Ominous cloud in heaven, Part-2 The Solution:

What Yamadharmaraj saw, blew his mind off its base.  Facing one direction, Chitragupta was chanting ‘If present shapes the future, then what shaped this present?’ Changing directions, he intoned ‘If future influences the present then what influenced that future? ‘Continuing, he murmured, ‘I am not what I want to be, then why I want to be what I am not?’

He had never seen Chitragupta, looking completely unhinged like this. This state of Chitragupta, deeply worried him, as he had never seen such an inexplicable and odd behaviour. As he was not privy to the nature of the problem, to understand the situation, he failed to guess, it was just a process of loud thinking. Unerringly, he came to a wrong conclusion.

Not knowing what to do, Yamadharmaraj did the safest thing - quietly walked away, wondering what bug had gotten into Chitragupta’s mind!  Pushed by his impulse, he decided to rush and inform Bramha, of his erroneous conclusion.

Brahma stood still for a moment, after hearing the message. Without pausing to think through, He decided to hurry along with Yamadharmaraj, to the spot where Chitragupta was exhibiting this odd behaviour.

What he saw, with his own eyes, puzzled and troubled Brahma, at the same time. He cast a compassionate glance toward Chitragupta, which incidentally broke the chanting spell. Opening his eyes, Chitragupta could not believe that Brahma himself, had come to visit, in the company of Yamadharmaraj.

In no time, Brahma understood that there was nothing wrong in Chitragupta's mind, except a deep philosophical awakening. This being a heavy subject, he gently told Yamadharmaraj that he would take over from here. Yamadharmaraj understood the subtle message, and left the place, a bit annoyed.

Touching Chitragupta’s shoulder, Brahma asked in a genial tone, “Any solution in sight?"

"Yes. More or less." Replied Chitragupta. This cryptic answer did not sit well, in the troubled mind of Brahma. He asked, “What do you mean by this?"

"I am just there but not sure of it yet", replied Chitragupta, vacantly gazing with a faraway look. This upset Brahma, and he almost decided to take Chitragupta to task. At this instant, Chitragupta came to the present and said, "The clue is so nebulous and right now the solution, is looking opaque. Will you please give me, some more time to think?  I will elaborate on it, a little later."

Brahma took the hint and returned to his favourite garden, hoping he could beat Chitragupta in finding that elusive solution. But in the end, it was Chitragupta, who came up with the solution, and met with Brahma, who was still furiously pacing, like a whirlwind.

Without any preamble, Chitragupta started speaking. “Let me elaborate on the chant, ‘I am not what I want to be, then why I want to be what I am not’ like this.  The leader of the warring pack wants to become the ruler of Earth and starts machinations to encourage and increase regional conflicts. These multi-front regional conflicts are then used to ignite wars in different zones. The aggressor meets with a defender and both vows to finish each other. One started it without knowing how to end it and the other fighting with determination, not to end it!

For the chants, ‘If future influences the present then what influenced that future?  ‘If present shapes the future, then what shaped this present?’ my explanation goes like this. The above-mentioned wars of, aggrandisement, ego-trip or trips of megalomaniacs, will definitely spill over into the future also, standing testimony to - present shapes the future and future influences the present.”

“Ok. But you have not come to the solution- from where and why, the sender of this ominous cloud enters the picture?”

“The answer is in the question itself.  Is there a war without destruction and suffering! Natural disasters such as earthquakes, drought, excessive rains, epidemics and pandemics affect whom the most? The answer is people who have nothing to do with these occurrences, is it not? These affected people themselves have decided to add another brush stroke, on the picture, depicting the theatres of war!”

“How? Care to explain this in detail?”

“Sure. I am just coming there. Among the people, who have sent the cloud, are some top-notch inventors. Relentlessly, they have been pushing the envelope of creativity. To show the world that they are what they wanted to be, embarked on, an unchecked invention spree of editing genes, creating table-top stars, mini blockholes, machines and mechanised humanoids able to mimic human brain in all its complexities. Unfortunately, these top-notch brains failed to foresee that their own inventions would become their nemesis, and such inventions would become the tool of destruction.”

Brahma could not take it anymore and asked in an agitated voice, " But these humans have been endowed with superior thinking capabilities and why should they want to wreak havoc on themselves and others?"

Chitragupta calmly replied, “A quirk of DNA. These people became what they wanted to be: an exception to my first chant.”

Sensing the trap, Brahma decided to deflect the conversation and said, “In creation, the human genome didn't have any such scope. Then how all these are happening?"

Chitragupta was ready with his point and replied, " None could have anticipated that the genes would undergo mutation and become self-learning to create more and more potent inventive powers. In effect, sitting in a room, a human mind can pin-point the exact location, where the Creator is residing."

Though, Chitragupta had deftly used general nomenclature, without naming him for muddying of gene pool, yet it unnerved him to know that a human mind might already be absorbing all these conversations. Brahma asked the next question, "What about the war mongers? Are they not showing animal like predator tendencies?”

“It is very easy to explain. Some of the genes, here and there, decided to follow their own abundant wisdom. They underwent rebellious mutations, bypassing a streamlined process. This accounts for the crop of aggressors, ego-trippers and megalomaniacal trippers. exhibiting ferocious animal like predator tendencies. They are our war mongers.”

“Chitragupta, so far you have only managed to draw circles around the problem, without hinting at a solution. I am beginning to see a cloud of doubt forming in my mind and taking position next to the ominous cloud. Don't you have any idea at all, about what has to be done now?”

Chitragupta, once again started to mumble strange sounding words. With nowhere to go, Brahma stayed rooted at the same spot, frequently looking at the ominous cloud for any visible change. 

Clearing his throat once, Chitragupta said, "I have found a way out. You can exploit the same gene that have been mutating."

Wondering, where this is going, Brahma asked, " How"?

During mutation, the gene had ignored to tinker with and retained this one trait without altering it. It is a weakness called self-first selfishness. 

“How that can be exploited, now!"

"You can grant a small extension to their life span, restricting it to only to the selected few, who have been affected and are in the crowd and appealing.”

“Would it not amount to showing undue favoritism? Moreover, Yamadharmaraj would be besides himself, when his system has to store more undeleted records.” Brahma voiced his doubts.

“No doubt, it would be an odd brush stroke, in the overall picture. Anyhow, wars will offset this imbalance, to some extent. Secondly, you can think of giving him some sort of additional perks on the job. Extensions and concessions work like magic on Earth. I am sure, here too they will produce the same effect!

“O.K, what about the wars that are likely take place in the future.” 

“We can prevent them by employing our own pre-emptive strikes.” Replied, a non-plussed Chitragupta.

Becoming curious, Brahma asked, “How that would be possible?”

“We use the life-extension granted innovators, to create lab-grown blackholes. These mini blackholes will suck in all the projectiles that are fired, in the battlefield, and obliterate them in zeptoseconds. When the stockpiles of armaments are exhausted, a point of no return looms large, the wars end as damp squibs. Though, fresh attempts will be made to manufacture more lethal weapons. As long as the life-extension granted innovators are willing to make good use of the grant, they will be willing and ready to come up with more and more powerful lab-grown mini blackholes. In this way, we could effectively   turn the tables on the aggressors! Now, instead of mutual human destruction, they will be busy in destructing new weapons and their new technologies!” The incredulous Brahma asked, “Is this your original idea?"

 "Yes" blurted out Chitragupta and after a pause added, "No, no. It is from mythology, where arrows, spears and tridents, with magical powers, have been used. I just modernised them with bullets, grenades, missiles and mini-blackholes!"

This lengthy explanation left Brahma speechless. He did not fail to notice the sneaky trick played by Chitragupta, using ‘we’, ‘our’ instead of ‘you’. Having done his bit, Chitragupta murmured something and left the scene. In the midst of suffering ‘ballistic missiles-hit like headache, Brama began to understand the import of Chitragupta’s plan. Worrying about how and how soon to implement these countermeasures, Brahma hurried home.