A furious war of words has erupted between the governments of Belgium and the UK after a large rocket crashed into the centre of Brussels. “It wasn’t so much the damage it did to our historic monuments – luckily it missed the ‘Pissing Boy’ and apart from that, there isn’t much else to worry about – but what was contained in its warhead,” Pierre Balongas, head of the city’s refuse department told the BBC. “When it exploded on impact, it spread several tons of what appears to stinking household rubbish across the city. It’s utterly disgusting, there are soiled nappies hanging from lampposts, unwashed empty tins have been blown through windows, old TV sets and electrical appliances rained down on peoples’ roofs smashing tiles and skylights and there are old mattresses and half eaten curries strewn all over the streets. Damn it, it hadn’t even been sorted for recycling!” According to the Belgian Air Force, radar telemetry showed that the missile had originated in the UK. “We can definitely trace it back to a launch site in Essex,” says Balongas, whose department is working day and night to try and clean up Brussels following the trash catastrophe. “In which case we feel that it isn’t unreasonable for us to be demanding that the British government foot the bill for this massive clean up.” With the Belgian government angrily demanding explanation for this outrage, the UK government has so far denied any responsibility for the missile, stating that even if it had been launched from British airspace – which they strenuously deny – then it was by third parties and is therefore not the responsibility of His Majesty’s government.

“So what are they saying? That terrorists are not only able to operate in the UK, but to launch missile attacks from there?” splutters an outraged Balongas. “And why are they using them to fire rubbish at Belgium?” Conspiracy theories have abounded as to who fired the rocket and why it targeted Brussels. Amongst the popular has been that the rocket was launched by the militant wing of the anti-EU lobby in attempt to ensure that relations between the UK and EU remain permanently soured following Brexit. “With the UK economy turning to shit after leaving the EU, they are worried that the movement to rejoin the EU might be gaining traction,” opines French political philosopher Jean-Luc Arseslappe of the Paris Academy of Hair Styling. “Not only will dropping a load of British refuse on the seat of the EU upset UK-EU relations, but it is also symbolic of their opinion of all things that emanate from Brussels.” There are fears that if the immigrant situation on the UK’s borders with the EU worsen, then refuse-filled missiles might be targeted at Calais as well as Brussels. “Who knows where this could end?” muses Arseslappe. “If more projectiles full of your foul smelling garbage fall on EU countries, there could be retaliations, with our garlic infused refuse being fired at Birmingham or Manchester – either of which it would improve infinitely.”

Despite the UK government’s denials of any involvement in the Brussels missile incident, sources have told The Sleaze that the rocket might actually have been part of a secret British waste disposal initiative. “It has become increasingly difficult to dispose of household waste in this country,” Dr Hiram Dustcarten, a former scientific advisor on rubbish to the Department of the Environment. “Our existing landfills are full and new ones are impossible to open because nobody wants tons of rubbish being buried near them, while plans for more incinerators are increasingly being thwarted by an unholy combination of environmental nutters and peole worrying that having one nearby will depress the values of their properties. We can’t even send it overseas any more – nobody will take it as British rubbish is amongst the most toxic in the world! Not even places like India or any African countries will take it – and they are total shit holes already!” The only solution, the scientist claims, is to blast it into space. “If you can get the carrier rockets far enough away so that they don’t go into orbit, then the stuff will drift harmlessly through the void of space for millennia,” declares Dustcarten. “Even if it did go into orbit and start falling to earth, then it would be burned up in the atmosphere during re-entry. So it is, in essence, a no-risk solution.”

Unfortunately, the programme has suffered some teething troubles, with some of the launch vehicles proving to be less than reliable. “There have been a number of failures during take-off,” Dustcarten concedes. “Some of the rockets have failed to leave the earth’s atmosphere, veering off course and falling to earth, instead, Luckily, most of them have fallen into the ocean, but a couple came down in Africa, one in South America and now this one in Brussels.” According to the scientist, this isn’t the first time that there has been attempt to dispose of British rubbish by rocket. “The inspiration for the plan came from British water companies’ attempts to blast excess effluent from their sewage treatment works into space,” he reveals. “People were getting upset about raw sewage being pumped into rivers and the sea, so this seemed an obvious alternative.” The experiment, however, was quickly abandoned, although Dustcarten claims that this was on economic grounds rather than because of the unreliability of the rockets. Nonetheless, it has been pointed out that these effluent flights could explain last year’s fireball over Dusseldorf, following which stinking raw sewage rained down on the German city for several hours.

While the possibility of reprisals from countries hit by the missiles has been mooted, there are fears that there might already have been reprisals from beyond the earth for those missiles which have actually reached outer space. Following a mysterious explosion near Middlesborough, a huge, smoking, crater was discovered, filled with s glowing green mass which gave off noxious fumes for several hours. “It was like a horrible choking fog that descended on Middlesborough, engulfing the whole city. Anyone who had the misfortune to inhale it turned green and ‘let go’ both ends simultaneously – thousands were taken to hospital,” says Everett Dumpston, Environment Editor of the North Eastern Daily Refuse Operatives and Rubbish Handlers’ Gazette. “It has been speculated that the mass is, in fact, a load of alien rubbish, or possibly even effluent, fired at the earth in retaliation for us fly-tipping our crap in their back yard!” The British government, meanwhile, maintains its position that it isn’t responsible for the Belgian missile strike. It also categorically denies that the UK has any kind of space programme designed for the disposal of household waste, dismissing Dr Dustcarten’s claims as ‘nonsense’ and describing the scientist as ‘a crank’. As for the incident in Middlesborough, a spokesperson suggested that, rather than being of alien origin, the source of the glowing green substance was something far less sinister and harmful – such as a spill of radioactive waste by a private disposal contractor.