" God is a state of mind - I think, therefore He is ..."                                                                                     

" It's natural to assign blame elsewhere for things we can't control. A Supreme Being seems a natural target. After all, if such an entity can't fix the problem, how can we as mere mortals be expected to? "

A subtle twist of sub-neutonic forces, and the transport pod was "there". Technically it had been there all along, as technically, it was always nowhere, and everywhere. It's all really a matter of perspective, and the Grinn had spent much of their subjective temporal history struggling with a way to rationally explain all the intricate nuances of existence that allow this to be so. Even at their advanced level of evolution, the whole truth was still mostly implied conjecture without solid verifiable truth. They had become comfortable if not satisfied with the fact that the answers at least now outnumbered the questions. What the Grinn had discovered allowed them to proceed with the Grand Experiment, and that would have to do for now.

The Grinn had evolved from the stuff of creation. Certain energy fields had (somehow) stabilized and formed coherent patterns capable of learning and building on what they had learned. Of all the questions left unanswered, the how and why of this still eluded the best of their philosophers and scientists. Ignoring that initial gap in their history, the evolution of what they were today was easily documentable, as the individual never really died. Their nuclear substance was constantly renewed, and memory was for all practical purposes infinite and absolute once an individual's experiences were reported to the collective mind. What one knew, all knew, and had known since (almost) the beginning. The big problem with such collective immortality was that it was impossible, or at least supremely impractical to forget a question once it had been asked. When one questioned, all could not help but wonder. Their inquisitive nature required that the question of their origin became THE QUESTION.

What bothered them most was their failure after constant exploration and endless wandering to discover kindred spirits to share their research and discoveries with. They had become resigned to the fact that they were alone in their universe. Resignation became tinged with boredom, boredom in turn led to apathy. How could it be that whatever freak set of circumstances that had allowed their existence was not repeated elsewhere? They reasoned that an infinite Universe should be capable of sustaining infinite coincidences which in turn should provide infinite resources to tackle their quest. The Grinn had for the most part stopped trying, and in doing so, began to lose interest in life itself. They discovered too late that their continued presence required a certain spark of vitality that had been lost. Grinn didn't die, but whatever fundamental element that was their soul could one day disappear, and what once was an individual dissolved into the collective conscience. The individuality died, that spark became static, and a voice in the chorus was forever gone.

The few who refused to abandon hope pooled their efforts and created the Grand Experiment. They reasoned if the universe had, through whatever set of unique circumstances, allowed their creation, they in turn might be able to re-create and nurture the same environment with the end result being the discovery of their true nature and the salvation of their race. If they could breathe that certain indefinable something into the substance that had become Grinn, they could once again grow and diversify, thus ensuring their survival.

The premise had seemed simple - discovery by observation. They failed. Whatever it was that made them possible eluded their best thinkers. The combined resources of the Grinn were unable to unlock the mysteries that allowed their existence. The only option remaining to the Grinn was to concentrate their attention and efforts on alternate life forces that showed similar potential, in the feeble hope that one day their analysis would provide the key. Of all who tried, only Jehovah was able to claim measurable success. He had theorized that of all the alternative building blocks capable of sustaining life, and doing so in a multitude of possibilities, carbon based elementals showed the most promise. Their potential had been mostly ignored and discarded, as whatever coherent processes that could be attributed to intelligent life were not sustainable in the Grinn universe. Jehovah's breakthru came when on a leap of faith, He attempted the same experiment in an alternate universe. Others had explored these avenues before, all shared the same knowledge, but it was the unique flavor Jehovah supplied that provided the final piece of that particular puzzle. It was a giant leap, and brought the Grinn infinitely closer to a solution.

Jehovah had decided to assume corporeal form once again to better understand what His creations were capable of feeling. All He surveyed had been alien to Him before He had first assumed the guise of carbon based life. Even then, more times than not, He had not an inkling of what went on in the minds of those who He now considered His children. The Grand Experiment showed a certain qualifiable success in that certain of the lifeform variations he had nurtured had developed the ability to think, and in doing so, had assumed limited control of their destiny. They continued to surprise and delight Him with their unique ability to shape and mould their immediate universe by instinct without really knowing how or why. Jehovah could never have allowed Himself such a haphazard approach to life, and was totally incapable of any action without a full analysis of all the alternatives and potentials of that action. Eons had passed while He decided to proceed with His tiny part in the Grand Experiment. He(almost) always was, and (almost) always had been, and could not imagine another way.

He found Himself spending more and more time with one particular group in a remote region of the celestial laboratory He had built. When exploring potential sites for his creations, a certain "M" class planet in a remote corner of a little known and less interesting star system on the fringe of his domain had caught His eye. He had painstakingly developed ecosystems that covered the full spectrum of variations that had been found to be condusive to biological lifeform development that trended towards his requirements. Jehovah proceeded to seed these environments with some of the more promising varieties and settled down to observe and record the results. Most of His efforts to advance the experiment failed, but several had taken root and even flourished. He now visited frequently and currently occupied one in particular that even He found amazing. Eden had become one of His favorites immediately - it had a certain flair that appealed to Him somehow, and He felt vindicated in seeing that His understanding of His creations had obviously not failed Him. Seeing evolution proceed to it's current level and demonstrating rational and coherent thought served to sustain hope that He was finally on the right track.

Humans were without doubt a giant leap forward, quite possibly THE beginning of the end of His personal quest. What had taken the Grinn eons to accomplish, they seemingly did overnight. From the primordial ooze that Jehovah had sown, their predecessors had swam, crawled, and clawed their way up the evolutionary ladder until they became what stood before Him today. Jehovah now knew in his heart that Adam and his decendants could be the final link in the chain. They questioned everything and sought the answers relentlessly. It all somehow felt right, all of the building blocks were in place, and He felt something ... triumph ... anxious to report to the Grinn His success in this tiny but significant part of the Grand Experiment. It was now time to leave and allow the humans who had inherited His creation to do with it as they would, undisturbed and uninfluenced by their Creator. The world was theirs to build or destroy, the universe theirs to conquer and explain. Only time would prove whether Jehovah had been right, and that this new life could provide the last clue needed to solve the riddle that was the Grinn by crossing over, becoming Their equals ... or their betters.