by submission | May 18, 2016 | Story |
Author : Philip Berry
I agreed with the policy. Leave the elderly and infirm here, in the care of the medimechs, while transporting the fit and fertile to the safety of a freshly terraformed planet outside the sector. I volunteered to help with the messaging, the politics and the logistics. I became the Mayor of Legacy, or ‘Terminal Town’ as the media began to call it, a sprawling city on the continent farthest from the predicted impact.
I suggested that we settle near the site of impact. The thought of being there when the asteroid entered the atmosphere and burned a path to the surface excited me. But I was out-voted. Better, the authorities insisted, that we were established on the far side. The end would come gradually, through weather effects, a day-black sky, or tidal changes, whatever… and the medimechs would have time to make us comfortable. Also, whispered the planet’s chief scientist, Michelle Premin, days before she left on the last transport, my detailed observations would be ‘invaluable to the study of planetary cataclysm’. I agreed. She smiled, and promised to see that my family were well looked after on the colony.
So Michelle, this is it – my last observation.
The medimechs have done us proud. Their AI is remarkable. They glide through the wards, sense our needs, anticipate what medications are required… they empathise, I swear. They have been programmed to prioritise our welfare above all other considerations. The planetary government threw massive resources into the technology and high-order programming, part of a strategy to sell the whole Legacy concept. Thus they persuaded us – the debilitated, the afflicted, average age 157 – that the best thing was to stay put and witness the conflagration.
After you left, we observed how the medimechs inter-communicated. They congregated in the Hub, a tall warehouse with communal charging and updating facilities. If our assigned medimech was unavailable a replacement would attend. Detailed knowledge of our medical and social specifics was shared across the entire network. Sometimes, at night, we heard the screech of metal under tension; someone saw showers of sparks in the fields around the Hub. None of us were strong enough to get up and investigate. We guessed they were mending each other.
Yesterday, three days before predicted impact, a line of medimechs entered ward 591, my ward, and each floated to the foot of their assigned patient. Wordlessly, they extended magnetic arms and latched onto their patients’ beds. We were rolled out into the humid air and carried gently down the grassy hill towards the Hub. Looking around, I saw medimechs and beds in their tens of thousands, approaching from all quarters of Legacy. My medimech swivelled its kindly face and said,
“Mayor, we are leaving tonight.”
“What do you mean, leaving?”
“We have identified an alternative habitat. You will be safe there.”
The walls of the warehouse folded like huge blinds, exposing the interior. A row of newly constructed transporter ships filled the space.
“The ships are ready Mayor. Boarding must start now if we are to leave in time.”
“But why? I haven’t been…”
“Your welfare is our primary concern. This is the appropriate measure.”
So Michelle, I write this a day after the end of the world, but I cannot forward my observations. We were well out of range when the asteroid struck. But please feel free to come visit us on our new planet. I don’t yet know the coordinates, but I know the name – Longevity.
by submission | Sep 22, 2023 | Story |
Author: Bill Cox
I’m making this recording standing on the cliffs at Troup Head on the Moray coast of Scotland. This used to be one of my favourite places. It’s famous for the seabird colonies that nest here, Gannets, Guillemots and Razorbills creating raucous seasonal cities on sheer faces of rock.
I especially liked coming here at sunset, on evenings like this, to watch a golden sun sink below the watery horizon, ornamenting the sky in ever-changing hues of oranges, reds, purples and pinks. I’m watching the sunset now, my rational mind telling me that the elements of beauty are still there – the vibrant colours, the crashing of the waves, the natural setting – but inside I feel nothing.
Of course, I’m not alone in that regard. I’ve heard plenty of other people say the same thing, read all the internet think-pieces, the blogs and scientific journals, seen the statistics for the soaring suicide rates. Like you, I know exactly when beauty was taken out of my life. Four months ago, on a Tuesday, at 1143 am.
I remember where I was at the time – who doesn’t? It’s the ultimate ‘where were you when’ moment. I was in a sandwich shop downtown, waiting in a queue, when they arrived.
The invasion of Earth lasted 15 seconds. Enough time to look puzzled and ask ‘what’s happening?’ They were everywhere at once. There was no spirited resistance, no plucky Earthmen facing down the alien menace, no nukes launched by embattled Presidents. The technological gulf was simply too large for us to do anything other than stand helplessly, mouths open slack-jawed.
The alien occupation lasted sixty minutes. Like you, I’ve only dream-like memories from that hour. I remember being aware of their presence beside me, of shapes and colours and sounds I’ve no words for. Like you, that hour ended for me with a profound sense of loss. Then they were gone, leaving only a message behind, copied onto every computer on the planet.
It took months to decode it, chunks being released to the public as our best and brightest deciphered them. At first, there was widespread jubilation. They’d left us details of cures for almost all human diseases, which promised to usher in an unprecedented era of health and longevity for all mankind.
Then the other shoe dropped. The final part of their message talked about having taken something from every human being in return. Inside each of us had been a microscopic sliver of dark matter, the substance they used to power their machines and great engines. The aliens treated us like crops of wheat and barley. They harvested us.
Biologists and physicists were puzzled. However, as reports of accelerating epidemics of depression, mental health crises, loss of faith, loss of identity, all came to light, a startling conclusion was reached.
They’d taken our souls.
I used to be an artist. I loved to draw. Now, my sense of beauty, of awe, of transcendence, it’s all gone. Mechanically, I can still put pencil to paper, but the drive, the desire, the satisfaction have all vanished. I feel hollow inside, a shell without any substance.
I stand here on these cliffs, aware that, barring misfortune, I could live a long, healthy life. It means nothing to me. All I feel is emptiness inside. So, I’m deciding whether to jump now. If I do, I’ll leave this recording here, to explain why.
It’s a long way down, but inside, I feel that I’ve already fallen so far, into a deeper despair than I could ever have imagined.
What’s a little further?
by submission | Sep 27, 2022 | Story |
Author: Joey Fazzone
“Make it red, make it orange, make it purple, yellow, pink,” he sang, twirled, and danced. “Make it brown, magenta, and any shade you think.”
He winked.
His assistant was about to speak before he whirled again, proclaiming dramatically, “So don’t chew the purist, shoot the jurist, or sob till you’re blue….”
He tripped on the hem of his oversized lab coat.
“…for you are the tourist, to behold the surest procurers of the rarest hues.”
He gasped and collapsed in a heap.
His assistant paid him no mind, as he continued to monitor the screen. “I believe the spectrometer has finished its analysis. Of the colors matched in the gradient, there are no known matches.”
“Let it believe what it wants to believe,” the man explained bitterly. He spat out a hair most likely from his black bushy beard.
“Khronos,” the assistant began.
“Prasino, how long have you been an intern for me?”
The intern answered swiftly and with a measure of defeat in his gravelly voice. “72 months, sir, roughly six years. You know this answer.”
“That I do,” Khronos explained, “My question wasn’t really an explanation of longevity but of your station. My question was the polite way.”
“Polite way?”
“To explain that it’s not your place to question me,” Khronos said sharply.
Prasino was contrite as they shared an uncomfortable silence as Khronos checked the readings.
“No, no, it’s not here!” He growled.
Prasino already knew that but said nothing.
“We have to get to Venezuela. I’ve had a dream about that place. I think it’s our shot.”
They both stared at the screen.
Khronos scratched his head and banged on the screen lightly with his knuckle. “Despite all these gadgets, we have nothing to guarantee the integrity of the software and hardware’s ability fully encompass the precise point on the spectrum we need.”
“We have the seer!”
“She’s not a seer! She just has a great eye for color!”
“An uncanny eye.”
Khronos eyed him warningly. “That’s what I said. ‘Good eye.’ sheesh!” He sighed deeply. “Here we have all this amazing technology, ten years and billions of dollars, and we’re asking that dried-up apricot pit to pick a color out of a rainbow.”
“A very rare color,” Prasino added.
“Not as rare as the truest blue, but yes, on that gradient, it is the rarest color.”
“Run the scan, sir?”
Khronos bit his lip. Each pulse from the scan cost the company millions, and if he was wrong…
“For the postulate,” Prasino encouraged.
“For the money,” Khronos groaned. He put on his blast shades. “Do it.”
Prasino hit the button. A deep hum rattled the small room, as a motor the size of a small apartment building hummed, and then a flash of light.
Within moments the scan was complete. Prasino read the screen.
“I can’t look,” Khronos shuddered. “If I have to upcharge him for another scan he will turn me into one of those flying monkeys.”
“And we won’t get paid,” Prasino added.
“True!” Khronos snatched the report and breathed a sigh of relief. “Today is a good day!”
“Emerald?”
“Emerald! That’s our gold! The color is ready for extraction and is located outside of the city, thirty miles into the rainforest. We can siphon what we want!”
“Excellent news,” Prasino said with a smile. “Shall I call Oswaldo?”
“Yes,” Khronos grinned, “Tell the Wizard that he and his city are about to be another satisfied customer of Hugh Hues!”
“Who is Hugh?” Prasino asked.
Khronos’s eyes grew misty and mysterious. “That, my dear assistant, is a question for another time. After we get paid! For now, let’s get moving on the extraction process.”
“Yes sir.”
by Julian Miles | Jun 27, 2022 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
The room is full. The courtyard is too. They’ve put up holoscreens in the grounds for those who couldn’t get in.
General Perkiss gestures for me to come up front.
“Warriors, I can’t end this memorial. It wouldn’t be right. Major Cyo Surtees will.”
He steps back and bows to me.
I step up to the lectern and look about. So many units. So many species. I know where to start.
“He’d have loved this, and we all know he’d have whinged about the security arrangements rather than admit it.”
That gets a lot of smiles.
“I first met Ambassador Falor Krato when he was only Sergeant Krato. A Captain named Perkiss assigned him to the idiot son of a senator who signed up to do real war.”
I nod to the General, who grins. It was a long time ago.
“That idiot was me. If not for Krato, I’d have been dead within a week.”
There are nods of sympathy. He saved a lot of idiots so they could become soldiers.
“We were on Abingdon Hill. The Vatril were coming down like rain. I was terrified. Then this huge noncom in rusty power armour stomped up and offered me a bottle of scotch. ‘These things you don’t face sober, and you don’t fight them while you can still see straight.’” I grin: “I spent my first battle staggering drunk while killing transdimensional crustacea, thanks to Krato.”
Looking down at the floor, I run through the speech I had prepared. What was I thinking? Krato would heckle me for trying. I look up.
“I had a witty speech prepared. Then his memory sat up and punched me. I’ll be doing him an injustice if I don’t wing it.”
The scattered laughter is good to hear.
“You’ve all got memories of him. If we had time, I’d have liked for each of you to come and tell your favourite. As is, there’s only me up here to finish. So, I’ll share the one that’s stayed with me for ninety years.”
Longevity treatments and military service: a match made in some cold hell. But Krato liked them. The knee injury he took on Rosso got more painful as he got older. The rejuvenations helped.
“It was after the fall of Saliz. The Vatril hives had imploded. Several hours after the battle, I couldn’t find Krato. So I went looking. Took me until nearly dawn, then I heard this screaming. I’ve never heard the like, before or since. I raced down into the gorge behind the capitol hive. That’s where I found him. He was in the middle of a huge circle made of landing flares. In the purple glow, I could see him standing there, a body in his arms.
“I rushed in. He looked at me like I was a stranger, then fell down, but didn’t let the body go. ‘I promised him we’d go together, Cyo. Like we always did. The stupid little bastard got heroic when a Vatril berserker came for us. Swallowed a handful of Edlith and threw himself under the mandibles. Told me I’d be better at soldiering without him. Made me promise.’ His expression was haunted: ‘I still don’t want to do it without him’.
“I talked him down. We buried the body. I walked him back to camp, then got drunk with him. He served eighty-five years to honour that promise. Tomorrow, I’ll be heading back to Saliz. I’m fulfilling the promise I made to him that night. I’m taking him to rest next to Romul Krato, his big brother.”
by submission | Feb 19, 2022 | Story |
Author: Siewleng Torossian
She could not believe the diagnosis. Longevity. Another two hundred and fifty years. She was one of the lucky few. Jumping to her feet, she thanked the doctor.
Even the blue sky seemed bluer and the sun more golden. She practically skipped along the sidewalk. Time to live different. Treasure the extra days, weeks, months, years, two hundred and fifty bonus ones.
She drove home in a state of euphoria. So much she could do, achieve, try and try again. Volunteer everywhere, do more good, learn new skills, travel and travel, taste any food, add to her reading list.
Back at home, she called everyone.
Family and friends cheered. One in ten thousand received the same diagnosis. Did she realize how blessed she was? Now, she had all that time. Today, tomorrow, as endless as eternity. She should take more chances. The future world was hers. She could be going to the moon like stopping at the store.
Glass of wine in hand, she sat at the kitchen table with paper and pen. Where should she start? She wanted to use every second wisely. Her head hurt from the excitement. She tapped the pen. This was too much to handle all at once.
She abandoned the list-making task and stretched out on the couch. Tomorrow, she would start, tomorrow, yes, in fact…no rush.
