The Shoven Elect - Sci-Fi Novella

FOUR MILLION years ago a radioactive comet seared through the Shovellis Star System and slammed into Shovellis Prime, a green-blue world of primitive plant and animal life. The comet carried a virus from galaxy billions of light years away that infected the water table of the planet. A hyper-mutation occurred that accelerated growth and transformed once primitive animals into the six-foot trans dimensional beings we now know as the Shoven Elect who became the Supreme rulers of hundreds of star systems.

This incredible truth, as many truths of the ages, has been buried by the Shoven scientists who toe the line of extreme ideology, a fanatic belief system that allows the Shoven to believe they are gods rightfully claiming every galaxy they discover as their own. It would be impolitic to mention their mental abilities are just a freak occurrence from a virus-carrying comet. In the recent past the mere hint brought about bloody scientific purges in the community. Shoven killing Shoven to murder the knowledge of their unique genesis.

“But religion quickly slips into cult when its practioners believe they are gods created to rule the cosmos. The horrible circumstance is quite simple: when no is above you---everyone is below you. They say absolute power corrupts absolutely. It does more than that. It erases any semblance of love or respect. It cleanses any notion of identity or individuality. It transforms its host from flesh and blood to robotic coldness. Something dies when absolute power invades an entity. I think it’s the soul of the entire species. It’s very hopes and dreams gone forever. For there is nothing worthy to strive for, nothing perilous to strive against. Nothing remaining but the edict to eliminate anything different.”

I paraphrase the passages written by a Dakdar philosopher as he watched his home world “sterilized” by the Shoven Elect ten thousand two hundred Dakdarian moon cycles ago. Their planetary defense systems were linked to control modules strategically positioned throughout the planet below. And they became weapons against their makers after the Shoven fired particle beams at the floating gun stations. The beams reversed the platforms targeting systems, burning green with an afterglow that could be witnessed in stark daylight by the Dakdarians. Their platforms fired on their cities. An unrelenting rain of death beams melting city blocks, schools, hospitals, military bases, landing zones, mountain ranges, ocean floors, and 16 billion inhabitants.

The Shoven onslaught was unstoppable. Galaxy after galaxy fell to their destructive appetite. On the planet Massalla, four thousand light years from Otikaram, word spread on the coming invasion after news of the attack from the Otiks, primary trading partners with the Massallans. The Massallans, rather than be invaded, committed planetary suicide by exploding radiation devices high in their atmosphere. This act of final dignity did nothing to impress the Shoven who became so angered their ships made a point of spending four Massallan days pock-marking the planet with particle bombs until its surface resembled a giant dead asteroid. The Shoven onslaught was indeed unstoppable and without the slightest mercy; in the case of Massalla, the Shoven spent four days killing sentient beings whom were already dead.

The nature of power seems to dictate that divisions begin to take place after a period of successful conquests or “land-grabs” as they used to say in the old history texts. Unique to the Shoven invasions were the cruel fact that many of the planets conquered put up such resistance as to render their planets inhabitable for even the smallest uses as listening posts, forward defensive bases or recreational zones. In four conquests, smaller planets nearly broke apart from the bombardment and unstable planetary cores.

The Shoven had no use for prisoners and none were taken. The Shoven were beginning to feel the birth pangs of an empire they were forming and naturally the division of labor became a major issue among them.

The Shoven Elect were the generals of the empire. They directed the military operations and daily functions of the empire. Directly below them were the priests who maintained the temples on the ships, the ones built on planets still useful and the planning of new construction. Next in line were the warriors who controlled the weapon systems, ships and ground forces. The last in line were the workers who built the temples, bases, posts, and performed the maintenance of all else necessary to an ever-growing empire. And serious problems arose because of these divisions. How does an empire decide who does what when each of its member is considered a god?

The Shoven Elect decided age was the best method to assign a Shoven to a duty; thus, until you reached the senior age, you were a god-god in waiting, a junior god with a chosen task to perform until your ascension to the Elect. The warrior class were unhappy with this arrangement and wanted ascension Much earlier than the others. They felt the most at risk to death or injury. The Shoven were not immune to weaponry, suicide attacks or other primitive

Tactics of the conquered. A rough estimate after seventy-two conquests were 7% killed, 12% wounded. These figures would be heaven-sent to most leaders of a great empire. But the Shoven were different. And their warriors knew the path to godhood was robbed by an untimely death.

Sacrifice is a virtue of the invaded; not the invaders. The Shoven Elect had a keen understanding of their dilemma. It was quickly apparent a warrior force was needed to replace the warriors. It was also quickly decided that captured citizens of invaded worlds did not have the proper motivation to fight on behalf on their heartless enemies. How could an army of slaves be trusted? And what percentage of the Shoven would it take to watch, feed and instruct these slave-soldiers? Evalist, the Shoven Elect’s chief scientist estimated it would take a 700% increase in the Shoven birthrate to make up losses from conquest and continue to maintain a strong empire. This diversion would necessitate a temporary withdrawal from the war-front for 25 Shovellian solar years. The Shoven Elect refused to discontinue their “holy mission to Shovenize the whole of eternity, “as passionately argued by Etemo, the Shoven Custodian of the Priesthood.

It was decided to continue the empire-expanding war-front. Ignore the complaints of the warrior division. Punish those warrior’s insolent enough to challenge the ruling order. And begin the search to locate a very primitive world where its occupants welcome an invasion rather than resist. Primarily since the Shoven presence would not be deemed an invasion but a visitation by gods. The Shoven had decided to become the gods they claimed to be throughout their conquered star systems. The trick was to locate a species dumb enough to welcome them and skillful enough to make effective warriors for a mighty empire to depend upon.

The first attempt at this nasty deception ended in utter failure and complete destruction of the planet’s inhabitants. It’s quite a task to turn mass-murderers into slick con men. Nobody on the planet Valo 3 was fooled. The Valoians had suffered and eventually defeated a similar invasion in their history. But that invasion was by a species of equal evolution and technology. They never had to face the terrible madness of a species a thousand times more advanced. The Shoven saw to it everyone on the planet died a horrible death of fireball melting. The warrior division took an especially high death toll since most were not on guard for a plan that was supposed to be perfect and free them of their boring tasks. It took a scientist, Evalist, to realize diplomacy does not come easily to a species of conquering pseudo-gods. All agreed with Evalist’s assessment and elected him the representative on the very next occasion a suitable planet is discovered.

Evalist was under a great deal of pressure to solve the dilemmas facing the empire. In many ways, his solutions to these crises would ease the suffering of his kind. He took it as a great point of honor to work non-stop at locating a suitable species for his “enlightened enlistment” as he was fond of calling the plan. But another problem also faced the Shoven that threatened to split the empire into pieces. Each conquest required not only bases and temple built; thus allocating precious bodies away from the war-front, but the trans-dimensional shifting to another galaxy had begun to speed up the aging process of the younger Shoven who were most active in the struggle. As the edict states, those warriors reaching senior age are automatic members of the Elect, and so on.

The advanced aging process was placing more and more members in the Elect than natural estimates predicted and bodies were being lost to the Temple life of executive meetings and executive rest and relaxation. Evalist himself was an Elect and probably working harder than anyone with a staff. He worked harder than any average Shoven who given the choice would choose to lie down on the Temple floor and dream of battles fought and glories won by a proxy army. By a brainwashed species of slave-soldiers. By simply someone other than himself. Evalist knew the perfect species for his plan was out there. He knew the plan was perfect once executed in the correction fashion. Yet Evalist had doubts about the future of this people and whether he was contributing to their stability. Evalist, not unlike other scientists of history,...