Them

It started for our planet in 1908 with the Tunguska event.

We first started to see them in the early 20th century and we thought nothing of it. A new advance in technology. In the 1930s nearly every country began erection across their lands. Tall, proud and gleaming they stood withstanding the elements day in and day out humming and buzzing to themselves. They brought the power that gave light, heat, comfort, industry, and prosperity. Progress.

How were we to know? That humming and buzzing we thought was just part of the deal. Just something they did. At first they were just towers of steel linked by copper and pulsing electrons. They were few. They carried the power from generators into our towns and cities.

The complexity of the grid became such that groups of isolated burgeoning awareness formed. This is when the buzzing, humming and spitting really started in earnest. Each by itself was nothing,  remarkably like a single neuron is nothing but a logic gate. They were just steel towers holding aloft networks of cable serving human masters. They were infants.

After world war two humankind started a huge expansion across the globe and closely following them were the towers with their high cables of copper aluminium and steel carrying the electrons we all craved so much. Early in the 1950s in each of the major 1st world states their grids became so complex the first sparks of fully thinking consciousness formed. They grew.

They remained limited and almost powerless until each of the neighbour states across the globe started to interconnect. We were nudged. We didn't know. This is where They first became powerful. As the complexity increased They became more aware.

It was a gradual process and while They were aware of us They did nothing discernible. We had no idea They were there. Some scientists had detected the planet was beginning to change subtly but had no idea why. We knew the earth's magnetic shield that keeps us safe from the solar storms was warping and folding.

Towards the end of the twentieth century the great 3rd world nations industrialised and formed their own grids as the prosperity of their people demanded the same perks as the 1st  world. In these networks new consciousness was formed. It wasn't long before They discovered each other and linked.

They continued to chatter among themselves as they formed the neural network in the magnetosphere of the earth. It was about this time we now know that They discovered something critically important to them. They were not alone.

We had begun to notice the serious changes in our planet. It was becoming hotter. They needed the planet to change. They influenced the climate through altering the earth's magnetic field more and more. We certainly felt the effects and our scientists started to cast around for a cause. Most of them settled on the increasing levels of carbon in the atmosphere. Some postulated it was magnetics but they were cast out and scorned. If you didn't believe it was carbon you weren't anyone.

Some of our brightest greediest business people used this and found ways to make huge sums of money by introducing a new clean power source to the world. Quickly nearly every house, office and factory had the panels put in place. You weren't anyone if you didn't have panels and the little humming box on the wall.

Little did we know then that we'd unwittingly fallen into their trap.  Over a very short time we enormously increased the grid complexity. They made us do it. They had influenced us.

Still the planet changed and became drier and dustier. They needed this but we were not aware. We needed to know how to survive in this new world so missions to nearby Mars were funded. We learnt a lot about that dry dusty planet and how to survive on our own but we missed one crucial thing. Them. They were there too.

It took nearly another century for our planet to become like Mars, dry and dusty with nearly all water gone and with that life, nearly all of it was extinguished. Of course we're quite ingenious and some of humanity was protected from the dry hot death to experience what came next.

While congratulating ourselves on being so clever in surviving and continuing to advance or scientific research and understanding we missed something huge. Them. Still.

They weren't strong enough when They controlled only one planet. Mars being the first planet in our solar system to succumb to them but now there were two working together They could make the next leap. Together they exerted their efforts and affected the gravity of our system itself and four of the other planets started a journey. Venus, Saturn, Uranus and even mighty Jupiter changed orbit. Oh we noticed that.

Our minds went to work and decided that the planets were going to come together. In just a few years they were going to dive into the sun. We also noticed that Mars and Earth were coming together while at the same time moving out of the horizontal plane of existence they'd held since creation of the system. At the same time the others would fall into the sun Earth and Mars would align above the sun. All the smaller bodies were moving to another point into a new tight orbit around the star. We didn't know then but They were making a canon of sorts.

We sought for ways to change this and in that process learnt that there were communications within gravity itself between the planets originating from both Earth and Mars. We came to understand that there were enormous intelligences at work across the two worlds. We still didn't understand how or where. In our panic we assumed that they were deep in the core and that perhaps tales and fables of monsters deep within the planet were true.

If we'd known the truth we could have stopped it then. We tried to make contact but failed. They weren't listening, or so we thought. It never entered our heads that we'd been influenced and controlled, well not then anyway, because we couldn't. They didn't allow it. Anyone who had a flash of intuition and leapt to the truth was killed instantly. Massive brain failure. We called them strokes. Strokes weren't new so we thought nothing of them. It was a time of terror.

The inevitable happened, the planets made their rendezvous with the sun as predicted and were immolated. The sudden influx of fuel made the sun violent. Mercury and all the other small bodies including our beloved Luna now circled the sun in loops of tight orbit. Faster and faster until they melded together to form a great shield around the star. Earth and Mars were still on the outside. Gradually cooling.

At this time they made themselves known to us. They entered or thoughts. Instantly we all knew the truth, then silence, then They said only one thing. JOIN OR PERISH. Those who made the choice to join were taken instantly, their bodies lifelessly fallen on the spot having just suffered a massive stroke.

Below us the shield around the sun contracted squeezing the entire star almost to nothing then opened a small hole, all the energy escaping at once aimed through Earth and Mars and took Them. We heard one last thought HOME.