When smoke rises, and when the sky becomes nothing more that an empty sea of black, you have nothing to live for. But when your hopes and dreams are mercilessly shattered, and when your life shrivels into nothing more than dust with the wind, you have nothing to die for.

I stood alone on the battlefield. All the other troopers were helping with the exodus. Above me the sky swirled ominously, and I could only see a few metres ahead through the faint light. Occasionally there was an eerie streak of green lightning, followed by a crack of thunder that resonated like the voice of a memory. My job was to scout around the space-craft, and then to report back to the team. But I couldn’t see the point.

I stood on the wasteland, and I knew the soldiers were coming.

How I miss the autumns of Utopia…

Human greed had proven prevalent in our universal struggles. It was normal for us to steal, rape and kill. It was normal of us to lust for money, or to fight for dominance. After all, we were humans.

And the battle for oil had been inevitable. With the last reserves at hand, different nations fought for total control. We knew this all along, so while they were busy launching nukes at each other, we embarked on a major covert operation to steal gas masks, and to build the Centrenion Spacecraft.

The Centrenion Spacecraft was a remarkable piece of work- it was a huge ship that could fit a few thousand people. But this was still pitiful in comparison with the world’s population. However, its job was to take as many civilians as possible deep into space when the Earth was no longer sustainable for life. And that time had come now. There was no other choice.

As the Nuclear Bombs fell like ravens of death, the Earth’s atmosphere gradually became more and more intoxicated.

And so Earth slowly choked on the noxious fumes, until the air was completely filled with radioactive particles. It became poisonous. Breathing the air meant a slow and painful death. Which explained why we had the gas masks.

When the countries finally realised that it was too late, that oil had no further value, and that the world itself was doomed, they started hunting for us. They had heard about the Centrenion Spacecraft, as well as its legendary technology that incorporated the use of both cryogenics and a Large Hadron Collider. They had heard about the spacecraft, and they wanted it. So they called us rebels. They even called us thieves. True. But weren’t we humans?