Earth Has Been Margin Called

by Simon de la Rouviere. License: CC BY-NC-SA 4.0.

with thanks to Niel de la Rouviere for helping me stick the landing.

Published: 2020.

—

“Humans? Hi. Earth has been margin called. What’s your backup planet?” came the voice from a giant luminous being as 8 billion humans filed into what looked like a gigantic waiting room.

“Hello? Guys? What’s your backup planet?” asked the luminous being again.

The humans looked around, jaws on the floor, and furrowing their brows. 

“Who is your leader or like head person or something?”

Suddenly, all the humans started shouting names to the luminous being. It sighed. A deep exasperated sigh.

“Uuurgh. You’re one of those species.” 

The luminous being rolled its eyes, bent down and pointed at the man standing in front of all 8 billion humans. “You there. Right in front. Yes, you, the one that’s looking behind him. It says here you name is Aaaaaaron, you are now the representative of all of humanity.”

“Fuck,” said Aaaaaaron. This always happened. Always in front of the line, alphabetically. He reluctantly edged forward.

“What happened? Where are we?” Aaaaaaron asked.

The luminous being let out another long sigh.

“Earth. Got. Margin. Called.”

“What does that mean?”

“Earth got put up as collateral in the galactic markets. The owner couldn’t cover his position and had to sell Earth to cover his losses. He had taken out a leveraged long position on exploratory dark matter mining. Unfortunately for him, it was discovered that it’s just floating existential angst. Under the new laws of the galactic markets, section forty seven dash e dash i dash four point five, if a planet is margin called, the primary beings of the planet is to be evicted. Earth is now owned by a Mr. Marinate from Planet Knopcurries. So. Tell me, please, what is your backup planet?”

Aaaaaaron looked back at the humans behind him, hoping someone might say that a backup planet existed. “I don’t think we have one?”

“Well, there’s definitely not one in the records. Do you have like another name or something I can check under?”

“Homo Sapiens?”

The luminous being chortled. “Look at you. You’re one of those species, having a cutesy sciencey sounding official name. Let me check for you.” The luminous being flashed, and immediately replied: “Nope. Nothing there either. Whelp, I’m sorry, according to code, you are to be wiped from existence.”

“Wait. Why can’t we just go back? It was ours, surely?”

“Uhhh. No it’s not. It was owned by Mrs. Tappercappy from Planet Milliponders. It was originally owned by Mr. God, he created it, but due to the financial crisis, he had to sell it. He was also a bit leveraged, recruiting his son to sell plots on Planet Heaven. Lots of beings lost planets back then. Sad.”

“Wait. Can we ask Mr. Marinate if we can just go live on Earth again?”

The luminous being sent out another long sigh through the massive waiting room. “I can call him for you guys, I guess? You owe me one.”

The luminous being rang the number of Mr. Marinate. “I’m putting him on speaker phone.”

A being with a deep voice answered. It boomed across the waiting room.

“Mr. Marinate speaking. Who is this?”

“Hi. Mr. Marinate. This is luminous being number four hundred and one. I’m calling you from the bureau of the office of the galactic trade markets, regarding the planet you just acquired from a margin call. Planet Earth.”

“Yes?”

“The beings on it, they want to go back to it. I’m putting a Mr. A.A.A.A.A.A.ron on the line.”

Aaaaaaron sighed: “It’s not a staccato. It’s Aaron. Like arrow, but with a ‘n’. Nevermind. Hi. Mr. Marinate, sir.”

“Hi.”

“Sir, we were the beings on Planet Earth. We’d like to go back, please.”

“Planet Earth, you say? Lemme check quickly.”

In the background of the speakerphone one could hear a chair creaking, and some fingers flying over a keyboard.

“I’m sorry Arrow. You guys are pests. Absolutely not. You’ve basically ruined it to shit.”

“Maybe we can buy it from you?”

There was silence on the other line. “What do you have?”

Almost at once, the humans emptied their pockets. First the poor and then the rich reluctantly followed. Aaaaaaron counted it all up.

“It’s about roughly a few trillion in US, Earth dollars, give or take.”

On the other side of a speakerphone came a gigantic belly laugh. “What a joke. Luminous one, did you hear that?”

Aaaaaaron, starting to panic, threw out another idea. “We can sell our souls?”

The laughter died down again. “Luminous one, what’s the worth of all human souls?”

The luminous being spoke. “I’ll check quick on the terminal.” The luminous being flashed: “About hundred and thirty two dollars. A rounding error, basically.”

Another laugh boomed through the room. “Who is buying that shit?” asked Mr. Marinate.

“I think the orderbook is mostly a fellow called Mr. Satan from Planet Hell. You know him? Creepy fellow that one.”

“Classic. Haha. Of course Satan would want these souls. A joke. Sorry, humans. You’ve got to go.”

Aaaaaaron looked down on humanity and saw the trembling babies in their mothers’ arms. “Wait. Is there anything we can offer you? Anything at all?”

“Ramble a few off, Mr. Arrow. You. Are. Hilarious.”

Aaaaaaron thought about humanity’s redeeming qualities, our defining features.

“We can offer love?”

“Please,” responded Mr. Marinate. “No other beings love more than the sensual, intimate lovers from Planet Tripplekims. If you come within three AU from them, you already start experiencing ecstasy.”

“We can offer war?”

“Please. No other beings can wage war like the warmongers of Planet Xankkkri. If they side with an unstoppable force, they can conquer an immovable object.”

“We can offer art?”

“Please. No other beings can create beautiful art like the creatives of Planet Prilmarf. They make the endless, dark vacuum of space seem like a tapestry of colours.”

Aaaaaaron thought for a while longer until the luminous being spoke up.

“They are pretting fucking stupid,” it said.

“More stupid than the Pluckytowners from Planet Ripgrinky?” asked Mr. Marinate.

“No. Pluckytowners are daft. Humans are reckless: they rarely think at all. Even the Pluckytowners have a backup planet, and they enjoy staring at oil rising to the top of peanut butter.”

“Reckless, you say? What do you mean luminous one?” asked Mr. Marinate.

“You know how you deliberated for three hundred and seventeen years to loan out the funds that gave you Planet Earth in the margin call? Humans, on average, think for about several seconds to open up such trades.”

“Yolo, yeah.” said Aaaaaaron, playing along with the discussion.

“Yolo? What’s that Arrow?”

“You only live once. Kind of like a modern way of saying carpe diem. Seize the day, and such shit.”

“Is this why you’ve let your planet basically burn out already?”

“You could say so? I guess?” said Aaaaaaron.

It was silent for a moment as Mr. Marinate thought. “Give me a hundred and twenty seven years to think about this for a moment.”

“We don’t have that time?!” asked Aaaaaaron. 

“Don’t worry humans. I can hibernate you all quickly. This is a waiting room outside of time. Earth won’t age.”

127 years passed and all the humans woke up from their cryogenic slumber.

“I have a proposal Arrow. Everyone can return to Planet Earth. In return, I want to own the rights to broadcast your recklessness to the galaxy. I suspect, the galaxy has never seen anything like you lot. It is an income share agreement. You earn ten percent of the deal. If you make hundred quintillion from it, you have the option to buy back Earth along with the associated TV rights for yourself. I can at any point in time choose to evict you or sell Earth along with the TV rights. All you need to do is keep being your reckless selves.”

The luminous being looked at Aaaaaaron. “I suggest not changing the terms, Mr. Aaaaaaron. Mr. Marinate will take another few hundred years to think about modifications.”

Aaaaaaron looked at humanity, all 8 billion staring in his direction. He looked back at the luminous being. 

“Deal!”

The humans cheered.

With a flash, they were all back on Planet Earth. They had a new mandate. Remain as reckless as possible, broadcasting their antics to the galaxy. If the ratings remained high, they get to keep Planet Earth. It was a paradox. Planet Earth will almost certainly now burn away, but humans felt it was at least better than disappearing into the void.

And so, humans did what they do best: being reckless. Unfortunately, they ran into problems. Because they were being watched, and had to perform what usually came naturally to them, they started failing. They accidentally became recklessly careful. 

At first, it was benign. People started accidentally recycling. People started accidentally falling into condoms and practicing safe sex. People accidentally spilled their alcohol. People accidentally didn’t run with scissors. 

As the ratings fell, in a bid to become reckless again, the UN declared that carefulness is to be outlawed. Unintentionally, this made it even worse, as making it illegal made it even more alluring. The carefulness escalated: In Australia, the government accidentally passed legislation that prohibited corporations from polluting. Soon, most of the world followed. Russia one-upped the world by accidentally relinquishing their nuclear arsenal. The most egregious carefulness came from a scientist tasked with increasing carbon output, tuning up a software parameter so high it underwent an integer overflow, flipping it to negative, turning the device into a carbon extractor. Suddenly, carbon levels started dropping perilously. Humanity panicked and the ratings dropped. Their planet was being saved as impending eviction loomed closer.

As the viewership dropped, humanity started losing the sense that they were being watched, and so the creeping responsibility to be reckless, diminished. Natural recklessness started blooming again. Legislation were repealed to pollute. Men drove at 250km/h on roads. Kids started throwing stones at each other, for fun. Drunk tweets were being sent. Many beers were held for seemingly inane antics. And so, when it seemed like the forever dark would meet them, the ratings went up again. They were saved.

This cycle continued for generations, keeping a balance that allowed humanity to live for aeons: first throwing caution to the winds, and then winding down the recklessness. The rest of the galaxy watched, sitting in their television rooms on planets as far as Planet Gomplekin at the center of the galaxy, to Planet Yikinum on the Scutum–Centaurus arm. At first, moral panic spread throughout the galaxy as parents saw their alien kids becoming reckless. Stone throwing was banned outright in Planet Hikkil when young Babi threw a stone at another young alien, just because. On Planet Arperturnip, diseases spread rapidly through the society after a man, leaving a bathroom decided to not wash his hands. Boycotts appeared, but as Barbara Streissand knows, this just increased the popularity of the show. Whilst some planets tried to ban humans from their airwaves, some allowed it to continue. Planet Jiggynimp overtook Planet Popokfi as the fittest planet in the galaxy, because they couldn’t stop laughing at the humans. Slowly, but surely, however, the allure of recklessness spread throughout the galaxy and many civilizations decided to not think so much about things. The warmongers of Planet Xankkkri learned to lay their weapons down and learn to recklessly love. The lovers of Planet Tripplekims learned to despise their neighbours and recklessly hate. The artists of Planet Prilmarf learned to stop caring about the meaning of art and stuck a banana to the side of the galaxy. Unfortunately (or fortunately) for the Pluckytowners of Planet Ripgrinky, they applied recklessness to their legendary daftness and became so silent in their minds that they became enlightened, forever disappearing from the galaxy. New technological innovations started occurring as scientists of other planets started following human scientists, and just kind of threw shit together.

The whole galaxy became enraptured in a new cycle of recklessness and carefulness, ushering in a new golden era of technological and cultural progress. This continued for a few thousand years, until humanity eventually earned the hundred quintillion necessary to buy back Earth and the TV rights to it. Over time, it made Mr. Marinate, in turn, the second richest being in the galaxy. The richest being during that time became Mr. Archie from Planet Trunkergorm. He realised that although dark matter was just floating existential angst, it actually was a harvestable element. 

Humans called up Mr. Marinate again. A descendant of Aaaaaaaron, Zzzzzzena, phoned him up.

“Hi. Mr. Marinate. I’m Zzzzzzena, a descendant of Aaaaaron and leader of Humans. I’m here to buy Earth and its TV rights back.”

“Thank you Zzzzzzena, I will adhere to the original terms. You have proved to be the most lucrative trade of my life. I bid thee farewell.”

Humans, now owning Earth, and having learned how to remain in balance with themselves and their planet turned off the TV feed. A deep peace fell on Earth as celebrations rose up that lasted a generation. It showed no sign of subsiding until one evening, a man decided to fuck it, and in a live concert, blindly throw his empy beer bottle into the crowd behind him. When it fell on someone’s head, the crowd was stunned into silence. A fight broke out. Slowly, but surely humans lost their muscle memory and became more and more reckless again. It was slow at first, but then started cascading. John Crombie notified the authorities when he decided to eat an extra chip one evening. He was immediately sent to an asylum to be investigated. Recklessness seeped through the white walls and straitjackets throughout the globe. Soon: Earth was on fire again and hope was lost.

“We have to do something,” said Zzzzzzena. “We have to turn on the TV again. We’ll die.”

The humans disagreed with their representative. They were sick of being the zoo of the galaxy for generations.

It wasn’t long until a message appeared from deep space.

“HUMANS. HELP. WE NEED YOU.”

Humans called up their alien friends far away and discovered that many of them had perished. Natural recklessness had taken hold amongst many alien civilizations and destruction was reigning throughout the galaxy. Without humans showing them how to maintain their recklessness, the galaxy fell apart.

“We don’t have time, people of Earth,” said Zzzzzzena, standing in a burning fire. “In order to save ourselves and the galaxy, we only have one choice.”

The humans agreed.

Zzzzzzena called up the luminous being at the bureau of the office of the galactic trade markets.

“Luminous one. The long and short of it. We want to take out a loan.”

“...and offer what up as collateral?”

“We will put Planet Earth up as collateral.”

The luminous being flashed: “Zzzzzzena, you have been granted a twenty quintillion loan,” it said. “Still as reckless as always, I see.”

With the money, the humans built a giant broadcasting satellite orbiting the sun in record time, adopting their legendary cavalier, fuck it, hold my beer attitude. In a spaceship orbiting the satellite, Zzzzzzena switched it on, broadcasting the faces of all of humanity to the galaxy.

On screens across the galaxy, a couple sat next to some of the last ice that still drifted through the arctic. It was perilously thin. The young man looked to the woman next to him. They nodded without speaking a word and downed the rest of their wine. They undressed, and ran across the ice, laughing as if the whole galaxy depended on them.