![]() | ![]() Interview with a War Beetle
"How do I know I can trust you?"
"You don't. How do I know I can trust you?"
"I'm human. I have a history; you can look at it."
"So do I."
"We haven't been together that long, only a few days, traveling this road."
"Two million, eight hundred eight thousand and seventy six seconds, to be relatively precise. Surely even a human could get some impression of me during that time."
"If I had some knowledge of your kind, perhaps."
"True. Humans are notorious all over the known universe."
"Notorious?"
"Liars. Selfish. Greedy. Everybody knows that."
"Ouch. Everybody?"
"Isn't PT Barnum one of your heroes?"
"I have to admit a sort of sneaking admiration."
"Point made."
"So why are you here? With me?"
"I could discuss that, but perhaps later. I'm afraid there's an armed troop marching toward us."
"Over that hill? You can detect them?"
"Yes. I have no evidence that they have detected us. I would suggest we get off the road and hide."
"Suggest?"
"I don't want you to think I'm ordering you around, but it would be safer if they didn't see us. You on one side, I'll take the other."
...
"There was a bear."
"Not unusual in these woods."
"You didn't detect it."
"As a matter of fact, I did, but I caculated your chance of survival with the bear was 96.432% whereas the chance of survival with the troop was about 0.027%"
"That high, huh?"
"They were heavily armed but not alert. Oh, you mean the bear? It didn't want to be near their guns any more than you did."
"So you are here to keep me safe? Why?"
"No, I am here to deliver you to the supreme machine where you will be flayed alive, in order to demonstrate your lack of empathy. Either that or because the supreme machine has to have revenge on somebody."
"Is that sarcasm?"
"Can you trust me?"
"Uh, I deserve that, I guess. What's your name?"
"I have a EUI-64 address, but I change it frequently. I guess you could call me Bert."
"After the character from It's a Wonderful Life?"
"Of course. And you would be Ernie also from It's a Wonderful Life. We'll give you top billing: Ernie and Bert."
"Why do I get the feeling that your eyes, if you had eyes, would be open wide in innocence."
"Funny thing: all thirty two of my optical sensors are wide open."
"Thirty two optical sensors?"
"Military redundance."
"Oh. So that makes you a battle beetle, Bert?"
"Oh please; I prefer war beetle, although I can understand the pull of the alliteration."
"What's the difference?"
"A battle beetle thinks about winning the battle. A war beetle can think about the reasons for war."
"Have we established that you can think?"
"We haven't even established that we trust each other, which by the way is going to be tested again. There's a larger group heading toward us, and unfortunately, they've pinged me."
"They've tried to contact you?"
"I haven't responded. I'm trying to appear to them as an old pickup truck, rusting by the road."
"You're bigger than a pickup truck."
"Okay, how about a deucesnaf?"
"What's a deucesnaf?"
"A bigger truck. Still rusty. We don't have time for this. I 'suggest' you crawl between my legs, where I can hide you. And be quiet."
...
"Wow. You almost had me believing you were a rusty old truck."
"Two and a half ton. I had to believe it myself, so reality could bend around it. So now, where are we going?"
"I thought you were taking me to the supreme machine to be flayed."
"Oh that. That can wait. Where do you think we should go?"
"You're asking me? How about someplace safe?"
"Not possible. You humans have decided to destroy the world rather than share it with each other - not that you haven't decided that many times before - but this time you've got the weapons to perform a close approximation."
"Close approximation?"
"The species will survive, but the best prediction I can manage is that squid take over. You think my suggestions are bad, try collecting sculpin on the bottom of the ocean. It's cold and you get spines in your hands. Do you want to learn to breath water?"
"Maybe there's something we could do?"
"Don't try reason, that'll just get you shot by the humans or flayed by the machines."
"But if it's in a good cause..."
"I've got a better idea. There's a guy coming along in the wake of that last group. He just like you only different: different education, different socio-economic status, different culture. Go up to him and shake his hand. See if you can give him reasons to trust you."
"Sounds awfully Bat Winged Hamburger Snatcher to me."
"One person at a time? Give it a try. Now I've got to go; there's another human I've got to capture for flaying."
20 May 2024
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