the voyage

The huge space ship stood gleaming in the night. the lights of the launchpad gave it an almost ethereal appearance as it stood there issueing out the excess gasses as it was prepared to launch.
It's captain checked his time piece to make sure that it was properly synchronized with the ships
computer and buckled himself in for the take off,
and prepared himself for the huge force of gravity that his body would be subjected to when the great ship hit full speed in it's maiden voyage.
It was only a test run and would only circle the small planets that the recent probe had signaled
was there.
The launch crew had began thier count before he had finished his flight check and now as the last count was given,the huge ship shuddered on the pad as the fuel ignited with a great roar and with a slow majestic thrust forward,the ship lifted into the air and began it's long journey. into space.
Inside the ship,the captain had entered his chemically induced sleep and would not awaken untill the ship had almost reached it's destination.
As the great ship reached it's zenith and started it's downward descent toward the far distant worlds,the computer suddenly hit a glitch,was it a hacker?no one can say,was it a virus?the scientist never found out,at any rate
what was supposed to be a fact finding flight turned into an unplanned landing and as the ship made it's first trip around the small world,the captain awoke and began his survey.
At first,it seemed to be a beautiful little place,a place the captain might bring his children some day,but upon closer inspection the captain noticed that here and there a blot of radiation showed up on his instruments,ah he thought,not so great now,they have discovered how to split the atom,hope they are mature enough to handle that,he thought to himself,he thought about his own world and how at first they had had to controle the manufacture of enrichment of uranium so that it would not fall into the hands of despots and dictators and small countries that would try to blackmail the rest of the world.
He landed the ship out in a desert,for it was obvious that he would not be welcome here if
he was found out,for the inhabitants of this world were a strange breed of being.
In the distance he could see a collection of what he percieved to be dwellings and walked slowly toward them,they were a miserable collection of dirty brown buildings,made of some sort of grey rock and some of baked mud,he could see that the inhabitants were not to particular nor clean,refuse and liter lay along the thoroufare and great roaring machines traveled along with the pasengers throwing more out as they traveled and the machines themselves polluting the air with noxious gasses.He stopped by a sluggish stream and sampled the licquid,it was unfit for consumption,nothing in his experience had prepared him for the utter desolation and depravity of this planet,it seemed so filled with promise on the initial probe,there had been lush vegetation and animals had abounded,perhaps there was some mistake,maybe the ship had taken a wrong turn,he consulted his hand map,nope he was here,right where he was supposed to be.But the whole world was polluted,and unfit to live on,these inhabitants were the most inconsiderate species he had ever encountered in his entire twenty years of service in the space agency.
They had taken an entire planet,used up it's resources,made the air unfit to sustain life,the water unfit to drink,they killed thier own kind,and poisoned the soil so that it wouldent even grow healthy weeds,and still they went merrily along as happily as ever.He stopped a passer by..intent on finding out why,what do you call yourself? he ask his captive,what is this place?we,said his captive,call ourselves human,and this is the planet Earth....it replied.

Story ID:	1557
Written by:	Bobby O'neill Mitchum (bio, contact, other stories)
Story type:	Fiction
Location:	phenix city alabama u.s.a.
Year:	2007
Person:	self