h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

September came. The big day was at hand. The Sun was barely up in Hong Kong before a very large rocket ship was observed cutting through the sky on its way to the first of its twelve destinations. Mardukian diplomats had spent days negotiating with the United Nations over visitation sites. China, India, and the United States were easy choices, as nearly three billion souls lived in those countries. Monaco and Liechtenstein, on the other hand, had no reasonable hope of seeing the Mardukians, except on television. Countries south of the Equator were also afraid of losing out, but in the end they got visitors in three cities: Sidney in Australia was a no-brainer. In South America, most of the possible choices were on the east coast: Sao Paolo, Buenos Aires, and Rio de Janeiro, with Lima being the only west coast one. Sao Paolo (the largest) was chosen. Rio was fairly close, and Lima was much closer to Sao Paolo than to Buenos Aires. In Africa, Kinshasa (Dem. Repub. of the Congo) edged out Cairo and Lagos because it was south of the Equator.

These details mattered little to the billions who watched by satellite feed as history was made, gifts were traded, and promises were extended.

A few Mardukians stayed behind when the others returned to Marduk. These were specialists who would set up infrastructure for the improvement projects that would reduce carbon in the air, restore billions of hectares of wasteland to green plants, and find biological controls for pests in farmers' fields.

A few seconds before the Mardukian space ship's hatches closed, a gift from Earth to Marduk furtively slithered inside: cockroaches. Both genders.

If it isn't one thing, it's another.

THE END