Binary Uplift

by Locutus2262

A WALL-E prequel series, telling about the events that started with the "trash crisis" and led to the humans' exodus from the Earth. Second place in EVE94's contest.

1. Prologue

Binary Uplift

by Locutus

Introduction

Greetings to all!

This is my first attempt at a fanfic, and in fact the first time since like 15 years that I'm writing anything fiction-like. I hope you'll like it!

I'm not a native English speaker, but I shall do my best so that your giggling about my bad English does not distract you too much from the story. :)

I quite liked the background setting of the movie WALL-E. And being a huge fan of Isaac Asimov's short stories and writing style, I thought I'd do a series of short story like episodes which deal with the "big garbage crisis", i.e. the events between roughly 2100 when the Earth's cities started to drown in trash, and the story of the movie itself. The episodes will deal with different aspects of what happened in this period, and what led to several striking events and also minutiae of the movie.

The episodes are self-contained but will of course present a linear flow of events. I will try to put one or more punchlines at the end of each episode, hoping that my attempts at following Asimov's example will work out.

Note: do not be surprised if the meaning of the series' title does not really become obvious during the first episodes. If all goes as planned, it will be revealed about halfway through the series.

Alright, here goes nothing.

Prologue

There is a theory that every interactive, self-regulatory system, once it has reached a certain level of complexity, undergoes a cycle of crises. Some systems show a longer interval of stability between crises, some a shorter. The two most prominent examples for such systems on the Earth, that is the planet's ecosphere as a whole, and human society as a highly complex subset, were no exceptions to this assumed rule.

While in most cases the system in question is able to avoid collapse and outlast the problematic times out of its own strength, using whatever is left of its normal state of stability, every once in a while there is a crisis so profound that something more is needed. This something can be sheer luck, it can be what believers like to call divine intervention, but every once in a while it is an event so extraordinary that no one who has not personally witnessed it will be able to believe it.

The Big Garbage Crisis that humanity faced in its twenty-second century was a model example of the latter case.