Insights...

Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.

- Albert Einstein

Noo and Lemon ran to Vaseline's office through the endless corridors that made up the inexplicable infrastructure of the Hive. Machines to the left and right would burst into rabid song unexpectedly, turning the corridors into echoing madhouses.  The few Hiveans that they encountered stared at them with their large, round and unblinking eyes.

“How do you guys keep from going deaf?”, shouted Noo at Lemon.

Lemon grinned and produced two earplugs. “No funding yet for volume control”, he explained, “Sin T’zin 2000 comes with two free earplugs!!!”

Noo stopped dead in his tracks. “You gotta be kidding! NOW you tell me???”

Lemon grinned a maniacal grin and handed him the earplugs. Noo put them in.

Immediately the printer pandemonium became a heavenly sweet silence, sweetly interrupted by a angelic voices humming hit songs. Noo sighed and smiled, then frowned and took the earplugs out for a second…

Raging madness again hit his recently pampered ears, making his stomach turn. Printers screaming and belting, evil hisses, whales on helium… Noo reinserted the plugs and was back in sweet heaven…

He looked at Lemon who was still grinning his maniacal grin.

“This is brilliant, Lemon…”, he said, “this is what you should be selling here on earth…”

Lemons grin sagged, and he seemed to relax. “No Noo, printer is brilliant, coffee machine is brilliant, earplug is old…”, he answered, “in da Heiwa nobody interested.”

Noo groaned, Lemon’s answers for some reason maintained an exponential incongruity with his version of reality.

“OK Lemon, in that case please explain to me what is happening here…”, he said, “let’s start with the coffee machine…”

“Ah, high security coffee!”, Lemon exclaimed, “da Heiwa took old idea and made new!”

Noo looked at him questioningly

Lemon smiled and continued, “We analyze all earth commercials many years and see earth people likes coffee… so we make coffee machine”. Lemon smiled some more.

“But, at da Heiwa no coffee, only K’abbage”, Lemon further explained, “so da Heiwa make coffee from K’abbage”

“What is K’abbage?”, Noo asked

Lemon fidgeted with his Goggl Translat, then spoke to it, “K’abbage”

Goggl Translat clicked to life and translated, “Cabbage”

Noo’s mouth fell open. Here was the answer to Merlin’s question, the reason that da Heiwa coffee was undrinkable, the one and final cause for his migraine (though new reasons were developing fast)…

“At da Heiwa, we many da Heiwa people and little coffee machines, so coffee is restricted”, he went on, “this is normal capability at da Heiwa, we very good at restricting!”

Noo nodded, he had come to the same conclusion. “So you mean that any machine made by da Heiwa sees a customer as a security threat?”, he asked.

Lemon’s smile widened, smart earth person, this Noo.

“Yesss, is true!”, he beamed, “if customer can identify, he receives coffee!”

“And if the customer cannot identify himself?”, Noo asked patiently, fearing the answer confirm his worst fears.

“If customer does not identify, he terminated”, Lemon said smugly.

“Terminated?”, Noo asked in disbelief, “you mean fired?”

Lemon nodded vigorously. “Yesss, incinerated! Look there…”, he pointed, “successful security test!”

Noo looked and saw a Hivean burst into flames after typing a wrong printer access password for the third time… he looked back at Lemon wide-eyed.

“You must be mad!!! You can’t do this to people!!!”, he screamed at Lemon.

Lemon looked back not understanding. “Is just one da Heiwa, we have many…”, he said, “…and you should be used to this. We have also seen earth news from years ago: bad economy, many earth people incinerated…”

“You idiot!”, screamed Noo, “people get fired, no incinerated!!!”

Lemon’s face assumed the maniacal grin again. “That’s not good! You mean people not have job???” He couldn’t believe his auditory facilities, “da Heiwa would never be so cruel!”

Noo fell silent at this radically new concept of cruelty. “You mean that not having a job is worse than dying?”, he asked

Lemon blinked. Once.

“Of course!”, he said, “Job is all!”

Noo sighed. “Lemon, that still doesn’t give you the right to kill an earth person for forgetting his password… On earth we are quite attached to life, and we’d rather give up our job than our life”

Lemon reluctantly considered this. “Noo…”, he hesitated, “…then we must change machine for America government…” He burped in embarrassment, “Our engineers increased security in new version, Sin T’zin 2001…” Again he blinked. Once.

“Lemon, think hard…”, Noo answered, dreading what might come, “what do you mean by ‘increased security’?”

Lemon shrugged. “Machine explodes thermo-nuclear when no identify”, he said.

Noo started running to Vaseline’s office again, followed by Lemon who was again grinning like a maniac.

More Song and Dance

 “I know that you believe you understand what you think I said, but I'm not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.”

- Robert McCloskey

"Don't be daft...", said Merlin, "why would you quit? This is a great opportunity! you're the first person on earth that actually does sales for an alien civilization. Think of all the experience you'll get!"

Noo grumpily looked at his phone and said, "Well, being nearly strip-searched by a coffee machine isn't the kind of experience I was looking for..."

"Ah, but it certainly is interesting! So what can you do to make this machine more successful?"

"Smashing it to bits with a sledgehammer comes to mind…”, Noo grumbled, determined not to let Merlin’s unwavering optimism break his sullen mood. “How can this…”, he hesitated, looking for the right word, “…monster ever be sold here? It’s a paranoid maniac! And then the coffee! It’s hideous!!!”

“Is it indeed?”, Merlin grinned, “and why is that?”

Noo shut up as he pondered that question. Why was that coffee so bad? He sniffed his cup and snarled… surely, it wasn’t…? Hmmm, maybe Merlin was right…

“You know, Merlin, I don’t know… yet”, he said after a bit, “Listen, I have to go now… investigate…”, he grinned. Merlin had done it again.

Merlin laughed, “No problem Noo, have fun and let me know. Let’s call again soon.”

Noo put his phone down and squeeked as he stared right in Lemon's friendly smiling face.

"Where did you come from?", Noo gasped

Lemon pointed at the door and his smile grew wider. "Helooo... Noo? You, meeting now"

"You shouldn't sneak up at me like that", Noo hissed, "you damn near gave me a heart attack..."

He packed his laptop and walked with Lemon to the meeting. It would be a long walk, for some reason the Hive offices came equipped with incredibly long corridors. The walls of the corridor were lined with machines looking grim to morbid to even plain ludicrous. Most machines were labeled ‘Testing. Please don’t touch’

"Why is sneak?", Lemon asked, smiling but obviously puzzled.

Noo laughed, "Sneak is when you walk to me without me hearing you...", he explained, trying to use words that would be in Lemon's grasp. "On earth it is considered...", he struggled to find a word that would not trigger the next 'what is...' question, "not good.", he finally decided.

Lemon’s answer was cut short as a machine that looked like a printer suddenly exploded in a screaming falsetto rendition of ‘Cherish the Love’

“Why are they doing this?”, Noo shouted, clasping his ears

“Is testing…”, Lemon explained in what he hoped was a friendly and non-threatening way. Going from Noo’s reactions, the Hive products could use some good marketing. Or maybe Noo was just a difficult customer, excellent study material though. He smiled as the machine screeched:

“Cherish da loooove

Cherish da Hiiiive – oh yeah

Cherish da love we have – while we is [digger digger]”

Noo almost cried, “On earth we torture people with this!!!”, he screamed.

Lemon’s smile widened, “So you like?”, he shouted back.

“No!!!”, Noo squealed, “please make it stop!”

Lemon was confused. “Noo, machine is printing, can no stop…”, he screamed back in his friendliest and most comforting voice, “why you not like Sin T’zin 2000 printer? Is latest and largest!”

“Me praise that mine dram will come truth”, the machine’s falsetto intensified to a piercing wail, “Cherish da Hiiiiiiiiive”

Lemon took the brochure and shouted convincingly, “The Sin T’zin print unit guarantees lower Total Clash of Owners, it provides a richdom pallet of colors ranging from black to white and improves slave morale by providing voluntary access to music to be chosen by management.”

The machine stopped abruptly and aggressively spat out a piece of printed paper. ‘Test’, it read.

The phrase ‘voluntary access to music to be chosen by management’ rang loudly through the corridor, and Lemon grinned an amused hiccup. “Good time, 6 minutes”, he concluded as he picked up the paper. Six Hiveans appeared out of nowhere and Lemon quickly instructed them in da Heiwa. The six quickly disappeared and Lemon turned his attention to Noo again.

“Soooo… what you think Noo?”, he asked, “Impressive, yes?”

Noo blinked.

“Is good Noo…”, assured Lemon, “I can see you emotion”. He smiled and was even a bit impressed himself, looking at earth’s first emotional response to the Sin T’zin 2000

Noo sighed. “Lemon, we really need to talk…”, he said, “I’m sorry to burst your bubble but this will never sell…”. He watched in wonder as Lemon blinked. Once.

“For starters”, continued Noo, “it took the machine five minutes to print one paper with the word ‘Test’ on it…”

“Da Heiwa minute?”, asked Lemon hesitantly

“Earth minutes”, Noo said and went on, “On earth, printers can print 1000 pages in that same time easily! This will never work in an office environment!”

“Ah, but Sin T’zin 2000 no spell errors… many checks”, Lemon objected.

“But Lemon…”, Noo rolled his eyes, “a printer should not check for spelling errors, it should print…”, and he yelped as the machine started singing again. This time it sounded as a whale on helium.

“Let’s take a wok together near the ocean short”, it slurred in a high squeaky threatening voice, “Manually, You and meeee”

“And what’s with the singing???”, Noo shouted, trying to overcome the machine that seemed to increase volume as he tried to make his point, “If I am emotional it’s only my desire to…”. His heartfelt desire got lost for posterity as the machine belted “Me often pry before me lie downward by your siiiide”

Again the machine stopped abruptly and spat out another piece of paper. ‘Test 2’ it read.

Lemon seemed overjoyed. “Big successss”, he said, “We now apply mood-skins to machine emotion!”

Noo blinked. Not once but many times.

“Lemon, I don’t understand… this time it took the machine even longer to print out the same amount of data…”

“Ah Noo, but more letters to check and more letters to print”, Lemon admonished and held up the two prints as proof:

‘Test’

‘Test 2’

“More important: Sin T’zin can now print in new mood!”, Lemon laughed merrily.

“New mood? What do you mean?”, Noo asked and then wished he hadn’t as Lemon touched a button on the machine, sending the conversation into sonic hell for the third time.

Finally, Noo picked up the third print (‘Test 3’) which was the result of the most morbid session of ‘Cherish the  Love’ so far. Noo was still shaking from the menacing evil voice that had hissed ‘Could me make it through the night?’ at him. He handed it to Lemon and said, “We really have to talk. This machine could bankrupt your company… and please do not test while I tell you a couple of things”

“First: the singing… what do you want to accomplish? It will probably scare the heebyjeebies out of normal people. Nobody will want that”

“Ah, but singing is differentiator…”, Lemon suggested politely.

“Singing will get us thrown out of any serious bid…”, Noo retorted testily, “who says it is a differentiator?”

Lemon looked uncomfortable. “Product managers say”, he finally said and quoted the brochure, “Your employee ratings will rise because heavenly voices (“heavenly???”, shouted Noo) make slave day bright as Sin T’zin 2000 performs high security print”

“High security print…”, Noo mused, looked at Lemon and approached the machine. The ‘Print’ button beckoned him in inviting pink. He pressed it.

The machine roared to life. “Access to [digger digger] restricted!”, it barked and would have squinted at Noo if it could have, “Please insert employed passss!”

At the bottom a hatch opened exposing a small slot…

Noo looked at Lemon perplexed. “You haven’t…”, he stammered.

Lemon smiled broadly. “Yes! High security print!”, he replied proudly, “and we just sell 50,000!”

“To whom?”, Noo gulped.

“Ah, big successss, we sell to American government!”, Lemon beamed, “them start test next week.”

“We have to speak to Vaseline immediately!!!”, Noo croaked, “This could start a global war!!!”

“Yessss…”, Lemon smiled enthusiastically, “You, meeting now!”

Coffee anyone?

Coffee is a brewed beverage prepared from the roasted seeds of the coffee plant, colloquially called coffee beans.

The Hive produces some of the worst coffee known to Mankind. Fortunately, the Hive also makes it close to impossible for Mankind to get this coffee...

- Wikipedia (2017)


Straight from the reception, Noo wandered to the coffee corner. He was still pondering the Goggl Translat. If this was meant to be a Universal Translator, its many glitches and botched translations certainly were introducing a number of communication hazards...

Noo arrived at the coffee corner. Nobody could be seen. At the end of the corridor he could see some da heiwa watch him with their round, unblinking eyes ("expectantly?", Noo thought, puzzled)

He saw the coffee machine and swallowed. It was large, black, looming and slightly sinister... Noo looked for a coffee menu and finally found a small button labelled 'menu'. He pressed it, and almost jumped as the machine came to life with a deep groan.

"Access to [digger digger] restricted", the coffee machine said in a strangely metallic slurred voice, "Stand still". A hatch quickly opened and his photo was taken with a dry click and a blinding flash, then the hatch whirred close again.

"What the...", Noo started, still blinking and disoriented but he was interrupted by the machine.

"Insert employed passsss", it barked and another hatch opened, exposing a slot. For some reason, the slot was at floor level. Noo was too startled to ask any questions, and started to really need a cup of coffee now, so he bent over and inserted his new pass in the slot. It buzzed lightly, then quickly accepted the card and swallowed it.

"Hey! My pass!", Noo shouted and was again cut short by the coffee machine. "Passss no acceptance!", it started humming in a menacing way, "termination imminent..."

"Listen", Noo said, "I just want a cup of coffee..." The menacing hum-hum-hum stopped immediately.
"Please choose 'menu'", the machine said, suddenly very calm. The 'menu' button lit up in an inviting pink color.

"What about my pass?", Noo asked suspiciously, "I really need it..."

The coffee machine ho-hummed and then said solemnly, "Must follow [dogger] proceeds, step uno: coffee, steeep duo: passsss". Noo grinned. Apparently Goggl Translat was deeply embedded in the Hive, and the silly translation errors could be amusing. But they were also becoming quite impractical.

He sighed and clicked 'menu'.

"Access to [digger digger] restricted!", the coffee machine said immediately, "Stand still". Again the photo hatch opened and Noo was blinded yet again as his photo was taken. The hatch whirred close again with a small amused hickup.

"Are you crazy???", Noo shouted, "what's this all about?!". "Insert employed passsss", the machine announced and opened the floor-level hatch again.

"I can't insert my pass, you idiot", Noo retorted, "you already took it!"

The coffee machine seemed to take this into consideration. "You need pass?", it asked.

"Yes", Noo said testily, "you took it away from me..."

"Please state name", it was now back at being large, looming and mechanically official. Noo had the uneasy feeling that this conversation was going into increasingly erratic circles. "Agnew Tudisz", he sighed, but the machine again interrupted. "Please use flowing formant: [latest name], [foist name]", it said and let out a small beep.

Noo struggled to understand, and then thought he did. "Tudisz, Agnew", he said.

"You say 'Tudisz, Agnew', conform?", the coffe machine asked. "Yes", said Noo.

The machine went silent with an occasional ho-hum, as it sorted through the collection of passes it had acquired over the years. "Hello?", Noo asked, "what's happening?"

The machine ho-hummed one more time and then announced, "Passsss no find. Names no match". And it went silent with an annoyed click.

Noo's mouth fell open. "You gotta be kidding!", he exclaimed, "Give me my pass!". He was now really getting irritated. "Oh come one, you have my pass..."

With a tired groan the machine came to life again. "Yes...?", it asked.

"You have my pass, I want it back". Noo was now determined, "Oh, and I want coffee"

"Please choose 'menu'", the machine said, sounding tired suddenly. The 'menu' button lit up in pink again, but it didn't really convince this time.

"No", said Noo firmly, "Give me back my pass first."

The machine groaned and clicked a couple of times, and asked, "Please state name". Noo opened his mouth but then decided not to answer yet. After an interval that was just a bit too long to not answer the question, the machine continued, "Please use flowing formant: [latest name], [foist name]", and beeped again.

"Tudisz, Ag..", Noo started and then realized that this did not work earlier. "Agnew, Tudisz", he corrected quickly. "You say 'Agnew, Tudisz', conform?", the coffee machine asked. "Yes", said Noo.

The machine immediately went into ho-hum mode again, and after a number of minutes whistled. "Find passss", it murmeled, "please enter [digger] covery code". Yet another panel opened, exposing a keyboard with three-thousand thirty-seven different da heiwa characters.

"Are you out of your mind?", Noo almost screamed, "what recovery code? I have never been given a recovery code! And how am I supposed to navigate this alphabet?"

The coffee machine re-asserted itself and started looming again. "Covery code embedded in passss combinatered with biological metricals!", it boomed, "Failing know this mandatorial procedure may result in termination!". It loomed some more and said, "Termination imminent..."

"It's re-co-ve-ry code, you moron!", Noo screamed, "And nobody explained anything when I just got my pass!!! Who approved you getting my biometrics anyway???". He was now positively seething with rage.

The machine found a way to scrape its throat and make itself taller. "Hrmph... please provide biometricians for [latest name] Agnew, [foist name] Tudisz!", it bellowed. Two new hatches whirred open. The first hatch provided fingerprint identification whereas the second hatch provided optical identification. "Please provide biometricious simultaneous", the coffee machine intoned.

Noo looked at the hatches. How was he ever going to do this? The fingerprint identification unit had obviously been built for a da heiwa hand: it hand a thumb and three fingers, and for some reason, the optical unit was about half a meter below the fingerprint unit.

Noo shrugged. "Sod it", he thought, put his hand in the fingerprint unit and bent over to show his eye to the optical identification unit. "Please hold position...", the machine admonished, "this will only take five earth minutes...", and it started singing a rather warped rendition of 'My Way'

"And now, the not-now future end is near,
And so me facial the end-of-now certain."

The machine sang, turning the text into gibberish and the song into a sombre dirge.
After a couple of minutes, Noo started to cramp as the coffee machine moodily concluded:

"Yes, there not-now-past are times, I'm sure you new,
When I bite off more than I [digger digger digger] chew,
But through it all, when there not-now-past is doubt,
I consumer it up and split it out.
I facial it all and I not-now-past stand high
And not-now-past do it myyyyyyyyy road."

Singing stopped abruptly and the machine squeeked politely. "Identify complementary. Helooo Tudisz Agnew. Your passssss covery code is 'の1ア弓23矢区切り点'...please enter in passsss covery consolation"

The keyboard with the three-thousand thirty-seven different da heiwa characters lit up in friendly pink.

"You have 10 earth seconds", the machine advised friendly, "1...2..."

Noo groaned as he got up from his cramped position and wailed, "Listen, I don't know your alphabet, how do you expect me to enter a code I only heard onto...", he looked at the alien configuration in front of him, "...that???"

The coffee machine stopped counting. "Count downward abortion. Please provide biometricians for [latest name] Agnew, [foist name] Tudisz for document covery code for sound impaired", it said. Again the biometric identification hatches opened. "Please provide biometricious simultaneous", it concluded. 

Noo felt like crying. "Why are you doing this?", he shouted, "you already know who I am!"

"High secure coffee, secure must be pushed!", the machine answered, then admonished, "Please provide biometricious simultaneous"

Noo cursed and assumed the position. Immediately the machine started 'My Way', possibly a bit grimmer than before.

After five minutes, the macabre chant stopped and yet another hatch opened. A small piece of paper was spit out.

Noo picked it up and read 'の1ア弓23矢区切り点'

The machine immediately started its count down, and Noo scrambled to find the right keys in the bewildering array of characters.

"8...9...", grumbled the machine threateningly, and Noo pressed the last code character.

The machine blipped and the floor hatch opened. Slowly Noo's pass came out.

"Passss verified. Please take covered passss", the machine said. Noo did. He still needed coffee, now more than ever. Gingerly he pushed the 'menu' button.

"Access to [digger digger] restricted!", the coffee machine said immediately, "Stand still". Yet again the photo hatch opened and Noo was blinded as his photo was taken a third ttime. The hatch giggled and closed.
"Insert employed passsss", the machine went through his routine and opened the floor-level hatch. Noo bent over and inserted his pass. This time the machine let out a small surprised burp and stated, "Identify completely", and was silent for a moment.

Then, on the megalomanical sounds of Strauss's 'Also sprach Zarathustra' ("Where did they get that from?" Noo thought), the front of the machine opened up. Lights shimmered in many colors and Noo was again blinded, this time by the shiny interior which showed an intricate web of tubes which ultimately culminated in a discrete small valve with a cup under it. The machine buzzed as it produced a panel entitled 'MENU' with a single button: 'Coffee'.

Noo pushed it. The machine again broke into the degenerated version of 'My Way' as something came dripping out, one drop at a time.

After 5 minutes, the machine proudly concluded on a "I not-now-past do it myyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy road!"

Noo took the cup and tasted it as the machine closed up and shut down. It was revolting.

Out of nowhere Vaseline appeared. "You like? Is heiwa lastest product! We produce many now, make millions!"

"Huh?", Noo started, "You want to sell this monster here???"

Vaseline interrupted him. "Marketing report is late. Please bring to me today" and he was off.

Noo sighed, shrugged, and took his little cup of ghastly stuff to his desk. He made a mental note to bring a thermos with coffee tomorrow.