A short history of what man covets most - STUFF

Who knows, they might otherwise have been the very best of friends.

Be careful what you wish for

Not far from where the Telephone-to-Heaven stood under it's golden dome, the world's last sweet and easy oil deposits waited under the burning sand. The desert breezes wrote a warning in the dunes, but the disabled people had no eyes to see it.

Long before there were any disabled people, or humans, or natives, the planet did a bit of stocktaking. In order to make the showroom more amenable for next season's models, it was necessary to re-define the environment within narrow limits. The answer lay with the atmosphere, which was a big word for something very small (in planetary terms). So small in fact, that it was no thicker than the skin is to an apple (which was still on the drawing board at the time).

The atmosphere was made up of invisible stuff called gases, which would have to be re-configured if life was to achieve its full potential. With infinite patience, the planet assigned the first biological machines for getting stuff, to the task of re-balancing those gases. Their task done, the myriad machines with their excess carbon were lovingly sequestered within the planet's warm bosom.

It seemed like a really good idea at the time.

But how could the planet have forseen the accident of the disabled people, or the suit-and-tie automatons, which had evolved to become the dominant life form? How could it have known that humans would use their tiny atmosphere as a rubbish tip for 150 years?

Even something as big and as clever as a planet has it’s limitations.

The Great Getting Machine

Early in the 21st century, Cheney's forces were lined up for a final assault on the remainder of the sequestered carbon. Many fine young humans were destined to die, so that the most severely disabled could go on enjoying the lifestyle to which they were accustomed.

Also present was the greatest machine for getting stuff that the world had ever seen. A great clanking, howling thing it was: at once aerodynamic, yet ballistic, yet amphibious and yet terrestrial to boot. That machine used torrents of oil, even when it was idling, so it was condemned to forever roam the planet in search of more oil. Like a shark, it just had to keep moving or die. Like an alcoholic, it leered at the Middle East.

The Great Getting Machine had been a work-in-progress for a hundred years. In all that time, humans spared no effort in its development, to the detriment of everything they held dear. It was the most criminal waste of resources in galactic history. That machine could only have been conceived by a severely disabled person, a suit and tie, or an Easter Islander.

Ever since a minor historical deity had been sacrificed in the early 20th century, the Great Getting Machine had roamed without pause across the planet. Many humans thought that the machine had a life of it’s own, even the ones who did do their science homework.

They were right.