PeterWatts_Blindsight

Peter Watts 71 Blindsight
Chelsea just didn't understand sexual politics. Sure she'd edited
brains for a living, but maybe she'd just memorized all that
circuitry without giving any thought to how it had arisen in the first
place, to the ultimate rules of natural selection that had shaped it.
Maybe she honestly didn't know that we were evolutionary
enemies, that all relationships were doomed to failure. If I could
slip that insight into her head— if I could charm my way past her
defenses— maybe we'd be able to hold things together.
So I thought about it, and I came up with the perfect way to raise
her awareness. I wrote her a bedtime story, a disarming blend of
humor and affection, and I called it
The Book of Oogenesis
In the beginning were the gametes. And though
there was sex, lo, there was no gender, and life was
in balance.
And God said, "Let there be Sperm": and some
seeds did shrivel in size and grow cheap to make,
and they did flood the market.
And God said, "Let there be Eggs": and other
seeds were afflicted by a plague of Sperm. And yea,
few of them bore fruit, for Sperm brought no food
for the zygote, and only the largest Eggs could
make up the shortfall. And these grew yet larger in
the fullness of time.
And God put the Eggs into a womb, and said,
"Wait here: for thy bulk has made thee unwieldy,
and Sperm must seek thee out in thy chambers.
Henceforth shalt thou be fertilized internally." And
it was so.
And God said to the gametes, "The fruit of thy
fusion may abide in any place and take any shape.
It may breathe air or water or the sulphurous muck
of hydrothermal vents. But do not forget my one
commandment unto you, which has not changed
from the beginning of time: spread thy genes."