November 12, 2064

DEEP-SPACE COLONIZATION LAUNCHES SOON

by Eloise Malinon

SAN ANTONIO – The flagship of the United Space Federation, technically named Colony Vessel: Alpha, but popularly known as The Seed, has finished construction this week. The Seed is the first ship in the USF’s proposed colonization fleet, with eleven other vessels scheduled for completion by 2085. The USF claims they began their colonization project with the intention of insuring the survival of mankind, as well as to help mitigate the overpopulation problem on Earth. Some prominent figures, such as decorated astronaut and face of the Anti-Nationalist Alliance, Aleska Boroski, have publicly questioned the validity of the USF’s purported humanitarian efforts.

“If the USF truly cared about the future of humanity, they would utilize their resources resolving problems on Earth, rather than abandoning our home planet with a few thousand people and a good deal of our natural resources,” said Baroski in a recent press conference. With global population estimated to be around twenty-billion, it is unlikely that the relatively small number of colonists leaving Earth will have any impact at all on the problems that have arisen from overpopulation.

While the altruism behind the USF’s colonization efforts may be questionable, the ambition that drives them is not. The Seed will begin its 10,000-year voyage to Proxima Centauri this winter, it’s 2,780 passengers prepared to live out the rest of their days on the massive vessel. Once they leave the Solar System, the colonists will be entirely isolated from the rest of human-kind, with only themselves and the computer technology ingrained in the ship to keep their mini-civilization running for the next ten millennia. A daunting proposition, indeed.

We spoke to several colonists about their decision to leave Earth forever. Carl Robeson of Little Rock, AK said that he is “just excited to be a part of the next stage of human civilization.” Others had different reasons for wanting to leave. “After my wife died, I felt like there was nothing left for me and my daughter on Earth,” said Jorge Martino of San Salvador, Mexico. “[My wife] had always dreamed of going into space, so I guess this is my way of trying to honor her memory.” In contrast, there were other colonists who admitted that they wanted to get away from the surge of refugees and threat of war in North America. “It seems pretty obvious to me that Earth won’t be habitable for much longer. The climate is going crazy, all the people are going crazy, and you just know that something crazy is gonna happen,” said one colonist who preferred to remain anonymous.

Whatever their motivations may be, their courage is unquestionable. But what might life be like for the generations to come? To answer this question, we talked to the USF’s head psychologist, David Brauner. “Of course it is really impossible for us, who have lived our whole lives on Earth, to imagine the life of one of these colonists,” says Brauner. “They will be born within the confines of a ship, and die within it. It does seem rather depressing to us, but then again they will not have the context of life on Earth.

“We have also included digital copies of every conceivable work of Human art and entertainment. The colonists will have access to all of the music, movies, books, poetry, paintings, television series, and virtual games that they could possibly want. They could spend their entire lives enjoying the cultural history of mankind, and still never experience it all.” With so much to occupy them, Brauner assures us that life for the colonists will be pleasant and carefree. We can only hope that, for their sake, he is correct.

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Check out the next installment in this series: Conceived Alone