Warning in a Bottle
Millions saw the enormous spaceships emerge from the depths of the ocean and leave planet Earth. So did you. You go with every kind of scientist available in submarines to discover the unknown oceanic civilization. Your linguistic expertise is what they needed in case they find unknown texts. And you did find a message.
“You have 20 years left. They are coming.”
You arrive out of one of the submarines, confused and annoyed by the message. All your years in the linguistic department deciphering thousands of buried texts in hundreds of unknown languages, this one written in plain English makes the vein in your head pop.
It is a thin line between comprehension and confusion and you stand on it. You wonder who is they? And why the deadline of 20 years?
You have seen the abandoned cities and the unknown launching stations. You understand that they hid deep in ocean trenches oblivious to the existence of humans. But you know they knew of your existence but never bothered to interact with your species.
You find out about their contribution to the Pyramids, the Stonehenge, the Taj Mahal, the Macchu Picchu. But they never wanted the credit for it. They experimented on working with humans a long time ago and they knew that your species wouldn’t ever get over the unknown enemies that you create among yourselves.
Maybe they did try to warn you over time, over centuries. Maybe they tried to help your species evolve into something more than mere tribes, and work together to save yourselves. They failed, you think.
But they still leave you with a warning. A warning to prepare for something arriving in 20 years. Astrophysicists and astrobiologists get to work. Try to understand the message that you have found among the oceanic cities. They surveil the cosmos for anomalies ranging from radio waves to gravitational waves. Every telescope looks for a smudge or a flicker on their giant mirrors.
You wonder how did the oceanic people knew about the threat. How could they have monitored for alien species coming to Earth form the darkest depths? They were advanced in every way possible, they used the geo-energy from ocean floors to power their civilizations, they built giant spacecrafts to carry them and a part of the ocean floor and water with them to survive, just as you would carry air. But you know for a fact that they didn’t discover any new physics or chemistry. It is still the same laws but with advanced engineering. You estimate 200 years more advanced than yourselves.
And then it clicks. The ocean people never looked up. For you, up is life and everything you find wondrous. But for them, up was the ocean floor. Their energy, their life, their civilization depended on it. Just as you look up in wonder, they looked down.
You run to scientists and world leaders. You tell them that you need to go back on a submarine mission. You plead that you all are looking in the wrong direction. They allow you one submarine to check out the abandoned civilization once more.
You reach the dark and bubbling hot waters full of architecture beyond your imagination. But you realize that nothing else remains. No life, no economy, and no science. But a skeleton without the nervous system. And that’s when you see the skeleton twitch…
Your team loses control of all submarines. You lose all forms of communication with the upper world. Your submarines all choreographically move towards a shipyard like structure.
And that’s how you arrive here. Your new home. Your second home. Your second home until the first one implodes. And it will. In 20 years. Your linguistic doctorate fails you. It was no warning, it was a promise.
© Gaurav Shetty 2020
