It had been an eventful evening for Claudia. She had decided to take a restful evening in her bathtub, lamenting over the fact that she hadn’t received any signals all day, when she suddenly heard a beep while in the water. Before she could prepare, she felt something tiny materialize onto her stomach by her belly button. It had worked! Someone had responded to her omnicube signal. She had finally been able to reach out to someone in need. 

After the conclusion to their first greeting, she showed the young human around where she lived. Soon after, he fell asleep and she put him to bed.

Now on her own, she looked for the signs of her other cubes before she noticed something interesting. The cube that had come from his planet still seemed to be active and sending her a signal. Curious, she inspected the details and noticed that it was relaying a signal to be teleported back with some kind of “special cargo.”

“These cubes have minds of their own, I swear” she mumbled. Curious, she teleported the cube back. After a few seconds, it materialized in her awaiting palm. The cube was only a few inches tall to her and weighed next to nothing.

“What kind of cargo did you find?” she asked.

Responding to her command, the cube suddenly enveloped itself in a bright light before it revealed what it was carrying.

Laying in her hand was a small blue and green marble that was rather heavy. Claudia knew almost immediately what it was.

“This is his home planet! How did you do this?” she looked at the cube which had appeared on her desk after opening.

A series of bleeps, bloops, screeches, and groans emanated from the box. It was an alien language that only Claudia seemed to understand.

“And you just took it? Don’t you know how many innocent people are on this planet?” she scolded it.

A series of gargles and beeps seemed to argue with her.

“Well, that’s true, but those war days are behind me. I don’t take planets as my own anymore. I’ve moved on and want to be a new person!”

Another series of bloops and whirls.

“What do you mean you can’t return it? You have reality warping powers, put it back this instant!” she barked.

A few quiet beeps responded before the cube went silent.

“Hey. Hey! Wake up when I’m talking to you!” 

No response.

Claudia sighed sadly, “Well, once a planet harvester, always a harvester, I guess. I’ll admit the temptation is there, but I’ve turned over a new leaf. I’ll make sure to not to cause any damage to it. But where to keep it?”

She looked around before noticing a small unused solar system model on her desk. It had several floating orbs rotating slowly around a large, bright source.

“Well, I suppose this model will do. Needed something to keep this star company.”

Carefully, she grasped the tiny planet between her fingers and cringed as she felt tiny, minute prods into her fingertips. She couldn’t see it, be she could feel the wanton destruction she was inadvertently causing to millions to billions of creatures on it. Quickly, she dropped it into an orb in the model where it suspended itself, slowly starting to spin again.

“I’ll just keep this a little secret” she said. She was about to leave when another signal was set off. Another cube had found someone. It listed that it also had a “special cargo” in tow. And then another with the same listings and then another.

“Oh come on…” Claudia groaned.