exasperated, grabbed Dragor by the scruff of the neck and hit him after each word.
  "WHAT"
  *WHACK*
  "THE"
  *WHACK*
  "FUCK"
  *WHACK*
  "IS"
  *WHACK*
  "WRONG"
  *WHACK*
  "WITH"
  *WHACK*
  "YOU?"
  *WHACK*
  Dragor blinked, the cloudiness in his eyes disappeared for a second. "Ouch," he mumbled, his voice sounding a lot more normal. He steadied himself, then his eyes glazed over once more, and the next time he spoke, it was with the same level tone he had used before. "There is no time to explain. All will succeed. I must go." He deposited the plants in Fizban's hands then left.
  "Are you a friend of Dragor's?" Melton asked Fizban, "He's in great danger."
  "What sort of danger?"
  "His bonsai tree has been abducted and replaced with an alien double," Welton said.
  "The double has taken control of him," Melton added.
  "Are you sure?"
  "You saw he was acting strangely. You must agree that something is wrong."
  "I'd better follow him, see what's happening. Is it OK to leave you two here?" Fizban asked.
  "As long as you're following Dragor, sure."
  Fizban ran outside and off towards Dragor's house. There were strange flashes in the sky that almost everyone in the street was looking up at. Dragor was continuing down the street unpeturbed.
  "Erm, bugger," Fizban said, trying to keep up without being conspicuous. Once Dragor entered his house, Fizban ran to catch up, and then tried to figure out a way of getting to the bedroom window to see what was happening. He looked about. All he could find was a discarded crisp packet. "Oh well, time to see if those origami evening classes were worth the time and money," he muttered as he picked up the packet and started folding it. Seconds later he was left with a fifteen foot aluminium ladder, which he placed against the wall.
  "Oi!" said a passerby, "I saw that! You didn't fold that, you had it up your sleeve."
  "Piss off," Fizban mumbled, climbing up the ladder. He stopped when he was just high enough to see inside the bedroom.
  Dragor had just walked in. "I got rid of them," he said, "They are now elsewhere."
  To his surprise Fizban saw exact replicas of Melton and Welton on he window sill either side of the bonsai tree.
  "We have replaced them," said the new spider plants, "We are superior."
  "You will destroy the plants," the bonsai tree said to Dragor, "The replacements are adequate. The originals must be uprooted."
  Dragor left the room again.
  "Good," the tree said to itself, "Everything is proceeding according to my design."
  Fizban gasped. Then a plan formed in his mind. He pulled a lump of semtex out of his pocket, fixed it to the centre of the window, then attached a 5 second timing device. As he clambered down the ladder he saw Dragor leave the house, but the short man did not appear to notice him.
  The charge went off.
  When the dust finally cleared Fizban saw to his chagrin that the window was still intact. Happily though the explosion had destroyed most of the surrounding wall, giving him an easy entrance to Dragor's room. He climbed back up the ladder and pushed himself through a gap in the wall, tumbling onto the floor.
  "What is this?" the bonsai tree shrieked.
  "I've found you out," Fizban said, "You've failed."
  "Failed?" the tree laughed. "Everything is coming to fruitition."
  "Even if I do this?" Fizban asked, grabbing the two spider plant replicas and running for the gap in the wall. Once he was at the bottom of the ladder, a few quick origami folds turned it into a 750cc motorcycle. He leapt on and raced off down the road, hoping he could get to his house before Dragor did.
  He overtook Dragor a hundred metres away from the house and then had to cope with the problem of the taking the turn into his driveway at sixty miles an hour. He was thrown off the bike and landed softly in a pile of leaves. This left only the small matter of having a large motorbike falling towards him at high speed. He tugged at one of the folds just before the bike hit him. A crisp packet hit him in the stomach at around forty miles per hour. He picked himself up and ran into the house, still carrying the two false spider plants. He switched them with the real Melton and Welton, then hid, hoping that Dragor would ignore anything the clones said in the same way he would have ignored Melton and Welton.
  Dragor entered the house. From his hiding place Fizban could see the small man was still wearing the same blank look. Fizban held his breath as Dragor reached for one of the spider plants, ignoring its cries and taking a firm hold of its stalk. As the plant was pulled free of the pot, its exposed roots started to smoke. It burst into flames.
  "Arrrghhh!" Dragor screeched, his blank look disappearing as he dropped the burning plant. "What am I doing here?"
  Fizban emerged. "I'll explain in a minute. Just uproot the other plant!"
  "That'll hurt!"
  "DO IT!"
  Dragor jumped, not used to Fizban shouting. He grabbed the other plant and tugged it free of its soil, throwing it to the floor before it had a chance to catch fire.
  "Now," Fizban said, catching his breath, "there's just the bonsai tree itself to deal with, I'll explain everything on the way back to your house."

  "WHAT THE FUCK HAVE YOU DONE TO MY HOUSE?" Dragor screamed at Fizban.
  "Things were serious, I had to do something. I only meant to break the window."
  "Most of the fucking wall has gone!"
  "Sorry," Fizban said, in the kind of voice that knows that it's saying the worst thing possible. "Look, lets worry about that after we've sorted out the bonsai clone."
  "Humph." Dragor muttered, and went into the house.