To describe George Taylor as unimpressive would be to state the obvious. Seriously height-challenged, even built-up heels would have left Tom Cruise towering over him. As a scrawny youth, he didn’t exactly have sand kicked in his face whenever he ventured to the beach – instead, the local kids built sand-castles on his chest!

Charismatically speaking, George was quite obviously AWOL when that little number was being handed out and in his later teenage years, discovered that any attempts to ingratiate himself with members of the opposite sex were more or less doomed to abject failure.

“It’s not that I don’t like you George,” one girl had heartlessly relayed to him during recess, “I’m just not that desperate ... sorry!” Even as she re-joined her chosen clique, the joint laughter then emanating from the group was something less than a self-confidence boost it must be said.

Sadly, his physical shortcomings were not even compensated-for by an above average intellect. George in fact was academically adrift from the pack. Majoring in the lower percentile bands mathematically, the youngster had trouble with anything much over his six-times table. Pi might well be 22/7 but as far as Master Taylor was concerned, Pi was at best – “Shepherd’s” and at worst – “rhubarb and apple.” History had him completely flummoxed with regards to anything in the wake of “Genesis,” while his ability to memorise the element-chart for Chemistry, took on legendary proportions the day he answered his teacher’s (in hindsight) critically unwise question, “What does the symbol Au indicate George?” with, “August Sir!”

Sport? Now that was another embarrassing little chapter to be endured. With the outright coordination skills of Porky Pig himself, football, cricket and basketball were never going to present themselves as viable options to one struggling to find his niche in school life. Fact is, he could neither kick, catch or throw. For the best part of ten years, the simple rigours of philately were to be the extent of his physical exertion.

And where were his parents all this time you may well ask? Spending quality moments with their other two children is the sad but truthful answer to that insightful ponderance. They found in the presence of their youngest boy, an inexplicable awkwardness if the truth be known.

“George must find his own water level in life” his father would comment sporadically, never once feeling disposed to offer his son it seems, the least word of encouragement.

The fact is though, not only had George already discovered his own water level, he had, in his relatively brief tenure upon the planet, unlocked (albeit accidentally) the very key to personal contentment and oneness of being.

Not for him, the transient pride of material ownership. His pleasures were selfless. Feeding the squirrels and birds on the heath, lending the occasional arm to the blind or infirmed, in their quest to navigate a street-crossing safely. Simply talking to the elderly and companionless in his small home-town of Kettering Fields, afforded George that which the educational curriculum itself had failed to deliver. Lonely they may have been, but the knowledge and experiences of the old he discovered, outstripped any worthwhile gains to be had by associating with those his own age. That included his two siblings naturally.

Where others may have commented “It’s getting dark,” George would gaze upwards at the shimmering sunset and see there, the beauty of the cloud formations as they extended their multi-hued fingers of tangerine and red ochre, back-lit still by the dying orb. During the winter months, while others would rug-up against the frigid elements, futilely complaining of the bitter cold, George would sit alone in the small summer-house, admiring the purity and cleansing nature of the silent snowfalls. Occasionally he would extend a gloved hand to catch a few eddying flakes that he would observe with fascination, until they passed from existence in his upturned palm.

The scent of flowers, the gently directed symphonies of falling autumn leaves, the majesty of fork-lightning, an animal’s trust ... these were the important things he knew.

Twenty now, he had been employed as an assistant at the local library since leaving school. Scholastically out of touch perhaps, nevertheless the solitude yet orderliness of his chosen environment, appealed strongly to him. Bereft of scientific and historical knowledge himself, his incapacity to understand the words within, in no way detracted from his ability to chronologically sort, categorize and recollect titles!

Fully unable to have ever understood the morbidity that led Roderick Usher to entomb the Lady Madeline, the personal descent into Hell of Dorian Gray, the technical innovations of Verne, the grotesque nature of Mr Hyde, George was still fully able to direct without hesitation, readers to the exact location of any book sought. Whilst co-workers had nothing but praise for the lad’s efficiency, female companionship remained for him at this time, a seemingly insurmountable stumbling block.

Naturally, the discovery of 2020JY12 some three weeks before Christmas that year, placed this minor contingency into perspective.

In astronomical terms, one might say the ‘discovery’ as such, was a tad overdue. Becoming aware of an object the size of Lower Manhattan, just three months ahead of it’s impact with what Scientists unequivocably agreed would be central India, was not cause for universal gratitude.

With an estimated impact speed of some eighteen miles per second, there was no need for a second opinion. This was your standard, garden variety L.E.E. – Life Extinction Event!

Pity the media – trying to publish headlines in fifty-point print on the average tabloid just wasn’t working! After the inevitable “How could so much technology have failed us?” it was recognised and understood by those still lucid in their thought processes, that “what difference anyway?” the outcome was as inevitable as it was unaddressable.

George quite enjoyed it.

Just three months to build underground bunkers capable of withstanding the incomprehensible fury of an inter-stellar collision – always assuming Earth wasn’t fatally fractured at the point of impact. Vaporised cities, a heat-blast beyond comprehension and three-hundred mile-an-hour winds, with the potential for a superheated atmosphere scattering red-hot debris for months. One that indubitably could not sustain life for decades. Matters were not helped when it was pointed out that the slightest miscalculation might involve an oceanic splash-down that would result in mile-high tsunamis that would likely place the strategically placed bunkers at the bottom of a new ocean. Options were thin on the ground. Less bunkers – but with fully self-contained survival chambers for the chosen few, was the universal decision.