A pre-shattering time capsule is found on Earth. In 2019, the time capsule was put into a cavern that was deliberately collapsed back in that prehistory era only to be opened, slowly, by centuries of erosion and earth shifts. Several teachers and historians carefully gathered text books, history books from around the world, old newspapers, maps, copied old scrolls, various sets of encyclopedias, bibles from as many cultures as possible, books on languages from around the world, to name but a few of what was in there. It was an incredible treasure trove of history. From the ancient histories, to the civil war, to the history of the various earth world wars, to things like the great depression to the modern era. The history books were from many nations and various cultures. And not just history books, but recipe books, people's personal diaries and photos as well. The capsule being a hard, resilient plastic container filled with inert nitrogen to try to prevent oxidation of these assets.
And who found this treasure trove to start? A homeless, hungry, twelve year old who was exploring caverns and a havenworlder who had come to visit earth and gotten lost from the tour group. -- Anon Guest
In the year 2525/ If man is still alive/ If woman can survive... -- Terran song lyrics, pre-Shattering.
Sooner or later, time catches up with the speculation about an era that was once the distant future. Fantasy clashes with reality, and illusion shatters. The futurism of the past becomes the zeerust of the present and the erapunk of the future.
This is Earth, 2525. In recent years, the Galactic Alliance has not only made itself known to Earth, but also served a class action lawsuit on behalf of all the 'garbage dump' colonies that Earth set and forgot. This is Earth, after five centuries of getting rid of the undesired and the undesirable, the trouble element, and the problematic few. This is a stagnant backwater with an elite few clinging to wealth as a signifier of worth, causing those struggling in the middle to blame the poverty-stricken for all the problems caused by the wealthy.
This is a planet that is desperately clawing for tourist money to attempt to fund the restitution owed to the uncounted throngs of angry colonial worlds. This is potentially the greatest disparity between extreme wealth and extreme poverty teetering on the knife-edge of revolution; trying to hide the dirty laundry behind a flimsy curtain with a metaphorical sign attached that reads, Staff only! Do not enter!
Please ignore the deprivation, destitution, and desperation behind the curtain. Earth thanks you for purchasing the merchandise made in sweatshops by the very people you, the visitor, are meant to ignore. Please contribute to this glittering charity that's no better than a band-aid on a sucking chest wound. Thank you so much.
In the midst of this, Korz met Git. Korz was a Havenworlder in a full resilience livesuit, and Git was a feral child eking out an existence on the refuse of a visitor resort. Korz had found a goat-track trail not on the rather detailed maps and, desiring to make a discovery, followed the track away from the sanitised Terra that ze really should have stayed on.
Ze was still within accepted tourist space, so no alerts immediately went out. Git was so well camouflaged with filth and mud that Korz didn't see them at first. They met when Git snatched a nutrition pack from where it slipped out of Korz's gloved fingers.
Korz froze, staring at what had once appeared to be a clump of mud that had apparently come to life like an ancient fragment of lore when the gods were making intelligence out of dirt. Git, meanwhile, was more concerned with chewing a hole in the pliable plastic containing the nutrient paste within.
Korz therefore had the time to deduce through observation that Git was a Human juvenile, starving, and alone. Korz had studied the local Terran dialect and began negotiations by offering a second nutrition pack, this time showing the filthy child where the output valve was so that they didn't have to risk their teeth on food-grade containment polymer with misophobic, hydrophobic, and full pathogen-repellant treatment.
After they drained those two containers completely empty, Git said, "...'t'cha wanna buy offa me? Y'r a tincan, so... Y' wanna get stuff? I got stuff..."
They either didn't have the education or the time to speak properly. This little Human was nervous and edgy, and trade was the primary means of survival amongst the lowest of the low. Korz decided that ze would pay the highest possible price for anything that this Human had to offer. "I would indeed like stuff," ze said. "May I know your name? Mine is Korz."
The filthy Human stood. Scrawny and undersized, bearing the signs of multiple nutrient deficiencies, they were still head and shoulders above Korz's own stature. "...'s Git, I guess. 'S what others say for me[1]."
"Are there others who are... good to you? Others who call you that?"
Git shrugged one shoulder and made a noise with no consonants that nevertheless encapsulated their ignorance on the topic. "Gotta move. Stuff's this way. Turn your alerts off so's I don't gotta move again. Hate moving."
Korz complied, ticking the checkbox for 'guided by a Human' as a reason for doing so. Ze did say, "There is an auto-alert that I cannot de-activate. It's triggered by my medical distress."
"Yeah, that's fine," said Git. "Y'r not in danger. 'S cool. Stuff's this way."
Git lead the way to a hidden den made mostly out of vehicle plating thrown over a substructure of building materials and rope. It was sturdy enough to bear Git's weight when the child bounced off of it. "Got stuff. I make stuff sometimes but this? This is ancient stuff. I got a fossil library. Alixanja shit."
There was a period of confusion in which Git told a garbled understanding of the Library of Alexandria and claimed erroneously that they had a fossilized fragment of that ancient depository of lore.
The shelter Git was staying in was something of a mine. As Git told the story, they found a corner of it under their bedroll and, with polished shiny surfaces to redirect the sun, realised that it was part of the legendary library. It had to be. Digging with improvised tools had only got them so far, but they knew it was something interesting.
"Thems is books," said Git, "and pages of writing and stuff. And there's things, too. 'S all in ambah 'r somethin'. Can't crack it, but this is ancient stuff. Alixanja f'r sure. This is the best stuff."
Humanity had made transparent aluminium, then re-enforced it with nanotechnology to make a sealed barrier impervious to the slings and arrows of deep time. They put their documented history inside the container, alongside several artefacts of the time, replaced the air with inert gas, and sealed it for a later accident to uncover it.
One sheet of paper, deliberately pressed flat against the side, said, Greetings from 2019! in large, friendly letters.
This was a slice of history not just from before the Shattering, but also from before the Green Wars. A slice that Git had barely begun excavating. Korz's scanners indicated that the capsule was the size of a Standard Family Domicile Unit. Perhaps a little more. With no walls, appliances, or furniture to get in the way.
Crammed full of the things that the people of 2019 thought were important to send to an unspecified date in the future.
"That's Alixanja," said Git. "Somethin' like Alixanja's gotta be worth 'nuff for house an' food f'r a year or two, yeh?"
Well... this Human wasn't entirely wrong. "It is worth far more than that, for sure." Korz appointed hirself Git's agent in this find, and started filing paperwork on their behalf. "You will not be forced to move," ze began, "however, there are important things that are going to happen, starting with housing and health..."
It was the find of the millennium. Git's rags-to-riches story would be one of the last that Earth ever told. The CRC, having found out that their minimum standards of living were not being met, added to Earth's onus and actively assisted in enforcing that those minimums were accomplished.
Henceforth, no Terran child would be living alone, no cogniscent on Terran space would be forced to subsist off refuse, and there was no such thing as "undeserving" any longer.
Git still called the find 'Alixanja'.
[1] Sad but true: in the annals of history, there have been children arriving at mandated school places who legitimately thought their name was 'shut up', or 'get lost'.
[Image (c) Can Stock Photo / zeffss]
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