Back before words were even words, elements ruled the world.  Back into the nether-years when the mist of the mountains was alive and very much magic.   

Something happened that sparked the formulation of higher thinking.  Thoughts, purpose, meaning--all were things to be had.  We formed theories about gods that formed men into nations.  The nations were bordered by wars fought over different ideas of love, justice, and life altogether.  

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IN A SPACE STATION OFF THE BRIGHTSHORE SIDE OF SOUTHERN MARS 

YEAR: 3036

"Men thought up the gods that they thought created them.  Were thoughts not the best slave-master?  Invisible and ever cloaked in vaporous reincarnation..."

Steeb Plubber contemplated the idea  folded his book on human zoology and laid it on his dresser.  He was a third level colonel of the Martian Thought police.  Every citizen of Mars was entitled seven hundred and fifty two thoughts per day.  They could be punished for going over as well as going under.  It was Steeb's job to monitor thoughts deemed irrational or strange.    

It was his thirty seventh year on the force and the thirty six years leading up to the current had been a breeze.  Mars was absolutely peaceful.  There was no ideas of work of commerce.