Forge of Creation

Human Nature

CA. 70,000 B.C.E. The Gene­tic Bottleneck

“Any suf­fi­ciently advan­ced tech­no­logy is indis­tin­guisha­ble from magic“
– Arthur C. Clarke

“The gods are up there I tell you, living on the mountaintop.”

“Some are cruel. They use men as sla­ves and throw them away, some­ti­mes bro­ken and lame, when the task is finished. Others are sad and asha­med that we are crea­ted by them in their own image. They try to heal their sad­ness by teaching us use­less things and then hold us up with pride when we learn, as if they had remade us. Then they send us back to our village where we are left to feed and shel­ter our­sel­ves again without their help.”

“I also know that the gods can heal as well as hurt” said Aser, one of the oldest men in the clan. “Once when I was youn­ger and more foo­lish, I tried to climb the moun­tain myself. Before I had reached the first sum­mit, the Che­ru­bim caught me and touched me with a bur­ning staff that shim­me­red like the pool below a water­fall. The pain was so great that I fell to my knees. They drag­ged me before their sha­man women. I know that I would have died from the pain had they not waved their beau­ti­ful hea­ling lights over my wounds. Take heed my sons and you others who may want to climb to the moun­tain­top and see the won­ders of the gods. They are great and terri­ble! So many who try, never return.”

“Why do they never return uncle?” Said Abrim, the youn­gest son of Aser’s youn­ger sis­ter. “You did! Then it is not impossible.”

Aser loo­ked up and down the rows of chil­dren before him. “I sus­pect that those who do not pay the pro­per homage are sent to the quick­sil­ver mines. Why take the chance you may never return home? No. It is bet­ter to leave the gods to their work, while we attend to ours.”

There was a stir in the crowd gathe­ring behind the chil­dren as an older boy crow­ded in to have his say. “The gods do not keep cowards! My father says it is an honor to be taken by the gods. A reward for strength, cou­rage, and pro­wess in battle. You would have us all live like old men, gathe­red together as an easy meal for any tooth-lion or fire-dragon that wan­ders hungry into the village.” This boy named Padrig was angry. His older brother Nolg had never retur­ned from his trek up the moun­tain. Aser knew that he and his family was grieved.

“Do not make the mis­take of choo­sing cou­rage over clear thin­king boy. The gods do not con­si­der us more than the tooth-lion con­si­ders his meal. Bet­ter that you face the fury of a fire dra­gon in battle than the glory of the Annu­nu­kai in their dis­trac­ted atten­tion. You may sur­vive the dra­gon, but never the sword of Cherubim.”

“And you are but a foo­lish old man. If I had a wea­pon, I could be a match. They would admire that and let me live, Just like my brother!“
Padrig swag­ge­red away hol­ding his staff high in the air, expec­ting a cheer, but none came. The sub­ject was too close for com­fort and no one but Padrig dared taunt the gods, let alone the old man.

When Padrig arri­ved at the family shrine, there was no one there. His mother, father, and sis­ter would return from their gathe­ring soon. He thought about what his brother Nolg had told him a few years ago, while stan­ding in this very spot, that the gods wan­ted brave hu-men for their armies. Then he never came home.
 
Padrig knew where he went. Nolg had been accep­ted into Edon and would be a wor­ker and a warrior for the gods. And so, he deci­ded, would he. Pac­king some dried meat and some cheese into his bag, Padrig left imme­dia­tely. Maybe he would be tes­ted and taken by mor­ning. Or relea­sed if he was not worthy. Either way he would know more about what hap­pe­ned to his brother.

Nodiel was anno­yed by the intru­sion into his medi­ta­tion. “Another one?” he win­ced, “This is the fifth one this week! None ever seem to be ready. Bring him then and let us see if he is worthy.” He watched as the Che­ru­bim brought the hu-man into the admi­nis­tra­tive cham­ber. If any have the curio­sity and can over­come their fear of the unk­nown enough to attempt a visit to the com­pound, then they must be tes­ted for sui­ta­bi­lity. This was the law ordai­ned from the begin­ning of this pro­ject to create the new wor­ker class. This pro­cess allows the iden­ti­fi­ca­tion of those hu-man with pro­mise, since it is impor­tant to per­pe­tuate and strengthen this breed to its fullest extent before begin­ning the final modi­fi­ca­tion. “The Warrior caste has been stuck in the mines for too long and it is time that they rec­lai­med the right to be warriors”, Nodiel remin­ded himself.

Since having dis­co­ve­red this star sys­tem many thou­sands of years ago, the Annu­nu­kai have bred various spe­cies that were native to this second pla­net in the sys­tem. Most pro­grams had resul­ted in fai­lure for various rea­sons. Some lines became weak when their life code was chan­ged. Others that were too quickly bred would revert to an ear­lier breed after but a few gene­ra­tions. The Annu­nu­kai also dis­co­ve­red that these sub­jects can­not be kept in a corral like mere animals.

This Hu-man sub­ject was hol­ding his arm as if it were woun­ded and there was a strange smell waf­ting about. Nodiel reached into the Hu-man’s mind, loo­king for a spark of auto­nomy and crea­ti­vity. “Why are you here?” He asked tele­pathi­cally. “What do you seek? Speak!” The hu-man loo­ked up then, and for a moment it appea­red as if he would ans­wer, then he star­ted strug­gling and strai­ning at his bonds, bab­bling and crying out like he was being tortured.

The quick test was finished and this one, though pro­mi­sing, had fai­led. He may have heard and unders­tood, but his fear was too strong, des­pite curio­sity, for this crea­ture to receive any mea­ning­ful trai­ning. These are mini­mum stan­dards accor­ding to the coun­cil of jud­ges’ dec­ree.
“Take him away…and get his arm fixed. This one has too much fear, he would be mar­gi­nal bree­ding stock at best. Are there any more?“
“One other Lord.” Said the guard.

“Then bring him!” The guard skit­te­red away, unner­ved by the lord’s anger at having been dis­tur­bed. He retur­ned quickly with a boy, not more than fif­teen years old, no wounds or chains, with a defiant look on his face.

Again Nodiel reached into this Hu-man’s mind. “Why are you here? What do you seek? Speak!”

The boy spoke. “I will be a warrior like my brother”

“And why did you come here with that request? Do you not know that I am your god and can rip the bones from your flesh as you stand for these assump­tions?” Then a pause to watch rea­li­za­tion creep into the boy’s eyes that a grave mis­take had been made. Then Nodiel spoke aloud, “What do you have to offer that I could pos­sibly want from you?”

“If you will not take me, then you will have to kill me because I will not return to my village ashamed!“The boy lun­ged for the sword in the guard’s scab­bard and pulled it with one stroke. The guard was taken com­ple­tely una­ware, yet mana­ged to acti­vate his halo to enve­lop both he and the boy before the sword could strike Lord Nodiel. There was no need, since Nodiel had read the boy’s inten­tions and had already drawn his own sword to parry the blow. The boy yelled a battle cry and struck at the halo’s force field with a fury of a rat flai­ling against its cage, then rea­li­zing the futi­lity, drop­ped the sword and fell silent. The guard, ashen and sha­king, de-activated the halo and imme­dia­tely set to bin­ding the boy’s hands behind his back. Padrig bowed his head to die.
Nodiel repla­ced his sword. “Punish him for his imper­ti­nence. If he lives, train him as a warrior. Find any brothers and sis­ters he may have and bring them to me as well. Now leave me!”

Was that a smile on the god’s face as Padrig was drag­ged out of the cham­ber?
Nodiel con­si­de­red how pre­cious few of this bree­ding cycle have taken on the neces­sary attri­bu­tes to jus­tify the pro­gram. This one would be ship­ped east to the Edon cap­tive bree­ding cen­ter to test, train, and breed. fema­les were much more dif­fi­cult to choose, since life strands from the female of the spe­cies per­sist much lon­ger without muta­tion than that of the males. In fact, some­ti­mes more than a hun­dred gene­ra­tions. The pro­cess must be con­duc­ted care­fully lest the whole bree­ding chain come apart in as little as 8 or 10 gene­ra­tions, requi­ring a new foun­da­tion sub­ject with which to start over. Once pro­ven, the life strands of the sub­ject can be modi­fied and com­bi­ned with those taken from the Annu­nu­kai to fit the needs of the pro­gram and then per­pe­tua­ted in all sub­se­quent fema­les, assu­ring stan­dar­di­za­tion.

In the begin­ning, the offi­cial pur­pose of this pro­gram was to breed inte­lli­gient sla­ves to work in the mines and super­vise the lower forms. This effort would free the warrior caste from having to per­form wor­ker caste duties and allow them to con­cen­trate on defen­ding the colony from the Zshal. There was a con­sen­sus when the coun­cil last met that the pro­gram should be con­ti­nued until suc­cess­ful. Howe­ver, there was no lon­ger agree­ment as to the final pur­pose of the program.

A thou­sand years ago, a lifeship of fellow Annu­nu­kai had arri­ved in this star sys­tem after losing their nearby colony to a race of insec­toid marau­ders called the Zshal. These beings have no indi­vi­dua­lity, and the­re­fore no rea­son but to devour a star sys­tem of every usa­ble ele­ment of life. No one has been able to com­mu­ni­cate with them or deter­mine where, if any, their home pla­net may be. They are equally at home in any atmosphere or even in the vacuum of deep space. Though their bodies are easily des­tro­yed, they are able to rea­ni­mate them over time. Scat­ter a Zshal to the four winds and within a hun­dred years, remai­ning par­tic­les will drift together, rec­rea­ting its phy­si­cal body, retur­ning it to its for­mer self.

There was a rift in the thin­king of the coun­cil. The Warrior caste sug­ges­ted that in addi­tion to repla­cing the wor­ker caste, these newly crea­ted beings would also make good warriors against the Zshal. To this end, they pro­po­sed to intro­duce variant code into the life code of at least 2 bree­ding strains of Hu-men. These could be bred as batt­le­field pawns to defend the sys­tem if the Zshal should arrive. The Warrior caste’s plan was to give them the capa­city to effec­ti­vely des­troy as well as to create. Give them a lust for power and greed for gain so that they could be mani­pu­la­ted and sent to their deaths against the Zshal.

The Jud­ges caste was against this idea on grounds that there is a moral res­pon­si­bi­lity to avoid intro­du­cing nega­tive strands into the life code of any being, no mat­ter how much les­ser evol­ved they may seem now. One day they may become a race to ally or rival the Annu­nu­kai. Who are we gods, that we should per­vert the work of the Archons for the advan­tage of our race alone? Secondly, that these new crea­tions should have the same per­so­nal rights as any other Annu­nu­kai citi­zen so that they may one day replace the dwind­ling ranks of the Wor­ker caste. Life code strands may come only from exis­ting Annu­nu­kai lines and not be repro­gram­med for uses coun­ter to the con­ti­nual pro­gres­sion of the race.
The Igigi Engi­neer caste, as usual, had no desire either way. They were to pro­vide the tech­no­logy for this pro­ject and desi­red to stay neu­tral in case it could be made a sca­pe­goat for one side or the other.

The Wor­kers caste had lost all of it’s mem­bers to the Warrior caste, the­re­fore it had no vote but to go along with the will of the coun­cil.
Both points of view were con­si­de­red too extreme by some and nothing was actually deci­ded by the grea­ter coun­cil. Meanwhile, both sides began wor­king their tech­no­logy to modify this being to their own image, see­mingly aware that the other was also doing the same.

The coun­cil has thus far appro­ved four of the seven female sub­jects neces­sary to assure a suc­cess­ful reso­lu­tion of the pro­ject. When the other three are appro­ved, modi­fied gene­tic mate­rial can be intro­du­ced to the makeup of all seven, then the coun­cil will start to release ten per­cent of the offs­pring to be trai­ned as mine super­vi­sors. Another ten per­cent will be used to test the new gene­tic modi­fi­ca­tions that are plan­ned, while the remain­der will be kept on the pre­serve in Edon for twenty gene­ra­tions, safe from pre­da­tors and trai­ned in good hygiene and bree­ding practices.

After that time, when they start to show the spark of mora­lity and loyalty, they are to be trai­ned in sur­vi­val tech­ni­ques, relea­sed in male and female pairs, and given infre­quent gui­dance while they raise their fami­lies into nations of new, inte­lli­gient, and self-aware souls. These will be the cho­sen people.

Nodiel won­de­red, “Should he be more pas­sio­na­tely against tam­pe­ring with nature? They had been just beasts; inte­lli­gient, but only because of their posi­tion in the eco­logy of this pla­net. In a billion years, natu­ral selec­tion will have either quietly des­tro­yed them or tur­ned them into a race to rival the Annu­nu­kai. Now they learn to mine, Soon they may be desig­ned to fight and die.”

“The Archons are really the only beings with a right to decide how to treat these hu-mans.” Nodiel thought. “Unfor­tu­na­tely, no Annu­nu­kai has com­mu­ni­ca­ted with the Archons in many millen­nia, since long before the Annu­nu­kai had left the home sys­tem Anuk to explore and dis­co­ver new worlds. Some of the Jud­ges say that the real rea­son to colo­nize the stars was to acquire then ens­lave other spe­cies. And that is, they say, why the Archons have with­drawn contact.”

“If that is so, then we are truly on our own. We are but gods to these hu-men. That is the way of things. We must play this role con­vin­cingly or one day they may rule us.”