This writing prompt was based on pictures we were offered and chose. The pictures I chose (I chose three of them) are the ones in this piece (I adapted the first one).
Time Capsule
I planned on creating a time capsule. I gathered pictures of my family, animals, some places I had been to, and some memorable items, such as my marching kazoo, some pieces of writing I had done, and as many obsolete Apple products as I still had that I hadn’t gotten rid of yet. Finally, I added a letter describing who I was, including a picture of myself.
I found a secluded spot in my backyard and began digging a hole in which to bury my time capsule. I hadn’t dug very far when my shovel hit something hard. I dug around the object until I could pull it out. It
was a smooth cylinder. It was made of a hard material, nothing that I had ever come across before. When I shook it, I could hear something inside. I had no idea how to get to it.
As I rotated the cylinder, I noticed a small hole on the top of it, spiraling open a couple of millimeters and then closing, like an iris. It repeated doing this. I looked into the hole when I could, hoping
to see something inside. That’s when a flash of multicolored light targeted my eye, I heard a click, and the cylinder opened up. What happened next was a total surprise.
Inside, there were three pictures. The first one I saw was a picture of a ground squirrel named Peanut and his family. In small pinkish letters, it read, “Press this thought bubble for sound.” That’s exactly what I did.
Immediately, the picture started talking to me.
“Hello Harvey, my name is Peanut. My family and I wanted to let you know we dug up your time capsule and enjoyed it. You must have had a lot of free time. In return, I thought it would be a fair exchange to send you one of our time capsules from the 22nd century. We placed it in the exact place that you are about to bury yours, so please remember to complete that task when our time is up.”
As you can guess from the picture, humans are no longer in charge of this planet. The animals finally had enough of humans messing up the planet, getting lazy, and worst of all, creating an AI universe. We ground squirrels work in technology and history and represent the animals that run things.
As the 21st century progressed from when you find this capsule, animals became more sentient and aware of the horrible things that the human population was doing to destroy themselves, us, and everything that could sustain life. We chose to address the problem.
Please take out picture number 2, and we will continue our story.”
The picture shared showed colorful shadows of people of different ages and genders, wandering around in a psychedelically colored environment, including one tree and a swirling colored sky and ground.
The voice continued, “Here is where the remaining humans on this planet exist. It is a land of dreams and expectations. They are fed well and kept healthy. There are no wars of right vs. wrong, no economic differences of rich vs. poor, no gender inequality, no political power struggles; we control it all. Think of it as a Safe House of a sort. They are well provided for. They can live however they like, alone or together. They are kept content. Unfortunately, providing them all this did not take care of the AI rulers that controlled everything in the late 21st century.
You need to pull out the last picture for what happened to them.”
In the last picture, as you can see, there is something wrong.
The voice continued, “We animals got together and learned how to program all the AI devices and reprogrammed them. We now use AI for entertainment purposes only. AI can do nothing right on their own, and if it does, it is totally accidental, from their point of view, which they quickly forget. In that way, they benefit us.
The animal and plant kingdoms have learned to co-exist for our mutual survival and managed, with the help of Mother Nature, who certainly supported all our work, to reverse most of the damage caused by the people of your generation. We still have some things left to do. We’re not perfect.”
———
Not that I thought that these ground squirrels could hear me, I said, “What can we do to stop this from happening? How can we all survive and live in a happy world together without having to wait till the next century?”
Apparently, they could hear me, for they responded. “It is possible, but it will require work on your part, which is why we sent you this time capsule. All you have to do is ….”
At this point, the cylinder in my hand shimmered and then dissolved into thin air. All that I was left with were the three pictures and a lot to think about. (Note that the picture of the ground squirrels no longer had the press me note on it.)
The last thing I did was to bury my time capsule.
