Warning: Long Term Exposure to Substances
in this Mine can Induce Mild Hallucinations.
Please Report Any Incidences of Psychological
Duress to Your Shift Manager.
REMEMBER: YOUR HEALTH COMES FIRST!
Tim frowned at the sign as the elevator descended into the depths of the planet. “Hey Mario? You ever wonder what substances we’re being exposed to?”
“There ain’t any substances.” Mario frowned. “That sign’s just a C-Y-A… Cover Yer Ass.”
“Huh?”
Mario shook his head. “I’m saying that sign’s there to make us think the things we see and hear in the mines are caused by some chemical or other, that they’re just hallucinations.”
“They aren’t?” Tim asked. “But I heard the tunnels speaking and…” He shuddered. “…I saw the walls breathing.”
“Well yeah, that’s because the planet’s alive, and it’s becoming sentient.” Mario said. By now the conversation was growing to the point that others in the elevator began to take note.
“What do you mean, alive?” Tim asked.
“I mean, look out at the walls.” Mario said, pointing to the shaft beyond the elevator’s cage. “You think it’s normal for a planet to be made of flesh?”
“Isn’t it?” Tim asked.
“No.” Mario said flatly. “Most planets are made of rocks and dirt and shit, not flesh and bone.”
“It’s true.” Another worker interjected. “I have a cousin who works in interplanetary shipping. He says that only a few planets are like ours.”
“Huh. I wonder why it’s like that.” Tim wondered aloud.
“It’s because it makes colonizing infertile planets easier.”
“What do you mean?” Another worker asked.
“Most planets contain enough elements to sustain a fully habitable biome, give or take a few asteroid bombardments to balance things out.” Mario answered. “The problem is, they tend to only have these elements in small pockets across the landscape, and in all the wrong amounts. It’s time consuming and expensive to spread them out the old-fashioned way, but you send a flesh-mesh to the planet and in five years the entire surface is covered in real, living skin. Like any other living organism, the flesh-mesh digests what it can and it moves the minerals wherever they’re needed. Twenty years after that and the flesh has burrowed miles underground and begun growing bones and organs and shit. A hundred years later?” Mario scoffed. “There ain’t a planet left. Whole thing becomes skin and blood and bone… But hey, you can colonize it.”
“But they’re not doing that with Tresta-5. I heard they’re colonizing it the old fashioned way.” Another worker stated.
Mario shrugged. “That planet’s different since there’s a lot of winds there, so elements are already pretty evenly distributed… But even if that wasn’t the case, there’s been a lot of hullabaloo about the flesh-mesh process, and corp-os are starting to avoid it. From what I hear, some of the earlier planets colonized with it are beginning to grow temperamental.”
“Temperamental?”
Mario nodded. “Turns out planets aren’t infinite in size, so when the flesh-mesh grows large enough and eats everything it’s supposed to, it starts lookin’ for other things to eat.”
“People?” Another worker asked.
“People, houses, the odd asteroid. Haven’t you wondered about all those towns that’ve gone missing?”
The other workers looked nervous.
“And it gets crazier than that.” Mario continued. “Some are speculating the reason Garnet-7’s orbit has started going wonky is because it sensed the gravity from Garnet-8 and is trying to get close enough to eat it. It’s not a surprise though… Life pushed to the brink tends to explore increasingly desperate means to survive. Our distant ancestors did it when they left the primordial oceans, and again when they first came down from the trees.”
“But sentience?” A worker asked skeptically.
“Why not? Sentience is just another tool life uses to spread. Perhaps sentience is an inevitable outcome of evolution.”
“But how can the tunnels speak to us?” Another person asked. “It’s not like they can just learn English.”
“Maybe they use pheromones.” Mario suggested. “After all, the flesh-meshes are made of the same basic proteins we are. It wouldn’t take much effort for a living organism to detect changes in our behaviors and correlate them with chemical signatures.”
“Huh.” The worker said.
“And anyway, why couldn’t it learn English?” Mario continued. “I mean, even the most sparsely populated planet has millions of people. Think about all the conversations they’re having. Is it really that far-fetched to imagine the planet’s able to focus in on these exchanges and learn?”
The men fell silent, with many watching the fleshy shaft beyond the elevator grate expand out into a massive chamber. The doors opened and the men stepped out into the familiar tunnels where they worked, but with a newfound perception of their surroundings. Each moved silently to his workstation, worried that the old saying “the walls have ears” might be a bit more literal than anyone would have hoped.