The Phage

An Interview with Adam.

Adam sat in his enclosed environment.  He put in his ear phone and adjusted his microphone.  I did the same.

“Hello Dr. M,” he said with a smile.

“Hello, Adam,” I replied, also with a smile.

“You promised to tell me everything this time.”  He sounded hopeful.

“Yes.  You can ask me anything.”

“And you will be honest?  Not hide anything?”

“Yes, Adam.”

He looked down at his hands as if at notes.

“Where did I come from?”

I reached into my case and pulled out the sphere.

“Years ago we found this in a very old layer of rock.  It obviously was not a natural or human artifact.  Upon closer inspection we found engravings that showed us how to construct an extraterrestrial life form, you.  Using the instructions on this and our own genetic technology, we made you relatively human, but you are restricted to your chamber because you cannot survive in our atmosphere.  We also learned how to reproduce and upload your species’ memories into your brain so you would know who you were.  Do you remember any of those?”

“I am not sure.  Maybe.”

“So, Adam, you are an ambassador from another world,” I explained, “It really was an ingenious way of bridging the great distances of time and space.  Your people sent a seed and when we could do it, technologically, we planted it.  And here you are.”

Adam nodded slightly, “I understand.”

My Last Interview with Adam

They dragged me in and threw me at his feet.  I looked up at him.  I could see him smiling through his breathing mask.

“Hello, Dr. M.”

My voice was not much more than a croak, “Adam.”

“I understand you have been busy.”

“We will stop you!”

“No,” he said coldly, “you won’t.  You really can’t.”

“We will…”

“It’s the nature of things, Dr. M.  You were destroying your planet long before I got here.  We at least have a purpose, a reason for stripping away the Earth’s crust.”

He knelt down on one knee and showed me a sphere.

“We are now launching billions of these into space every day toward promising star systems.  We think several will have intelligent life on them, and in the thousands of years it will take for these to reach them, their civilizations will progress and our life cycle will continue there.  It is just our nature, our way.

“It is natural.  You were curious and ambitious; you had to know, you had to try.  You created me and I took over your technology and industry.  It was only natural.”

The Scapegoats

And Aaron shall lay both of his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness… Leviticus 16: 21 

This was not my first time.  I have been in a confessional like this before.  But, this time I actually felt the effects of the atonement process, and I reminded myself that the scapegoats all volunteered to take upon themselves my human frailties and to carry them away into the world.

Within the privacy of the tiny booth I poured out all my sins, all my hatreds, all my fears, and all my selfishness.  I confessed my blood lust for vengeance.  I opened my tight grip on all that I selfishly believed was mine and mine alone, especially my money and my guns.  I gave up my shortsighted disregard for the polluted world of my children’s children.  The scapegoats would would take all these from me.

I looked over the names of the candidates again, reminding myself that they have each and everyone volunteered, even campaigned to accept my burden, to be imprisoned in their various offices. and to be blamed for everything.  And I voted.

At that moment I imagined the great burden lifted from me, believing that they would now carry my sins out into the world in my name.  I was no longer responsible.  I was now whole, sane, and free.  I had voted.

The Repentance Maneuver

“Mr. Fletcher,” the Committee Chair asked, “have you just apologized to your wife?”

George Fletcher nodded sadly, “Yes your Honor, I have tried but she won’t listen to me.  I have really hurt her and I don’t think we'll ever get over this.”

“Mr. Fletcher, this maneuver is only used to repair serious personal misconduct that cannot be remedied in the present.  We have reviewed your case and recognized the both the serious impact your actions have had on you and your family.  We also recognize your efforts to right your wrongs in the present have failed.  So, it is our decision to grant you the repentance maneuver and allow you to send a message back in time to yourself before you committed the offense.”

The Chairperson leaned forward and stared at George Fletcher and a very serious tone said, “Make it good one, Mr. Fletcher.”

Six days ago, George was walking to his destination.  A chime sounded in his head, but instead of the sweet voice of the system informing him of some news, his own rough voice boomed in his ears.

“Hey Stupid!  Stop!  Don’t do it!  You are going to ruin everything!  Stop now!”

The Cuckoo

I looked at the Carl’s results but they were hard to believe.

“What was your  sample?” I asked.

“Ten Thousand,” he replied, “Stratified across the major racial and socioeconomic groups.”

I shook my head.

“And so consistent.”

I handed the papers back to him.

“So, what do you make of it?” I asked.

“It’s a genetic marker of some sort.” Carl replied, “If you were born after 1947, you have this marker.  If you were born before that year, you don’t.”

“So, this is a mutation?”

Carl shook his head.  “No, a naturally occurring mutation would appear in a small part of the population and then spread through the rest.  But that would take generations.  This is something else entirely.  This is a new set of genes inserted onto our chromosomes suddenly and universally.  Technically, we should have never have found it, but one of my grad students stumbled upon it with some multigenerational studies.  It’s just weird.”

“OK,” I mused, “so we have a new set of genes appearing on our chromosomes after 1947.  What does that mean?  I mean do we have something doing genetic engineering on the entire human race?”

Carl lean back and looked at the ceiling for a moment, cleared his throat and leaned back forward toward me as if to tell me a secret.

“This is going to sound crazy.” he almost whispered, “Do you know how the cuckoo lays its eggs in other birds’ nest?  Those birds never know, and raise the cuckoo’s offspring as if they are their own.”

“Yes,” I said, “OK?”

“I think this is like that.”

The Return

We discovered the Dyson Sphere about a hundred years before we could actually reach it.  When we could we sent our star ships to the Sphere to examine it and to introduce ourselves to its builders.  Any civilization that was on Level II of the Kardashev Scale, using all the energy of its sun had to have a great deal to teach us, if they were friendly.

We approached the gigantic Sphere cautiously with our defenses up and ready.  There was no space traffic of any kind, and no signals responding to our hails.  And then he appeared on our bridge.

“I greet you voyagers from Earth.”

Our Captain looked at his bridge officers and responded to the man in a white robe.

“We also greet you as friends, and hope to learn about your great civilization.”

The man seemed pensive as if trying to understand us, or how to respond to the implied request.

“I am the Guardian of the Creators,” he began to explain,  “I have taken this form for your benefit, as I have a function but no natural form.  I will explain my function and then will ask you to leave.  I am sorry that I cannot fulfill your desire to know more about this sphere, but that is not my function.  I am the Guardian.”

We all looked at the Captain to see how he would respond.  This great opportunity seemed now to be denied.  The Captain respectfully asked the Guardian to continue.

“The Creators of this sphere were indeed very advanced technologically, but they were also very advanced in all the sciences and arts as you would know them.  They had become immortal, and transcended all their conflicts, and flaws as you would call them.  They had explored the universe.  They knew you, and knew you would one day come.  They knew all there was to know, coming to the end of every science.  To you they would be gods, and within this sphere would be heaven.

“But, one thing eluded them.  They could never be satisfied, they always wanted one more thing, and eventually they realized that the one more thing was communion with the universe as their parent.  They wanted to love and be loved.  They wanted to be told that their lives collectively and individually mattered.  But the universe, as vast and awe inspiring as it was could not embrace them as a parent or lover.

“Together, the Creators could not accept this existential angst any longer.  They, as one mind and heart, came to the conclusion that it was their great intelligence that caused this fundamental discontent.  And, as one, they collectively and individually decided to surrender their highly developed brains to live with simpler, less evolved ones.

“The Creators returned to a simpler form to live without language, complex societies, or the worries they include.  They now live simple and short lives on their home planet within this sphere.  They are helpless, therefore I am their Guardian.”

“So, you must understand, the Creators have nothing to share with you; and sharing intelligence is beyond my function.  I am their Guardian.  I will not let you disturb the Creators.  I ask you to leave.”

Before the Captain could respond to the explanation or the request, the Guardian disappeared.  We sat there astonished while our thrusters countered the gravitational pull of the sphere.

Counsel

When they came to our solar system, large numbers of people panicked.  There was rioting in the streets, looting of stores, and all the problems that the governments of the world predicted would happen if aliens were suddenly revealed to us.  But then we all sort of got used to them.  There were speculations of course about their reasons for being here, and sometimes the debates got very heated.  The religious proclaimed them as either angels or demons, Christians especially heralded them as one of the last trumpets of the archangels before the second coming of Christ.  The more secular just wondered what purpose these ambassadors from the galaxy might have.  Was it invasion, colonization, or an invitation to join them?

We waited for them to do something.  

The United Nations met in general assembly to consider our actions. How do we communicate with them?  It was generally agreed that we probably could not defend ourselves from them; their technology must be far advanced to ours.  We debated.

And we waited for them to do something.

They finally came.  They appeared in a column of light in the middle of the general assembly.  It frightened everyone there, of course.  UN security forces raced into the chamber with weapons trained on the extraterrestrial intruders.  There were three very different beings standing motionless inside that column of light for all the nations’ delegates to see.  Some of our ambassadors tried to escape before death rays were unleashed.  But there were no death rays.  The Secretary General called for order and calm, and he ordered the security forces to lower their weapons.

The three were obviously different species, and probably from different planets.  One was reptilian or perhaps avian, one was arthropod-like, maybe insect.  And the third was approximately humanoid.  From them came a voice, we never could tell who was speaking.

“We greet you, leaders of Planet Earth.”  The assembly broke into an amazed murmur of questions and surprise, everyone heard the greeting in their own language.

“We regret any concern we may have caused you.  We needed time to learn your languages.”

The Secretary General replied through his microphone and his translators, “We, the people of Earth welcome you.”

“We thank you for your welcome.” answered the three aliens with their one voice, “Please have no concerns.  We come in peace, and will do no harm.  We bring you greetings from a great society of beings from many planets.  We wish to communicate with you.  Would this be acceptable to you?”

And this began Earth’s communication with aliens.  It was not all wonderful and beautiful.  The aliens stood patiently as we quarreled over who should communicate.  Every nation great and small wanted access to the visitors.  The aliens accommodated everyone.  They seemed to be able to be in more than one place at a time.  Some to the rogue nations demanded advanced weapons to dominate the world.  The aliens respectfully and diplomatically declined.  In fact, they did not offer any advanced technologies to us at all.

“We have strict prohibitions to interfering with the technological development of emerging cultures,” they explained, “You have done very well on your own.  We trust that you can continue to progress.”

After months of state visits and tours of Earth, we got a bit impatient.  Finally, one head of state asked the aliens bluntly, “Why are you here?  What do you want?”

The three responded immediately.

“It appears that you are going through a difficult stage of development.  We all went through similar difficulties, nearly destroying ourselves and our worlds.  We wished that we had mentors to guide us through the problems we created for ourselves.  We are here for you if you need someone to communicate with.  We are here for you.”

And we all waited for them to do something.