SELF HARMING ON A GLOBAL SCALE

The new world Halcion was desperately seeking immigrants, though the leaders of Earth had no idea that Halcion was other than mildly interested in the folk of Earth, for they’d been truthfully told the Halcionistas were recruiting on several other worlds amongst beings of several species. The Halcionistas had decided no disclosure as to what they desired should be given, or more precisely no clues concerning what they specifically did not desire should be given. An individual either was desirable or would not be accepted.

No matter how wealthy an individual was or how powerful, all knew the Earth was a mess and it would not be long before it couldn’t feed and support a fraction of its current population of in excess of twenty-five billion. The result was when the Halcionista ships appeared and it was announced they were seeking suitable colonists all were desperate to be deemed suitable. Though the senior Halcionistas were constantly depressed by how few of Earth’s adult population were suitable, none were refused interview and all were treated equally at interview. Any who were deemed to have a victim mentality or a sense of entitlement that excused them from trying to help themselves were not desired. Any who had used the system to better themselves unfairly were not desired. Habitual criminals were not desired. Halcionistas were not interested in why a person behaved the way they did. For them there were no excuses, a person was either in their eyes, by their standards, acceptable or not.

Once accepted immigrants were taken to live on one of the two vast FTL vessels in orbit above the Earth where full disclosure took place. When sufficient colonists were aboard the ship took them to their new home leaving the other to continue recruitment from the over populated and resource scarce planet. The Halcion ambassador had been offered a secure enclave for the Halcion embassy by a number of nations, but deemed it safer from a security point of view and wiser from a diplomatic point of view to use one of the transport ships. As soon as the colonists left Earth orbit their ship was replaced by another FTL vessel. None on Earth had any idea how many such ships Halcion had, where Halcion was in relation to Earth or any idea how developed Halcion science and technology were other than that they were far in advance of those of Earth. In the event of a mistake being made concerning an immigrant’s suitability the unacceptable colonist would be returned to whence he came on Earth with suitably modified memories of the time spent in space, though no such event had yet occurred.

The FTL population contained a disproportionate number of members of the LGBT+, but no hard line feminists, no members of any overtly religious group, nor indeed members of any other group who wished to determine how others should live, and the average age of adults was over sixty, which was offset by large numbers of the very young since the orphanages of the planet had been virtually emptied. A major problem was the population contained few women of child bearing age which was resolved by some intensive research which extended child bearing age and the adoption of huge numbers of young orphans from famine areas, many of who came from groupings from which no adults had been accepted, though none were old enough to be aware of their background or its implications and all would grow up as equal members of their new culture. They were all Halcionistas.

The major principle on which their society was based was that all had the right to do whatsoever they willed provided it did not impinge on the freedoms of others. The constitution expressly stated that laws could not be enacted that limited the activities of the many purely to contain the antisocial activities of the few, better it was stated the few were put to death. It also stated that expulsion of the antisocial from society was not an option, for they could then return to hurt the innocent, death for the antisocial was preferable. Should death be decided upon, the name of an adult was drawn at random, the names of all who had served as executioners before were excluded, to carry out the sentence. Any adult unwilling to so serve would be returned to Earth or put to death: all had to serve and all carried a razor sharp belt knife.

The residents of Earth had no warning when the last FTL ship was to leave. One day there were two of the vessels in orbit, the next instead of one space was empty, and despite the many millions the ships had taken they had scarce made a dent in Earth’s population. As the Halcion Ambassador said to its staff, “That was the most depressing planet I have ever visited. I truly believed we could help both them and us, but with that mentality they are utterly doomed and will surely die poisoned by the garbage heap they have made of their home. It can’t be long now before they resort to eating each other for they have no scruples about abusing each other. It just hasn’t occurred to them yet. I think the worst aspect of it all is their widespread but insane belief that they can better themselves by putting others, usually minorities, down.” The ambassador shook its head and smiling at its wife and their now heavily pregnant husband continued, “Fortunately I have recently received news that we are doing much better recruiting elsewhere. Captain, take us home please. I suspect we could all use a good holiday.”