The memory I have of this life is that the Sirius people had reached a point in their civilization where their population was threatened with extinction. The cultural impulse was to seek perfection and diversity had been stamped out. But the logical consequence of perfection without diversity, is species extinction. So the Sirius Crystal people had to find a way to add diversification back into their world, their DNA. At some point, I know that they left their planet and went to other worlds and created hybrid beings. If they could not preserve their species, the Sirius crystal people would somehow make sure that their crystalline nature would live on in the DNA of other beings. But this story will be about how their first attempts at diversification.
I think this story reads like a short story, but it's just the beginning of what I know will be a longer story. This is a first draft with hardly any edits so please enjoy.
A Short History of the Sirius Crystal People - started on July 1, 2013
The matured cells started
disintegrating in the dish. Da'el watched in silence, and then
reviewed his notes. Impossible, he thought. He repeated the
experiment again for the one hundredth time, doing each step as
slowly and as precisely as possible, but the results were the same.
Shaking his head in disbelief, Da'el went back to his desk and wrote
the results down in his experiment book. He turned to first page and
reread the goal he had written for his work, find a cure for the
strange illnesses that was causing the older crystals in his
civilization to weaken and die before their time. He shook his head
in disgust and thought over the events of the last three years.
When the task was first brought to him
it was still early enough in the epidemic, that he was able to study
and collect material from everyone who had been affected. The
illness was unlike anything they had ever seen before. Crystals grew
larger as a person aged, with some crystals nearly doubling and
sometimes tripling in weight and size. A person's crystalline
structure also became stronger over the years, and breakage at that
age was nearly impossible. The illness changed all that when older
crystals became fragile and experienced breakage. Doctors were
dumbfounded at first, and considered it an anomaly until more and
more older crystals started coming checking themselves into
hospital.
At first the illness had attacked the
very old, but within three years the epidemic had started to affect
younger and younger members of the population. The illness was still
confined to those in his population who were considered old, but the
High Council of the Sirius Crystal World were concerned that the
illness would spread to to the younger population so they funded his
experiments. And in three years Da'el was no closer to solving the
illness but one thing was clear to him after he reviewed his work,
the cells of the old and new of his world had started to age faster
and faster as year passed. He closed his book and looked at the
night sky, and realized it would soon be morning.
While his driver too him home, a
theory began to form in Da'el's mind about what was happening but he
dismissed it immediately but the scientist within him rebelled.
Every theory must be considered he knew, but the implications of this
theory would be considered heresy. What was worse, Da'el knew that if
he was correct his own family would be affected. If he could get his
wife Bishka to understand, he knew that he would be able to continue
the work that he now knew would be the key to the future of their
world.
When he walked into his house, he
found his wife Bishka sleeping with her head on their eating table.
He smiled at how often he came home and found her sleeping like that.
He wondered if she would ever grow tired of waiting for him, but in
all their many years of marriage she never did.
Da'el went to his wife and kissed her on her head, and stepped back. Bishka sat up with a start, and stood up and found herself gazing into the eyes of her husband. She smiled and walked over him and hugged him.
“It's a little early for you, isn't
it” She said with a chuckle.
“I thought I would come home and
surprise you with an early dinner.” Bishka smiled and bowed, and
went to their food supplies and came out a few minutes later with
some warm food which she lay on table next to the plates that were on
the table. Da'el smiled and sat down. He wasn't really hungry but he
knew that eating some food would calm his mind. Bishka sat with him
while he ate, and asked how his day had gone. Da'el told her a little
bit about his day, but wanted to wait until he was through eating
before he any serious discussion.
After he had told her of his theory,
Bishka sat back in her chair in a stunned silence. “Are you sure that there is no way
to regenerate the cells?” Bishka said finally.
“I have spent two years trying to
regenerate the cells and nothing has worked. The only thing left to
test is to add other DNA.” Da'el said surprised that he was able to
even say the words. The Sirius Crystal people had cherished order and
simplicity; their whole culture was build on these principals. And
there was no place in their world for the chaos of diversity and
change.
“The High Council will never agree
to this. It is against everything we have stood for, our way of
thinking, our way of life.” Bishka said with tears slowly falling
down her face, knowing that what her husband said was probably true.
He was considered the most brilliant mind in their race, which is why
the High Council had given him this problem to solve.
“Without an infusion of a more
diverse gene structure, the illnesses will spread to a more younger
population. The only logical result that I can see, and believe me I
have turned this over and over in my mind a thousand times, is our
population will be unable to reproduce and we will eventually die out
as a species.” Da'el said slowly and carefully.
“But that will take generations.
Perhaps a cure will be found by then.” Bishka said with enthusiasm
until she looked at her husband's face. What she saw in his eyes
frightened her.
“The disease is progressing
geometrically. In three years it has jumped 20 years. We have less
then 5 years before our people are dead. But the High Council must
be told, so we can begin to experiment with adding the new genes.”
Da'el looked at his wife and saw fear in her eyes, and it struck him
why she was so fearful. He looked down and cursed himself. He had
forgotten that four years ago, they had decided to start a family.
Their first set of twins would be born this year, and ever year after
that for the next three years since they had decided on having four
sets of twins. In their ordered world, crystal children were born as
male and female twins so the energy between the two beings were
balanced. Bishka has guess that those births may now be jeopardy.
“There is no reason to think that we
still cannot have have our children.” Da'el said with a calmness
and confidence in his voice that he did not feel.
“But to what kind of world would
they born? Into a world that may be dying out?” Bishka said
practically screaming at her husband. When she realized what she had
done, she held her down in shame. She had never raised a voice to her
husband, and in fact had not lost this much control since she was a
cihld. Crystal people were taught to control the few emotions that
they had from a very young age. Emotions made one lose control and
without control there was no order and balance. Bishka and Da'el sat
for a long time in silence, unsure of what to say to the other.
Finally, Bishka finally glanced at her husband and said in an even
voice, “Will our twins be born with this illness?” Da'el looked
down at the food left on his plate, and felt sick.
He did not know
how to answer which was a first for him. He really did not know the
answer to that question because even if the twins were born without
the illness, it was more than likely that within five years they
would most likely contract the illness. And because he did not know
what to say, Da'el said nothing. He stood up, walked over to Bishk
and bent down and kissed her on the cheek before whispered in her ear
“I cannot tell you what the future will be, not even for our
children, but if I don't continue my work there will be no future for
us or our children.” Da'el straightened up and started walking to
their bedroom. He stopped before he left the room and said, “Are
you coming?”. Bishka stared at him and mouthed to him “No.”.
Da'el stared at her for a moment and left the room.
Bishka sat there with her head in her
hands and wept until she could cry no more. Then she lay her head on
the table, closed her eyes and fell into an exhaustive sleep.
