Challenge #02200-F010: Mor Daka is Bad
Aliens learn about the Atomic Bomb.
"You use WHAT to BUILD A BOMB!?"
"cold war.....Cold War, are you shi***** me?"
"YOUR SPECIES HAS HOW MANY OF THESE DOOMSDAY-DEVICES?"
"WHAT do you mean, they are STILL being Used ?!?"
Imagine a shattered Class 6 deathworlder learning about this.
Imagine how Havenworlders would react ^^ -- Anon Guest
[AN: Class 6 are purely theoretical, in an environment that would be hostile to most known means of evolution, so I'm going with Class 5]
"I wouldn't colonise that graveworld, if I were you," warned Zef. They were a hundred AU's from the Hephtous ship, and that was pretty much the minimum safe distance. They were Class 5 Deathworlders, but even those tough nuggets had their limits. "The previous inhabitants decided to nuke themselves into oblivion."
There was a few minutes' wait. In-system comms between non-friendlies took time. Zef did some sudoku to pass the time in-between basic ship and self maintenance.
A reply came back in broken Galstand and the Hephtous vessel had come to a relative stop. "We extending comms relays half distance, you doing same. Request clarification for meaning - nuke."
Zef sent out their half of the comm probe handshake, waiting for a connection before using the relay. They defaulted to GalStand Simple. "Nuke being ancient Human term. Being short form of longer word, nuclear. Meaning clarification, fissionable materials used as weaponry. Long time pollution. Making sick babies if living there."
The minute between sending and receiving was tense.
"We scanning surface," said the Hephtous. "Finding many hot spot, high pollution. Much harm. We thank much for warning. We asking - how you knowing?"
"That being long story," which took longer to tell for it being told in GalStand Simple. Many concepts had to be explained in a much longer format.
Once upon a time, there were warriors who sought out the ultimate weapon. A weapon that would theoretically end all wars for fear of using it. Very smart people devoted months of their time to it.
How a simple equation with three letters, one number, and one operational sign changed the way the world thought about war. How people were turned into shadows by the power of it.
Unfortunately, none of those very smart people were smart about a little thing called Human Nature.
How two cities were basically wiped off the map by the first such weapons used in war. How the survivors suffered from radiation poisoning and how very, very many died. How those two weapons should have issued in a new era of peace for fear of them being used again, but how Humanity raced to create more, have the most, and invent bigger ones.
They made bigger and more destructive weapons. One nation striving to have more than the rest of the world put together. They abused this power to become global bullies.
How the biggest and nastiest of those bombs in pre-Shattering history was large enough to turn an entire nation into a smoking, radioactive crater with nothing left to pick over and no safe way to pick it for a thousand years or more. How the neighbours of that nation would sicken and die, how their children would be born deformed if they were born at all.
Of course, other nations had smart people, too. Those in power urged those smart people to create more of the same. A race began to see who could have more, who could have bigger, who could have most.
How they made weapons that could, potentially, crack the very earth upon which they stood, destroy entire continents, and poison the rest of the globe for thousands upon thousands of years. If they used them.
How the people who originally settled this planet had used them, and how each 'hot spot' of lingering radioactivity had once been a continent before those bombs re-ordered an entire world. A world that was only just now entering a state in which it could plausibly host intelligent life - though not for long. So far, even simple life forms were still evolving means to survive the lingering rads.
"We thanking you for warning," said the Hephtous. "Having one question; these weapons no more existing, yes?"
It broke their heart, but Zef had to tell them. "No. Other Humans be making more and bigger ones. Acting for deterrent, they saying."
The comms gap stretched in worrying silence. Deathworlders of a higher grade could decide to do anything at all, including attempted genocide for self-preservation purposes. Zef watched the tactical readout with their heart in their throat.
Finally, the Hephtous said, "You humans are crazy," and cut the comms before leaving the system.
[Image (c) Can Stock Photo / curraheeshutter]
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