The Cradle of Humanity
The continent of Antarctica is the most forbidding landscape on Earth, and has been so for over thirty million years. It would take an extremely advanced technology to make this region habitable. Such a place would make a perfect home base for beings wishing to keep a covert eye on the planet. Approximately sixty thousand years ago, the Auk'kheem arrived and built such a facility on the bedrock of this hostile land beneath the glacier, complete with a portal that would allow the researchers to return home from their city beneath the ice. The Wheel of Worlds would keep the residents supplied with food, medicine and equipment, as well as allow the researchers to report their findings back home.
The Builders of the Wheels kept their research project secret on a planet cleverly hidden in their portal network. Only the Auk'kheem knew the details of what they were trying to accomplish: the development of a new species of intelligent being that would serve as a bridge between all the other races. The parameters of this project were known only to the Builders, and the evidence of it was kept hidden away from all the other members of the Consortium of Intelligent Species. A base stock was selected and once settlement sites had been chosen, the gene splicing and genetic manipulation began. The city was dubbed the Cradle of Humanity, the name given to the newly developing species.
The dome covering the city was built to bear the weight of nearly a mile of ice and heated to create a permanent water cushion between the ice and the dome. This barrier also prevented the city from being scraped off the bedrock and swept away by glacial movement. Only a few thousand residents lived beneath the dome, while the rest traveled intermittently to the surface by way of an underwater passageway to shepherd the developing creatures, keep them fed and protect them from catastrophic harm.
As the humans proliferated and gained independence, they began to migrate toward other regions on the globe. Transitioning from a hunter/gatherer society to forming villages, the Builders maintained regular visitation to their flock, teaching them how to survive and develop a variety of skills and knowledge. In their cultural infancy, the new beings viewed their mentors as gods.
When war broke out elsewhere in the galaxy, the Builders realized they could no longer keep their project to themselves and sought the support of a few other members of the rapidly deteriorating Consortium to carry on their work as a fail-safe. The Tirmas agreed to assist in limited capacity out of concern for this new species rather than in support of the Auk'kheem's research.
Much later, near the end of the War of Shadows, the Jinn were visited by the Architect and informed that humanity would become the key to their own survival. It was at this point that they took up the mantle of caretakers for the growing population of humans on Earth.
Within the dome, the Jinn were able to travel to their home world for many thousands of years; however, as humanity moved into the modern era and began to develop tracking systems, such as RADAR, and weapons of mass destruction, the aliens began to withdraw, leaving less than a hundred of their kind to keep watch within the Cradle. During the Nineteenth Century, the Wheel of Worlds became unusable, marooning the remaining Jinn on Earth. However, at the appointed time, two representatives left the city by way of the sub-marine passage in order to rendezvous with the Nexus in Chaco Canyon. Once that milestone had been reached, the inhabitants of the Cradle prepared for evacuation, some traveling through the newly arrived replacement Wheel of Worlds to their home planet for the first time.
The Builders of the Wheels kept their research project secret on a planet cleverly hidden in their portal network. Only the Auk'kheem knew the details of what they were trying to accomplish: the development of a new species of intelligent being that would serve as a bridge between all the other races. The parameters of this project were known only to the Builders, and the evidence of it was kept hidden away from all the other members of the Consortium of Intelligent Species. A base stock was selected and once settlement sites had been chosen, the gene splicing and genetic manipulation began. The city was dubbed the Cradle of Humanity, the name given to the newly developing species.
The dome covering the city was built to bear the weight of nearly a mile of ice and heated to create a permanent water cushion between the ice and the dome. This barrier also prevented the city from being scraped off the bedrock and swept away by glacial movement. Only a few thousand residents lived beneath the dome, while the rest traveled intermittently to the surface by way of an underwater passageway to shepherd the developing creatures, keep them fed and protect them from catastrophic harm.
As the humans proliferated and gained independence, they began to migrate toward other regions on the globe. Transitioning from a hunter/gatherer society to forming villages, the Builders maintained regular visitation to their flock, teaching them how to survive and develop a variety of skills and knowledge. In their cultural infancy, the new beings viewed their mentors as gods.
When war broke out elsewhere in the galaxy, the Builders realized they could no longer keep their project to themselves and sought the support of a few other members of the rapidly deteriorating Consortium to carry on their work as a fail-safe. The Tirmas agreed to assist in limited capacity out of concern for this new species rather than in support of the Auk'kheem's research.
Much later, near the end of the War of Shadows, the Jinn were visited by the Architect and informed that humanity would become the key to their own survival. It was at this point that they took up the mantle of caretakers for the growing population of humans on Earth.
Within the dome, the Jinn were able to travel to their home world for many thousands of years; however, as humanity moved into the modern era and began to develop tracking systems, such as RADAR, and weapons of mass destruction, the aliens began to withdraw, leaving less than a hundred of their kind to keep watch within the Cradle. During the Nineteenth Century, the Wheel of Worlds became unusable, marooning the remaining Jinn on Earth. However, at the appointed time, two representatives left the city by way of the sub-marine passage in order to rendezvous with the Nexus in Chaco Canyon. Once that milestone had been reached, the inhabitants of the Cradle prepared for evacuation, some traveling through the newly arrived replacement Wheel of Worlds to their home planet for the first time.
Type
Outpost / Base
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