A Kept Species
by Jamie Wahls
It was a bloodless conquering, as they went.
The aliens ships deployed missiles the size of roses' thorns, and sleeted down over our cities. They interfaced with the internet, uploaded themselves into our computers and phones, and seized control.
We spoke to them, in our panicked self-texts and google prayers, and asked:
"What are you doing? What do you want?!"
They replied:
Do not fear. We love you. We have come to take care of you.
They burrowed into the planet's crust, and built machines below the surface--machines that cleaned the air, that produced food and medicine, that offered abundant free energy.
"VALENTINE'S DAY INVASION!" screamed the tabloids, "HUMANITY, LOVED TO DEATH!"
The aliens were gentle about it. Despite mankind's frenzied efforts to shoot each other and nuke, well, anything, they took our toys away before we hurt ourselves.
A decade passed, as they turned their technology towards providing for us. The coming of the aliens was the end of scarcity, and, for a while, humanity could hardly believe its collective luck.
There was panic and dread and frenzied debate, of course:
Erudite professors arguing that altruism and compassion were the natural end-state of a sufficiently advanced species, saying that it is only natural that a species for whom interplanetary travel is effortless would spend a penny's worth of their phenomenal cosmic power to uplift us.
Firebrands on the radio reminding us that pigs are fatted before the slaughter, and everything has its price.
Reality was nuanced, as it often is. In this case, unfortunately, both sides were right.
The aliens loved us... or, more precisely, they found us endearing. Precious.
It wasn't long before they started to breed us for cuteness.
