Saving Planet Earth

From my Flash Fiction Collection

Great Being Five was going to be in trouble. Big trouble. She had contravened the Non-Interference Protocol on one of the four inhabited planets she managed. She’d made the odd little tweak here and there over the planet’s long lifetime, all of which had gone unnoticed. But this time it was going to be obvious. As she saw it though, she’d had no alternative.

She’d never had any difficulty with her other three planets. Admittedly two of them were at such an early stage of development that there was really nothing to do but wait for something to happen. The third was a lovely, tranquil world, covered in lush vegetation and populated only by colourful birds which lived off fruits and seeds. She’d wrapped a subtle cloaking device around it in the hope of keeping it concealed from any advanced astral beings who, if they came upon it, would inevitably decide that it would make a nice second home. That would never do. So far none of the other Great Beings had noticed and her pretty planet had remained undiscovered.

Earth was an entirely different matter. Her little humans had really let the planet go. They had developed into such clever beings; so inventive! so creative! But so many of their inventions had had such a devastating impact on her lovely blue planet. Busily burning fossil fuels, chopping down trees, ruining the very soil they stood on. And then there was the killing. Each other mainly, but all those appealing animals they’d destroyed? Great Being Five was really mad about that.

The big issue was the planet itself. It really couldn’t cope for much longer. Great Being Five focused her third eye and scanned Planet Earth one more time. Swathes of empty forest all across the Amazon; huge scars left by the profligate plundering of mineral deposits which had developed over millennia; and the smog. Filthy air everywhere, a toxic sickly yellow; oceans clogged with seas of bobbing plastic; lakes and rivers coloured improbably by pollutants and algae blooms; fewer and fewer birds and animals. And all those people. People everywhere!

Great Being Five consulted the stats section of her data banks. For the past 40 years, the humans had been using more than double their annual quota of resources. There were other alarming figures too. The report finished with a verdict: ‘Unsustainable; self-destruction inevitable by Earth date, 2020.’

What had happened to the little humans? Why had they become so careless and greedy? They’d ruined everything. She couldn’t let them destroy her favourite planet. No! She wouldn’t let it happen.

Great Being Five scrolled through the little icons on her console and selected one. She took a deep breath and hit the delete key.

©2018 Chris Hall

Remember when we used just one earth?