by submission | Sep 25, 2008 | Story
Author : Asher Wismer
It was about the size of a leaf, but a little flatter, with scalloped edges and covered all over with a glimmering sheen of circuitry. At one end, a little nozzle protruded, making a gentle swell in the surface of the leaf, while other, smaller holes ringed the circumference.
There were millions of them.
I watched from the dark surface of Mercury, feeling the faint, persistent gravity pull of the Sun beneath my feet. Mercury itself was just large enough (to one standing on its surface) to obscure the Sun from view, but everything in the “night” sky still seemed unnaturally bright.
I shifted in my heavy suit, resisting the urge to take my helmet off and scratch that point right between my shoulder blades, and watched the soft rain of leaves.
They weren’t really leaves, of course. With micro-micro processing reaching the theoretical limit possible without resorting to quantum mechanics, these were little more than chips of solar cell material, an electrolytic fuel generator, and a tiny gas reservoir in the center. Smelters, assemblers, and of course the hundreds of redundant computer chips that would one day form a cohesive brain.
In a few hours, the sun would rise over Mercury’s horizon, and the little leaf-ships would absorb and release massive amounts of solar energy, accelerating to .05 the speed of light.
Here, on the current dark side of the slowly rotating mini-planet, everything was gray and dusk, no sharp shadows of any sort. Even the shining star of Venus was dulled by distance, and the only things reflecting were the little leaf-ships. Far beyond, the glow of Earth was dulled by pollution and decay.
Once the little ships reached the Asteroid Belt, they would home in on Ceres, the largest known asteroid. They would use their miniscule fuel stash to decelerate and, buffeted by the faint solar winds, would land on Ceres’s surface. There, the smelters would smelt, the assemblers would assemble, and eventually they would build a rocket engine to steer Ceres out of its millennia-long orbit.
It would crash into the North Pole of Mars, vaporizing the mostly CO2 icecap and release it into the atmosphere. The added atmosphere thickness would help warm the planet, taking years off the projected time necessary to terraform it.
I would be long dead, of course. It had taken all my money to build the little fleet, and all the fuel I had left to get me to Mercury. This was my final project, my life’s work, and I would last long enough in my reinforced suit to watch the little leaf-ships flash into life with the Sun’s rays. The morphine injector would do the rest before the sun had a chance to boil me alive.
For the living, I make my final sacrifice.
by submission | Sep 24, 2008 | Story
Author : Roi R. Czechvala
It was just a routine patrol. Twelve men. Whitcomb was on point; I was bringing up the rear. He had just forded a narrow stream when they hit us. Claymores blew hell out of the main body. Seven died instantly. There was no mistaking that. When chunks of bodies fly, somebody wasn’t going home.
A couple of guys returned fire, shooting blindly into the jungle, the others were too stunned to move. Whitcomb splashed back across the creek. He emptied mags and reloaded as fast as possible; shooting randomly.
Green tracers ripped out of the dense brush. One tore through Mock’s head, still burning bright when it slammed into a tree behind him. Damnit, we were from the same home town. Now, suddenly, he was face down in the muck. Dead. It could have been me.
I pumped my 203 as fast as I could feed shells into the breech, lobbing grenades everywhere. I could hear the muffled “crump” of their explosions. They did little damage. Their blasts were absorbed by the thick foliage and mud.
I was protected from the hail of bullets by the roots of a tree I had fallen behind. The barrage was relentless. I winced at the screams of rage and pain as the guys fought back, furiously spraying the jungle; chucking frags everywhere. All I could do was pop up and fire a burst wherever I saw a muzzle flash. I jumped up and squeezed off a short burst. A searing pain ripped through my arm. I fell back into my hole, cowering like a frightened rabbit.
The firefight seemed to last for hours, but it had been only minutes from the first blast to the final round that whizzed past. I could hear the muffled voices of gooks in the forest. I eased up just enough to see them slowly emerge from the mist. I watched the bastards viscously stabbing the bodies of my friends to make sure they were dead.
One started yelling in that tinker toy language of theirs, motioning the others to Walker’s body. They prodded him, then were silent for a moment. A fierce argument broke out and they beat feet back into the undergrowth. I waited for hours before leaving my sanctuary. I wanted to be sure the slopes were gone. I had to collect the dog tags, the little metal tokens that proved my friends had once lived.
I couldn’t see very well in the growing gloom, but I finally managed to make out a blood smeared piece of aluminum on what had been Walker’s chest. I tried to pick it up, but it wouldn’t budge. What the hell? I grabbed and pulled…his body moved with it. It was a rib. I fell back in horror and stumbled over Mock’s body. The back of his skull was a twisted wreckage of metal and wire. I turned my head to vomit. I saw a thick silvery rod poking out of Shavers leg where a femur should have been. What the hell was going on?
Horrified, I crashed through the brush. Tripping over an exposed root, I was sent sprawling. I pushed myself up, got to my feet. I glanced down at my forearm where the bullet had grazed me, the glint of metal caught my eye. Confusion left me, and was replaced with a wave of realization.
I chambered a grenade in my 203, and slapped in a fresh mag. I headed back to the fire base. Somebody had some explaining to do.
by submission | Sep 23, 2008 | Story
Author : Ben ‘Inorian’ Le Chevalier
Invas charged forward, his sights set firmly on his enemy. The blood was rushing through his body, filling him with life and vigour. The only thing he could see was his prey. He leapt, and bore his adversary to the ground. His spear moved smoothly through the man’s lower abdomen until it thudded into the ground. The body slowly sank down the rough wooden shaft. Invas stood up and let loose a roar that sent birds flying from the nearby trees and small creatures bounding off through the parched undergrowth. Something was wrong. He turned, pulling the spear from his fallen enemy and levelling it at the new threat. As he watched with horror, the crude rope holding the flint onto the wood shaft unravelled, and before it hit the dust he felt a spear penetrating his chest.
The world went dark.
Invas charged forward, his eyes scanning the enemy ranks. His brothers in arms, his countrymen ran with him. He found a suitable mark in the enemy lines and hastened his pace. Invas drew back his arm, felt the weight of his weapon and balanced it, ready to strike. He ducked under the enemy’s spear and struck, smoothly running the bronze sword home, through the leather and deep into the soldier’s stomach. He tore it out with a grunt and spun, deflecting the sword that had been heading for his back. His new adversary turned the deflection into a spin, and brought the sword round, redirecting it into Invas’ own chest, tearing through bronze, skin and bone.
The world went dark.
Invas charged forward, gunshots firing all around him. He held his Enfield .303 to his chest and, head down, rushed towards the enemy position. Bullets whistled past him, hitting more than a few of his squad, but he kept moving. He was on the enemy emplacement. Invas shot the first man he saw, taking him out with a clean shot through the eye. Not having time to reload he smoothly stabbed the next man he saw with the bayonet. As he struggled to free it from the fallen man Invas felt a cold rush, and a blade in his lower back. As he fell to the floor he heard a man shout ‘Was zum Teufel?!’ and a gun cock.
The world went dark.
Invas charged forward, dodging swiftly between pulses left and right. His scanners picked up a signature in the nearby asteroids and he ran the engine to full throttle. He powered up the mech’s weapons as he rounded the rock and let loose a volley of his own pulses. The enemy mech was punctured by several of them, and failed to respond to its pilot’s frantic commands. Invas put the saber of his mech through its stomach and kicked it away. As he flew from the asteroids another volley of pulses fired at him. He twisted the mech and tried to escape, but a pulse caught his main engine, which offlined. As he desperately tried to get the engine to respond another volley of pulses squarely hit him. He was thrown backwards, and the cockpit filled with red light.
The world went dark.
Floating in limbo, Invas wondered what the next life would hold.
by Duncan Shields | Sep 22, 2008 | Story
Author : Duncan Shields, Staff Writer
I felt sick.
I had a fever and a headache and my joints were complaining. I shuffled across my carpet into the light. I stood looking out over the city while holding a steaming zipmug of CitruSinus in my hand. The windows overlooked a new age of wonder. It was a sunny day.
It would continue to be sunny until 4:10PM when a light shower would cover up the sunset. It’s the way I organized it. I’m the mayor. One of my duties before the dawn was to decide the day’s weather. It was my favourite part of my job these days. The job had gotten rough.
The secession of the East Side into its own forceful municipality had hurt my ratings. The arming of the homeless by the opposition had further damaged my career. The tasers and plasmawatt shockers were ostensibly for defense but assaults had doubled since they handed them out and vigilante action was on the rise as a result. The police were threatening to strike. I was about a day away from declaring martial law and going down in history as a Bloodmayor.
The city I had tried to help was almost out of my control. The people who voted for me were threatening to riot. I sighed and looked at my city and took another sip of my drink. There was smoke coming from the east side again. I heard distant sirens on the way.
I told the window to zoom in on the source of the smoke. The news channels covering that area blossomed in my peripheral vision as the window targeted and refocused. An ambulance had been tipped over and was burning in another east side riot. The lifeless drivers were being torn apart by a laughing crowd of pierced hysterical head-boys.
I thumbed my lapel and gave the order for a clearout. Two seconds later, a blast of light lanced down from the sky and incinerated a circular footprint ten meters in diameter around the ambulance.
I looked up and I could see that the maser had burned a perfect circle through the clouds. I watched it’s hard edges start to drift and soften and become chaotic cloud again.
Story of my life. I shook my head. I made my decision.
The next weather tapquest I sent out was going to read “two months of rain”.
No mercy. History be damned. This city had to be brought to heel.
by submission | Sep 21, 2008 | Story
Author : Ryan Somma
Ng’s eyes were straining as far as they could go in their sockets to get a look at the brand new shiny avataris sapiens parked at the end of the conference room table. His client’s attention was on the current speaker, a real-life sales person local to the building who was selling some sort of recently evolved market indexing algorithm. Ng was a real-life person also, but not in the context of this meeting. The avataris sapiens was not real-life in any context.
Ng had gotten a good look at it coming into the room thanks to his client lingering on it for what seemed like an eternity before greeting the other meeting members. The avataris sapiens was elegant in design and motion as it stood to greet everyone as they arrived, mimicking the motions of it user.
Ng’s suit was impeccable; his makeup and hair stylized so much as to render him almost artificial to everyone in the room, but the avataris sapiens was even less human. No matter how much Ng sculpted his body at the gym, lasered and tattooed his eyebrows into perfection, or whitened his teeth, the avataris was truly artificial.
Ng stifled a yawn, pursing his lips together tightly with a long, deep inhale so as not to draw any attention to himself. The client had brought him online at four this morning, which was four in the afternoon Eastern Standard time. This six am conference meeting was a natural compromise between timezones, but so was the six pm meeting Ng had attended for another client the previous night. He was fatigued and his stomach was grumbling for missing breakfast, but suppressing these human needs were what made him such a good avatar. Besides, the avataris did not need food or sleep at all.
“What are the metrics on this AI?” Ng came alert as his user’s voice came through his speaker, questioning the sales rep “What kind of return can we expect from its investment choices?”
“The best,” the sales rep answered confidently. “In simulation, our AI can outperform the greatest stockbrokers in the world. We are even planning a public demonstration of its superiority. It will be like when Deep Blue beat Kasparov at chess, historic.”
“And so another human chore will be automated,” a voice to Ng’s left said.
Ng’s visor-harness flashed, and Ng turned his head as his user’s attention was drawn to the speaker. It was the avataris, beautifully artificial, replicating its user’s speech and movement with more grace and elegance than any real human could perform.
The sales rep replied with a jovial quip that Ng did not hear because his user was focused on the avataris. Ng’s breath caught in his throat as he imagined his user admiring it, as if admiring a private jet or corner office. Ng knew he was to the avataris sapiens as renting was to owning, and he was the medium through which his client was seeing the next best thing.
Then, to his horror, the avataris turned its head slightly, noticing his stare, and it smiled at him with otherworldly perfection. Was it acknowledging the unspoken compliment in Ng’s user’s fascination? Or was it a knowing smile, intended for Ng and his obsolescence?
Ng’s heart pounded in his throat, and his stomach grumbled.
