Arkhe

In this letter, I will tell you the story of my discovery of the prophesized Arkhe people, who lived somewhere in the far recesses of the universe- where the space consumed by dark matter bends gravity to its will. 

By the skin of our teeth, we managed to steer the Mothership through the density and breach the galaxy’s tight-locked capsule. In pursuit of a habitable planet, we stretched our voyages light years from Earth in search of a place to call home. I was appointed sect #1200 to journey into uncharted territory, way beyond the death star #1511, unfortunately in its white dwarf stage, as many planets are today. Our captain back home decided to admit me as the sole writer of the crew, tasked with documenting our travels in the vivid imagination only a true writer could. But I’d be lying if I said the hollow space outside our shuttle windows felt any more foreign to the uncomfortable space between me and my crewmates. My work is seen as less significant compared to the matter at hand, with my colleagues constantly rebuffing my mentions of encountering potential life beyond, simply stating “That’s not what we’re here for”. Nevertheless, I’ve since kept my philosophical tirades to myself, lest the morale decrease anymore, and we all go mad on our trek to utopia. 

We stumbled upon this planet serendipitously, bouncing from wormhole to wormhole, aimlessly searching for any signs of vitality in the dead space. After many weeks of failed navigation, we simply began pushing toward any bright light we found; the space amongst stars seemed to widen the farther the blackness swallowed us. And it was a bright light, indeed, which graced us with its warmth after endless miles of decaying matter. At first glance, it appeared perfectly ellipsoid, albeit more oblate in comparison to once-lived planets. The light emitting from its satellite stars reflected a nebulous pink glow. From a distance, it looked like floating Eudialyte, which made me chuckle at the thought of any natural Earth mineral surviving. It had no water-esque landscapes, from what I could tell; mostly covered in wavy, beige filigree. My comments on its unique appearance fell on deaf ears, as our flight commander braced us for impact into its exosphere. 

We landed in a sandy ditch atop a beige mound. Immediately, my team gathered excavation supplies and headed off, prodding the world for its sustenance. I was the last to fully descend from the ship - eyes immersed in the bloody haze of the crimson sky. The red air was cut off by a paradigm of pointed mountains, ranging from shades of cerise to pale rose. In the distance, rocky chasms halted the pink landscape with rich shadows, yet from afar, looked to be maroon and other deep shades of red, rather than fully black. I joined my colleagues into the desert, taking note of the ranging shade, shape, and texture of the land. At surface level, the ground was littered in quartz-like sand. Digging further, the color deepened to a dark ruby-red, with the air of moisture detectable even behind our helmets. Water! Quickly, they began plummeting their tools into the ground, until small geysers of milky liquid emerged from the surface. I watched all of this behind my tablet, taking notice of its peculiar shade, yet still in resemblance to the rest of the land. Soon, my team was occupied in uncovering the elements of the liquid, and my position as general observer was even more unnecessary now.

 I made my way through the blushing valley. There were no signs of flora, with a few scattered pebbles providing some decoration to the desolate landscape. I noted changing textures on the ground; varying from silt, sand, and clay, all encased in intestinal color. I wandered nearer the sloping mounds toward the mountains, where I spotted a cave hidden in the belly of the hill. I remember taking a quick glance back at my team, who seemed to hardly notice my disappearance. I began my descent into the cave, the rocky edges proving fatal for my suit and helmet, but the air of wonder leading me into corners I should not have leaped. As I cascaded down the drop away, holding on to the wall for balance, I miscalculated my descent and tumbled deep into the mouth of the cave. When a stalagmite finally halted my fall, I found my helmet had shattered upon impact. Mentally, this terrified me, but before the evidence of what had occurred cemented its truth in my psyche, my gasp of shock kept me from spiraling out of control. I felt the surge of untarnished air permeate my lungs and nostrils. I could breathe! At last, we had found a planet suitable for our needs. At that moment, I could almost kiss the dirt floor in my joyous anticipation to run and tell the others. But before I could celebrate any further, I realized the true depth of my fall. I could not climb over the towering rock walls which caged me from the surface. Fear began to rush over me, as I desperately shouted for my colleagues. After what felt like hours, no one came, and I decided to wander deeper in the cave for another way out. 

I walked along the limestone walls, my legs and feet turning to glass the farther each step took me. Unfortunately, I didn’t find any glimmer of outside’s light, and afraid I would spend eternity roaming the crimson catacombs, I halted my journey. As I sank to the ground, with panic invading my chest, I had the strangest urge to still analyze the environment around me. Perhaps it was the writer in me always looking for a story, but I could not give up my integrity to explore. I shone my light against the slick walls; scarlet crystals sprouted against the stalactites, which barely kissed the forming stalagmites on the ground. I moved towards the back wall; red ochre smeared on the naturally flat surface, reminiscent of ancient cave peoples, long since abandoned by the new, intergalactic age of man. I further analyzed the color; what at first looked to be natural pigment dusted on the walls eventually morphed into a painting of some sorts. I looked closer, studying the crude shape it depicted. A circle. At the bottom were smaller, less pronounced shapes dusted with a softer color. I could not analyze these shapes; it was something unbeknownst to the geometry of man. But instantly, I thought of them to represent some kind of people. I shone my light further down the rocky corridor, anticipating more pictures. As far as I walked, I could not find any flat surfaces in which a scene could be painted, but throughout my journey, I stumbled across strange stones lining the floor. Picking one up, I immediately noticed its foreign appearance to the rocks and pebbles I had come to know. Its material was unknown to me, but as I set it apart from the natural stones of the cave, I began noticing more and more. Piles of this strange artifact lay stacked in corners and crevices. They ranged in size, some as large the length of a stalagmite to barely the size of my hand. I pondered deeply their makeup until the thought they could be bones sporadically crossed my mind and lit up my eyes. Just as I made this conclusion, I heard the shouts of my crew members echoing from the far side of the cave. Still clutching onto a bone, I ran towards the noise and saw my colleagues crouching just above the rocky wall which prohibited my climb. As I came into view, their shouts of curiosity turned to screams at the display of my naked face against the alien air. I quickly assured them of its safety, though my untamed excitement and bone-wielding stance might’ve convinced them I was starting to lose it. They sent tethers down to lift me back to the surface. While I was elated with the thought of previous life on this planet, the rest of the crew were not as impressed with my discovery. I was met again with the terrible principle “That’s not what we’re here for”, regarding my wanting to further explore the land’s cave systems. Instead, they wished to indulge in the new discovery of the breathable air, and once again, I was left to my own devices. 

It has since been three months since my initial discovery, and my team has paid no attention to the few added findings I’ve collected. We’ve relocated closer to the mountain range in search of fertile soil, which has given me access to new locations rich in history. While hiking up a trail, I found remnants of Cyclopean-like masonry, etched into the sides of mountains. After prodding the ground for further inspection, I found more stones, carved not in the randomness of nature, but in a design that would assume it made by something that thinks like a human. I’ve pondered the devastation of these ruins. At first, I chalked their decay up to natural disaster. But upon revisiting the painting in the cave, I’ve considered the destruction to be caused by an asteroid. How long ago, I cannot say, for there is very little evidence to even assume it as such. I am thinking solely through the mind of a visionary, wanting to appoint some mythology to the land we’ve come across. Since our arrival, our crew has not given any proper name for this planet. My suggestions for names rooted in mythology have all been thwarted, as they believe it arbitrary to appoint mythical significance to this floating mass in the sky. They’ve since been referring to it as our mission number, but with every utterance of #1200 I feel I stray further and further from my connection to our initial pursuit. As we travelled through the cosmos to reach this point, we’ve passed nothing but death and destruction. Areas in which we were sure there had to be surviving remnants of something were instead graveyards of all that used to be. In our desperate attempts to keep our own planet alive, replacing the rhythm of nature with machines, we’ve inadvertently replaced the rhythm of ourselves with hollow metal shells of what they used to be. I went into this mission with the hope that I could stall this growing detachment, but instead, I see we’ve already let ourselves go into the weightless void of deep space.

That is where you come in. I am writing this letter in hopes my discoveries evoke some kind of passion or even mere interest in the matter. At least, something to remind me, and possibly someone else, that there still exists the surge of wonder in beings who have the gift of pondering the changing universe. This planet, while branded with the serial number of our baseless excursions, I like to call Arkhe; the Mycenean word for “new”. And it’s people, I imagine to have been just like us, or you, in the early days of cognitive existence. When the land of ripe planets was fruitful and dangerous, and there existed splendors in every section of the world. And these people, while barely surpassing their earliest stages, might have still harbored the same drive as those of us who did thousands of years beyond our emergence. When we created magnificent art and architecture, stories and sounds that harbored our deepest fears and desires. Their demise, like the inevitable oblivion waiting for all of us who live in this catastrophic universe, might’ve even had bits of expression in its happening. Perhaps the aforementioned meteor, through the clouds of the red sky, was thought to be a god, or some spontaneous thing coming to grace the people of Arkhe with its wisdom. And they celebrated its arrival through painted depictions of its emergence and stone pillars up the mountains, where they journeyed in hopes of grazing the nearing collision. To whoever you are, I hope this message finds you well. In the wake of our own dying breed, we’ve been blessed with the bones of another to rebuild ourselves. Perhaps in the coming years, when stars farther than ones we could ever reach, too, die out, you seek the same shelter as we did, and find this land ripe with the stories of our past lives. 

As I end this letter, I see before me a pink landscape, filled with thousands of imagined people whistling away.