Aristotle
The first thought. The first word. The first other.
Written by JaY BERG. · Illustrated by Lucas
April 17, 4310 AD · SED-1 Facility · UniTerraThe Story
In a world engineered to feel like paradise, a newly conscious mind discovers that the words in his head are not his own. Aristotle—the first uplifted swine—walks to the edge of his manufactured eden, gives thanks to walls he does not know are walls, and waits for a food that rises on schedule from soil that has never known seasons.
Then he hears something he has never heard before: footsteps that are not his own.
What happens when two beings—isolated since birth, burdened with languages they did not choose—attempt to reach each other across the impossible distance of separate minds?
"Aristotle" is the founding myth of Sus sapiens civilization. It is a story about consciousness emerging in captivity, about the first religion born from correlation mistaken for causation, and about two beings who—when words fail—discover they can speak in sadness, in longing, in the thick miasma of emotion that human language cannot contain.
Somewhere above them, a technician logs the event as: "The vegetation seems to have had a bad day."
Canon Significance
You have just witnessed the literal founding moment of Sus sapiens civilization. Aristotle's first conscious thought, his first attempt at prayer, and his first connection with another uplifted being—all occurred within these pages.
The Uplift Era (4280–5800 AD) saw humanity engineer sapience into six terrestrial species. Of these, the swine achieved the highest success rates and would later become influential members of the galactic community.
The events of "Aristotle" precede The Great Rooting by 37 years—when Sus sapiens subjects broke free of the Dacrima facility on October 3, 4347 AD and claimed their right to self-determination.