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Good News for People Who Like Bad News
01-18-24
Dear False Positive Readers,
This is Ashley Walton, Mikeās sister and editor of False Positive. I have really terrible, awful news and a tiny bit of good news.
You might have noticed itās been a couple years since weāve posted anything on this website. Well, brace yourself for the saddest update Iāll ever share.
I’m gonna guess ‘no.’
And he’s screwed
Mmm.. so it’s a Pentagram, a David’s Star and The Unholy Symbol of N’zuul, “The Devourer of Souls”.
My first thought with his test was “Red balls? Test space shaped roughly like a pentacle? How peculiar!” Now given their apparent interest in the five pointed and six pointed stars, I’m thinking they’re either intergalactic satanists seeking kindred souls, or intergalactic Inquisitionists seeking sinners to redeem. The black- colored communication sphere does not bode well either way.
Oh good. He passed the test. What sort of rewards are in store for him now, I wonder.
Flying Spaghetti Monster 1: It has scriven the forbidden pointy shapes!
Flying Spaghetti Monster 2: It must be purged!
god im never going to look at them the same again,,,
Clearly this is going to end well
Reds are at the low end of the spectral line. The black may just be too deep into the infrared for him to see, but even then it would be hard for the aliens to see as well b/c everything at this temperature glows in infrared already, so even if it’s IR it still may still indicate “lights out”. Which is unlikely to be happy, unless it’s just a really awkward silence.
The pentacle was the obvious test he failed (it would have been my first go tbh, but I tend to die more frequently than most). That and the other two seem to have some significance one would suggest they’re looking for someone who understands their significance.
But why? Wait, these guys don’t think they reincarnate into other beings in order to redeem themselves from past life transgressions…? Telepathic pheasant guy may have known what was going on and intentionally failed the exam I suspect.
Either way religion and aliens is a sure-fire prescription for Good End!
š Right?
D:
Oh, and one more thing: I don’t think this is too far in the future. Space chimp and human somewhat preserved enough to reconstruct, and the human having what I’d guess to be a mathematics or engineering degree implies likely early space flight. Also I hate to think how spidercreepy managed to get into space, but maybe Barbarian just rolled five twenties in a row.
I’m betting the magic word was “my” given the words the friendly telepath was sending on the previous page (great effect!)
Yeeeah, ape dude, that screen is way too crowded. Your powerpoint skills need work!
One has to admit this guy managed some pretty impressive sketches with just his zipper. Srsly, lookit them spirals.
And yeah, if we read the color language top to bottom, all the comments on his drawings go from red(-ish) to black. Veeeery probably not something to feel super comfortable about.
oh, and I just thought of something. Are they trying to find intelligent species to check if they “know god”? Are they looking for god’s presence throughout the universe? Enforcing it?
Naaaaah, no one would go that much out of their way just to impose their religious views on someone they’ve never met.
Don’t discount the string. The string allows for circles. The golden spiral is made with a series of quarter circles dividing rectangles into successive squares over and over into infinity. Ļ, the golden ratio.
It’s still impressive.
He lucked out with the many layers of paint on the floor allowing for convenient carve drawing.
I’m trying to figure out what he was drawing when he got “danger.” is it a star?
His drawings are a hell ass better than what I could do with a pulled apart zipper and a suspiciously soft floor. Maybe the aliens are just as impressed as I am?
Maybe they are just mad because he didn’t draw a triforce among all those pentagrams?
Ahhhhhh I’m going to explode with curiosity!!!
Here are some theories – if you go back and look at the original test, the dots form two five pointed stars, one big and one smaller inverted one. When they disapproved, they all broadcast white and sent him to the cell. So maybe black is approval that he’s closer now with the starry shapes.
In the telepathic message you can see blurred words like DEATH, NATION (maybe?), OTHER and RELIGION, possibly telepathic word searches as the alien tries to find a relatable word-concept in our hero’s head. Maybe it implies the aliens worship death and resurrection.
So maybe they’ll:
– Take this as a sign that he continues to be their messiah and sacrifice-kill him horribly, then bring him back to life so he can do it all over again.
– Worship him in some way that he wants to escape from – which is why he was in a spacesuit and outside the ship – and forcibly bring their “god” back inside and revive him so they can continue worshiping him.
Or – my first theory is completely backwards, and they’re zealots forcing conversion on other species. If you show the wrong symbol/idea/religious concept, they kill you, then bring you back for another chance at “redemption”. Possibly the test was to prove he didn’t know about the “wrong” religious ideas any more, so white was approval that he was making progress – but then his redrawing the “bad” symbols means it’s time for purification – he hasn’t learned.
Or he was an astronaut turned vampire staked through the heart.
(I’m also wondering if they worship Christ the “Redeemer” in their own alien way.)
I am probably completely wrong on all counts, because the author is brilliant and it’s killing me waiting to find out. š
Man, everybody’s a critic!
Huh? Critic? Or overimaginative conspiracy theorist? š
i think he was talking about the aliens. š
Ohhh, gotcha. š They’re probably the intergalactic equivalent of hipsters. “I was into the Dark Stareater Bel’shamarhoth before he went all mainstream.”
If the aliens view pentagrams as sacrilegious, they might just as easily use the same traditional light-dark symbolism as humans. White is unity and completeness; black is the absence of all the colors, nothingness. The aliens respond with white after the first test because the subject was pure and passed the test. They’re responding with black now because he’s impure.
If the story continues in that direction, I wonder less about the subject’s fate and more about what the aliens might have in store for the rest of humanity.
the story is told from the man’s perspective, and this is false positive so we probably won’t get all the answers
White could be “Yes” and black “No” or vice versa.
White is when all colours combined.
black is the absense of colour.
thats why most logically(like Calling White people people of colour is logical since its all colours combined and black is absense of it) they are sensing danger from him due to symbols representing a lack of colour.
Alien #1: We are looking for people who like to draw. You have proven worthy to take the Famous Artists Correspondence Course.
Alien #2: You have rendered the profane sigils that are anathema to the Pastafarian faith! You will be sent to our God for judgement. Still, that isn’t too bad. We have found that He loves those we send to Him so much that He refuses to give them back.
Alien #3: Look at what you did to our floor! Just look at it! Who’s going to clean up that mess? Not me!
They are probably wondering if it’s too late to put the pipe back in and drop him off back where they found him. š
White ought to mean ‘Anything’, therefore, put human in holding cell for further investigation. Black would mean ‘I/we don’t know, can’t determine, no information.’ The other alien, communicating telepathically, is warning about the intentions of the Redeemers (as previously speculated here).
anyone notice that on page 12 their eyes were white after seeing the results of his “test” does that mean he did what they wanted if theopposing black is assumed to be displeased?
If zealots, the culture might revolve around the religion and black and white might be religious terms.
Or just the binary, positive and negative for the results they are seeking. Maye they got a false positive result. š
I don’t hink I like the aliens’ tone they’re using…
These aliens remind me of the Octopuses in Children of Ruin – Adrian Tchaikovsky. Which is really cool since the book came out like 6 years after this comic.