The Ten Best People, A.D. 2119

By Tom Ball. Published on March 8, 2023.

This list was of the 10 best people, not the most famous people. In fact, some of the best were not well known.

     To start with #10 was Mayor of Amsterdam city state. Her name was Rie R. Her city was one of the first to declare independence on Earth. She set up a socialist state and people who were not kind were booted out of the city. But those who had imaginative, kind ideas were rewarded. Like creating interesting jobs for the people who were not so well off. Or ideas to bring in tourists were rewarded. Like better sex workers and clones of the best sex workers were suggested and put into law. Or building plans for a sister city on Ganymede called New Holland. The plan was to clone 1000s of the best Amsterdam people to the colony. And so on.

In the #9 position was Ms. Kind Universe, 2119. She set up a colony on Mars for the less fortunate in Space. She paid for their air car ticket to Mars #13, City of Kindness. And once there, they were given a free condo and free food and drugs, and she helped those with mental problems by providing a number of shrinks with new experimental drugs. There was no pressure to succeed here. And everyone here was kind, generous, and nice. She loved many of the men and befriended many of the women. It was a Utopia.

In position #8 was Lily H., who experimented with drugs that made people kind and brought out the best in them. But her patents were stolen by Gerard U., who marketed the drugs to billions and made trillions of dollars. But Lily was glad that the drugs were out there for the people.

Coming in #7 place was Will M., who was an outstanding citizen in his home city state of Seattle. He was a tycoon and spent a lot of money developing future entrepreneurs and staking them each millions of dollars to get started in business. In particular, he told them to invest outside Earth, where according to him, the greatest opportunities lay.

In #6 place was Frank W., who once said, “In the near future, the best people need to step up to the plate and make a difference.” And he became Mayor of Luxembourg. And he made the city into a haven for radical thinkers who were harassed and abused in their home cities / nations. And he said, “I will publish and distribute the words of these freedom thinkers.” And so, Luxembourg became a hotbed of discontent. And many World Leaders used the radicals’ ideas in their cities. Like one radical who said, “People should be taught to think outside the box and respect others who do so. And the best radical ideas will one day become mainstream.” And another said, “Freedom is hard to find in this World, and this has always been the reality.” Still another said, “Radicals need to breed like bunnies to increase their influence. It is now possible to have endless kids in the lab, provided one can afford it.” Here in Luxembourg, all radicals got a generous stipend from the city government and negotiated with rich people everywhere to have kids together. Many rich people wanted different sorts of children who would be good thinkers.

In #5 place was Alexandra Y. She was a biologist and rich philanthropist who helped wipe out the remaining genetic diseases. So now all diseases were cured. She inherited her money. And she said to those writers who felt they had the nascent ability to come and camp on her property and live next to other up-and-coming writers. But they had to pass an interview to get invited in, saying what kind of writing they wanted to do. A number of them became famous and moved out, yet Alexandra was still overjoyed at their success.

In #4 was Jermelai S., who was an obscure writer. He wrote of a World of Wishes in which the government would try and grant the peoples’ wishes within their power. The government would mind read with their people and determine their strengths and weaknesses and work on them. And he wrote of a World of Mind Reading in which everyone loved one another for their mind. Finally mind reading was made available to all and his dream came true.

Next, in #3, was Sharon H. She was a beautiful woman and gave ugly people plastic surgery and genetic therapy to make them all good looking, and above all, tried to make their minds beautiful. She injected brain matter into their brain to improve its function and soon many who wanted were clever. It looked like Sharon would be very famous one day.

     Next up was #2 in our best people list. It was Vivian H. She helped eliminate racism by encouraging people to change their skin color and set up a large chain of skin changing shops which permanently changed peoples’ skin color to any color they fancied. Soon, people everywhere kept changing their skin color. And some cities and nations made it law for people to change their skin color at least once a year. 

And finally in the #1 position was Benji T. She was the person who wrote, “Helping the Destitute.” It was about how no one should fall through the cracks and everyone should be well-off. It was not a unique sentiment, but she wrote it so eloquently and talked about people she’d helped.     

And she wrote “The Future in Which the Good Guys Win” about how it was possible to achieve an Utopia.

And she wrote “Luxury on Venus” about how Space could have more luxuries than Earth and the best people should come to Space and help develop it. Also, she wrote, “Loving Anatoly” about loving an evil man and turning him into a good man.  And she wrote “Helping David” about helping underdogs everywhere. And she wrote, “Beauties on Europa” about how only the most good-looking, cleverest were let into the colony. And she encouraged people to get plastic surgery and brain apps to qualify for the colony. And she wrote “The Spies” about how the spies would use lie detectors and hypnosis on questionable people and would make society safe and again an Utopia.

Many people were surprised by some of the choices for the top ten as they were not so well-known, but the list was circulated all around on TV, and so all 10 were more famous than they had been previously. 

Tom Ball has appeared in 28 publications. And has published novels, novellas, short stories and flash. Website: tomballbooks.com. Online publishing website: fleasonthedog.com.