He continued with a sorrowful shake of his head, “And snow leopards, which are now extinct in the wild and number just 27 in captivity. You can liken that to the thickness of the ink printed on that sheet of paper.”
The students were dumbfounded by the startling perspective. It was truly eye-opening.
“This is the stark reality of our world’s population disparity, to which we all seem to be blissfully unaware. As for our ever increasing, insatiable desire for meat and animal products; the populations of our domesticated cattle, sheep, pigs and horses are together equivalent to another skyscraper 4,5 kilometres tall.”
Payton paused momentarily, then closed his analogy with a final hard-hitting assertion. “The over-population problem is not caused by elephants, bison, rhinos or any other wild species for that matter: it’s us, human beings, with our vast complement of domesticated species … and our respective skyscrapers are each growing taller by a monstrous kilometre every decade!”
Galactic Core: Venture
Deep within the swirling density of the galactic core, a sleek new exploration spacecraft approached Endurion’s origin IGT Station (IGT-001). It was a Generation-15 Saurayan Mk224 intra-galactic spacecraft, which measured two kilometres in length and 400 metres in width. The spacecraft had taken a half-century to construct and had been specifically customised for space exploration purposes. It was fitted with the latest technologies available from across the Federation, making it the most advanced spacecraft in the Exploration Division’s fleet.
On its maiden flight, the spacecraft had been christened ‘Observatory’, as a tribute to the Exploration Division’s highly celebrated Excelascope Space Observatory. Its crew numbered 2 000 individuals, who had been exclusively selected for this epic venture. Not a single member of the crew took for granted the incredible privilege that had been bestowed on them. They all knew that they were part of what would undoubtedly become one of the most historic exploration expeditions in the history of the Galactic Federation.
Thousands of Galacian generations had passed by, wishing that they could have observed the most widely talked about and superb creation yet discovered in the galaxy: Stellar System 413’s ‘Miracle Planet’. The Galacians had had to wait more than 65 000 years for their first visit to the planet and then, unexpectedly, another 50 000 years for their second visit. The build-up to the big occasion had captivated Galacian populations across the charted galaxy.
The long awaited moment had finally arrived. The Observatory surged forward towards IGT-001 and its ultimate destination, Stellar System 413 (Galactic Star Catalogue Number: GS4|8kpc|G2-8P|XTSR|413) located halfway along the galaxy’s fourth spiral wing.
9:30 a.m. Earth: Oxford University
Payton continued with the lecture. “So that leads me to my next question: what makes our species so special that we are above and beyond any form of population management?”
A female student in the front row answered without hesitation, “Well, biblical scriptures state that the Earth was created for humankind to rule over and that we should ‘go forth and multiply’. We’re just following God’s instruction by populating the Earth and managing its resources as we see fit.”
Payton responded, “You raise a very good point and I can only respond by questioning whether humankind has gone forth and multiplied responsibly, as God most likely intended. As for humankind ruling over the Earth, surely God envisioned us being Earth’s guardian … rather than its tyrant?”
The student pondered over his response, while murmurs of discussion spread through the lecture theatre.
Payton continued, “Why else do we believe humankind is exempt from population management?”
Another student replied, “We’re above this kind of system because of our high intelligence level. Our human rights, entitlements and exemptions are different to those of all other living creatures because we are a superior species. Anyway, a government can’t just institute laws controlling family size, as it would infringe on our democratic freedom of choice – and that wouldn’t be ethical. Just look at China and their one-child policy* … it is totally barbaric and despised across the world.”
Payton smiled at the fashionable, yet misinformed, opinion that had been expressed. It had set the stage for an interesting debate that was sure to follow.
[* In 2015, Chinese authorities announced that the nation would be abandoning its ‘one-child policy’ and replacing it with a ‘two-child policy’. The policy amendment was widely welcomed, and resulted in a moderate increase in nationwide birth rates during the years that followed. In 2025, however, after a decade of sustained economic decline and increasingly frequent food shortages, the authorities took the controversial decision to reinstate the one-child policy, despite public outcry and global condemnation.]
Galactic Core: Observatory Spacecraft
On board the Observatory, in the Council Chamber, the spacecraft’s Commander and his nine Councillors were seated at a round conference table. The 10 of them constituted the Exploration Council, and all were busy using the table’s interactive glide surface to finalise their expedition plans. A quiet notification tone sounded in the chamber, alerting them to a message from the spacecraft’s Captain.
“Commander, we’ll be travelling through the IGT Network between stations ‘IGT-001’ and ‘IGT-413’ in half a minute. Prepare for hypershunt.”
“Thank you, Captain.”
The Commander ran his hand over the glide surface in front of him, then entered a few commands. A 360 degree view of the spacecraft’s bridge was immediately shown around the chamber’s circular ‘interactive display’ perimeter wall. This allowed the Council to monitor everything that was happening on the bridge.
The Commander then motioned towards the small spherical ‘orbonic projector’, floating just above the centre of the table. This was an ‘energised plasmatic orb’ that served as a holographic projection device. Within seconds the orb had turned into a hologram of the galaxy, suspended just above the table’s glide surface.
A bright green positioning beacon then appeared showing the Observatory’s exact location in the galactic core. There was a timer above, counting down from 60 seconds. A palpable tension filled the air of the Council Chamber, as the counter approached zero.
9:50 a.m. Earth: Oxford University
It was 20 minutes before Payton finally brought the heated debate on human population management to a close. The students’ views ranged between two extremes: those who believed that population management was totally immoral and those who believed it was absolutely necessary. Payton was glad to have brought the controversy surrounding population management to their immediate attention. It had forced them to think about it from multiple perspectives. The students had, unknowingly, just begun their long journey towards environmental enlightenment.
Payton spoke, “Now I have one final question for you and this will be the topic of your assignment due next week Friday: what are the biggest threats facing humanity and the future of this planet?”
The students volunteered numerous answers, which were duly noted down by Payton on his chalkboard. He noted the following: uncontrolled proliferation of nuclear weapons, nuclear war, terrorist attacks, rogue and hostile nations, economic collapse, uncontrollable spread of highly contagious diseases, food and water shortages, unemployment, lack of education, political and social instability, asteroid impact, over-population and, finally, extreme weather events caused by climate change.
Each of the points was discussed briefly, before Payton brought the lecture to a close. It fascinated him that the threats of over-population and climate change were still, to this day, far off people’s radar of real threats facing humanity and the planet’s future. They were there, but lurking quietly in the background, like a pair of tranquilised yet stirring elephants in the room. They were being continuously ignored because it was too daunting to contemplate dealing with them. But it was inevitable that they would awaken and go on the rampage, wre
aking destruction and havoc on an unprecedented scale.
In Payton’s mind, over-population and climate change were mere symptoms of a far greater threat facing Earth’s future – humanity’s casual attitude towards the world’s fast-approaching environmental collapse. His life’s work was aimed at convincing his students and the rest of the world’s population of that fact.
2. DISCOVERY
Galactic Core: Observatory Spacecraft – Commander Trennor
Commander Rifton Trennor was a Galacian of Auroran descent and native to the planet, Endurion. After a half century of study and two centuries of diligently working his way up through the ranks of the Galactic Exploration Division, he had been appointed, with unanimous Senate approval, as the Division’s Commander-in-Chief.
During his distinguished career, he had charted and documented over 10 000 strategically identified stellar systems, which had led to the discovery of over 206 inhabited planets, 8 437 habitable planets and almost 12 000 ‘planets of interest’. The Commander was now 854 years old and had never once regretted his decision to dedicate his life to intra-galactic exploration.
The steady expansion of the Intra-galactic Travel Network had greatly increased the volume of the galaxy that could be accessed and explored. But the galaxy’s size was truly extraordinary and his Division’s absolute dependence on the IGT Network limited its exploration capability. The Commander longed to access parts of the galaxy where previously dispatched IGT Stations were yet to arrive at their destinations.
In spite of the constraints, his renowned achievements in the Exploration Division had gained him galaxy-wide acclaim and celebrity status. Bestowed upon him after half a millennium as Commander-in-Chief, was the honorary position of Chancellor to the Galacian Senate, a post that he had now held for a century.
Trennor was now in command of the Division’s new flagship galactic exploration spacecraft, the Observatory. There was no one more fitting to lead this particular expedition, the auspicious purpose of which was to rediscover the stellar system that was home to the Miracle Planet.
Stellar System 413: The Miracle Planet
It had long been hoped that the Miracle Planet was not distinctly unique in its splendour, and that other highly diversified inhabited planets would be discovered in the outer reaches of the galaxy’s spiral wings. But, frustratingly, it turned out not to be the case. So far, with almost 80% of the galaxy having been charted, the Exploration Division’s wide-ranging exploration efforts had revealed only 26 580 inhabited planets, out of a total of 940 billion documented planets.
Of these, only 55 were home to life that exhibited intelligence; and only 12 of those were considered to be super-intelligent. Altogether, the number of species discovered across the charted galaxy and documented by the Exploration Division in their Species Register, totalled just over 122 million.
This Miracle Planet alone supported almost 12,5 million species – over 10% of all charted life discovered to date. Nowhere else in the galaxy had such a diverse and extensive array of living organisms been discovered in a single biosphere. It was home to 12 times more unique species than any other charted inhabited planet.
Diversity of life on this scale was unparalleled, which meant the planet was truly exceptional in every imaginable way. What could so easily have been just another insignificant ball of rock orbiting around an equally insignificant ball of burning hydrogen at 30 kilometres per second, had turned out to be the greatest discovery in galactic history. This particular ball of rock was hugely significant. It could only be explained as a miracle … an incredible sanctuary that had enabled life to flourish so extraordinarily in the otherwise harsh expanse of space.
The planet unveiled a characteristic rarer than probability could intelligibly calculate: an ultra-long, life-supporting biosphere. This referred to the planet’s robust and enduring environmental equilibrium that had allowed life to be sustained for over four billion years. No other discovered planet had maintained a state of life-supporting environmental equilibrium beyond two billion years, which in itself had long been considered anomalous. This Miracle Planet’s biospherical phenomenon had allowed its unequalled evolutionary diversity of life to thrive beyond any comprehensible scale across the planet.
A particularly fascinating reality about the creation of life on any planet in the galaxy was the multitude of parameters that had to fall within the very specific ‘creation window’. All the inhabited planets discovered by the Exploration Division were markedly similar in terms of this creation window. If any one of the parameters was marginally outside the window, then life would stand no chance of being created or sustained. What was also intriguing was the fact that even if all the parameters fell optimally within the creation window, it did not necessarily mean that life would be present. The random latitude of fate also had its role to play. Of further significance was the fact that of those planets that actually exhibited life, only a small number of them exhibited complex life and only a minute fraction of these exhibited intelligent life.
The classification of the creation window’s benchmark parameters had assisted the Exploration Division in narrowing down their search for new life in the galaxy to only those stellar systems whose respective planets fell within these parameters. However, success in finding abundant, highly diversified complex life on a single planet was virtually non-existent … until it encountered the Miracle Planet, which swiftly became known as Andorayan Sanctuarium, meaning ‘The Great Creator’s Ultimate Wonder’.
So spectacular was its glory and reputation, that it was spoken of by Galacians in every populated part of the galaxy: from the furthest extents of the galactic spiral wings – where stars were being born, to the galactic core – where they were being engulfed by an immense all-consuming black hole.
It was as though the Great Creator had saved all of creation’s very best for this final masterpiece. Experience, care and precision had all been harmoniously drawn together when creating this single planet, where every possible condition that could make it perfect for life had been combined into a unique and glorious occurrence. Andorayan Sanctuarium was it – the galaxy’s magnum opus.
Now, with 50 000 years and a multitude of generations having passed since the Exploration Division’s first opportunity to visit the planet, its existence had drifted slowly into myth and legend. Even though there was factual evidence on record to back it up, the Galactic Federation’s founding races wanted to witness its existence first-hand to verify the almost unbelievable facts previously recorded. They wanted real-time proof that would support the historical findings and remove all elements of doubt and conspiracy. That had unfortunately not been possible for so long, but the time had finally arrived – Andorayan Sanctuarium was on the verge of rediscovery.
Stellar System 413: IGT Station 413
White strip-lights began to illuminate within IGT-413’s cylindrical interior, as its intelligent software systems were methodically tested and reinitiated. Its 50 000 years of dormancy had come to an abrupt end and now the previously dysfunctional mega-structure was on the brink of becoming a fully operational unit again.
The gyratory cyclopacitors began rotating in alternating orientations, increasing in rotational velocity with each progressive revolution, while locking in the received origin coordinates. The strip-lights became indistinguishable as they blended into a bright silver blurring warp. The cylinder’s empty interior underwent a gradual transformation through varying degrees of luminosity, temporarily distorting the view of the stars through its length. It was now just seconds away from carrying out the hypershunt.
Galactic Core: Observatory Spacecraft
In the Council Chamber, the Commander and his nine Exploration Councillors watched the spacecraft’s green positioning beacon on the galactic hologram. The experience was unnerving for all of them. The countdown reached zero at the exact moment the Observatory passed through IGT-001. The beacon disappeared from the galactic core as the spacecraft was hypershunted fr
om IGT-001 to IGT-413.
IGT-413’s luminous interior collapsed into total darkness and then blazed in an iridescent blue light that flared out of both ends of the cylinder, like huge flaming cones. Then, in an imperceptible flash of time, the Observatory appeared within the empty void of IGT-413’s interior and blasted out of one end at 50% light speed.
On the galactic hologram in the Council Chamber, the green positioning beacon immediately reappeared halfway along the fourth spiral wing, confirming the spacecraft’s successful hypershunt between the IGT Stations.
Relieved smiles and cheers filled the chamber as the Commander and his Councillors exchanged congratulations. The crew on the bridge also erupted in celebration, some laughing and others crying out of sheer relief and joy. They were all glad to have travelled safely through the notorious mega-structure that had caused so much disappointment and controversy.
IGT-413 was finally operational again after so many long and trying years. Having performed its duty flawlessly, the rotating sections began to slow and shut down one after the other in the same sequence that they had started up. The white strip-lighting then faded away and the station settled into its power regeneration phase.
Captain Parenton hailed Commander Trennor from the bridge. “IGT Station transition successful, Commander. Hull and systems integrity confirmed at 100%. Speed to be increased to 95% light speed and direct course for Andorayan Sanctuarium to be set on bearing 272H-3V.”
Wake-up Call: 2035 Page 3