What the Darwin?

  This is not the story about the end, but rather an end.

  Although dreadfully displeasing to think about, the end of the Earth's lifespan was as inevitable as the extinction of toilet paper in the early 24th century. Yet, even if the humans had billions of years to prepare for this event, to find out that the sun's expansion was not just another hoax made by climate enthusiast for the purpose of mass control – or some other rubbish claim of conspiracy – seemed to come as a shock.

  One day in May the temperature rose, and if the thermometers around the globe had a mind and mouth of their own, they would surely protest. Fortunately, production of such thermometers was discontinued a million years ago, and whoever thought of it had been killed, resurrected, frozen for some time, then thawed and killed again.

  The approaching apocalypse was a reality, and few saw this as a blessing, perhaps except for the members of the Global Statistics Committee, who would finally agree on the leading cause of death that particular year.

  Bitter and not so bitter non-members of the Global Statistics Committee, however, prepared to take measures.

  The largest spaceship in human history was built, and they hoped they would find someone out there willing to help them out of this rather indelicate pickle. Humanity had yet to make contact with alien species, and although many theories were written around this subject, the truth was they were simply going the wrong way.

  Placed on this ship were Earth's two most fertile humans, who coincidentally both happened to be French. Even more coincidentally was it that they were next-door neighbors, but they seemed more than happy to aid in this great cause. Some would even say suspiciously happy, especially the nosey old woman living across the street from them.

  The plan was to populate the ship with the spawns of these two brave beings, and those spawns would again create new spawns, until the closest intelligent planet had been located, after which they would have to procreate their way back to Earth with news.

  The clause that forbade incest was – for this purpose – altered to not include what was considered as 'out of reach' for the average human. They even named the ship after the clause.

  Although the plan with Clause 13 seemed like a brilliant one at the time, the ship's intended purpose never saw fruition.

  What no one knew was when faced with the rather stressful situation that was the destruction of one's home planet, the likelihood of birthing a male was drastically increased. In fact, so drastically increased was it the fertile couple ended up with 26 exceedingly healthy males, before the couple died of exhaustion.

  The humans of Earth remained oblivious to this.

  While waiting for the ship's return, a single professor in the arts of dying had attempted to soothe the human race by teaching them the upsides of death, like considerably less exercising needed to keep in shape, an eternity of regret for past mistakes, and slightly reduced taxes. He even brought in his unconscious assistant to demonstrate the painless transition from life to death, but all he got out of his lecture was one less assistant.

  Instead, the people decided it was time to panic.

  Three weeks later, the people got tired and the panic subsided.

  It was predicted that Earth wouldn't be around for any longer than a few more days. The battle between a planet and its sun was considered over, although it could barely be called a battle. As a final act of defense for their carefree lifestyle, the humans all agreed that, well, they had a good run. They accepted their fate, and the entire planet came together to hold hands and stare into oblivion in unison.

  Prepared as they were, the humans couldn't help but frown when they realized the long-dreaded judgment day did not come this time either.

  The pollution that lurked in the planet's atmosphere was so dense it had almost turned solid, and therefore the planet was only pushed away and out of the sun's orbit. 

  Earth sailed through space and never once did it turn to glance one final time at its former solar system. Perhaps not so strange, since the planet did not possess eyes. That patent was deemed rather unnecessary, and was never seen realized.

  What did the humans think of this? Well, they were quite stunned. No one managed to utter as much as a vowel. That is, except for one man.

  "What the Darwin?" he said.

  The murmurs began. Not many understood just what this was supposed to mean – perhaps not even the man himself – but nevertheless, this was considered an apt explanation of the event. This was later known as the 'First Words' of the 'New Era'

  In celebration, the humans brought Darwin himself out of cryogenic preservation. Unfortunately, they also accidently resurrected the man who killed the inventor of Vocal Thermometers, and thus Darwin once again wound up dead.

  To this day, Earth is still travelling in blind search of another sun to intrude upon. Until then, they enjoy everlasting night in complete darkness. But, when they think about it, the humans never really needed the sun anyway.