Chapter 2
.
We all knew where we were when we first heard the news. I was at the movies, just watching the latest superheroes defeat evil. When the movie ended I went outside, everyone was talking. Something had happened less than an hour ago, and everyone was talking about it. I checked my cellphone, mom had sent me a text, wanting to make sure I was okay. I called her to let her know I was fine, and asked what was going on. President Duric was making a statement, that something was heading for Earth. They weren't sure what it was, but it appeared to be some kind of spacecraft. And it was slowing down as it got closer to Earth, an asteroid wouldn't know to slow down. It appeared that we were about to have first contact with space aliens. They hadn't made direct contact yet, but that would only be a matter of time. The president urged calm, we should not panic. By the time I got home that day, the aliens had sent their first message. It was a simple one. "Watch your television at 8pm in three days. We will make our intentions clear then." The next three days were, interesting. The aliens were already hacking into our communication systems, making sure they could make their broadcast without interruption. Everyone was talking about this, what did these aliens want? Had they come to improve our lives, giving us food replicators and cures for cancer and A.I.D.S.? Or where they coming to enslave us? If it was the first, then we should welcome them. If it was the second, we needed to fight them immediately. But if so, why give us advance warning? That was a hopeful thought, but not everyone agreed. North Korea launched a nuclear weapon against this alien ship. We only learned that this missle was intercepted by the aliens just in time. They didn't reveal how close North Korea came to wiping them out. But they were able to send this missle right back to North Korea, wiping out their government and killing over one million people. After that, even countries with hostile intentions didn't dare try this, they were too afraid. Many of us were afraid as well, had North Korea's blunder doomed us all? We all just had to wait for 8pm Saturday night. Ofcourse it was only 8pm in the eastern standard time zone, but the broadcast was done simultaneously, everyone wanted to know what they had to say. A part of me wanted to just go to the movies, not know. But the movies were all closed at 6pm, so were restaurants. Pretty much all non essential services were shut down, only a few networks even bothered to try with other programs. For all intents and purposes there was only one show on this night. The talking heads of the media were no doubt watching, ready to analyze whatever the aliens said. I supposse I could have watched some DVD, but I needed to know what was coming. The alien ambassador looked human, and he spoke in english. I soon realized that there were a number of these ambassadors, speaking in many different languages. What he said this night has always haunted me.
.
"Humans, I have a grave message for you. My people are from a distant galaxy, but our world is gone now. The fact that I look human is not a deception, there is a less than 1% genetic difference between my people and yours. Perhaps we have evolved from the same sub-species. This has left us with favorable genetic characteristics, and liabilities. With our homeworld dead we must resettle. Earth is the only one with enough environmental characteristics for us to settle here. There are seven billion of us, and we know there are seven billion humans on Earth. The problem is that Earth can only sustain ten billion lives. We are not going to execute four billion of our own people, nor do we expect that four billion humans will suddenly commit suicide. There is only one alternative, war. No doubt you will fight back, even kill many of us, just as we will kill many of you. How many from each side will die, it is impossible to say. We shall fight until there are only ten billion alive, on both sides. We truley regret that it has come to this, but it is the only for our people to survive. May God be with you all."