The Lecturer
Nov 10, 2022 17:00:49 GMT -5
Post by Radrook Admin on Nov 10, 2022 17:00:49 GMT -5
Alaric Rubinstein, the tall, lanky, gray haired, blue leather uniformed lecturer, had been warned concerning the possible bad effects of eating the meat of the Walala beast prior to giving his scheduled lecture at the Space Exploration Cadet Academy could cause. But being intoxicated, he had paid the warning no mind and voraciously consumed three servings of the meat.
Now, under considerable abdominal distress, he stood nervously before two-hundred white-uniformed cadets that had been restlessly waiting for an hour. He had meticulously planned a much longer introduction, but now he was forced to jump right into the body of his lecture and be done with it quickly lest he suddenly lose control of his bowel and disgrace himself.
“Good evening gentlemen.” Rubinstein said in a deep resonant voice intended to convey a confidence that at that moment he didn’t have. Making matters worse, the microphone whistled, crackled and popped, forcing him to waste precious time wrestling and readjusting it away from his lips while muttering several imprecations under his breath. Finally getting rid of the static, he continued.
“As you are all aware, graduate space cadets on missions to unexplored regions of our galaxy will inevitably encounter intelligent non-human species."
Suddenly feeling an intestinal contraction, he paused and took a swig from the glass of cold water. This was met by a menacing rumble from his small intestine. The cadets stared back with blank expressions on their faces. After an hour's wait, they were in no mood for what to them appeared to be, needless histrionic antics.
"On such occasions," Rubenstein continued nervously as if he had just heard the deafening roar of a predator in the bush, "you will need to be very careful not to misunderstand or be misunderstood. One way to avoid misunderstandings is by not reaching a hasty conclusion.
Now, hasty conclusions are called hasty for a very good reason, they are reached before enough evidence is gathered. For example, if a few aliens greet us with a hail of rocks, it would be hasty to conclude that they are all hostile rock-throwers. After all, the vast majority of such aliens might be friendly and these hostile ones might be either insane or else antisocial outcasts and not representative of their kind. Or it might just be their way of showing friendship."
Rubinstein forced a broad smile displaying his pearly white teeth in order to emphasize the irony of the whole situation but his almost pleading bloodshot tired eyes betrayed hidden worry of an impending intestinal storm.
"The sad part about such sloppy thinking is that it can lead to an escalation."
He shifted from a smile to a deep frown in order to emphasize the seriousness of the situation while placing a palm of one hand on his pot belly in an attempt to calm what seemed to him a beast getting ready to go on a rampage. This time the intestinal rumble was loud enough to get picked up by the mike and there were hushed murmurs in the audience. Ignoring their reaction he continued:
"Consider this hypothetical: Friendly aliens appear in the distance and this time we use our molecular disintegrators and obliterate them before they can get within rock-throwing range. The once-friendly aliens reach a hasty conclusion based on our response, and our next human expedition might be greeted with sonic blasters as a precaution. Earth will then be informed, things will escalate, and soon we might have an interplanetary war on our hands. Think about that. Any questions? But make them quick, because my time is limited.” he uttered as he felt a faint contraction of his large intestine kick in.
Arnaldo Garibaldi, who had been fidgeting nervously throughout the short lecture as if he were being bitten by a horde of ravenous Saggitarian ticks, rose slowly to his feet.
“Yes sir, I have a question.” he said in an emotional quavering voice resembling a child just having been physically chastised by abusive parents. The sound of his voice drew the attention of the two security guard Androids who immediately swiveled their synthetic heads in unison in his direction.
“What you just said is all pretty and nice sir, but what if that second group of aliens you say are friendlies are just setting me up so that they can get near enough to launch another barrage of basaltic rocks at my head, sir?” Arnaldo Garibaldi asked as he stared at Alaric Rubenstein with his large, dark, eyes beneath thick bushy black eyebrows. His nervousness and concern for safety didn’t harmonize with his athletic appearance. He was a bald, tall, bull-like man with muscles almost bulging through his white academy uniform. But here he was peevishly concerned with getting hit on the head with a rock. After having quickly pondered the ridiculous incongruity of it all, Rubinstein hastily replied.
“Well private Garibaldi, are you suggesting that we quickly assume hostility and open fire?”
“Well sir, its either that or risk getting clobbered by a rock on the head a second time, sir.”
Garibaldi finished the statement by slowly wiping perspiration from his bald head with a white handkerchief he had fetched from his back pocket.
There was something about blows to the head that had always irked Garibaldi. In the academy cadet circles, his phobia was a well-known quirk. He had once been invited to be part of the academy's boxing team but had turned it down because of his aversion to getting hit on the head. So the other cadets in attendance didn’t find his behavior unusual and just casually smiled knowingly.
“I didn’t join the academy to get hit on the head!” he had responded to the boxing invitation with an almost panicked look on his swarthy southern Italian face. Of course, Rubenstein was totally unaware of this, and to him it seemed Garibaldi only wanted to be the center of attention.
“So from your standpoint, private Garibaldi, you prefer to risk an interplanetary war than to getting hit on the head by a rock?” said Rubenstein, hoping desperately that his logic could quickly put an end to this diabolical interruption. But it wasn‘t to be:
“With all due respect sir," Garibaldi shot back, "but a rock to the head can be lethal. Especially if the aliens throwing them are extremely muscular. I don’t relish having my right to defend myself from an attack upon my skull denied sir. I didn’t join the Space Academy to have my head bashed in that way.”
“It is just a simple hypothetical private,” Rubenstein replied in desperation.and kept glancing nervously at the auditorium entrance that led to the rest- room and dabbed with his index finger at the perspiration trickling in droplets from his forehead to the tip of his high-bridged, beak-like nose.
“Sir, I realize that, sir.” Garibaldi responded immediately as if the matter were life or death.
“But according to your simple hypothetical, how exactly do these aliens look? Are they, by any chance, supposed to be flabby midgets, sir?”
“There really is no sense in being specific since it’s a simple standard hypothetical, private, a simple standard hypothetical.” Rubenstein repeated in what sounded like a desperately pleading groaning voice of one being subjected to physical torture.
Completely oblivious to what was becoming obvious to the rest of the cadets, Garibaldi continued to obsess with the subject.
“Hypotheticals? Well sir, Hypotheticals involving the integrity of my skull under a hail of alien rocks are very relevant to me, sir. With all due respect, of course."
“Alright, let’s assume the hypothetical aliens are flabby, potbellied midgets then? OK?” Rubinstein snapped in a desperate attempt to bring the conversation to a swift merciful conclusion. He had expected Garibaldi to sit down immediately, but to his horror, there he still stood shaking his bull-like head in disagreement.
“Sir, maybe you are unaware of it but if it’s a low gravity planet, even a pebble these malicious midgets hurl against my head can be deadly!”
“Lets assume that its a strong gravity planet hypothetical then!” Rubenstein uttered in a voice that was becoming increasingly high-pitched after giving Garibaldi a murderous look of impatience, and subtly gesturing for the two android security guards posted at the back of the lecture hall that he needed assistance.
“So am I to assume, sir, that these midgets whom you now claim live on high gravity planet lack the musculature to hurl rocks at our heads?”
“Well I didn’t exactly-”
“So how did they hypothetically crack open my head if they couldn’t hypothetically hurl rocks, sir?”
“That was in the other hypothetical private Garibaldi. In this hypothetical they are on a high gravity planet and don’t have the rock-throwing ability. That having been said--”
“Then I have no reason to shoot them since they haven’t been able to hit me on the head with a rock!” Garibaldi announced triumphantly gazing around at the cadets as if awaiting accolades for winning a debate.
“Private Garibaldi!” the lecturer almost yelled.
“Sir, yes sir!” Garibaldi said, while suddenly standing ramrod straight at attention, barrel-chest forward, elbows back, chin tucked.
“I am going to be forced to request that you leave.”
Rubenstein was now holding on to the lectern sides drenched in cold sweat, and summoning all his willpower not to bolt from the auditorium towards the lavoratory.
“Leave sir?
“Leave, yes, leave!”
“May I ask the reason why, sir?” Garibaldi answered while squinting his beady, dark eyes.
“Because you are disrupting the lecture! That's why!”
“Disrupting? Are you making a joke, sir? I am only respectfully requesting an explanation sir. It isn’t going to be your head up there on the line. Not your skull that’s will be in danger of getting busted. It’s ours and we have a right to know exactly what we are going to be up against and how we should react.
There was a sporadic burst of tentative applause from the rest of the cadets, but the two android MPs mindlessly programmed to maintain order and discipline and dressed in the black leather operational patrol uniforms did not join in and their emotionless menacing glares discouraged any further support.
“In other words, you are going to insist on disrupting this lecture, private Garibaldi?” Rubenstein gasped more than he said as he swayed slightly forward and backwards in relation to the exit. Seemingly totally oblivious to how Rubenstein looked and felt, Garibaldi responded:
“No disruption intended, sir. I just want straight and true answers. Are those aliens a danger to my skull getting cracked open, or not!”
At that moment a loud crack resounded in the lecture hall as android MPs lead-reinforced baton came crashing down on Garibaldi’s head and then another as he immediately wheeled about to defend himself.
The second blow caused him to topple forward and land on the concrete floor with the top of his head. He was then carried unconscious back to the barracks bleeding copiously from his head, as Rubenstein bolted for the men’s room at what some might very well consider having been a totally preternatural velocity.
The blast that proceeded from men’s room was initially misidentified as a detonation from a small explosive device since its resonance was considered far beyond the human body’s capability to produce.
Now, under considerable abdominal distress, he stood nervously before two-hundred white-uniformed cadets that had been restlessly waiting for an hour. He had meticulously planned a much longer introduction, but now he was forced to jump right into the body of his lecture and be done with it quickly lest he suddenly lose control of his bowel and disgrace himself.
“Good evening gentlemen.” Rubinstein said in a deep resonant voice intended to convey a confidence that at that moment he didn’t have. Making matters worse, the microphone whistled, crackled and popped, forcing him to waste precious time wrestling and readjusting it away from his lips while muttering several imprecations under his breath. Finally getting rid of the static, he continued.
“As you are all aware, graduate space cadets on missions to unexplored regions of our galaxy will inevitably encounter intelligent non-human species."
Suddenly feeling an intestinal contraction, he paused and took a swig from the glass of cold water. This was met by a menacing rumble from his small intestine. The cadets stared back with blank expressions on their faces. After an hour's wait, they were in no mood for what to them appeared to be, needless histrionic antics.
"On such occasions," Rubenstein continued nervously as if he had just heard the deafening roar of a predator in the bush, "you will need to be very careful not to misunderstand or be misunderstood. One way to avoid misunderstandings is by not reaching a hasty conclusion.
Now, hasty conclusions are called hasty for a very good reason, they are reached before enough evidence is gathered. For example, if a few aliens greet us with a hail of rocks, it would be hasty to conclude that they are all hostile rock-throwers. After all, the vast majority of such aliens might be friendly and these hostile ones might be either insane or else antisocial outcasts and not representative of their kind. Or it might just be their way of showing friendship."
Rubinstein forced a broad smile displaying his pearly white teeth in order to emphasize the irony of the whole situation but his almost pleading bloodshot tired eyes betrayed hidden worry of an impending intestinal storm.
"The sad part about such sloppy thinking is that it can lead to an escalation."
He shifted from a smile to a deep frown in order to emphasize the seriousness of the situation while placing a palm of one hand on his pot belly in an attempt to calm what seemed to him a beast getting ready to go on a rampage. This time the intestinal rumble was loud enough to get picked up by the mike and there were hushed murmurs in the audience. Ignoring their reaction he continued:
"Consider this hypothetical: Friendly aliens appear in the distance and this time we use our molecular disintegrators and obliterate them before they can get within rock-throwing range. The once-friendly aliens reach a hasty conclusion based on our response, and our next human expedition might be greeted with sonic blasters as a precaution. Earth will then be informed, things will escalate, and soon we might have an interplanetary war on our hands. Think about that. Any questions? But make them quick, because my time is limited.” he uttered as he felt a faint contraction of his large intestine kick in.
Arnaldo Garibaldi, who had been fidgeting nervously throughout the short lecture as if he were being bitten by a horde of ravenous Saggitarian ticks, rose slowly to his feet.
“Yes sir, I have a question.” he said in an emotional quavering voice resembling a child just having been physically chastised by abusive parents. The sound of his voice drew the attention of the two security guard Androids who immediately swiveled their synthetic heads in unison in his direction.
“What you just said is all pretty and nice sir, but what if that second group of aliens you say are friendlies are just setting me up so that they can get near enough to launch another barrage of basaltic rocks at my head, sir?” Arnaldo Garibaldi asked as he stared at Alaric Rubenstein with his large, dark, eyes beneath thick bushy black eyebrows. His nervousness and concern for safety didn’t harmonize with his athletic appearance. He was a bald, tall, bull-like man with muscles almost bulging through his white academy uniform. But here he was peevishly concerned with getting hit on the head with a rock. After having quickly pondered the ridiculous incongruity of it all, Rubinstein hastily replied.
“Well private Garibaldi, are you suggesting that we quickly assume hostility and open fire?”
“Well sir, its either that or risk getting clobbered by a rock on the head a second time, sir.”
Garibaldi finished the statement by slowly wiping perspiration from his bald head with a white handkerchief he had fetched from his back pocket.
There was something about blows to the head that had always irked Garibaldi. In the academy cadet circles, his phobia was a well-known quirk. He had once been invited to be part of the academy's boxing team but had turned it down because of his aversion to getting hit on the head. So the other cadets in attendance didn’t find his behavior unusual and just casually smiled knowingly.
“I didn’t join the academy to get hit on the head!” he had responded to the boxing invitation with an almost panicked look on his swarthy southern Italian face. Of course, Rubenstein was totally unaware of this, and to him it seemed Garibaldi only wanted to be the center of attention.
“So from your standpoint, private Garibaldi, you prefer to risk an interplanetary war than to getting hit on the head by a rock?” said Rubenstein, hoping desperately that his logic could quickly put an end to this diabolical interruption. But it wasn‘t to be:
“With all due respect sir," Garibaldi shot back, "but a rock to the head can be lethal. Especially if the aliens throwing them are extremely muscular. I don’t relish having my right to defend myself from an attack upon my skull denied sir. I didn’t join the Space Academy to have my head bashed in that way.”
“It is just a simple hypothetical private,” Rubenstein replied in desperation.and kept glancing nervously at the auditorium entrance that led to the rest- room and dabbed with his index finger at the perspiration trickling in droplets from his forehead to the tip of his high-bridged, beak-like nose.
“Sir, I realize that, sir.” Garibaldi responded immediately as if the matter were life or death.
“But according to your simple hypothetical, how exactly do these aliens look? Are they, by any chance, supposed to be flabby midgets, sir?”
“There really is no sense in being specific since it’s a simple standard hypothetical, private, a simple standard hypothetical.” Rubenstein repeated in what sounded like a desperately pleading groaning voice of one being subjected to physical torture.
Completely oblivious to what was becoming obvious to the rest of the cadets, Garibaldi continued to obsess with the subject.
“Hypotheticals? Well sir, Hypotheticals involving the integrity of my skull under a hail of alien rocks are very relevant to me, sir. With all due respect, of course."
“Alright, let’s assume the hypothetical aliens are flabby, potbellied midgets then? OK?” Rubinstein snapped in a desperate attempt to bring the conversation to a swift merciful conclusion. He had expected Garibaldi to sit down immediately, but to his horror, there he still stood shaking his bull-like head in disagreement.
“Sir, maybe you are unaware of it but if it’s a low gravity planet, even a pebble these malicious midgets hurl against my head can be deadly!”
“Lets assume that its a strong gravity planet hypothetical then!” Rubenstein uttered in a voice that was becoming increasingly high-pitched after giving Garibaldi a murderous look of impatience, and subtly gesturing for the two android security guards posted at the back of the lecture hall that he needed assistance.
“So am I to assume, sir, that these midgets whom you now claim live on high gravity planet lack the musculature to hurl rocks at our heads?”
“Well I didn’t exactly-”
“So how did they hypothetically crack open my head if they couldn’t hypothetically hurl rocks, sir?”
“That was in the other hypothetical private Garibaldi. In this hypothetical they are on a high gravity planet and don’t have the rock-throwing ability. That having been said--”
“Then I have no reason to shoot them since they haven’t been able to hit me on the head with a rock!” Garibaldi announced triumphantly gazing around at the cadets as if awaiting accolades for winning a debate.
“Private Garibaldi!” the lecturer almost yelled.
“Sir, yes sir!” Garibaldi said, while suddenly standing ramrod straight at attention, barrel-chest forward, elbows back, chin tucked.
“I am going to be forced to request that you leave.”
Rubenstein was now holding on to the lectern sides drenched in cold sweat, and summoning all his willpower not to bolt from the auditorium towards the lavoratory.
“Leave sir?
“Leave, yes, leave!”
“May I ask the reason why, sir?” Garibaldi answered while squinting his beady, dark eyes.
“Because you are disrupting the lecture! That's why!”
“Disrupting? Are you making a joke, sir? I am only respectfully requesting an explanation sir. It isn’t going to be your head up there on the line. Not your skull that’s will be in danger of getting busted. It’s ours and we have a right to know exactly what we are going to be up against and how we should react.
There was a sporadic burst of tentative applause from the rest of the cadets, but the two android MPs mindlessly programmed to maintain order and discipline and dressed in the black leather operational patrol uniforms did not join in and their emotionless menacing glares discouraged any further support.
“In other words, you are going to insist on disrupting this lecture, private Garibaldi?” Rubenstein gasped more than he said as he swayed slightly forward and backwards in relation to the exit. Seemingly totally oblivious to how Rubenstein looked and felt, Garibaldi responded:
“No disruption intended, sir. I just want straight and true answers. Are those aliens a danger to my skull getting cracked open, or not!”
At that moment a loud crack resounded in the lecture hall as android MPs lead-reinforced baton came crashing down on Garibaldi’s head and then another as he immediately wheeled about to defend himself.
The second blow caused him to topple forward and land on the concrete floor with the top of his head. He was then carried unconscious back to the barracks bleeding copiously from his head, as Rubenstein bolted for the men’s room at what some might very well consider having been a totally preternatural velocity.
The blast that proceeded from men’s room was initially misidentified as a detonation from a small explosive device since its resonance was considered far beyond the human body’s capability to produce.