by J.R. Blackwell | Jan 1, 2006 | Story
After a night of drinking, following the uncontrolled sleep of total blackness, there comes for humans a level of morning sobriety that is so clear it is painful. The white light of morning truth shines through to the black recesses of the human brain, and suddenly, the consequences of all those epic and sloppy actions of the night before pile like boulders, clear and terrible in the bitter morning.
In this cold, sharp daylight, Nima Atom was very aware of the two, no, three sets of alien legs that were entwined around him in the giant satin bed. Blue, green, and red bodies circled around his. Nima lay awake, listening to their soft breathing and piecing together his memories of the night before. As Nima gazed out the window in front of him, he became increasingly aware that the view he was seeing of the beautiful city, with its rounded golden domes, was a view that could have only been seen from the magnificent palace of the Shah-on-Shah, the ruler of the planet. Indeed, the lush fabrics and the little bubbling pools indicated wealth, and the slight and colorful figures that surrounded him wore jewels in their head skins that indicated them to be the royal wives of the palace.
Nima lay there, sober and aching, and imagined the night before. He had spent the night in a luxurious haze; beautiful alien women buying him drinks, escorting him from club to club, feeding him, encouraging him to sing, and kissing him with their long, leathery tongues. He blushed as he remembered being bathed in one of the pools by the giant window, where the curtain was now softly fluttering in the warm breeze.
His arms and legs pinned, he began to formulate an escape plan, a plan which first began with the artful extraction of his limbs from those of the women around him. His imagined plan stumbled in execution for when he flexed the muscle of his right arm the ruby woman resting her head there opened her purple eyes. She smiled at him, her sharpened teeth gleaming.
“Hungry?” she asked
“Listen,” whispered Nima “I don’t want to wake up the others, but I think I really need to go now, can you help me?”
“Why do you need to go?” asked a voice behind him. Nima looked up and into dark violet eyes and a green smile.
“Babe, I, uh, I’ve got a ship to catch.”
The blue woman stretched languidly, and snaked an arm over his stomach. “Stay. Eat with us.”
“Ladies.” Nima scrambled off the silk bed, wishing he could remember their names. “Ladies. The night was lovely, but I fear I have overstayed my welcome.”
“You really enjoyed the bath last night.” Said the green woman.
“”Oh, it was lovely, I’m sure.” Said Nima, trying to remember and forget at the same time. “It’s just that I’m sure that the Shah-on-Shah would not like me in here with his, er, wives.”
“We like you in here with us.” Said the nubile ruby beauty. “You lasted for two whole minutes with me last night. Our males only last for seconds.”
“Oh geez. Please don’t spread that around.” said Nima. “I usually last longer it’s just that I had a lot to drink and ““”
“You should show us how long you can go.” Said the green woman, her hands rubbing her naked legs.
“And I would love to stay.” Nima held out his hands defensively. “Really. I would. But I would also like to live. Living is an important value for humans.” He laughed nervously. “Um, yeah. So maybe, ladies, we could reschedule for another time, and you could tell me if there is anyway I could get out of here without the Shah-on-Shahs guards noticing.”
Ruby stood, her naked body glistening. “There is a way, if you follow me.”
“Oh, thank you, thank you!”
As they left through a door behind a pillar, Tiki leaned back and smiled at Ruma’sens green face.
“Poor human, he seemed so nervous. Perhaps we should have told him that the Shah-on-Shah encourages us to have relations outside of our own species.”
Ruma’sen patted Tikis blue shoulder. “No, third wife, trust me. It’s more fun for them this way.”
The two women smiled, bathed by morning light.
by J.R. Blackwell | Dec 26, 2005 | Story |
When Goldie opened her eyes and saw the colorful fish swimming outside the curved window, she screamed, loud and high. The big Ohma waddled over and picked her up in its fuzzy, globular arms, hugging the little girl close to its warm soft body. Goldie shoved the Ohma away and wiped at her tears.
“Stupid Ohma.†She said “You’re not what I want.†Goldie went to the kitchen, where Ammee was spinning on its circular base. Green tentacles reached into the storage unit and on the high counter, making food for Goldie. When she came close Ammee started whistling a little tune.
“I’m hungry!†Goldie clutched her stomach and fell on the floor.“ You take too long. You’re killing me!â€
Ammee uncurled a tentacle towards the little girl, offering her a peeled carrot.
“I hate carrots! How many times to I have to teach you!†Goldie kicked Ammees silver base, and it squealed. Goldie kicked Ammee again, and the base flipped over, food flying from the ends of the tentacles. Goldie giggled; Ammee had never been so funny. She kicked a tentacle, and it turned a dark blue. The Ammee twittered and Goldie kicked the base again, but it didn’t change colors there. Goldie opened one of the drawers and picked out a bunch of forks. Goldie scratched the tentacles till they turned blue. Some of them spilled out blue water on the floor. She giggled, watching the Ammee trying to right itself with all its tentacles deflated. Dumb Ammee.
With the Ammee on the floor Goldie could eat whatever she wanted. Goldie went into the cold box and picked out the ice chocolates and ate the whole box. The Ammee was still squeaking on the floor, spilling its blue water everywhere.
“Mom will punish you when she gets back.†Warned Ammee. “She’ll punish you for the mess.â€
It seemed like she couldn’t tear up the silver shiny bits on Ammee, only the squishy tentacles. Ohma was all squish. Goldie wondered if Ohma was pink inside. Goldie picked up her forks and started to scream. Screaming and crying always got the Ohma out of her closet. The Ohma trundled over to Goldie and picked her up, humming a little tune. Goldie squealed with delight and stuck the forks in its soft fur. The Ohma made a weird low noise. It tumbled backward and Goldie bounced on its stomach, squealing. She kept sticking the forks in it till she ran out and then she went back to the kitchen. Her stomach hurt, and her throat felt like it had food stuck in it.
“Ammee, make me medicine.†she kicked Ammees tentacles, but it didn’t move. Goldie felt like somebody was sitting on her heart.
“Get up!†she pushed the base back onto the floor, but the wet tentacles kept pulling it over. Goldie tried to pile all the tentacles together, but the floor was wet and she slipped, falling on her bottom. Goldie cried. She screamed her loudest, but Ohma didn’t waddle through the door. Goldie crawled across the floor, her bottom and face wet, her tummy hurting, and found Ohma where she had left her, flat like a giant mattress. Goldie crawled on top on the Ohma and pulled a limp, furry arm over her like a blanket.
by J.R. Blackwell | Dec 21, 2005 | Story |
Herring rushed down the wet road toward the dock. Thirteen minutes till the grid went live. Thirteen, an unlucky number. Herring thought about knocking on one of the doors in the first class residential district, pretending to be a businessman trapped by his late hours. It would have worked before his counterfeit identification card had been confiscated. He paid good money for that thing and now it was a loss. No one would believe he was second class without identification.
This morning, the city had turned the season to winter, the big clock that dominated the North side displaying a snowflake for the seasonal shift. It was almost ten o’clock, curfew, and the temperature was dropping.
Nine minutes.
Herring ran past merchant quarter, and those dark windows, everyone already home well in time for curfew. The only people out now were the police, flying above the streets in their hover copters. Herring ran for a block and then stopped taking eight seconds to run back to the alleyway next to the Cookie Crumble store.
Seven minutes.
Herring remembered one winter night spent without protection, how before the morning he began to wish for unconsciousness, that he might slip under the water and just die. The memory of the cold and the wet made him shiver. At the bottom of the silver Cookie Crumble dumpster, under the oily boxes and burnt cookies there was a blackened tarp. The tarp smelled terrible, like ash and oil. Herring pulled it out of the dumpster and broke into a mad dash. The cold air flowed into his chest, cooling him from the inside with each deep breath. His face flushed, the wind smacking his cheeks, but he could not stop.
Three minutes.
The dock was in sight, He could see the little crowd gathered next to the only pier with a broken scanner, dark figures under glow lamp. They shuffled under the pier, slipping into the water. Herring balked. It was two minutes early! How could they go into that water a full two minutes early?
He felt the heat on the bottom of his shoes and cursed. His watch was wrong. Herring cursed the guy that sold him the thing, the shop it was replicated in and himself, for not double checking the time. He was running during the Hot Minute. The minute before the system went live, the city turned the heat up on the sidewalks. His shoes were melting, making sticky rubber marks on the faux wood boardwalk.
Thirty seconds.
His feet were boiling; he could feel his heels burning, his socks absorbing the melting rubber. The ground sparked, and Herring screamed, falling on one knee. Current ran up his leg and shook him violently. Herring forced himself up and forward. His mouth and eyes were frying; his bones were shaking inside of him. He screamed again. Nearly there. A few more steps. He leaped into the water, under the pier, the salt water burning his feet, bringing water to his eyes. He gasped for breath and stumbled, head slipping under the water. He found footing and forced himself up, splashing. The cold bit him viciously, and slammed into his wounds. The chill of the winter ocean hung around his shoulders. He heard grumbling in the darkness.
“Sorry, sorry.†Herring shook his head and touched the bottom of his feet, which burned his fingers. “Shit.†He stuck his fingers in his mouth, trying to suck off the salt.
“That tarp smells awful.†Said someone in the darkness.
Herring wrapped it around his body, waist deep in the water. “It’s all I got.â€
by J.R. Blackwell | Dec 16, 2005 | Story
There were no trees on earth but despite this the Martian men took to the metal forest as easily as the native Martian woodlands. They battled the native Earthers in crumbling buildings and industrial towers, dead electrical lines strapped between sprawling cities. On Earth, this urban warfare was measured in inches.
Orion had slept in steel trees for a month now, though sleep wasn’t really the right word for the state of drowsy stillness he felt while resting in his net. Smoky earth days slipped into florescent nights and it was hard to make a clear distinction between them, loss of sleep blurring time. The stimulant pills made his heart thump against his breastbone, but it had stopped clearing the clouds from his mind, and even that nervous anticipation of violence, that fear, was beginning to fade against exhaustion.
Orion’s five companions were weeks dead, and he hadn’t the time to mourn them. Earthers used whatever weapons were available, black market rifles, stolen ray guns; they even unearthed toxins to pour in the path of the Martian forces. Earth was the cradle, earth was the battleground.
Orion climbed the high oilrig, one of the thousands that dotted the small cities, built to drill hopelessly through dry earth. Fixing his net between the iron bars of the rig, he lay and listened, putting his weapon on standby to save battery power. Orion debated taking a stimulant pill but he had only a four left, and wouldn’t get more till he reached the drop point, which could take weeks. Better to save them for the bad nights.
Orion set his motion alarm and tried to doze off, his last stimulant pill still rocking his heart. He imagined his heart must be bruised by now from bumping so hard against his breastbone. As he closed his eyes, his alarm sounded in his inner ear. Orion grabbed his ray gun and switched on his night vision, searching for a heat signature. Nothing. And then- a blur – a heat source climbing towards him. Orion powered up his raygun, shaking it, even though he knew that did nothing. The signature was eight feet from his position. He had three seconds till shot. One. Two. He pulled the trigger. There was a thud, as the heat signature reached the ground. The fear was back. Orion was awake the rest of the night, but there was nothing for those long hours. No more heat, no more movement.
In the morning, Orion climbed down and landed on top of last night’s excitement. The face was turned, and the smooth skin was splattered with blood. It was a child, still gripping a submission ticket, one of the many Martian forces had scattered over Earther settlements. The kid had come to surrender, and Orion has shot him in the face. Blood and bits of bone were matted in his hair. Orion took another stimulant to get through the day, no attention to conservation anymore. His heart pounded hard against its bone cage.
by J.R. Blackwell | Dec 11, 2005 | Story
Moresheck was one of the brutish, ham handed psychics that roamed the twisting urban alleys of the north face of Mars. All his rapes were consensual. All his fights were fatal. He was a free citizen bound only by his ability to pay for damages, but no one ever got far enough to charge him. Getting close to Moresheck meant getting lost in a personal hell.
He was thirteen when he had been manually altered, sold by his parents to the Corporation that ran Mars, pumped full of steroids and a cloud of little machines that created a complex cocktails of enzymes designed to produce emotional reactions in a projected subject. Years later the practice had been outlawed but by that time Moresheck had twisted enough minds to get himself made into a free citizen. Even the government Pods couldn’t touch a freeman. He wore yellow to appear dangerous and sleek, but it was the brain cocktail that really made people quiver. Moresheck wandered the streets invading minds, thrashing around in higher consciousness like a mad bull in a shop of Venetian glass.
Sleeping was the dangerous time for Moresheck; it was only then that people could hurt him. Moresheck stole pills so that he could stay awake for a few weeks before collapsing. When he did sleep, he crashed in empty apartments and in the deserted Martian sewers, where streams of mud slugged slowly under the planet.
Moresheck first saw the dark man outside the sewer one morning, just sitting, watching the sky and smoking as if he didn’t see the giant brute emerging from the sewers. Moresheck thought about taking his cigars, smoking was illegal and cigars were a hard item to find, but for some reason Moresheck just passed him by. Two days later, the dark man was outside a shop where Moresheck had convinced the employees to fit him for new clothes. Afterwards, he tried to remember the dark mans face and realized he could not. Not one detail. Moresheck began to grow worried. What if he was becoming schizoid? It happened, sometimes, to psychics, especially powerful ones. Maybe the dark man was his mind playing tricks.
After that, he saw the dark man more often, standing on buildings looking down, at cafes and hubs and transport docks. As much as Moresheck hated the figure of that dark man, he was for the first time since he was a child, afraid to approach someone. What if the dark man has the power to hurt him, or worse, what if the dark man wasn’t real, what if he would dissolve when Moresheck got too close?
Moresheck felt a heated pressure growing inside his body and he needed to blow it off, to relax again. Moresheck headed to his favorite little spot, one he saved for special occasions, the one with the girl with the small hands. Moresheck thought of her as his girl, his alone, the one who would love him and wait for him. Her mind was so soft, she would say whatever he wanted, however he wanted. An hour with her, and he could forget about the dark man.
The dark man was waiting in the street outside the girl’s place, hands jammed in his pockets. Moresheck tried to memorize his features, repeat them back to himself but they drained out as quickly as he said them.
“I think you’ve done enough.” Said the dark man, reaching into his coat. Moresheck concentrated. If the man was real, he would bend to Moresheck’s will. The man just stood there as the brutes face puffed red.
“I pay for all my damages.” Said Moresheck, shaking his head.
“I’m not with the Pods.” Said the dark man as he reached into his coat. “I don’t care about your crimes.”
“You are not real, dark man. You can’t hurt me.”
Moresheck ejected the little chemical compounds, the little bugs that changed the minds of his victims. The man pulled his hand out of his coat. Moresheck was surprised to see that it wasn’t a flash gun. It was a tissue. The man blew his nose.
“Buddha’s belly, Moresheck, your ejaculate makes my head hurt.”
“Fear me.” Said Moresheck, trying to inject strength into his voice. It was flat. He spit on the ground and scratched his hands, releasing more of his cocktail into the air. The mans nose bled, but there was no fear in his face.
“You’ve been all over this city, raping whatever moves, taking what’s not yours, splitting minds, making madness. It’s over, you are done.”
Moresheck roared with the temper of a thirteen year old boy defied, red faced, he rushed at the man in the long black coat, screaming. The man cut his own hand with an unfolded pocket knife, and splattered the blood on Moresheck s face. The blood boiled on Moresheck s skin, like acid on plastic, bubbling and warping. Moresheck launched himself at the dark man, wrapping his huge fingers around his throat. The man struggled, smearing his bloody hands over Moreshecks melting skin. Moresheck roared in pain, and then his eyes rolled back into his head, his body convulsing, a cloud of metallic dust blowing out his nose and mouth. Moresheck collapsed and the dark man rolled the giant off of him and stood, shaking his bloodied hand on the red dirt, which sputtered and fumed at the with the touch of the acidic droplets.
The dark man rubbed his throat where the prints of Moreshecks fingers were bruising his skin and clutched his hand, waiting to feel relief.
