Of Love and War
Created | Updated Jan 12, 2020
Of Love and War
Warm, soft breath on my cheek. My love sleeps. Peaceful. Perfect in every way.
I feel the aches and creaks in bones and joints, nature's imperfect machine counting down in heartbeats. Another failed attempt, another final night, yet another evolutionary reset looms.
So close, this time, so near, so promising.
A gentle arm pulls me closer, seeking warmth and the comfort of security against the dark. A simple gesture that highlights the failure of this race.
An unforeseen variable, a chemical imbalance, but love has doomed them all.
I watch and report. Each step forward followed by crushing failure.
This war machine, so promising in its infancy, now redundant, rendered useless by one stupid but viral emotion.
Humankind would go the same way as millions of other creatures across our domain. Promising soldiers now impotent and unruly, reluctant to fulfill their very reason for existence.
Warriors, killers, an unthinking, uncaring, biological weapon was what we wanted, what we needed to win the war that had raged for so very long, and, for a few short millennia, is what we thought we'd achieved.
Warfare came naturally to this fledgling race, engineered for rage and murderous intent. Each atrocity committed in the name of Tribe, Race, Nationality, Creed and Greed showed great promise.
These animals slaughtered and butchered their way through their own bloody history, killing in the name of anything that justified their imprinted bloodlust. Dominating and violating even the very planet we had given them.
All was good. All was going to plan.
Then, an unexpected evolutionary glitch. The animals began to care.
We were sent to adjust the experiment, poke and prod and carefully nudge this warrior race back on track.
A few, well-designed specimens, bred to spread the rage and anger, promote and encourage all that was brutal in their nature, dominated for a time, then the anomaly resurfaced.
Animal instinct subdued by errant emotion. The fallacy of goodness ruining each and every test.
Not only did these lab-rats stop warring amongst themselves, they began to show empathy for the dumb creatures we had given them dominion over, displayed a worrying concern for the planet they were magnificently destroying!
All in the name of love.
As a scientist, a neutral observer, I am dismayed at our failure. As a being involved in the production of a weapon so promising, I am disgusted and dismayed that I too seem to have been infected by this emotional disease.
Obviously, I have quarantined myself, removed myself from any further involvement. Become another casualty of this virus that has devastated our intentions.
As I now grow old (a unique experience with this species - one that could offer fascinating research) I wish things had gone differently. Wish this experiment had produced a viable conclusion instead of abject failure and disappointment.
But no, this species will not survive, refuses to accept its very reason for existence. The war machine has failed, infected with a virus so strong, we have no alternative but to eliminate every last subject, wipe the planet clean, disinfect the universe to avoid an epidemic.
Soft breath on my cheek. My love sleeps. Peaceful. Perfect in every way. But one.
This will be our final night. I hold her tighter, feeling the disease take hold. Oblivion beckons but I am unconcerned. Love has conquered all.
