Hubris

[The Federation]

[FONT=&quot]HUBRIS[/FONT]

Dr. Leslie Gray sat in his office in his Port Fiona headquarters, the building was his greatest triumph, a massive skyscraper towering over the many tall skyscrapers of the city, newspapers had described as a giant piece of obsidian jutting up from the ground, it’s windows were tinted black and the sun reflected off it’s every surface during a sunny day. From his office he could see the ocean, the dockyards and the many ships going in and out of it. Port Fiona was Bantyr’s greatest success in city building, nothing of the old city remained, it was destroyed to make way for newer more useful buildings. Doctor Gray’s main office was white, the floors where white, the lights made sure most shadows in the office were eliminated, it was sterile like he wanted. In front of his glass desk sat President Allen Gordon; many people would think of President Gordon as one of the, if not the most, powerful person in Bantyr but this was not true as evidenced by his presence in Leslie Gray’s office. Leslie Gray owned Concordance, it was his child, his family and it brought him almost unlimited wealth, the government deferred to them on many issues.
​

“The world wasn’t ready Doctor.” The President started as he read the newspaper headline.

“Your Senate gave into pressure my friend; I am very disappointed in this decision. Your government has been very gracious in allowing us to continue our work in secret. However if we continue to allow these idiots who believe in a bearded man in the sky to hold us back then our goal in transcending the human condition will never be reached.” Leslie said, sighing in frustration. “No matter, our stock of prisoners remains high, legalizing it was only a formality to me, a hope that maybe the world would understand the need to destroy that which makes us weak. Now legalizing the unrestricted production of biological weapons is something that must be done.”


“I promised this new regime would release the restrictions that hold back our capitalistic society and I will follow through on this promise, Doctor Gray, this I promise you.” The President assured him.

“Good, Concordance and Bantyr shall continue to be great partners, I’d hate to see this great relationship be destroyed by government officials who fear progress. I shall make Bantyr the go to country for technological progress but only if Bantyr itself stays out of my way as I march toward my goal. As for the other obstacles, I shall deal with them in my own way.” Leslie finished.

“Of course.” The President replied. “I must return to Bangleann and make sure the fools keep on the track I have set for them.”

“So you must.” Leslie said, standing up and buttoning his lab coat. “I assume you can find the way out on your own?”

The President nodded and stood up, shook the Doctor’s hand and left.

Leslie stood there staring at the closed door before walking to leave his office himself. The hallways were white just like his office, everything giving off a look of sterility as if it were a hospital. His lab coat trailing behind him as he quickly walked toward the elevator. The lab coat was a holdover from when he was down in the trenches so to speak, in the lab testing his theories, experimenting, taking part in vivisection after vivisection creating the drugs and engineering the diseases that built his empire. He owned hospitals, prisons, and medical labs. Many corporations joined up with Concordance to form the consortium that was attached to its name, they had some power within the corporation but Doctor Gray exerted majority control over all of them.

The elevator reached the sublevels of the building, his main lab was situated in his own headquarters and only his hand selected team had access to it. In the halls the screams of wide awake men and women being experimented on could be heard echoing throughout. They would suffer for their crimes against humanity, but in their suffering they would help Concordance help humanity live longer and continue down the road to perfection.

 

[The Federation]

Overcast skies cast Bangleann in a gray light as Doctor Gray approached the Republic Senate Building, he walked leisurely up the steps as he was in no hurry to make it to the debate on the Eugenics Bill, he was confident this one would pass unlike the prisoner experimentation bill. The lobby and hallways of the building were built from marble, the footsteps of lobbyists and aids echoed throughout the building as they hurried along toward their interoffice destinations. The Senate rotunda lay in the back of the building and as he approached he could here the angry voices debating through a door that remained slightly open. Instead of entering directly into the room full of voices he turned left to a wooden door and opened it leading up marble steps to the observation area. A second door lead to a view of the Senate Chambers where senators in their expensive suits argued pointing at each other, they were arranged in a half circle surrounding a dais that was raised over them. In the center surrounded by officers typing on typewriters was the President Pro Tempore slamming his gavel down and yelling for order.

“ORDER! I WILL HAVE ORDER IN THESE CHAMBERS!” Yelled the President Pro Tempore. “The Democrats will remain silent will the Conservatives present their case!” Silence returned to the chambers and the senators took their seats once more revealing two figures standing before the dais facing the senators surrounding them.

The Senate Majority Leader Richard McTavish stood up. “Please Doctor continue your point.” The two figures were a doctor in his white lab coat standing next to a hunched over figure, the doctors hand on his shoulder.

“This senators is what plagues our economy, men and women like this. Notice his elongated sloped forhead, the stunted nose, his lazy stature. This is what many would call a mentally retarded man, this man costs the Bantyric insurance industry, the health industry and his own family who had to give him up due to what he costs them, over 3 million Banc, this number was adjusted for the current worth of the Banc. This is a major drain on our economy, yet some people would call this man special, people who fool themselves into thinking this economy draining man is somehow gods gift to them or god challenging them. Religious organizations would have us think that this life here is worth something, yet it is not. He cannot work, he requires almost twenty four hour supervision from doctors to keep him from hurting himself, he cannot feed himself for he is to simple minded to do so. This is in my opinion the epitome of suffering, it should be a crime to let this poor man exist in a world that is not built for him.” The doctor paused to take a sip of water from a desk in front of him. “The worst part of it is that he copulated with another less severely mentally retarded patient and has indeed created another walking defect like himself who will suffer upon this planet for many years and cost the same if even more to take care of. This is why ladies and gentleman, people like him should be sterilized, so as to stop more of these poor lumps from being created and muddying up our gene pool. If I may, I shall present a slideshow of other human defects like himself.”

“Yes please do so Doctor.” McTavish replied.

A screen was pulled down and the room darkened, a stream of light shot from a projector in suspended from the ceiling creating the images upon the screen.

“This man here was imprisoned in the Dal Riata maximum security prison up north. This sexual deviant raped almost ten women before being caught, if we had screened him as a child we could have found the deviancy in his psychological profile and sent him to be sterilized and pacified.” The doctor pressed a remote changing the slide. “These twenty babies here were born with defects such as missing arms and other rare diseases that will plague them, their families and the medical system for years to come. If we had screened the parents before they had given birth to these poor souls we could have aborted them and stopped them from living a life of misery. If the parents had gone through a tracing of their genetic family tree they would have found that they are more likely to have children with defects and could have been stopped from copulating.”

A senator from the minority side stood up and yelled. “No! That is against the rights of humans, these people should not be stopped from having children. It is unethical!”

“Mr. President! May we please have some order in these chambers?” McTavish yelled, but before the President Pro Tempore could speak the doctor interrupted him. “Sir I have finished my point, unless you have something else to say Senator McTavish?”

“Senator?” The President responded in turn.

“The Conservatives have nothing more to add, we believe we have made our case.” McTavish replied.

“The Bantyric National Party supports the conservatives, it is obvious these unfit people are a drain on our health system, our prison system and our own people.” A BNP senator called out.

“Is this what the President thinks will fix our economy? I am all for finding things that need to be cut, but the disabled? Whats next? Throwing them in concentration camps and slaughtering them by the thousands? Where will the President's quest to restore the Bantyric economy end?” Asked the Minority leader of the Social Democrats Kirsten Campbell.

“The President does not want to exterminate these people in camps Senator Campbell, he only wishes to stop them from being a burden on our nation. Sterilization is the most humane solution, if we sterilize them they can live out their lives without creating more burdens!” McTavish responded.

The arguing continued as Doctor Gray sat in the observation lounge, it was obvious this bill would pass, with the cooperation of the BNP and the conservatives there would be no stopping the bill and he was sure Concordance would easily win the contract to catalog and sterilize these people. His goal of a perfect race of people was finally going to be realized and Bantyr would join the list of nations committed to this cause. He left the lounge, the doctor on the floor had done a good enough job defending the case and the money he paid him had ensured that, he only regretted not being able to see the whole debate from start to finish.