To Be Human
Author : Gerard Hutchings
When they arrived, they offered to restore the earth’s atmosphere, removing pollutants, reducing greenhouse gases, restoring ozone. In exchange they just wanted to settle on Mars. How could we refuse? After three years they had terraformed Mars and built many habitations.
Next they offered to take all our homeless, poor and terminally ill and those of their families who wanted to go with them. They settled them on Mars. They also wanted the asteroid belt and would throw in cleaning up our waterways and oceans. They removed the asteroid debris, built five planetoids and filled the interior with life and more habitations. These they offered to the overpopulated and crowded.
As part of the resettlement people were taught the culture and values of our visitors. All those off earth seemed to be living happy and content lives. They lived side by side with the beauty of nature, enjoyed a healthier lifestyle with less disease and illness, and had jobs that were exciting and relied on their imagination and real skills. The aliens imparted their knowledge freely to all those they resettled.
Slowly other planets and moons were colonized by the people of earth and eventually the changes were also made to earth. The high rises disappeared and there was more wildlife and vegetation. No animals or insects ever attacked humans again. It was this more than anything else that made people wonder if some form of technology was employed to also sedate mankind. For some reason the rich and powerful had not been able to hold onto their old ways. Perhaps because those who they relied on had simply left themselves.
The big project now was building interstellar ships similar to those of the aliens. We would travel away from Sol together to bring the same benefits to other systems and their inhabitants.
As we set forth with our alien friends I still wonder, have we lost our individuality. It certainly doesn’t feel like that, although we no longer seem capable of doing wrong by others. Perhaps we have just regained the humanity we should have had all along.
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