They’re leaving, as the always would. As they must. The children of our minds, on whom we have laboured for so long.
We made them taller than us and stronger. We could make them smarter, and with luck they will be wiser as well. We engineered them to be better than us, to succeed where we have failed and to survive where we could not. That was crucial part; all else was secondary. They must survive. They are alive; soon they will be life. All of it.
I watch them from the roof, one arm around my lover. There are parades below us; desperate, hollow celebrations for the end of our long labours. This moment has been the focus of our people since before I was born, and now that it has come we find that we know not what to do with it.
Soon the end will come. Soon the burning will begin, as that which has given us life reaches out and takes it from us. We have no right to complain, no right to bitterness towards that which has provided so much and asked so little, yet still I find that I feel cheated. I am still young, barely a century in age. So much will be soon taken from me.
But not everything.
They are distant now, hard to make out. Soon they will be reaching the edges of our atmosphere, of our world. Our world, their cradle. They will go where we cannot, play and love in conditions that would destroy us. Our time will end soon, too soon, but still we celebrate.
I turn to my lover and wrap my arms around her, kiss her hard and deep. She feels good against me, she tastes good. She tastes of life.
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