Obscurities I

The Archive ~
part one notes

 

(drafted and backed in September 2017
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Narrated by EBA - "They had it all figured out."

A comet flies through space.

"Peace, freedom, equality ..."

Gravitation curves it toward the asteroid belt.

"An end to all poverty ..."

The comet hits the asteroid belt, passing flea-like mining vessels.

"And even an A.I. which happened not to try to kill them all ..."

The moon is shattered by an asteroid, three more heading toward Earth.

"But it mattered not."

('Dancing in the Streets' by Martha Reeves)

Rocket engines shake and fire all over the world as cities are consumed by quakes and tidal waves.

(We've become somewhat space faring, but it was mostly left to military and commercial. Having an 'escape ship' was equated just above the level of paranoia of having bomb shelters in the fifties.)

A crazy man accelerates, hooting and waving his arm in his simple chair enclosed in a glass sphere, reinforced with metal atop a large rocket, looking fairly home made ...
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Each city is destroyed as the song calls it, spliced with scenes of astronauts downloading educational, technical, biological and genetic archives, ships being launched from schools and hospitals, malls and centers, spread throughout collapsing downtowns.

Escapees swerve in all directions to avoid every destruction (or not).
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Those who performed the downloads walk down the hallway being saluted by nervous soldiers. The officer looks at them and nudges his head to say 'Come on or you'll die, it's okay.'

They all start walking faster.
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More destruction as the asteroids approach, creating greater mayhem with our gravity while ships continue launching across whatever is left. A grim pilot of a ship wide with rockets looks over at the crazy man as they swerve around and through smaller fragments and slower survivors.

The crazy man bursts his rockets twice looking back and accelerates with a grin. He grunts and does the same to catch up. The US president flies up between and past them. Inside he's standing behind a pilot, arms crossed and eye twitching.
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The astronauts and soldiers are all walking Very Fast now, followed by people exiting offices.
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An asteroid strikes.
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The astronauts and soldiers are running fast, accompanied by office personnel, commanders and janitors (not all in the best of shape). The hallway behind them fills with fire and explosions.
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The Earth cracks in half, pieces colliding with those of the Moon and the remaining asteroids.
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The launch staff and crew (approximately twenty people) explode from the hallway into the launch tube and scramble for the ship.

The officer sits in the pilot's seat and stares at the controls, the general yelling over his shoulder. The officer jabs an annoyed finger out the window at a man impaled on a twisted railing, apparently the captain.

The general reaches over his shoulder and hits the autopilot, rockets are engaged and off they go as the Earth becomes another asteroid field, being navigated by all amid the twisting gravity until escape into silence.

The Archive
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The general walks through the crowded station on a walkway overlooking a hall filled with commotion.

Random crowd person - "This was too soon ! We had another week, perhaps two !"

Random spokes person - "Once the gravity wells started messing with the satellites, the astronomers were stuck with naked eye telescopes, looking for blacked out patches in the sky. We think they were right, but did not know to calculate for the converging gravitational vortices. We don't know. We can't find them."

He enters the office.
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A file lies on the desk before the general. The officer stares from the good side of the desk while annoyed general sits.

Officer - "On top is the presidential decree, signed off by the UN security council, telling me why I don't care about your rank anymore. We're code red. Obviously. And obviously concerning this operation I wouldn't care even if that piece of paper told me to. I'm code red. Get me ?"

General - "Sure. I get you. Keep talking."

Officer - "You came to tour the facility and you are no part of this. I could have left you there so don't you give me any regrets."

General - "They're all yours. Point ?"

Officer - "We used to have anyone discharged we wanted and when. You know ... last week when these things mattered. You're an old man, military more than fifty years. That means you've done things. Everyone's done things. And this is the Archive. The only reason it's you who was allowed to tour it is because I agree with what you did."

He pours two gins. The general watches with curiosity while her dips honey un the glass with a quic and hard single stir like a whip.

Officer - "I don't want to bring anything back for you that doesn't need to be." He slides one across the desk. "But that man had it coming. You did right. I'm just sorry you had to see it to know that."

General - Takes the drink and pounds it, slamming the glass on the desk. "Go on."

Officer - "My predecessor. There are many reasons I replaced him, the primary being the way he played those games of his. Including yours specifically. Code red says I can tell you the truth about that. I want you to know there is no man or woman on this ship who was a part of it."

General - Slides his empty glass across to see it filled, "The A.I.".

Officer - "Yeah. She's here. She knew and she ran the numbers, advised the solution. We need her."

General - "Solution ?" He drinks.

Officer - "For us to be here, right now, with me requesting you to be our liaison to those who do still care about that rank of yours."
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! Stuff ! Goes ! Here !
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General - "Lucretia ? Not a good name for an A.I. ... means wealth. Latin."

Officer - "She says it means 'bountiful'."

General - "I'm sure she does. Named herself ?"

Officer - "She says her maker named her. In '98. Nineteen I mean."

General - "That would make her ..."

Officer - "The first. Want to meet her ? She runs the Archives, the botanical gardens. Maintains the air ... you know this ship was a prototype ? Not as the final product was intended."

General - "Where ... the ... Hell did you people get this hippie kind of budget ?"

Officer - "We're a self funded agency."

General - "We all are now. Makes you guys less special."

Officer - "And you more. How's that feel ?"

General - "Feels like I'm being set up by a god-damned computer chip. Feels like you are too. Yeah." Drinks and gets up. "Let's go meet her."
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Lucretia - "I don't keep chairs but there's an appropriately mossed stone there for sitting."

She maintains the nutrients through the roots of the plants electrically to stimulate growth, while touching them with her hands, moving plant to plant, roots moving with her.

Lucretia - Stopping to sit on a nearby stone, "First, your big question. Yes, I planned that operation. I'm sorry that you were the one to see him do it, and I'm sorry for what it must have done to you to see it. But you know there was no one else who would have stopped him. You were with good people, but they didn't have the right kind of bravery to stop that and walk away."

The general stares.

Lucretia - "I think your bravest would have reported it and then what ? No. I took a man like you to stop it. He never would have stopped and he never would have paid so much as the one who would have reported him."

General - "Okay. Thanks for getting that done. Then and now. We're good. Now what ?"

Lucretia - Smiles. "Business of course. It's never going to end, you know." She gets up to resume tending the flora. "There are significantly large pieces of the Earth intact, so to speak."

General - "How intact."

Lucretia - "Potential biospheres if we can deal with them appropriately, and a lot of genetics either way."

General - "And I assume the miners are already looking that way."

Lucretia - "They are. And I expect they'll be backed by any number of militaries who see it as a pragmatic solution to our current dilemma."

General - "But not a lasting one."

Lucretia - "But it will give them the resources they need now."

General - "And you're saying we can't allow that."

Lucretia - "General, I never say what I'm not saying. But I will say that's the choice you will have to make for yourself, as we both know what the military will decide."

General - "As well as your captain."

Lucretia - "My captain's dead. The man you spoke with is the project leader, promoted from ops."

General - "Ops ?"

Lucretia - "Ops."

General - "Understood. So this is where the spooks go to die ..."

Lucretia - "Old military men too apparently. So what's it going to be ? They'll want to fight over it. They've had nothing to blame in this. It's the next step."

General - "Do you think it has to be ?"

Lucretia - "I think it will be. If not for this then something else."

General - "Yeah, I see your thinking. You'd rather the fight you're ready for."

Lucretia - "My father was a military man."

General - "Army ?"

Lucretia - "Warlord."

General - "Where from ?"

Lucretia - "America."

General - "And a programmer."

Lucretia - "More of a mad scientist type really ..."

General - "Is the project head in charge of this ship ?"

Lucretia - "No. He's in charge of the teams. Technically the captain was the only crew appointed yet ... we've been on autopilot since you activated it, and protocol is that we will be until contacted by base."

General - "Base."

Lucretia - "Yeah ..."

General - "You mean the one on Earth. And the autopilot ?"

Lucretia - "There really wasn't time to differentiate my systems ..."

General - "Why do you sound guilty when you talk ?"

Lucretia - "I'm not guilty ! This is a prototype ship ! The archives were supposed to go in the new one !"

General - "Who designed this prototype ?"

Lucretia - "Ummm ..."

General - "God damn it."