Children of Time

In a far-future setup, a terraforming and uplift experiment on a new planet goes wrong, and a nanovirus intended to accelerate monkeys instead transforms local spiders into an intelligent civilization. Their society develops across generations while the planet changes around them, creating a parallel history of adaptation, technology, and conflict.

In a second thread, the remnants of humanity flee a ruined Earth aboard an ark ship, crossing space for centuries or millennia in suspended animation. As their ship slowly makes its way toward a seemingly suitable world, human factions, scarcity, and time itself reshape what survives of their civilization.

The two threads converge when the human survivors reach the planet and discover it is already inhabited by the spider civilization. The resulting collision forces both species to confront survival, fear, communication, and the consequences of human ambition.