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| Sunday, 12 March 2006 |
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The Resurrection THE great one has spoken once again." one clicked with the other. "The oceans are shrinking and lands are rising." The other clicked back. They were strange creatures - blue - green scaled with finned limbs and head, webbed feet and hands, gills on their necks puffed as they breathed 360 o rotating eyes surveyed the water world they inhabited.
They spoke in clicks as marine mammals of a now long forgotten world far away. They were looking at a land mass in the middle of an ocean, covered in green. The only island - in the world of Hydra - a 40,525 square miles of tertiary forests. A sudden blob and another creature emerged out of the water beside them. "The great one summons us." Said the new member. A soft ripple came towards them accompanied by a base hum. "We must go", said the third member and all three disappeared under water. Staring They were all staring at a sphere just visible over the water margin. There were about a thousand of them, green scaled, bold headed, rotating eyes and webbed feet keeping them afloat. They were the Chimeras of Hydra. They all looked alike, their faces were blank, their only distinct feature a multicolored belt of scales on their necks, a bright array of colours when they huddled close. Females and males were all alike except for the soft swell of the hips in females and the slightly broader shoulders and comparatively smaller hips of males. They were of a strange metal, featureless with a similarly featureless crystal-like sphere-studded with bright white lights - surrounding it. The whole complex thousands of meters across looked quite out of place in the bottom of the Hydranion sea. Investigate After waiting for a long moment the oldest Chimera decided to investigate. Although this complex had been in Hydra as long as the Chimeras themselves nobody ever before dared to go in. It called when required and related its' messages through a low frequency hum audible only to Chimeras. The older Chimera went through the spare as if it was non existent and then in to the nearest building beyond. When he returned the others huddled around him to listen. "The great one wants a female in heat." clicked the older Chimera. "Woshu, you have to go." He pointed to a female "No!" said a male swimming beside her, who must have been her mate. "You have to let her go Aau, she's the only one." Aau's neck turned red. Suggesting that he wasn't giving in. Woshu touched his arm, her neck was warm auburn. She turned towards the sphere. Inside one of the buildings, there was no water. She found it difficult to walk. Although she has walked before on Hydras only island webbed feet aren't exactly made for walking. She wouldn't last long without water anyway. She fumbled among many unfamiliar objects and finally reached something like a big dark screen. At her approach the screen hummed in to life with a flickering image of an old man, a human. Woshu clicked a gasp. "The great one!" "Welcome Chimera, the chosen one......" The screen started clicking. Simultaneously the mouth of the image started to move, with subtitles translating the clicks to the long unspoken language - English. Resurrect "The great one wants to resurrect the human race..." The image had spoken in old Chimerian but Woshu had been able to make out what it wanted. ".....and it has chosen me." clicked Woshu, reporting to the others. "To do what?" clicked Godo the oldest Chimera. "To bear the first human baby." "Absurd!" clicked Aau. ".....we're Chimeras, we can't make human babies." "You're forgetting Aau, we have 95% human genes." Clicked Godo. "You and your folklore Godo, we're nothing like them. They used us for their experiments. We weren't ever their concern...." clicked Aau his belt turning a deep red. "....they were a dying race so they made us to carry on their name. We're just trophies to them. "Be respectful Aau" clicked Godo his neck turning blue expressing fear and respect. "we're here because of them. Haven't they shown us the way so far?" Her plan was to go to great one and click her refusal straight out. If she made it angry so be it. There was no sense in being afraid. But the reaction she received at her refusal was totally unexpected. The screen darkened and shut down. "Just as I thought" contemplated Woshu. "Lifeless." Woshu turned to leave. Just then the screen started clicking again. When Woshu turned she saw the same old man. But it talked or rather clicked with emotions and expressions Woshu had never before encountered. "I knew this would happen" clicked the man on the screen. "I knew you Chimeras were too intelligent to blindly follow orders of a lifeless machine...." it clicked on. The indicator 'play' at the bottom of the screen, flashed on and off. "We're an extinct race, waiting for the right moment for the resurrection. All attempts of resurrection devoid of surrogates failed. You're our only hope. I know this may sound selfish. After all we did use you as subjects of experimentation. But think not of human's as individuals....." The man on the screen sighed which Woshu tried to mimic. "........but humans as a race. We were a very intelligent race, foolish perhaps, yet intelligent. Please consider the possibilities, the potentialities of such an intelligent race. We're not here to take over your planet, nor to order you around. We're simply asking for your help." the screen went blank. Although non of the younger Chimeras were willing to help the resurrection. Woshu knew that there was something personal in the message than in the messages before. Thus Woshu agreed to have artificial insemination. With the mood swings and morning sickness even an average pregnancy would be difficult. But the mixed emotions that came with carrying a human baby made it worse. But the worse thing of all was that she couldn't keep the baby. It was a big-blue-eyed baby boy, a land creature and she was water bound. Her neck turned white as she knew what she had to do. After giving birth she left the spherical compound to the safety of the deep waters. Faran removed his slim eye band and rubbed his eyes. They were slightly red and damp with tears. He looked around him and was finally able to orient himself after the virtual realty-emotional roller coaster ride. He has just looked up his own birth-and the events that led up to it-from The New Archives, a short virtual reality history of human resurrection. He realized it was only his past virtual self he had just been looking at-the baby-and that he was still safe inside his space ship. In front of him he could see the great screen at a corner of which the travelling speed was indicated, numbers fast changing. Rest was the vast expanse of the Universe, its stars reduced to just streaks of light at the speed they travelled in. How long has it been, he wondered, since he saw his mother-Woshu-last 25 years more or less-since she left him in the spherical compound as an infant. She'd be 48 now fairly old for a Chimera. In the past 25 years mankind had increased from one infant to a 100,000 with the help of surrogates like Woshu, who took after her. But ultimately the humans had to leave the security of the spherical compounds for space exploration. When the human race was first anialated it was a slow process. The sun of their solar system was dying and the human race just simply stopped reproducing - since there was no point in it. Some others left earth in search of a new habitat. Others resolved to more extreme measures. Like that of Dr. Saburos', the old man on the screen. He and his predecessors were the founders of Chimeras - a genetically engineered species - and "The Resurrection". They made Chimeras so one day resurrection would be possible. All these were recorded in The New Archives. The task of the newly resurrected human race was to follow in the foot-steps of their predecessors who left in search of a new habitat during the Armageddon. "We're now approaching the galaxy of Synetra Captain." announced a voice. Faran, startled looked to his right. It was a hologram image - he had forgotten Trance - the ships awater. "The sister ship is just 5 light minutes from there." Said Trance smiling at Faran "Have we made contact?" asked Faran "No...." Trance looked down. "I don't think we should get our hopes up." Trance was right what everyone expected was that thousands of their predecessors or rather their later generations would open the ships doors and welcome them. But all Faran and a 100 of his crew members found was an abandoned ship, all intact, a majestic machine named Alexandria. But no humans or any message from them. Faran's ship was one of the pioneer retriever ships sent after the predecessor sister ships, as commanded by Dr. Saburo and his colleagues in the first chapter of The New Archives. I'll program Alexandria to auto-drive to Hydra, shall we move..." "No!" Faran interrupted Trance quite abruptly. "....leave it. This is far enough we're going back to Hydra". Faran..." Once in a while Trance addressed him as Faran instead of captain when she thought there was no need for formality. "...what about the mission?. "Faran was looking at the screen intently. "What about it......." he paused "what have we achieved so far 2 empty ships. "He turned his sad gaze to Trance. "It's time we realized that our home is Hydra". "No Faran that's the home of Chimeras". "Aren't we the same? Isn't my mother a Chimera." He turned his face towards the screen, Trance reached out an arm to touch him but withdrew realizing that she couldn't touch him or comfort him. "No Faran you're not the same. You don't, look the same." Faran frowned at the screen. "No we don't, but now with the invention of the Chimerian translator, communication isn't a problem, and it's not like we're intruding, they don't have much use for land anyway. We can reconcile our differences." He paused only for a moment. "Put the ship in to star drive. We're going home-to Hydra." Trance respected him for his conviction. "As you wish captain." Then said to the screen "coordinates 923488 - destination Hydra." n Sajitha Prematunge - Kelaniya University.
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