This one took even me by surprise.
Writing comedy was a task that for long I felt I was unequal to. Translating humour to the flat page is a daunting task for most of us. Usually it involves a lot of gesticulation, silly voices, and the occasional intake of alcohol, to make us funny.
But, in this case what it took was a promising premise – an alien lands on earth and is then immediately recruited to standing for elections! That’s how my comic sci-fi political satire novella Cosmic Ballot came to be.
Like The Renunciants (my lit-fic novel manuscript), this too is unpublished and waiting for the day some publisher will see value in printing it. Here is an excerpt.
“I just got off the phone with Kaptan’s secretary, and things are still at a stalemate between us.” Mago slumped in his chair and reached for his drink. “So, first thing tomorrow morning I’m submitting my resignation.” There was a palpable tone of loss in his voice.
Artufrie didn’t like seeing his friend like this, but he also wasn’t sure of the correct protocol at these times. Once earlier, when he had tried showing sympathy, he had put his head on Mago’s lap, like he’d seen dogs do on TV. Needless to say the reaction from Mago had been veritably unsympathetic.
“The path is now clear,” Mago continued after a few swigs, “for you and to get this party started.”
“Phweeeee.” Artufrie blew his party horn, but stopped when he saw Mago’s face. “Did I do something wrong again?” he asked tentatively.
Mago smiled indulgently, “No, Artu, you actually got it quite right. This is the right time for celebration.” He held up his glass and said, “To new beginnings.” Not knowing what this meant, Artufrie copied Mago and repeated, “To new beginnings.” They clinked their glasses and Mago took another sip. “This is one damn fine Margarita.” Artufrie had surrendered his resolve to avoid alcohol after tasting margaritas for the first time.
A few glasses later, Mago was slurring his words. “Dish world is a dam darty plesh. You can’t trusht anyone here. No one!” Artufrie, meanwhile, had stuck seventeen plastic straws into one another to make one long straw, and was trying to sip his drink from across the room. “This is why I love you, Arthufufry. You don’t make me nervoush. You’re the only one I can trusht becaush you aren’t from thish world.”
Artufrie struggled to talk with the straw in his mouth. “I’m with you, boss. From the beginning I’ve seen a mix of pragmatism and long-term vision in you that raises you above most of your ilk. You are building something matchless and bold, which your old companions cannot.”
Mago became emotional and tears welled up in his eyes. “See, this is what I mean. In just a few days you have seen qualities in me that others haven’t even in years. I’m an utterly wasted little boy, Artu. When I was in college, my final year project was, quite appropriately, a launch plan for a fictitious new political party. It was my pride and joy at that time, and earned me the Chancellor’s Medal. But, when I joined the party, I never got to try out my ideas in the real world. Nobody wanted to change. Eventually it was wiped off my mind, as well. And, I hadn’t even thought about it in the last eight or ten years, until the day Kaptan treated me like scum and removed me from my offices. Since then, old memories have been re-ignited, my claws have started coming out. Oh Artu, Artu, I feel like a young lion prowling the savannah again.”
Having drawn that picture, Mago slid off his seat, got on his hands and knees, and started roaring like a sulking carnivore at the far end of a vegan buffet line. The whiney noise made Artufrie choke on his drink, sending margarita dripping out of his nose and toppled the whole setup. Nonplussed, Mago tromped all over the floor, including the place where Artufrie’s broken glass was scattered. In his stupor he didn’t feel any of the glass getting embedded deep in his knees. That was a problem for the morning after. The lion continued on his prowl to the cabinet, where he used his paws to throw down some books and framed photos, before revealing a spiral-bound dissertation at the back. Mago picked it up in his mouth and sauntered back to Artufrie and dropped it in his lap.
Artufrie held it up to the light and read the title aloud, “Old Wine in a New Bottle: A Plan for Launching a New Party with an Old Agenda. By Mago Maga, Final Year, MA Entire Media Studies and Some Political Science”. He looked at Mago who had fallen asleep with his head on Artufrie’s lap. “This is very impressive,” he said as he flipped the pages with one hand and patted Mago with the other. “Good boy. Who’s a good boy? You’re a good boy.” Mago smiled a warm and fuzzy smile, in his sleep, and pissed himself. Artufrie picked up the sleeping, cuddly lion and put him on his bed, after laying down some newspapers. Then he went to his own room and read the dissertation through the night.
—
Artufrie was ready and waiting at the table at breakfast time. He was mostly done with the fried eggs and juice when Mago finally stumbled in. He had on dark glasses and looked like he’d been violently sick. The instant Artufrie’s fork scraped his plate slightly Mago recoiled. “Not so loudly,” he admonished, and immediately regretted hearing his own loud voice. Artufrie put aside his cutlery and tried eating the runny yolk with his hands.
“Aren’t you feeling well?” Artufrie asked, with yellow goo running down his mouth.
“Hungover,” groaned Mago.
“Ah!” replied Artufrie, and nodded with a lot of sympathy, though he had no idea what that meant. He lowered his voice to a whisper, “I went through your entire project. It’s really very comprehensive. You have everything ready, right from what our party should be named, to ‘Five Rallies to Clinch Any Election’. This is the whole shebang.”
“That’s my manual. Your instructions. I’m going to show that obese oaf Kaptan and his men what a real strategist can do. You and I together will steal the elections away from him in the next three months. Mark my word.”
While they were talking the cook came in with a tall glass for Mago that smelt of coffee, raw eggs, and mango. “Morning After Special, sir,” he said to Mago as he placed it before him. Mago pinched his nose and drank the entire glassful in one go. Then he put his head down on the table and the cook started counting down the seconds from ten.
“Ten… nine… eight… seven… six… five… four… three… two… one…”.
With that Mago suddenly convulsed and jumped on to his feet. Like Superman emerging from a phone booth he took the dark glasses off and stood akimbo. “Sriharikota, we have lift-off.” The cook nonchalantly took the glass away, knowing his job was done, while Mago moonwalked across the room.
“That man can burn all the toast he wants,” Mago said to an utterly bewildered Artufrie, “but he sure knows how to mix a hangover cure.” After a few more moonwalks around the room, a sweaty Mago sat back down next to Artufrie. “Now on to more important matters – can you tell me how these shards of glass found their way into my knees?”
“You said you were a lion in the savannah.”
“Ah, got it.” Mago called the cook back, who came in this time carrying iodine and gauze. The lion got his first aid, howling loud enough to scare the monkeys on the trees outside.
“Moving on, if I remember correctly, the party name I proposed in the dissertation was the Common Reform and Aspiration Party. You see there’s an aura of democracy and love of the common people in the name itself. The public loves that, it makes them feel safe to think that the most important people in any nation are the commoners.”
This sounded very reassuring to Artufrie. “That’s exactly how we think as well. Back on my planet, the common people are the backbone. In fact, the administration thinks of themselves as the ones who serve the people, not rule them.”
“There you go, you know how it is. A name like that is like water on the mortar and pestle, makes it easier to grind the grain. The next thing we want is a catchy agenda. You remember where that is in my dissertation?”
“I think so.” Artufrie turned the pages till he found it. “Here it is: Military – Economy – Honesty.”
“You know why I chose those?”
“Oh yes, that’s what I love about it. It’s a vision of independence and self-sufficiency. Multifarious forms of security that assures everyone of a happier tomorrow. Such bliss.”
“Well, sure, I guess you could see it like that, but only if you’re a total novice. Tell me, if I offered you a job as a factory foreman, or one as a policeman, which would you choose?”
“All other things like salary being the same?” asked Artufrie.
“Yes.”
Artufrie tried thinking like an earthling. “Well, I suppose the policeman’s job.”
This was the answer Mago wanted. “You’ve got it. They want the baton. And, similarly also the wallet, and the self-righteousness. Triple threat to wave over everyone else. That’s why Military-Economy-Honesty is such a powerful mover. Everyone wants to feel like they are being led by Darth Vader, wearing shiny black helmets, endowed with Death Stars. People dream of power. Ruthless, indiscriminate power.”
All this sounded a lot more violent and vindictive than Artufrie was expecting. “What about Honesty? That’s not about power, is it?”
“Oh my dear extra-terrestrial Bambi, that’s the most powerful of all. Honesty is the part that makes even the worst among us sleep a sound sleep at night. To tell yourself and the world that what you’re doing has nothing but good intentions is the panacea for all the pains of morality. If we are honest, we are never wrong. And if we are never wrong, then everything we do is for the good of others. So if Honesty is in our DNA from ancient times, then as a race we are destined to rule the entire world. It’s our duty to tell everyone how much better we are than them.”