Birth and Death Chapter 1

         I sat cross-legged on the floor before the breakfast table in that rustic house my parents forced me to call home and hearth.  They could have afforded much more, yet their choice in housing and other quality of life items never made sense to my youthful mind until years later.  Both of them were well off and high within the newly reformed Asiatic government.
         A loud crash brought my attention from my internal peace and contemplation to the present in the rural, wooden house we lived in.  Several wooden bowels rolled from the room saddling the one the table and myself where in accompanied by several streams of profanity and unintelligent mumbles.  My father stormed out of the room with a slight limb showing through his ragged lounge pants.  He was never one to allow pain to show through his pride or ego that he reinforced on a daily basis.  I shook my head at him as he limped up the uneven steps of the house, slamming his bedroom door behind him, only to have it swing back open.  I slowly closed by eyes, knowing what was to come in the following moments of time.
         “We'd never this problem if you could have built a better house!!!” My mother yelled after him as she stormed out of the room to where I was sitting.  My mind and soul were screaming for me to say something or just to simply intervene, but I knew better than to get involved in the problems of adults and their arguments.  I retreated internally using some things my grandparents had taught me before being carried off to the necropolis before their time.  At the time, I feared for them and their untimely death, but now look at it with a sort of reverence.  If my parents ever found out what their lineage had taught me, I would be joining the dead and ending my bloodline forever with my death, yet being an only child had its benefits. 
         The government outlawed the ways of the past and shunned anything that could be learned from before the time of the Unification.  They feared the power and the peace that stemmed from an earlier time.  Insurgency has been raging for the better part of two centuries now and had become a normal part of life.  Most people that lived in these modern times had no idea why the Insurgency had started or when it would end, all they knew was the blood and the carnage produced by random incidents.
         “You have no idea what building this house was like and never will!!!” My father stomped out of his room, his temple spasming in its normal fashion when he was stressed.  He ceased his stomping as he slowly headed down the stairs.  Reaching the bottom of them, he leaned up against the wall separating the two main rooms of the house and crossed his long arms across his chest, staring at my mother.
         I just continued to sit there at the communal table, shaking my head slowly and subtly.  The two of them used to be quite peaceful before their decision to move themselves and myself out here to this rural home.  Suddenly, my attention was yet again brought to the fight in the foreground with the sound of a sickening thud; it was my mother being her usual forceful self.  My father was lying on the ground with a wooden cooking utensil glued to his forehead.  I could hardly contain a slight whistle at the sight of current scene in the house.
         “That is no way to speak to your wife, you sick son of a . . .” She trailed off, catching herself before swearing in front of me.  She was usually the better role model for other people and me.  She let a slight sigh before walking the few paces to my father’s rest hulk and peeled the utensil off of his forehead.  Looking over her shoulder she began say something, but a look of pure horror crossed her face as all color drained from it.  A slight chill ran down my spine seeing the shock and disbelieve in her face.



         “General Tza, with all due respect, this project breaks every regulation and moral code that this station lives by.”
         “Listen to me, Mr. Hing, I am a military officer, you are a civilian.  You can deal with the pleasantries of morality and ethics of science.  I deal with the cold, hard reality of death and life.  This facility is no longer under civilian rule and administration.  I am hereby taking over it.  You can make all the appeals you want, but be forewarned that all of them will fail miserably.  You have no power whatsoever.”  The general looked over at the frail man wrapped in a small, ill-fitting coat.  Tza was not a big man, by any standards, being slightly over five feet in height, yet an aura surrounded him giving his figure a powerful, commanding presence.  His baldhead sickly gleamed under the research facility’s bright, sterile lights.
         “General, you cannot do this.  I highly protest and speak for everyone employed by this building.  You have no power and authority to do this.  I will…” The thin man’s voice trailed off as his eyes focused down the barrel of the officer’s side arm.  A visible lump could be seen being swallowed by the scientist.
         “Authority?  Listen to me, my dear Mister Hing; I have the ear of the consulate.  I suggest that you just let this topic and discussion drop.  I really don’t feel like paying the janitors for overtime to clean up this room if we continue down this path.”  With a slight click, Tza raised a thick, hefty eyebrow at the scholarly man and cocked the weapon centered between the two men.  Silence grew deeper as the two of them stared blankly at each other as the clock ticked slowly onwards.  Hing slowly shook his head as he casually looked down the barrel of the officer’s drawn weapon.
         “General, my, my, you surprise me, such a piece of primitive . . . technology.  You do realize, my dear General that your personal side arm will never affect me in any shape or form?”  With a crackle of laughter, the scholarly Hing threw back his head in a fit of laughter without a care for his personal well-being.  Tza slowly sighed as he gently shook his head at the other being in the room.
         “Doctor Hing, you do realize that any personal shielding that you do have on and have managed to smuggle into this facility have no affect on kinetic weapons.  For a man as smart as you are, you really do lack some simple, common sense.”  He closed his eyes as he felt the trigger of his side arm give way.  Time within the room came to a complete stop as the man’s finger completely depressed the firing mechanism.  With a sudden lighting crack, time fast forwarded showing a single, small smoke trail leaving the barrel of the gun.  Dr. Hing licked his lips as the color drained from his face.  He looked down to where the General’s weapon now pointed and slowly, tenderly fingered the oozing hole in his chest before slowly raising his head to face the other man.
         “W-w-w-why?” muttered the scientist as he slumped to his knees, a good portion of his shirt and overcoat now soaked with the deep color of blood.  The General slowly opened his eyes and looked at the man on his knees with a look of disappointment and despair.  He slowly shakes his head as he turned for the door of the windowless room.  With a slight turn of his wrist, Tza turned the door handle and opened the door.  Looking back over his shoulder, a single, tiny tear could be seen rolling down his cheek.
         “I am sorry that this turn of events had to come to pass . . . brother.”  The General pulled the door closed behind him as he returned his gun to its place under his shoulder.  He slowly, casually glanced over at the people staring at him and the room he had just left.  He shrugged and began his walk down the hall away from the people crowding the room’s door.




         With a slight metallic clink, the man behind the podium braced himself as he mentally prepared himself before the gathering crowd sitting in the rows in front of the raised, wooden stage.  Several images began to play themselves out on the projection screen behind the man.  He coughed slightly to himself as he raised himself to face the crowd.
         “I welcome you all to this presentation on what is probably one of the most controversial and most debated within the scholarly, social, and political realms: the subject dealing with the emerging species of humans living and sharing the same solar body.”  The man leaned his arms against the podium’s flat surface and looked down at his notes for a second, committing them to memory.  “Each group began emerging during the lat 21st and 22nd centuries, mainly from the well developed Western countries, namely the United States, Great Britain and Germany, with exception of the oldest of the species.  Each group has developed their own code of behaviors and ethics during their emergence centuries ago.  However, two of the three groups are still a minority within this celestial body and this presumably will cause tension within the planet’s sphere of influence and possibly beyond.  Yet the biggest problem facing the human races of this planet is the future, not the now or the near present, but the distant, far off future.”  He pauses for a second and looks out at the crowd, scanning all of the faces present.  Suddenly a small, childish hand pops up in the crowd and starts to move, trying to catch the attention of the speaker.  With a gentle, warm smile, he calls on the young, petite woman.
         “Excuse my ignorance, but I thought all people living here on Terra and its colonies were of the same species.  How can there be more than one species of human?”  With a slight chuckle, the speaker shakes his head slightly at the woman in a jovial manner.
         “It is a common mistake to make, my dear, and one that is quite simple to fix and explain.  As you and the rest of the crowd, I assume, knows of the human species’ family tree well into the 20th century and off Homo sapiens.  Yet, in as little as two centuries two more species had appeared, but not because of natural selection, Darwin’s theories, or even evolution itself.  It was the rapid advancement of technology that led to the development and creation of the two new species.  So as of today there are three species of human’s living on this planet and her associated far-flung colonies.  The first is the well-known Homo sapiens, the mental picture of what the term ‘human’ refers to.  The second species and the second oldest are the Transcendents, which are basically, for all general purposes, sentient, living androids.  Finally, the third species of human inhabitants are the Immortals, which are Homo sapiens that through severe and unorthodox genetic engineering and manipulation have created a whole new species.”
         “Sir, I am still confused, how can a machine still be considered human, much less living.”
         “Ah, the age old question of whether or nor a machine can be truly sentient and ‘alive.’ Now look at me, I am human right?”
         “Yes, you are human.  I don’t see the point you are making, sir.”  A slight electrical whir and whine fills the air of the auditorium where the presentation was being held.  Suddenly, the presenter and speaker was no longer standing behind the podium and wasn’t even on the stage.  A strange being took his place.  Large, elfish ears protruded between long strands of metallic looking hair hanging down to the being’s shoulders.  Red, glowing eyes peered out at the crowd, scanning the crowd as the man before had.  A slight, glowing aura could be seen swirling around the newly arrived being causing its hair to float slightly in the air. The being spread its long arms, the smooth gray skin of the creature flowing as the arms spread away from its body.
         “My point?  The point that I am trying to make is that even the two newer species that share this planet with the older species are offsprings of that older species.  We have flaws of our own and we have our strengths.  No one species is superior and no one species is inferior.”  With the end of the creature’s speech, dead silence fell over the auditorium and its occupants.  “I am one of the Transcendents, one of the new species that seems to have quite the effect on the older specie.  If I had not presented my true self and nature to you all, the group sitting here could well have mistaken me for a normal, run of the mill homo sapien.  But fear not, I and my kind mean you no harm.”  The man bowed and left the stage and room entirely.  The crowd in the auditorium remained stunned, seated in dead silence until they were forced to leave by the closing of the auditorium.