by Stephen R. Smith | Mar 31, 2014 | Story |
Author : Steve Smith, Staff Writer
Baxter stood in the atrium of Marpo One and gazed up through the greenery, through the clear observation port above and into the blackness of space.
Three years he’d called this home, he with the sixty three other lost souls that had signed up for the one way trip to the red rock. They were a motley crew, all skilled in their fields; geologists, ecologists, survivalists, mediators, physicians, and each with nothing to lose by leaving Earth and everything behind them and living out their days as pioneers.
There had already been two births on Marpo, which wasn’t supposed to happen this early, but confine men and women together and it’s a practical inevitability.
Baxter would be happy if he’d just had a partner for some recreational non-procreational activity, but nobody wanted anything to do with him.
Something about him had changed, maybe the long sleep to get here, or the time spent in a self perpetuating cycle of loneliness. The more marginalized he felt, the more people left him alone, which made him feel even more isolated, and that made for a Baxter people really didn’t want to be around.
He kept to himself, did his job, and didn’t think twice when the voices came to him, first in his dreams, then in his waking hours.
They reaffirmed the things he already knew; Janey the Botanist was a bitch, and should be run through the organics recovery mill at the earliest possible opportunity. Markus the Manslut was jeopardizing the future of the colony, and should be flushed through an airlock in his sleep, a sleep that would be blunt force trauma induced.
Not right now, however, for right now Baxter was on route to the atmosphere chamber for what had become the de-facto nursery wing to blow it the hell up.
He bypassed the alarm and wedged the door on the atrium end of the tunnel, shouldered his welding rig and marched towards his grim obligation.
“Alright Baxter, stand down.”
The voice in his head was familiar, but the message was new.
“I’m going to do what we agreed needed to get done, this is important for the safety of the mission.” Baxter shook his head as he spoke out loud, confused at the sudden inner conflicting instructions.
“When you’re ready, lockdown corridor three, opaque and disable.”
Baxter felt a new height of anxiety; the voices were still in his head, no longer speaking to him, now clearly speaking about him. Dropping his rig he took off for the door he’d come in through. Half way there the lights went out, then the tube filled with electric blue lightning and Baxter travelled his last few feet in searing pain into a heap on the floor.
“It’s always the isolated male that cracks. We need more women with lower expectations.”
Behind him, a section of the observatory ceiling opened, and a pair of black suited figures dropped into the hallway.
“Do we bring him out?” One of the figures looked up through the opening, awaiting instructions.
“No, everyone thinks he’s on Mars, so we can’t really have him walking around here, and the rest of Marpo Nine thinks they’re a hundred million kilometers from home, so we can’t really have him just disappear, can we?” The voice was clinical, matter of fact. “Load his welding rig up, open the gas and light him up when you’re clear. Un-wedge the door so the fire seal holds, he’s not using hot enough fuel to breach.”
The figures worked quickly, stripping the bypass and closing the atrium hatch, then dragging Baxter back to the middle of the tunnel before strapping him into his welding rig. One of them pressed a nicotube into Baxter’s mouth to moisten it, then rolled it between his thumb and forefinger. He waiting until his partner had climbed the rope ladder back through the ceiling before pressing the igniter and tossing the tube down the hallway. He opened Baxter’s tanks wide and then pulled himself clear and sealed the hatch behind him.
Baxter came to on his back with the stars flickering overhead.
He used to find peace in the stars, as a boy, then as a pioneer before the voices came.
The voices were gone now, and Baxter felt a old familiar calm.
In a flash, both were gone.
by submission | Mar 30, 2014 | Story |
Author : Thomas Fay
‘Some cereal as well, thanks,’ I said to the checkout operator. I didn’t specify what kind as there was no need. There was only one kind of cereal. It was nutritious, filled with all sorts of grains, nuts and dried fruits. Shame it had no taste. Not like Froot Loops.
I miss Froot Loops.
‘Will there be anything else, sir?’ the checkout operator asked. She looked to be about sixteen with long hair, an acne ridden complexion and a vapid look in her eyes. I guess some things never change.
It’s a shame everything else had.
‘No, that’s it.’
I handed over my credit card and watched as she deftly swiped it through the wafer thin reader. Seeing a satisfactory green light flash up, she handed the card back to me.
‘Thank you for shopping at Food Land. Have a nice day, sir.’
I smiled despite myself. This wasn’t shopping. Shopping involved selection, a choice made on mood, appetite, financial capacity and personal taste. The elimination of brands had removed choice. There was no more orange juice, apple juice or pineapple juice. Now there was simply juice. It kind of tasted like all the other flavors combined.
Looked like it too.
Most of the time I didn’t mind the lack of variety, the single words describing items as ‘butter’, ‘bread’, ‘coffee’ without any colorful packaging or creative names. It certainly made shopping easier.
And it had staved off inevitable disaster.
It was amazing that it took people so long to figure out just how much energy and materials were wasted on packaging, branding and oversupply. Companies had attempted to diversify their products to the point where almost every single individual was being catered for. A chocolate bar which had at some distant point in time been conceived as simply ‘chocolate’ flavor had evolved into about fifty different flavors; dark, white, fruit, nut, fruit & nut, dark fruit & nut.
The list went on and on.
Now that was all a thing of the past. Landfills were no longer overflowing with colorful packaging and expired groceries. The world’s population of ten billion was adequately fed and able to focus on more pressing matters.
Like saving what little flora and fauna we had left.
I didn’t mind the lack of choice. I understood why it was necessary and how it had saved humanity. It kind of reminded me of my childhood, growing up under a Communism regime in Eastern Europe. In those days grocery store shelves had been empty and people queued for hours just to get their hands on exotic fruits such as oranges and watermelons.
I guess that’s probably why I can live without the variety better than others. But there are still times that I think back to the days when grocery store isles had been filled with multitudes of colorful boxes, cans and packets. Some part of me missed those days.
And Froot Loops. I still miss Froot Loops.
by submission | Mar 29, 2014 | Story |
Author : Dakota Brown
His words were calm and thoughtfully processed. Though the harsh and forceful voice wasn’t as evident as it was previously, she still recognized what was at the heart of the matter.
He wanted her to finish the job.
The room sparked and stank of chemicals. The machine had begun its process, its result either finishing her job or extending the pressure.
The gears squeaked to a halt and the hissing turbines fell to silence.
Nothing fell into the machine’s tray. The process was a success.
She held the nothing up, showing it to the project leader. His breathy, monosyllabic retort signaled his content.
From where the project manager stood, his employee held a square of nothingness that showed only the space behind her. She held invisibility. She held the future.
He left her with a smile, a few words of congratulations, and (in his excitement) his clipboard.
On the clipboard she found the plans for her invisibility sheet. It would end war by making war and cease fear by causing fear.
Technology takes time to incorporate other technologies. Hers was the new one, and had nothing to combat it. It was with ease that she printed a larger sheet, destroyed the machine, and left the complex.
Discarded on either side of the Earth are two sheets of nothing, one slightly larger than the other. They were left as trash is, forgotten and useless, because “nothing” can’t stop war or fear.
by submission | Mar 28, 2014 | Story |
Author : John Kinney
The soldiers walk down the empty street, bathed in red sunlight. A gun falls from above them and clatters to the ground. A body follows it.
“Scan!” Says the Captain. He looks at the man who fell.
“Tick! Scan!”
They scan. Two men watch north, two men south. Two aim up at the building where the man had jumped.
“Clear,” says the Captain, and the group falls in. They watch the man on the ground.
“Oh Jesus,” a young soldier says. “That’s James.”
“What’s happening,” James says, his head moves slightly when the tick does. His eyes stare blankly upward. His shinbones protrude from his skin.
“Jesus,” the Captain says.
“What’s happening?” James says. He stares up at the red evening sky. The young soldier sobs.
“He can’t feel it, can he?” One soldier says.
“No,” says another.
The Captain sighs and raises his rifle, but as he does, the tick digs deeper. It digs down until James’ head cracks open slightly. His eyes roll back and he breathes his last breath. The soldiers all stand silently in the red light, listening to the suckling sounds of the tick.
“Well?” Sobs the young soldier. “Kill it already! He’s dead now, so kill it!”
The captain aims his rifle at the tick’s round, brown back and pulls the trigger. In a spray of yellow mess, the tick falls to pieces.
They walk silently down the road, their eyes scanning for the scuttling bodies of more ticks. Their ears open for the shrill chirp of the mantis.
by Julian Miles | Mar 27, 2014 | Story |
Author : Julian Miles, Staff Writer
There used to be a saying: “how long is a piece of string?” It meant that you didn’t know how long something would take. I never understood it. A piece of string has to be a specific length, because someone made it. So my reply was usually: “ask whoever made the string.” It didn’t make me popular. But it did give me that nickname.
I always had a thing for durations. Of course, to work out a duration, you needed mathematics. A lot of mathematics. Sometimes you had to come up with the mathematics that described each process involved. Turned out that I had a unique talent. I applied mathematics to things that they only thought that mathematics could be applied to. For them, it was like magic. For me, it was simply a process of envisioning the smaller processes, then the similar processes, then getting the numbers to do their ‘thing’: In my head, numbers would move about and settle themselves where they needed to be. Whole formulae in some cases. It was easy, but only for me.
When duration calculations got a little dry, I went into probable outcome prediction; the ‘tarot’ end of mathematics. My talent stretched to cover that too.
So when the world took a turn for the worse, the government engaged my services to do projections based on current situation plus various strategies they proposed. When my projections showed the narrowing prospects of victory, their proposals took a turn into dog-in-a-manger territory and from there down into last-man-standing.
My projections from the last seven options they presented to me ranged from bad, through grim, down to the extinction of life on earth. All with better than ninety-five percent certainty. They fired me. Sent me home with warnings of instant death if I spoke a word about their plans.
I said nothing. But my neighbours saw me move to high ground, one with a freshwater well and cave system. They saw me welcoming friends from all over the place. My neighbours were a solid community. They looked to their own and if one of their high-fliers thought that consolidation and fortification was needed, they would join in that work without question.
So when my former employers chose the penultimate option at the extinction end of the scale, we were ready. Well, we were somewhere that allowed us to watch the endless winter roll in. Ready would be the wrong word for listening to the transmissions that told of the slow death of over ninety percent of humanity.
It is day five hundred and ninety-three since the winter started. I’ve just finished new projections for my little colony. If we start eating each other, we can make it to day seven hundred and eleven. Otherwise it’s day six hundred and forty-one.
Looks like I’ll be asking for volunteers to make the foraging trek again. With less than a twenty-eight percent chance of returning. Because if they return, the prediction is that they will have found something that allows us to survive past a thousand days.
It’s out there somewhere. Five expeditions. Each time the chance of return drops by around eight percent. But the reward prediction remains unchanged.
Out there is our salvation, and all my mathematics can do is replace prayer in giving my people hope.
