There they were, thrown together from every region of the
planet inside the mothership and clearly confused. There was
a shepherd from the Pyrenees, a rice farmer from Southern
China, a sociology professor from Canada, a fire fighter from
Tasmania and a housewife from South Africa among many others.
Why this motley crew of human beings had been suddenly beamed
up to the mothership was just as puzzling as anything else
that had been happening over the past few months.
Literally, out of the blue the aliens had appeared one day
and, without anybody really understanding how, had taken over
control of everything. After the initial shock, elation, bout
of fear or depression (depending on the individual), life
had apparently returned to normal. As a matter of fact, to
most people the most unsettling aspect of the alien invasion
was that they remained invisible while, clearly, things began
to change on planet Earth. Within days of the arrival of the
aliens, governments ordered the destruction of all nuclear
arms. Every car owner on the planet was traded a new car running
on hydrogen and biofuels within a week of the alien’s
arrival. Coal and nuclear power plants were closed and immediately
replaced by fusion reactors and incredibly efficient solar
panels and wind mills. Nobody lost their job; people were
simply transferred to a new factory if their old one was closed
down. Agriculture was transformed overnight; seed varieties
had become available that produced a crop in weeks without
the need for any watering or addition of fertilisers and pesticides.
Hunger was abolished within a month! All kinds of diseases
were cured with outlandish-looking and tasting medicines,
but they worked! The inclusiveness with which this transformation
of all human societies took place was the clearest indication
that this was somehow driven by the elusive aliens. Sure,
some people (mainly politicians, high-ranking soldiers and
industrial captains) had disappeared but the amazing thing
was how calm, complete and peaceful the transition to a sustainable,
non-aggressive society had happened. Every single conflict
anywhere simply stopped, and gigantic arsenals of all kinds
of weapons disappeared into factories and re-appeared as consumer
goods. There were neither any murders and robberies nor any
transgression of laws happening; nothing like this took place
anymore. An age-old dream of humankind had become reality.
When the realisation of what the aim of the aliens were had
hit home, there were spontaneous ‘Thank You’ parties
world-wide. But still no one had seen any of the aliens. Occasionally,
one would glimpse a space craft whizzing by but that was it.
It was as if the aliens controlled the mind of every individual
human being on the planet, and got him or her to do exactly
what was beneficial for society. It was as if, suddenly, a
bubble had burst inside everybody’s brain and finally
everybody saw, understood and acted on what was morally and
ethically the right choice. People gathered on the streets
and discussed the strange events. Why could we not do this
ourselves before and without the aliens, was a frequently
asked question.
The people looked around the room. There were windows from
which one had a stunning view of the blue planet set against
the dark backdrop of the cosmos. Everybody gathered around
the windows. Admiring Earth from space was something nobody
here had ever expected to be able to do. It was awe-inspiring.
‘I think we are here because they want us to see this.’
volunteered the shepherd and everybody understood him. Suddenly,
people became aware that there was a kind of head phone inside
everybody’s ears. ‘Boom’, the sound seemed
to come from everywhere and the gathering went instantly quiet.
‘Boom’ it went again and then, suddenly, there
it was: a saucer-like, small robot hovered amongst the people.
An Argentinean entomologist instinctively looked for his butterfly
net, only to immediately discard the silly notion. Somehow
the robot radiated total calmness.
‘Follow me’ the robot instructed and the ear phones
of the gathered representatives of humankind hummed. Everybody
understood the robot without any word being spoken. They all
knew now that they had been chosen to witness something that
the aliens considered important. Walking through the spaceship,
hardly anybody focused on anything else but the robot leading
the way. Finally, the robot stopped in front of what appeared
to be a wall. Again without a word being spoken, everybody
understood to follow the robot right through the wall. Crossing
the apparently solid wall was a weird sensation for most but,
given how the day had started, it hardly raised an eyebrow
on anybody. However, what the representatives of humankind
saw once they had past through the wall was a different thing
altogether. They were in some kind of laboratory. Arrayed
along one side of the room were a number of cages with human
beings inside them. And suddenly everybody understood where
all the politicians, the generals and leading figures of the
old economy had disappeared to. There they were right in front
of the people they once ruled on Earth, but they seemed to
be totally oblivious to their surroundings. The interesting
thing was that they had not been randomly assigned to a cage;
instead it seemed that they had been carefully allocated a
space inside a particular enclosure. There were the cabinet
ministers and leading military figures from Israel and Palestine
fighting it out in one cage, the government of Sri Lanka and
the leaders of the Tamil Tigers were hard at it in another,
and in a third cage some well-known Christian and Muslim fundamentalists
were involved in a rather violent clash of fists. And on the
chosen representatives went with mouths agape in total amazement
of what they witnessed. Further down the line some well-dressed
industrialists tried to smash each other with wooden clubs.
Somehow a hostile takeover seemed to be the issue. In yet
another cage, a burly general stood triumphantly over the
corpse of a uniform-clad victim. Somewhat worryingly, however,
the aliens had obviously made one mistake. In one cage, the
players of FC Barcelona and Real Madrid were sitting together
peacefully, obviously wondering why they had been abducted
and put together in this strange room. The aliens must have
misinterpreted live coverage of a football game for a war
scenario. And then the robot spoke or rather there was sound
coming from the head phones. ‘We want you to see this.
They are here because they were your leaders and should have
known better.’ This sounded very accusing and everybody
felt really bad. ‘We will leave soon and you will be
given a second chance. Do not mess up again as the emergence
of a violent, space-faring civilisation will not be tolerated
by the Galactic Community.’ The threat stung deep and
the implication was clear - there was not going to be a third
chance! And suddenly it was all over and every person that
had been on that spaceship circling the Earth rubbed their
eyes. They were standing exactly where they had been abducted
that morning. And they had all understood. It was up to them
the second chance was not squandered.
