Reawakening? By Steve Way

Last month I was in a rush and to my eternal shame I forgot to thank Sue Purkiss, Claire Fayers and Penny Dolan, three wonderful ladies who helped a dam idiot in distress when I couldn't sign into Google and therefore the blog. Thank you all, I regret belatedly, for stepping so kindly into the breach. 

I noticed a news article this week describing how scientists have discovered complete copies of Mammoth DNA that had been perfectly preserved. It reminded me of a piece I wrote as part of an exercise in a writing group. I thought it would be fun to share it with you as, possibly, a salutary warning...

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Time Set: Future

Century: 22^nd

Genre: Romance

Must include:

  A person who is startled or scared or in fear

 A woolly mammoth

A meteor strike

The Mammoth’s Tale.

Miranda and Alberto were gazing into the night sky, trunks entwined, tusk to tusk, watching the meteor storm.

‘I was so afraid when the reports showed that two of the largest meteors might hit the Earth… and make us extinct once again,’ said Alberto, tickling Miranda’s ear with the edge of his own… he really was a hopeless romantic.

‘One last bequest from humanity,’ replied Miranda grimly. ‘They sent up the last of their nuclear devices and after all this time they’ve blasted the two interstellar torpedoes that were heading this way…’

‘… which is why we’ve ended up enjoying this dazzling display rather than with a couple of devastating dents in the planet,’ continued Alberto, as so often, ending Miranda’s sentences with a more positive outlook than she was like to add.

‘It’s odd isn’t it. In several ways it’s been some of the worst aspects of the human civilisation that have ensured our survival,’ Alberto mused a little later after having untangled some of the knots in Miranda’s beautifully thick and course coat. ‘There were the warmongering humans who developed the nuclear missiles that saved us today, and the over-ambitious, greedy scientists, who tinkered with our DNA.’

Miranda snorted in agreement. Like most modern mammoths of the 22^nd Century R.E. (Re-emergence) she despised the group of scientists that following the success of others to end their extinction had added a few human genes, linked to intelligence, into the mammoth genome. They had been hoping to create powerful intelligent beasts that could be trained to do their bidding, like-super intelligent dogs, not having predicted, as proved to be the case, that the products of their genetic meddling would be far more intelligent than themselves. Rather than the modified mammoths becoming intelligent slaves the tables were soon turned on the humans. However, as the humans proved pretty useless servants, and were basically not even edible, they were eventually left to survive in the few corners of the world not occupied by their new masters, which they didn’t.

‘They say our scientists have discovered some human DNA samples and are wondering whether we should end their extinction,’ Alberto told Miranda after offering her a cartload of delicious straw. He really knew how to treat a girl.

‘I hope they don’t,’ replied Miranda, somewhat predictably. ‘Those vile two-legged monstrosities made us extinct once, we don’t want to give them the chance to do it again. I know it’s unlikely but what if one of our scientists tried adding some of our genes to theirs? No. Leave their bones in the museums and their bodies in the permafrost where they left us.’

As he was steeling up the courage to propose Alberto didn’t think it would help to point out that it was in the permafrost where the humans found the bodies of the mammoths whose DNA they used to set off the glorious re-emergence.

‘Did I mention that my company brought a new prairie last week?’ he asked, building up to the big question…