Original Design

by William Latoria

  The tall alien shook its head, “No, little one, you did not evolve from anything other than your original design. You originally looked like this.” it said, as it held out its hand. Before him appeared a miniature version of the aliens themselves, miniature when compared to the aliens anyway. The image before him was easily ten feet tall, with skin as black as the aliens’ and as barrel chested as the alien producing the image. The body was far smoother and more streamlined than the aliens’ bodies were, which was one of the more noticeable differences between them. The chest jutted out more prominently than the aliens’ or even a human’s would, and the face was featureless, with just two eyes and a mouth. Where the nose should have been was a thin, vertical slit about two inches long. As the image imitated breathing, the slit would widen to allow air to flow in and out. Where ears should have been, were perfectly round holes, no bigger than a nickel. Thick flaps of skin attached to the either side of the image’s head, draped over the ear holes, and as Blackshade watched, he saw the image bring the flaps over the ear holes, sealing them. Like the aliens, the thing before him had no reproductive organs to speak of, no nipples or belly button, and was completely hairless. As the image spun around, Blackshade saw it had an anus, just like the aliens. Unlike the aliens however, it had no tail, only four fingers on each hand, and no toes. The feet of the thing were slightly wider than a human’s foot was now, but it was one solid mass of flesh. Where the toes would be was just a solid ridge of flesh and tendons. Blackshade found the figure both disturbing, and uncomfortably familiar.

  “This… this is what we looked like originally?” he asked, disturbed. When the alien nodded, Blackshade shook his head, “Impossible. We would have found some proof of that. In the soil, fossils. There’s no way we came from something like this and don’t know it.” he said defiantly.

  “No, there would not be any record of it in the soil little one.” the alien corrected him, “When we deposited you here we did so en masse. Along with billions of tons of other, obsolete life forms, failed experiments, and waste. Anything left from that time would have blended together as it biodegraded and then been broken down into its baser elements, leaving behind no trace.”

  Blackshade shook his head, “Bullshit. I don’t believe you.” he said, rejecting everything the alien was telling him, “If I’m a machine prove it. If you created my race prove it. I don’t believe you!” he said, clinging to the hope the aliens were lying to him. What bothered him more than anything was that something deep down inside of him was telling him the alien was telling him the truth.

  The alien looked somewhat taken aback by this, “Prove it? I would have thought the proof was obvious.”

  “Obvious how?!” Blackshade asked.

  “Well, to begin, how do you think you are suddenly able to speak with me? When we first arrived, you could not understand me, and now you can. What makes this possible if you are not a machine?” the alien asked.

  Blackshade was ready for this, “Your technology is far superior to ours, that’s what’s obvious. My people have universal translators too, just not as sophisticated as yours. Humans have known for a long time that our brains function similarly to a computer’s processor. You must have technology that can upload things into our heads, that’s all.” he said contrarily.

  The aliens looked irritated, “Explain to me your readouts then. What living creature has a readout display?”

  Blackshade was once again confused, “A what? What display?” he asked, looking down at his tissue ware. It was currently in standby mode and had no active displays running. “What are you talking about?”

  The taller alien looked angry at this, and Blackshade thought he may have gone too far with his insolence. The shorter alien walked up again and spoke quietly to the taller one, only this time, Blackshade could hear every word it said. “They do not know. They cannot see the readout. They must not be able to see in that spectrum anymore.”

  A sick feeling formed in his stomach; he wasn’t sure he liked the sound of this.

  The tall alien looked at him again, but instead of anger, he saw pity on its face. “I think you are right.” the alien agreed, as it pointed at him again. Blackshade knew what was going to happen, and he didn’t bother trying to fight it. He felt an odd prickling numbness wash over his head again, only instead of his forehead itching, his eyes began to itch instead. It didn’t take long for the sensation to pass.

  “Look at your fellow humans, little one. You will see what I am talking about.” the taller alien said gently.

  Apprehensively, not sure what he was going to see, Blackshade did as the alien suggested. Affinity had curled up into fetal position on the ground and was now rocking back and forth mumbling to herself. Yoshi, who was still unconscious, lay perfectly still with his forehead exposed. On his forehead, clear as day, was a readout similar to the old fashioned computer displays of the 1970’s. Green letters ran across Yoshi’s forehead, displaying the words, ‘Shut down due to sensory overload’. The words were in perfect English and ran across Yoshi’s forehead in a font that was an exact match to the default font used by the first home computers. Blackshade was about to ask the aliens for clarification, when a new string of words appeared on Yoshi’s forehead, ‘Functionality will be regained in eleven minutes’.

  Blackshade’s jaw dropped. He looked past the civilians and towards Zahera and the Air Soldiers watching from their defensive positions. He couldn’t read what was being displayed on their foreheads, but every one of them had glowing green letters projecting from their foreheads. The evidence couldn’t be ignored.

  “How is this possible?” was all he could muster.

  The aliens seemed to understand. “Please, little one, let me explain. I know this is not easy to accept. I cannot imagine what you must be going through, but maybe an explanation will help you better understand all of this and help your fellow automatons understand as well.” the taller alien said sympathetically.

  Blackshade looked up at the alien and nodded dumbly, “It definitely couldn’t hurt.”

  The taller alien nodded, “My species is known as Omegas, and we are an ancient race that has been around for trillions of cycles. We have been mapping the universe for billions of cycles now and had been for millions of cycles before we created your race.” the alien began slowly. Blackshade found he was soothed by its tone.

  “What do you mean cycle? How long is that?” he asked, curious.

  The tall alien leaned back and closed its eyes. After a few moments, it opened its eyes again and leaned back toward him, “Years. In your terms, a cycle would be considered a year. Please keep in mind, the translation program I gave you is only as good as your cerebral. Without proper context, your cerebral will try to compensate as best it can with what it has been exposed to. As time goes on, and you are exposed to more, the translations from my dialect to your own will improve.”

  “What do you mean, my cerebral? Do you mean my brain?” he asked.

  Again, the alien leaned back and closed its eyes. Opening its eyes a few moments later, it responded, “Correct, little one. I mean your brae…in.” it replied.

  Blackshade noticed that when the alien tried to say, ‘brain’, it struggled with the word, and the movements of its mouth actually coincided with the word it tried to speak. He realized the alien had just spoken in English.

  “How did you learn my language?” he asked, bewildered. “If you haven’t been here for millions of years, how are you learning so much about us so fast?”

  The alien chuckled at this, “We have many ways of acquiring new information, little one.” the alien said playfully, “On your world, you have developed a planet wide information system. You call it the inter-net.” the alien said the last word with some difficultly, as it recited it in English. “My people have the ability to interact with the signals that broadcast from your internet, and we can process that information directly into our own minds. It is a very efficient way of learning.”

  Black
shade was envious, “You can download information from our internet just by willing it?” he asked, shocked, “How? Isn’t that stuff encrypted?”

  Both of the aliens laughed at his statement, “Forgive us, little one. We do not mean to insult you. Your signals are encrypted, you are correct, but your security is very… simplistic to us. I am sure you can appreciate that.” the taller alien answered.

  Blackshade felt stupid. Of course, human technology was a joke to the Omegas. Hadn’t that been a chief concern of his since he learned of their existence? Wasn’t that why he was here? To negotiate a peaceful agreement with them, so they didn’t wipe out the planet with their advanced technology. He felt like he wasn’t making a good first impression on the Omegas, and he redoubled his efforts to not ask anymore stupid questions.

  Blackshade nodded his understanding. With another proud, motherly smile the alien continued, “As I was saying, for as long as I can remember, my race, and our allies, have been at war with a destructive race known as the Kritchet. They and their allies are a match for us in almost every way and have powerful tools of war at their disposal. We are the only things standing in the way of the Kritchet rampaging through the universe and destroying everything.” the alien explained, anger becoming more evident in its voice. Blackshade noticed the alien had to take a moment to get itself under control before continuing. He found the act of it controlling its emotions to be very human, and the realization made him feel more comfortable around the massive visitor.

  “Back, millions of years ago, we fought them wherever we found them. On planets, asteroids, and even in space. Our weapons were crude back then by our current standards, and we did not have the technology we have today. Resources were the key to our survival, and the only way we had to replenish them was to strip mine the planets we took from the Kritchet. This was a long and arduous process that took many ships out of the fight for far too long as they scavenged the conquered planets. That was when the more intellectual caste of Omegas created you. A complex, yet easy to manufacture automaton that we could send down to conquered planets, to gather resources without us having to be there. We would send millions of you down onto the planets to gather up resources, while we continued to travel the universe and fight the Kritchet. Then, after thousands of cycles of doing this, we discovered new technologies that made the use of your kind unnecessary. Resources were still hard to come by, so we gathered up all of you and brought you here, to this very isolated and toxic part of the universe. When we first found this planet, it was full of large lizards that would have corrupted the process we needed to take effect. So we terraformed the planet from orbit and cleared it of all the indigenous life, making the planet well-suited to fit our needs.”

  Blackshade was stunned by the revelation, “Wait, are you saying you are responsible for killing off the dinosaurs?”

  Again, the alien closed its eyes and leaned back. After almost a full minute it opened its eyes again, “Yes, we are responsible for that. Your scientists claim it was a meteor, but that does not make sense. Your own research has shown that, not only did everything die on this planet as a result of that event, but that the planet was shrouded in ash and completely uninhabitable for decades afterwards, with not even bacteria surviving.” the alien explained, giving him a knowing look before continuing, “If that was the case, little one, how did your kind come to exist here? How did anything come to exist here if everything was destroyed by our terraforming, or as you believe, an asteroid’s impact? No, little one, my race was responsible for this planet’s destruction, and at the time, it was a necessary evil. We had to use this planet’s naturally occurring toxicity to better break you and other biological and mechanical waste down, so we could repurpose those resources into constructs and items we required. Unfortunately, shortly after we dropped billions of tons of material on this planet, the Kritchet found us, and we had to retreat from this sector of space. Only recently have we been able to push them out of this quadrant and begin to reclaim what we lost here millions of years ago.”

  Blackshade tried to wrap his head around what the alien was telling him, “So, what you’re telling me is that after we became obsolete, you just dropped us off here to rot? And then, after we had biodegraded into the soil you would come back, harvest whatever sludge you needed from our remains, and make us into something more useful to you… is that right?” Blackshade asked tentatively.

  The alien nodded unabashed, “Yes, but not just your kind. We deposited many billions of tons of other ceased material to be broken down here. Other obsolete and ceased machinery, organics from other worlds, ceased sentient creatures, and even waste we could not decompose on our ships due to its volatile nature.”

  Blackshade was appalled, “So the Earth is just a huge landfill for you. You dumped us here after we were no longer useful, as well as the rest of your trash, and then to make matters worse, you dumped toxic waste here too!?”

  The alien calmly nodded again, “Yes, we did. As I said, this planet is naturally conditioned to be toxic and break down anything on its surface. The crust of the planet is very efficient at corroding and breaking down nearly any substance that comes into contact with it, given enough time. To be honest with you, little one, we are very surprised to see your kind flourishing here.” the alien answered truthfully.

  Blackshade shook his head, rejecting all of this, “What you’re saying can’t be true. This planet isn’t toxic, it’s our home! It provides for us! Humanity has lived on this planet for millions of years, along with thousands of other living creatures! If the planet was so toxic, how would that be possible!? Some people believe that we evolved from a specific species of monkey, which is why we still have so many similarities to them. Others say that God created this world for us, but we messed it all up. Either way though, you’re wrong, this planet is not toxic, it’s not an alien garbage dump, and it’s our home! If it was as awful a place as you say, then how could we be here? How could humanity exist at all if the Earth was poison?”

  The alien smiled at him sadly before responding, “We researched this planet and the ways in which your species interacts with it before arriving, little one. We know that what you say is not true. In order for your kind to survive here, you have to wrap yourselves in those artificial outer skins to avoid being ceased from exposure. What would happen if you striped off your outer skins and wandered outside of your shelters for too long? Exposure to this planet’s natural forces would cease your functions in a matter of days, and you know it. You say that your species evolved to live on this planet? If that’s true, why are so many of you allergic to everything on it? Without your medicines, you would cease to function from your negative reactions to the environment. Even with your medicines, many humans cease every cycle due to exposure to a substance they are allergic to. What about the sun? Do you know that a yellow sun is the most radioactive and toxic of all the suns? What would happen if you went into a field on a clear day, completely unprotected from the sun? It would burn every layer of your flesh with its radiation and cause you great physical harm. The damage from the sun’s radiation would quite literally put poison into your internal systems, inhibiting your systems and eventually shutting down your critical functions. If you could not find shelter from the sun in time, it would cease your functions completely, allowing the crust of this planet to begin the process of biodegradation. In fact, the crust you walk on is nothing more than a compound that is formulated to break down bio-mechanical-organic materials into their baser elements. Is that not one of the reasons you bury those that have ceased? To return them to their base elements so that the land may reuse their resources for a purpose that supports those still functioning?”

  Blackshade said nothing, as he stubbornly tried to come up with a logical argument. The alien seemed to take his silence as its queue to continue, "What about your sleep protocol?” it asked him accusingly, really hitting its stride now, “You were never designed to sleep every day for four to twelve hours. That is incred
ibly inefficient. The sleep protocol is an emergency shut down procedure that was only enacted if the unit could not find another source of energy. Instead of ceasing, you would automatically shut down all but your most vital systems while your self-perpetuating systems recharged. The reason your species has to sleep once every twenty-four hours is because this planet is continuously draining the energy from you. Even if you spend the entire day doing no work and expending no energy, your bodies require the emergency shut down, or if enough time passes, your functions will cease. It is incredible to me that you do not realize how inefficient it is for a species to require being shut down for twenty-five to fifty percent of every day.” the alien explained, as if this was the most obvious thing in the universe. Blackshade still doubted, but he had to admit the alien was making an interesting argument.

  “You still do not believe me? Look at the most simplistic known life on this planet. Single cell organisms. Do they require sleep? No. Do they require clothing? No. What about bacteria? Do they require sleep or clothing or shelter from their environment? No. They thrive because that is what true living races do. Machines, like yourselves, simply follow their programming to the best of their ability, and since they are made by mortals, they are imperfect. Only the Gods can make perfect living species, and the Omegas are not Gods.” the alien stated definitively.

  Blackshade was crestfallen, “So there is no God? No omnipotent power that created us? We’re just old machines you dropped off here to be broken down into dirt.” he said sadly. “The Atheists were right after all.”

  The alien looked confused by his response and closed its eyes, after a moment they sprang back open, “No, little one. You were not created by a God, but gods do exist.” the alien corrected him firmly.

  Blackshade heartened at this. He had never been a religious man, but he liked to believe that there was an afterlife, something to look forward to after this life was over. “So God and Jesus are real then? Or is it one of the other religions that got it right?” he asked anxiously.