by Julian Miles | Feb 17, 2025 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
He’s going to watch it again. Unbelievable.
“Any chance of a coffee?”
The stare is a definite ‘no’ with an attempt at being hard.
“You can ask for details. I was there.”
Plus I have complete recall thanks to my action audit unit. I got it turned on after some clown tried to blackmail me into assassinating someone, then died. Not my fault the police failed to arrive in time to defuse the bomb he’d intended for me. The owners of the car park even tried suing for damages.
Pushing the display away, he stretches, then looks across at me.
“You’re a lucky man, Jarn. Most of you stockers are garbage collectors.”
The link attached to my official statement should allow government types to see my unredacted specs. I’m not a stocker-
Oh, for pity’s sake. Another amateur?
Let’s see.
“I do okay. Except when people try to roust me. That brings back memories. The memories bring back behaviours, and those cause a reaction. Which is why I’m here. The dead people started it by trying to run me down.”
He gives me a blank stare. Now that one works.
“You trotted up the bonnet, stomped through a reinforced windscreen, then punched Mike so hard he expired before Tino could help him? How is that a normal reaction?”
Tino couldn’t help because my boot through the windscreen embedded itself in their chest, a detail you should have just seen. I looked straight at them before extracting my foot so the audit would get it clearly.
“It’s a combative response thing. Like this.”
I pop the restraints and flip the table out of the way.
They always think attaching the cybered arm to the meat arm means I can’t escape. I have stress plates bonded to the bones specifically for that. I bleed, it hurts, and it helps.
He doesn’t react. Where did they find him? I kick out and his chair imitates a tablecloth pulled out from under the crockery. He actually hangs there, arse in the air, before toppling backwards.
A boot to the chest keeps him down while I take his gun.
“How are you familiar with them, and why shouldn’t I kill you?”
Pasty-faced of shit creek looks up at me with a dawning awareness of how deep the brown stuff has gotten hereabouts.
“You won’t get away with this.”
“Entirely possible. But you’ll still be dead.”
And there it is: eyes going wide as realisation bites down hard.
“I was told to keep you offline for seven hours.”
“How many outside?”
“No-one. We were a three-man team. I roped in a cosplay buddy before I came to get you.”
No wonder they were quiet. Quick thinking, though. Especially after losing two friends.
“Where’s the quiet box?”
If this is a trick, there’s a signal suppression unit somewhere.
“This place is an old fallout shelter. No need.”
Clever. Thought it was shabbier than your usual police station.
“Right. You’re going to stay here for the remaining five hours.”
“Why?”
I punch him. His head bounces off the floor. Probably survivable. I’m out of here.
There’s an elderly man in an expensive suit sat by the exit. Either side of him are bodyguards. The one on the right might slow me down – briefly.
“Well done, Jarn. My name’s Ethan. I’d like to offer you a job.”
Surprise, surprise.
“No thanks.”
I walk past.
Playing games like this? You’re either arrogant or stupid. Either of which will make working for you a pain in the arse.
First coffee, then lunch. Bloody amateurs, bane of my life.
by Julian Miles | Feb 10, 2025 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
The com lights up. Sally: Bradford, New Britannia, Earth? What the? How long has it been?
I stop rushing and let my AIde handle it.
“I’m supposing you’ve not heard-”
“You have reached the residence of Chris Utten. This is Alice, his AIde. Speak now to leave a message.”
“Hellfire and chips! You named it Alice? Answer the call, Chris…”
She waits. So do I.
“I’m sure you’re listening, but you always were more stubborn than me. I don’t have the advantage of being an obsessive waiting on a target.”
That’s unkind. Also true. My efforts to hide it… Probably made it obvious to everyone except me.
“Until I heard the word ‘Alice’, I hoped you’d moved on with your life. Now I suspect you’re doing quite well, but not as well as you could, because you’re always ready to rush across half of known space to be with a woman who never cared.”
What is this, interstellar pick on a hopeless romantic day?
She gives a soft laugh. I know that moment: looking down with a shrug as your vape runs dry at the exact moment you really needed a puff, or watching the tail lights of the last transport disappear as you make it to the pick-up point on a rainy night. You frown, give that laugh, and get on with your life like nothing happened. You’ve never known how much I envied that. Just roll with the inconvenience instead of spending a week working through every possible scenario for the day before the inconvenience, so it would have come out differently. At least I can stop those fixations trapping or distracting me these days.
“You’re wondering why I called, aren’t you? I hope you’re sitting down. Alice died in a shoot out with the police yesterday.”
I stagger back and fall onto the bed.
She what? She should have called… Why and how would she do that, you fool? Twenty-four years and I’m still an idiot.
“Seems like she’s been using the same trick she used on you to make herself a comfy living.”
Trick what? I never got close. Just loved her from afar, so sure she had a secret thing for me as well.
“Unfortunately for her, one of her marks was working with Pargilians. They spotted her telepathic touch.”
Telepathy?
“Which is why I’m calling. I think you should come back and lay claim to your absorption field technology. You know the one: you mentioned it to me when Renntech patented the same thing a couple of days before you intended to. You said there was no way they could have found out about it, so it must have been a freaky coincidence of parallel development.”
But if their source had been reading my mind as I reviewed the design and patent application…
“Turns out you got lucky. Her recent marks all died in suspicious accidents. That’s the other thing that gave her away once the police started investigating.”
Alice didn’t need to kill me. Just needed to ignore the infatuated inventor next door while eavesdropping on his mind. I wasn’t a threat, because I never suspected. How could I? Psionic abilities are still so incredibly rare among humans.
Sally sighs.
“Come home, Chris. It’s time to get on with your life. I won’t ask you to stay. Just come and claim what you never realised you missed.”
I sit up slowly. She hasn’t thought it through. If I go home, I’ll end up fixating on her.
Alice is gone, and I’m out here.
Which is exactly where I need to stay.
by Julian Miles | Feb 3, 2025 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
…And so the seas rose again, while volcanos and storms brought even more devastation and starvation. Those godly ones who led us looked within themselves and made a decision: in their image was the world, and in their image it would be again. But until the disasters abated, they would retire. There would be a time of darkness, but they promised to return in glory. The people lamented, but their gods were resolute: in order for great things to eventually continue, many things must first cease. They were withdrawing to ensure people survived. Doing it with sorrow, but it was the only way: the best for everyone.
And so they went, along with their chosen, into the heart of the land. Under a great mountain they created a haven, and into that they descended. Outside the grand entrance to that place there was a vicious war, as those expelled sought to re-enter and the unchosen sought to enter. Many more – equally unchosen but loyal – kept both hordes at bay until the gates closed.
In the aftermath, a frenzy took hold. Countless were those slaughtered in the killing madness that seized all. In the end, vanishingly few remained. Of them, only one was spoken of with awe.
Jenna strode from those gates so covered in bloody ruin that even those still in the grip of the madness shrank from her presence. Out into the storms and wildfires she went. Many said she had gone to die alone in the manner of all savage beasts.
She did not. Years later she returned, bringing with her an easing of the furious weather.
Upon a crude cart she brought a slab, and walked at the head of a throng, each of whom brought a slab of their own. Big ones, small ones, every possible size, colour, and shape. This multitude confronted those who had remained.
None dared stop her as she walked through and right up to the gates. With enormous effort, she lifted the slab from the cart and staggered forth to set it down against the junction of the two portals. Then she sank to the ground.
Laying hands upon that slab, she spoke her last words.
“Curse you for abandoning when you could have saved. We will do better. Without the fear and greed, without the lies and cruelty, we will remake this world. Stay inside your white god mountain. Watch us do what you would not.”
She died at that moment, anchoring the slab with her life. One by one, those who accompanied her laid their slabs, first to cover her body, then to cover the gates.
Those who had remained were the first to go forth and return with their own slabs. The pile grew into a ring, and still grows. Everyone brings a slab at some point in their lives: to lay a burden down, to mark a new hope, in remembrance, or in thanks.
It is also the way of this new world to bind agreements by placing a slab. Not one promise so made has been broken.
Those old gods were both right and wrong: the mountain has become a shrine, but not to them. It is Jenna’s Grave, and we honour her with every slab.
by Julian Miles | Jan 27, 2025 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
“Does it ever end?”
Bruce rises slightly and turns to stare at Lilimya.
“If you don’t pay attention, it’ll end sooner than y-”
He explodes from the waist up, a wave of heat momentarily turning snowflakes to steam.
Lilimya is blown backwards, splinters of bone peppering her armour amidst a spray of blood.
She lies there looking up at the stars, wisps of breath rising from her respirator vents. High above, she sees the flickering light of a spacecraft manoeuvring in HEO, probably a drone hunting enemy machines. Combat outside the atmosphere has been automated for many years, just like fighting underwater. If the same had happened on land, Bruce would still…
She whispers.
“Sorry, captain.”
Then again, he hadn’t needed to face her to reply. She caught him off guard. He responded incorrectly. It goes round and round. They’ve chatted and even argued while in battle before. This time was just the time the big scythe in the sky swung too close to survive. With a sigh, she wonders who’ll be his replacement, and if there’s anything left to replace him in. Most likely, she’ll be transferred to another battalion.
Something grinds against a kerb outside. Lilimya powers down her suit. She grins. Start the clock: eighteen minutes to suffocation.
“Scan-far show-no fight-ers.”
The voice is loud and obviously mechanical, but the tone gives her the mental image of her family dog looking back at her while out walking.
“Good work, Arcady Twelve. Move to next zone and assist Unit 24.”
“Thank-you. Mo-ving. Un-it. Two-four.”
The something grinds against a lot more kerb, then crushes what sounds like a vehicle, before crashing and grinding off into the distance.
Somebody sighs loudly.
“Op Sight, this is Arcady Actual. Nobody spotted they had meat in this zone?”
Smug enough to chat with externals still on…
The reply is so cheerful it makes her wince.
“Sorry about that, boss Arcady. Been busy rolling up France and Germany. It’s not like you’re in danger over there, especially from what was likely a non-combatant.”
Lilimya boots her suit into ambush mode. We’ll see about non-combatant, you pricks.
“Op Sight, there are valid arguments for this country having developed the fundamentals of modern warfare. ‘That sort of potential never leaves a population, merely goes dormant’.”
“Arcady Actual, quoting our revered Thought Leader is said – by himself – to be a non-argument. If you want to debate, do so in your own words.”
Lilimya comes up with her Custerson-Daeschler combi shouldered and aiming where she’s looking. The fire selector is set to ‘Everything’. Seeing a bulky form with whiplash antennas rising from helm and backpack, she blips her targeting once. Nothing between this prize prick and the chunky ping that must be Arcady Twelve.
Bracing herself against the wall behind, she pulls the triggers all the way back.
“Boo.”
The combi roars as it unloads three magnum rounds, a ten-gauge sabot, an incendiary grenade, and an anti-vehicle minimissile.
The armoured suit staggers under impacts as fire blossoms across its side and back, then the minimissile drives through and explodes inside the wearer. As black smoke erupts from it’s respirator vents, the suit falls.
Lilimya straightens up from where the recoil knocked her back regardless of her bracing. Her shots hadn’t hit dead centre because of that, but an untidy kill is still a kill.
She grins, then switches her suit from ambush mode to silent running mode. A callsign like Arcady Twelve hints at there being at least eleven other dangerous automata prowling about. It’d be embarrassing to get killed on the way home.
by Julian Miles | Jan 20, 2025 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
The afternoon is chill, clear, and sunny. The quiet is unearthly. The smell isn’t too bad – yet.
I tap another ‘play’ icon.
“I’ve got moments to dictate this, so I best keep to essential- Damn. I’m wasting time telling- Fuck, this isn’t it. Anyw-”
I listen to the sound of a body hitting the ground and dropping the phone I just picked up. I put the phone down, then look about: a street littered with corpses arrayed in similar caught mid-action poses. I do a rough count. More died filming than trying to get away from it. Yet to find one with a decent shot of what killed them, though.
Whatever it was, it was quick, but not fast enough to be a surprise. Most of fleeing victims… I turn until I’m facing what they seemed to be moving away from.
Pay attention to details: so what do I see?
No. Stop. What do I see that’s out of place for a kill of this size?
No holes. Nothing burning. No wounds.
No tops on any tree over thirty feet tall?
I turn again, slower. Yes. Treetops are gone. But there are taller buildings? To the top of… That one, then.
Most of the bodies on the second floor are by the windows. A few died moving away, but most died with their phones in their hands. I step over and around the remains, checking for a live device.
Those near the windows are all dead: recorded until the battery died. So, I should restart with the body furthest from the window… Winner – and loser: fingerprint lock.
Fingerprints are incredibly durable, even after death. Using fingers of the dead is a pet hate, though.
Right, breath out. Scroll. Last video. Tap.
“Oh my God, what is that? Is it a space shuttle?”
I peer at the shaky image. People who ‘talk with their hands’ should shut up while filming, or at least learn to hold still. I can make out why she thought it was one, though.
“What’s happening over there?”
The view swings left and zooms to the end of the main street. The air seems to be distorted. People are falling down. The view moves right and up to bring the rear of the aircraft into view. I can see more intense ripples in the air behind it.
“I think we should get back.”
She realised too late, but left me the evidence I need: the emanations from the propulsion system are lethal. As it was moving so slowly, people saw, but couldn’t escape. Actually –
There are side roads cutting across main street. Some people must have made the right choice: a swathe of destruction always has edges. Get beyond them and you’ll survive.
Time. I’ve got enough. Pulling out my satphone, I speed dial headquarters.
“This is Garrett. Apart from phone and outlier retrieval, the zone is clear.”
“Device Neutralisation Team ETA is one hour. How many outliers?”
“Unknown. Some must have dodged in the right direction. Ranger patrols and media teams will need to be ready.”
“They’re already on it. Do you have a cause?”
“Absolute proof that the Kecksen Drive is deadly. Prototype Two is recognisable in the footage.”
“Recommendations for mitigation?”
“Water tower at the centre of town, pump problems upstream, switch to emergency supply, water contaminated due to poor maintenance.”
“I like it. Anything else?”
“Prototype Two was flying low and slow. If that wasn’t in the flight plan, find out why.”
“We most assuredly will. Another good job, Garrett. Now make yourself scarce. We’ll be in touch.”
“Yessir. Going now.”
