42
In a time, who knows when, an extremely advanced species known as the Ethereal Beings (say they do not have a definite shape, but in Earth are best known as Rats), that had already solved all mathematical, physical, chemical, and biopsychosocial problems, reached an impasse: they do not have the solution for the Ultimate Question: What is the meaning of life, the universe and everything? That, by the way, seems to have strong tendencies to be answered tautologically.
As they, after all, were the clever beings populating the galaxy, they decided to build a large artificial brain that was entirely dedicated to seek the answer to the Ultimate Question. For this, they dedicated some million years designing and building a large computer, which then called Deep Thought. Its definite shape was not known, but some say that it was represented as a big squared head and something like a mouth and an eye. I think this was the most appropriate way they found to make it look friendly. But this was the least of their problems.
Once finished and “conscious”, the following order was given by the wise Old-Mor to Deep Thought:
— We, the Ethereal, your creators, could not solve the only problem left to us, so we created you to give us the answer to Ultimate Question: “What is the meaning of life, the universe and everything?”
Deep Thought grimaced and said:
— Okay… hence 1 billion years I give the answer…
The elders did not have time to agree. Deep Thought started to roll its eyes, as one who was in a cyber-trance state, and began to gather and analyze a giant’llion of data per second.
During the billion years many relevant facts occurred throughout the galaxy: entire systems were devastated by the draconian flu (imagine, infected people sneezed fire! Now imagine a million people doing it!); stars died, and whole worlds got completely immersed in the darkness (mainly because the galactic government program “Stars for all” had not come to them yet…); a new edition of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy was published; the slugs of Sillyum were taken to the intelligent species category; was the first Inter-systems Contest of Unfunny Jokes; the chimeras of Grotescum invented the wheel, and, of course, the Humans do not existed yet…
Passed all these times, come the Big Day of the most expected announcement by all times, spaces, peoples, races, and governments of the galaxy. For this, the Ethereal, commissioned a planet to the hyperspace engineers of Magrathea, which they named Auditorium, and invited from neighboring species to those that inhabited the farthest reaches of the galaxy, many of which even did not know about the Ultimate Question.
In the Big Day, the planet was crowded of strange, beautiful, natural and artificial beings. It was so crowded that if some specimen provided by legs (or something similar) raised one of them for, say, to scratch the knee (or something similar), would not find no more place to put it back, it would have to watch the announcement on a single leg (or better, on a single leg on the floor at least).
It was a terrible noise when the Wise Elder-Mor’s voice sounded across the planet:
— Beings of all Galaxy*… Is with infinite pleasure, that we receive you from all corners in this great day. The day when we will know the answer to the Ultimate Question.
— Entire civilizations were forged in the hope of this answer, empires were completely overthrown because of it, but only today, for the happiness of the people, we will have it with us…
During a minute the silence fell all over the Auditorium. Only the representatives of a weird and extremely anxious species not more appropriately called Geckos, shook like green cane making a annoying noise that echoed through kilometers, and resembled the sound of a vibrator (Vvvrrrrrrrr!). It’s worth to note that the — were really strange: they had yellowish skin, goggled and “dead” eyes, and were toothy…
Exactly at the end of 60 seconds, the Elder-Mor turned to the Deep Thought, that returned to itself almost immediately, and, without hesitation, asked:
— Oh Deep Thought! What is the answer to the Ultimate Question, which is, What is the meaning of life, the universe and everything? Which we sacredly waited for 1 billion years?
Still half-eyed, Deep Thought took a deep breath and said:
At the same time it was made a deafening noise of voices protesting, shouting, hooting, and crying. The poor Geckos were flabbergasted, and the drool was dripping them. Philosophers representatives of the planet Sophir were disappointed, and one of them shouted “Fallacy! Fallacy!”. To the most conservative of them it was the greatest metaphilosophical scam of all times, for others, however, it was the masterpiece of the Ultrapostmodern Philosophy. The slugs of Sillyum gave a thinly endless little laugh (Hihihihihihi!…). The representatives of the United Planets of the Galaxy protested angry, claiming this was the greatest information censorship ever seen: “this is an attack on democracy!”. They even cogitated a armed invasion to the Ethereal’s dimension, that, by the way, had a unknown model of political organization… Furthermore, the Asteroid Pirate’s syndicate were given in huge laughs saying that this was the best joke ever told. In its turn, the Free Robot’s Federation questioned what was happening: “but, why 42 is not a sensible answer?”
The Elder-Mor made an indescribable expression (even because he was represented by a quantum-relativistic hologram, the most modern at that time, and it was possible to be laughing and crying at the same time…). And, after more 1 minute, facing Deep Thought, shouted:
Deep Thought gave another sigh, this one longer, and then closed its eyes and pulled its mouth left side, and next said:
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