A Child's View (Part 2)

Chapter 1


Every Afternoon, Tum sat in his little tree-house, between arriving home from school and eating dinner. He wasn’t a lonely boy, but simply enjoyed his solitude. He would sit and think. He would wonder about the Universe, and his place in it. This was quite a lot for a young boy to think about, but Tum lived in interesting times. Every adult was captivated by the “sousx” coming through giant three dimensional holographic public address computers in the corporate run government designated squares. There were at least three in his town, but larger cities had many more.  “Sousx” can most closely be translated into late 21st Century English as “news.” However, this is far from an exact translation. It is much more complex than that. Perhaps, terms like “propaganda” or “controlled information” might be more apt, but these terms do not suffice either. The “sousx” also was transmitted directly on a frequency that allowed for the brain waves of most citizens to be affected directly. This varied from from person to person, and Tum himself seemed to be perfectly unaffected.


The people of Tum’s town seemed to be walking through their lives trance-like, but if Tum were to speak with any of them individually, he could immediately tell whether this person or that person was in a deep trance, mildly damaged, or seemingly unaffected, like himself. Tum was always surprised at the vast number of people that seemed to be, to a greater or lesser extent, unaffected. Many had been able to, at least partially, break the trance.


The latest “sousx” everybody was paying attention to was about the most recent war, some light years away, against a planet hardly anybody could find on a map of the Universe, called “earth.”  Apparently, this tiny blue planet that hardly had the capacity for space travel, was considered a grave threat by the leaders of the “Xact.” The closest English translation of the word “Xact” would be “association” or maybe “alliance” of several planets. Some of the planets were more cooperative with with the “Xact” than others, and there were rumors and “conspiracy theories” about how uncooperative planets were dealt with. These rumors included theories such as instigating fake revolutions to cause problems for the leadership of a troublesome planet, bribery of the leadership of such a planet, sabotage of the important assets of a planet, and far worse things too terrifying to mention. Each planet had its own name, but the people had gotten so used to the term “Xact” that it came to mean each individual planet, or the whole alliance. The names of the individual planets had long been forgotten, except perhaps in some scholarly circles, and even among the scholars - this seemed to be rather arcane knowledge.


Tum’s planet once reigned supreme over the whole of this confederation, but lately there had been a tacit alliance formed between a few planets to the east on the Universal map that was starting to call Tum’s planet's supremacy into question. Interstellar economists debated the financial solvency of Tum’s planet, and its ability to continue as financial center of the “Xact.” Some economists argued, however, that these concerns were being greatly exaggerated. For the moment, Tum’s planet remained master of the “sousx,” and that was the most important element in controlling the fate of the “Xact.”


Each planet had its own political structure, and Tum’s, from the perspective of an earth dweller, probably seemed most like a republic of some sort, or even a parliamentary democracy. However, forms can be misleading, and in the case of Tum’s planet, the real power was in the hands of a very small elite. The selected leader of the planet, and therefore “Xact,” was a man called Sans. His politics were very amorphous, and he could appear to be anything the masses wanted him to be. If one wanted a man of peace, then one saw him as such. If one needed a firm leader, then one got that. And on it went.


The war “Xact” was currently fighting against....what was the name of the tiny blue planet?  Oh, right - “Earth.” Anyway, this planet was so backwards, Tum couldn’t understand why anyone would be interested in it at all. It certainly couldn’t be a threat to planets outside of its own solar system. The inhabitants, strange little bipedal creatures, seemed quite content to war on each other, and Tum thought it very likely that they would destroy themselves anyway. They couldn’t possibly be a match for the “Xact” intergalactic fleet.  In fact, Tum was aware of those, not being seduced by the “sousx” trance, thought these continuous interstellar wars were prolonged as another way to divert the people from all of the problems they faced on their own planets. Others went so far as to claim these wars, were in some way, a production of the “sousx.” Therefore, they would not be really occurring at all. Tum thought the truth was somewhere in between, as it seemed obvious to him that there was an objective reality “sousx” could not hide. But what seemed too painfully obvious to Tum, was the disproportionate nature of the whole thing. His people’s fleet could destroy “Earth” and the entire solar system it was in. So, why was this “Earth” made such a giant threat?


Well, there was still another theory proposed some not affected by the “sousx.” It was the same idea no matter what form it took. Either it was put as this planet alliance was some form of what an English speaker from “Earth” would call an empire, and so had to expand, or it was that the “Xact” needed the resources of other worlds to maintain a very corrupt system and social structure.


Although Tum was a child of barely 30 years old (a year, of course, can be very different, depending on how fast your planet rotates around a star, and spins from day to night), he knew he was not normal, and perhaps precocious. He also understood the level at which he was not affected by the “sousx.” Often times, even those unaffected by it had a difficult time even acknowledging what it was.


When “Xact” went to war, they didn’t send fleets filled with living breathing soldiers. No, all of these wars were automated. Pilotless craft, or warships if you will. Even an advanced technological society like “Xact” found it difficult to compensate for leaving the comfort of the shielding radiation belt. Oh sure, they had the capability to do it, but it was much easier to send pilotless ships. Besides, if they were to send soldiers, the soldiers might develop a certain abhorrence for war, not too mention the impact on society if and when those soldiers came back injured physically or otherwise.