"They're made out of meat."

tintin

Imagine if you will ...

The leader of the fifth invader force speaking to the commander in chief ...

reporting what was found upon visiting the planet Earth.

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"They're made out of meat."

"Meat?"

"Meat. They're made out of meat."

"Meat?"

"There'sno doubt about it. We picked several from different parts of theplanet, took them aboard our recon vessels, probed them all the waythrough. They're completely meat."

"That's impossible. What about the radio signals? The messages to the stars."

"They use the radio waves to talk, but the signals don't come from them. The signals come from machines."

"So who made the machines? That's who we want to contact."

"They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Meat made the machines."

"That's ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You're asking me to believe in sentient meat."

"I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. These creatures are the only sentient race in the sector and they're made out of meat."

"Maybe they're like the Orfolei. You know, a carbon-based intelligence that goes through a meat stage."

"Nope.They're born meat and they die meat. We studied them for several oftheir life spans, which didn't take too long. Do you have any idea thelife span of meat?"

"Spare me. Okay, maybe they're only part meat. You know, like the Weddilei. A meat head with an electron plasma brain inside."

"Nope.We thought of that, since they do have meat heads like the Weddilei.But I told you, we probed them. They're meat all the way through."

"No brain?"

"Oh, there is a brain all right. It's just that the brain is made out of meat!"

"So... what does the thinking?"

"You're not understanding, are you? The brain does the thinking. The meat."

"Thinking meat! You're asking me to believe in thinking meat!"

"Yes, thinking meat! Conscious meat! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. The meat is the whole deal! Are you getting the picture?"

"Omigod. You're serious then. They're made out of meat."

"Finally,Yes. They are indeed made out meat. And they've been trying to get intouch with us for almost a hundred of their years."

"So what does the meat have in mind?"

"Firstit wants to talk to us. Then I imagine it wants to explore theuniverse, contact other sentients, swap ideas and information. Theusual."

"We're supposed to talk to meat?"

"That's the idea. That's the message they're sending out by radio. 'Hello. Anyone out there? Anyone home?' That sort of thing."

"They actually do talk, then. They use words, ideas, concepts?"

"Oh, yes. Except they do it with meat."

"I thought you just told me they used radio."

"Theydo, but what do you think is on the radio? Meat sounds. You know howwhen you slap or flap meat it makes a noise? They talk by flappingtheir meat at each other. They can even sing by squirting air throughtheir meat."

"Omigod. Singing meat. This is altogether too much. So what do you advise?"

"Officially or unofficially?"

"Both."

"Officially,we are required to contact, welcome, and log in any and all sentientraces or multibeings in the quadrant, without prejudice, fear, orfavor. Unofficially, I advise that we erase the records and forget thewhole thing."

"I was hoping you would say that."

"It seems harsh, but there is a limit. Do we really want to make contact with meat?"

"Iagree one hundred percent. What's there to say?" `Hello, meat. How's itgoing?' But will this work? How many planets are we dealing with here?"

"Justone. They can travel to other planets in special meat containers, butthey can't live on them. And being meat, they only travel through Cspace. Which limits them to the speed of light and makes thepossibility of their ever making contact pretty slim. Infinitesimal, infact."

"So we just pretend there's no one home in the universe."

"That's it."

"Cruel.But you said it yourself, who wants to meet meat? And the ones who havebeen aboard our vessels, the ones you have probed? You're sure theywon't remember?"

"They'll be considered crackpots if they do. Wewent into their heads and smoothed out their meat so that we're just adream to them."

"A dream to meat! How strangely appropriate, that we should be meat's dream."

"And we can mark this sector unoccupied."

"Good. Agreed, officially and unofficially. Case closed. Any others? Anyone interesting on that side of the galaxy?"

"Yes,a rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence in a classnine star in G445 zone. Was in contact two galactic rotation ago, wantsto be friendly again."

"They always come around."

"Andwhy not? Imagine how unbearably, how utterly, cold this galaxy would beif one were all alone with no-one to talk to but meat."

copyright Terry Bisson reprinted from OMNI, 1991