James P Hogan. Giant’s Star. Giant Series #3

The experiments were not successful, and soon afterward the Ganymeans disappeared. The terrestrial species left on Minerva rapidly wiped out the virtually defenseless native forms, adapted and radiated to flourish across the planet, and continued to evolve. . .

Almost twenty-five million years later-around fifty thousand years before the current period on Earth-an intelligent, fully

human form had established itself on Minerva. This race was named the “Lunarians” after the first traces of their existence came to light in the course of lunar explorations being conducted in 2028, which was when Hunt had first gotten involved and moved from England to join UNSA. The Lunarians were a violent and warlike race who developed advanced technology rapidly and eventually polarized into two superpowers, Cerios and Lambia, which clashed in a final, cataclysmic war fought across the entire surface of Minerva and beyond. In the violence of this conifict Minerva had been destroyed, Pluto and the Asteroids born, and Luna orphaned.

A few survivors were left stranded on the lunar surface at the end of these events. Somehow, when at last the Moon stabilized in orbit around Earth after being captured, some of these survivors succeeded in reaching the only haven left for them in the entire solar system-the surface of Earth itself. For millennia they clung precariously to the edge of extinction, reverting to barbarism for a period and in the process losing the thread that traced their origins. But in time they grew strong and spread far and wide. They supplanted the Neanderthals, who were descended from the primates that had continued to evolve undisturbed on Earth, and eventually came to dominate the entire planet in the form of Modern Man. Only much later, when at last they rediscovered the sciences and ventured back into space, did they find the evidence to reconstruct the story of their origins.

They found Danchekker attired in a stained white lab smock, measuring and examining parts taken from a large, brown, furry carcass lying on the dissection table. It was powerfully muscled, and its fearsome, well-developed carnivore’s teeth were exposed where the lower jaw of the snout had been removed. Danchekker informed them that it was an intriguing example of a relative to Daphoenodon of the Lower Miocene. Despite its evidently distinct digitigrade mode of locomotion, moderately long legs, and heavy tail, its three upper molars distinguished it as an ancestor of Amphicyon and through it of all modern bears-unlike Cynodesmus, of which Danchekker also had a specimen, whose upper dentition of two molars put it between Cynodictis and contemporary Canidae. Hunt took his word for it.

Hunt had practically insisted to Caldwell that if they succeeded

in arranging a landing for a ship from Thurien, Danchekker would have to be included in the reception party; he probably knew more about Ganymean biology and psychology than anybody else in the worid’s scientific community. Caldwell had broached the subject confidentially with the Director of the Westwood Institute, who had agreed and advised Danchekker accordingly. Danchekker had not needed very much persuading. He was far from happy at the manner in which the eminent personages responsible for managing Earth’s affairs had been handling things, however.

“The whole situation is preposterous,” Danchekker declared irritably while he was loading the instruments he had been using into a sterilizer on one side of the room. “Politics, cloak-and-dagger theatrics-this is an unprecedented opportunity for the advancement of knowledge and probably for a quantum leap in the progress of the whole human race, yet here we are having to plot and scheme as if we were dealing in illicit narcotics or something. I mean, good God, we can’t even talk about it over the phone! The situation’s intolerable.”

Lyn straightened up from the dissecting table, where she had been curiously studying the exposed innards of Daphoenodon. “I guess the UN feels it has an obligation to humanity to play safe,” she said. “It’s a contact with a whole new civilization, and they figure that up front it ought to be handled by the professionals.”

Danchekker closed the sterilizer lid with a bang and walked over to a sink to rinse his hands. “When the Shapieron arrived at Ganymede, the only representatives of Homo sapiens there to meet it were, as I recall, the scientific and engineering personnel of the UNSA Jupiter missions,” he pointed out coolly. “They conducted themselves in exemplary fashion and had established a perfectly civilized relationship with the Ganymeans long before the ship came to Earth. That was without any ‘professionals’ being involved at all, apart from sending inane advice from Earth on how the situation should be managed, and which those on the spot simply laughed at and ignored.”