A Crappy Idea [FICTOID]

“This photograph depicts every act of defecation that has ever happened,” said the king proudly.

The ministers reacted in horror.  The photograph was huge, filling an entire wall of the court.  It looked like a huge smear of brown with a few tan and dark green streaks thrown in.

“Why -- for the love of all that’s sweet and holy -- would you want such a thing?” the prime minister asked, belatedly throwing in, “Your majesty.”

The king did not pick up on this breach of court etiquette.

“Precisely because nobody else would,” the king said. 

There’s a damn good reason for that, the prime minister thought before saying out loud, “Why do you perceive it necessary to commission such a work?”

“Because I want to leave something unique behind when I go to my heavenly reward,” said the king.

The prime minister had an opinion on that but wisely kept it to himself.

“If I may enquire,” the prime minister said, “how much did this photo cost?”

“Well, that’s the thing,” said the king.  “It’s not really a single photo, it’s a mosaic made up of several trillion images.”

“How much did it cost?” said the prime minister, gaining an inkling of the financial disaster looming ahead of them.

“And it’s not really a photo,” said the king.  “Every pixel is actually a composed AI image, so there’s a lot of computing power involved.”

“How much?”

“There are trillions of micro images in there,” said the king.  “When you amortize the cost it isn’t so bad. Really.”

“How much?”

“Well, I had to sell off a few royal estates,” said the king.  “Plus a few of my boats.”

“Which boats?”

“Just the ones in the royal navy.”

“You sold the navy?”

“It’s not as if we had any sailors left.  After all, I reallocated the defense budget to this project, so no more soldiers’ and sailors’ pay.

“And I closed the hospitals to save cash, discharging all the staffers.”

“What happens if somebody gets sick?”

“I hadn’t thought of that.”

“You’re mad,” said the prime minister.

“No, actually I feel happy and quite good about myself.”

“There will be repercussions for this.”

“Oh, piffle,” said the king.

. . .

Later, after their long time rival neighbor invaded and took over the country, sending the old government to the chopping block, the king belatedly realized it might not have been that good an idea.

© Buzz Dixon