Earth is competing in the galactic song contest. And Earth’s producer is looking for an expert in outer space civilizations and the fine arts. We all find out that one being’s beautiful music is another’s just plain weird. The only thing they all have in common is the critics…
Beth sighed and looked at her chewed-down fingernails. One fingertip was starting to bleed. This wasn’t how she had pictured her first job after graduating at the top of her class from the Lunar Academy. Work at this Earth media services provider wasn’t good, not for her health, not for her peace of mind, and not for her dreams. She missed the moon.
There, everyone had been impressed with the specialty field she created for herself at the local university, Milky Way galactic history and culture. She had been inspired by her encounters with the first extraterrestrial guests.
Drac and other aliens had visited the moon and then planet Earth briefly to get a general impression, they said. Beth had made an effort to get to know them, and they had courteously permitted this communication. She and Drac, one of the holograms who made an effort to project a humanoid appearance, complete with big, wide, brown eyes, became friends.
Possibly, the aliens appreciated someone asking about art and entertainment on other planets instead of demanding the secrets of faster-than-light travel. Beth would have liked to know how their universal translator worked, but she was tactful enough not to make any requests.
The aliens, who only popped up as holograms, didn’t reveal any technological secrets. They said that would happen after inhabitants of Earth had shown that they deserved to belong to a galactic association of planets. To the surprise of people on Earth, the aliens showed a preference for spending time with the people living on a base on the moon.
The aliens left, promising to stay in touch, since there was no way human beings could initiate communication. To everyone’s surprise, after their departure, an invitation for planet Earth to participate in a galactic song contest appeared on all communications devices, both on Earth and on the moon.
Beth, suddenly an expert on these aliens, was invited to come to Earth and work on a song presentation.
“You’re so lucky,” fellow students on the moon said.
“It can’t have been easy, getting this job back on Earth. That’s still where all the cultural action is,” her professors said. “The competition must have been immense.”
Right. She had felt lucky, until she actually got to planet Earth. She wasn’t overweight by anyone’s standards, but she felt so unbearably heavy on Earth after having grown up on the moon. Her bones and muscles didn’t let her run and jump like she was used to. Dragging her short legs for any distance exhausted her, as did trying to keep up with the fleet-footed Earthie colleagues at the studio.
Her short, straight, brown hair also didn’t do well with wind and humidity. Most of the time, she looked like one of those long-haired canine creatures after it emerged from the numerous natural repositories of water.
And yet, she had felt lucky to be here in an entertainment studio preparing a show segment to compete galaxy-wide. She dreamed about how the alien visitors might like the song she selected, then remember her name, and perhaps invite her to visit other planets. That was what she wanted more than anything.
To her disgust, this Earth studio stank with many competing odors, salty, sweat-drenched clothing, burnt meat products, sour dairy products, and chemical cleansing agents, along with artificial imitations of blossoms of plants. Beth couldn’t understand why Earthies put up with this stench. She never got used to it.
The habitats on the lunar base had had such pleasantly neutral scents, with just a hint of what they called mint, perhaps due to the efficient air circulation. Fastidious attention to personal hygiene had been the norm on the moon. On Earth, it seemed to be the exception, despite the overabundance of water.
People on the moon had also been more reasonable, easier to communicate with. Even after three months, Beth couldn’t get into the mindset of the Earthie entertainment employees, even though they were very talkative and were constantly telling her things she didn’t want to hear.
She had been hired to help produce the song entry for planet Earth in a galaxy-wide contest. The rumor was that various political machinations involving bribery and extortion had resulted in this company being given the contract to produce the presentation for the contest.
Her Earthie colleagues were hell-bent on winning the contest, while Beth thought it would be more important to give the alien species an accurate, though flattering, insight into the universal character of human beings.
These two basically incompatible goals made her work difficult, as did the fact that she wasn’t as familiar with Earthie music or entertainment as she had thought. The competition concept was also somewhat new to her. Activity on the moon was more cooperative.
Obviously, human beings did vary widely among themselves, but compared to the aliens she had gotten to know, the human variations were negligible.
Beth’s head was throbbing. After six months, she was so sick of working for Def Defner’s TV Network, recently renamed Milky Way Television.
Def, a middle-aged, obese man, wore his thinning, brown hair pulled back in a waist-length ponytail. He indulged in daily temper tantrums, which included screaming in a high-pitched voice and throwing smaller electronic devices around the room.
Beth thought Def was a bad joke.
However, Def’s production company had gotten the commission to create the performance for the Milky Way Song Contest. Beth truly didn’t want to how this was even possible. Nonetheless, facts were facts.
Def had insisted on selecting his own people among Earth performers and songwriters to create a song for the contest.
Beth’s only official task was to evaluate the entry and, as the representative of the newly- formed extraterrestrial commission expressed tactfully, make sure it was suitable for representing Earth.
“Is that Earth’s entry?” Beth gasped as she glanced at the video screen that took up an entire wall. Def, you’ve got five people ─ but I can’t tell which gender exactly ─ in tuxes surrounded by a crowd of naked people writhing on the floor!”
“They’re not completely naked.” Def sounded insulted as the pitch of his voice rose. “They all have ruffles around their necks, wrists, and ankles. The ruffles are all different colors representing different ethnic groups and sexual preferences. And they aren’t writhing. Haven’t you ever heard of fractals? They are interpreting various fractal patterns as background for the song.”
“Poodles!” Beth said. “They’re doing it with poodles right there on the stage.”
“People are too big and not fuzzy enough to adequately hint at edges of fractals,” Def said. “Besides, if you look carefully you see it’s just people getting it on with people and dogs with dogs.”
Beth listened with growing horror. “What is that discordant yowling?” she asked.
“That’s the song,” Def said. He sounded angry and offended.
“But there’s no melody.” Beth said.
“Of course it has a melody,” Def said. “It is a musical transformation of prime numbers. The composer wants to show the Milky Way aliens that we aren’t mathematical illiterates.”
“That’s impossible,” Beth sighed. “The numbers would get too big too fast. You couldn’t transform them into notes anyone could sing.”
“So they double back and start over ─ that’s a reasonable adjustment. The principle is the same,” Def said.
“Who is responsible for the rhythm? That at least sounds familiar.” Beth said.
“A German song factory that always wins the European song contests,” Def answered curtly.
“The guy who only lets people lip-synch?” Beth asked, wishing she was slightly more familiar with musical works of art on Earth.
“No, the other one. And for a very reasonable fee, he also wrote the lyrics.” Def clenched his fists. Beth glanced to see that her hand-held communicator was out of his reach.
Beth ignored Def for a moment and concentrated on listening. “Good is good, bad is bad. This is the most fun I’ve ever had?”
“Yeah,” Def smiled contentedly. “Absolutely inspirational, isn’t it! Simple, so that the aliens can understand it and us. To make absolutely sure they get it, you need to write something inspirational for the aliens about the introductory video of Earth and this song.”
Beth shuddered. She had a feeling she knew which planet would end up dead last when the contest was over. The only question was whether that would lead to Earth’s destruction or whether compassionate extraterrestrial critics might be inclined to recommend temporary isolation of a planet infected with poor taste.
“You don’t hate popular music, do you?” Def asked anxiously. “I was told you were an expert on outer-space creatures and had an appreciation of the fine arts.”
“I thought my duties would be more concerned with liaison work with the extraterrestrials who will be visiting Earth for the contest,” Beth said, sadly.
“Sure, but if you don’t even appreciate the best Earth has to offer, how can you explain the weird stuff we’ll have to broadcast from the other planets?” Def looked both worried and annoyed.
“As long as they don’t have poodles,” Beth thought.
Def couldn’t stop talking. “You may think of yourself as some high-brow intellectual who’s better than the rest of us, but here and now, you’re a media producer. Your job is to see that this show meets the requirements of the alien organization so that they invite us to future events. More importantly, you make sure we keep the viewers here on Earth loyal for the thirty-six hours the show is supposed to last, so the people I sell commercials to will be happy.” Def stomped off.
Beth shook her head. It had all seemed so different when the aliens first visited. She remembered the exhilaration and euphoria when the first message from outer space arrived. For a short time, the Earth’s inhabitants were ecstatic to learn they were truly not alone.
All too soon, of course, sanity returned, strangely enough with very little bitterness or disappointment. People accepted the fact that the alien visitors were not enthusiastic tourists. It was even bearable that they aliens proved to be so advanced that they didn’t have much interest in further contact with planet Earth.
Then, though, it was positively bizarre to learn that aliens were interested in having Earth join a galaxy-wide song contest. Apparently, for every contest one new primitive planet was invited to participate. Next time around, Earth would have to make it through the sing-offs to qualify.
The principle for the show was simple enough, probably having been perfected millennia ago. Each of the hundred-plus entries would show a three-minute film introducing its planet and inhabitants, translated for those cultures who hadn’t yet developed universal translators.
Then, the video of the song would run. After all the presentations, the judges on each planet would rank each entry, and the scores would be added up with each group of judges given a predetermined amount of time for deliberation. A winner would be calculated and announced.
Beth was to write Def’s comments to the video introducing Earth’s entry. So far, the video consisted of Def bragging about his multi-media network.
When the contest supervisor arrived with demo videos of the extraterrestrial contestants, Beth had to create commentary to help the Earth audience appreciate the alien songs.
Beth couldn’t imagine how simultaneous broadcasting and voting could be possible, considering the distances involved, and found herself grateful to accept Def’s impatient explanation, that “the aliens can send everything back and forth through hyperspace, whatever that means.”
She had hoped for an opportunity to discuss music with the extraterrestrial representative, and she was still excited about the chance to see the videos of songs from other planets before anyone else could.
Gradually, however, she realized that Def only wanted her to further his schemes of expanding his TV network out into the galaxy. He wanted to “sell” Earth to a very new audience. Beth was supposed to interrogate the contest supervisor about what things from Earth would be salable somewhere else.
“It’s here!” Def’s secretary came running into the viewing room. “The alien is here.”
To her amazement and relief, Drac, dressed as a circus clown, or rather his hologram, appeared. “I’m glad to see you, again, Beth,” Drac said with an indefinable, though somewhat artificial, accent.
Looking at Def, Drac continued, “I am of course a holographic projection. None of my people could survive this planet’s atmospheric pressure and temperature.”
“Why are you dressed as a clown?” Beth blurted out. It seemed a reasonable question. Aliens who could assimilate languages and cultural history almost effortlessly must have a reason for everything they do. When she was on the moon, Drac had worn moon habitat clothing.
“Don’t you like it?” Drac asked surprised. “Our psychologists assured me this outfit would prevent any reactions of hostility or even ambivalent uneasiness on planet Earth.”
“Shut up, Beth,” Def barked. “This is going to be perfect. I’ll put him in a commercial for the show every day until the show.”
“This conversation seems to be drifting off course,” Drac interrupted. Staring intently at Def, he said, “You may call me Drac.”
“Pleased to make your acquaintanceship,” Def proclaimed proudly, stretching out his hand. “I’m Def Defner, owner of the Milky Way Multi-Media Network. I will be in charge of the whole contest show. All the other people here are just a fragment of my huge staff. Ms. Grant there,” he pointed at Beth, “will be your liaison. She knows all about you spacey types.”
Then, Def made an enthusiastic effort to pump Drac’s hand, but of course he just flew through the projection.
Beth was mortified. What must Drac think of her for working for such a jerk?
“I assume you have good reasons,” Drac said quietly.
“That’s right,” Beth said softly. “I’d forgotten. For all practical purposes, you can read minds.”
“Yes,” Drac mumbled, glancing at Def. “Do you have an office or some other space where we can get to work? There is much to do. I assume you will want to experience all the songs I have brought with me.”
“Yes, of course,” Beth said. “Def, if you want me to get a decent job done on time, don’t bother us.”
“Huh?” Def asked blankly. Then, his inherent instinct for business took over. “Right. That’s what you’re here for ─ to be my PR person with the space aliens, even if they look like clowns. I’ll be bringing you a list of suggestions for deals later.” Mercifully, he then left.
“I have a tiny office around the corner,” Beth said uncertainly.
“That will be sufficient,” Drac replied and followed her. Beth wondered what Drac thought of the whole planet. She hoped he didn’t assume that they were all like Def. Then she blushed, remembering again that Drac could read her thoughts.
“I’m sorry if that makes you uncomfortable,” Drac apologized.
“No,” Beth started to explain. “I mean, I keep forgetting, and then of course, I make a complete fool of myself. Please forgive me if I forget and think something I would never say, or don’t even want to think.” She stopped, sure now that she had managed to make an even bigger fool of herself.
“No,” Drac insisted. “I have to learn to respect the privacy of your thoughts. That’s sort of a forgotten concept with us, so I’m out of practice. But to get back to our task, we’ll transmit the songs directly to your media recording device.”
“Of course,” Beth mumbled. Her curiosity overcame her embarrassment. “I feel so privileged and lucky to be the first person on Earth to view songs from outer space.”
“Don’t get your hopes up,” Drac answered dryly. “Styles change, but quality doesn’t really improve ─ even over millennia. We have translated and transposed the works so that they fall within the ranges your senses can pick up. With any luck, you won’t be bored.”
That turned out to be the understatement of the century. Hours went by as Beth immersed herself in the videos. The songs were overpowering. Most of them weren’t even songs in the strict sense of the term, but rather pleasure-inducers for the brain.
There were breathtaking combinations of sound, color, and emotions. Multi-dimensional representations performed intricate dances, darting in and out of the bounds of the universe. Sounds within and almost beyond the limits of human hearing moved Beth alternately to childish giggles and profound depths of sadness.
Fogs of varying colors combined and separated in a hypnotic display. Alien “singers” appeared and disappeared. “Melodies”, or rather themes both simple and complicated, raced through her auditory receptors. She didn’t know if her emotions were being manipulated subliminally, or if it was just a side-effect of the songs.
Beth sighed. What she had experienced was so incomprehensible, but so moving. Every performance so far had captured some bit of the universe that transcended culture, DNA, time, and distance. And what did Earth have to offer? “Good is good, bad is bad….” She felt nauseated.
“Why are you ashamed and unhappy?” Drac asked. He seemed concerned. “Your planet’s entry will mirror your development, your current level. There is no shame in that.”
“No, no, no,” Beth insisted. “The entry isn’t typical for anything other than Def Defner’s taste. This isn’t us ─ you will all get the wrong impression. We are primitive, but we have more to offer than this!”
Drac looked confused. “But why then?”
Before Beth could even formulate her bitter thoughts, Def stormed in.
“Battle-stations time, gang,” he panted. “Shut down the fun and games arcade; now you earn your money.”
“Now that’s enough,” Beth began.
“As the gladiators once said to some pretty frightened lions, ‘Bad news, guys, they’re throwing you to the Christians tomorrow’. Fanatics of I don’t know how many political groups, religions, and other persuasions are threatening to shut us down before the song contest is broadcast.”
Drac looked puzzled, but the clown cosmetic adornment probably disguised his real thoughts. “Your planet’s enthusiastic inhabitants hate music?” he asked.
“No, no,” Def blustered impatiently. “This bunch of wackos doesn’t believe in extraterrestrials, and they are accusing us of spreading a vicious lie to manipulate people.”
“They don’t believe in us?” Drac asked. “Hasn’t there been enough evidence? Every time we showed up somewhere, all the media were invited.”
“They say we’re faking it,” Def answered. “Beth, get these wackos off my back.”
“But she has only viewed some of the entries,” Drac objected. “She really has to maintain a tight schedule in order to do a thorough job of preparing your moderator’s comments.”
“Then hurry it up,” Def yelled. “They are threatening to blow up the studio and shoot down the broadcast satellites. You, Mr. Alien, how well-protected is your ship up there?”
“My ship, as you call it, is sufficiently distant,” Drac said as his image faded and disintegrated.
Beth sighed. She wanted to watch the last video again, but Def’s fury made that impossible. “I’m really the last person capable of reasoning with fanatics,” she began. This was true. There were no such nutcases on the moon.
“They are threatening the show, and you are being paid to get the show produced and broadcast. So the wackos are your problem.” Def marched out.
Not knowing what else to do, and hoping she looked a little inconspicuous, Beth went to the lobby and peered out the front door. There was a motley group of about twenty protesters in front.
Some were marching, carrying signs threatening hellfire. Others claimed the extraterrestrials would plunder planet Earth. Still others insisted the aliens wanted to impose their alien culture on the planet. However, there didn’t seem to be any consensus.
Some signs said the spacemen were a big lie to trick people into listening to music that would destroy their brains. Others said the space aliens were devils escaping from hell. Still others said the music would contain subliminal messages that would enslave everyone on Earth. Most of the protesters did seem to agree that any kind of alien music would destroy the world one way or another.
Not knowing what else to do, Beth walked outside hesitantly and asked, “Can I help you?”
That was a mistake. “Repent!” the crowd screamed. “Keep our electromagnetic waves pure and undefiled.” Beth wondered how much current entertainment these people ever watched. None of the alien videos she had seen even hinted at the violence common to most providers on Earth.
“Surely you don’t want to risk your viewers having their minds controlled by creatures from outer space,” an earnest young man pleaded in a squeaky voice. From what she had learned so far about the rest of the galaxy, Beth doubted that the aliens had much desire to soil their minds with any such contact.
“We must pray for all the unenlightened inhabitants of our galaxy,” a simpering Miss Godly America (easily identified by the gold banner stretched across her amply godly bosom) added. “They haven’t yet recognized the savior. But we can’t let them corrupt our youth.”
Beth wondered fleetingly if somewhere across the galaxy another group of star-worshipers would object to Def’s pornographic fractals’ corrupting their larval stage offspring. Nonetheless, she thought she should try to sway the crowd.
“You have a good point, you know,” she began. “But have you given enough thought to your responsibility for bringing your holy writings to the rest of the universe? How can you do missionary work if you don’t understand the poor heathen aliens? Watching their videos will give you an inside track to their ways of thinking.”
This was a lucky but effective guess. The protesters immediately started squabbling among themselves, the pragmatists versus the fundamentalists, and Beth could slip away.
She still had no idea what to do except double the guards on the building and arrange for private security services to watch all the broadcasting equipment. As the big event was just a few days away, the biggest problem seemed to be timid advertisers who might pull their spots if harassed.
Beth decided to look for some science fiction fans who could be persuaded to join in the fracas. Damn! All she really wanted to do was go back and experience some more alien videos.
Drac returned at sporadic though frequent intervals. He told her little of himself or his planet, but his comments about the videos were invaluable. He was always able to suggest a metaphor that made her find something to say about even the most mystifying experience. She started skimping on sleep to view some videos over and over again, even though she realized she could never manage to view all of them.
The songs transported the alien planets into her awareness. She felt the emotions of the performers and could identify with them, even if the concepts were too many dimensions away. Sometimes she was a visitor on each planet; other times, she was the planet itself; other times, she was speeding along, part of a cloud of photons. A few times, she was a singularity bursting into a universe and then inexplicably folding back up again.
There were few repetitions. At times, she wondered at how vastly different each video was. The only common thread was a basic truth her intuition felt. Each planet was showing what its inhabitants felt or experienced or dreamed or hoped for. There was no fake advertising in the hopes of attracting tourists or investors.
Gradually, her determination grew. She might not be able to stop the protesters, but the danger from them seemed secondary. It was more important to keep the aliens from believing that Def’s howling fractal fornicators were the essence of what Earth had to offer.
She demanded access to Def’s music library, where she spent the few hours she might have slept searching for something that moved her as much as the alien videos. But nothing did. Many renditions struck a chord, but it was the joy of familiarity, not the thrill of discovery.
She wanted just one song that would express the best human nature had to offer. Surely somewhere were some lyrics that would hint at a yearning which could be understood across the light years, a common desire. Speaking for herself, she wished for more time to learn and understand all there was to know about the galaxy.
“How am I doing?” she asked Drac wearily. She had made her choice and now had to concentrate on tactics and opportunity. There was no way she could view all the remaining videos anyway. From the beginning, she had been leaning on Drac’s hints as to what she should concentrate on.
“You’ve seen the best ones,” Drac replied. “And I can give you summaries of the rest. Most of them are just shameless imitators of other winners anyway.” Beth nodded gratefully as Drac transmitted a few commands into her computer.
“When can we expect Earth’s performance song?” he asked. “Time is no real problem. We can have it transmitted to the other planets via hyperspace to get it there at the proper time slot.”
“Soon, I hope,” Beth said, thinking through her options.
Part of her mind was soaring to the inner regions of the galaxy, the origin of the last video she experienced. She felt the sensual pull of the Sagittarius A*, and then the subtle fear of annihilation.
“The recording describing your planet is quite good,” Drac added casually. Beth felt relieved. She had thrown Def’s advertising away and started editing an intimidating mass of film she found even before Drac arrived. How do you describe and introduce a whole planet in three minutes?
She tried to combine nature’s beauty and human feeling. The view sprang from an Iowa farm to the Great Barrier Reef to a chateau in the Alps to a tent on the Mongolian steppes. The camera zoomed over the Sonoran desert, Victoria Falls, Lake Titicaca, and around the planet again.
People spoke with the passion in their eyes, the old, the young, the athletic, the infirm, those happy, apprehensive, all of them. Dogs barked, insects buzzed, and winds whistled. Clouds formed; rain and snow pelted the ground. Ocean waves rose and fell.
“Can I transfer your world’s musical presentation along with it this recording?” Drac asked.
Beth smiled. “Yes, you can have both now. The song will need translation, but I hope the thought behind it is universal.”
Drac nodded. “Translators have been waiting eagerly.”
Drac looked at her. “You know, I see a lot of problems your planet still has, and we also have our version of what you call a prime directive. Still, I wish you success. Your planet’s traits of spontaneity and unpredictability are quite attractive. I’m sure others will want to know more about all of you.”
And he was gone.
Two days later, the broadcast began. Beth cringed listening to Def mangle her already inadequate words describing the other planets and their songs. What she wrote was such a clumsy attempt to translate overwhelming experience into words. She hoped the viewers would just pay attention to the songs.
After twenty hours, when everyone was losing his concentration, the protesters pushed their way into the broadcasting studio, having used their various heavy, holy books to batter the security forces. Then video number one hundred and one started, and the protesters fell to their knees. Beth stared. She hadn’t previewed this one.
On the screen, a familiar-looking figure knelt on a mountainside, both hands clutching stone tablets, as he sang a moving rendition of a famous prayer. “Praise God,” yowled the protesters. “It’s a miracle!”
Drac materialized and sighed. “Those miserable copycat Grxxiens,” he complained. “They pull this trick every time, pandering to the tastes of the newest planet, collecting points for their supposed sensitivity toward primitive cultures. They never win the contest, of course, but always are invited back.”
Beth gasped. “Why didn’t you tell me about this song?” she asked.
“I really didn’t consider it to be one of the better competitors and there wasn’t anything you needed to say about it,” Drac said puzzled. “Is there a problem?”
“No.” It was all Beth could do to prevent her relief from turning into hysterical laughter. “They solved the problem. The religious protesters will now be convinced that the broadcast is the will of their deity.”
“Then you have nothing to worry about,” Drac smiled and disappeared.
As was customary, Earth, the newest participant in the competition, was the last entry. Def blinked but was awake enough to read what was on the screen prompter. “Fellow residents of the universe, we humbly present to you an expression of our hopes for ourselves and for all of you.”
“What?” Def sputtered. But, it was too late. The video of a lone singer was broadcast to the viewers from one edge of the galaxy to the other, over millions of light years. This was Earth, and Beth was proud. She hoped that planets of androids, cyborgs, and out-and-out immortals had managed to find a good metaphor for staying truly young forever.
END
