Are we ‘them’?

Extraterrestrial life forms. We have watched them in movies, read them in books, saw them as the friends we always wanted and, also, the enemy that was too dangerous to be true. Some say they are us, but different while others say they are made up by the mind because it’s such a genius magician but a lousy researcher. We argue, debate and still find it difficult to come to a conclusion about their very existence. In the midst of it all, people make their own theory, their own story of how aliens are related to us or how they helped us progress at a great pace. One of the fiction is here which became more and more interesting as I thought about it over and over again. And after I wrote it, I said, “They are not very different than we are.”

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away (not a Star Wars fan-fiction), there was a planet like ours. There resided the most intelligent beings that were known to their kind because life did not exist in planets and galaxies near them. They studied the atmospheric conditions of other planets which led them to conclude that most of them were barren and lifeless. This was a very disappointing conclusion because the planet, and its people, were breathing their last.

Much like our own planet Earth, their planet had also been victim of pollution, exploitation of resources and inevitable death. To sustain their kind, a group of astronauts were sent, on regular intervals, to different planets and galaxies, to know if there is any flicker of light that their kind might survive the apocalyptic end. After a certain period of time, it became mandatory for beings that fall under a certain age, to fly and seek life. The chances of survival were slim but it was the chance they had to take to ensure survival.  For simplicity, let us assume, the beings to look something like the one in the cover photo.

They were long strides ahead of us in terms of technology but the basic problem of poverty, malnutrition, income inequality was also evident in their planet. It was too late to do anything. Land were infertile for agriculture, the air was so deadly that almost everyone had to take in regular medicines to find the oxygen among them and breathe, the water neither tasted tasteless nor looked colorless. The water treatment plants surrendered to the workload that was imposed on them. Euthanasia was made legal in most of the countries and number of suicides grew every week. Technologically, they possessed the ability to travel in time but only if they could go back in it.

An astronaut, like all the others, was depressed by the sight of its own planet. He wanted to go out there and find a planet where life would exist. If not now then later in the future. The thought of taking beings into the other planet, if life was found, was meaningless. The offspring’s chances of survival were uncertain in a foreign land because, even if a planet was found, it would’ve taken years before it was approved habitable. This led to debated between the scientific community and the other powerful ministers in the world. They finally decided to not send the beings but their DNA. If beings were present in the planet with life, then the infusion of DNA can either kill the being, have no effect or lead to something that was beyond imagination.

It set out with the same mission like any others’. Find home.

After travelling and skipping galaxies (due to technology, the spaceships could travel at light speed), the being finally came to our planet. But it was not like any other planet it had seen. The sky thundered, the clouds poured rain, asteroids and meteorites continued striking the planet and it was established that life was impossible here. But, just out of curiosity, the astronaut travelled in time unless he saw tall, thick trees, huge mountains, blue sky and large animals (dinos, of course).

Dodging their feet and camouflaging in the surrounding, the being experimented with the DNA of the animals and waited until their offspring was born. It was easy with the time travel, results could be seen instantly.

While some species had no effect, others died. The experimented was not limited to the huge animals as new, more evolved animals came into being. They could fly, swim, adapt between land and water, lived underground and eat each other. The range of animals impressed the astronaut and it motivated it to continue its experiments. But slowly as no progress was seen, the astronaut was starting to lose all the hope it had gained. After a particular time-travel, he didn’t see any huge animals at all. They had disappeared somewhere but the planet hadn’t changed.

As days went by, the astronaut grew more and more impatient and would often kill the animals because of frustration and annoyance. Sometimes it would lay down in the night and look at the stars, one might have been its planet, he could never know for sure. The beings there were dying and here it couldn’t find progress. It was the inevitable death, he thought, with no beginning.

During its stroll, he came across a peculiar primate that was small in comparison to huge gorillas. With lost hope, he experimented with them and travelled in time to see if anything, at all, happened. To its surprise, something had changed. The primates walked relatively straighter, the hair in their body reduced significantly, their round facial bone structure was now promising of a stronger cheekbone and they seemed to be less strong than they were.

This overwhelmed the astronaut with unknown emotions and he experimented with some more of the same species. It was working. Some years down the line and the body had much less hair, they walked straight and they were less strong but were much smarter now. They built home and wheel and fire which was never thought of by other animals, evident by their shock. Time grew and so did the intelligence. They built machines to carry people, to fly, to go swimming underwater but also those which killed each other when the time came.

The astronaut witnessed all these. It was not sure how old it was but it didn’t matter. Its kind survived. Someday the other astronauts might come and see the life dancing, as it should. As time passed further, the people grew less and less strong. Their shoulders hunched, many couldn’t walk with a straight back and the size of their head grew was larger than ever before. They looked abnormal to their kind but the astronaut knew what was going on.

After some centuries of wait, finally, almost everyone looked like the astronaut (although all of them had hunched back). The astronaut was filled with extreme joy by now but it felt week physically. Maybe it was time of its death but it was ready now. It would just be a matter of time before others discover this planet and group together to inhabit it with the other beings that live rather peacefully. The new beings were not smart or intelligent. Technologically they were years back than the specie of the astronauts but they knew how to live with each other (after many wars), and the astronaut died, thinking that its kind would be welcomed the same way.