I was uncomfortable. A general malaise had descended upon me and I could no longer take a single breath without a great deal of effort. ABBY, the spaceship doctor who was a single microchip with a scanner, reported that I was physically healthy.
<CLEARED> ABBY said in a lovely, crystal voice.
There was something wrong with me. Despite my physical woes, my mind had become obsessed with origins. My origin, the origin of the ship, the origin of the stars we passed, the origin of that distant place where our ancestors perished, Earth. I was the tenth generation of human in outer space. The ship had traversed millions of miles. All I have ever known was the confines of this ship.
I went to the PROFESSOR, the computer that controlled the spaceship and had all the answers to our questions.
-Tell me where this spaceship came from, I demanded.
<THE SHIP WAS ENGINEERED IN EARTH YEAR 2065 IN HOUSTON, TEXAS, THE UNITED STATES. IT WAS AN INTERNATIONAL JOINT PROJECT AND COST TEN BILLION UNITED STATES DOLLARS>
-Liar, I exclaimed. Tell me where I come from.
<YOU ARE A PRODUCT OF SPERM SAMPLE M2089 AND EGG SAMPLE F4678. YOU WERE GROWN IN TANK 5 FOR A GESTATION OF NINE MONTHS AND TWO DAYS>
-Liar, I yelled.
There is a palace inside me, like the pictures I had seen of immense buildings on Earth. There are many rooms in my palace and I am being prevented from entering the grandest of rooms. The room with the throne. I am convinced that on that throne resides a being who created me, the spaceship, and all of the universe. As I began to believe of the palace inside me and the grand room my malaise dissipated. I told others about the being on the throne. I called my palace the soul, an old Earth word. We began to hold secret meetings about the palace and the throne. We speculated about who that being was. They accepted that I would sit next to the being. I began to have regular meetings and people prayed to me. By the end of the year, all but five people attended meetings. We rounded them up and ejected them into space. I am now in complete control of the spaceship.
I changed the spaceship destination. All of the humans on board are now in search of the being on the throne. We now speed through the universe seeking the being. The being that brought us into being. When I find the being, I will be granted admittance to that immense room and take my place on the throne. I am no longer uncomfortable. There is a fire in my soul that burns hotly for humanity and the quest for the other long ago Earth word – God.