Flying Mother Nature’s silver seed to a new home, they sang as the Grow Your Own creaked into the sky, Flying Mother Nature’s silver seed to a new home in the sun. They even had a Neil Young hologram.
Deadhead was the first planet they found. They had no idea how far they were from Earth. The pilgrims arrived there because while the aim was Polaris, the new navigator got confused. He later claimed the universe had been calling to him. They settled down to breed because that’s how colonists survive. Little or no problem with infant mortality, no weird diseases or vicious creatures. The population increased by half every ten years, women first giving birth in their late teens, early twenties. Life was one big happy commune.
Deadhead was perfect: a warm and friendly sun, oceans, snow-capped mountains, drinkable water, weird but not dangerous flora and fauna. It seemed to welcome the plants and people that appeared one day from Earth.
A few months after their arrival various types of alien showed up.
Some looked like thistledown; others resembled rolling warty balls, snakes with hands, even floating Portuguese Men o’War propelled by farting (how it sounded, luckily no discernible smell); a swarm of the most delicate dragonfly-like insects the size of seagulls that danced at dusk and dawn. The neighbours were coming to say hi.
Communication was impossible. The colonists had suspected it would be and weren’t fussed.
Mostly the aliens hung around watching. A biker from Oakland tried tagging one of the rolling warty balls, only to swear loudly when it stung his left hand, which fell off the next day. A clean separation as if by laser, no other ill effects, perfectly healed, but henceforth tagging was out. A month later a replacement hand began to grow from the shiny stub. Except it was a new right hand and the biker already had one.
Aliens? You can look but best not to touch.
It’s to be remembered that these colonists were used to fantasising about seriously strange shit, either stoned or straight. There was very little the universe could throw at them that would invoke the kind of screaming disbelief for which insanity is the only comfort.
As time went by, several colonists found they could sense a mental road map that led to valuable alien trade. As in seeing, somehow, what goods an alien would want in order for colonists to get... well, the ultra-cool yellow metal cubes that enabled people to get inside each other’s heads, to share emotion and perception. Or like a spookily fast-growing tree with fruit that when cooked tasted and smelt just like meat. The scientists said the nutritional value was similar but better and the enforced vegetarians cheered. There’d been no room for animals on Grow Your Own. “Hell,” had said the former USMC, “we’ll shoot something when we land."
And then seven computer chips, traded for a Fender knock-off made in Djakarta along with the fake Hammond organs and Bechstein baby grands. The Fender had once kept good company, although at the time of the trade it lacked strings and a volume knob. No one knew they were computer chips until someone linked one up to a PC ("Dunno, man, felt like the cool thing to do") and they discovered real artificial intelligence.
Within two years the chips and the pre-cogs amongst the colonists were running Deadhead. The human leaders, those pre-cogs who handled most of the trade with aliens, called themselves Progs.
The beginning of the good life.
Creativity died.
Not immediately, and always kicking and screaming, sparkly painted fingernails clawing at the colony’s raison d’être. But. Faced with a choice between anarchic misrule and order, between danger and safety, between a future and none, the majority made the sensible decision. After all, the Progs didn’t ban music or art or anything. They just wanted it kept simple. Chanting was good. So was plant drawing, a prize to any that looked exactly like the original. Think calm, think serene, and no surprises.
No more psychedelic drugs available, no cocaine. No uppers of any kind. Nothing to disturb the serene. Heroin, yes. Downers. And a strain of marijuana that should have been called Silent Kush. When they weren’t working, Deadheaders spent most of their time stoned. No one needed to work very much.
Who needs to be creative? The Progs have the answers to problems that usually need imagination to solve.
Who needs to be wildly self-expressive? Go chant or draw a leaf.
The Progs called it The Way.
The AIs managed to get a few robots built before the humans lost interest. Those robots begat more. It was a tranquil, automated world. Aliens still came to stare, trade, then left. Soon the colonists didn’t wonder, didn’t care, what the alien gizmos did. Leave it to the Progs and the AIs to figure it out.
The AIs and Progs also solved a major problem: genetics.
You do not want a colony to fail because of inbreeding.
True, the population was increasing fast. The chances of cousins having kids were remote. But they did exist. Furtive sex behind the woodshed wants what furtive sex always wants: right here, right now and to hell with the gene pool. The AIs could map the colonists’ DNA, to establish which would be bad matches. Second and even third cousins could be a problem, over time. The Progs could go further. They could establish which pregnancies in the now would result in badness many years down the line. Only the Progs could sanction birth. It became The Way.
It didn’t suit everyone. Various groups took off for distant places, desperate to preserve the dream that had led them to leave Earth. But it’s difficult going native on a planet where you don’t belong. All the tech, all the plant-stock, was with those who’d taken the path of least resistance. The breakaways either came
