Pyramids, crop circles, and even the odd astronaut suit left on the moon: it's fair to say aliens have communicated in some unique ways over the years. But this? This is another level. When our earthly emissary craft, PROUD-69, arrived on the aquatic K2-18 b, nobody anticipated a joke playground rhymed response: 'He who smelled it, dealt it.'
'We were prepared for mathematical equations or diagrams of complex cosmological theories', states Dr. Riley Ambrose of the National Space Association. 'To receive a schoolyard retort... it leaves a fair bit to digest and interprets.'
The PROUD-69's voyage was an eight-year-long venture to explore the exoplanet K2-18 b's possible 'Hycean' nature. First detected by NASA's Kepler telescope in 2015, the planet is almost 8.6 times more massive than Earth, with an element mixture suggestive of a water ocean layered over a frozen underbelly. The telescope's studies were eightfold fewer than Hubble's, yet it revealed similar level of details.
From Professor Viscera, the leading scientist in Xenolinguistics from the University of Astrophysical Anomalies, 'It's an unexpected response. So unexpected that one wonders if the concept of gas-related embarrassment is a universally shared experience, or if we've misinterpreted a deep philosophical musing.'
Ambassador of Badinage, a widely renowned intergalactic humorist, has been called in to help decipher the message: 'I've been analysing Alien sitcoms from 'Andromeda Armpit' to 'Zeta Zombie Zingers', and if this is a representative sample of their humor, then I must say we have not been outwitted. Instead, it looks like aliens have the same questionable humor as Uncle Bob at the family barbecue.'
The Science and Humour Interspace Telemetry group (S.H.I.T) will be conducting a further investigation. 'If this turns out to be the first interstellar practical joke,' says group spokesperson Penny Farthing, 'it will be a landmark in the broad scope of cosmic humor.'
The probe continues to maintain a vigil on K2-18 b, tracking signals and preparing for potential future communications. It seems our guides through this cosmos share something bizarrely human with us. Jokes, it seems, are a universal language.