Fritz fumbled in the dark. He had no idea where he was or what he was doing. A short time ago, a fly had buzzed him awake by getting too close to his ear. He hated that. It made him feel dirty to have had a crawling verminous insect so close to him. Perhaps it had landed on him while he slept? It would have tickled his sleep-numbed skin with its germy feet, sticky with traces of some rotting refuse or, worse yet, a decomposing carcass that offered a warm home to its maggot eggs. How he detested the filthy intrusion into his sleep. The merest hint that it might have considered investigating something as intimate as his ear made him shudder. He thought a moment longer before his sudden resolve stirred him from the bed. Its renewed buzzing convinced him that it must die immediately. The filthy thing could not be permitted to pollute his personal space a moment longer. As he stood, he knocked over the remains of last night's beer and pizza supper. The noise surprised him and made him realize he had a headache. Too much beer again. He made a mental note that he really must do more than just promise himself not to drink so much every evening. As he grabbed one of the several newspapers strewn across the table and chair, he rolled it up while he eyed the fly, which was blithely depositing its sticky detritus on the rim of an almost empty tea-cup. Fritz manoeuvred himself into position and raised his arm ready to strike. The insect took no notice and flitted to a new position just next to the light switch. Perfect, thought Fritz, as he wheeled around to step over the long, low table that stretched between his sofa and the television. He caught his foot, and tripped head-long into the TV, crashing his head through the glass tube that slowly exploded into a million sparkling fragments, gently flying through the air while his stupid, brainless, unshaven and unwashed face made firm contact with the live terminal of the power supply, jerking his body in a painful, deadly spasm that killed him. The fly flitted around the room a while longer. Once it was satisfied that the meat was no longer moving, it ventured once more into the dark, moist ear and laid its eggs.