A different perspective

Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say. That is not entirely true. For a brief moment you can. Let me take you back a few years to understand. The IUEA Corps have been in a prolonged war with our closest neighbors from the first planet ever discovered. We called it Proxima Centauri b. They had a name for it that we have yet been able to discover, simply because a., we haven't been able to decipher their language, and b., from pretty much our first encounter with them, we have been more or less at war. And we have seriously been outmatched since. Who exactly are them you ask? Them.. are a carbon-based life form, basically a half squid, half venus-fly trap appearing intelligent plant species that the scientists refer as Dendrocnidians Beta Proxima-something. We pilots just call them the Gympies.

What's been going on with the Earth up to this point is kind of messed up. Turns out all that fuss about global warming was true. Everything about it. Right now, the Earth is under a giant rock of ice. Ice you say? Well that whole theory about the reversal of the currents and the theory that the earth's crust is set to a ten-thousand year slip and slide event; happened. Some were fortunate to have survived, but as a whole, the survivors of the Earth getting back at it's current residence, forced us to stop fighting among ourselves, and began to work together in order for the "Greater Good." Money is of no use when there is no one to spend any or keep any. So we got rid of it. We had to learn and adapt to our environment in order to survive or just die and wait for the next stage of evolution. So the IUEA was born. The International United Earth Alliance, good ol' Yuwee.

We live deep under the ice along the equator, with ship yards built at the solar poles. The atmosphere is too thinned out to stay out in the open without the radiation turning an unshielded human into an over-fried strip of bacon. Since the Ozone was depleted, the ice is actually what keeps the excessive solar radiation from making the rest of us extra sizzled. We were able to save what was left of humanity. And we are all collectively called Terrans. Race, religion, politics all pretty much no longer defines who we are. No time to put people in categories or little boxes when there are not that many of us left. The Earth is repopulating slowly but surely. And that is when an almost long and forgotten little satellite known as Voayger 1 crashed into the surface of Proxima Centauri B, and our closest neighbors outside of the solar system came to knock on our doors.

But that is old news. Everyone left alive back home knows this, just wanted to catch you all up just in case after hundreds of years went by and you might have forgotten. Anyhow back to the whole "no one can hear you scream in the vacuum of space" ordeal. Turns out that while technically this is correct, there is a brief moment that you can scream, very loudly and quite well! Almost one of those blink and you miss it kind of deals, like when you are speeding down on a turbo ice-sled along the inter-equatorial slideway, and you blink just before you come to this small township, and before you know it you pass it by and are miles away. That happened to me a few times back when I lived on Earth, way before I became a fighter pilot in the good ol IUEA Galactic Marine Corps. But I digress, I tend to rattle on from time to time. I never thought to live this long. I used to laugh and tell my friends that I would be that old man sitting on his rocking chair yelling at kids to get off my lawn.

So the truth of the matter is when your fighter is damaged in deep space and explodes, there is a little bit of atmosphere in the control cabin that surrounds a pilot. Usually vanishes in a second or less as your whole world evaporates around you, leaving you basically naked and afraid in the absolute darkness and frighteningly cold depths of space. But you can scream quite loud and fortunate for me.. I did. And someone heard it. And I was saved from near instantaneous death. Unfortunately, I was picked up by our friendly neighborhood Gympie Cruiser and brought on board their podship. This is where my story gets interesting.

The Gympies can't reproduce human speech.. or any speech now that I think about it. So, there I sat tied up in vines from my shoulders down to m toes, still screaming mind you. The coldness of space and the stale recycled air of a starstinger... that is what we called our space fighters by the way, the Starstinger X150's. Ultimate state-of-the-art weapons of war, pieced together from old rediscovered jet planes, refurbished and refitted for use in both atmosphere and in deep space. Not very comfortable, but maneuverable, and well enough armed to actually fight the Gympies in space. I mean hell, we live on a block of ice, but we are alive. Ain't no way a giant space plant gonna take us out now, am I right? So anyhow, there I was screaming, the cold recycled air became hot and humid, and I noticed that I was dripping in sweat before I stopped and realized that I was not in immediate threat of dying in the cold hard depths of space. There were several Gympies in the "room" with me as I was tied down with vines. I stopped screaming like a little girl, and buttoned up real fast. And as I was trained to do if ever captured, I gave my name, rank, and service number in the face of the enemy. Floofs of feather-like spores or what not emanated from one of the Gympies and after a few moments another one floofed back, so I know they were 'talking' to one-another. Another floof later and the sound of what I will call leaves rustling, a near-perfect human voice started to speak to me. I couldn't see where it was coming from, but it lacked emotion.

"Why are you here?" The voice asked me. I replied with the name, rank and serial number gambit that was engrained into me from my training.

"It must be stupid." The voice spoke. This kind of upset me. I mean after all, they don't let the folks that live on the south-side of the equator pilot starships now.

"No this one is not stupid. I can talk thank you very much." I said right back.

"Good. Why are you here?" The Gympie asked me again. Of course not knowing how they "talked" to me directly was concerning but we had ourselves a nice little talk. After a few hours, the Gympies decided to make me their ambassador to represent their planet and species. Which, to me is a lot better than dying in the cold-hard vacuum of space. And all because they heard me scream! That was fortunate for me well enough and I got to be the Ambassador so you can have a seat and talk with one another. Turns out that they don't want a prolonged war, as food and resources are scarce on their home-world too. So they want to come to Earth and help rebuild our planet as well. A win-win!

The people gathered at the negotiation table had some questions, their faces wearing expressions that were a mixture of horror and confusion, some looked upon the event with some trepidation, but I held fast and firm. "Peace is more beneficial than extinction." I finally said. "We both have made enough sacrifices than to keep this war going on forever." I said to my human compatriots. The Gympie finished using me to talk and slid a tentacle from the bottom of my decapitated head and neck and the room went dark for a moment. I heard someone scream as the Gympie placed me back along an ivy covered shelved wall, much like a ventriloquist would one of it's dolls, A head on a stick wondering how did I ever get to this point in my life before I felt the brief flush of humidity return and my universe go totally dark as the Gympie released me from it's grip.