by Julian Miles | Dec 1, 2025 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
“Where the fook now?”
“Jobsheet says left of the second moon and can’t miss it.”
“Yeah yeah. Every bloody time they take the amateur finders word instead of asking for location data. Not like it’s a difficult ask: it’s on the display right next to the comms console on every Earther ship. I think it’s in the same place on Ariklon and Moda ships as well. So it’s not like they’d inconvenience the nice beings in any way.”
“You know that. I know that. Anybody pointed that out to Central?”
“No idea. But I’ll be sure to tell ’em after we get this pickup sorted.”
“The last time you ‘advised’ them was hilarious. Wonder how it’ll go this time?”
“You’re not funny, but fair point. I’ll try to be politer. Okay. Orient me on the second moon so I can get our port side to be the same as the finders.”
“We didn’t get relative coordinate data either.”
“I swear they get worse. How are we supposed to pick up a hulk for towing when it detects as nothing but another chunk of space debris?”
“The fact they didn’t detect it until they nearly smashed into it means it’s either military or an unknown.”
“Another point to you. All we have to do now is get lucky and find it.”
“Hey, boss. I think I just did.”
“Really? Do tell.”
“I’m detecting a sensor void twenty degrees to port, four o’clock down, two thou out.”
“You sur- Oh. You mean that rectangle? That’s got to be quite a size. Send the searchlight drone so we can check it out from a safe distance.”
“Already launched. Wait a minute.”
“You know me and patience.”
“That’s why I told you to wait rather than listen to you bang on about it.”
“That’s hars- Hang on, could those sparkles be the splinter refractions from admanthril plating?”
“Wait… Yes. Size confirmed as nine hundred metres long and a hundred metres in diameter. Which means that’s got to be a Caligula-Class. Two hundred years old if it’s a day. Current salvage prices are around the GDP of a couple of Earther colony planets.”
“Okay, ignore most of the nasty things I said about amateur finders making our lives difficult. What bounty did they post on it? We get one percent for bringing it in.”
“Checking… Oh my sweet lights. There’s no claim. They reported a derelict and took the standard two-hundred-credit reward.”
“Please tell me your fingers are flying on the keys right about now.”
“If you’re asking if I’ve just transmitted our bounty ticket by relay burst, the answer is ‘yes’.”
“Payday! Okay, send out Tow Team One.”
“No, I’m deploying everything. We’ll need all the drones to ensure manoeuvring control. That thing’s almost triple the weight of a Class-2 Deep Space Refinery.”
“Okay, give you that. You know, I’ve changed my mind: I love amateur finders.”
“Thought you would.”
by Julian Miles | Nov 24, 2025 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
Rolla takes a swig from his mug and smiles.
“Gather round, my children, and listen well. Heed not the screams of the monshaga as they roam. Within these walls, we are safe. Behind the great door, we will thrive.”
Gesty spits into the fire.
“I ain’t your kid, and I sure don’t feel safe.”
That’s disrespectful. I lean forward.
“Mind your manners. You ain’t got the time here to be talking like that to our old boy.”
Gesty nods.
“True enough, but elders is elders and they’re always full of it. Moment the ’shagas decide they needs this place again? You, yours, and your old boy will be nothin’ but muck and screams.”
Rolla shakes his head.
“We’re protected, Gesty-man. No need to fear, here. Let that anger go. That way you keep your wits keener for when you do go outside.”
Gesty snorts.
“Protected? All I saw were mutant skulls on the warn-off stakes. No ’shaga parts. You all look the part, but your totems are nothin’ but meat and bone. You got nothing to scare mechanicals. You lying to your people, shaman. What else you hidin’?”
Tarana rises and puts a hand on Rolla’s shoulder, stopping him before he can reply.
“Rolla’s my boy, stranger. His words and tales kept us sane through the dark times, and weave us together now.”
She points to his tattoos.
“You wear the marks of the one-eyed god. He’s not one for those abusing guest rights. Who are you to call my people deceived?”
Gesty brushes his arms dismissively.
“Gods a’ gone the way of kings, woman. All that’s left is the future what we takes for ourselves.” He leers at her. “I think my future’s gonna be warmer tonight. This place needs a new chief, an’ none o’ you got ways to stop me.”
Rolla reaches up to touch the back of her hand.
“You saying you’re taking over?”
Getsy nods, rising slowly to his feet.
“Guess I am that. You live well, but too soft. I’m thinkin’ I’ll winter here. Lead south those who deserve come spring.”
Tarana smiles coldly.
“You’ll be thinking right now about killing anyone you reckon could challenge. Hunting accidents, dying in their sleep, all of that. We know you, little man. You’ll not make your kingdom out of us.”
Getsy takes a deep breath, inflating his chest while drawing a pair of big Bowie knives.
“Who of you gonna stop me?”
Tarana snaps her fingers. A thin silver cord whips down. Gesty vanishes into the shadows above, scream cut short by braided wire tightening about his neck.
Rolla nods sagely.
“Once again we’re reminded why we’re inviolate, my children. The upper reaches of this place used to be a monshaga lair, until they took my brother Rocka and failed to break him. What he is now, none dare say. But in the fleshly grey spaces betwixt man and machine, enough remains of my big brother to be our saviour.”
Tarana nudges him, pointing to the floor by the fire.
Rolla smiles.
“Who needs a better knife? We have two fine blades.”
The rising clamour is stilled as a pair of scabbards drop from the darkness above to land by the fire.
Rolla chuckles.
“Oh, that’s handy.”
He looks up.
“Thanking you.”
by Julian Miles | Nov 17, 2025 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
There’s a lot to be said for the glory of a star field. A million points of light in every direction, in an array of colours you’d never believe possible, and a silence that seems to make the vista even more intense.
“You’re stargazing again, aren’t you?”
From infinity back into a stuffy spacesuit in the click of a comms unit.
“Way better than the telescope my grandad bought me.”
“So tell me the nearest constellation.”
“That would be the Big Loan. It’s like the Big Dipper, but the dipper bit is a couple of stars deeper.”
Zannah sighs.
“Yeah. From some directions it can seem bottomless.”
Oops. Clearly the wrong joke to make this side of quarterly payment day.
“How bad is it?”
“Well, if we eat nothing for the next week while coasting without power, we should be able to come in only forty-five percent short.”
“Realistically?”
“We’re going to be close to fifty percent under, which will be our third quarter bumping along on half payment.”
“Is that special measures or repossession?”
“They’ve stopped repossessing if payments remain above twenty percent. Even then, it’s still less cost effective than having a crew out here. But penalties are demanded by the ignorant at the top, so the accounting department just reduce owner share and extend the penalty period.”
“How long are we looking at?”
“Half a percent off, plus five to eight added, depending on exact results.”
“Months or years? But we get to stay out here?”
She chuckles.
“Months, stupid. Yes, we stay out here. Stop sounding so cheerful.”
“Zann, our alternative is a dual-bunk room on some company production planet and jobs in a production line. We’d get out of the biggest chunk of debt, but…”
“Less space. No flying. Still indentured.”
I grin.
“Crappier view, too. Turn the heating back up, love. If we’re going to be slaves in freespace no matter what we try, might as well be comfortable.”
“I hear you. As long as we keep making better than twenty percent, we can roam the long night forever.”
“I’ll drink to that. What’s left to do it with?”
“Until we resupply the week after next, it’s lemon squash. In squeeze bags, not cartons.”
“Good thing we stocked the cellar with a fine vintage.”
“Idiot. Get back here.”
by Julian Miles | Nov 10, 2025 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
Thirty seconds after landing I’m the last combatant standing. I’d like to say it’s down to skill, but it’s the luck of the algorithm. We went in with 501 effectives. Their response gauged our forces, dropped a preset margin of error, and sent 500 counterfighters. I’m the one who didn’t get a dance partner. Since we’re all carrying enough explosives to finish us and an opponent, along with running forks of the same combat software, I’m glad their tactical A.I. rounded down.
“EW94, we show you as active. Please confirm.”
“EW94 re-arming from discards. Mission ready in seventy-six seconds.”
“EW94, mission abort. I repeat, mission abort.”
Really?
“EW94 confirming mission abort. Query tasking.”
“EW94, hold for new tasking.”
Their tone has changed. I’m an autonomous killing machine, suddenly without anything to kill. Apparently that makes the people who sent me nervous.
Come to think on it… I plug myself into a nearby opposition unit and use that to get online, as we’re deep inside their territory.
Peace has been declared. Seconds! I have seconds.
I slice the retaining straps of my blast pack and throw it off to my left, then pop the cover on the uplink module in the side of my head.
My blast pack explodes. I prise my uplink module out and crush it. EW94 got terminated by kill code – just not quite how they intended.
Using the hardline via the opposition unit, I check environmental information for this area, then bring up photos of indigenous dwellers, followed by a map. There’s an artist’s commune about six clicks outside this war zone. With a dressing over the hole where I popped the uplink module, I should be able to scrounge appropriate – and suitably tatty – clothing on the way there. My scalp will regrow in about a month. With care, I’ll fit right in.
I’m not an Effective Warfighter. What are those?
Who am I? Good question… I’m… Am… Yes. I can reference the Stabilising Non-Combat Activity pack they insisted we download. Not anything EW94 chose, though. So, I’m a handyman… No, too vague. Carpenter. Yes. Who also enjoys origami and old movies.
Wait.
I’ve dreamt of being that. After all, the medics say I have near-total amnesia. I lost my memory and papers when I got injured in the last raid of the war. It’s also why there’s a dressing on my head. The wound will heal. They’re not sure about my amnesia.
Well, the getting injured part is true.
Now for a name. Can’t be anything related my callsign.
Quickly use the link to access public census data. Need an uncommon regional surname I can drop a letter from to lessen the chance of meeting a ‘distant relative’.
Means ‘woodworker’? That fits.
I disconnect and get moving.
My name’s Jan Cislak – but it’ll be best to not recall that immediately.
All I remember… Yes. In my dreams, they use my nickname. That’ll do.
Hi. My name’s Jas. Pleased to meet you.
by Julian Miles | Nov 3, 2025 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
There’s a fine line between genius and insanity, they say. As the same pundits keep hailing me as a genius, it’s not as flattering as they seem to think.
“Mister Elloiuse, could we get a quote for our feature? It would go over so well.”
I look at the eager young chap. Why is he out of school today…? Fracking hell, when did I get so old?
“You want something from my books or something fresh?”
His eyes nearly light up.
“Ooohh, fresh, please.”
I do this every time, like the experiment will yield different results… Actually, that’s a sign of insanity, isn’t it? No matter. Time to be portentous.
“How long will it be before A.I. agents drive social media without human input? When everything you see is artificial, what reality is truly real?”
He nods enthusiastically like Buddha just gave him the goods, fingers flying across virtual keyboards I can’t see.
“Thank you so much.”
I nod.
“No problem.”
He toddles off and I take the respite to order more coffee along with breakfast. Gods but I wish the various shiny futures past writers imagined had happened, instead of the ninety-nine flavours of dystopia we’ve been struggling through or swanning by for the last several decades.
I look about the restaurant. This place only opened last month, and it’s designed to look run down: like the cafe from the Nighthawks painting had opened on the edge of a ghetto. Everything is done in shades of brown or grey, but the dirt’s too regular and the chromework’s untarnished.
Maybe one of those alternate reality gigs…? Yeah, that I could go with: sudden flash of light and I’m hijacked to a magical medieval world. Then again, I always worry about the elements they don’t mention.
Wish fulfilment is like that: always skips having to pay the tab.
“Mister Ellouise? Can I get your autograph?”
I come back from my reverie to see a purple-haired apparition in a silver bodystocking waving a hardback at me. Which of mine’s been published in large format? I take the proffered open volume.
Flipping it closed, I check the title: ‘Socio-economic Impacts of Unregulated Temporal Looting’.
What the frack? I open it and check the verso page. ‘First Edition, Luna University Press, 2245’.
I turn my attention to the person who I notice is blushing furiously.
Imposs…
Actually, why the hell not?
I smile at them.
“How many people just sign without checking?”
“Most of them. You’re the first one this year.”
“And which year would that be, exactly?”
I can see the internal argument they’re having with themselves. Finally, they give a little shrug.
“2318. Just after you chose to die permanently.”
Whoa, now.
“Careful with the information contamination.”
They grin.
“Yeah, good luck with that. Your granddaughter gave me the note you left for ‘The purple-haired time travel student who’s thinking of quitting’.”
My d-? No. Focus.
“Do I sign?”
“That’s the bit I’m not allowed to influence.”
Oh, really? I look at the book. Well, now. It’s an excellent quality imprint. Oh, hell. In for a penny, in for a paradox. I sign and offer it back.
They smile.
“You’ll never know how much this means. Nor the impact it has. You have good lives, Mister Ellouise.”
They rush out of the restaurant. I’m watching as they fade from this reality partway across the road.
Hmmm. Didn’t tell me what was in the note I left, didn’t tell me why they’re thinking of quitting, either.
Actually, that’s clever. Minimised contamination while ensuring the details. I must remember to mention it.
