The Nonplussed
An Introduction
by
Anon
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.
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Hi! I don't have a name, but you can think of me as Storyteller, because that's what I do. What kind of stories do I tell, you might be wondering? Well, true stories would probably be the most basic way to describe them. Whoops... hold that thought! I know what you're probably thinking, and the most basic way to describe the stories I tell would be, ah... biographies. Kinda. I don't tell the stories of single individuals, though. I tell the stories of entire civilizations. Maybe 'historical accounts' would be more accurate?
Ok, here it is... the purpose I've tasked myself with is the preservation of the memory of Universal Civilization, which means learning the stories of every civilization that exists or has ever existed, and recording those stories for posterity. But as stories, as opposed to a simple recitation of facts.
Now you're probably wondering where I get my source material. Right? Mostly I just take what a civilization has already recorded as their own history and use my own words to turn it into a story that's way more interesting. Don't worry, nobody cares. A lot of these civilizations are already dead, you know.
Ok, now that that's been explained... first things first. What follows is the true story of a recently discovered civilization of uniquely intelligent creatures, known to themselves (mostly) as humans. That's just the most common word they use for self reference as a species... there are many, many, many more, a few of which are: humankind, human beings, humanity, homo sapiens, terrans, earthlings, dirtlings, earthmen, man, men, mankind, the people, the folk, the fallen, all God's children, children of Adam, children of Cain, children of Abraham, children of Sol, children of the sun, the Earth's gonads, hairless apes, cro-magnons, troglodytes, super simians, mighty mammals, carbon units, ugly bags of mostly water, mostly harmless, the Nonplussed, and dozens more names for their collective selves in even more dozens of different languages. Isn't that strange? Well, they're a strange race, as you'll soon discover for yourself, if you choose to continue reading.
By the way. This is a story about humans, of humans, and for humans, so If you're reading this and you're not human then it probably won't make any sense to you at all. You can still read it if you want to, though. Maybe you'll like it, who knows... but I doubt it. You'll probably just want to file it away somewhere and get on with your totally gross and disgusting alien business. That's probably what a human would say.
However! If you're human, and I really hope that you are, then I recommend that you continue reading because this is YOUR story! It's all about human beings, just like you - smart, retarded, hilarious, insane, evil, benevolent, funny looking, socially inept, miserable, deliriously happy, beautiful, disgusting people - plus a few really exceptional ones thrown in here and there. Statistical anomalies, you know.
You may be wondering (if you're human)... what right do I have to tell your story? If you're that disgusting alien again, this isn't your story so shut up. I've read your story and it's disgusting. Go bother what's his face - he's the one who had the stomach and the will to actually write your disgusting story. If I were a human, I mean, that's what I would have said.
Anyway, sorry about that, human sir or miss. The reason why I have a right to tell your story is because I discovered it, and having been the one of my kind who discovered it, I'm now obligated to tell it, because a story exists to be told, and I'm a storyteller. Logical, no? Plus, it's just a stroke of luck that your story happens to suit my preferred telling style, because I'm naturally inclined to look at things from an angle of absurdity. And you guys... well. What can I say? I love you guys.
I really hope there are some humans around to hear this, your story. It would be a crying shame if it turned out that, after all of this, your civilization never made it across the threshold, because your species is truly a rare gem - an idiot savant civilization, to borrow one of your metaphors - and a brightly shining diamond in a galaxy filled mostly with toys and trinkets. I often wonder if a species like yours can ever truly understand its worth as it takes that purposeful step over the threshold and into oblivion, laughing all the way... you know, I just can't stress it enough, how rare a phenomenon it is that you and yours represent. I truly hope you've survived, and I say that with all seriousness and against my better judgement.
You're also probably wondering (if you're human) just what the heck is up with that threshold I've mentioned two or three times now. To all of the disgusting aliens following along with my narrative - stop interrupting! Everybody knows that you all survived your own disgusting thresholds, and I'm not sorry to say that I'm sorry that you did! So either shut up and listen, or go fuck off and die! That's the last time I'm gonna tell you all. I'm sorry, humans, for cursing. Those damn aliens...
My apologies again for the interruption, senors and senoras. Please allow me to continue. You see, the thing with the threshold is... well, it's like a... a point of no return, or more like a line of no return. No... well. I mean, yeah. Those are metaphors, the point and the line, meaning a crucial place in your own story where the collective mentality of your entire species loses its mind. Don't worry, it happens to every intelligent species throughout the universe that develops a technological civilization. It's natural, see. It's just that it's so... odd, that you guys actually made it that far as a civilization... that you became capable of going insane. It's rare, as I've said, and even rarer with an idiot savant civilization, like yours. The rarest of civilizations. Do you understand now how you make the galaxy shine? We all love you and we're rooting for you! We just hope you didn't fuck it all up at the threshold.
So! Are you (if you're human) ready to embark upon a fast and furious adventure filled with action and intrigue, festooned with heroic deeds of derring-do, performed by the common man against withering odds? An adventure that's going to end in tears for everyone? If you're human, then the culmination of your story either begins here or ends here - at the threshold. If you're still that disgusting alien, just go away already.
Once again, please accept my apologies. If you've survived to read this, then hopefully you'll understand that the universe is filled mostly with disgusting aliens. So sayeth would the human.
****rough summary follows****
Anyway, here I've compiled a quick rundown of the global events which comprise the story describing the deterioration of your collective mental condition as a global civilization. Revisions may be necessary, but please accept this rough draft, for now.
In 2019 North Korea nukes Antarctica to destroy American morale by taking out Santa Claus (based on faulty intelligence) which triggers a larger nuclear skirmish involving the entire Middle East and parts of Asia, with everybody calling dibs on the batters box at the same time. It only took four days to transform Mumbai, New Delhi, Karachi, Islamabad, Mecca, Cairo, Damascus, Tehran, Baghdad, Pyongyang, Seoul, Tel Aviv and Jerusalem into a bunch of radioactive, crater shaped mirrors smoking in the desert. With most Muslims somewhere in the upper atmosphere, the United States declares an end to The War on Terror, and immediately starts sniffing around for something else to wage war upon.
Since it's long been established that when the United States wages war on something, that it absolutely does not go to war on that thing, but instead just spends billions of dollars to make it look like it it did, so it also was that after winning the War on Terror, the United States declared a new war - the War on Nuclear War. The defense budget was immediately quintupled and spent on fast tracking the development, production and immediate dismantling of 50,000 brand new, 500 megaton PlanetBuster bombs, which really, really pissed off the state of Georgia when the other 49 States just kind of chucked the bill for all of it onto Atlanta's doorstep.
The world-wide cold snap resulting from the nuclear skirmish of 2021 effectively negates global warming - which is finally revealed simply to have been an elaborate SNL skit concocted by AL Franken that had 'gotten out of hand'. Sea levels rise by five meters, as nuking Antarctica causes the Western Antarctic ice shelf to fall into the ocean. Figuring that the worst effects of global warming went ahead and happened anyway, the carbon footprint is quadrupled by a world no longer concerned with greenhouse gas emissions. After almost two decades it's becoming clear that global warming is a thing again, and this time it's for realsies.
In 2034 the Goolsby administration declares a War on Global Warming and orders the development and construction of a freeze ray to freeze the moon in order to halt the effects of moonlight on global warming at a cost of trillions of dollars. It's referred to secretly as 'The Two Dog Night Light Project'.
Do you see what I mean about you guys going insane?
Georgia refuses to foot the bill for the freeze ray and secedes as the Confederate State of Soviet Georgia in 2041.
See?
In 2041 the aircraft carrier carrier USS Donald Trump is launched, carrying an arsenal of aircraft carriers and 1000 planetbusters to make a statement to Georgia.
See? See?
The Flying Turtle is launched, the first interplanetary space vessel with a practical EM drive.
The Two Dog Night Light is launched aboard the Flying Turtle.
Civil war ensues between the US and the CSSG in 2042.
Russia allies with the CSSG.
WWIII is imminent, until Bobby Kay Rudolph, an American physicist working at The Larger Hadron Collider, opens a rift to the Eleventeenth dimension of the Far Flung Hunger by smashing martini molecules together at light speed.
Emperor Cannibalus the Starvling invades the solar system.
Isn't that funny?
*****************
The events of The Nonplussed occur as the human race approaches a critical threshold of social and technological development and population density as a civilization. Upon crossing this threshold, Mankind collectively goes insane as a species, and will either survive the inevitable trauma of the ensuing chaos or destroy itself; if not as a species, then as a civilization. This is a natural occurrence in the development of all intelligent races throughout the universe which achieve a technological civilization - some survive; most do not. North Korea is the first example of the collective insanity taking hold as Mankind crosses over the threshold. By the time Trump is elected president of the United States in 2016, the entire world is joining in, and by 2041, Humanity as a surviving species is well on its way to hell in a hand basket.
CANNIBALUS THE STARVLING
Then the truly unexpected and impossible improbable occurs. An American particle physicist and drunken alcoholic without any shits left to give proves the pseudoscientific theory which ruined her career by openening a gateway to a parallel universe, purely by accident, and at billions to one odds by slamming the hair of the dog into itself at light speed using the Largest Hadron Collider, a particle accelerator which spans the globe at the equator. An entity known to itself as Cannibalus the Starvling emerges through the gateway from its own realm, which it calls The Far Flung Hunger, and into our universe. It takes the form of a petulant child, about eight years of age, and declares to all information processing systems, machine and organic - from a virus to a thermostat to a termite to an 8 bit game console to a supercomputer to a dog to the advanced AI imbedded in the global internet, and finally to humanity - in an all reaching, all demanding, all encompassing, supremely peurile, infinitely self absorbed, ear splitting, mind shattering declaration - that it is STARVLING, and that it expects LUNCHEON, and it's looking to US to provide it.
THE METHOD
My brain hasn't discovered this part yet.
