It Takes An Idiot To Raze A Village

"So, Doctor, what was life like before the Revolution?"

"Ah, J'lel'smia, if you only knew..."

[cue up nostalgic music appropriate to the era]

"There I was, a young research scientist studying the shedding rate of skin cells, when I discovered a family of microscopic organisms that had not been described yet."

"You mean, that was the pivotal moment?"

"Oh, no.  The moment you want me to describe exists in another place and time."

"Why don't you tell us about that one?"

"I could but I won't.  Not yet.  First, you need to understand what led me to start the Revolution."

"You started it?"

"Well, not I.  I just found the clue to who and why."

"Go on."

"Do we need to take a break?  You have a bead of sweat running down the center of your forehead."

"CUT!"

"Thank you, Doctor."

"My pleasure."

[flurry of off-camera noises as people rush on stage to freshen makeup]

"Doctor, you were saying?"

"I'm an old-school kind of researcher.  I still use paper notebooks on which I record my lab work.  One day, while working with a synthetic patch of skin, I noticed pits appearing on the notebook beside me.  Curious as to its cause, I cut a sample corner of paper and looked at it under a microscope."

"Is that when you..."

"No.  I'll get to that in a few minutes.  Anyway, under magnification, I could see tiny organisms liquefying and digesting the paper."

"Interesting."

"Yes, it was.  I had a hunch that the synthetic skin parasites and the paper eaters were related so I ran a DNA analysis of them.

"Sure enough, the organisms were related.  In fact, they were identical, nothing like I had ever seen or read about."

"Ah, then this IS the moment?"

"You're seeing where I'm going with this, aren't you?"

"Please proceed, Doctor."

"Thank you.  I told an assistant to post electronic information about this new lifeform and see if anyone responded.

"As you're aware, I received a message from a group previously known as an international terrorist organisation.  After their enemy had declared peace and promoted the terrorist leaders into high-level positions in the established government, the terrorists converted all their cash and weapons holdings into a top-notch biology research lab."

"Of course, Doctor."

"What no one saw then was the impact of my contact with them."

"We all know about the Revolution."

"Indeed.  But few have dug into the details of the science involved."

"Until now...?"

"Yes, until now.  Did you know that most of us are covered with artificial lifeforms?"

"Artificial?"

"Oh, I guess you call it nanotechnology, don't you?"

"Yes.  I thought we all did."

"Not me.  I'm old and my life perspective causes me to view life from an old person's vocabulary."

"But Doctor, you're the one who invented the Fountain of Youth genetic rejuvenation product line.  How can you say you're old when your body is just as young and active as a twenty-year old?"

"J'lel'smia, you don't know the real reason for the Revolution.  You see, I've invented the Fountain of Youth three times."

"Huh?"

"I know. It doesn't make sense.  Have you noticed that all of us tend to get younger looking?"

"Well, of course.  You nationalised your company for the sake of our species, giving everyone free use of rejuvenation."

"That's the thing, though.  What you just said I don't actually remember doing.  I found a set of my paper notebooks locked in a safe and they show a timeline that hasn't happened yet.  Based on what I wrote in those notes, the Revolution is a repetitive cycle."

"I'm not sure what you mean, Doctor."

"Well, the artificial life, or nanotechnology, as you call it, was programmed to latch onto other life and replicate the other life's genetic information, running preprogrammed mutation estimation routines to determine the 'ideal' DNA of the other life.  From there, the nanotechnology would begin replacing cells that had mutated outside an acceptable range of genetic changes."

"Doctor, you sound like you're quoting from a Fountain of Youth sales brochure."

"Perhaps I am.  I don't spend enough time with the sales and marketing departments to know what they've produced.  However, you're missing my point."

"I am?  Are we not here to talk about the early days of your research and the moment you found the seeds of the Empire of the Perpetual Revolution?"

"Yes.  But I'm trying to tell you why it is perpetual."

"Go on."

"Thank you.  The nanotechnology has worked wonders on cell replication.  When I and the former terrorists reversed the skin cell consuming organisms to replicate and regenerate skin cells, I tested our work on one of my notebooks.  There, I saw something I thought impossible.  The FoY...'Fountain of Youth' cells were converting some of the paper fibers back to tree seeds.  According to the notes I've read the past few days from my locked-up lab notebooks, I quickly locked up some of my lab notebooks."

"I don't understand.  You mean you hid your research from yourself?"

"You could say that, yes.  More importantly, I found where we worked frantically to stop the spread of the nanotechnology but only partially succeeded."

"What do you mean, 'partially succeeded?'"

"I don't know."

"You don't know?"

"The notebooks are gone."

"Gone?"

"Is there an echo in here?  Yes, the artificial lifeforms have converted my notebooks to some form of their original constituent parts.

"I can only guess that the folly of FoY means that the nanotechnology tries to interpret the original condition of our brain cells and converts new memories into old ones."

"Doctor, what you are saying?"

"That's the point, J'lel'smia.  I don't know exactly what I'm saying.  I think the repair function of the FoY technology has no limits, or none that I can find.  From dim memories, I recall discovering and rediscovering FoY a few, possibly three times.  I've had conversations like this with people like you I don't know how many times."

"But, Doctor, that's a symptom of traveling the talk show network.  Every guest feels that way after a while."

"Are you sure?"

"Absolutely.  We have a psychiatrist on staff who can help you with specialised medication, if you like.  He's a bit eccentric, choosing to live in a plastic bubble, but he's very effective."

"Somehow, I think we've had this conversation before."

"Doctor, thank you for your time.  The Revolution owes a deep debt of gratitude to you.  We appreciate you entertaining us today with alternate theories about the start of the Revolution - you've always opened our eyes to new possibilities.

"Next on our show, a two-year old baby who claims to be over three-hundred years old."