A Problem of Etiquette

Everyone thought the aliens would be friendly. As humankind pushed out into the solar system, and then leapt out after someone finally managed to invent a lightspeed drive, they kept on sending out long-range probes, throwing out signals, announcing their presence on every wavelength known. In retrospect, that was a mistake.

It all started when an android from the Andromeda Cluster dropped in to see that these new arrivals in the galaxy next door were all about. The android strolled into the outermost Pleiades colony, found itself in what appeared to be a drinking establishment, and naturally asked for one. “A Streamwater Surprise, please,” it said. It had of course done a basic scan of human language models beforehand.

“Right,” said the barman, “That’ll be 2 creds.”

“Thank you,” the android said, producing a two-credit card from its pocket and handing it to the barman. It paused, waiting to be handed its libation.

The barman stood with the two-credit card, looking back and forth from it to the android, a look of expectation on its face. The android ran the situation through its language models and preliminary scans. “I’ll be at the booth,” it said, making a slight bow, and turning to walk away.

Ordinarily the barman wouldn’t have done this, even if a customer were rude, he felt it his duty as a barman to overlook the matter and serve up the drinks. Besides, he could always complain to the sympathetic ears of his regulars and they were sure to make it up. Nonetheless, something bothered him about the man. He couldn’t put it into words if he’d been asked, but he had a vague sense of something inhuman. And he didn’t like it.

“Excuse me,” he said, a touch louder than he needed to, “Haven’t you forgotten somethin’?”

The android turned, puzzled. It had made its order and paid. By the android’s analysis all that remained was the drink, which the barman had not yet begun preparing. “No,” it said in some bewilderment. “Have you?”

The barman took great offense to this, but he felt unable to express his outrage in suitable words, so he just made a dismissive “Pah!” noise and began fixing the drink. Unfortunately for humanity, there were several of his regulars in the place that night. One of them had overheard the whole thing and he also took offense.

“Hey, you!” he said, grabbing the android’s arm. “Don’t you know better than-”

What happened next was the fault of a colony of tentacled beings entire systems away, a fact which would never be known to anybody. These tentacled beings had gotten into a legal dispute amongst themselves and settled it using combat droids, as one does, only they’d relaxed the safety protocols. The result was a lot of smashed robots and a lot of expense, until they’d asked the manufacturer to tighten up the protocols. That settled things right up and turned the dispute into a lengthy stalemate, but more importantly the manufacturer put the protocols in place for all of its creations, including this particular android. Thus when the random human being in the bar seized hold of its arm, the android immediately flipped over to Battle Mode. The arm in question emitted a disintegration pulse that vaporized the human and half the bar with it.

Things deteriorated from there. A century later, after the Pleaides Wars and the rise of the Android Imperium, as the human survivors scattered throughout the few systems left to them, very few if any knew how it had started.

One thing they remembered, however, one rule that became a law among their people.

Always tip your bartender.

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This story is a follow-up to Wrecks.