CANAISIS ∞ Chronicle One: The Last Living Ship ∞ 1: A New Mission

17 ∞ Understanding Humans

As he made his tea, he considered the implications of warships visiting other colonies. Nothing good, he was sure. No matter how impractical stellar distances made warfare, Humans seemed to never learn. Societies seemed to be caught in a cycle of rise and decline.

Would Humanity ever evolve into a society stable enough to endure the time and distances of space travel?

Humans prefer planets—it's where we came from, after all.

Maybe the answer lay in not using planets. Why couldn't Humans create habitats that simply wandered in space? There was an infinite amount of resources in the Universe. In fact, planets made up an almost infinitely minuscule amount of those resources. But, no matter the location, would societies still be caught in cycles of decline? The Universe was a very unforgiving entity between the stars. In an environment where making the wrong choice meant Extinction, he had to believe that Humanity wouldn't be able to decline too far.

An interesting thought for later. He would bring it up with Canaisis. She often had insights into Humanity because of her perspective.

With his tea bulb in hand, he made his way to his cabin and sat down.

"How are our guests?" he asked aloud, as was his habit when at his desk.

Canaisis' voice carried through the room, "All is well, Captain. They're just rising and seem to be organizing for their tasks today."

"Good. Anything I should know?"

"They seem quite pleased with the generator—our model has a longer lifespan.

"Also, it seems your asking Ayla not to kneel is of some great significance. I'm not sure what, though. Some of Ahmid's crew are worried about you being a First Citizen. Ahmid has explained to them that there was no such thing as First Citizens from your time, and that after working with you, he's certain you're not like them.

"Again, I'm not sure what the significance of this is. Earth's records say that First Citizens came to be after the Corporation revolt in which the leaders of the uprising were so designated. The records imply that First Citizens were selfless servants of the People who made great sacrifices."

Gareth sat back and mused on what Canaisis had said. "There's a saying that the victors write the history books."

"I can see the logic of that, Captain."

"It means that you only have the victors' point of view, that the records will only show you what they want you to know."

"Foolish to record false data, but I can see Humans behaving in such a way."

"It's not necessarily false data all the time. It's just that the historians may just be recording history as they see it, from their point of view. In a conflict, usually both sides believe their actions are for the right reasons.

"Sometimes, though, false data is entered. And sometimes accurate data is omitted. In these cases, it's a matter of reading between the lines."

There was a moment's pause before Canaisis replied, "This is a skill set I'm not proficient in, Captain. I'm learning, but Humans are remarkably analog. There's hardly anything about them that's binary, on or off, black or white. The term they use is 'shades of grey' or 'grey area'. A range of probability. In that respect, Humans are very quantum."

Gareth lifted his brows at that. "Very quantum? Yes, I suppose you're correct. I'll have to think about that for a while. In the meantime, bring up those First Citizens records, please."

His monitor lit up, and he sipped his tea as he began to read.

The First Citizens were indeed the leaders of the revolt against the Corporations. Examples of the inhuman acts of the Corporations were outlined. Whole groups of people turned into Human automatons for factories. Their brains surgically altered and implants installed rendered them mere biological machines. How much awareness they had after the modifications was conjecture.