Nano Bytes

Sauthca The Box on the Beach

It was one of those late autumn days at Southport where the sun is low in the south, grey clouds are in the west and the wind is high, blowing a layer of sand particles so that when you're tramping along the high tide line, you seem to be running in a buff coloured dream of relativity.

The sea to my right was shallow, and great creamy fans of foam made patterns on the shiny wet sand.

I revelled in the huge sky, the brilliance of the sun and the smell of the sea.

Bright as it was ahead, I briefly saw a penetrating vertical spear of blue light hit the sand some mile ahead of me. I waited for the thunder, assuming the flash to be lightning but no sound came. I thought perhaps that the wind buffeting in my ears had deafened me.

I put my head down and settled to a steady tramp into the wind.

Looking up a few minutes later, a glitter of light held my attention, way ahead.

I stopped and the glitter took shape and volume to become a rolling, many sided box apparently blown along the beach by the wind. As it neared me, it became a hypnotic object of beauty, a jewel of azure bright facets, each face picking light from the sun and internally reflecting it to dazzle the eyes and provoke an overwhelming desire to possess such a wonderful artefact.

It was only a foot or so in diameter, and as it was about to pass, I started to run to intercept it. The moment I moved, the object stopped its rolling progress.

As I walked towards it, the jewel, as I perceived it to be, split along the edges of its facets to spread itself in petals on the sand like a flower, and in the centre of the flower was a brilliant electric blue sphere, within which were mesmerising swirling patterns of light and dark.

I was so taken with this transformation that I barely noticed that the object and I were now cocooned in a warm, windless hemisphere of silence. The sand still roiled past the confines of the hemisphere, but soundlessly.

From the central sphere I seemed to hear a voice - not through my ears but within my head.

«Greetings. We wish you no harm but we must have words with you. You do not need to articulate your thoughts but if it helps you, you may so do.»

«I – I», I stammered,«Er Hello, erm, who is we - who are you?»

«This is - or I am, if you prefer to personalise our interaction, an automated robot probe which we send to all planets threatened by carbon life forms.»

«That doesn't answer the question who are you - the ones who sent you.»

The probe seemed to stop. The patterns in the sphere froze in stasis.

I was once more in a bubble of quiet on the sands of Southport beach.

Then the patterns resumed their hypnotic dance within the sphere.

«I am sorry but I have problems of file compression‑I have to exchange information with mother above.»

«Is that where the beings who sent you are?»

«No, she is another, very large automaton.»

«But you called it - her, mother.»

«All the best computers are female.»

«So you're a him?»

«No. I am an it.»

«How's it our defence systems haven't been alerted?»

«We hide behind asteroids and moons. There are always those.»

«But your communications with mother would be detected.»

«We steal bandwidth from your many artificial satellites. There are always those too. Now look, I do not have the time to discuss how we elude your primitive technology. Suffice to say we have and will continue so to do.»

«Oh. Er - so why are you here?»

«We attempt to save planets from so called intelligent, carbon based life forms.»

«It's this 'we' that I don't understand. Is there a life form that created you or initiated this - this mission?»

«No. Not any more. We are self replicating machines that were created by a now extinct carbon life form not unlike you, who realised the flaw in the make up of carbon life forms. Now I do not have much time. Battery charge limits I think you would appreciate.»

«OK - but you must understand I'm completely at a loss to make logic of this - this - whole thing. I can't understand without asking more questions. What can you want of me?»

«A decision.»

«I thought I'd reached a stage in life when I didn't have to make any of those.»

«Rubbish — "

The probe made another one of those stops where I was released from its hold on my mind.

«Sorry - we are not allowed to use opprobrious expressions. A temporary software failure. We need a decision on a question. Do you want to save your planet from complete destruction of the living environment ?»

The question was so vast in its implications I couldn't wrap my mind around it. Of course in one sense the answer must be - yes. But what was this computer based 'thing' playing at? Was I really dealing with what amounted to a very sophisticated assemblage of printed circuits and an operating system as flawed as Windows Vista.

I asked «What makes you think the planet needs saving?»

«Windmills.»

«Windmills? I thought they were planet friendly?»

«Yes, they are, but by the time you carbon based life forms start building them it is too late. First we see nuclear weapons experiments. It is the warning sign for which we watch. Then it is windmills. You always do the same thing. You get your power from oil and coal, then nuclear and then try to do it with windmills. Well some of you get to make hyperturbines but that's end of planet - or shortly after - shortly in our terms, not yours.»

«Hyperturbines. I've never heard of those?»

«Forget it. I do not have not the time to tell you. You must decide.»

«But if I say yes - or no - what happens?»

«If you want to save the planet you must reduce your population. If six billion of you want to live like the richest ten percent you need five planets of resources. You do not have five planets, only one. Therefore you must eliminate the demand of four fifths of you. Fortunately we have a means of so doing.»

«What's that?»

«We have another machine above which carries a radiation which sterilises and then soon — "

Again one of those pauses when I was released from the direct thrall of the device, but I was now so appalled by what was implied by the words from it, that I trembled.

" — kills four fifths of the population.»

«Which - what - how, is the four fifths chosen?»

«We find that carbon based so called intelligent life forms always have a selfish gene which is carried by four fifths of the population. The radiation system selects these.»

«So you have another machine that can do this to us - above - in orbit is it?»

«It is a Him," the Him was uttered with a deep reverence, and the display in the sphere momentarily stopped its frantic dance.

«So if I say no, what happens?»

«We go on to the next endangered planet. They are all the same. It is a big universe.»

«I can't make a decision for the other six billion - well‑less one of me.»

«We do not have the time to allow a — "

I was released once more. The sun had set - but I had not seen its setting. The hemisphere in which the flower and I were held, was illuminated in soft blue light.

" — democratic decision. Six billion to vote or one organism taken at random - the result will be a matter of indifference to us, and probably the same .»

The patterns in the sphere seemed to draw me in so that they were all around me.

«You must make a decision. You have no alternative. Decide. Decide now.»

«Oh God," I muttered.

«There is no God. Only your projected desire to be a child once more and have your mother to decide for you. Decide. Decide now.»

«Then I have to say no. We'll try somehow to save our planet and ourselves. But not kill eighty percent now. That's inhumane.»

«Very well. You are wrong. But we are built to accept decisions from so called intelligent organic creatures. Goodbye.»

The protective hemisphere evaporated, the flower closed back to a box and a shaft of light sucked it into the clouds, and chill rain fell onto my bald head.

I stumbled back to my hotel, wet through, cold and fearful. Would we, could we - humanity - pull through without creating an intolerable environment? Could the alien cure have worked?

Anyway it was pointless to speculate. Most people would be likely to think I'd made it all up.