If aliens arrived tomorrow, what’s the first thing you’d ask them?
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Well, shit.
First, I’d have to find my emergency plan.
Somewhere around here, buried beneath several decades of accumulated paperwork, questionable decisions, and things I swore I’d need someday, there should be a document concerning the possibility of an extraterrestrial invasion. I put it together years ago, back when watching V and Close Encounters of the Third Kind convinced me that humanity wasn’t taking this whole alien business nearly seriously enough.
Now, before anybody starts questioning my mental stability, let me clarify something. It wasn’t exactly an emergency plan. I didn’t have evacuation routes mapped out, emergency rations stockpiled, or a designated rendezvous point for surviving members of the human race. What I had was a list of questions. Important questions. The sort of things I figured somebody ought to ask before we started exchanging diplomatic gifts, signing treaties, or allowing eight-foot-tall visitors with suspiciously large heads to establish embassies in our neighborhoods.
Unfortunately, I seem to have misplaced the list.
Fortunately, I remember some of the questions.
And since nobody has appointed me Earth’s official ambassador, I figure I can dispense with all that diplomatic bullshit and get straight to the important stuff.
For starters, do alien women really have more than two boobs, or have science-fiction writers just been getting a little freaky?
I’m serious.
For decades, Hollywood has been presenting us with extraterrestrial women whose anatomical arrangements suggest that somebody in the costume department had a particularly interesting imagination. Now, I’m not judging. Different planets, different evolutionary circumstances, different plumbing. I understand that. But I’d appreciate a little clarification concerning what’s scientifically plausible and what’s simply the result of some lonely screenwriter spending too much time with his imagination.
And while we’re discussing matters of questionable extraterrestrial behavior, let’s address this abduction business.
Is that shit real?
Because I’ve heard some stories over the years, and frankly, I’m having trouble separating legitimate interplanetary activity from the possibility that somebody got hold of some particularly enthusiastic peyote or LSD.
Again, I’m not judging.
People do strange things. Sometimes they see strange things. Sometimes they do strange things and then see even stranger things. That’s humanity for you. We’ve been confusing hallucinations with divine revelations, supernatural encounters, and messages from beyond the stars for longer than anybody cares to admit.
But if y’all really have been abducting people, I have a follow-up question.
What’s with all the probing?
Seriously.
You’ve supposedly mastered interstellar travel, developed technology beyond our comprehension, and figured out how to navigate distances that would make our finest scientists reach for another bottle of aspirin. Yet somehow, your preferred method of investigating the human species involves sticking things into places where things generally don’t belong.
Now, I understand scientific curiosity. I’ve got plenty of it myself.
But come on.
Y’all got a little freak in you, don’t you?
It’s okay. You can tell me. I’m not going to put it on the internet.
Well, probably not.
Now, before we get too comfortable, there’s something else we need to establish.
Just because you can fly through space in a cool-ass spaceship doesn’t mean you run shit down here.
Understand?
I realize your technology is impressive. Hell, I’d love to take a look under the hood of that spacecraft. You’ve apparently figured out propulsion systems, energy sources, and navigation techniques that make our current achievements look like somebody rubbing two sticks together and celebrating the invention of fire.
Congratulations.
Seriously. That’s impressive.
But technological superiority doesn’t automatically grant you authority over everybody unfortunate enough to be standing beneath your landing gear.
We’ve had enough trouble with that particular philosophy here on Earth.
For centuries, people have confused having better weapons, faster transportation, or more sophisticated machinery with possessing some divine right to tell everybody else how to live. History is littered with the consequences, and frankly, most of us are still cleaning up the mess.
So, if you’ve come to exchange knowledge, share discoveries, or perhaps explain why the universe seems determined to keep so many of its secrets to itself, pull up a chair.
Coffee?
But if you’ve come expecting everybody to bow down because your spaceship has better mileage than my truck, we’re going to have a problem.
Which brings me to another question.
Y’all got any special powers?
You know, reading minds, moving objects without touching them, making people do things against their will? Anything like that?
I’m particularly interested in the mind-reading business. Not because I have anything to hide, mind you, but because I’ve met enough people whose thoughts I’d rather not accidentally stumble into. There are some places a reasonable person simply shouldn’t go without protective equipment.
And mind control?
That raises a whole different collection of concerns.
Although, I suppose it might explain a few things about human behavior over the years.
But here’s what I really want to know.
Do y’all have a death ray?
Please tell me you’ve got a death ray.
That would be cool as hell.
I don’t necessarily need to fire it. I’m not asking to borrow it. I just want to see one. Maybe watch a demonstration involving an abandoned automobile or something equally expendable. Nothing dramatic. Just enough to establish that the technology exists and that several generations of science-fiction enthusiasts haven’t been waiting for nothing.
And I bet that thing doesn’t even take AAA batteries.
Think about that.
No digging through kitchen drawers looking for batteries that haven’t already been stolen out of the television remote. No discovering that somebody put dead batteries back in the package. No rechargeable battery packs that promise twelve hours of operation but start complaining after forty-five minutes.
And I bet there’s no USB-C cable involved either.
Can you imagine?
An advanced extraterrestrial civilization capable of crossing the unimaginable distances between stars, only to have its most powerful weapon rendered useless because somebody forgot the charging cable back on Zeta Reticuli.
“Commander, we cannot destroy the planet.”
“Why not?”
“Kevin forgot the adapter.”
I’d be disappointed.
Not surprised, mind you. Just disappointed.
Because if there’s one thing humanity has demonstrated conclusively, it’s that no matter how sophisticated our technology becomes, somebody will eventually design a proprietary charging system that requires purchasing additional accessories.
I sincerely hope extraterrestrials have evolved beyond that particular nonsense.
Of course, there are other questions.
Plenty of them.
I’d like to know whether they’ve discovered other civilizations, whether they’ve figured out what existed before the universe began expanding, and whether they’ve managed to solve some of the mysteries that have kept human philosophers, scientists, and theologians arguing for centuries.
I’d also be curious whether they’ve developed a political system that doesn’t eventually turn into a collection of ambitious idiots fighting over who gets to sit in the biggest chair.
That might actually be worth traveling across the galaxy to investigate.
But those are questions for later.
First, I need to establish whether we’re dealing with explorers, conquerors, scientists, tourists, or some intergalactic degenerates who’ve been conducting unauthorized medical examinations on unsuspecting farmers.
Because context matters.
And despite what certain science-fiction movies might suggest, I don’t believe possessing extraordinary technology automatically makes somebody particularly intelligent, compassionate, or civilized.
Hell, we’ve managed to put people on the Moon while simultaneously demonstrating an astonishing inability to get along with the people living across the street.
For all we know, extraterrestrials might be exactly like us.
Just with better transportation.
Which, now that I think about it, might be the most terrifying possibility of all.
Anyway, those are some of the questions I remember from my original list. There were others, but after several decades, numerous moves, and the general foolishness associated with being alive, the document appears to have disappeared into whatever mysterious dimension collects missing socks, misplaced car keys, and instruction manuals.
I’ll probably find it eventually.
Most likely while looking for something entirely unrelated.
In the meantime, should an extraterrestrial spacecraft appear over my neighborhood tomorrow, I intend to remain reasonably calm, observe the situation, and avoid making any unnecessary assumptions about the intentions of our visitors.
I’ll put on some coffee.
Maybe offer them a cigarette.
And once we’ve established that nobody intends to vaporize anybody, I’ll begin asking questions.
Politely, of course.
After all, first impressions matter.
Although, now that I think about it, there’s one more thing I probably ought to ask before we get started.
That death ray of yours … does it come with a warranty?
Because I know how this shit works.
The minute I get one home, something’s going to break.
