Author : Clint Wilson, Staff Writer

The survival group, pulled from Earth by the alien craft mere hours before the cataclysmic solar event scrubbed the planet clean of all life, were still in absolute shock.

Some seven hundred refugees, huddled together in the large hold, listened as the alien with the round grey head spoke to them. “We have been monitoring your evolution for millennia via worm-cam. We can show you recorded images of any point in your history.” He motioned to a large wall, which suddenly blurred into a view screen.

The crowd murmured in awe as footage of prehistoric people hunting, gathering, creating fire and tools, was displayed before them for some time.

Then they were treated to actual images of great historical figures of their race. Gilgamesh, a fierce barbarian, as was Attila The Hun, Cleopatra, actually quite beautiful despite the rumors, and the great Julius Caesar! Folks whispered that he was taller and slenderer than any of them had imagined.

On and on the mesmerizing real life images went, until one man jumped up and shouted, “What about Jesus? I want to see Jesus!”

A few others scoffed at this crazy person with his ancient ideals. One woman snickered, “Who cares? Even if he existed he was only a man.”

The grey-headed alien cut them off. “Here he is if you should so desire.” The entire crowd skeptics alike shushed and stared at the black-haired, brown-skinned man walking across the desert in his flapping robes. The alien continued, “It’s true he was a human male, but we admit to tampering with him.” The people stared in sudden disbelief. “His message was really quite simple, implanted by us. But your kind were too savage to enact his ideals. Even those who claimed to follow him were mostly flawed.”

“I was not,” said the man who had originally jumped up. “I followed his ideals.”

“Yes, for the most part you did Tom Douglas. And that is why you are here.”

The man registered surprise. “You know my name?”

“Of course we do. Just like we know Mohamed Hassan over there who spent his life trying to follow the ideals of the prophet with whom he shares a given name, also influenced by us, and again misread by most who claimed to follow him.”

The Middle Eastern man looked back at Tom Douglas and said, “Good for you brother. Peace and tolerance is the only true path.”

Then a black teenage girl chimed in, “I’m not religious at all. So what do you make of that?”

The grey tilted his head lovingly. “It matters not Marsha Wilson that you followed a religion or not. Tell me Miss, to how many animals have you been cruel?”

“Why, none of course!”

“And how many times have you lied to achieve gain, monetarily or otherwise, over another person?”

“Well, none really ever… I guess.”

“I could go on but I think everyone here is getting the idea.” The seven hundred men, women and children looked at one another nodding slowly, many with tears in their eyes. For they all knew “generally” good folks who were not amongst them.

The grey went on. “There was only room for this many, and we had to act quickly. So here you are. And for those of you who still practice religion, now might be a time to thank your deity for giving you the sense to be true to the universe throughout your lives. Without this good sense there would be no hope for the human race… and we would have left you all to burn in the global apocalypse.”