Short story – “Exodus”

“Exodus”

Leaning forward, Paul Harper kissed his wife Deborah on the forehead and whispered, “I love you.”

“I love you too,” she whispered back with a tired smile.  Their three month old Linda had finally fallen asleep in her mother’s arms.

Ever so gently, Paul placed his hand on the back of his daughter’s head.  Like every time before, he smiled at the touch of her silky hair. 

Sooner than he would have liked, Paul glanced towards his study and frowned.  Deborah nodded and began to turn away, but he stopped her with a hand on her shoulder and kissed her forehead again.

When Paul entered his study, he closed the door as quietly as possible and sat at his desk.  Closing his eyes, he rubbed his temples.  He still had twenty-three essays to read and correct before he could go to bed.  Fortunately, they were short. 

Since next week marked the fortieth anniversary of the Pentans making First Contact with humanity, he had his students write about what they felt was the biggest consequence of that event.  He remembered his own teachers giving a similar assignment for the twenty-fifth anniversary, but he couldn’t remember what he had written.  He didn’t have the time or energy to look through his old files to see if he still had it, and besides he suspected those files had probably been deleted long ago.  But before he had his students write out a long essay, he had them turn in a brief, one page version.  This let him see where they were going so he could advise them on any problems they might run into.  It was a good plan, except for the part where he had said he would return the essays tomorrow so his students could work on the full versions over the weekend.

With a sigh, Paul got to work.  David Lepper apparently had gone to the net and just copied some college student’s paper.  Paul doubted any of his eighth grade class could discuss how Wittgenstein’s theories could be used in an approach to the Pentan language.  Elba Madero’s one page outline was a rambling three pages about how great it was for humans to learn we were not alone in the universe.  Almost in contrast was Ann O’Rourke’s half page statement that Pentan technology and experience cut considerable time off the construction of the Mbandaka Space Elevator.  And it was no surprise that the school’s star goalie, Doug Rach, wrote about Sphere-Soccer and other such sports made possible with Pentan gravity control.

Paul’s method was to read each essay twice; the first time to get the general idea and the second to mark mistakes or inconsistencies.  But he had to read Doug’s three times because his mind kept wandering.  Kids looked at gravity manipulation and made up new sports whereas adults looked at it and wondered how it could change the oldest sport.  Paul had once read that for every variable-g gym there were two variable-g sex parlors for couples who didn’t have the time or money to fly up to an orbital or lunar hotel for a weekend of acrobatic sex.  He had been trying to talk Deborah into visiting one since before they were married, but it wasn’t until she was six months pregnant that she reluctantly agreed to give it a try, mainly because it would let her be light on her feet.  But she ended up enjoying it so much they went back three more times.  Her parents had promised to come over some weekend to watch Linda and give the new parents a break and Paul had a good idea what they would do.

Saving his comments on Doug’s essay, Paul shook his head to clear his thoughts and moved on to the essay by Jon Suthers.  Jon was a teacher’s nightmare; an intelligent but lazy student, as well as a class-clown.  His teachers never knew what they would get from him.

Up on Paul’s screen came Jon’s essay, “Unforeseen Benefits of Contact with Pentans.” The first sentence read: “One of the greatest benefits of the Pentans making Contact with us – but one few people will discuss openly – is it allowed for the humane disposal of Earth’s riff-raff.”

Paul gave a low whistle.  “This should be interesting.” He continued reading:

The first group of riff-raff to leave Earth were the Technophiles.  This group – incensed that the rest of the world did not share their desire to “improve” humanity with genetic and cybernetic enhancements – stole Unity I, the first Human-built vessel with tunnel capabilities, and went off into deep space never to return.

While the world was enraged over the theft of the ship, most people considered it a small price to pay for not having to deal with such people again.

Once tunnel capable vessels became common, more groups chose to follow the Technophiles – although these purchased their vessels.

One of the first groups to legally leave were the Marxists.  These followers of Karl Marx – a Nineteenth Century philosopher – figured they could not fit into the Human Republic which requires Member Nations to have a democratic form of government as well as a capitalist economy.  Of the three nations on Earth that are not members of the Human Republic – Switzerland, Vatican City, and the Ashgabat Caliphate – none hold to the Marxists ideals.  So in 2063, a group of around a hundred Marxists led by Juan Dávila settled on the third moon of Thor – a Jovian planet orbiting the star Iota Horologii some 50 light-years from Earth.  The colony – named Trier after the birthplace of Marx – has slowly grown through the emigration from Earth of others who share their views.  While Trier is not a Member Nation, there is a treaty of non-interference between it and the Human Republic.

Through the door, Paul heard Linda begin to wail.  He went to stand up, but stopped himself.  I have to finish these he told himself.  Taking a deep breath, he forced himself back to Jon’s essay.

Similar arrangements – allowing for travel and trade – have been made with other colonies such as Nike, Five Pillars, and Here.  But others have severed all ties to the Republic, for example, Freewinds, Zion, and Cana.  The conditions – and in some cases even the location – of these “colonies” are unknown, but not that many people care.  (Although, as in the example of Trier, it would be nice if similar people left on Earth had the opportunity to emigrate.)

The reason it is beneficial for all these colonists to part company with the rest of humanity is that most of these colonies are populated with political and religious fanatics; brethren to groups that have caused considerable turmoil on Earth for millennia.  With them out of the picture, perhaps the rest of us can finally live in peace. 

But are we truly better off without such people?  Throughout history, various groups have decided that the world would be better off if certain other groups were no longer around.  While the Human Republic cannot be charged with genocide in the “disappearance” of the Technophiles or minor religious groups like the Scientologists – is the result not the same?  For how long have the wise been telling us that our differences make us stronger, not weaker?  How much weaker is the choir of humanity because of the loss of so many voices?

Paul sat back in his chair and rubbed his temples.  “That was interesting, all right,” he said to himself.  Then to his computer he said, “Insert comment,” and a small screen appeared at the bottom of the essay and filled in as he spoke.  “There is a significant change in voice and tone between the beginning and the end of your essay, Jon.  Either revise to have a constant voice throughout the whole, or if your intention is as I suspect to emphasize the end by the change, then you need to work on the beginning and make it more … satirical so the ending doesn’t come as a jolt.”

Pausing for a moment, Paul added, “Oh, and ease up on the dashes.”

Linda had quieted, and Paul hoped Deborah would be able to get some rest.  He then began rereading Jon’s essay to further critique the writing.

***

This story is part of my Human Republic series, and this was to flesh a bit of that universe out.  I’d submitted it to every place I could think of, but nobody took it.  So I self-published it back in 2014, but that site didn’t last that long. 

The reason I’m republishing it now, is that while some would cheer if certain political and religious groups left Earth for good, that’s a rather slippery slope.  Our differences make us stronger, which mean we have to accept there will be some with shitty ideals.  To be clear, it is perfectly fine for some to think left-handed people are the spawn of Satan, but if they ever start attacking left-handed people, then they belong in jail.  

Father Brown and Lucifer

Last week I wrote about how I sometimes think about what I would do if I was somehow transported back in time.  It’s a fun way to pass the time.  A related time killer is to wonder what I would do if I somehow ended up in some series.  (It could also be a movie, but series usually cover more time and so give more opportunity to explore.)  For shows I’ve already watched, it’s fun to wonder if I could explain things to fix the problems that will come up, like uncovering the villain not revealed until a season finale cliffhanger.  And for shows that I haven’t seen, I wonder how I could explain things using my general series knowledge, like if it’s a police procedural than the character played by the famous – to me – actor is probably the murderer.

At some point in this bizarre train of thought, I wondered what series I would like to binge watch with a character from another series.  Yes, it’s weird, but what you do to pass the time makes perfect sense.  After some thought, I figured I would like to watch Lucifer with Father Brown.  Lucifer is a show about Lucifer getting bored of Hell, so he retires to Los Angeles.  There he meets a homicide detective and starts solving murders.  Father Brown is the title character from the 2013 series who lives in a quaint, small, 1950s English village where there is a murder every other week.  And half the time the local police arrest the wrong person and it takes Father Brown to piece together the truth.

The reason I would like to do this, is because I think Father Brown would be most interested in Lucifer, for both the crime solving and theological aspects.  I also feel that if the two could meet, Father Brown would become friends with Lucifer.  There have been several episodes of Father Brown where he’s met homosexuals and instead of preaching damnation at them, he’s treated them as people who are probably having a difficult time, and if there was anything he could do to help them he would.  In the case of Lucifer, I suspect he wouldn’t have the knee-jerk reaction of just taking God’s side and would actually listen to what Lucifer has to say.  One of the things that keeps coming up in Lucifer, is how he hates that so many people blame him for their actions: the devil made me do it.  And I’m sure Father Brown would understand that.  As for Lucifer, I think at first he would be amused with Father Brown’s willingness to bend the rules, but then he’d come to respect his judgment. 

Having written all that out, I’m now wondering if there is any Father Brown-Lucifer crossover fanfic.  It’s the internet, so there probably is.  That may, or may not, be horrifying.  Anyway, that’s just something weird I do to pass the time, and it fits in with the new season of Lucifer starting tomorrow.  In case you’re wondering, another show I might want to watch with Father Brown would be Warrior Nun, just because why not?

Everyone should work in retail, at some point in their lives

About ten years ago, I had a good paying, 9-5 job that I … didn’t like all that much.  So I moved back home to help my parents around the house and farm and to have time writing.  Which is great, but it did burn through my savings.  So a couple of years ago I got a crappy retail job to pay the bills.  Was it my dream to return to retail?  Fuck no.  But there aren’t that many good paying jobs where you only work a couple days a week because you also need time to help you dad bale hay or pick green beans for your mom to can or write.  And over the years I’ve come to the conclusion that everyone should work in retail, at some point in their lives.  And it’s not because of some grand social ideology of seeing how rough it is for people stuck in low paying jobs – that’s a side benefit – it’s to see how fucking annoying customers can be.

I’m not talking about the “If you tell me to wear a mask I’ll shoot you” type of customers, I’m talking about the little annoyances that build up day after day.  Like whenever something doesn’t want to scan so the standup comedian goes, “It must be free.” Yeah, that wasn’t funny the first forty times I heard that today.  Or the people who assume – since you work there – you must know the price of this random item, half of which I didn’t even know we sold.  Or, why do so many people feel the need to explain – sometimes in detail – why they are buying anti-diarrhea medicine? 

Similar to knowing the price are the people who assume I know what all the sales are.  It seems that I’ll be off for three or four days and I’ll walk in and someone will immediately come up to me, show me an item, and ask, “Is this on sale?” And while I want to just shrug and go, “Fuck if I know,” you can’t do that and stay employed.  Speaking of sales, a couple of years ago, it was probably mid-December and we needed to get rid of all the Christmas lights so we could start putting out Valentine’s Day crap, so we had a one day sale of Buy One Get One Free on your basic, $2 Christmas lights.  This one lady got super pissed off when she found out it wasn’t on these $20 Projector light things that just so happened to be on the same shelf as the stuff that was on sale.  Apparently, she wanted us – shorthanded to begin with and at Christmas – to rearrange everything on a shelf for a One Day Sale, because she couldn’t be bothered to read to see what exactly was on sale.

Probably the issue that irks me the most are the customers who assume I have no idea what I’m doing.  For example, several times each shift someone will ask, “Did you ring up this item?” Sometimes – because of the stupid layout of everything – I won’t see a pack of gum or something small.  But nine times out of ten the item in question is a 48 roll of TP that takes up 2/3 of our counter space.  I almost want to slap myself and go, “How did I miss that?”

Worse are the people who don’t know how everything works, so they assume we’re cheating them.  Like our system for calculating sale discounts makes perfect sense … to a computer.  It’s just not the clearest thing for customers to understand, so we must be ripping them off.  “Why did those each ring up at $3 when on the shelf it says 2 for $5?” “Because it doesn’t actually take the sale price off until I hit the total button.” The reason it does that, is because some sales are “Buy X, get Y for half-off,” and it is so much easier for the computer to check all your items for these X-Y, or 2 for whatever, sales once at the end instead of after each item scanned. 

A related issue are our receipts.  It’s almost a code that gives as much information about each item sold in as small a space as possible, and once you know what it is doing it makes perfect sense.  I don’t know how many times people have come in five minutes after leaving – looking over their receipt in the parking lot – and demand to know why they didn’t get some discount, like a $5 off their total sale.  And I look at their receipt and go, “It did take the discount off.  It took a little bit off each item, that’s what these little amounts here are,” and I sometimes circle the discount it took off each item.  And they usually argue with me, like I was the idiot that designed the system.  And half the time they usually just huff and leave the store thinking we cheated them, when they are the ones who refused to listen to the explanation. 

That’s why I think everyone should work retail at some point in their lives because when you’re the one standing behind a register, you see how fucking annoying people can be.  I consider myself a good customer: I don’t tell pointless stories, I don’t make scenes, and I don’t demand to see a manager because I don’t understand a line on the receipt.  Part of that is because I’ve worked retail.  Probably a big part is that I’m not an asshole.

Half our knowledge

I have this habit – whenever I read or watch something set during some historic period – of wondering what I would do if some time portal opened and sent me to that time.  (Like the stuff that goes through your mind to pass the time makes sense.)  Basically, it’s a fun, mental exercise.  Like, if I ended up in Ancient Greece, how could I explain where I was from?  Assuming I appeared in a ball of lightning or something in front of people and wasn’t a strangely dressed barbarian found roaming the countryside who would probably just be speared.  Or what if I ended up in London – or Berlin – in 1940?  As a general rule of thumb, I’d try my best not to change the course of history.

For the longest time one of the more popular versions was if I ended up at a plantation in the South in 1860.  So they would know there’s something odd about me, I’d hope to show up above their dinner table while the family was eating.  I’d beg forgiveness, and ask for their discretion.  And as a white guy, hopefully they’d treat me okay.  (I’m ignoring the whole slavery issue because, well, getting into that now kind of sidetracks the entire point of this post.  Also, it’s rather pointless for me in the … comfort … of 2020 to state categorically what I would say to slave owners if I was magically transported back 160 years.)

I spent a lot of time wondering how much I could tell them of the future.  Like, I’m sure the womenfolk would want to know what the latest fashion was, and my best response was to say that they would consider the future fashion scandalous.  I might even say, “There are these things called bikinis – which women wear at the beach and swimming – that are made with less material than this,” and then I’d hold up a napkin.  Of course, that might make the mistress of the house faint from shock.

Anyway, to get to the point of this post, I would imagine that the white family members of this house – not having TVs or Netflix – would be well read.  They might ask my opinions on the “new” book A Tale of Two Cities, which I have read but I don’t remember much of it.  They might also ask me what I think of Ivanhoe, or some Greek philosopher, and I’d have to admit that I’ve never read them.  So they would probably think of my as an uncouth Yankee – okay, true – but I wanted some way to redeem myself.  And so I came up with the idea of “Half our Knowledge,” which shows that I have access to far more culture than they did.

If you made a graph of what humans know vs. time, you’d see that the Total Human Knowledge increases over time.  At first it was basic things like which plants we can eat and how to make fire, then it advanced to making pottery and boats, and now it’s reusable rockets and dating apps.  But there’s also poetry and plays and movies.  Now this is extremely rough, because what counts as a “unit of knowledge?” Does The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark have the same weight as Thor: The Dark World?  (Shakespeare wrote about forty plays, which is about as many superhero movies released in the past fifteen years.)  And this also ignores lost knowledge, like all the ancient books that all we have are their titles.  But if you ignore all of that, then you realize that there was a point in time that had half the knowledge we have here in 2020.  When was that?

When I first thought of this idea, my knee-jerk answer was 1900.  That was before flying (1903) even before sliced bread (1928).  But as I thought about it, I moved my answer to 1940.  Because a lot of stuff we don’t think twice about – jets, computers, nuclear power – all came about during World War II.  But once I thought of computers, that really threw everything out of whack.  And it comes back to the problem of what counts as a unit of knowledge.  How does “Eating that green berry will make you sick” compare to the trillions and trillions of calculations a supercomputer does modelling how a protein folds up, which could fully explain why that green berry makes one sick?

And then there’s all the social media stuff.  Like, how many equivalents of The Iliad are tweeted each day?  And before you say that what some asshole says online shouldn’t count as knowledge, I have to ask what did the average peasant think of Robert II of France?  He was the King of the Franks a thousand years ago.  The answer is, they probably thought he was swell, because if they said otherwise some nobleman would cut them in half with a sword.  But unless some literate peasant wrote down what they thought or some clergyman asked them what they thought and accurately recorded it, we have no idea.  But the historians a thousand years from now – assuming they can still access the data – will have millions and millions of tweets, blog posts, YouTube videos, etc., of people voicing their thoughts on Trump.  So shouldn’t the rambling Facebook post of your crazy uncle be counted as, in some sense, knowledge?

Given that we now have supercomputers finding all sorts of tidbits of knowledge and that there are seven billion humans reading over all our old knowledge and making new stuff every day, could it be possible that the “half our knowledge” point was a recent as … 2000?  And I know it sounds ridiculous to try to balance making the wheel, domesticating cows, and creating plastics to what has happened in the last twenty years, but in 2000 Pluto was basically just a point of light, now we have maps of it.  In 2000, YouTube wasn’t a thing, and now how many billions of hours of videos have been made?  In 2000 I had only been writing for a few years, now I have several ebooks to my name.

There is no right answer to when we had half our knowledge, but it’s a question that the more you think about it, the deeper down the rabbit hole you go.  A reference that hypothetical family in 1860 wouldn’t get since Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland didn’t come out until 1865.