Different Planets
Earth was not always going to last, its resources were growing thin with each day. The soil was beginning to fail the farmers and the people were running out of hope with every passing moment. A man and a woman were to salvage what was left of the remaining population, an Adam and Eve for the new millennium of 6000AD. A new governance had merged in this year. Each country had intertwined with the centuries what had recently passed and there was no longer any animosity between its people. Almost utopian, yet it lacked diversity and challenges to its own moral being. Many criticised the decreasing individuality of its populace, others praised its government for drawing an end to world war. However, the sad truth remained civil war was a regular occurrence. Panic constantly arose due to lack of energy, lack of food, lack of hope. The conception of the new Adam and Eve was a propaganda method installed by the new mono-government, a tool to spread word of peace across its nation. Only the hope for Earth’s future, its Adam and Eve: Dobe and Sileh knew the truth. Only they knew they were running out of time and with each moment, if they procrastinated, they would draw themselves closer to Earth’s extinction.
The man, Dobe Narn, was set in charge of finding new planets, looking for hospitable worlds where the human populace can start anew. He did hold hope for Earth’s future, believing his absence would be for a long period but having an ambition on his return. His partner Sileh would of kept the life there prosperous. Older than she was, he felt as if he needed time away from the planet to appreciate its beauty, but knew it was of purity so rare he wouldn’t be able to replicate his feelings for it on any other planet. He was considered an emotional mess by most who knew him, ‘the man who thought with his heart’ was a reputation he gained back home when he knew he should be the man who fought with his mind. He didn’t care however, he decided long ago that his emotions were the right thing to lead his path, logic got you only so far, he knew if he was to find the right place he would have to rely on his heart alone.
Sileh Tiferk, was put in charge of Earth but also held the trigger to its destruction. Her perspective on all the events what occurred left her with an ever-pessimistic attitude, she understood Dobe’s positivity but she couldn’t quite hold on to his optimism of its future. She had seen its people question Earth’s future. A young girl approached her one day while she was scouting out the an old forest, now a wasteland in a forest North of England. ‘Hey it’s you, the lady on the screen! Can I have a picture? Can I get you to sign Fuyyi?’ The girl hands over her doll. It’s a Fuyyi doll, a popular character from a computer game. ‘And what’s your name?’ She looks down on the girl, her hair is tattered from being washed in water what’s been in dirt for a long periods of time. ‘It’s Tabitha, but don’t sign it to me just put your name. Everyone’s going to be so jealous’. She grabs back the doll as soon as Sileh signs it. ‘We’re not going to die soon aren’t we, lady?’ She looks at the girl, looking perplexed. ‘What did you just say?’ The girl looks her in the eye, ‘it’s okay, we all die in the end, it’s just our time isn’t it? My Grandma died last week, it’s okay. Everyone dies’. Tabitha runs off into the distance, her Fuyyi in hand.
Dobe stands alone in a space station. He has recently found two habitable planets. Both resemble Earth enough to inhabit, he’d sent out a message several months ago and the worlds have already begun to be populated. A message runs up on the monitor as he grabs a drink from his dilapidated mug:
Earth is now abandoned.
It has now been granted ‘Wasteland’ status.
Earth’s new population: 0.
Remain on your designated planet.
Orders are none negotiable.
- SILEH.
He considers what he has read for a moment. He knew that Earth was dying but he had no idea it would die so soon, let alone at all. He stands there grief stricken, angry. He had achieved his mission but he didn’t think leaving Earth would mean leaving Earth forever. He picks up his receiver and dials Sileh. A creak’s heard echoing through space, static streaks across his monitor. The technology of Earth became so advanced at one point, but now it was worn, so much of the improved methods of screens had been drastically sacrificed for practicality. A picture of Sileh appears and a voice is heard through a static vision.
‘Hello? This is Commander Sileh Tiferk reporting from the newly inhabited planet X89-67. Code name: Amjas. What do you have to report Commander Nard?’ There is a delay with each sentence. He waits a minute until he is sure the whole message has been received. ‘.....’, ‘....’.
‘This is Commander Dobe Nard reporting, explain your reasons on Earth. It wasn’t ready to be evacuated, it still had life. I repeat explain why it was evacuated’.
A long silence holds the air. Dobe looks out of the screen of his space station, a red planet is seen in the distance with a circular disc surrounding its orbit. In between the red patches are glimmers of alien blue, brightly capturing the eye. Suddenly sound is heard back from the monitor, the picture of Sileh reappears.
‘We’ve moved on Dobe. You can’t go away for so long and expect Earth to be able to keep up its energy. It needed you and you deserted it, you can’t not expect us to wait around for you to say it’s alive? People were growing tired of waiting for its answer of hope. You have to be practical about this Dobe. Earth couldn’t survive the way it is in. It’s as simple as that’.
Sileh waits for the message to send. A clear picture of Dobe is on her screen, his face is tired, the lines on his forehead are creased, is small eyes are barely visible from his thick eyebrows. An echo is heard from outside. A man is waiting in the doorway. She looks in his direction and waves a hand ‘it’s okay. I’ll be done here soon’. A click is heard as another message from Dobe comes through.
‘I don’t understand. How long have you planned on this for? I hadn’t received any warning of this, I am an equal member of this mission, I should have be informed before you went ahead with the evacuation. Have you fully occupied Amjas? Is Earth to be abandoned....’.
A flicker in the airwaves disrupts the message.
‘I re—et, is E-th to – abandoned permanently?’
Sileh looks out of the window. Outside there are foreign trees growing, she knows how strange they all seem but she anticipates how familiar they will be for her with time. She looks forward to moving away from the dying planet of Earth. However emotionally drawn towards it she was. She presses a grey button on the console before her.
‘Amjas is occupied, yes Dobe. It’s what I felt best. You always said yourself that there are times when logic alone can’t decide on what the future holds, sometimes you’ve got to go with how you feel. Right now Amjas is what I want. It’s what Earth’s people want. Have you settled on FG7-XR, have you settled on Acadan?’
This time the message seems to send quickly, she receives a reply almost immediately.
‘The population has been sent there, but I’m not ready to go there yet, as I’ve reported I was expecting to settle back on Earth. How could this be possible? Earth was not dead. How could you pull the trigger on it so quickly?’
Dobe stands alone in an empty room. With every sound he makes it is picked up by the curved walls and is carried back to him within moments, he hears his voice from the reverberations ‘trigger so quickly, trigger so quickly’. It sends a shock down his system. He’s frustrated how much hope he had put in to rebuilding Earth. He had spent months detailing how to give life back into its soil. His plans were simple but effective: give it more love. Care for the Earth, love the Earth.
‘There was nothing quick about this. You never cared for Earth, Dobe. You treated it in a bad way and when things got bad you left for your own selfish purpose, I’m on Amjas, you’ve got Acadan. We’re on different planets and that’s how things will stay, for now’.
The reception improves, the moon that faltered the signal has moved and each message receives substantially quicker.
‘So you plan to stay on Amjas? Or do you intend to find another planet? Isn’t there hope? Hope for Earth?’ Dobe catches the his own reflection in the picture of Sileh. He looks withered, the greys in his hair catch his eyes and he forces his view towards the image of Sileh again. She looks beautiful, younger than he is; jet-black hair and wide eyes. She doesn’t smile but it’s suggested that is she did she could win the heart of any man. As Dobe stress gradually reduces he finds it increases after the moon what had should shifted is once again in his space stations vicinity. He waits impatiently for a reply, but nothing comes.
He waits around for hours, his eyes become bloodshot, he can’t sleep. All his hope was on the Earth being compatible with life, but now he no longer has that he is no longer sure just what he has left. He isn’t ready for anywhere else. In the one room looking out into oblivion Dobe feels alone, isolated, helpless. A tick is heard, a message comes through. Dobe rushes to the screen, he looks at his heart rate clock on his wrist. It just increased dramatically.
‘Amjas could be my future but times still young, anything could happen. Just concentrate your efforts on Acadan for now. Don’t worry about anything here you’ve got your own life to concentrate on, you need to spend all that effort you used on Earth to introduce life on your new home’.
Sileh has been waiting for days for Dobe’s reply. She knows that he’s not ready for any of this but she knew it’s what she wanted to do. The man she is with shows her the progress the planet Amjas has made, he looks at her and smiles ‘looks like it was never meant to be Adam and Eve then, eh?’.
She smiles back, ‘I guess not, no. I think all we needed was a clean start’. The man, who looks the same age as Sileh takes hold of her hand ‘so you think you’ll return to Earth?’ Sileh thinks for a moment. She isn’t sure just how she feels. She wasn’t certain about moving on until the moment that child spoke to her, it was a sudden realisation that she could be doing more with the life of Earth. Why would she wait around for one person to bring back hope when she can off and search for hope on her own? It just seemed right for her.
‘I can’t say for now. Right now though I want to try make it work on Amjas’.
‘And Dobe? What about him?’
‘He has his own planet to worry about now’.
A cordially dressed man approached Sileh, ‘Mam, we’ve just received a message from Commander Nord. Would you like to it?’
‘Go ahead’.
‘Mam, it just says to go to the communication room’.
Sileh looks at the man she’s with and leaves him. She enters the room and Dobe is there on the screen. He appears to of fixed the connected.
‘I’m not saying we should not give up on our new planets, but if we wait. If we give it time. Will you go back to Earth?’
Sileh thinks. She knows that she’s happy in her new planet and that the people are happy, but she’s filled with nostalgia and knows there’s precious history in Earth.
‘I can only promise you that we can check it’s soil, see if things grow. But even then we can’t promise that life will be the same again, and even if we can reintroduce the population, what if it still doesn’t work? What do we do then? Forgot about all the effort that we’ve put into these new worlds?’
‘I’m saying we need to try. Trying is all we can do. I love Earth, I love everything thing about it. I know I mistreated it and I know I shouldn’t have, I know I took it for granted while you took care of it. Everything I ignored I know I won’t ignore again. Our planets now might not even sustain growth, they’re just as vulnerable as anything we’ve had before us, the results may be no different. Do we keep going planet to planet trying to make things work while leaving destruction in our wake or do we stay on the one and repair what’s been damaged? Make work what didn’t work and try and amend?’
Sileh looks at the man she was just talking to. His face is chubby, different to Dobe’s, in a lot of ways his face represents to her the face of Amjas and Dobe’s the face of Earth.
‘I’ll be honest with you Dobe’s. We can try make it work when you return but I can’t promise anything, it could fail. It could be a waste of time’.
‘We could do it now, I could go to Amjas and we can return to Earth soon, we don’t have to wait’.
‘No. It’s too soon. We need to let things reintroduced into its climate. I don’t know what life will be like here but for now I prefer it over than what life was like back home. There’s no stress, there’s no diseases, there’s nothing to worry about. I know it won’t last forever but for now it’s what I want. Stay where you are, explore Acadan. It’s your orders you know what you have to do now go do them, it’s my final words. If Earth is to be explored again it won’t be in the near future, do you read?’
Dobe looks into the picture of Sileh. Speechless he turns off the monitor and sits down on his chair. He didn’t realise before how much he had wanted Earth to work, how he envisioned himself to be the Adam, as the person who helped Earth into its new millennium. It was all falling through his fingertips. He contemplates and sits up. The red planet seems inviting to him. ‘A whole world to explore and I’m concerned about a world what couldn’t even work? What am I doing? Is this some rose tinted view of Earth or do I really care about it enough to give up on this exploration? Do I need to listen to her?’
Sileh has long since been in the communication room, she’s spent hours planting seeds in the ground, making sure that the crops would grow. Spending time with her new friend who she would hope would set an example better of Dobe. Deep down all she wanted from her partner was someone who showed loyalty and support to her planet, but Dobe was irrational, not uncaring but too sporadic and unpredictable to be able to really be a founder of anything. She knew he was given the job he had was because he wanted to explore. Now that his home had been taken away he has simply panicked, unsure and uncertain as he always his, just as uncertain as Sileh has always been. It’s the one reason she knew it wouldn’t work, not now anyway. How can you start life on a planet with so much uncertainty surrounding its structure? What could possible come of a castle if it’s build on the sea, would it not just drift into the ocean to be forgotten about? She picks up a shovel and digs the earth of Amjas thinking only a moment of what was and what could be of Earth.
On Acadan Dobe leaves his ship, he sees children running through the grass and playing in the waters of the sea. Laughter is shooting across his ears as he attempts to come to terms with his foreseeable future. A life he expected is no longer a life he can definitely achieve. He can only do what he’s been good at for so many years now and just go with his gut. An old man approaches him as he steps on the grass ‘So commander it looks like this is our new home, quite a beautiful place we have here isn’t it? Lots of potential I’d say’. Dobe looks around and considers that the people here don’t see this as a temporary layaway but a place where they’ll be growing up and growing old. He thinks that for a moment he could set up enough life here and set off back home then he stops himself to reply to the old man ‘yes, I think we can definitely get the potential out of our new home. We just need to give it love, care and attention. Whether it be here or anywhere else, or anyone and everyone we meet’. The old man looks up to Dobe ‘wise words, I can see that you’re going to make a good leader’. Without a second glance Dobe pats the old man on the shoulder and nods. ‘I guess time will tell, maybe I will be, maybe I won’t. I know one thing. Life’s mysterious are forever shrouded in time. I can’t promise you I’ll be your leader, but I can promise you I’ll help this planet thrive’.
In the distance he sees a couple walking in the sand, he quickly remembers the flickering picture of Sileh. Her planet has just begun and so as his. Dobe has settled on his fate, if in time he lives back on Earth then he knows what he’ll do, if not then the life he chooses will be his to make the most of, in his new home, his new planet, a different planet, Acadan.
Earth is now abandoned.
It has now been granted ‘Wasteland’ status.
Earth’s new population: 0.
Remain on your designated planet.
Orders are none negotiable.
- SILEH.
He considers what he has read for a moment. He knew that Earth was dying but he had no idea it would die so soon, let alone at all. He stands there grief stricken, angry. He had achieved his mission but he didn’t think leaving Earth would mean leaving Earth forever. He picks up his receiver and dials Sileh. A creak’s heard echoing through space, static streaks across his monitor. The technology of Earth became so advanced at one point, but now it was worn, so much of the improved methods of screens had been drastically sacrificed for practicality. A picture of Sileh appears and a voice is heard through a static vision.
‘Hello? This is Commander Sileh Tiferk reporting from the newly inhabited planet X89-67. Code name: Amjas. What do you have to report Commander Nard?’ There is a delay with each sentence. He waits a minute until he is sure the whole message has been received. ‘.....’, ‘....’.
‘This is Commander Dobe Nard reporting, explain your reasons on Earth. It wasn’t ready to be evacuated, it still had life. I repeat explain why it was evacuated’.
A long silence holds the air. Dobe looks out of the screen of his space station, a red planet is seen in the distance with a circular disc surrounding its orbit. In between the red patches are glimmers of alien blue, brightly capturing the eye. Suddenly sound is heard back from the monitor, the picture of Sileh reappears.
‘We’ve moved on Dobe. You can’t go away for so long and expect Earth to be able to keep up its energy. It needed you and you deserted it, you can’t not expect us to wait around for you to say it’s alive? People were growing tired of waiting for its answer of hope. You have to be practical about this Dobe. Earth couldn’t survive the way it is in. It’s as simple as that’.
Sileh waits for the message to send. A clear picture of Dobe is on her screen, his face is tired, the lines on his forehead are creased, is small eyes are barely visible from his thick eyebrows. An echo is heard from outside. A man is waiting in the doorway. She looks in his direction and waves a hand ‘it’s okay. I’ll be done here soon’. A click is heard as another message from Dobe comes through.
‘I don’t understand. How long have you planned on this for? I hadn’t received any warning of this, I am an equal member of this mission, I should have be informed before you went ahead with the evacuation. Have you fully occupied Amjas? Is Earth to be abandoned....’.
A flicker in the airwaves disrupts the message.
‘I re—et, is E-th to – abandoned permanently?’
Sileh looks out of the window. Outside there are foreign trees growing, she knows how strange they all seem but she anticipates how familiar they will be for her with time. She looks forward to moving away from the dying planet of Earth. However emotionally drawn towards it she was. She presses a grey button on the console before her.
‘Amjas is occupied, yes Dobe. It’s what I felt best. You always said yourself that there are times when logic alone can’t decide on what the future holds, sometimes you’ve got to go with how you feel. Right now Amjas is what I want. It’s what Earth’s people want. Have you settled on FG7-XR, have you settled on Acadan?’
This time the message seems to send quickly, she receives a reply almost immediately.
‘The population has been sent there, but I’m not ready to go there yet, as I’ve reported I was expecting to settle back on Earth. How could this be possible? Earth was not dead. How could you pull the trigger on it so quickly?’
Dobe stands alone in an empty room. With every sound he makes it is picked up by the curved walls and is carried back to him within moments, he hears his voice from the reverberations ‘trigger so quickly, trigger so quickly’. It sends a shock down his system. He’s frustrated how much hope he had put in to rebuilding Earth. He had spent months detailing how to give life back into its soil. His plans were simple but effective: give it more love. Care for the Earth, love the Earth.
‘There was nothing quick about this. You never cared for Earth, Dobe. You treated it in a bad way and when things got bad you left for your own selfish purpose, I’m on Amjas, you’ve got Acadan. We’re on different planets and that’s how things will stay, for now’.
The reception improves, the moon that faltered the signal has moved and each message receives substantially quicker.
‘So you plan to stay on Amjas? Or do you intend to find another planet? Isn’t there hope? Hope for Earth?’ Dobe catches the his own reflection in the picture of Sileh. He looks withered, the greys in his hair catch his eyes and he forces his view towards the image of Sileh again. She looks beautiful, younger than he is; jet-black hair and wide eyes. She doesn’t smile but it’s suggested that is she did she could win the heart of any man. As Dobe stress gradually reduces he finds it increases after the moon what had should shifted is once again in his space stations vicinity. He waits impatiently for a reply, but nothing comes.
He waits around for hours, his eyes become bloodshot, he can’t sleep. All his hope was on the Earth being compatible with life, but now he no longer has that he is no longer sure just what he has left. He isn’t ready for anywhere else. In the one room looking out into oblivion Dobe feels alone, isolated, helpless. A tick is heard, a message comes through. Dobe rushes to the screen, he looks at his heart rate clock on his wrist. It just increased dramatically.
‘Amjas could be my future but times still young, anything could happen. Just concentrate your efforts on Acadan for now. Don’t worry about anything here you’ve got your own life to concentrate on, you need to spend all that effort you used on Earth to introduce life on your new home’.
Sileh has been waiting for days for Dobe’s reply. She knows that he’s not ready for any of this but she knew it’s what she wanted to do. The man she is with shows her the progress the planet Amjas has made, he looks at her and smiles ‘looks like it was never meant to be Adam and Eve then, eh?’.
She smiles back, ‘I guess not, no. I think all we needed was a clean start’. The man, who looks the same age as Sileh takes hold of her hand ‘so you think you’ll return to Earth?’ Sileh thinks for a moment. She isn’t sure just how she feels. She wasn’t certain about moving on until the moment that child spoke to her, it was a sudden realisation that she could be doing more with the life of Earth. Why would she wait around for one person to bring back hope when she can off and search for hope on her own? It just seemed right for her.
‘I can’t say for now. Right now though I want to try make it work on Amjas’.
‘And Dobe? What about him?’
‘He has his own planet to worry about now’.
A cordially dressed man approached Sileh, ‘Mam, we’ve just received a message from Commander Nord. Would you like to it?’
‘Go ahead’.
‘Mam, it just says to go to the communication room’.
Sileh looks at the man she’s with and leaves him. She enters the room and Dobe is there on the screen. He appears to of fixed the connected.
‘I’m not saying we should not give up on our new planets, but if we wait. If we give it time. Will you go back to Earth?’
Sileh thinks. She knows that she’s happy in her new planet and that the people are happy, but she’s filled with nostalgia and knows there’s precious history in Earth.
‘I can only promise you that we can check it’s soil, see if things grow. But even then we can’t promise that life will be the same again, and even if we can reintroduce the population, what if it still doesn’t work? What do we do then? Forgot about all the effort that we’ve put into these new worlds?’
‘I’m saying we need to try. Trying is all we can do. I love Earth, I love everything thing about it. I know I mistreated it and I know I shouldn’t have, I know I took it for granted while you took care of it. Everything I ignored I know I won’t ignore again. Our planets now might not even sustain growth, they’re just as vulnerable as anything we’ve had before us, the results may be no different. Do we keep going planet to planet trying to make things work while leaving destruction in our wake or do we stay on the one and repair what’s been damaged? Make work what didn’t work and try and amend?’
Sileh looks at the man she was just talking to. His face is chubby, different to Dobe’s, in a lot of ways his face represents to her the face of Amjas and Dobe’s the face of Earth.
‘I’ll be honest with you Dobe’s. We can try make it work when you return but I can’t promise anything, it could fail. It could be a waste of time’.
‘We could do it now, I could go to Amjas and we can return to Earth soon, we don’t have to wait’.
‘No. It’s too soon. We need to let things reintroduced into its climate. I don’t know what life will be like here but for now I prefer it over than what life was like back home. There’s no stress, there’s no diseases, there’s nothing to worry about. I know it won’t last forever but for now it’s what I want. Stay where you are, explore Acadan. It’s your orders you know what you have to do now go do them, it’s my final words. If Earth is to be explored again it won’t be in the near future, do you read?’
Dobe looks into the picture of Sileh. Speechless he turns off the monitor and sits down on his chair. He didn’t realise before how much he had wanted Earth to work, how he envisioned himself to be the Adam, as the person who helped Earth into its new millennium. It was all falling through his fingertips. He contemplates and sits up. The red planet seems inviting to him. ‘A whole world to explore and I’m concerned about a world what couldn’t even work? What am I doing? Is this some rose tinted view of Earth or do I really care about it enough to give up on this exploration? Do I need to listen to her?’
Sileh has long since been in the communication room, she’s spent hours planting seeds in the ground, making sure that the crops would grow. Spending time with her new friend who she would hope would set an example better of Dobe. Deep down all she wanted from her partner was someone who showed loyalty and support to her planet, but Dobe was irrational, not uncaring but too sporadic and unpredictable to be able to really be a founder of anything. She knew he was given the job he had was because he wanted to explore. Now that his home had been taken away he has simply panicked, unsure and uncertain as he always his, just as uncertain as Sileh has always been. It’s the one reason she knew it wouldn’t work, not now anyway. How can you start life on a planet with so much uncertainty surrounding its structure? What could possible come of a castle if it’s build on the sea, would it not just drift into the ocean to be forgotten about? She picks up a shovel and digs the earth of Amjas thinking only a moment of what was and what could be of Earth.
On Acadan Dobe leaves his ship, he sees children running through the grass and playing in the waters of the sea. Laughter is shooting across his ears as he attempts to come to terms with his foreseeable future. A life he expected is no longer a life he can definitely achieve. He can only do what he’s been good at for so many years now and just go with his gut. An old man approaches him as he steps on the grass ‘So commander it looks like this is our new home, quite a beautiful place we have here isn’t it? Lots of potential I’d say’. Dobe looks around and considers that the people here don’t see this as a temporary layaway but a place where they’ll be growing up and growing old. He thinks that for a moment he could set up enough life here and set off back home then he stops himself to reply to the old man ‘yes, I think we can definitely get the potential out of our new home. We just need to give it love, care and attention. Whether it be here or anywhere else, or anyone and everyone we meet’. The old man looks up to Dobe ‘wise words, I can see that you’re going to make a good leader’. Without a second glance Dobe pats the old man on the shoulder and nods. ‘I guess time will tell, maybe I will be, maybe I won’t. I know one thing. Life’s mysterious are forever shrouded in time. I can’t promise you I’ll be your leader, but I can promise you I’ll help this planet thrive’.
In the distance he sees a couple walking in the sand, he quickly remembers the flickering picture of Sileh. Her planet has just begun and so as his. Dobe has settled on his fate, if in time he lives back on Earth then he knows what he’ll do, if not then the life he chooses will be his to make the most of, in his new home, his new planet, a different planet, Acadan.
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