“Lord Master Archaeologist, wait up!” Sael-Un caught up to the lord of his faculty, “Milord, Master Cavendish has reported back from his exploration of Space Sector 17, I believe he has some good news.” Lord Aardis stroked his graying whiskers, his once strong body and quick thinking had become slower over the years, yet one could still see life burning in his sharp eyes. He straightened his colourful gown and answered with the slow, thoughtful voice that was the norm for elders, “Well, let's see what he has to say then, because we could really use some good news.” Loss of general interest in their field of study had caused budget cuts and layoffs, they had been lucky to get an archaeologist on the expedition to explore that part of space, a sector that was notorious for its radiation.
Lord Aardis and Journeyman Sael-Un walked down the corridor and into the datafile-library, which doubled as a communications chamber, where the other Masters of the faculty had already gathered, along with a few lucky Journeymen and Apprentices. Master Jihas started up the array and told it to connect to
The Second Chance, the space vessel which carried their colleague. “Connecting to
The Second Chance, buffering, connection is now live.” The faculty could not afford an advanced connection array, so the metallic voice was disturbing to their ears. “This is Master Cavendish, reporting to the joint Archaeological-Historical Faculty on Home. I am pleased to tell you, fine gentlefolk, that we seem to have found traces of a civilization consisting of an intelligent species.” None of the folks present in the library could believe their own ears. Final proof that they were, in fact, not alone in this universe, something which would be received gladly in scientific circles, but would be widely disbelieved in religious circles, and as the religious leaders still had a large proportion of the population on Home, their homeworld, enthralled, these news would likely be ignored by many. “We haven't analyzed all of the few databanks still intact after the many years of radiation, yet from what we have learned, we believe this ancient race to be called Hoo-mahns, and that they were obliterated by a massive radioactive explosion, most likely of their own making. Assuming from the few remains on this planet, which is the third from the local sun, it was most likely not their homeworld, there is a ring of rock between this planet and the second, where we believe there may have been a planet, which would be in the hospitable zone, and would probably have been the location of their home. This is just speculation, of course. From the abrupt end of the logs we assume the incident that wiped out the species occurred somewhere around 10.000 of our years ago. We will continue to analyze the information and report back as soon as we discover anything new.” “Thank you, Master Cavendish.” Master Jihas turned the array off.
“Well, gentlefolks,” Lord Aardis said, “We seem to have stumbled upon something short of a miracle. We will need all hands on this one, so please report back to your stations, and Master Jihas will send you your portion of information to analyze. That will be all, thank you.” Being the no-nonsense man that he was, Lord Aardis didn't open for speculation or discussion yet, he wanted them to know more.
Two weeks later, Sael-Un was still sitting in his lab, which he shared with a younger Journeyman in Physics, analyzing information about the event that wiped the Hoo-Mahns out. From what they had learned from the historical records they had scavenged, they had been a warlike species, there had never been a moment of true peace everywhere on their home planet, which they had found out was indeed the ring of rock between the second and third planets. “It's a kind of funny coincidence, Waed-Un,” Sael-Un told his room-mate, “The Hoo-Mahn civilization was destroyed almost the same time, give or take a hundred years, as our own civilization was founded.” “You want another coincidence?” his room-mate said, “The radiation from that sector has the exact same signature as the radiation found in the sediments which was probably the top layers when we started building our cities.” Sael-Un pondered for a minute. “That is indeed a funny coincidence. Maybe, hear me out, now, just maybe our species gained cognitive and social intelligence from the radiation caused by that massive blast?” Waed-Un looked at him for a moment, then he burst out laughing. “That's the biggest load of womp-crap I've heard in my life. Everyone, apart from those religious nuts apparently, knows that our intelligence was evolved over many years. You gotta get some sleep, man.” Sael-Un smiled. “Heh, yeah, you're right.” But he couldn't get the idea out of his mind.