The Human Condition

So great was the Human greed that it mined the Sun, supposedly safe in the knowledge that it wouldn’t do anything to the creator and nurturer of themselves. But once they had started, they couldn’t stop and the delicate balance was crushed by outside intervention. They had plenty of warning, of course. Enough time to build a fleet of colony worlds to house the soon to become 9 billion refugees. It was the first of January 0 years After Departure when the ships all ignited their engines and slowly walked, then ran, then sprinted away from their terrible doom and guilt. Each ship spun to create gravity, and for people living on the surface, the sky was the bright green fields on the other side. The Armada was aimed at a nearby star system where we would set up a new world. But we had brought along a stowaway. Greed was travelling with us.

He collapsed to the floor. His heart, beating for over 200 years, now terribly and utterly silent. Death was swinging in. Ready to snatch the life of one more Human. He rolled on the floor. Not panicking. Not fretting. He had been waiting his whole life for this. He looked with dimming eyes out into space. Aging and Death were not the Human Condition. They were part of his life. Greed was though, a purely Human invention, which would control them for the rest of their existence. The Human Condition could never die.

All he could see now were those intoxicating blue eyes again. Brighter and brighter. He fell towards them and then into them . . .

© Andrew McIntosh 2003