While they were volunteering and helping communities develop some resilience against the threats of climate change, his first child Sophie was born in 2007. She was named after his mother, Shelley. Sophie did well in school, but she loved music. She knew all the top songs and knew how to sing them on her Apple Music app. She also had a pretty good voice. Tom’s second child, Sam, was born in 2009. Right away he could tell that Sam was going to be something special. Sam was just like his father. Both he and Sarah felt the same way. It was their parents’ intuition that he would be a great success. Two years later, in 2011, Robert came along. By this time, Tom and Sarah were involved in community efforts to increase climate change solutions and staying somewhat active in town halls. Much of their time was spent raising their three children.
Robert was doing well in school when Tom had to start devoting all of his time to the project. All three of their kids had a relatively normal early childhood. Both he and his wife went to work every day and made sure their children were cared for. His children joined all the youth sports programs and had lots of good friends. Birthday parties were held almost every week where they lived, and there was not much to worry about. With young children, they wanted to ensure a future in which they did not have to worry about climate change and its effect, all over the world.
When Donald Trump became president in 2016, given that all of the positive changes that had been implemented by President Obama were suddenly reversed, Dr. Burns and the environmental community were now forecasting dire consequences with the shift in government policy. Many of the regulations in the Environmental Protection Agency were canceled. It seemed that half the population was thrilled that they were doing better economically and refused to accept they were sacrificing the future of mankind.
It was estimated that all life would perish beginning in 2040—by 2100 everything alive would have become extinct. These reports were secret, classified documents and could not be made public, since it would cause widespread panic. However, the scientists Tom worked with had done their own calculations.
Congressional stories read by the public on the climate mentioned the seriousness of the issue but also watered down what the future effects might be. Congress refused to act to help the environment.
Some people felt Trump should be impeached just because of his impact on the environment. It was treason to sell out the American people to the idea that climate change was not man-made. Dr. Burns could not take a chance on this president and his beliefs. Whoever became president after Trump would be left with an impossible task of cleaning up the atmosphere and pollution, and there was a chance it would not be successful.
Just as once the fight against poverty was to be fought at all levels of society for the sake of a common humanity, now the fight to act on warnings at all levels of society was critical for the sake of our survival. That meant not burying intelligence and accurate assessments when it came to the environment. It was maniacal and beastly to think that just as Agent Orange had been poured out of the sky to win a war that war outcomes and strategies were a better investment of time and money in embracing another form of slow death as the world degenerated.
The skies were the realm for the undamnable it appeared, dropping any chemical to disintegrate trees and vegetation, but Tom would be damned if he would let them turn all the skies into another damaging place where the absence of hope for the future would cloud everything. There was no such thing as absolution when it came to releasing oneself from the responsibility that came with knowledge for capricious reasons. Sure, our lingering wishes for a past came and went, but not every set of threats could be bombed away.
Tom didn’t consider making exceptions in the minds of men who distorted the sacred trust and integrity an option. It wasn’t a chain of command problem he was going to recreate. He would command his ship when the time came and communicate with the other commanders with space providing a much better sense of hope. Nevertheless, he was tinged with foreboding as he looked up into the sky on this late evening in July. He wondered if this was what his own grandparents had felt leaving for the new world and better prospects. Maybe there would be sentimental attachments and waves of concerns about whether they were leaving the worst for the better. Other than that, the parallels ended as the times demanded he witness a different set of circumstances and that hurricanes, disappearing islands and flooded backyards couldn’t be forced into submission.
He felt a wave of relief as he considered that he was dealing with the problems of these times with his hands on a lot more knowledge and awareness. But they had come to the new world for better prospects and that was a torch he was willing to carry to light the way for his own children’s future too.
He pulled into the space center and looked forward to the challenges he and the other commanders faced.
Chapter 12 – Data
Tom Burns, Rocky Mountains, CO
The following day, Tom received progress reports on all four ships during one of the commanders’ weekly video conference meetings. It was all excellent news. They shared suggestions with each other. Everyone seemed to get along fine. Things had calmed down a bit since the meeting with Yuri. Planning and building the ships began in earnest.
However, things hadn’t calmed down in terms of extreme weather and climate events. Oman had seen 108-degree weather and Algeria also hit a record high of 124 degrees. California’s wildfires became the deadliest and most destructive in history. Wildfires in the Amazon threatened to destroy twenty percent of the Earth’s oxygen supply. The world wasn’t on track to limit temperature rises or achieve necessary emissions reductions, while droughts were slowing agricultural production in central Iowa and Illinois.
People were generally nervous about when the dry spell would end given its impact on people’s lives, food production and livelihood. If they were going to adapt to these narcissistic times, it would mean rising above zero-tolerance for immigrants like Luis or for technological advances that were meant to meet necessary climate impact goals. Apathy in the eyes of humankind’s challenges, no matter how kind God might be, meant believing religious fanatics that claimed there would be no more climate disasters since God had said so. Tom doubted sincerely that the prayerful insurance policy for the planet covered neglect and inaction.
The commanders worried about all of these weather anomalies also. The commanders agreed that over the next several years hired crews would be developing and designing the spacecraft. Each ship would have four levels, and their command posts would be on the top floor. The living quarters and medical facilities would be on the third level. The second level would be reserved for the crew’s functions, including the weapon systems along with the space shuttles. The fourth level would be where the engine rooms were located.
Tom informed the other commanders that he’d hired several new people, including Mr. William Borucki, to develop some flight paths to the many galaxies and to determine what obstacles might occur, such as meteor showers that needed to be avoided. Tom also had brought experts in astronomy and astrology to join the meeting.
William Borucki advised, “We need current maps of the stars, meteor showers and asteroids. At this point, plans can only be selected from data that has been collected by astronomers on Earth. We know this data has been collected with extremely powerful telescopes such as the Kepler taking pictures of the same part of the sky repeatedly every six seconds. Between 2009 and 2018, the Kepler has been used to identify exoplanets. Before that, I worked for NASA researching the potential of finding Earth-size planets beyond our solar system through the process or technique of transit photometry. I pioneered the Kepler mission. Now that Kepler has run out of fuel and has been retired, orbiting away from Earth, it set us all on a new course full of promise to continue exploring our galaxy.”