Kathryn A ([info]kerravonsen) wrote in [info]b7friday,
@ 2005-01-20 17:42:00
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Current mood: blank

Opposites Destroy

B7 Friday Theme: opposites
Words: 175

The madness has come even here. Clive attacked Anna this morning, and if she hadn't been trying out the TK booster she'd be dead.

We are the last ones left. The Sesla station went silent last week. Kate hasn't slept in two days, but it's no good. Researchers, scientists, the best biologists on the planet, and we have not found a cure. To think that a pesticide designed to interfere with the love-life of the lowly fly has instead turned men into homicidal killers. Violence tied to the sexual response. We thought it was just airborne, but it looks as if it's gotten into the food-chain now. No male past puberty is safe.

Civilization is doomed, unless we can find a way to preserve it. We may have to go with Pella's suggestion after all: artificial insemination. Ironic that we have the means all here, deep frozen for safekeeping.

A life without men. But we have no choice; if they live, they will destroy us. What strange world will we build for our daughters' daughters?

(Idea stolen from "The Screwfly Solution" by James Tiptree Jr. -- which means that this is indirectly [info]altariel's fault. Or [info]communicator's, I forget which.)


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[info]pinkdormouse
2005-01-20 07:56 am UTC (link)
Love it. A far more satisfactory explanation of the Seska backstory.

Gina

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[info]kerravonsen
2005-01-20 09:31 am UTC (link)
Thanks!

A far more satisfactory explanation of the Seska backstory.

Not to mention that it could explain why (a) the hydroponics were so important, (b) the Seska were willing to deal with Dorian and (c) Avon was behaving out of character -- he'd eaten some of the local food; and (d) the Hommiks weren't necessarily homicidal at this point because (i) by this time the chemical had grown less and (ii) they were probably more resistant to it than the average male human being.

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[info]vilakins
2005-01-20 09:29 am UTC (link)
Is this Pella an ancestor of the one we see? This must have happened before the oldest Hommik was born.

And I remember reading that story. [shudder]

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[info]kerravonsen
2005-01-20 09:40 am UTC (link)
Is this Pella an ancestor of the one we see?

I was more thinking along the lines that Pella had been named after her because this Pella was one of the Founding Mothers, but she could have been an ancestor as well; they were both ruthlessly pragmatic. Note that I had a "Kate" there as well.

This must have happened before the oldest Hommik was born.

Oh yes, definitely. I was thinking in terms of at least a century.

And I remember reading that story. [shudder]
I couldn't bear reading the whole thing, I just skimmed it, and it still made me shudder. It's indirectly Una's fault because someone in a comment on her LJ linked to an online version of the story, and I read it. 8-P

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[info]vilakins
2005-01-20 10:21 am UTC (link)
I read it in a book of SF short stories years ago. It's one of the many reasons I often sneak a peek at the ending first these days. Nice explanation though, and one I like a lot better than the usual boring sex wars--so overdone in SF (I've just watched the Farscape ep 'Coup by Clam'--sigh).

I did find the names Pella and Kate a little confusing, but it makes sense that children would be named for them.

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[info]mistraltoes
2005-01-20 09:51 am UTC (link)
It's a good story. I can't buy it 100% because it doesn't account for Nina. But it's a neat fit to the episode apart from that.

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[info]kerravonsen
2005-01-20 10:29 am UTC (link)
Thanks.

It doesn't account for Nina in what way?

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[info]mistraltoes
2005-01-21 11:13 am UTC (link)
Because Nina seems quite happy with Gunn Sar, and to be working with Cato, and shows no symptoms of being an abuse victim; I can't see that being the case if the men were all violent. But you've accounted for that above with the dropping levels of contamination, and the increased resistance, so yes, it does work.

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[info]kerravonsen
2005-01-21 09:10 pm UTC (link)
Yes, it wasn't possible to put the whole theory into the ficlet.

I agree that by the time we get to Nina and Gun-Sar, the Hommiks don't seem to be abnormally violent (I like the point that someone made that the Hommiks would have to have a culture which dissapproves of violence to women, or Gun-Sar wouldn't have hit Nina in order to provoke Avon into challenging him). The conflict, by this stage, appears to be purely cultural. Cultural conflicts that are inherited tend to keep themselves going for generations with mutual ill-will on each side (just look at the troubles in Ireland) -- but that which will keep a cultural conflict going isn't necessarily the same as that which started it in the first place. That which would start an actual war between the sexes would have to be pretty compelling. In order to even start it, they would have had to believe that compromise was completely impossible.

Who knows, maybe some of the Founders guessed that perhaps, in several generations time, there could be peace, but peace was impossible at that time, in that situation.

I love it when it all fits in like that.

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[info]astrogirl2
2005-01-20 03:49 pm UTC (link)
I felt rather proud of myself for recognizing the source material before I got to the explanatory note, though I see I'm not the only one. :) And it does seem like a good explanation.

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[info]kerravonsen
2005-01-20 08:04 pm UTC (link)
Thanks!

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