Signs of Intelligence

“What about this one, class?”

Misc. Bertlethwop tapped a glass box with a pointer. Inside was a small, furry animal. It hissed at the assortment of curious youth that gathered around to ogle. One of the students bent closer to the glass to study the mammal. It displayed a mouthful of razor sharp teeth and emitted a yowl that made the student back away.

 Misc. Bertlethwop tapped the glass again. “Well, what do you think? Intelligent or not?”

The class was undecided. They shuffled in place, each trying to avoid the teacher’s gazes. A student at the back raised three tentacles hesitantly. 

Misc. Bertlethwop nodded their two heads three times, one for each tentacle raised.

“I don’t think we can tell,” said the student, reluctant to look their teacher in the eyes. “We haven’t observed this creature long enough to make an important judgment call like that. It seems very aggressive, which often is a sign of lower intelligence, but it’s also very afraid. We should try to communicate with it before we pass judgment.” He nibbled a fourth tentacle nervously. “I mean, right?”

Misc. Bertlethwop gave a trill of approval. They beamed at the student, who dodged just in time. “Good for you, Gweep. Both on the dodge and keeping an open mind. I have no doubt you will be a Star Captain someday… if you keep applying yourself. 

Gweep beamed back, but Misc. Bertlethwop merely deflected the adolescent laser with an absentminded flick. She had 17.2 decas on him, which meant at least 34.4 decas of experience. The little brat would have to be quicker than that to supplant her.

Misc. Bertlethwop ignored his feeble attempt and addressed the entire class. “Gweep is correct, despite being a little underpowered.” The class tittered, and Gweep looked sheepish. “How can we communicate with the creature to determine intelligence?” Misc. Bertlethwop again faced a room of students suddenly distracted by the floor panels beneath them. “Well?”

Gweep waved two tentacles but Misc. Bertlethwop shook their heads.

“Someone besides Gweep. Someone who might aspire to be more than merely oil to grease the cogs someday?” 

The threat worked. A diminutive shadow twig piped up. Her layabout second uncle had been turned to machine grease and the memory still haunted the family. Misc. Bertlethwop nodded at her.

“Yes, wish*emelex? What are your thoughts? How can we communicate?”

“Telepathy?” asked wish*emelex, her delicate wisp of a voice more faint than usual. She prepared to phase out in case Misc. Bertlethwop beamed at her.

“Perfect answer!” Misc. Bertlethwop crowed. “If you are a ghost. Not everyone is a ghost, dear. Diversity means you and me, working together but differently, each with different abilities because respecting our differences keeps us free. Class?”

The class repeated the worn-out mantra with a lack of enthusiasm until Misc. Bertlethwop shot another beam into their midst. She had their rapt attention again.

“Someone else?”

Gweep raised three tentacles again. He bounced a little on the other six as he released an excited mist of pheromones into the air. His classmates backed away from him in disgust. Gweep, as usual, didn’t notice.

“Misc. Bertlethwop… I know…I know…”

They let him mist a few more pheromones before they nodded. 

“Yes, Gweep?”

“Technology!” Gweep exhaled the answer and the entire class was caught up in his musky, purple tinged breath. “We have technology!”

Misc. Bertlethwop clacked their talons.

“Yes, Gweep! Good! We have technology to level up our physical limitations. That is the purpose of it. Why don’t you take the lead and show us.”

Gweep looked proud. He fumbled in his fanny pack for a minute before pulling out a metallic green Cator and flipped open the top. The rest of the class was noticeably impressed. He moved toward the glass box as wish*emelex phased out to reappear closer to him.

“Cator, identify language.”

The Cator whirred to life, the languages of galaxies and gods spilling forth in a jumble of confused syntax. The furred creature in the box yowled at the cacophony of broken languages that assailed it. The Cator mimicked the noise in several pitches before getting it exact. Above the flipped open port letters appeared, made of light: Speaking Feline. Message?

“Ooooh, Feline. Of course,” Gweep said this as if he were perfectly fluent in Feline, which he wasn’t. wish*emelex was impressed nonetheless.

Gweep leaned in to the Cator, even though he knew full well it was capable of hearing him from two moons away. He looked intensely at the Feline.

“We mean you no harm.”

Out of the Cator came a series of soft purrs and mews. They sounded friendly, warm and nice. The Feline stopped hissing and narrowed its eyes in distrust. It gave a plaintive meow.

The Cator whirred, processed the Feline’s language and then communicated back: “If you mean no harm to me then why am I imprisoned in this box?”

“A good and logical question,” observed Misc. Bertlethwop. “What do you think, class?”

The Feline had calmed down and just observed them back. It licked a paw, gave a meow, and then waited.

The Cator whirred, and then: “Where I come from, boxes are the worst of offense and are only used with an intention of harm.”

“Oh!” Gweep looked embarrassed. “We’ve committed a cultural error. We must show ourselves for the kind and civilized people we are and treat this intelligent creature as a guest, not a prisoner or pet.” 

The Cator whirred and emitted a series of meows. The Feline bowed its head in acknowledgement and gave a single mew.

The Cator whirred, and then: “A reasonable mistake for a reasonable people. All is forgiven.”

Gweep looked at his teachers imploringly. “Please Misc. Bertlethwop? Please can I let it among us?”

Misc. Bertlethwop said nothing but motioned with a talon for him to proceed as he saw fit. He unlatched the glass and opened the case.

As soon as the glass box had a slight opening, the formerly docile Feline erupted in a fury of claws, teeth and fur. In shock, Gweep stepped back. The Feline flew straight at him. The metallic green Cator flew from his tentacle and shattered on the floor. The Feline attached to his face, forcing discarded fur into his air passages and kicking viciously at his neck with a collection of barbs that caused Gweep’s skin to immediately welt up and bleed. He collapsed back on the floor, wailing. Then, as soon as the attack came, the Feline went full stealth and vanished.

Misc. Bertlethwop let the lesson sink into the shocked class for a minute before reaching down to help an embattled Gweep back onto his suckers.

“Well?” Misc. Bertlethwop looked at the silenced class. “Intelligent or not?”

“Very intelligent,” wheezed Gweep through his decreased breathing capacity. A fluff of hair puffed out with his exhale.

“I agree,” said Misc. Bertlethwop. “And therefore we do no harm. Last one.”

The rest of the class moaned inaudibly. Misc. Bertlethwop snapped the glass case closed, clicked a button on their desk and the box vanished into the floor. Misc. Bertlethwop clicked a different button, and a new case popped up with a new inhabitant.

This was one they’d never seen before. Bipedal with sparse hair growing from uneven patches over a thin, pink skin and no extra appendages, or even a carapace. It beat the sides of the glass enraged, flecks of foam spattering from its apparent communication gap but only gibberish came out. Wrinkled genitalia swung exposed beneath a rotund middle. The creature had no protections, but it displayed aggressive behavior as if it were dangerous.

Misc. Bertlethwop tapped the glass with their pointer. “Well, what do you think? Intelligent or not?”

“It doesn’t look intelligent,” muttered Gweep. His neck oozed cerulean ink from a dozen razor cuts and his skin was puffing up around his optical stems.

“It doesn’t look intelligent at all, but looks can be deceiving.” Misc. Bertlethwop looked pointedly at Gweep. “Does anyone want to open the case?”

As one, the entire class moved back a step in reply. 

“Let’s try to communicate with it, shall we?” Misc. Bertlethwop opened up their desk and removed a Cator, less fancy than Gweep’s now shattered one, but just as functional. 

“Cator, identify language.”

The Cator whirred to life, again the languages of time and tempest spilling forth in a cacophony of electric utterance. The bipedal creature in the box shrieked in fear at the jumble of broken languages. The Cator mimicked the noise in several pitches before getting it exact. Above the flipped open port the words lit up in the air: Speaking Hooman. Message?

Misc. Bertlethwop leaned toward the glass and locked eyes with the creature within.

“We mean you no harm.”

Out of the Cator came a jumble of laughs, groans and wails to mimic the animal in the case. It paused, listened and then resumed kicking at the glass with bare feet, yelping and then limping around the box in apparent pain before attacking with the other foot.

“Definitely not intelligent,” whispered wish*emelex.

“Can you communicate?” asked Misc. Bertlethwop. The Cator repeated the message in Hooman. The creature paused, listened and then erupted in language and gestures that involved slapping its own hindquarters and thrusting odd digits and phalanges at the glass. 

The Cator whirred, and then translated: “I’ll show you communicate you piece of #%&$^$*^$# Martians, you crap %#^(& head mother ^#@(*&% hole wiper &^$#&%( for brains…” The Cator stopped and an error message appeared.

Misc. Bertlethwop tried again. “Calm down, please. We mean you no harm. We are merely trying to establish if you are intelligent or not. If you are intelligent, we will let you free without harm.”

The Cator whirred, and communicated this message back to the human. It listened quietly for a minute, met eyes with Misc. Bertlethwop and then waved what seemed to be a preferred digit in the air between them with defiance. 

“Are you intelligent?” asked Misc. Bertlethwop.

The Hooman waited for the Cator to whir a translation, head cocked to one side much like the Feline earlier. “It might be intelligent,” observed Gweep, interested in spite of his recent mishap. The Cator passed a message in the Hooman language. It listened, frowned and then erupted in another furious wave of rage and profane gibberish. Even Misc. Bertlethwop took a step back.

“$#^&@ aliens! I’ll show you $&*#@! And $^&*(%$ and I’ll %$#@& in your eyeholes you mother ^&%$#@ son-of-a-#$%#@!” The Hooman started throwing itself against the sides of the glass case. The class watched in silence until it settled down. Misc. Bertlethwop decided to try one last time.

“I need you to prove to me that you are sentient or you will be euthanized,” said Misc. Bertlethwop. “Do you understand euthanization? Put to sleep forever, no longer alive. Dead.”

The Hooman listened to the Cator translate. It calmly walked to the glass, turned around to show its back and bent over. 

The class leaned forward in curiosity. The Hooman placed its flexor appendages at the point where the legs joined the rear torso, pulled aside its rear quarters and slapped everything against the glass. The entire class, including Misc. Bertlethwop, recoiled in disgust. The Hooman slid its genitalia across the glass leaving a greasy streak.

“No, ugh! It has a second mouth!” Gweep had turned a pale shade of blue.

“I think it’s some sort of sucker,” cried wish*emelex.

Gweep lost his ink all over the floor. wish*emelex immediately phased without being excused. Misc. Bertlethwop wasn’t going to report the absence. This demonstration had escalated to disaster fast.

They fumbled for the specimen controller on their desk. “Definitely not intelligent,” Misc. Bertlethwop declared. “Does the class agree?”

There was a unified affirmative from the general chaos and Misc. Bertlethwop hit the removal button. From an invisible vantage point somewhere in the room the Feline yowled. The Cator whirred and translated: “If Hoomans aren’t serving Felines, they serve no purpose. They are functionally sentient at best.” 

Misc. Bertlethwop agreed and stabbed the controller a second time. The Hooman began to descend into the floor. The Cator picked up the last of the conversation before it vanished into the dark and the floor slid closed.

The Cator whirred and translated: “...my chocolate starfish, you $#@%^&!, you #$@!^& mother $%^&$#@? You like that? That’s the last #@!%$^ thing you’ll see when I…”

The class was stunned into silence. Still unseen, the cat emitted a low, rumbling noise that soothed the collectively frayed nerves of the class. It was therapeutic, Misc. Bertlethwop decided. Hoomans were undesirable, but a galactic alliance with the Felines seemed plausible.

The Cator whirred and translated the Feline again: “The value of a Hooman is in the opposable thumb. They can be trained to serve as acceptable labor. As a Feline Ambassador, I can help you set up a breeding program.”

“Sometimes science yields unpleasant results, like the Hooman,” Misc. Bertlethwop summarized. “But because we dared to explore we may have a new ally, and therefore mutual advancement.”

Gweep was propped up against a wall, tentacles splayed limp across the floor and covered in his own sick. The Feline appeared out of nowhere and curled up against his unsoiled back. Gweep instantly relaxed. His color perceptibly deepened.

“The search for intelligent life is fraught with unpleasantry,” he said thoughtfully. “But worth the discomforts.” He stroked the Feline’s forehead and it purred.

The Cator whirred: “Indeed. My people call it the survival of the wittest. The fleet shall inherit the Earth.”

From beneath them, glass shattering and a trail of incomprehensible shouting that ended at the sound of a deployed beam rang up.

Misc. Bertlethwop thought it a good place to end the day’s lesson. She needed to get the Feline to onboarding anyway. “Class dismissed early,” they announced.

Gratefully, the students filed out. That was quite enough Hooman for everyone.