kaleidoscope: Slices Of Life - some rich dude bought the sun

Written by: Aaron Wong (21-I4)

Designed by: Ashley Lay (21-O1)

The sun has been bought. 

Yes, that ball of fire hanging high above you, the great celestial object you would most definitely be familiar with (unless you're literally living under a rock). The eternally burning orb and the omniscient witness of the millennia of human history; watching empires rise and fall. The giver of life that has birthed all organisms on Earth with its bottomless reserves of energy; the object tied so deeply to many of our spiritual beliefs, you may as well start calling it God. And some really rich dude bought it last Tuesday. 

There’s no way that happened, you’re probably thinking to yourself—as did literally everyone else on the planet when the news first broke out. A spoof headline, a hoax; the latest product of The Disinformation Age. That’s all it had to be. Perhaps this very skepticism, the complacent attitude that such a preposterous event could never possibly transpire, was precisely why it happened. 

Alan Musk, the world’s wealthiest billionaire, did what many thought to be impossible. Hiring the best and brightest lawyers in the world, the legal case was beautifully argued as his legal team deftly leapt through legal loopholes, as expertly as professional acrobats through flaming hoops. Now, the sun is his (technically, it is legally recognised as his property in 124 out of the world’s 195 jurisdictions).

While there have been many individuals— eccentrics or shrewd entrepreneurs, depending on your perspective—that have previously attempted to lay claim to the sun in times past, none of them had the same... persuasion, that Musk has, the kind that sways the legislation of countries. It would seem that money does buy anything.

    However, his crazy plan does not end just yet. What is the next illogical step in his delusional machinations, you might wonder? Why, it is to rename the sun. 

His application got through by email yesterday. I know that I must stop itfrom becoming a reality. Tomorrow, I will have a particularly eventful workday. 

    “We are absolutely not accepting Alan Musk’s application.”

    The faces spaced around the conference table were as clean as blank slates—the ones that were staring back at me, at least. A few of my other colleagues in the room had suddenly decided to count the number of wrinkles on their hands. Taking their stunningly verbose feedback of zero words into account, I carried on.

    “Even with our role as the International Astronomical Organisation, I believe it entirely out of our authority to change the name of the Sun.”

    “I disagree. We have assigned personal names to some stars before. Remember last week, when we named that star after some famous Spanish astrophysicist? Technically, the Sun is also a star, so I think we could probably give it a new name.”

A hushed agreement arose from the table, in the form of approving murmurs and eager nods. 

My head exhibited a rather notable lack of vertical movement—I was the only exception in the entire group. I could not help but raise my eyebrows at the puzzle unfolding in front of me. Had they all gone mad?

“All of you seem to disagree with me…” I started, as my narrowed eyes swept the room.  That was when I noticed something most peculiar, something that confirmed the suspicion that had been gnawing at the back of my mind. 

“Hold on… Bart, isn't that the newest Rolex model? That must have cost you a fortune.”

    “Haha...yes, it is..." Bart vaguely muttered in my general direction as he self-consciously adjusted his tie. 

    “Oh, and I couldn’t help but notice the chariot you rode in on this morning was not the public bus, but a brand spanking new car! If a Rolex simply broke the bank, then a car must have taken out the whole retirement fund!”

    “Uh, I’ve been saving up my-”

    “Hey, I get paid the exact same salary as you, so I know for a fact that that’s not true!”

    “Actually... it was, uh, a generous gift given from  a friend of mine...”

    “Oh! I see...Who’s the friend, huh? Was it Alan Musk? Hmm?”

    At the end of the exchange, nobody met my eyes. The worst of my fears had been confirmed; the entire management team was compromised. I cursed under my breath. I was a fool! I had not anticipated the possibility of Musk leveraging the sweet scent of monetary gain in order to bribe my colleagues.

    I spat out my farewells, then stormed out of the meeting. A sour taste clung to my mouth. I could trust no one but myself in the team now. That left me with one  final resort. I rushed through the office building, carelessly bumping shoulders with many but apologising to none.

    When I reached my destination, I skidded to a halt in front of a rotund man hunched over a computer. Without so much as looking up from his screen, he said with a deadpan register, “Justin from records, how may I help.”

    “You’re going to receive an order from higher authorities to update our names database. Whatever you do, do not carry out the update, I beg you.”

    “Oh, that order? I just got it two minutes ago.”

The monotone delivery of his words belied the unnerving nature of the news as each syllable pressed a needle into my heart. Panic started to swell in my throat.

    “But you haven’t updated the database yet, have you?”

    There still had to be hope; I chose to believe that with every fibre of my being. I must still have time to stop it from happening. 

    “No, I just rolled out the update moments before you arrived,” Justin turned his computer screen around to face me, waved at it, then said, “See?”

    My heart sank. The measly group of pixels on the screen hammered the harsh reality of my failure deep into my soul. The worst, most terrible outcome that I had been trying to prevent had occurred. It would leave a permanent scar on humanity’s civilisation for eons.

    To be clear, I had never been against the changing of the sun’s name per se. My issue lay with what the new name was going to be.

    Displayed on the computer screen boldly and prominently was the name: “Hot Stuff”. 

    What a horrible name.