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He cleared his throat again as he started the aerocar and brought the vehicle to hover mode. He pointed the car into the darkness of an eternal night as his voice transmitted into the universe for anyone to hear. He was transmitting on every known channel and wave.
"My name is Jer. My last name is unimportant for in a few short days it will not matter anyway. I am here, now, reporting on the destruction of our planet, Earth. I'm doing this because I'm one of the...no, that's not right...I'm the only one that knows what has happened to our sun.
"I'm a planetologist and I work for the government to find other worlds that could be habitable for humans...you see, Earth has been running out of room. The year is 2077 and 10 years ago I found the first of three possible habitable planets.
"Vehicles traveling the speed of light was unheard of before then, but with the dawning of light speed came the realization that the Earth was running out of room for human population. I was an astronomer in those days and one of the lead astronomers at that. The discovery of that planet set things in motion that was just too exciting to contain. The Unified Nations president gathered a team of top astronauts and families from all over the globe and they set off for a distant planet that, by my recommendation, was supposedly supposed to be habitable to our species. They left four years ago on a trip that would last eleven years. I hope that my recommendation works out for them, for they wont have a planet to come back to if it doesn't.
"Now, what do I mean, you may ask? The very year the team launched for that distant year, I took a fascination in our own sun. I'd seen in the astronomy e-zines and web letters that our sun was going through a vigorous and violent flux. Solar flares and giant fire storms spread across its surface and taking measurements I saw that our sun was expanding drastically on a daily basis. This wasn't good.
"I called and warned everyone I knew, including the U.N. president. They all laughed it off...every one of them. Nobody believed me and I couldn't understand why. Me, the one who was hired by that very government authority...me, the one who gave them a new planet...me, the head of their planetology department. Why wouldn't they believe me?
"It doesn't matter now.
"Our planet was been using "friendly energy" since the 2020's. The use of oil and gas was deemed a boon and in a global effort to keep ourselves from destroying our planet further everything was converted to solar power. We even invented solar boosters that ran off the night sky, boosting the solar energy from the stars, allowing major cities and towns to not have to worry about power shortages. These boosters are what now power the Earth, but I can see now, out my widow that some of the solar boosters were over working themselves, the moon one a major source for the booster, and its reflection is gone now. Black outs are stretching over the city...a city that, two hours ago, watched the sun disappear and permanent night take over.
"Now, anybody receiving this message, whether they may be from Earth or years from now, in some outer reaches of space, may be wondering why I'm broadcasting this message? I really don't know myself. I may be doing this because nobody would listen to me before, or I may be doing this because I want you to know that I was right. Detect a little bit of selfishness? I really don't care. In a few days it wont matter anyway."
Jer banked the aerocar to the left and decreased his height. He was almost home.
"Now, I want to tell you what happened to our sun." He cleared his throat once more and continued. "The unstableness I witnessed for four years in our sun was it's death throws. Two hours ago, I watched its death.
"I can still see it now. The sun seemed to swell even as I watched through my telescope and then it collapsed in on itself. I'm proud to say that I am the only human on Earth to watch a black hole form, but I'm sorry to see it under this present situation. I watched our orange ball of fire collapse and suck itself in to the point where even it own light couldn't escape the fierce gravity that ensued there within. As I watched, I saw space dust heat up and burn as it was sucked into that dark swirl. It was the scariest, yet most beautiful event I've ever witnessed...next to the birth of my children."
He pauses here, and one can only guess that it is his wife and children he is now thinking about as his transmission emits only dead air. He sniffles as tears cover his cheeks and he continues in a broken voice.
"I'm almost home now. My family waits for me in a city that has become violent and dangerous over the last few hours. I'm afraid that we wont survive long enough to see the cold destruction of our world. That's what will happen first...cold death. Even now, in the dead of summer, the forces of the black hole are pulling our planet out of its orbit and the lack of a sun is causing the Earth to cool. Pretty soon there will be nothing but freezing cold and ice covering our little planet.
"I look up right now and I can see the swirling vacuum sucking our little solar system into its hungry maw. The moon should be full and round in our sky, but there is no sun to illuminate it, and it suddenly strikes me that with the forces pulling at us now, Earth could be in for a collision of explosive proportions with our own moon.
"A streaking star disappears into the spiral and I can only guess that the black hole had just taken Venus as its next fiery victim."
Jer turns on the heater as the aerocar settles in front of a small house in a peaceful suburb of the city and he wonders how peaceful it will be come tomorrow. He sits there for a long time, transmitting nothing but sniffles and sighs as he cries like a child. He can no longer talk through his tears, but he struggles out two more little sentence.
"This is Jer, of the late planet of Earth, signing off. May God have mercy on our souls."
Jer turns off the motor to the aerocar and punches the lighted transmission button on the console. It goes dark and the mini disk slows its spinning and stops. He steps from the aerocar and walks the lonely walk to his home where his wife and children wait. His breath escapes his lungs in a visible, cold fog.
Jer enters the house, gathers his family around him...and waits.
