This week, Futures is pleased to welcome back Michael Adam Robson with his new story A trip to Central Park.  Adam last appeared in Futures with a robot companion in The puppet, this time he’s got a very different kind of visitor. Here, he reveals what inspired his latest tale — as ever, it pays to read the story first.

Writing A trip to Central Park

It’s fun to think about what our first contact with an alien race might be like, there are so many possibilities.

One unflattering prospect is that they’re totally indifferent to us.  Our civilization is pretty primitive, and we might not be worth talking to yet.  Or maybe it’s them, they’re not very social, or as curious about meeting aliens as we are.

Maybe they’re interested, but we’re just so different that we don’t know how to talk to each other, or recognize each other as being intelligent, or even alive.  Intelligent life could be everywhere, it could be right in front of us and we don’t even know it.

We hope they’re friendly.  Carl Sagan’s opinion was that any civilization advanced enough to master interstellar travel would probably be altruistic … but who knows how an alien mind might work, or what motivates it?  Maybe the reason we’re not hearing any signals out there is because they tend to attract hostile attention and get snuffed out.

Of course, even a friendly alien could be dangerous.  Looking at our own human history, when two civilizations meet, the outcome is often bad, even when intentions are good.  With another species, misunderstanding is inevitable.  We might extend a hand in friendship, only to have them think we’re offering a snack.