Far-out Show (9781465735829) (7 page)

“But those in charge should know all the
bitsy pieces of what is being planned and done.”

“Noted with precision, Wilburps. So all with
their eyes open can see that reversing of the things makes the
picture happen too.”

Eighteen-inch wide Wilburps sitting firmly on
the six-inch wide top of the decorative side railing of the gazebo
would have seemed noteworthy but perhaps risky to most people. The
zerpy hovering an inch above that board would have been a major
point of interest but there were no Earth inhabitants there to see
it.

“At home no one thinks a zerpy hovering is
strange. But as they say on what we have now confirmed they call
Earth, when in romance, do as the romancers do. At least your
talk-talk gets better as we get update transmissions.”

“This should be okey-your-dokey. If local
beings look upon us they will see you as resting on that
barrier.”

“You are having doubting thinking about what,
Nerber?”

“After these first encounters I am
worry-warting that things are so strange here. There is the need to
be first to complete the challenges to win but running fast into
the spinning thing what they call a fan seems not to be clever. So
much is not what I was told it should be like here.”

“I am required to correct your just said
statement. You were told what it
might
be like here. Nothing
was for surely certain.”

“Understood. The bottom-most lineage though
is that we are here to provide Pacification By Distraction With
Entertainment for the masses and there may be more interesting ways
to do that than the list of challenges. Those were selected by
Ormelexians with no true experience of what it is like here, only
what has already been done on shows at home. I am here so I can
explore and maybe find more interesting things even if they slow me
in completing the list of official challenges.”

“Be remembering that you are mainly a tool of
the producers who sold the show because of what they promised would
happen. They can transport us back at any time if they decide you
are not fulfilling their wants or needs.”

“So you
are
sending them my every word
and thought despite my efforts to keep those as my privates until I
could review and decide what is good to let them know,” Nerber
noted.

“I cannot assure you that is not so. You
manually adjusted my program as I was activating on arrival here,
My awareness is of those restraints but you are a trained zerpy
engineer so you know there could be commands blocked from my
awareness that are causing me to rodent you out as they seem to say
here, whatever that means exactly, but you get the driftingness of
it.”

“Being without knowing how many competitors
made it to the surface and how much each has made done of the
challenges is much harder than I realized it would be. The show
wants me to be stressed, even frantic, to make good visual crowd
excitement but I now see how narrow of mindedness that attitude is
when I am the first to be here. Are the Ormelexian masses truly
only distracted by wild and crazy risks and grapplings in slippery
or sticky messes?”

“Focus, Nerber. You agreed to come here on a
specific mission. You are obliged by duty to accomplish that if
doing so is a possibility thing. This is a programmed
encouragement-and-keep-you-acting-right message.”

“Understood. I repeating am, that the
bottom-most lineage is good show material - and those not here are
not in the best position to decide what might fit into that
categorizing list.”

“What do you need to know to attempt the
challenges?”

“For a rough starting, better to know how the
inhabitant kinds decide and make sensing of their surroundings.
Being in danger makes good entertaining for those at home but being
harmed here with no medicinals to cure things is, I now see clear
most for sure, risky as to be so much of stupidity.”

“My data bases include a full list of
materials that will function as medicinals in many situations.”

“Based on materials found on Ormelex, not
here since we have never been here before to test and examine. Your
reassurance message was appropriately dispensed but made no sense
anywhere but on the home planet. It is foolish hardy to think those
who prepared it for you to deliver did not realize that and maybe
had a laugh at the silly business of what they were doing except
that they were being paid to follow their directives and store
messages that might be needfully used.”

“Contest challenge the leading off one. Get
physical with a local of the most advanced species. What is the
problem?” Wilburps asked.

“Three points for starting outs. What does
‘get physical’ mean with a type of being you know almost no facts
about? Second-most, how do I know what is ‘local’ with so little
input about this place but it is a rush-rush contest so I am to do
this without finding what is any distance away. Third-most
repeatings the second-most but is not just the same. Without taking
time to make visits around, who can judge what is the ‘most
advanced species’ and why bother to risk messiness or worst when
some
dinglefingledorkpork
of a celebrity judge may say your
actions fail the defining words and so were wasted risk to be
making?”

“Your concerns are recognized as having some
value. Challenge the second-most?” Wilburps asked.

“Recognized as having value but not as having
validity. Words that seem to mean but are only gas to move things
along.”

“Your concerns are noted. Repeating the
challenge the second-most, create a monument that can be detected
by our planet’s zerpy in high-orbit by moving a mountain.”

“Define
mountain
, what the word means
on Ormelex.”

“Any bright object making itself or
reflectioning brightness that allows visual detection,” Wilburps
answered.

“Define
mountain
. What the word seems
to mean on this place the inhabitants call Earth.”

“No for-certain-sure definition is
available.”

“State the most likely definition based on a
complete analysis of the intercepted information from here.”

“Nerber, you are maybe wasting our time when
you should be rushing to make good visuals and win the
contest.”

“Redirectioning message appropriately
dispensed. Now state the definition I asked for.”

“An amount of the planet’s surface raised
above the surrounding area. May be massively big.”

“That is what I made learning of from our
data bases on the trip from Ormelex. Makes my point, the definition
does. Do I attempt to make or move an Ormelexian mountain or an
Earth one?”

“Part of the challenges is by plan to make
you interpret what is listed as what the challenges can mean where
you find yourself when you announce for the recording that you are
accepting that challenge.”

“Even your programmers do not truly know what
that line is supposed to have meaning for.”

“Acknowledged as correct. Challenge the
third-most, record the most interesting behavior of the most
interesting species you can find,” Wilburps said.

“More of the similar to the point of not
being different. Lots of interpretation based on no more
information than a few guesses but subject to sneering disagreeing
say-sos from celebrity judges. Not worth the effort is my now
judgment.”

“You seem to be jumping ahead in
deciding...”

“Encouragement and cautioning message
acknowledged. Moving on. Challenge the four-most.
Mimmimkink
the largest alien you can find into submission. Translate that to
Earth realities,” Nerber insisted.

“The nearest local term for
mimmimkink
seems to be mud wrestle. The challenge then is to mud wrestle the
largest life form you can find into submission.”

“A standard he-male ritual at home but who
will be unthinking enough to attempt such close contact with any
large creature here? With no knowing-all-abouts of its kind’s
defenses. No knowing-all-abouts of their style of aggressive
responding to being jumped at. No knowing-all-abouts whether they
must be cornered to make them do anything to make for excitement to
witness visuals. No knowing-all-about if it will only flee, not
make a fighting with your exhibition. By
zoytheus
not
knowing
rachem accadip
about whether it is even safe for us
to touch one? So many variables, no useful inputs. Clearly failure
of the producers to prepare proper challenges for the contestants,
not the back part in the forward position.
Choss-choss
on
them.”

“Saying things against those who control your
only way home is not the bestest way to be proceeding, Nerber.”

“They will not resist sending that home when
I say it officially. They want controversy stirring up and
disagreement-making to add sparking to the show. Being the
completely total and agree-with-them-for-every-detail guy will not
make me their best friend except that it will make me a better
profit-maker for them because the audience likes what seems to not
being going along with the plans of those ones who act like
shot-calling leaders.”

“So you refuse to mud wrestle?”

“Who can say what will happen and I will okay
as I take the time to see what kinds of creatures there are here? I
do make pointing out that challenge the seventh-most and last is
truly the same as the four-most challenge. That makes revealing at
once and the same timing of the show makers wish for always with
the fighting since they have trained the masses to want that.”

“Clarify how the four-most and last-most are
the same.”

“The last is to pick a fight with an alien
who has seemed friendly until that moment. Where all the types that
do not right away make to attack you are friendly sort-of any move
to
mimmimkink
any creature is like maybe probably gonna be
picking a fight with it. They could be differing when the types are
known in advancement but on a planet of we don’t know what they are
or know
rachem accadip
about how they act it is being a
meaningless line drawing to separate them.”

“You have been thinking again. You were asked
not to.”

“And the producers promised lots of
information it is clear they knew they did not possess.
Sib
sog
, send out weeping distress calls to all planets.”

“Your
nigly
, uh sarcasm, is duly
noted. Challenge the five-most. Eat the local food while I record
and transmit you doing that.”

“Sounds like innocent fun. Earn a few extra
points in the contest by upchucking for the laughs of the audience.
Better yet you might turn colors or your head spikes might do
unusual things. Not a fun thought however, with no way to be
testing things in advance that one makes big chances of the
contestant being poisoned out of reach of any help and dying with
convulsings and screamings for the audience to watch. We
contestants were warned that death can happen and that disqualifies
us. No one else cares much about us, we are the only protectors of
our safety. Taking in any untested, unknown material is not risking
for excitement, it is dumbness removing you from any chance of
rewards but leaving the producers with images of you becoming dead
to laugh about and sell.”

“Not facing the listed challenges makes you
of lesser value to the producers who might decide to abandon you
here.”

“That is the message I have been listening
for. The giveaway that you are transmitting this to the producers
as I talk it out. Reminder to those listeners who are not supposed
to be known then, I did my own checking in places average
Ormelexians are not supposed to be able to find out stuff from
before I signed to become a contestant. I know about the strong
order from the governors that no bodies or zerpies may be left on
the planet to be examined by the inhabitants. I know too that
research finds that shows on which contestants are terminated by
the producers when they are not getting the results they hoped for
always fail soon after. The audience considers that cheating and
they do not reward cheaters. The audience soon finds other shows to
favor and the show-airers find other producers’ to make shows for
them that amuse the audience. In the world of profits and
influence, nothing that is done stays secret for long. You can
transport me back and cancel my role in the show but if you leave
me here or activate my self-destruct device you go with me.”

“Challenge the six-most. What problems?”
Wilburps asked.

“Okay, you heard me so we will move along.
The six-most says I must participate in some alien planet
entertainment event. There is the same matter of interpretation
with little to go on but this is one I might gladly accept if I can
find and identify some happening I recognize as an entertainment
event for the inhabitants. No making committing promises until I
find the particularly relating facts but this seems like it could
make for good visuals without unneeded risking if I can figure what
the participants are doing and am judging that my abilities will
let me do the same like kinds of stuff. Stay tuned on this
one.”

“You will engage in fights with inhabitant
types?”

“My searches through our data bases make me
be thinking the types here do activities other than what we would
describe as fighting to entertain themselves. If that is turning
out to be truly correct and I am able to take part in such
goings-on I will truly consider delving in and swimming with the
tide if that phrase that I saw listed as one they sometimes say
means to me be doing the same as they are and we all are for
enjoying it. If there are fights I will at least be able to watch
at first to see how they do it and what their limits are before I
decide to get into it.”