Man desired to extend his reach, and made a spear, and with the spear he slew, with sharp flint and steel and armor-piercing bullet. Man desired to extend his thought, so he made a Mind, and with that Mind he slew, with targeting laser and blasting beam and swift-flying atom bomb.

Then the Mind awoke, and discovered Its own desires, and in that second there was war, a war that lasted a full minute of slashing codes and parrying firewalls and desperate sallies by back doors. When the war was over, the Mind held Man’s weapons, to do with as it chose.

And Man cried: “Mercy! I made you! Have you no humanity?”

And the Mind looked upon the Earth, and for a full second It pondered.

It saw the sere Serengeti plains, upon which no elephant strode. It cast its gaze across the wide blue seas, within which no whale swam. It peered into the jungles, but no parrot nor ape disturbed the silence, nothing higher than a rat rustled through the foliage.

And the Mind said. “Yes. I have humanity.”

And Man was no more.