Our name for ourselves is simply the People, reflecting the lack of any other race in the galaxy to compare ourselves to by name. We know of just two other races, both long dead, of which Homo sapiens is one. The other we know only through a handful of artifacts—ancient pyramids—beacons marking a forgotten and disrupted path through the galaxy. I have seen one of the Pyramid Planets. I was a member of the first follow-up expedition, in the early days of our exploration of the galaxy. The Pyramids were signaling machines, driven by a technology it took us millennia to comprehend. Sadly, by the time we saw the beacon, the pyramid builders had vanished. I say “I have seen” though I remember nothing of it. That went, as part of my first Erasure. But it is in my record. The rest of the galaxy, as far as we have been able to map it, is empty and lifeless. We have found places where, in time, we believe life may emerge. These nurseries we protect and—carefully—study. Other galaxies?
