Oziach wrote this amazingly creative, interesting and exciting piece. This could totally be turned into a full book or movie.

Trying to accurately imagine what the future will be like feels like a lost cause. As time passes things change, though it feels like things have always been leading up to this specific moment in time, as if things can't advance beyond this point. Everything appears static.
It was unfathomable to try and contemplate what the world could evolve into beyond that contemporary year of 2054.

World peace was obviously a no-go, the Korean Union and Eurasian Coalition in a seemingly endless cold war, and Cuba negotiating plans against the Republic of Texas, though there was nothing but rumors there. U.S.A. extremists constantly strike against Canada due to some unsavory laws passed on the subject of racial discourse. Croatia and Babylon luckily split away onto their artificial islands, and speculation showed that they might have formed the world's 10th continent.

Technology seemed like it had nowhere it could go from then, all predictions proving farfetched. Architecture beyond moldable nitinol bindings, cars off their magnetic rails, phones that projected themselves in a place other than your wrist, and gaming reaching beyond the standard augmented reality... it was absurd to try and picture how (if) things could change.
Even fashion had stayed constant in those recent decades, from kevlar shirts and jeans to invert-caps (a trend in recent years by the new, hip generation of rascals), and interactive tattoos connected to various websites. I myself was dared into getting one of those in my youth. Biggest regret of my life, other than my 1st marriage.

Still, I couldn't have imagined a different world. A world where people don't group up in their personal stadium rooms to watch the national E-Sports Cup. A world where true peace is a reasonable goal to achieve, and everyone is equal. A world where everywhere we look there's a new advancement on the horizon that will blow us away.

It was a far off dream. An impossible dream.

However, our expectations and predictions (or lack of) were shattered when the Relatives arrived.

I remember the day vividly.

I was 28 years of age when I heard the news of their arrival. My son was asleep upstairs in the dead of night, the clock reading 14:37 U.T., a broken lampshade making my surroundings dim as my 122 cm TV switched on by itself due to the emergency protocol system installed by the state. A blinding light caught me off guard, causing me to stumble backwards and bump into a drawer, denting the corner of it. I recollected my thoughts and adjusted my eyes towards the screen, a news anchor's voice presenting itself to me.

"A blinding light has been seen in the capitol building. We have word that 34 individuals have presented themselves to the legislation, claiming that they're from the distant year of 2088. Their claims have been mostly proven through demonstrations of technology that has apparently never been seen by mankind, though whether or not this is authentic is still being debated amongst those present. We'll be updating coverage all day, so stay tuned."

Our first glimpse of the strange beings wasn't long after. Footage showed a clear image of the 34 travelers, their appearance similar yet somewhat uncanny to what humanity had to offer. Their outfits were woven from a material that was impossible to identify with our knowledge at the time. Their veins seemed to glow a neon yellow as if their blood was golden, it appearing to shine through their skin. Whatever it was didn't help in making them appear more human. Their representation seemed to fall on every race and ethnicity imaginable, from Caucasian to African, Fillipino to Hispanic, Babylonian to... okay, I had no idea what the last one was, but you understood my point.

Their nickname, the Relatives, derived from the fact of how they were essentially human, yet just distant enough from what we knew as humanity to call our own. A fitting name, if you ask me.

The initial reaction to their arrival was a negative one, many people across the world expressing their paranoia that these people would conquer us and were secretly extraterrestrials or the illuminati. Even the illustrious philosopher Reynold Wains was convinced that there was something inhuman about them.

My opinion remained neutral, however. Something seemed to click in my head... a sense of hope for the future. A hope for change. Maybe we'd been looking at the world the wrong way this entire time. Maybe things can truly advance beyond what we can fathom.
The Relatives told tales of an idealistic future where technology has advanced beyond our wildest imaginations, from holograms taking physical form at the press of a button to an energy source that defied all that we knew to be possible, and even a world where most nations stand united as one to explore the expanses of the universe past the blue marble we call Earth, though obviously didn't clue us in on how to achieve said goals as to not disrupt the advancement of our place in time.

They left only a few days later, revealing that they had shown up simply for a college project, testing the reactions of past civilizations to what the future could be. For them it was a casual assignment. For us it was life changing.

I'm now 35, and it's the year 2062. We still have no clear idea of how to achieve this layout of the future that they teased us with, but I personally didn't care. They gave me the opportunity to open my mind as to what the future could be.

After all, the word "future" is only relative to our present.