Hello, my name is Charles

by on November 6, 2016 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

Many humans have always felt the need to travel to new places and leave behind what they know. But this was most often a small-scale ordeal with no more than a single-family unit or so. The massive colony operations of the Twenty Second Century were another matter entirely. They consisted of tens of the thousands of human beings sent into deep space by the combined work of billions of humans on Earth, Mars, and Venus. What reason did our governments have to back the expensive colonial projects when much smaller and cheaper scientific expeditions could have been sent in their place? I have spent my life looking for the answers to that question.

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Hello, my name is Jack

by on November 5, 2016 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

I grew up with the intelligent dogs and cats of Earth. And of course I met some of the catgirls that make Los Angeles famous. But something I learned out in the stars is that these modifications were real minor. Dogs and cats still walk on all fours. They’re just smart. And an extra set of cat ears and maybe a feline tail doesn’t turn a Japanese schoolgirl into some kind of alien hybrid. They’re still what they started as, just better. I’ve met people out in the stars that show just how minor the genetic modifications we’ve worked with are. I’m talking stuff that would be Big A Alien if quick study couldn’t find their genetic heritage. It makes me wonder what else is scattered out there in the stars. What people we’re going to meet in the depths of space.

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Hello, my name is Betty

by on November 4, 2016 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

Humanity tamed the world and the animals in its quest to go forth and multiply. They turned wild plants could only feed the gatherers into field plants that could feed worlds. They turned wild animals into domesticated companions that could guard them or do their heavy work. Wherever they have gone, humanity has always created the world around it in an image that best fit humanity’s wishes. Sometimes these lands become veritable Gardens of Eden, while at other times they become Hell on Earth.

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Hello, my name is Charles

by on November 3, 2016 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

We expanded into the galaxy slowly at first. It took years to plan each colony, years to travel between the stars, and decades before those new worlds became productive. But we spent the time and money to do it. Some have asked why we did so. It was so expensive to do this that no one could make a profit. The early colonies would have bankrupted anything short of the Great Powers, and a careful study of their economies shows how much they poured into the process. Protests against the wasteful spending were common in the Western Alliance. Not so common in China and Russia where protesters had a tendency to end of dead. But even there, the strain on the economies is easy to see. So why did we go? That is a very good question.

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Hello, my name is Jack

by on November 2, 2016 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

Sometimes I’m amazed at the kinds of life I find out in the worlds I go to. Sometimes it looks like something that could have grown up on Earth. Other times it is truly alien. And sometimes it’s twisted just enough that you can guess its origin if you look at it sideways. Like something that would be at home in Alice’s Wonderland or a Disney film. I can see why some people think that aliens talked to them to give them some of those ideas. Either that, or they had some really good drugs to spike their imaginations. Sometimes I wonder which possibility I would prefer.

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