Now that they’ve seen relative stability on Earth, they have been emboldened enough to make the approach in a spirit of cooperation (besides, I think they are getting impatient for commerce). We have not had any reason to doubt this, from what we have seen in the last eight years.
Here’s the big news: they kept extensive audio-visual records during their observations over the last couple of millennia. A massive historical archive. All this while, they’ve had visual sensors on their satellites pointing at Earth, some buried in our moon, and even dropped on Earth itself. Ground level zooms. Recorded audio. It’s as if someone turned on a video camera and left it running for thousands of years. Almost every bit of collected information has been collated and indexed chronologically.
And they’re offering it to us for use.”
At first, most of the council failed to see the implications of this announcement. I had to spell it out for them. For the first time, we could potentially answer historical questions, from the mundane to the most extraordinary. Was there really a Shakespeare? Did Mallory and Irvine make it to the top of Everest first? But apart from such interesting but ultimately useless questions, geographical observations such as the shifting of the Polar caps and the original extent of rainforest coverage could be studied scientifically; great battles and economic changes can all be revealed. We can set to rest some of the most legendary as well as incendiary questions that historians never thought they could answer. We’d actually go back in time. The greatest documentary ever!
We’ve decided that this is classified top-secret for now. We’re still coming to grips with this.
Mey Smythe’s Diary – Brussels - 23 Oct 2131
I’m happy to record that I’ve finally won! It’s been a struggle, slowly persuading everyone on the council that the pros outweigh the cons; that these archives represent the greatest inheritance we will ever know; that we are indeed mature enough to confront the distant past without any adverse effects; and that the sources must be made as open as possible. The massive vote of confidence represented by the Azureans treating us as partners should clearly tell us we’re far removed from those murderous hordes of the Middle Ages. This is the Age of Understanding.
The members of the Senate will be carefully informed soon. For now, they will be asked to keep the information confidential. First sample requests to be made of “The Ark-ive” (as it’s been dubbed) will be conveyed via the Azurean cultural envoy. I’ve got a few of my own: where did I misplace the deliciously anachronistic reading glasses my wife gave for our tenth wedding anniversary.
06:00, the next day
Neek took a welcome sip from his mug.
“That is pretty interesting. I’ve been through a lot of material on that period, and none of them ever mention this point, this ‘Ark-ive’. Let me quickly run a search through the material again.”
Comments
Post new comment