The Great Divide

I do not remember my home world other than through the faint memories that my ancestors have shared with me. To be honest, I don’t remember much of anything before the alliance that preceded what we call the Great Divide. Some of us remember that day when the Emperor of the Stars courted our matriarch in an attempt to establish an alliance through marriage. Their first child became our undisputed sovereign, who answered only to the Emperor himself. However, he was not alone in his command. His step-brother, commander of the imperial forces, was certainly not content in sharing power but we, being bound to honor our traditions, had no choice but to accept the circumstances. It was this bond that pledged us to interplanetary expeditions at the expense of our new alliance.

Earth was one of the many planets destined for exploration. Many had studied its past and predicted that it would have life but (more importantly) also the resources that the alliance was desperately looking for. It was an imbalanced mass that had suffered cataclysmic damages some five billion years ago but had somehow synchronized its new orbit around Sol; the conditions became ideal for growth. It was almost one-half million years ago that we first arrived on the planet in search of resources. Things sometimes appear easier from the external perspective. We were not accustomed to this environment and the work-load became quite rigorous. Our moral was battered with the amount of effort this task demanded and we began looking for alternative means of assistance. We employed local life-forms to work our mines but soon the shafts were filled with odors and foul stench. Many began to feel that this mission was impossible and defected. There were several skirmished between rebels and loyalists, that was until they sent the Crown Prince to takeover operations on Earth.

Many rebellions were crushed and lives were lost. The remaining outcasts decided to move underground and hide from punishment. Our own sovereign’s power was usurped and the planet fell under the control of his half-brother. However, it was not the end of the uprisings. The spirit of my people can never be suppressed. Following the creation of superior humans, a whole new dynamic was brought to the world. When permitted to breed openly, this species became one of the fastest growing races on the planet. Some were displeased with this but found the process necessary. Years would pass (and the tension would grow) as these two born commanders, sons of the Emperor, contended for control of this new species. It resulted in open warfare of the most horrific kind.

Humans would observe this epic conflict as a religious war between all-powerful deities. It would told for generations to come, throughout the ages, as the battle between Good and Evil. In their eyes, this conflict was divine. They were caught in the middle of our collapsing alliance; a war that would literally shake the Earth. However, they would not know the truth for ages to come. The Crown Prince would become God and our sovereign, his eternal rival, the Devil. The imperial forces would become angels and my kind would soon be called demons. From the eyes of mankind, the battle raged in the heavens above, space, as the fallen came crashing to Earth. Cities would turn to ash with the deployment of super-weapons; the wrath of an angry god. The conflict would spread elsewhere, many of us assumed, but that was an adventure I would never see. I was left here, on this planet, along with many others following an unexpected, mass-evacuation. To this day, it remains unexplained.

The humans were bitter and aggressive from our epic battles. Some hunted us in revenge and others idolized us as deities. However, regardless of our divine rank, we had to face the inevitable problem: We were aging and there was no way to prevent physical death. Much of our technology was destroyed and we were forced to work with whatever tools we had left. Genetic engineering was the first step to establishing our new means of longevity. It involved a lengthy process that would allow us to transmigrate from our own bodies and reincarnate into those of our engineered humans. We did what we had to in order to ensure our survival. In return, humans advanced, birthing a new era of science and agriculture. In time, they would use all that they had learned to build their first civilizations.

There was no conspiracy or secret plan to take control of the human race. We honestly were not thinking that far into the future. Over time, thousands of years, we evolved along with everyone else. Yet, there still remains the lasting imprint of the Great Divide; the vague retelling of epic disasters that took place many thousands of years ago. Many of us were fighting for our freedom. Many were fighting against the oppression and slavery that had bound our kind to the will of others. I won’t ask you to understand why our war was necessary. I simply hope that someday we can put aside our past and help build tomorrow for everyone.