The Mind of Herzok Metcahf
Justin

There has been war for a thousand years. The surface of this planet is marked by craters and the ruins of a once flourishing civilisation. Now, nothing remains, except for the unrelenting thunder of a thousand guns, and the burnt out husks of once magnificent towers. No one is sure exactly when the war began, or why. Some say that a very important person was assassinated, and different factions in that once-thriving civilisation rose to arms. Others say that it was inevitable, for the peoples of that ancient civilisation had split into several races too different to share the same planet.

And so they warred. For a thousand years the peoples fought, decimating the planet's population. The average lifespan dropped from two hundred to two years. Genetically engineered babies are born, and grown into fully developed soldiers within a few months, in bio-vats somewhere within deep underground bunkers, where their leaders direct the war. These leaders have prolonged their lives by a few hundred years through the use of arcane technology. Yet even they do not remember the beginning of the war, for they were born into it, just as the soldiers they feed to the battle are born into the war, and die in the war. The leaders are the progeny of the ancient governors. Presidents, we called them. Now there is no one alive who remembers when there was peace. No one except I.

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