Timelines

by Bob Blink

  Oh, I almost forgot. Al visited us here a couple of weeks ago. At seventy-five years of age, he still looks great. Even though he was in his mid-fifties when he received the uptime medications and won’t have the full life extension expected by some of us who were younger, he still has a long life ahead of him. He is retired now, but is in great demand. He travels a lot, and gives talks around the world. It is good for expanding awareness of what almost happened to us.

  One of his fan groups came up with an interesting idea. Al has long believed the reason the aliens never found an advanced human civilization uptime was because we all left. Given what we know, and what we are making sure the world remembers, mankind won’t forget there is a threat looming in our future. It’s coming from space to our part of the galaxy. But we know that space travel to the stars already exists in Carol’s time. Many of us think she might have brought a bit of the alien technology uptime with her. Naiya carried one of the alien computers with a set of the files uptime when they last visited. Doc says he is sure she took samples of the alien metals, plastics, and other items. The technology of Carol’s time would be far better able to analyze, duplicate, and possibly improve on them. With that to help spur our technological development, where could we be in another thousand years?

  There is a lot of galaxy out there. Knowing a problem is coming, why not just locate a new place far away. How long would it take to relocate the whole of mankind? A couple thousand years? They have the time. Why not? I think he might have something. But here’s the thought. Not that Al is suggesting it’s true, but it’s intriguing. What if mankind made the move away from earth? And later decided to come back? What if the threat the aliens were afraid of is really us returning. Wouldn’t it be ironic if they made their own problem?

  “Ready dear?” Naiya asked as she came into the room carrying Kurt, our youngest. Our daughter Carol was in tow as well.

  It’s time for our annual trip to the cache. It’s nowhere near the old entrance, but it’s something we arranged a long time ago before the aliens returned. We can’t know if the future turned out secure for Carol, but it’s important for us anyway. Each year we leave a status of the past year of our life. Pictures of the kids, that kind of thing. The gates closed, so everything that we will ever leave for her will be there the first time she checks. We believe she will find it and know what we shared together. It’s our way to communicate with her and to hold her in our lives.

  Time to go.