All Tomorrows

The purpose of this work is not to describe the limitless progress that followed the crossgalactic contact. One could go indefinitely, chronicling how the united galaxies re-encountered and subdued the Qu, how they cradled their suns with artificial shells, multiplying their inhabitable zones a billion-fold, how they criss-crossed interstellar space with wormholes and made travel a thing of the past. Ultimately, descendants of those beings even conquered Time itself, prolonging the existence of their minds indefinitely via rejuvenating technologies.

For a time, all men were gods.

But from (y)our vantage point, one discovery truly stood out in this orgy of advance. Compared with gargantuan achievements like the taming of space and the construction of the starshells, it was a mere blip, a revelation of long-forgotten trivia. This was the re-discovery of Earth; the birthplace of humanity, where the omnipresent Asteromorph, the star-gliding Machine, and the millions of humble resident races could all trace their origins.

It was made quietly, by a singular researcher combing the vestiges of forgotten history, decade after decade. Millions of years of wars, invasions and extinctions had buried the evidence thoroughly and comprehensively. When she finally came across irrefutable evidence, nobody was around to celebrate. That would come later.

By the time of Earth’s rediscovery, humans have diverged considerably from their ancestral forms.

Return

The discovery sparked a certain amount of interest, though nowhere as much as other breakthroughs had. To most humans of the cosmos, their ancestral birthplace was simply an interesting piece of information, a piece of trivia with which they had lost all ties.

Still, a ship was sent forth, and it landed without ceremony, for now there was no intelligence left on Earth. Too far away from the main centers of population, it had been completely ignored, gone stagnant and feral. But still, it was Home.

When the explorers stepped out, human feet trod on old Earth once more; after an absence of 560 million years. Mankind was back home.

All Tomorrows

I must conclude my words with a confession. Mankind, the very species which I’ve been chronicling from its terrestrial infancy to its domination of the galaxies, is extinct. All of the beings which you saw on the preceding pages; from the lowly Worm to the wind-riding Sail People, from the megalomaniac Gravital to the ultimate Galactic citizens, lie a billion years dead. We are only beginning to piece the story together. What you read was our best approximation of the truth.

Why did they disappear? Perhaps it was a final, unimaginable war of annihilation, one that transcended the very meaning of “conflict”. Perhaps it was a gradual break-up of the united galaxies, and every race facing their private end slowly afterwards. Or perhaps, the wildest theories suggest, it was a mass migration to another plane of existence. A journey into somewhere, sometime, something else. But the bottom line is; we honestly don’t know.

Ultimately, however, what happened to Humanity does not matter. Like every other story, it was a temporary one; indeed long but ultimately ephemeral. It did not have a coherent ending, but then again it did not need to. The tale of Humanity was never its ultimate domination of a thousand galaxies, or its mysterious exit into the unknown. The essence of being human was none of that. Instead, it lay in the radio conversations of the still-human Machines, in the daily lives of the bizarrely twisted Bug Facers, in the endless love-songs of the carefree Hedonists, the rebellious demonstrations of the first true Martians, and in a way, the very life you lead at the moment.

Many throughout history were unaware of this most basic fact. The Qu, in dreams of an ideal future, distorted the worlds they came across. Later on the Gravital, with their insane desire to recreate the past, caused the ugliest massacres in the history of the galaxy. Even now, it is sickeningly easy for beings to get lost in false grand narratives, living out completely driven lives in pursuit of non-existent codes, ideals, climaxes and golden ages. In blindly thinking that their stories serve absolute ends, such creatures almost always end up harming themselves, if not those around them.

To those like the misguided; look at the story of Man, and come to your senses! It is not the destination, but the trip that matters. What you do today influences tomorrow, not the other way around. Love Today, and seize All Tomorrows!

The Author, with a billion-year old human skull.