Silver in the Second Temple

Chapter 1The answer was simple. Humans were not ready to become a space-faring culture. While Kim knew that this was one hundred percent the truth, they also knew that they had gone too far in making this statement, too far in reducing the problem they faced, down to its simplest form, in order to efficiently deal with it. Raised and educated within the Firmament Foundation, Kim had been taught to follow the methodologies and processes of the Foundation’s chief architect and originator, Professor Labyrinth. A key tenet of this thought process was reduction. However, in reducing the problem this far, Kim knew that they were tired. A tired mind is worse than a dead one, as it makes more mistakes, they recalled, standing to stretch and recharge before continuing. Kim made it to the door before their Moneykey noticed, the homunculus chasing to be at their side before they made it out into the hallway. The two of them traveled side-by-side, Kim walking on stiff legs, the Moneykey on fore-knuckles and feet, slowly making their way to the recess that held the battery of vending machines. Although they already knew the answer, Kim hoped that the lemon sodas had been restocked. As Kim walked, they let their mind wander from the task intentionally, for the first time since they had been given it, and loaned the use of the wastefully spacious office, some six hours ago. Humans were not ready to become a space-faring culture because they were, mostly, far too selfish. They were unable to grasp the full scale of the universe and look beyond immediately benefiting themselves. Every generation or so would face a new crisis and disregard all the useful lessons of history in the pursuit of personal comfort. The result of this would be the following generation criticizing their elder’s every action, before becoming the problems of the next. And so on. Occasionally, either the crisis or the optimism of youth would produce a generation obsessed with the stars beyond and steps would be taken to place humanity among them. But with governments elected for short terms and immediate profits being the goal of corporations, humans, collectively, never got very far. That was the pattern until the Firmament Foundation was created. With faster-than-light travel theoretically possible, but currently a practical impossibility, any attempt to colonize the stars had to be made on long timescales. Longer than any previous government had ever existed and far longer than any corporation could predict profits for. On such timescales, the crews sent out into the void needed to be self-sustaining and, at that point, had no use for the power structures that had sent them off in the first place. Why would the short-sighted leaders just shoot that much money into the void? The second issue that held humanity back, was their relative fragility. There was so much in out there that could kill a person and so much that could go wrong while traveling through space, leading to that same result. Why not modify people then? The technology existed and was relatively inexpensive. A race of super humans designed to spread humanity throughout the stars! Oh, no. There was far too much opposition to that. Fiction writers, religious leaders, paranoia, and the human condition being defined in its infancy by the g******e of the Neanderthals and other similar peoples, killed that idea before it had even left the drawing board. Kim grudgingly accepted a grape soda as tribute while resolving to have the vending machine restocked first thing tomorrow. They were used to getting what they wanted. For its part, the Moneykey was satisfied with a nut bar. Kim removed the wrapper and sat on the floor, back to the machine, and watched the grateful homunculus eat the generous offering without taking its eyes off them. The homunculi were the masterstroke of the Firmament Foundation, the move that finally got humanity into space. If humans could not be modified for survival in outer space, why not create something entirely new? A creature deliberately designed for the purpose of space exploration. Of course, there were objections at first, but this is where the Foundation excelled—public relations. Already a household name in everything from appliances to entertainment, all it took was a well-timed and judiciously aimed advertising campaign to swing opinions in their favor. You could own a piece of the space program! The Foundation created their first homunculi as pets for children and families, the simple chores of tidying a kid’s toys away or washing a window, nothing more than a carefully concealed mass-marketed test for getting them ready for the rigors of space travel. Soon, backed by cartoons, video games, comic books, posters, ubiquity, the Foundation could create anything they wanted or needed for their programs. Hopefully, in time, the Foundation would also be able to shift cultural perceptions and habits towards the long-term benefit of everyone. Kim, still watching their Moneykey, wondered how many different types of homunculi there were now, at least a hundred and fifty available at retail. The Moneykey, however, was not one of them. The thing resembled the long-extinct gorilla, but stood only eighteen inches or so at the shoulder. The Money key’s back was home to a tiny mountain range made of synthetic diamonds. That was where the “cute” designation came from, as diamonds were still considered to be symbols of wealth and success. A relic of the past when authors, unable to conceive of digital currency, considered them to be the best option for the cash of the future. This was why the creatures were issued to many Foundation executives as their personal homunculi. While not an executive, Kim was important enough to warrant anything they needed in their role and knew enough of homunculi that the presence of another Moneykey would calm those belonging to the executives they frequently had to deal with. Kim only ever fleetingly felt anything for it. Rested, Kim resolved to return to the loaned office and approach their task anew. Without waiting for the Moneykey to finish their snack, Kim stood and retraced their steps back down the hallway. Re-positioned behind their notes, Kim began the process of reducing the problem once more. The issue related to one of the Foundation’s vessels currently sailing through the interstellar void, vertical to the galactic plain. One of the longer-term projects, the vessel, named Droste, was typical of its size and class. Its crew of homunculi were a varied mix of specialized creatures, all created to carry out specific, simple, tasks. The Droste also carried a complete company, two hundred, of cryogenically frozen Slates. Slates was a generic term for any one of a number of different type of homunculi who were mentally blank. They had no personality of their own, instead having the space to receive another consciousness. They could be puppet-controlled at any distance, making them bio-mechanical spacesuits for an as-yet-unborn generation of astronauts. The problem that Kim had been bought in to fix, was that one of those Slates had supposedly defrosted itself and was now at large somewhere on board the Droste.