"Your time is coming,
There's no use fighting,
You need to realise,
This is the end of the world!"
The Story of 2045...
After observing a huge asteroid passing the Earth, they make measurements and design charts that appeared to show that this very asteroid was on an enormous elliptical trajectory through the Universe.
Our story begins over 4,000 years ago, with a group of Babylonian astronomers who believe they have made a crucial discovery.
They predicted that it would return to impact directly with the Earth, but they couldn’t be precise as to when this would occur so they embarked on a journey to the edge of their known world, Britain. For it is here, they had been told, that a place exists which can be used as an observatory to measure precisely the trajectories of celestial bodies.
So the Babylonians travelled to what is now known as Stonehenge.
“It appears The Nebra Sky Disc is crucial to us now. Dug up by amateur metal detectorists in Germany in 1999, it apparently holds the key…”
Some of their party survived and when they returned home they created a 'Brotherhood of Overseers', to protect their knowledge and artefacts, to whom they tasked with keeping their findings secret until such time as they should be disclosed to the world.
Generations of select families passed the information down until the time came; and it was to the Roman Empire that their information was given. A group of the Overseers travelled to Bethlehem to liaise with the Romans, and observe the impending impact.
With their charts and mathematical models, they lined up the workings of the Henge and, sure enough, their estimates were proven. The same asteroid would impact the Earth two thousand years hence.
They produced a metal disc with metals collected on their journey, including gold from Cornwall, that portrayed the imminent impact, but during their return journey they were attacked at Nebra, in what is now Germany, and the disc was lost.
The asteroid did indeed return, but it did not hit the Earth.
Instead it came very close, lighting up the sky in an almighty spectacle. The Roman authorities, constantly seeking ways to subjugate their enslaved citizens, took the opportunity to turn this into a sign from their gods. Others interpreted it as a sign from a single god, and Christianity wass effectively born from this event, the name originating from ancient Babylonian texts...
The stories of the 'Son of God' were attributed to the spectacle of the passing asteroid and its near miss. Meanwhile, the Overseers joined in a covenant of secrecy with the Romans and the new religion of Christianity, which the Romans adopted some 300 years later, came into effect.
Although the original Babylonian astronomers were wrong about the precise date, they were pretty accurate in their prediction of the elliptical trajectory of the asteroid.
It would indeed strike the Earth, but in another 2,000 years; the now predicted date is 2045.
The Overseers used religion not only to cover their story, but also to manage the people, and it was decided that they would create a series of events to reduce the world’s population, so the impact of the asteroid would not be the sole cause of mankind’s demise.
A great plague was begun in 1665, but the population recovered.
The Overseers then devised plans for a series of great European wars, commencing at the beginning of the 19th Century with Napoleon, who was one of the high members of the Overseers’ dynasty. But the population kept on recovering, and growing.
And when to tell the wider population that Earth will be destroyed?
If 100 years before the event, in 1945, mankind could stop producing children, then the asteroid would destroy a planet devoid of human life.
But by now the Overseers believed there may be a way out; there may in fact be a solution to mankind’s fate, if we could only escape the Earth. War had taught them that, as well as death, could come solutions - innovation through necessity. And so a Second World War was concocted to do just that…
And it worked.
Out of this war came the slim possibility that, within 100 years, we could use giant rockets to take humans to Mars. So the Overseers decided that mankind’s skills should be put into designing a method of relocating, at least some of the population, to Mars.
The next 20 years were spent getting man to the moon. Once mankind accomplished this giant leap in 1969, the Overseers deemed it possible to get to Mars, and so the effort was turned to getting enough people established on that planet, before the Earth’s destruction.
It would be a tall order, and the timing would be incredibly tight.
Meanwhile, news of the imminent impact began to leak and spread.
Certain people were able to ‘foresee’ the event, particularly young children.
“Look Daddy, the moon, it's frowning! It's telling me something bad is going to happen…”
And some individuals would plead with society to take such warnings seriously, many becoming outcasts and preaching on street corners. Some of these became religious icons; shaman to get the population to ‘repent their sins’. Nobody was taken seriously until a series of strange events began, some 20 years before the predicted date of impact.
“The signs are everywhere; and they are menacing! Changing ocean tides, psychedelic colours in the night sky, magnetic compasses no longer point north. In our new zeitgeist, religion takes on a new meaning. Shaman appear as the new priests; cults are preparing… and the eagles!
Of all the majestic birds of earth, the eagles are turning; their calls now almost like weeping. And still, no explanation. But SOMEONE must know…”
And the world’s population became restless.
Eventually the news was issued to a concerned world through an event known as The Great Reveal. Unrest spread with inevitable anarchy and continuous rioting. Many governments around the world fell and international systems collapsed. Eventually a United Nations World Government was established to oversee mankind’s demise… and possible evacuation to Mars.
Meanwhile, there were a series of billionaires who had their aim firmly on the Red Planet, and began pouring enormous sums into their own projects.
“Here at Kennedy Space centre, we are seeing an extraordinary sight. One of the tri-glomerate of rocket Billionaires is actually aboard this launch heading for Mars…
The announcement came only hours ago, and has taken NASA by surprise... But in a statement issued by his company, it appears he must have been planning this for some time...
We can only assume he is escaping the Earth to live on his newly constructed base station on the Red Planet.
We await confirmation, but this is, to say the least, a strange, if not ominous, day.”
Part of the United Nations World Government's approach was to create a drug that would cause a painless and euphoric death. People could take this as an alternative to the fireball that was otherwise inevitable.
Initially this was distributed around the world by the so-called ‘Boatmen’.
This reduced the population significantly, along with the general chaos and anarchy that had come with the announcement.
In the final year before impact, those who remained were encouraged to go to ‘Salvation Centres’ set up all over the world. Here, individuals, groups and families could take the drug and meet a peaceful end together.
“Yeah, Ive got just the right thing,
To help you on your way.
At the end it's gonna ease your pain,
And you don’t even pay!
It's gonna be a wonderful feelin’,
No more stress and despair.
I’ve got just what you need,
To take you there.”
Meanwhile, news emerged that the rocket programme was well under way.
Apart from the private billionaires, who were establishing their own Martian bases, the UNWG commissioned 20 enormous rockets, each capable of holding 100 people, to travel the 3-month journey to Mars.
A UNWG Martian Base was established, mainly underground, that would enable the 2000 people to survive, and indeed thrive.
Food could be grown, and Artificial Intelligence would run most of the systems, including policies and law.
But who would be chosen to go to live on Mars, and how would they be chosen? A complex algorithm, or something simpler?
“But who will be chosen?
What are their names?
Remember, not everyone goes,
It's a tough old game!”
But the restless population would find out where these rockets were being launched, and they wanted in. The carnage that preceded the launches was a terrible end for most, but not as terrifying as the end that awaited the rest of the world in only a few months' time.
“We don’t want it, we don’t like it, we don’t have no say,
We won’t take it, we won’t fake it, we won’t take the pain,
Lord we’ll crash it;
Lord we’ll smash it; Lord we’ll have our way,
We the people; we born equal, we gonna end your reign!”
Eventually the rockets launched, 10 from the United States, and 10 from other countries in a final international effort.
But what would await them on their arrival in Mars’s orbit?
“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth; a formless void of darkness.
Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light. God saw that it was good, and said, "Let us make humankind; and let them have dominion over the fish, the birds, and every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.”
Thus began Earth’s journey. And God said, “How mankind looks after my creation will be written in the stars: I shall return one day to pass judgement!”.
This He did…
… and it was the FINAL day!”