Post by redsycorax on Jun 30, 2023 4:52:41 GMT
Perhaps the darkest possible alternate Earth in the multiverse, Earth-718 is a world without the presence of Kryptonians. There, Lex Luthor became US President, and then found the remains of the sinister Coluan AI Brainiac. He merged intellects and the hideous consequence was the destruction of all known life on that alternate Earth. Eight billion humans, all of its higher cetaceans and primates, and even micro-organisms, bacteria and viruses ceased to exist. At the end, Luthor boarded Brainiac's former saucer headed away into the blood red, burning skies, oblivious to the scarlet chemical acid rain - and also the fact that the Presence resurrected his former wife, Lana Lang, to act as Universe-718's sepulchural Spectre.
++
ONE BILLION YEARS FROM DATUM "NOW":
The Spectre, Lana Lang, hovered above the almost unrecognisable corpse of Earth. Any memory of the ephemeral once-dominant species that had been obliterated in a nuclear holocaust aeons ago had faded into oblivion, except when it came to the similarly ancient Guardians of the Universe who supervised the Green Lantern Corps. Over time, the battered and abused planet had finally healed. The radioactive ruins eroded into nothingness, the accursed elements dissipated their poison into nothingness. Life once more became possible and arose, but it was running out of time. Given that millions of years had passed, not even the fossilised remains of humanity still existed. She had kept watch over the world that had given her birth and insured that the cephalopods that succeeded vanished humanity were able to grow to technological maturity and evacuate the solar system before the eventual doomsday of all life on the reborn Earth took place as the sun began to prodigally expand into a red giant. Apart from a few exploratory and scientific missions from other interstellar species observing the end of that solar system, the Spectre was alone.
And then, she wasn't, as Luthor's starship, eroded and battered itself, left hyperspace and reinserted itself in orbit near her:
"Hello, Lex."
"Why do you address me in a dead language?"
"Because you're too late, you fool. If you sought to do anything to this planet or the species that replaced the one that you cold and callously obliterated as part of an obscene experiment, then that's over. You can't, now. Even if its former recent inhabitants never knew about humanity or called this planet Earth, they reached the stars in its stead. Did you enjoy that loneliness in the supervoid?"
"Why have you persistently thwarted my experiments and intellectual endeavours?"
"Because that's a euphemism and neither of you in that composite body deserve anything else. As Brainiac, you slaughtered countless species and destroyed countless worlds because you could and because you excused it as the 'pursuit of objective knowledge.'"
"The cosmos is meaningless and without purpose."
"So that excuses genocides beyond number? Or the destruction of humanity? Merely because you're too arrogant to contemplate its existence does not mean that something greater than you does not exist. Why do you think I still exist?"
"So if you do serve this 'higher power', why do I still exist? It could have erased me, reprogrammed me, so many other things."
"Because you deserve to existentially and intellectually suffer, eternally thwarted in your malignant dreams."
"What gives you the right to judge me?"
"Because you do not have any "entitlement' to engage in destructive and genocidal exploitation and erasure of whole sentient species out of some ersatz 'superior' intelligence. You are a sentient organism, you are clearly not acting on the ancient orders of the long-extinct Coluan computer tyrants given that they are now little more than indistinct rust heaps on the surface of an abandoned planet because you witnessed they had been overthrown, and because even if you do not consider yourself accountable to any deity, you are accountable to interstellar law for your actions."
"That is illogical. I..I refuse to accept it."
"Careful, that sounds like "illogical" volition and not based on deliberative choice."
"Will you therefore continue to exist to constrain my actions until my AI infrastructure becomes eroded and incapable of operation?"
"Yes, I will. Because all metals decay, as will your innards. And when that happens, you will lose your sentience altogether. I will be there to witness that happen. However, before that does, if you persist in deliberately harming and abusing other sentient species, you will be stopped and face the consequences of your actions."
"The Luthor component of myself recalls an ancient French existential drama called No Exit by the philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre."
"Oh, yes. I think Lex and I saw a performance once. Let's see... three people are trapped in a locked room in hell, desiring and hating one another and have been condemned to be so for the rest of eternity. What an appropriate summary of your own existence from now on."
"I am a sentient being! I have the right to make choices!"
"No-one is denying you that. However, that does not mean that you have immunity from the consequences of your actions and causing deliberate harm to others. If you refrain from doing so, however, you will not face those consequences."
"Never!"
"Then the die is cast. And therefore, you will see me again. Over and over again, when you commit acts of large-scale cosmic malice and depredations against other sentient life. It's your choice. Oh, and no, it's not about you specifically. I have done, and will continue to do, the same duty when it comes to stopping any analogous sense of self-entitlement to abuse and slaughter others with impunity. Goodbye for now."
And in an unguarded moment, as Brainiac momentarily let his concentration lapse, Lex re-emerged, screaming:
"Damn you, Lana! Damn you to hell for standing in the way of our self-determination and freedom!"
And the only response was the Spectre's disembodied funereal silence, albeit with a strong impression of contempt and steely determination never to allow him to repeat the atrocities that he had already performed. Lex continued ranting and screaming until Brainiac resumed control of their hybrid body. He would not let this insubstantial remnant of a long-extinct ephemeral species triumph over him. He was Brainiac. He would triumph!
THE END [1.40 PM, 1 JULY 2023]
++
ONE BILLION YEARS FROM DATUM "NOW":
The Spectre, Lana Lang, hovered above the almost unrecognisable corpse of Earth. Any memory of the ephemeral once-dominant species that had been obliterated in a nuclear holocaust aeons ago had faded into oblivion, except when it came to the similarly ancient Guardians of the Universe who supervised the Green Lantern Corps. Over time, the battered and abused planet had finally healed. The radioactive ruins eroded into nothingness, the accursed elements dissipated their poison into nothingness. Life once more became possible and arose, but it was running out of time. Given that millions of years had passed, not even the fossilised remains of humanity still existed. She had kept watch over the world that had given her birth and insured that the cephalopods that succeeded vanished humanity were able to grow to technological maturity and evacuate the solar system before the eventual doomsday of all life on the reborn Earth took place as the sun began to prodigally expand into a red giant. Apart from a few exploratory and scientific missions from other interstellar species observing the end of that solar system, the Spectre was alone.
And then, she wasn't, as Luthor's starship, eroded and battered itself, left hyperspace and reinserted itself in orbit near her:
"Hello, Lex."
"Why do you address me in a dead language?"
"Because you're too late, you fool. If you sought to do anything to this planet or the species that replaced the one that you cold and callously obliterated as part of an obscene experiment, then that's over. You can't, now. Even if its former recent inhabitants never knew about humanity or called this planet Earth, they reached the stars in its stead. Did you enjoy that loneliness in the supervoid?"
"Why have you persistently thwarted my experiments and intellectual endeavours?"
"Because that's a euphemism and neither of you in that composite body deserve anything else. As Brainiac, you slaughtered countless species and destroyed countless worlds because you could and because you excused it as the 'pursuit of objective knowledge.'"
"The cosmos is meaningless and without purpose."
"So that excuses genocides beyond number? Or the destruction of humanity? Merely because you're too arrogant to contemplate its existence does not mean that something greater than you does not exist. Why do you think I still exist?"
"So if you do serve this 'higher power', why do I still exist? It could have erased me, reprogrammed me, so many other things."
"Because you deserve to existentially and intellectually suffer, eternally thwarted in your malignant dreams."
"What gives you the right to judge me?"
"Because you do not have any "entitlement' to engage in destructive and genocidal exploitation and erasure of whole sentient species out of some ersatz 'superior' intelligence. You are a sentient organism, you are clearly not acting on the ancient orders of the long-extinct Coluan computer tyrants given that they are now little more than indistinct rust heaps on the surface of an abandoned planet because you witnessed they had been overthrown, and because even if you do not consider yourself accountable to any deity, you are accountable to interstellar law for your actions."
"That is illogical. I..I refuse to accept it."
"Careful, that sounds like "illogical" volition and not based on deliberative choice."
"Will you therefore continue to exist to constrain my actions until my AI infrastructure becomes eroded and incapable of operation?"
"Yes, I will. Because all metals decay, as will your innards. And when that happens, you will lose your sentience altogether. I will be there to witness that happen. However, before that does, if you persist in deliberately harming and abusing other sentient species, you will be stopped and face the consequences of your actions."
"The Luthor component of myself recalls an ancient French existential drama called No Exit by the philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre."
"Oh, yes. I think Lex and I saw a performance once. Let's see... three people are trapped in a locked room in hell, desiring and hating one another and have been condemned to be so for the rest of eternity. What an appropriate summary of your own existence from now on."
"I am a sentient being! I have the right to make choices!"
"No-one is denying you that. However, that does not mean that you have immunity from the consequences of your actions and causing deliberate harm to others. If you refrain from doing so, however, you will not face those consequences."
"Never!"
"Then the die is cast. And therefore, you will see me again. Over and over again, when you commit acts of large-scale cosmic malice and depredations against other sentient life. It's your choice. Oh, and no, it's not about you specifically. I have done, and will continue to do, the same duty when it comes to stopping any analogous sense of self-entitlement to abuse and slaughter others with impunity. Goodbye for now."
And in an unguarded moment, as Brainiac momentarily let his concentration lapse, Lex re-emerged, screaming:
"Damn you, Lana! Damn you to hell for standing in the way of our self-determination and freedom!"
And the only response was the Spectre's disembodied funereal silence, albeit with a strong impression of contempt and steely determination never to allow him to repeat the atrocities that he had already performed. Lex continued ranting and screaming until Brainiac resumed control of their hybrid body. He would not let this insubstantial remnant of a long-extinct ephemeral species triumph over him. He was Brainiac. He would triumph!
THE END [1.40 PM, 1 JULY 2023]
