Alistair, 

A friend of mine asked me to take care of a package for him. Naturally, I said yes. There is now a very large crate in my living room. At first, it was fine, but after the first few hours, the crate began making groaning sounds followed by panicked grunts and repeated pounding. I know that I promised to take care of this for my friend, but honestly I feel like I should just put it out in the hall where the noise won’t be so annoying. Is this abandoning my responsibility to my friend?  

Wearing Ear Plugs in Quebec 

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Ear Plugs, 

Your friend is either crate-shipping a live human being (there aren’t a lot of non-evil reasons for doing this) or is a secret god testing to see if the world is going to get a new round of punishments for not learning their lesson about opening boxes they get handed. Either way, approach the situation very delicately.

If your friend is a god – indicated by having godly abilities, preternatural good fortune, divine appearance, and an ego larger than small countries – do not open the box, and make it abundantly clear you did not. He’ll be disappointed but that’s only because he’s incredibly petty.

If he is not a god – indicated by not having those things (though the ego may still be around) – then you probably have some poor soul trapped in the box. Ask your friend to explain the situation in good faith, making it abundantly clear that you really hope he’s a government agent working to take down morally dubious enemies.

Alistair