Zeroth Contact, the Video

Post date: Aug 25, 2017 6:19:58 AM

When the Lumen5 artificial intelligence engine turns my winning story, Weirdest Story Award, 2016 Sin City Word Hoarder’s Holly-Daze Writing Challenge, into a video

Stardate -307951.1

I flew to the biggest light source, the surest indication of a wealthy advanced civilization. A bright beam guided me to a pyramidal structure completely unsuitable for a landing, but I found a space in the city demarcated by orange cones, next to a sign the computer translated as "The Atomic Testing Museum."

The aliens in their rolling conveyances all converged on the strangest chapel I have ever seen, a huge cuboid structure jam-packed with merchandise of all sorts. Logically, one had to conclude that their King advertised what tribute to pay, but this unusual civilization was not so.

Instead, a male with white facial hair, decked out in red and white, presided on a throne as worshippers filed in and expressed their wishes to him--most blatant attempts at bribery. My computer strained to translate the incomprehensible requests.

A jumpy male child said he “had to pee” and ran away. One female of the species, who turned many heads when she sat down on the rulers lap, requested Botox so she could live in sin. Another alien, in leather, prayed for a collection of music from a long departed King, Elvis.

An elder male asked for what he called a "stripper," but resigned himself to a lumberjack shirt when his female partner, wearing colorful feathers around her neck, stormed the throne. She slugged him hard, propelling him into me. I regret to report that I dropped and lost my auto-writer.

These primitive, corrupt aliens, in my opinion, are unsuitable to join the Vulcan Federation, and I recommend against First Contact.