====================== Pulpscape by Richard Curtis ====================== Copyright (c)1987 by Richard Curtis First published in Locus, January 1987 e-reads www.ereads.com Science Fiction/Humor --------------------------------- NOTICE: This work is copyrighted. It is licensed only for use by the original purchaser. Duplication or distribution of this work by email, floppy disk, network, paper print out, or any other method is a violation of international copyright law and subjects the violator to severe fines and/or imprisonment. --------------------------------- At the first whiff of Commander Shmeegl the two guards instantly activated the immense double doors of the Royal Hall. This was technically a breach of regulations. All entering the Hall, even His Majesty himself, were required to proffer their pheromones for identification before being admitted. But at this moment Shmeegl was the most celebrated individual on Slork, and he winked jauntily at the guards as he strode into the vast chamber. A chorus of excited chirps went up from the assembled courtiers as they detected his aroma and felt the presence of this extraordinary individual. Shmeegl prostrated himself before his ruler, who caressed his head with his proboscis in keeping with the strict protocol of the court. "Arise, Shmeegl," the king murmured. Shmeegl raised himself on his hind pods but paused for one dramatic moment before lifting his face. "You smell well considering the distressing conditions I am told you endured during re-entry into our planet's atmosphere." "It was nothing really, your majesty," Shmeegl replied with unbecoming false modesty. "A few glitches in the hyperwarp. I've had bumpier rides." He produced a small aromatic packet from his pouch and presented it to the king. "I am happy to present you with my formal report on my mission to the third planet in the Gnarpal sun system. By your leave, I will be happy to summarize my observations and conclusions for His Majesty's court." "Proceed, lad." Shmeegl settled comfortably onto his hindquarters and addressed the throng. "As you know, the purpose of my mission was to confirm the presence of higher life forms on that world, and to ascertain the level of that intelligence with a view to establishing relations for the mutual benefit of our societies as we have done in so many other instances. "As to my first purpose, the samples collected by my crew and me, which we hope to exhibit after our scientists have thoroughly analyzed them, testify that this world teems with every variety of plant, animal, bird, insect, and creature of the sea imaginable, much of it exhibiting a primitive form of intelligence. More important, it boasts of a specie of bipedal creatures whose intelligence, while woefully inferior to our own or even to that of our common domesticated flibling, did conform to the G-10 rating established by the Academy of Science and Exploration." The king raised a pod. "G-10 meaning..." "Suitable for closer examination, Your Majesty." "Ah, of course. Go on." "I spent several days observing their civilization and altering my appearance and metabolism to conform to theirs, and acquiring their astonishing garb so that I might live among them. During that orientation I studied several subspecies of this race, which calls itself 'human,' and ultimately selected one which I hope exemplified the application of intelligence to what we all agree is a worthy endeavor for any civilized race, the dissemination of information. I told myself that if any segment of the human race would exhibit superior intellectual qualities, it would be the variety known as publishers." "How do publishers, er, broadcast information to other humans?" "In a way which, by our own standards, will seem laughably crude, Your Majesty. Unlike our system of releasing information-laden molecules into the air for olfactory detection, the humans print works of information and entertainment on bound folios of paper called books." The king stared at Shmeegl blankly for a long moment before a glint of recognition entered his eyes. "And the books are then oxidized and the vapors released for olfactory detection by the public." Not wishing to embarrass the king, Shmeegl framed his reply diplomatically. "A splendid surmise, Your Majesty, and certainly logical by our own measure. However, the human publishers distribute these printed works in an entirely different manner." "The books have no odor?" the king exclaimed. "Not in the sense we commonly understand. In any event, the books are conveyed to smaller distribution centers around the world called stores, similar to our food markets, where they are acquired by individual humans interested in their contents." The king was still struggling with the concept. "But if they have no aroma..." Shmeegl was the soul of patience. "Your Majesty, humans absorb the information not through their noses but through their eyes. Their eyes, er ... ingest the contents of each leaf of the book and convey the information to learning centers located in their crania." "But that could take hours! Days! Weeks even!" "I never said it was an efficient system, King, but the humans seem content enough with it." At this point, Dernif Ploor, the realm's prime minister, identified himself with a pheromonic shpritz and stepped forward. "My dear Commander Shmeegl, might I trouble you to elaborate on the distribution of these ... you called them 'books'? What incentives are put forward to stimulate the humans to acquire them in the market centers?" "In a few instances, printed materials are issued to inform the human populace of the availability of books, My Lord," Shmeegl replied smartly, "and to proclaim their virtues. But for the overwhelming majority, there are no means for alerting the populace at large to the presence of books in the stores." The prime minister shook his head as if he had just been doused. "But if the humans are not made aware of the existence of the books, do not those books then go unpurchased?" "Many, in fact most of them, do, My Lord." "And what becomes of the surplus of unpurchased books?" "Many are returned to the depots whence they were originally distributed. Most, however, are destroyed." A sibilant intake of breath echoed through the court. The king expressed the collective dismay. "Destroyed, you say?" "Destroyed, Your Majesty." Shmeegl felt a warm flash of embarrassment suffusing his body. "To be precise, they are shredded and dumped into a vat to make a sort of soup." The Great Hall reverberated with incredulous murmurs. "You are telling us," said the king, "that the books are distributed among the populace, no one is apprised of their availability, and they are then returned for destruction?" "That would appear to summarize it accurately, Sire." "But Commander, how is the information in the books transmitted to the populace?" "I cannot answer that," Shmeegl replied forlornly. "And what makes it all the more mystifying is that the publishers profess intense concern about what they term 'illiteracy' on the part of the populace at large." "Illiteracy meaning...?" "Unfamiliarity with the contents of books." The king now began to sputter. "But ... but ... would not the populace acquire literacy if the books were made available to them instead of being issued in stealth, withdrawn, and thrown into a vat?" "It would seem so to a reasonable being. But the humans who produce books do not seem to have grasped the connection between the supply and the demand." The prime minister raised his voice. "Would you not have done well, Commander, to befriend those humans who produce books and attempt to ascertain the reasons for their, ah, perverse behavior?" "My Lord, I did that very thing. I actually materialized in the headquarters of a publisher, Labrea House, and briefly lived among those who produce books. I altered my shape to conform to theirs." "Clever, Shmeegl. But how did you disguise your odor?" "I covered my skin with large amounts of cologne, My Lord. They mistook me for a literary agent." "And what did you learn at..." "Labrea House. I learned that books are created by human specialists designated to organize information or compile myths. For their services they are paid in currency of the realm. The amount of currency is predicated on the number of units of any given book distributed to the populace." "How," asked the king, "are the publishers able to calculate the proper currency to be awarded to the composers of books, when those books are being distributed one day and shredded for soup stock the next?" "The authors, to use the accepted term, are awarded a small pittance to sustain their lives," Shmeegl explained. "The balance is held by their publishers for several years until a determination can be made as to the number of units of each book acquired by the populace. If there is a positive balance at the final reckoning, it is disbursed to the authors. Seldom does it come to very much, I am told." "Why would anyone undertake to create books, then?" the king inquired. "They are tranquilized, Your Majesty." "Indeed!" "That was my observation. They go about in a stupor cherishing the fantasy that the populace will find favor with their works and acquire them in large quantities." "Which is all but impossible, according to the system you have described," said the king. "Occasionally a book finds favor with a large segment of the populace," Shmeegl pointed out. "And are the authors of such books well rewarded, at least?" "Handsomely, it seemed to me. In fact, those authors are often awarded more currency for creating the book than the publisher earns in profit for producing and distributing it." At this the prime minister seemed to go into a spasm of shock. "My dear Shmeegl," he cried. "Are you asserting that these publishers deliberately create a negative balance of currency in order to acquire the work of authors who stimulate pleasure in a large segment of the populace?" "That is correct, Prime Minister." "If such a thing occurred in a business enterprise on our world, it would surely collapse." "Oh, they collapse on the human world, too," Shmeegl said. "Even in the short time I spent there, several did collapse and their assets were redistributed to other publishers." "But if the acquiring publishers conduct business on the same basis as the acquired ones, would they not collapse, too?" "They do, My Lord. But as they are larger, their rate of collapse is less perceptible." "And the humans engaged in the enterprise of publishing -- do they not recognize the ... the _futility_ of this process?" "They are called editors, My Lord, and I was not able to ascertain their feelings about the process because they were always in meetings." The king waggled a pod. "These editors, Shmeegl. Their function is...?" "To locate authors and stimulate the development of their creative faculties." "And they do this while they are in meetings?" "No, Sire. I don't know when they do it. In all the time I spent observing them, I never noted any actual contact with authors. I was told that some editors do actually devote attention to authors, but after a brief period of cultivation the editors then depart for employment at a competing publisher." "And that," said the king, "is considered the most effective way to stimulate development of authors' creative faculties? By departing for a competing publisher?" "I am only reporting what I observed, Your Majesty." Shmeegl's words seemed to sink into a pool of sullen and hostile silence, compelling him to make his peroration. "Your Majesty, Prime Minister, good people of Slork, I am the most decorated and experienced explorer on our planet. My expeditions to the planetary systems along the rim of our galaxy have yielded a superb wealth of information that shall be absorbed by our scientists long after my molecules have been dispersed into the atmosphere. I have unerringly guided our society to those civilizations where highly intelligent races now furnish us with knowledge, material wealth, and military support. In short, I believe I know a smart species from a dumb one, and I would like to think my recommendations would be seriously considered. "And I have to conclude that the human race, at least as personified by those engaged in disseminating information through publication of books, would produce nothing of benefit to our civilization, and our resources would be better allocated to more profitable enterprises. Judging from your bemusement, Your Majesty, I would guess I am safe in assuming you concur with my conclusion." The king's chin had been buried thoughtfully in his forepods during Shmeegl's speech, but when he looked up there was a definite scowl on his face, and he gave off a distinctly disagreeable odor, one that sent shivers through the assembly. It was the acrid odor of displeasure. And now he spoke. "Commander Shmeegl, I am second to none in this realm in admiration for your achievements. It was I, after all, who selected you above all other candidates for the mission to the human world. But I have to say that I am most disappointed in the superficiality of your observations, your haphazard research techniques, and in particular the astonishingly unwarranted conclusions you have drawn from the information gathered by yourself and your crew." Shmeegl was all but rocked off his pods by the force of the king's wrath. He abased himself before the throne, baring his neck in the traditional posture of a subject surrendering himself for execution. The king now addressed himself to the rest of the court. "If we understand Commander Shmeegl's report correctly, we have a species of tranquilized individuals -- authors, he called them -- creating works in a stuporous state for editors whose principal role appears to be that of leaving one publisher for another just as soon as the authors are producing anything of value. The publishers function on a deliberately unprofitable basis for the sole purpose of acquiring each other. The by-products of this process, books, are issued secretly, promptly withdrawn from the marketplace, and destroyed before the populace can benefit from them. Have I captured the essence of it, Shmeegl?" The groveling officer muttered something into the tiled floor. "The obvious, the easy conclusion, the conclusion that Commander Shmeegl would have us accept, is that humans have not yet achieved the level of intelligence that would enable them to realize the senselessness of their industry. After all, if we conducted our business on the same basis that the humans seem to, an alien observer might quite rightly conclude that we were completely out of our minds." The court rustled its agreement and leaned forward to hear what the king had to say next. "But I reach quite a different conclusion. I believe there is a subtle and brilliant logic in the behavior of these publishing humans. Unfortunately, owing to the shortcomings of those mandated to observe them..." At this Commander Shmeegl pulled his head into his body as if in anticipation of the executioner's blade. "...we are left with more questions than we began with. Did it ever occur to you, for instance, Commander, that the editors move from one publisher to another because that is the way that authors are fertilized?" "No, Sire, it did not." "You did not think to bring a sample editor back with you, did you?" "They were in _meetings_, Your Majesty." "Did you stop to think that the Labrea system of marketing books may be based on some underlying principle of negative profitability that might hold the key to anti-matter?" "I must confess I did not, Sire," Shmeegl admitted. "Or that the soup into which shredded books are dumped is the source of informational pheromones dispersed into the atmosphere for the edification and entertainment of the populace?" "Forgive me, Your Majesty, it never even crossed my mind." The king raised his head to address the court. "My people, it is clear to me that we may well have encountered an intelligence so sophisticated as to make our own seem puny by comparison. If we were to accept Commander Shmeegl's recommendations, we would forgo one of the most exciting opportunities our civilization has ever encountered. I am therefore ordering the mounting of a new expedition to the third planet of the Gnarpal sun system for a thorough and systematic examination of human behavior. I shall lead it myself. You, Shmeegl, shall accompany the expedition as a guide." "A _guide_, Your Majesty!" Shmeegl whimpered. "You can count yourself fortunate if I do not require you to scrub out the fuel tanks -- _Lieutenant_ Commander Shmeegl." And so it came to pass that some five Slorkian years later a flotilla of saucer-shaped deep-space ships gently lit on 54th Street off Lexington Avenue before the revolving doors of the Labrea House Building and disgorged a team of furry octopods smelling distinctly of cologne. A delegation of ministers, led by the king, escorted him to the eighteenth floor and waited respectfully in the anteroom while their leader conversed with the firm's president about such wonders as author fertilization, anti-profit economics, and the dissemination of information by means of paper-pulp soup. After two hours the king emerged, radiating pheromones of intense satisfaction. Prime Minister Ploor was the first to greet him. "I gather it went well, Your Majesty." "Well? Behold!" The king waved a document under the proboscis of his minister. "A three-book contract for my autobiography, a collection of my favorite recipes, and a work to be decided." "How gratifying," Ploor said, sniffing the contract. "Gratifying? Listen to this. A two hundred thousand dollar hard-soft advance with a straight ten percent paperback royalty and a pass-through of my share of translation rights, plus ten thousand for every week my book is on the bestseller list. And Shmeegl said these people were crazy!" "Shmeegl was clearly misguided," said Ploor. "And what now, Your Majesty?" "Why, lunch at the Four Seasons, of course! They want me to meet their publicity person. They think they can get me onto _Hollywood Squares!_" ----------------------- Visit www.ereads.com for information on additional titles by this and other authors.