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Writing Group / Re: Writing Prompts!
« on: December 20, 2010, 06:23:44 AM »
FIRE FROM THE GODS
“How many does that make now?”
“Eleven.”
“Damn. Two in one month. How did this one go?”
“We don’t really know yet. We’ve only just confirmed that they were an FTL civilization. Nailing down the manner of extinction with any degree of precision is going to be a long road. Preliminary reports suggest social upheaval, but that might be a result of whatever it was that actually killed them, not the cause itself.”
“Goodthomas Jonah and his followers are going to have a field day with this.”
“Nothing we can do about that. We’re scientists, not politicians. We don’t hide results we don’t like.”
“We’re sure they were FTL, aren’t we?”
“Yes. There’s no doubt about it. We’ve found congruencies in three planetary systems well outside of their respective radio shells. They must have had FTL.”
“How long ago did it happen? Do we know that yet?”
“The chrono team thinks it was probably between three hundred and five-hundred years ago. They won’t have a full report for a couple of months yet, but they don’t expect the number to change much.”
“And how old? Do we now how old they were when it happened?”
“The chrono team is working on that too. That’s even less certain. But it looks. . . ” “Like its right around fifty-seven years.”
“Well, they’re saying sixty years, plus or minus ten.”
“Let’s not release those numbers until Chrono is willing to release a full report. No need to throw more fuel on the fire when we don’t know if the numbers are correct.”
“They’ll leak out anyway.”
“I know. But I don’t want them quoted as official numbers until they are official. And tell chrono to try to get us that report ASAP.”
“What do you think?”
“About what?”
“Everything. What Goodthomas and his followers are saying.”
“Goodthomas is just a crazy. Humanity has had them since long before we left Old Earth. He’s not really any different from all the others.”
“So you don’t believe there is any truth to what he’s saying? That we’ll be next?”
“I didn’t say that. Goodthomas is crazy, I have no doubt about that. But even if he’s crazy, he might be right.”
“It’s a scary thought, isn’t it?”
“Yes. I don’t like it, and we don’t have much evidence for it, but its a nasty thought. The more I look at the numbers, the more what he says starts to make sense.”
“But all the FTL engineers and researcher say that there is no possible mechanism. That the engines can’t possibly have any sort of effect on us that could cause this.”
“That might just mean that none of them are looking in the right place.”
“I know. And the numbers don’t look good. One hundred-forty-one extant human or human-descent civilizations—”
“One-forty-three.”
“Really? I hadn’t heard. Who found them?”
“Lemarc and his group. Both in the same system actually, but they don’t have any contact with each other, and Lemarc’s people think that they are biologically distinct, so we’re counting them as two different civilizations. But anyway, go on.”
“Right. One hundred forty three extant human civilizations. Evidence for maybe twenty extinct civilizations. Of those, eleven have been confirmed FTL civs. None of the non- FTL’s lasted for more than two generations past initial settlement. Most didn’t make it one. In the case of the non-FTL civilizations, cause of extinction is pretty consistent. Lack of resources, imported divisions among the original population, and in the case of Cambell’s civ, plain old bad luck. If that asteroid hadn’t hit them, we might have one more extant civilization today.”
“And the FTL’s?”
“No known consistency. Confirmed extinction modes include convergence of natural disasters, social upheaval followed up by plague of unknown origin, and civil war. The rest are still uncertain.”
“Not quite true. There is one consistency. All extinctions happened within fifty-seven years of first FTL flight.”
“We don’t know that. Hiroto’s hypothesized as much, and Goodthomas and his crowd are convinced its true, but we can don’t have hard numbers for all of them.”
“Should I run through the list?”
“I’d rather you didn’t. I’ve looked at the numbers.”
“And?”
“It looks bad. The number suggest that no civilization that used FTL drives survives for even a century. The limit may be 57 years. But we don’t know why. For all we know it’s just coincidence.”
“It doesn’t scare you? It doesn’t scare you that we’ve been using FTL for thirty years now? That we may have less than that left?”
“Of course it scares me! Why do you think I’m in this line of work? Every day I hope to find evidence that it isn’t true, that there is no reason to believe that our civilization will be gone in three decades! I don’t buy it. Goodthomas tries to scare everyone with it, but the theory makes no sense. No one can suggest a cause. There is no link between the FTL drives and any of the extinction modes. No one even has a theory as to how that could work.”
“Yet they’re all dead.”
“Except us.”
“Yes. Except us.”
“How many does that make now?”
“Eleven.”
“Damn. Two in one month. How did this one go?”
“We don’t really know yet. We’ve only just confirmed that they were an FTL civilization. Nailing down the manner of extinction with any degree of precision is going to be a long road. Preliminary reports suggest social upheaval, but that might be a result of whatever it was that actually killed them, not the cause itself.”
“Goodthomas Jonah and his followers are going to have a field day with this.”
“Nothing we can do about that. We’re scientists, not politicians. We don’t hide results we don’t like.”
“We’re sure they were FTL, aren’t we?”
“Yes. There’s no doubt about it. We’ve found congruencies in three planetary systems well outside of their respective radio shells. They must have had FTL.”
“How long ago did it happen? Do we know that yet?”
“The chrono team thinks it was probably between three hundred and five-hundred years ago. They won’t have a full report for a couple of months yet, but they don’t expect the number to change much.”
“And how old? Do we now how old they were when it happened?”
“The chrono team is working on that too. That’s even less certain. But it looks. . . ” “Like its right around fifty-seven years.”
“Well, they’re saying sixty years, plus or minus ten.”
“Let’s not release those numbers until Chrono is willing to release a full report. No need to throw more fuel on the fire when we don’t know if the numbers are correct.”
“They’ll leak out anyway.”
“I know. But I don’t want them quoted as official numbers until they are official. And tell chrono to try to get us that report ASAP.”
“What do you think?”
“About what?”
“Everything. What Goodthomas and his followers are saying.”
“Goodthomas is just a crazy. Humanity has had them since long before we left Old Earth. He’s not really any different from all the others.”
“So you don’t believe there is any truth to what he’s saying? That we’ll be next?”
“I didn’t say that. Goodthomas is crazy, I have no doubt about that. But even if he’s crazy, he might be right.”
“It’s a scary thought, isn’t it?”
“Yes. I don’t like it, and we don’t have much evidence for it, but its a nasty thought. The more I look at the numbers, the more what he says starts to make sense.”
“But all the FTL engineers and researcher say that there is no possible mechanism. That the engines can’t possibly have any sort of effect on us that could cause this.”
“That might just mean that none of them are looking in the right place.”
“I know. And the numbers don’t look good. One hundred-forty-one extant human or human-descent civilizations—”
“One-forty-three.”
“Really? I hadn’t heard. Who found them?”
“Lemarc and his group. Both in the same system actually, but they don’t have any contact with each other, and Lemarc’s people think that they are biologically distinct, so we’re counting them as two different civilizations. But anyway, go on.”
“Right. One hundred forty three extant human civilizations. Evidence for maybe twenty extinct civilizations. Of those, eleven have been confirmed FTL civs. None of the non- FTL’s lasted for more than two generations past initial settlement. Most didn’t make it one. In the case of the non-FTL civilizations, cause of extinction is pretty consistent. Lack of resources, imported divisions among the original population, and in the case of Cambell’s civ, plain old bad luck. If that asteroid hadn’t hit them, we might have one more extant civilization today.”
“And the FTL’s?”
“No known consistency. Confirmed extinction modes include convergence of natural disasters, social upheaval followed up by plague of unknown origin, and civil war. The rest are still uncertain.”
“Not quite true. There is one consistency. All extinctions happened within fifty-seven years of first FTL flight.”
“We don’t know that. Hiroto’s hypothesized as much, and Goodthomas and his crowd are convinced its true, but we can don’t have hard numbers for all of them.”
“Should I run through the list?”
“I’d rather you didn’t. I’ve looked at the numbers.”
“And?”
“It looks bad. The number suggest that no civilization that used FTL drives survives for even a century. The limit may be 57 years. But we don’t know why. For all we know it’s just coincidence.”
“It doesn’t scare you? It doesn’t scare you that we’ve been using FTL for thirty years now? That we may have less than that left?”
“Of course it scares me! Why do you think I’m in this line of work? Every day I hope to find evidence that it isn’t true, that there is no reason to believe that our civilization will be gone in three decades! I don’t buy it. Goodthomas tries to scare everyone with it, but the theory makes no sense. No one can suggest a cause. There is no link between the FTL drives and any of the extinction modes. No one even has a theory as to how that could work.”
“Yet they’re all dead.”
“Except us.”
“Yes. Except us.”