May 13, 1999    The Mousian Chronicles
 

It didn't start with Mice (what we on the project have come to call the
inhabitants of Mouse). It started a couple of days ago. With squirrels.
Squirrels that eat your food. Squirrels that chew through containers.
Squirrels that invade cupboards and stores. Squirrels that chitter minor
battles amongst themselves. Squirrels that glide from the ceiling into
your dinner. I guess now you can see where it started.

It was obvious that something had to be done. The chief engineer produced
a clever device, designed to remotely incarcerate the beasts for later
deportation. We were very nervous at the first attempt. Nothing like
this had been tried before, as far as we knew. With in a few hours we had
our first squirrel. Red and angry he was. Then it was time as our
maintenance officer, a native Texan, put it, "to run'im out 'a town" Again
we were very nervous that our holding container would hold for the long
journey, or that other mishaps might befall us. As you will see later,
things can happen on these trips. But the trip went well, and the squirrel
launched like a rocket out of the opened container.

That was our first attempt. Since then we have been very busy deporting
squirrels. We get two types. While the sun is up we get the reds. When the
sun
is down and the camp is quiet we get the gliders. These seconds are more
docile. You almost feel sorry for them as they look at you with those big
black eyes, pleading. But then you remember the food, the chewed
containers, the invaded cabinets.

This has continued for two days. One red during the day. One glider at
night. Last night the Engineer produced another device. This for the
smaller
animals we have come to know as Mice. Mice are amazing creatures. They
seem
to be everywhere but no where. Smart enough to be ubiquitous, yet dumb
enough to be enticed by an empty hole (see engineer's design notes for
incarceration device). We are exploring theories that Mice are all small
physical extensions of the same being. Of course our first priority is the
defense of our supplies and our mission here, but we would be remiss not
to collect as much data as possible on Mousian creatures.

The device was set as we prepared for the evening, and this morning we had
caught something. From inside the device was a scraping noise and through
the inspection port we could see, what appeared to be one live
Mice (note to self: this terminology seems clumsy maybe we need something a
little different, like Mause, Mose...) We set off on our large cruiser to
the relocation zone, with the device in the cargo bay, feeling quite cocky
and routine about the trip, from our experience with the reds and gliders.
Upon arrival we saw that nothing was routine.

The one Mice we had, appeared to be dead. My first thought being to note
that the trap had triggered itself several times on our trip, and been
left open. My hypothesis being that the Mice had been caught by the
triggered doors, and, sadly, killed. Nothing to do but chalk it up to
experience, not transport Mice in this way, and ask the engineer to tinker
with the design. "What a mess for just one Mice", I thought. It just
didn't occur to me that there may have been more.

Our itinerary had us scheduled to stop and do some cleanup around the
entry port, so we headed back to the outpost, stopped and set about our
business. I opened the bay door, preparing tools, when I caught
something out of the corner of my eye. "What was that?" Then again, a
little gray face and whiskers. Mice are a strange looking creature.
Nothing like the animals on Earth. I looked up and there was another
one. But these Mice were loose in
our cruiser. "What had happened?" Then I remembered the open door of the
device. "How many could have escaped?" We have no idea of the true
capabilities of these Mice, and try to limit contact with all species
found here. The only tool I had to deal with the situation was the
engineer's device. My only choice was to corner the creatures and then
offer the empty hole of the device as a route of escape. We had to strip
the bay of tools and equipment and discovered two Mice. Each one was
cornered and presented with the choice. Strangely they seemed calmed by
the option of the hole, sniffed and entered. Then the "snap" and they were
"spanked" into the cell. One left it's tail hanging out, still whole and
unharmed so I triggered the device manually to take the tail in. Feeling a
little nervous that the device would yet hold the Mice, but relatively
safe as it had held them in the night, we completed our clean-up task and
headed to the outpost (I hope you all love run-ons).

Back safe still with two live Mice. Our engineer has designed and provided
a temporary holding and transportation device to supplement the
incarceration device. As I write this there is another squirrel and the
two mice waiting to be transported.

Notes to Future expeditions:
Bring metal storage containers
Name things carefully for the names may stick and you can never change
  Mice to Mause (or Mose) once it has stuck.
Never underestimate small gray creatures. It is obvious that for something
  so small to survive so well, it must be part of a larger consciousness,
  capable of almost anything.
Even on a science mission be sure of you chief engineer's and Maintenance
  officer's skill and resourcefulness. They are the only reason we will
  survive this ordeal.
 
 
 

This excerpt from the book:
"My Trip to Mouse: A Journal"
Dedicated to Vanessa Holtgrewe: May you never see things the same way.
Published by MiXiM, New York
Copyright 1999