The Day After . . .

3-How We Got Where We Are

In days past, Earth had seen its share of good times and bad. After five world wars and near desolation due to a poisoned environment, not to mention the struggles first between humans and their renegade computers and then humans and their own genetic offspring, Earth weighed the minuses against the pluses of a supposed golden age, and eventual utopia, and determined that the humans had to go. Massive geological upheavals, flooding, electrical storms, radioactive clouds, and global warming forced civilization into the stars. Finally, it was as aliens that humanity reached its longed for greatness, even amongst countless other races it eventually encountered and befriended or destroyed.

Colonizing most of the known Milky Way Galaxy, humans established a new planet, Jordan, in the Misagi-Ho III System, as home. Much like their former home, many of those unhappy about their eviction remained there creating a population of ten billion in a three-hundred-billion- member family.

Having gone so far as to make the leap to the next nearest galaxy, Andromeda, humanity decided that their alternate name of "Earthlings" must once more be proven, and the old homeworld was reinhabited, as technology eventually triumphed over hardship. Now, however, Earth was reserved for very few humans and became a refuge for genies and A.I.s, the genetically and technologically advanced. In spite of this, the population grew to rival that of Jordan.

Like any good neighbour, humans wished to have a nicer yard than the family next door. And so, in a show of solidarity and strength, Arcana, newly elected Premier of the Human Alliance, the first white human male to hold the post, decided that the Capitol should be returned to Earth. Human race supremacists answered with violent outbursts. Feeling this stinging backlash and taking it to heart, genie and A.I. protectionist groups responded in kind, angering each other in the process. One act of violence led to another. One earthyear later, Arcana declared martial law on one hundred and thirty-three worlds and a state of emergency on the remaining colony planets. Three hours later, he was assassinated. Ragnarok began as Utopia crumbled.

Some planets found their entire populations extinguished, either exterminated or rendered incapable of providing for themselves. These planets were called by some the fortunate ones, as others were simply destroyed along with every organism on them. Some survived, but never intact. The Human Alliance simply ceased to exist, now nothing more than a few splintered planets and empty space junk.

By some standards, Earth fared better. After fifteen earthyears of fighting, Drakon came. Like a dark angel, a force unlike any seen before swept over the planet. It succeeded in uniting the genie forces that had been crushed early in the fighting due to lack of organization. Unlikely allies came in the form of sympathetic and unsympathetic human forces. You see, witnessing the devastation of the Alliance, an earlier defeated alien race attempted to use the opportunity to grab the human homeworld for their own. From this came Earth's "salvation" as the alien, A.I., and remaining human forces were crushed and the planet united; one nation under Drakon.

Sliding into place at the head of all, Drakon's rise was as enshrouded as the being himself - if "himself" indeed is appropriate. A dark heart cloaked in darkness, using myth as deftly as any of the great prophets of the past, and possessing a mind like few dictators before, he - or it - took the rabble from the gutter and gave it purpose. Creating a new army from the discarded, the weak, and the frail, and using abilities termed magical by those not in the know; providing the knowledge and tools necessary for its competition.

The alien armada was first to fall when their electrical systems mysteriously failed. The attack was as immediate as it was deadly. A newly found alliance of all of Earth's forces rushed upon its weakened foe. The mothership was breached first, and the head cut off. Then, like the hydra of Greek myth, the stump was burnt in a nuclear fire to prevent two new ones from growing. The flailing arms and legs then were easily dissected by the humans and A.I.s, who then collapsed from exhaustion, their own systems having caught the "bug" that the aliens had brought. Their carcases were taken in by Drakon who asked only for undying obedience and worship in exchange for the favour.

So now the new god of the planet stands over a beaten people. Drakon's castle sits upon a site in a place once called Manhattan, though it hasn't gone by that name in years. "The 'world's greatest city' for the world's greatest ruler," is how Drakon might put it, if Drakon ever spoke. Oh, don't get me wrong, Drakon does have the power of speech, presumably from a mouth somewhere under his black, jewelled cowl - after all, he does have eyes, which look out on a world only slightly less devoid of life as they themselves, and even horns, just it is usually devoted to speeches and orders and the like. Even were he to engage in conversation, there would be no one to do so with, as friends were a weakness not possessed by the dread king. He had chosen a consort, however, as it seemed most successful rulers needed, but somehow Facade seemed as empty as her name would imply. Such a shame, though, that a fine sense of humour would go to waste. You see, Drakon had chosen his home to be on the exact geographic location that had once been the address of a group known as the United Nations. Fitting yet somewhat ironic.

Here Drakon can now get up in the morning and walk out on his balcony and look over a utopic world where disease and crime have been eliminated - usually at the source, as capital punishment is the preferred method of both surgery and imprisonment. Population growth is strictly regulated - ". . . no worries about famine . . ." I believe were his exact words - as the cloning banks had fallen into disrepair, and the repair technology had been outlawed. The "old-fashioned method" was now necessary. This usually created what Drakon termed "unnecessary attachments" however, so the human male population was virtually exterminated as were all genetically-engineered females. This provided a bond between the remaining races in a mutual need for the other but also insured a distance between the sexes for at least several generations.