Chapter XXV: Annihilation
They could not prevent their growth into bigger communities. The access to technology, combined with their adaptability saw the development of what could one day be a potent adversary for the planet - their own creation. Sporadic resistance had been documented in various camps around the planet, but it was not yet a concern for their control of the planet.
The scientists were increasingly intrigued by the humans' more restive state. They had formed bigger communities, numbering in the tens of thousands, and some as far as millions. They lived much longer too, commonly reaching one hundred solar years and some well into a second century. A few even managed to pass two hundred years of life.
The complexity of these new masses was reaching new heights very quickly. More authoritative leaderships formed, some even had their own armed forces. Those societies they could not control, as the camps were reaching similar proportions and controlling that many humans was enough of a challenge. They had the ability to wage war and decimate their numbers to a more manageable size, but the risk of damaging their own valuable operations was already too great. Established colonies of Annunaki already lived in the vicinity of the labour camps, and they numbered in the many thousands themselves.
It was a great continent in the largest ocean on the planet that Mu first appeared. The continent was considered too desolate, so its purpose was to contain humans that were considered troublesome, inefficient or rebellious. The geographic isolation and lack of resources on that continent meant that those left on it would not be able to survive a very long time. Yet, this was one of the key mistakes the Annunaki made towards their downfall.
Anu shifted his gaze to the following file. He had already read this information before, but could not help shaking his head at the short-sightedness of his ancestors; even if, ironically, this meant thousands of years from the perspective of the average human.
The civilization arising on Mu was remarkable. Making use of limited resources, using and innovating whatever technology they had smuggled and stolen through the years and building their cities with durable, lasting granite megaliths meant that they were on the way to become a significant power that would inevitable alter the balance against the Annunaki. Some of them saw that, but it was not possible to convince the Council of the threat these people represented. On their own turn, they advanced rapidly, building an extensive industrial and manufacturing base, using the experience and knowledge gained and passed down by the troublesome rejects from one generation to the next.
A unified system of writing and recording was even more a cause of concern, which was ultimately overlooked. A robust system of education, government and citizenship took shape over several centuries of evolution. Combined with the technological prowess of the species, they had evolved into a contender for control of the planet.
At last, the Council had agreed that the threat existed and was willing to do something about it. Unfortunately, by that point it was too late. Outright confrontation would cost the Annunaki too many of their investments, not to mention lives. At least, in battle in the air and on the ground, the people of Mu were a worthy opponent. So, they were forced to concede them a degree of influence - the one time prisoners and their offspring had become their rivals for the planet. Their progress had not stopped: within a thousand years of first establishing themselves, the Mu nation was in some respects more advanced than the Annunaki.
Further west, in the vast peninsula beneath the tallest mountains, several coordinated revolts successfully overthrew the rule of the Annunaki. The Elohim were instrumental - although many humans were killed in the confrontation, the ultimate aim had been achieved. They called themselves the people of Rama, quickly organized themselves and established links with Mu to the chagrin of the Annunaki. With their help, a re-conquering of India would not be easy. They could not lose India like they lost their prison continent.
Not too long after, a violent regional war erupted. The Rama Empire, as it had become to be known, had established itself firmly in control over the whole peninsula, not without significant help from Mu. A rapid weaponization program ensured that they were adequately capable before the Annunaki arrived. With full force, several nuclear bombs were exploded over key cities and strongholds. While the casualties were in the hundreds of thousands, in places over a million, the Rama Empire kept fighting. In the direct conflict that followed the strategic strikes, the Annunaki were not able to gain control of India again. What is more, the war put an end to their tenuous alliance with Mu. Both powers were not outright enemies.
The war ended in a detente. The leadership of Rama poured resources into the advance development of nuclear development. As a result, the recovery from the destructive conflict was not complete for nearly twenty years. The Annunaki themselves were not willing to risk another conflict of this scale. Instead, they began planning a final confrontation that in the words of their leader then, Anu's ancestor, would determine whether they stayed to shape the course of this planet, or leave it to its own destiny.
**
Osiria emerged along the river Styx, after yet another successful rebellion. Mu's indirect influence was visible yet again: political support, aid to militarize and recover quickly after the destruction. The Annunaki had been hit particularly hard by this loss, because it not only cost them a very sensitive and profitable colony, but also significantly in the offensive they put up to resist the advance. The mountains and highlands of Western Asia were far too removed, sparsely populated and not of any significant interest, but they provided a possible base of actions to regain Osiria in the long run...
Despite the shared influence of Mu and the Rama Empire, Osiria evolved in its own direction. A government of two kings, a renowned school of philosophers and remarkable building projects, constructed in the same megalithic fashion, but with added finesse, eventually became the recognized marks of Osiria. Communication and trade between the three powers, spread across half the world, intensified.
Mu had affected another movement, but this time across to the East. In the Americas, another high culture had begun to develop, but the Annunaki had not managed to reach it yet. High in the mountains of South America, it was a population of humans, just like themselves, but much more brutish and virtually ignorant of the ways of civilization. The starkest mark of their state was a disturbing practice of human sacrifice. If they were to succeed before the Annunaki came across them that had to be the first ritual to be banned and wiped from the collective memory.
Through careful guidance, the emissaries from Mu were largely successful. The locals described them as the lords with white robes and auburn hair, come to teach them the ways of civilization. It was almost as if they were treated with divine status. The emissaries did all they could to dispel these notions, but could not be entirely successful in that venture. Among a few fringe elements on the outskirts of these peoples' reach, human sacrifice persisted, but it was far too removed from the new main culture. The stories that talked about killing humans also were beginning to fade, giving way to the enlightened thinking the emissaries were keen to instil in the population and their leaders. Viracocha and Quetzalcoatl, `creators', became their titles. Admittedly, it was flattering to be regarded in such high praise, and Mu's efforts on the continent intensified as a result. Powerful cities, symbolic of the strong bond between the two countries, were erected at Pumapunku and Tiwanaku; for the first time, Mu gave these people, the Inca, as they had come to call themselves by this point, building technology they had acquired from the Annunaki long ago and perfected beyond recognition.
Intelligence revealed that the Annunaki were getting closer to the continent, having already performed several exploratory landings. They were aware that the people of Mu were fully engaged in building up the native population to resist an invasion, but with not having the resources to launch one, they could only watch.
The leadership in the capital, Mu'a, had agreed on the transfer of weapons and advanced technology. The forays of the Annunaki had become worrisome and a confrontation was likely to be soon at hand. Without knowing the exact time, scale and weaponry they were going to use, several times as many emissaries were sent for equipping and training purposes. Mu even went as far as to station an arm of their forces for support.
The move had not been without reason. Not too soon after the build-up began, the Annunaki launched one of their own on the eastern coast of the continent. Intentional provocations, such as firing incidents, bombing runs on the outskirts of the defenders' positions and the expected militant rhetoric only served to heighten tensions between Mu and the Annunaki. Officially, neither side wanted to engage in hostilities, but the tenuous alliance was growing more questionable with every passing day. Neither side let up from the arms race in South America; the host civilization was not nearly large enough to conquer the whole continent, and that allowed the Annunaki to establish a strong foothold in the eastern half. Slowly, their positions expanded westward, and as intelligence in Mu revealed, any humans caught along the way were either killed or enslaved and put in electrified holding pens. The armed forces responded by locating two more armies on the Western seaboard, hoping to act as a last stand if the invasion were to unravel all of their efforts. Their hopes for launching a counter-offensive could only materialize when the advance had been stopped and a front established.
Mu's ruling elite had no idea that this step was only the first in the grand strategy of the Annunaki to re-conquer the planet and eliminate the political independence of the humans. Not shortly thereafter, they annulled the peace treaty with Mu via a short message sent after the first major engagement with the continent's forces in South America. That battle was lost for the defenders, but the war was far from over.
While the Annunaki could not always predict the outcomes of their actions very well, they were used to planning for the long term. Now, they did possess one technological advantage the humans had only recently become acquainted with - nuclear bombs. It was a device the Annunaki rarely used, let alone on a living world such as this one, but once the humans had developed enough bombs of sufficiently powerful magnitude, their whole presence here could be in even greater jeopardy.
On the ground, Mu was slowly losing ground, being forced to retreat further and further into the Western mountains. However, the battles were becoming more bearable, because the terrain favoured the defenders over the attackers and they took full advantage of that. Not too long after, the front stabilized; in Mu'a, thoughts returned to beating the Annunaki away from South America, but progress was difficult with their numerical and technical superiority. What they could not foresee, however, was that this was only small part of the grand strategy the aliens had put in motion to regain control of the planet.
Simultaneous nuclear attacks had been launched on Rama, Osiria and Atlantis. In an all-or-nothing gamble, the Annunaki deployed massive armies to quell any and all resistance. Aerial bombardment supplanted the ground efforts, in one massive invasion meant to paralyze and destroy the human race.
Atlantis was the first major casualty. The force of the nuclear strikes fatally destabilized the geology of the island nation, causing large section of it to collapse beneath sea level and be flooded. Those who were not killed in the blasts perished in the depths. A second after-effect was the trigger of disastrous earthquakes that fractured the remaining landmass, causing large sections of it to slide beneath the waves too. The horror, beyond words to comprehend, was marked in the memory of only a few dozen survivors out of millions. In the immediate aftermath, they managed to evacuate themselves to the shores of Europe and Africa with little more than the clothes on their backs.
The disaster that wiped out Atlantis opened the Pillars of Hercules to the wall of water that rapidly enveloped Osiria. While they had been preparing to fight, they were not able to foresee this kind of destruction being wrought upon them. The rapid flooding quickly submerged and destroyed many of the strategic and valuable installations necessary to sustain the resistance. Even the megalithic structures, which may have been able to survive a massive earthquake, were defenceless against the oncoming wall of water. The magnitude of the death and destruction rivalled those of Atlantis. Encouraged by their early successes, the Annunaki focused the remainder of their efforts at the final two bastions of human power - Rama and Mu.
Anu flipped to the next archive. The fallacy of his ancestors astounded him in their thoughtless rush to end the dominion of humans on Earth. In the documents recovered from the period, the two powers had come to an agreement. Their mutual sacrifice was the only way to critically disable the Annunaki and preserve the independence of humans; especially selected members from both, teachers and experts, would take it upon themselves to begin civilization anew and prepare humanity for the next time the Annunaki returned. They knew that, because it was not possible to destroy them to the point of extinction. What was possible was to send them back in the depths of the galaxy and prepare for their eventual return.
The fighting on the ground was fierce. Many died on both sides. Strategic nuclear strikes on the large cities - specifically one of the most important ones, Mohenjo-Daro, produced innumerable additional casualties. Mu, as next in line, had only suffered several heavy encounters and in South America, the front still largely held. As such, the bulk of their forces was focused on assisting Rama against the invasion. Aerial battles, the use of their own nuclear forces on the invading Annunaki and the irreversible destruction it all caused equalled a total war: one of annihilation.
Millions were already dead. They knew this war would never make it into the records of humanity. It would be wiped from collective memory within a generation. No humans would enter the ruins of Mu and Rama for centuries, that's how few, would be left by the end of this war. Anu had never delved this far into the archive before, and it captured and fascinated him.
Under his leadership, the Annunaki never engaged into such a destructive war. Back then, it almost killed them off for good. Now, they were facing a much larger, more advanced humanity. From the intelligence he had been receiving from his commanders, magic would not be enough to eliminate the human threat entirely. In fact, it could end them for good, as well as them.
Blowing up the planet was an option then, as it was now. However, that was not the point of the exercise. Earth was a long-sought prize and destroying it would not serve the effort and resources put into regaining it.
Months passed in a stalemate state of fighting, amid rotting corpses in the streets and countryside, unimaginable destruction and rising radiation: the use of nuclear weapons had not stopped. Mu was now engulfed in war as well, as the South American front had been broken and the Annunaki had made landfall in the eastern part of the continent. Their plan for it included a fate shared with Atlantis: letting it sink beneath the waves, so no other human civilization could arise in the place of Mu. Rama barely held on, in large part due to the support Mu was still able to offer. However, with the intensifying war on its own territory and the rising number of nuclear strike, mounting casualties and unparalleled destruction, more and more soldiers were withdrawn.
Eventually, Rama collapsed. Its great cities were turned to rubble, the men, women and children to ash, in a warzone rendered inhabitable by radiation. The survivors escaped high in the Himalayas and further north into Asia, in areas much more sparsely populated and far from civilized. Compared to a nation of hundreds of millions, they had now been reduced to a few hundred. Those affected by radiation disease were going to die in the span of days, reducing their overall number even more. The few chosen to re-kindle civilization were part of that troupe and far from danger themselves.
As per the agreement with their counterparts from Mu, they agreed to head west to what was once the edge of Osiria. There, away from the prying eyes of the Annunaki, they would begin anew, together with the teachers from Mu. A communication was received just in time that they were on their way when it became clear that all would be lost in the war.
The annihilation of Mu was more savage than that of Rama. Cities were bombed again and again until not a single stone was left standing. People were tortured viciously before they were killed, civilians and soldiers alike as they were captured on the battlefield. The Annunaki felt the need to make a point out of the resistance, but it did not abate. Everyone died willingly, regardless of the odds. Reading the record, Anu was both astounded and disgusted.
Anyone who escaped, managed to make it to Asia or the Americas. Tens and hundreds of millions had been murdered ruthlessly, without mercy, without consideration. The combined radiation from Rama and Mu spread around the hemisphere by wind currents, but the former domains of these civilizations were uninhabitable. Nearly no life remained. The Annunaki proceeded to deal the continent the same fate as Mu. Specifically placed charges produced explosions and earthquakes that broke the back of the once mighty continent. In a catastrophic denouement, it took the legacy of the destruction, any survivors and remaining Annunaki to the bottom of the ocean.
For the aliens themselves, the blow had been nearly fatal. Most of their colonies did not survive the war and the lethal radiation was eventually going to destroy the ones that did survive. Their numbers had been decimated by the humans, but at least they had ensured that they would not be able to recover for a very long time. They hoped, longer than the time they took to rebuild and return.
With what few supplies and forces that survived the catastrophe, they departed back into the depths of the galaxy to re-build and recuperate; hopefully, to return one day and claim the planet from their creations.
A/N: One review is all I ask. What is this story like for you?
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