by deviantArt Contest Runner Up | Apr 5, 2008 | Story
Author : Todd Keisling
“People of Earth, hear me!”
The transient stood in the center of the station and held a large placard that read “THEY’RE WATCHING.” The few commuters who paid him any attention allowed a large distance between themselves and this poor, confused soul.
“The Shadow Government that controls this planet does not want me to tell you what I know. They know I know, and I must make haste before they triangulate on my position.”
His voice was studious and eloquent. It came as a shock to the few who noticed. This dump-dweller, with his drab army fatigues, plump winter parka (despite the Summer temperatures) and vacant look in his eye, was the speaker of such intelligent diction?
Those who managed to hold his stare did not do so for long. Their eyes were distracted by the carefully sculpted hat of tin foil on his head.
“We are the last remaining few! When Atlantis sank, it was only part of their master plan to enslave humanity. They keep us in bondage by partitioning out the airwaves in small, digestible chunks, easy for our tiny minds to swallow while they withhold that which they do not want us to know.”
One of the few commuters actually paying attention spoke up and said, “I thought Atlantis was a myth?”
“That’s what they want you to think,” the vagrant countered, pointing in the young lad’s direction. “They want you to believe that. Area 51 isn’t really a secret lab for testing alien spacecraft. There are no aliens. There never was a moon landing. We are alone, but they want us to fear the possibility of extraterrestrial existence. They pump our minds full of Hollywood glamour and lies. Fear is their bargaining chip. It’s their foothold over civilization—so it has been, and so it always will.
“But I know. I know too well. They couldn’t keep me contained at Groom Lake, and they won’t keep me contained here. They think they can steal my brainwaves and turn me into one of their sheep—”
He pointed to the tin foil hat. He didn’t notice the approach of two security guards.
“—but I know how to beat them. The men who run this Shadow Government want us to remain asleep in our beds of fear, and their—hey, let me go!”
The vagrant offered little resistance. While one guard handcuffed him, the other took his sign. As they ushered him out, some commuters heard him say, “They can’t keep me! They’ll never get my brainwaves!”
And then they were gone. The station returned to its normal hustle and bustle, the low drone of human voices and shuffling feet. Across the lobby, two men in black, three-piece suits and fedoras put out their cigarettes, stared at one another for a brief moment and then erupted into laughter.
“And all this hoopla about Area 51! Everyone knows it’s one of our subterranean retirement centers,” one said.
“‘The men who run this Shadow Government,'” said the other.
“I know! It’s absurd!”
“As if there ever was such a thing! Men and their self-absorbed fantasies. The human mind still astounds me. Do you think it’s safe, letting the last few run free like this?”
“Oh, I’m sure the Collective knows best. As long as they don’t know the truth, Plan X will continue.”
“I suppose you’re right, Krelyx. ‘No moon landing,’ indeed.”
They cackled as they vanished into a passing crowd of commuters.
by deviantArt Contest Runner Up | Apr 4, 2008 | Story
Author : Salli Shepherd
In Fresno, California, Kalisha Henderson jacks herself in to a palm-length, slimline psii-pod and closes her eyes. She is young, barely in her teens, and her mind soon fills with images of pink, prancing horses with horns of silver.
She hasn’t yet learnt to hold her impressions well or long enough to leave a decent neural imprint. Soon the horses shred and tatter, fading into cartoonish, equine ghosts. With a low moan of despair, she watches her popularity rate spike briefly and then plummet again to almost zero. She’ll have to try harder, much harder, if she is ever going to succeed. She also realises her Subscription is running out and, in anticipation of that terrible loss, weeps loudly into her hands.
On the other side of the world, Peter O’Flaherty is enjoying the fruit of being a Master of his art. From Peter’s psii-pod and thence into ArtiCon’s main gallery flows a horrifically lifelike pack of Hell Hounds, slavering and many-limbed, set loose on a roomful of barebreasted cat-women. Millions watch the carnage, enthralled, and for every minute they do so a credit leaks from their account to ArtiCon’s coffers. Peter will see one ten-thousandth of the money, but he doesn’t care. His popularity rate just went through the roof, and the subsequent endorphin reward meted out to him through the Subscriber chip embedded in his temporal lobe sets him shivering, pleasure dripping wet and warm down his thigh.
They are just two, among six billion Subscribers.
Kalisha’s little burst of misery, a mere drop in the ocean, is nevertheless a  source of great happiness to Narghaflog. Roughly the size and shape of an inflated sleeping-bag, the alien hooked up to ArtiCon’s artificial brain by hairlike microfilaments quivers and blubbers in joy. What fuel these creatures provide! What manner of mesmeric delicacies! Narghaflog’s entire planet is beholden to It for this cheap source of food, fuel and entertainment. And to think, It almost passed the place by. With a pulse of neurons and self-satisfaction, the great Arcturean explorer transmits a message to Its second-in-command.
“Lhamayaoh! Plant discord in that large spike on Subscriber #27985362, immediately.â€
The lesser creature does as It is bidden, proceeding to insert a twin trend of manufactured outrage and disapproval into Peter O’Flaherty’s rating stream. Immediately, a massive wave of murderous anger drives response levels off the chart– Peter’s dedicated fans and followers, numbering in their millions, won’t stand for the creations of their favourite Dream-Weaver being sullied by unfavourable critique.
Moments later, the slug-like denizens of Arcturus let out a telepathic roar of approval as a tide of human rage floods at the speed of Thought across space, permeating their depleted auric channels. Narghaflog allows a final shudder of pleasure to wobble Its colourless flesh before turning back to the neural monitors, thanking the Spawn-Source for happy accidents and the limitless vanity of artists.
by deviantArt Contest Runner Up | Apr 3, 2008 | Story
Author : DarlingDante
Dr. Hammond mopped the sweat from his forehead, his round red cheeks heaving in labored breath. He’d maintained a manicured composure during countless conferences, lectures, and even the couple of morning news shows he’d smiled through, but on the day of the test, a beaded crown of anxiety hung on his brow.
Newspaper headlines around the world read: “Hammond’s Miracle Machineâ€, “Energy from the Airâ€, “A New Beginningâ€, and so on. He knew the technical aspect of his work was lost on most of his colleagues, let alone the average individual, but as long as he flashed a chart or a diagram on TV, and the people who were supposed to know what they were talking about agreed with him, that was good enough for everybody.  Â
A smiling head popped into his office from the hallway “Almost show time Dr.!†Dr. Hammond barely nodded in acknowledgement. The flimsy familiar office chair that he’d grown old and fat in creaked as his weight shifted slowly off its edge. “Showtime†he muttered to himself.
He could see the machines busy with activity. Engineers checked over every inch of the mechanisms and, from the distance of the observation window, looked like ants swarming on a stick jabbed in their nest. The Nevada sky was clear, and although he couldn’t see them, he knew that there were thousands of spectators from around the world huddled in a half circle behind the safety mark. Little villages of onlookers had popped up out of the desert around the testing site in the weeks before. He had been so angry that a member of his staff had been careless or stupid enough to leak the location then, but now that the day had come, he knew it wouldn’t matter. His life’s work was framed in the long glass in front of him, as if some grand or mad painter had seen the whole of him and spread it out on crystalline canvas. The observation room was private by his request. He wanted silence at the climax of his life.
Dr. Hammond’s moment of reflection was interrupted by a hasty knock, followed by the door to his sanctuary being flung open. Robert, his chief assistant, dashed inside with a bundle of computer printouts tucked under his arm. Robert was the only other man alive that had understood some of the critical workings of the project, and in some minor ways contributed to its fruition.
“Dr. we really need to talk.†Robert sputtered, catching his breath. His words sounded discordant in the vacuum of Hammond’s haven.
“Well what’s so important?â€Hammond spat back with a look on his face as if he’d been struck.
“I know you’ve told me to relax and enjoy myself, but I couldn’t help going back over the numbers, and some things just didn’t add up.â€
He turned his back to Robert, again fixing his gaze on the edifice that was preparing to activate.
“The numbers are fine.â€
“Doctor, I really think we should take some time to look this over…†Robert trailed off, and after a moment’s hesitation said: “We are going to have to reschedule the test.â€
A small smile crept across Dr. Hammond’s wide cheeks.
“The numbers are fine.â€
The countdown blurred into a hum of syllables sounding to Dr. Hammond like a backwards count into anesthetic sleep. There was a brilliance that seemed to darken the crystal sky, then a violent shake that split the awful image of achievement into fragments. As the concussion rushed toward his outpost, Dr. Hammond pressed his palm to the glass.
“It’s finally finished.â€
by deviantArt Contest Runner Up | Apr 2, 2008 | Story
Author : naquoya
It ended as it always was. Just me with my thoughts bidding farewell to the only friend I really knew. At least he was the only one who really knew me.
There was no grave site. No urn to hold his burnt remains. No, there was just my memories of him, which will fade in time I guess. He told me they would. He told me they always do. How do you let go of something you have held onto for so long?
My shrink said it was just a faze. It will pass, it had to.
“These drugs are designed for your condition” he told me. He never told me what that condition was.
“But I don’t want to lose him.”
My shrink didn’t understand. It was his job to not understand. My family, they just wished I would grow up and be normal.
Sometimes I feel I was born into the wrong body. Or perhaps the wrong time. Or perhaps the wrong place. But I once found the place for me. He took me there.
“Did I tell you about the time he took me to his home?” My shrink gave me that look. The look that says ‘what am I to do with you’. What he did was up the dosage. He always did. It cost me my friend.
It’s not my shrinks fault. I was just born into the wrong body. Or perhaps the wrong time. Or was it the wrong place? Ah yes, there was that other place. His place. He took me there once. I tried to tell others about it. No one would listen. No one listens when they think you’re crazy. My friend, well he listened. He took me home, to his place.
To his world. A world of lights and movement. And buildings. I’ve never seen so many buildings. And they pierced the sky. It was just so beautiful. I know, I was there. I didn’t dream it.
The drugs tell me I did. My shrink tells me I did. My family tell me I did. But I didn’t. And now it’s starting to fade.
He told me it would.
by deviantArt Contest Runner Up | Apr 1, 2008 | Story
Author : ifrozenspiriti
“True knowledge comes from memory,” he proclaimed to the gathered smiles and nods. “Memory is what makes us human.”
The next morning, he fed the memory of lackluster lovemaking and asthmatic perfume staining hotel-white pillowcases to the Machine, along with the memory of breakfast’s runny eggs and the remnants of dreams—bright, sticky, meaningless.
It bulged with hoarded humanity: documents, dictionaries, translations; photographs, paintings, cave art; poetry. And now, technicians in white lab coats (for tradition’s sake) fed it countless small metallic squares; and now, it fed on memory.
The Machine was the answer.
“The meaning of life?” he asked the crowd. “How can we even consider the possibility, inadequately armed as we are with just our individual memories?” There was always whispering at this point, the sibilant rustling of coat sleeves and comprehension.
As the people filed out of the room—some silent, some whispering to family members—they each picked up a square before stepping into the icy wind of normalcy. No one left without a square.
Some of them, filled with a buoying sense of righteous self-importance, would go home immediately and spend the remainder of the evening reciting their recalled lives into the squares. They’d send them off in the morning, and they’d wipe their hands on their thighs and smile at that sense of accomplishment, of significance; and then they’d rush off to work with the smile slowly sinking into a cup of gas-station coffee.
Some of them would go home and watch TV and forget about the squares, buried under phone bills and pizza-delivery pamphlets and appointment cards and the other accumulated detritus of everyday life. And then they’d wake, days or weeks or months later, to a sensation of unexplained guilt; and then they’d clean off the kitchen counter and discover the squares, still shining, and hastily record some record of Life and send them off Priority.
Some of them would finally fall asleep to echoes of dystopian daydreams. They’d wait weeks to send the squares, watching them warily for signs of mind control, before finally giving in to family-member rebukes. They’d whisper something rushed and send them away, feeling somehow lessened.
And then technicians in white lab coats (for tradition’s sake) would feed the squares to the Machine.
“It will be a great day indeed for our humble humanity when this project is complete,” he said, and his was the voice of prophecy.
He’d lost track, long ago, of how many times he’d delivered the same speech. At first, to elegantly clinking clusters of Society over thin-stemmed sips of wine, while the Machine was still a novelty among the cities’ highest circles. Then, as the advertisements increased and rumors tore through towns like whirlwinds, there were more stars visible in the country-clearer sky than in the ratings of his hotels.
“When all human experience is contained within a single vessel . . . a vessel equipped with the most advanced problem-solving pattern-recognition software ever imagined. . . . Well.” And the crowd was left drifting for a few seconds on those glimmering clouds of promise.
He smiled as they left, pale beneath the podium-bleach of the lights, and wondered when the question would be asked. He watched the (ever-smaller) crowd collect their squares, and wondered what would happen when the most advanced problem-solving pattern-recognition software ever imagined tried to categorize the accidental, tried to organize the entropic.
The next morning, he’d feed these thoughts to the Machine.
