Challenge #00897-B166: Adult Onset Responsibility

So if the first person to contact another world is automatically ambassador, what happens if an accident involves first contact being between the alien civilisation and Bigot McAssface, who would fit right in on that Greater Deregulation. Specifically, the rest of BMA’s civilisation, especially the ones interested in galactic alliance, would usually say the complete opposite of anything he does, but now he’s their galactic spokesperson.

[AN: This story will contain slurs because my main character is an arsehole]

“Keeping

the channel open and waiting for a rescue that will never come. Goddamn slopes and reee-tards running everything take all the good jobs away from a hardworking man. None of ‘em can do a decent job for the right

price. Like hell was I paying two weeks’ wages for a substandard repair

job that I could do for myself for less than a meal! I did just as good a

job as any of them stoopid fucks. Probably better. It did last three days longer than the usual patch.”

What Andrew Kysely did not

reveal was how fifteen separate techs told him to stop his bad habit of

over-gunning his engines or doing fast-reverse braking. That sort of

thing was bound to burn out an engine ahead of its time.

“Gonna

put on some music. If you idjits out there hate what I play, then how

about you boost a little faster and get here sooner. The longer you

take, the longer I’ve got, on the record, putting my opinions into the

comms.”

He put on one of his favourites, They Took My Job So They’re Gonna Die. An underground Country classic.

When

he got back from the toilets, he would wax lyrical about the censorship inherent in Purgatory politics. His people were so oppressed. The darkies in power kept going on about equality and leveling the playing

field, and then never giving the hard-working white people any kind of

help they would appreciate.

Something about skill levels and willingness to work.

Idiots.

He

was still in the can when something went strange with physics. He could never afford a grav drive - those damn slopes overcharged for the things and refused to give him one because he would ‘kill’ it - so the

first thing he noticed was how random droplets of piss tended to slow

and stop in the air unless he vacuumed them up. They were supposed to

spiral towards the walls and join the general patina that the idiots at

locks and docks refused to clean.

The next thing he noticed was,

after he flushed and cleaned up, how the regular kick-off didn’t work,

and how he had to swim to his cockpit.

The view out of the window was purple smoke and… some kind of eye-dazzling haze.

And

coasting through the mess was some… weird thing. Like a giant brain with whiskers and… peacock feathers? Undulating along like a

jellyfish.

They gently shoved his ship along with feather-tendrils the size of an arterial highway. And then they were gone.

Normalicy resumed like waking from a dream.

It took him a full minute to realise that he was broadcasting dead air.

Andrew

took up the mike. “Don’t mind me, guys. Take your time. I’m only hallucinating from some kind of deprivation. Or the chemicals you keep

sticking in my ration packs have finally caused a reaction. I told you. I

keep telling you. A man. Needs. Meat. Maybe a few vegetables, but mostly meat. Chemicals ain’t food. I’m reacting to something in there

that you idiots use to substitute for REAL FOOD.”

And then the

aliens came. It was a bulky, blocky ship. Andrew kept on the air,

describing the vessel and tripping over his words. All the way until

they dragged his ship inside.

Koop’xand’l had the bad luck

to be assigned the new ambassador. The human communicated by yelling, yelling louder, and baffling attempts at mime. It was not a clean

creature, and seemed to expect others to look after its messes.

Therefore, it was either some variety of elite… or a candidate for Diminished Responsibility.

The jaunt through the new wormhole was quick A short hop with no internal nexus points. The Mark-Maker

hovered in a position clear of the wormhole and mined data from the inhabited planets’ broadcasts. Some of which filtered into Koop’xand’l’s

dataplat.

Most useful were words that the human could understand. “Many calm. Ambassador staying many calm.”

The human gaped. Then slowly enunciated. “How. Did. You. Learn. To. Talk?”

Evidently, the new ambassador believed the Coelophita to be less than intelligent. Reducing things down to that level was almost insulting. “We are scan planet transmissions. We are hunt information. We bring. We use.”

“Are you telling me that you’re learning from the media broadcasts?”

Ah. So he wasn’t that slow, after all. “Correct.”

“Those’ll give you the wrong picture. Let me tell you what’s really going on…”

Koop’xand’l recorded it, of course. For later translation. And she was able to confirm some things as true. The planet was called purgatory. He was

from a group of people called Cawkids, a thin slice of the population

that, according to the media, felt entitled to a larger slice of the

metaphorical pie. And, according to Ambassador An’dru… deserved it for

existing.

Later examination would prove that there were no Cogniscent Rights violations in the Purgatory System. The Cawkids were

isolationists who believed in their past victories (on another planet)

and refused to admit that their absent privilege was cheating.

And,

a matter of some minor interest, all the Cawkids resided on one smallish continent called Nutexus. It bristled with prejudice, bullets

and beer.

Purgatory proved to be mostly full of decent humans who

honoured and respected the List of Cogniscent Rights without ever seeing

it beforehand. They had developed it independently. A notation of some merit for the humans therein.

Unfortunately…

The Purgatory delegate had at least tried to pick up both GalStand and Coelophita and mixed them both in her confusion.

“Citizen Kysely is number outlier. Should not being counted. He is number anomaly. Worst example of planet.”

“We

are aware,” said Koop’xand’l in the little Ingliss he knew. “Law remains. First encounter being most experience. Experience gaining

position.”

Secretary Esoghene winced. “He is not representing planet. He is representing minority only. Is much bad.”

“There may being solution,” offered Koop’xand’l. “I am hear words ‘killing with kindness?”

“…so

I got me a fancy gold jumpsuit,“ Andrew rubbed his greasy hands down its front. He doubted that any of the weirdos in the arena could

understand him, so it didn’t matter what he said. Just that it went on

for a good long while. “And this matchin’ bracelet and anklet set. And

all the meat I could ever want. Eggs, bacon, gravy. Y’all know how to

feed a man. ‘Course I put on a li’l muscle,” he patted his now-ample

belly. “But that’s a sign of prosperity, ain’t it? I’m doing good. I am

doing good.“

Pretending to be his assistant, Rong looked up

from her tablet monitors to see if Andrew was done preening. Considering how his core food group was Deep Fried, and his addiction to

foodstuffs that were bad for him… she estimated he had about a week left.

A month, if he discontinued his habit of ignoring the medtechs.

She,

and three other ‘assistants’ were all poised and ready to take his duties over on the instant of the inevitable heart attack.

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