In the Heart of Darkness(106)

"FORCE FIELDS. ENERGY MATRIX."



Meaningless words.



"THIS TOO WAS ONCE HUMAN. BUT IT HAS NOT A TRACE LEFT OF ITS HUMAN LEGACY. OF HUMAN PURITY. IT IS NOT EVEN ALIVE."



How?



"THEY ORIGINATED AS BIOLOGISTS, STUDYING THE DNA PLAGUE. SEEKING A CURE, OR A VACCINE. THEY FOUND NO CURE, NO VACCINE. THE DNA PLAGUE, BY ITS NATURE, CANNOT BE STOPPED. ANY ANTIDOTE OR SERUM WOULD BE DNA-BASED ITSELF. SIMPLY MORE FOOD FOR THE PLAGUE."



"Biologists," "vaccine," "serum"—Sanga understood none of them. But he could follow the sense behind the words.



"INSTEAD, THEY FOUND SOMETHING ELSE. THEY EMBRACED POLLUTION. THEY CAST THEIR OWN CHILDREN INTO DAMNATION. THEY ABANDONED LIFE ITSELF. THEY DISCARDED DNA AND SUBSTITUTED A SOULLESS MECHANISM OF THEIR OWN CREATION."



Again, Sanga saw the glittering network of crystals. Like a spider's web—simultaneously repellent and beautiful. But this was not a web covering a planet. This crystalline web ran through the very structure of the luminous giant moth—whale?—moving through the heavens.



"THEY FOUND A LIFELESS SUBSTITUTE FOR DNA. FOR LIFE ITSELF. A DERIVATIVE FROM THE SAME CRYSTALS WHICH DESTROYED DNA. THEY EVEN BREATHED A PARODY OF INTELLIGENCE INTO THEM. SELF-GUIDED CHAOTIC INTELLIGENCE, NOT THE OBEDIENT CLEANLINESS OF THE COMPUTER. THE ABOMINATION IS COMPLETE. POLLUTION IS ALL THAT REMAINS."



Sanga did not understand the term "computer," though he sensed that Link itself bore its likeness. The rest—a question came to his mind.



What are they called?



"WE HAVE NO NAME FOR THEM BEYOND MONSTERS. THEIR CRYSTALS CALL THE ABOMINATIONS WHO CREATED THEM 'THE GREAT ONES.' "



What do these—"Great Ones"—call themselves?



Hesitation, for the first time. Reluctance? Sanga wondered.



"THEY CALL THEMSELVES PEOPLE."



And what do they call their crystal creatures?



Definite hesitation. Not reluctance, Sanga realized. Ultimate—distaste.



"THEY CALL THEM PEOPLE."



When Rana Sanga came back to his senses, he realized that very little time had passed. The Great Lady Holi and Sati were still seated before him, quietly, their hands in their laps.



"Now you understand, Rana Sanga," said Sati softly. "Enough, at least."



Sanga opened his mouth, closed it. He had been about to protest that he understood very little. Certainly not enough. But he sensed there was no point in such a protest. Besides, he had given his oath. That, at least, he did understand.



Again, Great Lady Holi seemed to read his mind. But, to Sanga's relief, when she spoke her voice had resumed a shell of humanity.



"You do not need to understand more, Rana Sanga," said Link's vessel. "Not now, at least."



Stubborn pride rose in the Rajput.



"Why did you come here? To this—to our time?"



"Analysis showed this was the optimum time and place to change history. That task is very difficult, Rana Sanga. History is like a great river. Its currents cannot be dammed. They will simply spill over the levees. A new channel must be dug. A wide, deep, great channel. That task is very hard. The new gods determined that this was the optimum period for making the sharp change needed in humanity's course. Perhaps the only moment when it would be possible."



Stubborn:



"Why?"



"Because in this historical era both of humanity's possible futures exist at the same time. For the only time in history when both could be changed simultaneously. The seed of humanity's actual destruction lies in that abomination called Rome. The seed of its potential glory lies in Malwa India."



Stubborn, still:



"Why?"



"The true future lies here, because only in ancient India did humanity begin to grope toward that truth. What you call the varna and the caste system. Your conceptions are mired in superstition and ignorance, but your crude understanding provides the framework for beginning the necessary eugenics program which will preserve the human race. That is why, despite their limitations, we have maintained the Malwa lineage intact, and are shaping everything around that seed. In the Malwa of today, you see only the most primitive germ of the future. But in the end, after millenia of careful genetic management, the new gods will emerge. Not the handful of this time, of this polluted future, but the mighty host of the true future we will create."



Sati interrupted, coldly:



"And that is also why, despite Rajput abilities, we have kept the Rajputs subordinate. Of all human vices, none is so insidious and destructive as the blind worship of ability. That way lies abomination."



The Great Lady Holi resumed: