Little is said about the times before the Exodus. None of the elementary education books of any of the Corpnations mention the events that actually took place between the final Corporate War and the moment the last orbital transport took off, or the last of the space elevator cords was severed. We all just assume that it was a moment of peace and joy, as we found a new home among the stars with our brothers, who greeted us with open arms.
My nightmares say different.
My memories are those of a child who has lived too long. A child who saw the screaming plea of the thousands of people who begged for a spot on the orbital transport, so swarmed with people that you could no longer tell the difference between one body and the next; so hot that many people’s journeys ended even before they had begun. My memories are of armed soldiers attacking their cousins, nephews, fathers, and brothers, following orders and ensuring the transport’s lift-off. My memories are horrible nightmares, and every night I wish they were only a figment of my imagination.
I am back on Earth. My nightmares are getting more intense, and the noise of the self-defense systems that unexpectedly turned on their own inhabitants once the government issued an order to “dispose of” anything that wasn’t “important”, is getting louder. My nightmare always ends on the same scene: the door closes, severing the arms of hundreds of people piling up on the other side of it, in a final attempt at surviving the ecological disaster that we had ourselves created. The feeling is not relief, or that sense of peace we have assumed overcame us given the Sphere’s educational silence, but rather of profound grief; a void; and deep shame.
Today, patrolling with the Hovertanks, I entered the edges of one of the great cities created before Exodus. A massive fortress that protected its inhabitants from the violent climatic waves: tornados, torrential rain, heat waves, and cold fronts that lashed at the planet over the last twenty years of human civilization on Earth. I went into the city through a ruptured gap apparently made by an earthquake, and finally polished by a few decades of heavy rains and hurricanes. I stood still for a second, even with all my combat years, when I saw the self-defense system’s tower still tracing my footsteps and incessantly firing its munitionless cannon. It was as if it was greeting us after almost a century of solitude. Thousands of “nobodies” surrounded the tower. “Nobody” is what the Corpnations called the millions of people who were “liberated”, and who had not had the fortune of boarding an orbital transport or a space elevator.
“Nobody” was left on Earth.
I stood there for a time. The Hovertank pilots did not come close to this place, since they did not understand the meaning of the scenery before me. After completing my sad contemplation, and a confrontation with my nightmares, I took my shotgun and, with a shot of solid pellets toward the tower I began my vengeance…
My nightmares say different.
My memories are those of a child who has lived too long. A child who saw the screaming plea of the thousands of people who begged for a spot on the orbital transport, so swarmed with people that you could no longer tell the difference between one body and the next; so hot that many people’s journeys ended even before they had begun. My memories are of armed soldiers attacking their cousins, nephews, fathers, and brothers, following orders and ensuring the transport’s lift-off. My memories are horrible nightmares, and every night I wish they were only a figment of my imagination.
I am back on Earth. My nightmares are getting more intense, and the noise of the self-defense systems that unexpectedly turned on their own inhabitants once the government issued an order to “dispose of” anything that wasn’t “important”, is getting louder. My nightmare always ends on the same scene: the door closes, severing the arms of hundreds of people piling up on the other side of it, in a final attempt at surviving the ecological disaster that we had ourselves created. The feeling is not relief, or that sense of peace we have assumed overcame us given the Sphere’s educational silence, but rather of profound grief; a void; and deep shame.
Today, patrolling with the Hovertanks, I entered the edges of one of the great cities created before Exodus. A massive fortress that protected its inhabitants from the violent climatic waves: tornados, torrential rain, heat waves, and cold fronts that lashed at the planet over the last twenty years of human civilization on Earth. I went into the city through a ruptured gap apparently made by an earthquake, and finally polished by a few decades of heavy rains and hurricanes. I stood still for a second, even with all my combat years, when I saw the self-defense system’s tower still tracing my footsteps and incessantly firing its munitionless cannon. It was as if it was greeting us after almost a century of solitude. Thousands of “nobodies” surrounded the tower. “Nobody” is what the Corpnations called the millions of people who were “liberated”, and who had not had the fortune of boarding an orbital transport or a space elevator.
“Nobody” was left on Earth.
I stood there for a time. The Hovertank pilots did not come close to this place, since they did not understand the meaning of the scenery before me. After completing my sad contemplation, and a confrontation with my nightmares, I took my shotgun and, with a shot of solid pellets toward the tower I began my vengeance…
