By: Kyle Zhu

It’s 2023. It’s a sunny day, beautiful weather. It was history class.

“Our founding fathers of Valeria signed the Declaration of Autonomy, declaring independence from Spain, on June 5, 1775. Then, our first president, then General Marlowe Murphy, led us to victory in the Insurrectionary War.” History was boring. It was always the same people, the same countries mentioned, nothing changed. Of course, you wouldn’t understand this history nor this language, so I tried my best translating here.

Back home, the television was on. “Scientists discover weak radio signal from just outside earth,” my “dad” was obsessed with science, even though he was a construction worker. My “mom” was a scientist. That was how they met. Both of them weren’t home. I stared at the sky, where a speck of light seemed to flash inconsistently. It was not an Avia-sorry, airplane. That was an unknown flying object that resets history every 5000 years. Gamma ray bursts. Destructive weapons beyond humanity’s imagination would eradicate almost any proof of organism existence. All except for me. I have been alive for more than 5 restarts, and I have been called many different names. God. Jesus. Moses. The Almighty. Buddha. Immortal. And that was only in your restart.

I’ve seen the world too many times, seen events play out so similarly it was almost boring to live. Today was another restart. I remembered the date. August 16th 2023. Pretty soon, scientists would realize that the weak radio signal would turn into a destructive weapon capable of killing every living organism on Earth within seconds. But they would have nothing to do about it. The dread of thinking about it still sends shivers down my spines. Billions of humans, trillions of animals and plants, immeasurable amounts of cells and organisms, extinguished with no hope of ever growing back. And as always, there would be a few lucky alive, spared by the aliens, their memories completely gone and primitive as cavemen. I was never hit by the ray, nor did I ever die. It was a curious phenomenon.

“Hey, Dave, stop the 3DVR observation thing. It’s too primitive. Plus, we must reset the world.”, a human remarked. “Alright,” replied another human, “I’m just having so much fun watching the world through a primitive’s lens.” They were humans, except with no hair, weak legs, and what seemed like a larger brain. Dave logged off his Neuro-Interceptor account with a series of thoughts and walked over to the front of the spaceship, where the human patiently waited. “Why the rush, Can?” Dave asked as he put his hand on a button whilst sipping tea. Can answered, “For us it’s 5 hours, but for the residents of Terra Firma it’s 5000 years. And you’re supposed to know that after possessing the primitive for all those days. ” Dave shrugged, “I kind lost track of time. And for your information, Can, I didn’t possess him, all I did was grant him temporary invulnerability to peek at his thoughts. Fair trade, I’d say.” As the fingerprint, retinal and voice pattern scans were complete, a soundless destructive burst of ionizing radiation was sent towards Terra Firma, where a few random animals, plants, and people would be spared. Dave sat down, relieved in his chair, “it was lucky we had the privilege to monitor Terra Firma. Give them 200 more years and they could either blow themselves up or blow us up.” Can was not feeling well after extinguishing trillions of animals and plants. “The ‘Milky Way’, as they say it, was listed under Galaxy Union as not to be attacked due to their undeveloped technology.” “I know, that’s why we’re resetting their progress,” says Dave while chewing a bar, “We’re not attacking and taking over. We’re merely firing weak gamma ray bursts at them for them to restart. They could have beat us in technology if they had 500 more years.” “Lucky, we had them under control,” sighed Can, somewhat relieved of pressure. He never wanted to kill anybody. “Relax,” said Dave, “They’re only primitives. They are worthless, nor can they beat us in technology. Makes you feel better, no?” Dave sat back down on the pilot seat and started to turn on the spaceship. “We still have 5 hours. We can take a ride if it improves your mood.” Dave’s hand was on an eject button. He was sick and tired of his fellow crewmate being so gracious and caring. He knew humans conquered half the galaxy by force and ruthlessness. But his partner wouldn’t die. Every time he was ejected into complete vacuum wearing nothing but shorts, he would crawl back with no apparent memory of what happened. It spooked him. This time, he would eject and fly away, even if it opened Terra Firma to new technology. Can was about to answer as his eyes widened on the hand pushing the eject button, when a message was sent to his external dendrites. “BOB!” it read, “Get off your stupid lowly 4D VR thingy and get some food! You’ve watched the thing for a week now!” He quickly replied, “But Mom, I have glucose dripping into my bloodstream! I don’t need food! And also, it’s a simulation!” Thinking back to the thoughts of Can, he couldn’t help but laugh at how primitive the human was. Arms, hands, and feet? For what? Walking and driving? Bob himself had frail hands, no feet, very little bones and a visible heart, kidney, lungs and bladder under his pale white piece of integument they call skin. His arteries and veins were attached to glucose-dripping machines that fed him water, sugars and essential proteins and fibers without ever having to move. He was one of billions of teenagers, children and newborn to adapt to the luxurious lifestyle gifted to them. Robots and automatons ran everything. No one needed to work, cook, clean, write, just enjoy life, like utopia. Skin and bones were never necessary if you had telepathy and you were never going to go anywhere, he thought. He never thought of having a next generation.

And as a preserved brain in a giant canister seemingly woke up from a dream, it thought to itself, “what wonderful but terrifying times that there were still genders. And glucose machine? What a relic. There was one in the museum I visited last week. Such primitives.”