The Prime Minister

by Bill Kowaleski

The Rigelians first visited Bill Fitch just three days after his fifty-first birthday. It was a somber time for Bill. His wife of thirty years had died only a month before, and he was just beginning to pull out of the deep depression that had overwhelmed him. As was his way, he’d holed up in his winter home high on a ridge to the west of Tucson, Arizona. Its isolation assured that he’d have no visitors, or so he’d thought.

His bedside clock read 2:44 when a bright light streaming into his bedroom window awakened him suddenly.

Great, I’m finally losing it, he thought. But when he stood up and walked to the window, it certainly seemed that the light was real. It hung in the sky just above his driveway like a hovering soundless helicopter.

He turned to put on his shoes so he could go outside and investigate, but just at that moment a beam shot out from the light into the room projecting an image on the wall. It was an image of nothing Bill had ever seen: a creature like a wall-sized octopus but with eight rigid legs. It shone with a greenish-pinkish iridescence, and it wore what appeared to be a Panama hat on its central body. Then a male voice boomed, filling the room at a volume more suited to a rock concert.

“Am I correct in assuming that you are the famous author, William Fitch?”

He felt oddly calm and confident. Why am I not afraid? I think maybe it’s because nothing really matters to me anymore. Que será será.

“Uh, yeah, but famous is maybe pushing it.”

“Pushing what?”

“Yeah, I meant famous is an exaggeration. My work makes me moderately wealthy but that’s mostly due to streaming series adaptations.” His voice rose. “Who am I talking to anyway?!”

“So sorry, William. We have extensively studied your culture but we still have much to learn. I am a Rigelian; that is, a visitor to your world from a planet circling a star you call Rigel. I have a name, but you would be unable to pronounce it, so call me Fred.”

“And to what, Fred, do I owe the honor of this visit?”

“Oh, no, William, it is we who owe you!”

“Fred, could you cut the volume like ninety percent? You’re gonna burst my eardrums.”

The sound level dropped immediately. “Again, apologies, William. Allow me to explain our visit. Three of your years past you published a book titled The New World Order, which we gained possession of. We used it as a tool to learn this particular language you speak and write with, and we became quite excited by the story itself.”

“New World Order? That book sold all of maybe five thousand copies. It was a dud.”

“Maybe to your shortsighted fellow humans but, for us, it was a revelation. You see, it contains a complete plan for making Earth suitable for interplanetary trade. Imagine our excitement when we realized that we could add almost eight billion consumers to our potential customer list!”

Bill rubbed his chin. “A plan for making Earth suitable for interplanetary trade? Where in the book was that?” he asked Fred.

“Why, it’s the entire story. It’s the way you show how to create a world government, to squelch all those fiery emotions humans have entirely too much of, to control the basic criminality of your species.”

“Well, it was just some ideas, and those few critics who read it ridiculed it for being unrealistic and simplistic.”

“That’s because humans cannot enforce their own rules,” said Fred. “But now, you no longer have that problem.”

“Uh, Fred, what changed?”

“We’re here now! And we’re going to enforce the rules you will set down.”

“Fred, you need to understand something. I have zero power to set laws and enforce them. No one person has that for the entire world. And we have this process called democracy—”

“Sorry to interrupt, William, but these are all details. Let me finish my narrative.”

“Okay.”

“Your book became a cult classic in our empire. We translated it into our thought-projection system, what you would call a language, and it was read by over one hundred billion entities on one hundred and forty-three worlds. It’s, how do you say it, a buster?”

“Blockbuster?”

“That’s it! But here’s where we owe you something. You received nothing for all those many entities’ pleasure in reading your book. This violated our most sacred principles and must be rectified. We had many discussions about this and decided on a suitable reward. We’re going to make you the Prime Minister of Earth.”

“The what?”

“Yes, I know, the role definition is unclear, so allow me to explain. At the highest level, it means that you will implement the plan in the book, with our assistance of course.”

“Let’s slow down here, Fred. How do I know that you Nigelians aren’t planning to set us up for an invasion, or maybe just fatten us up to eat us, though we don’t really need much fattening up.”

“Hah hah,” intoned Fred. “Is that humor you are exhibiting? We Rigelians, William, would not want to eat you. We are an aquatic species that lives on organisms similar to your plankton, or krill, or seaweed. In fact, when we first encountered Earth, our first contacts were in your oceans with your octopuses. But they found us uninteresting and, worse than that, they never purchase anything. So, we reluctantly turned to you vicious deceptive creatures. But, as I have said, and we Rigelians do not like to repeat ourselves, some changes are needed before we can accept you into our empire.”

“Aha, it’s conquest you’re after!” said Bill. “Well, count me out, then. I’m not interested. In a word, NO!”

Fred’s projection on Bill’s wall aimed four large black eyes at Bill, staring in a way that made him most uncomfortable.

“You reject our offer to make amends? Such rudeness is unimaginable in our society. But why should I be surprised? Your species needs many improvements. I suppose we could then fall back to our secondary plan.” Fred paused and inserted a rather artificial sigh.

“You could just pay me. Would that meet the requirements of your sacred principles?”

“In what way could we pay you? Our plan was to introduce new technologies that you would buy from us with your metals, but that requires much infrastructure buildout.”

“Look, Fred, a couple hundred thousand dollars would work.”

“Where do you propose that we procure this money, William? Should we open an account at your financial institution? And what is the current exchange rate between your currency and krill tokens?” Fred became uncharacteristically quiet. His projected image turned and twisted.

“Uh, Fred, tell me, what’s your plan B?”

“The alternate plan, you mean? Oh, it’s not as good as using you and your book, but we have read several other books written in your language, maybe ten in all, and there was one that presented a vision of a society we felt would work within our empire. Because the book presents no plan for achieving that society, we decided we would need an experienced politician to implement it. Now that you’ve eliminated yourself, we will approach him as soon as we learn his language.”

“Which book, Fred?”

“It has a curious title, just a number. 1984.”

A wave of panic washed over Bill. “Fred, I don’t understand. The vision of society in 1984 couldn’t be more different from that in my book. And there are so many other books about an ideal society. Why don’t you study those first?”

“We are not a patient species, William. We could spend a thousand of your years studying those books and only end up confused. It’s much simpler to choose between only two alternatives. Certainly, 1984 presents a different sort of society than your book does, but it works for our purposes.”

“I see. Who is this experienced politician you plan to approach?”

“A Russian man, currently in a position of authority. His name—”

An even stronger wave of panic washed over Bill. “Fred, stop! I’ve changed my mind. I’ll be your Prime Minister.”

Fred emitted another one of his artificial sighs. “I don’t know. Such indecision. You could change your mind again, and then we’d be right back where we started. Did I mention that we Rigelians do not like to repeat ourselves?”

“If the alternative is 1984, trust me, Fred, I’m not going to change my mind.”

There was a long moment of silence. Bill said nothing, fearing he’d only make matters worse by continuing to plead his case. Finally, Fred spoke. “We have consulted and agreed that to ensure your commitment, we will have you sign a formal contract. Now you may think, in the deceptive and conniving manner of your species that you could simply break the agreement later, but our contracts are unbreakable.”

“Not sure how you do that, Fred, but no matter. I’m all in.”

“Very well. I am transmitting the contract to your email now. You simply have to type your full name in the box at the bottom.”

Bill went to his computer and brought up his email where a new message from FredRigelian had appeared. When he opened it, all he saw was a jumble of symbols and things that looked like children’s drawings. At the bottom was a box with his named neatly typed below. It was the only thing in the contract he could read.

“Fred, I like to read what I sign. Could you—”

“Sorry, William. Our contracts require certain clauses and standard wording that we cannot translate into your limited language. But fear not. It simply codifies what we’ve discussed.”

Bill sighed, put his fingers on the keyboard, typed his name, and clicked the send box at the bottom.

“Excellent!” Fred’s artificial voice betrayed excitement for the first time. “Now we’ll transport you up to the orbiting ship where you’ll be fitted with your implants.”

“Implants?”

“Yes, clause thirty-seven describes them. They’ll give you powers that will make it easier for you to implement your plan. And we can also use them to ensure your compliance. Remember that I told you that the contract is unbreakable?”

“But, Fred, I didn’t know about—”

A droning noise drowned out the rest of Bill’s words. A clear plastic bubble closed around him. He felt himself moving toward then out of the front door of his house. He rose straight up, faster and faster. Now he could see the curvature of the Earth, and more stars than he’d ever seen even on the clearest Tucson nights.

I wonder which one is Rigel, he thought. I suppose I’ll be finding out all too soon.