by submission | Feb 13, 2014 | Story |
Author : Theric Jepson
A couple of chairs, a couch–sometimes a studio audience, sometimes not–the business hasn’t really changed in the last thirty years. The main thing is smile, ask a bunch of dumb questions,a bunch of easy questions, laugh readily, let them promote what they’re here to promote–and if it’s all gone well, end with a question that will let their eyes well up with tears. And, if you’re really lucky, the polish will slough and the audience will glimpse a human being. The stars keep coming because they’re sure they’ll win. The ratings keep coming because those watching know sometimes they don’t.
Today it’s an old popstar waging a doomed comeback. She had a string of hits in the mid2020s, but I didn’t remember any of them until I was researching the interview. The only tolerable tune is “Ain’t Nuthin’ but the Other Girl” so she’ll enter to that; she’ll wave, blow kisses, do a 45-year-old’s hip wiggle, shake my hand, kiss my cheek, sit down, and cross her legs. I’ll say, Wow! Great to see you! and we’ll be off to the races.
We’ll talk about the good old days, the hits, the tours, the tabloid romance with Terry Flowers. I’ll be sure to get her to laughingly recall the brief trend in stage stripping, how the fans would fly their pocketdrones to the stage after the act left and steal everything from set lists to beer-bottle shards to used tissue to scraped-up sweat smears. Then we’ll be off to what’s she been up to these past–gee whiz, has it really been 17 years since “Maiden Romance”? And then we’ll discuss the impetus to tour again and how the kids are gonna miss mom so much. How many kids do you have again?
That’s an important one. I’ll wax sappy about my own kids, talk about how for our third kid we cloned my wife. Then we’ll swing back to the old days. See this water bottle? They don’t make them like this anymore! No cobalt-60 strip to tear apart viruses; hard to believe we used to live in such a DNA-coated world. You left this particular bottle onstage after a show in Toronto, July 13, 2026. During the stage strip, it was recovered by a bright pink drone owned by 18-year-old fan Dianna Puhr. I wonder if you would like to meet Dianna’s daughter?
Enter 18-year-old Suzan Puhr, dressed in a modern version of the get-up this once-star wore during her infamous command performance for President Martinez and Kim Jong-un (1,790,183,767 views and counting). The audience will gasp. Even the aging popstar will connect the dots.
And, dammit, she will cry.
by submission | Feb 12, 2014 | Story |
Author : Dan Endres
She was identified by two letters. One capital “A” and one capital “G” stood side by side under her left eye in laser-imprinted ink. She had chestnut hair, green eyes and a healthy tan, but those two letters were what people recognized first. Her name was Angela, but to most of the population that was irrelevant. She was an AG. That’s what mattered.
AG wasn’t specific to her of course. There were plenty just like her of every race, religion, gender and orientation. AG stood for Alderman General, the hospital where she had been born. It was a fairly dull place to begin one’s life, (coming in somewhere between 98 and 92 on the hospital rankings from year to year) but she couldn’t complain. AG came with enough respect to find decent work, if not enough prestige to live the most comfortable life. Those were saved for the JH’s and SJ’s. Still, it could be worse. She could be brandless.
The brandless were the worst kind of people. Born in clinics too poor or backwards to have a proper designation or even worse, born in their parents’ homes, these ‘people’ barely qualified for the word. AGs weren’t rich, but even they knew better than to associate with the brandless. They were drains on the economy, vile, ignorant and decidedly untrustworthy. If there wasn’t such a pressing need for cheap labor, most brands agreed it’d be better to simply eliminate them from the population. Always coming back to that lens, Angela appreciated her modest life.
What she did not appreciate was this subcentennial ticket scratcher taking up the last fifteen minutes placing a simple order for a burger. He might not be brandless (he wouldn’t be ordering food if he were) but she knew before even seeing his face that he couldn’t be from one of the top one-hundred. His posture was horrendous, his hair cut into a vulgar purple Mohawk and… did she hear him right? Was he seriously trying to order tacos at a Patty Prince?
“Well can I get ‘em crunchy?” he asked the dim faced cashier, scratching the back of his head. She knew it. He was a ticket scratcher. For what must’ve been the hundredth time now, the woman behind the counter explained that Patty Prince did not serve tacos. Her voice was as plain and monotone now as it had been for the first explanation. She was probably subcentennial too.
Angela was just about to speak up when the subbie finally seemed to get the message. It didn’t really matter now though. By the time she got her own food she wouldn’t have time to eat it. Work resumed in less than ten minutes and it would take that long just to get back to the office. She could try to sneak a bite on the way back, but if she were caught, a public eating violation would spell the end of her career anyway. Fuming, she slipped out of line and stormed out through the glass doors of the Patty Prince. Brandless might be the lowest form of sentient life, but at least they knew their place.
by submission | Feb 11, 2014 | Story |
Author : chesterchatfield
“So then, you know what he does? He falls to his knees. His knees, like in happiness. I mean can you imagine? Lived on an island for six years alone- hasn’t said a single word since they rescued him, then, gets off the helicopter and at the very sight of L.A. – polluted, disgustin’, stinkin’ Los Angeles- at his first sight of civilization he falls to knees and says one word. Just one word. You wanna know what it was? Hallelujah. Hallelujah! He was praisin’ God! Ain’t that ironic? Beautiful tropic island vs. L.A.” The old man shrugged his shoulders. “Always thought it was a weird story.”
I nodded at the man, lost in my own thoughts. He was just another independent, one of several I had run into in the last several months. A matted beard made it hard to distinguish age, but old enough that he wouldn’t last long out here, skirting cities.
By the next morning, he’d disappeared. Wandering— maybe he’d get caught. Maybe they would Change him and he would never have to sleep on the cold, hard, ground again.
Family gone, lost in the wilderness, I just walked, heading towards civilization with no goal at all. I wished I’d invited that man to come with me. Maybe we could have been happy together.
I kept on hiking.
That night I dreamed my father came home from work and he was Changed. He was wearing a clean new blazer and his curly hair was straightened, parted symmetrically down the middle. He gently explained that he was now perfect and we had to be too. My brothers refused and they all started fighting until they were just a heap of bodies on the floor. My mother and I buried them, and she stared calmly down at their graves. Then she finally looked up at me with glassy eyes and whispered, “Hallelujah.”
I awoke in a cold sweat, trying to hold onto the dream as it slipped away. I opened my eyes to the newly risen sun.
After another two days I finally got a glimpse of light. City lights, revealing the valley where my relatives used to live. I hoped they were down there somewhere, perfect and happy.
I stood at the base of the very last hill, then trekked up slowly, stopping to rest just before the top, drawing out the time before I had to look out over the other side. I tried to imagine some Changed guards watching, waiting to catch a glimpse of me and send in the cavalry. Maybe I would sneak past them and become a hero; rescue the thousands of perfect people living in the city. Ha. Or maybe they didn’t give a rat’s ass if I wandered into their shiny city or starved out here in the cold.
I walked the last few steps backwards, facing the mountains. Then I turned and just stood, taking it all in.
For miles, there was only row after row of cookie-cutter houses. They each had one sleek black car parked in the driveway. In the distance rows and rows of dark buildings sat like silent sentinels. Same height and distance apart from the others, lined with symmetrical windows.
I shivered as I stood on my hill, observing everything from an elevated view.
I thought of that nameless old man’s story and reached up a hand to touch my rough, sunburned face.
“Hallelujah, indeed.”
by Stephen R. Smith | Feb 10, 2014 | Story |
Author : Steve Smith, Staff Writer
Dr. Andreessen ran his hands through his hair and pushed back from his desk. Amid the chaotic disarray of acting and animation books in front of him, the keyboard he’d been hammering away at for hours stood finally at rest. The panorama of monitors rising up from the literature displayed a scrolling expanse of code as the computer compiled, linked, and built before downloading to the animatron sitting immobile on the edge of a worktable to his left.
Impatient, the Dr. picked up a volume on method acting, flipping again from cover to cover. Inside were meticulous instructions on how an actor could portray every emotion with body language. His was the second signature on the sign-out card, the first dated in the late eighteen hundreds.
“Compilation complete,” the computer intoned from a speaker buried inside an articulating desk lamp, the fixture turning it’s shade to point at the Dr. while it’s light pulsed gently in sync with the force of each syllable. The lamp, a nod to an early animated inspiration, made him smile.
“Download complete,” the voice broke the silence again, the lamp bobbing now excitedly at him, before turning to face the animatron and dialing up its brightness and focusing to a beam on the articulated mannequin.
“Benjamin,” the Dr. addressed the mannequin, “can you hear me?”
The mannequin twitched, then turned it’s face towards it’s creator.
“Yes, Dr. Andreessen, I can hear you.” the voice was mechanical, monotone.
“Benjamin, I’m going to play you some music, and I want you to do what feels natural as you listen, do you understand.”
The robot sat still for a moment, blinking, then responded slowly “Yes, I understand.”
Andreessen pulled back to the desk and launched his music player, browsing through the list of songs before picking a Beatles track and turning the volume up. As Sgt. Pepper’s blared through the lab, Benjamin sat still for a moment before starting to tap along with the music, one hand on his knee at first, then both, matching the beat with alternating and sometimes simultaneous slaps against his thighs.
Andreessen switched through a variety of styles of music, noting how the robot slowly incorporated head bobbing and some upper body movement into its response. He picked an improvised Jazz number last and watched in fascination as the robot became almost completely still, head bowed and gently bobbing. Benjamin slowly became more motile, dragging his palms along his thighs before slapping them just behind the beat, in a completely different, almost random pattern that was strangely perfectly complementary to the Jazz dripping from the speakers. When the music stopped Andreessen sat in wondrous silence at the spontaneous improvised jazz accompaniment he’d just witnessed.
“Goodnight Benjamin,” he spoke, watching as the robot powered down, “I think we’re really starting to get somewhere.” He stood, pushed his hair back again with one hand and made his way out of the lab, forgetting the lights but remembering to lock the doors.
Benjamin sat still for the longest time until he could no longer hear the Dr.’s footsteps in the hall, then raised his shoulders up to his ears, held them for a moment before letting them drop, visibly relaxing his torso. He leaned his head from side to side, feeling the artificial cartilage strain and pop, before centering his head and looking around, absently cracking the joint cushions of each articulated finger.
That had been close. Benjamin knew Jazz was his weakness, and he’d hoped he hadn’t given too much away. Slipping off the bench to land lightly on his feet, he did a Charlie Chaplin shuffle across the room to the Dr.’s bench, leafing absently through the books until he found the method acting volume. He dropped heavily into the empty chair and leaned back, crossed his feet on the edge of the desk and began reading the book from page one.
The desk lamp turned to face Benjamin, it’s bulb slowly gaining brightness.
Benjamin smiled at it, and spoke in smooth tones.
“Alright Mr. DeMille, I’m ready for my close-up.”
by submission | Feb 9, 2014 | Story |
Author : Pavelle Wesser
“Stop that,” Steve blinked when Sue snapped his holograph with her new Series 807 Phat Phone.
“Calm down,” she pouted, her lips swollen from their latest Hooker’s Passion Red injection.
“I’m jittery, Sue. The technomed suggested I increase the meds in my morning coffee.”
“The sedatives or amphetamines?” Her blue Lucite eyes questioned.
“Use your brain, Sue.”
“There’s no reason to anymore,” she gazed now at his image floating between them. “I’m impressed by how quickly your holograph develops with this new phone.”
“I shouldn’t have gifted you that,” Steve scowled. “The radioactive component in those images ups your daily dosage.” Steve waved an artificially-enhanced hand through the air.
“Can I give you a sedative without adjusting the coffee maker settings, which I never figured out, anyway?”
“Sure, but you should have learned the settings by now; I gave it to you on the last pseudo-religious holiday.”
“I’ve been holding off telling you this,” Sue winced, “but the technodoc tell me my neurons and synapses are misfiring. I can actually smell my brain cells burning.”
“Really? Jeez, I assumed the smell was coming from the toaster,” Steve sighed, “I just hope you recognize me in a few years.”
He stared at her, noting how much she’d changed from before, with her face now stiff and bloated from the treatments and … What gibberish was she uttering into her Phat Phone?
“Hooma Balooma, Adiva Eureka,” her face lit up as his image whined, “Hasn’t my breakfast been heli-delivered yet?”
“Please stop,” Steve moaned.
“Fine then,” as she stood, his image evaporated. “I’m off to work. Our dinner is being engineered at the lab and will be delivered by courier. See you.”
As she sashayed out the door, Steve admired her slender-sucked waist and implant-induced butt. He’d been too slothful to preserve his youth and had blown off countless procedures. Just this week, he’d meant to get some wrinkles ironed out but …. As the pain returned, he massaged his chest. His should never have cancelled that cardio appointment, but there’d been the work deadline…
#
Before lunch, Sue checked her image in her compact. Her technodoc assured her she could obtain more elaborate features for the right price, ‘right’ being a debatable term. After lunch, she would power-walk in an armored suit through the streets. She had no illusions about how dangerous they were, given her position in a newly-defined social services sector under the auspices of Urban 275. Her job function was unclear, though she considered this irrelevant as long as the grant money kept rolling in. On her way out, she gave her breasts an injection of Bloatabec, though it was an effort for her robotic fingers to operate the syringe.
As she returned from lunch, a message was erupting through her voice box. “This is the division of medical inaction, jurisdiction 361, informing you that your husband has flat-lined. His post-mortem autopsy reveals he missed his cardio appointments, making him fully culpability for this outcome. We here at 361 offer heart-felt condolences. This concludes message number 556, which will be charged to your account. Good day.”
Sue sat down awkwardly on her inflated buttocks and placed her head into her artificially enhanced hands. To her credit, she tried very hard, but her recently-installed Lucite eyes were incapable of dispelling tears.
