by Julian Miles | Nov 8, 2021 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
The grey muffling my senses relinquishes it’s hold. I find myself lying in the same chair I sat down in. I’m in the same clothes. My digital chronograph tells me eight seconds have passed. I look to my other wrist. The vintage analogue watch has stopped. I’ll do for that antiques dealer. He said it was in full working order. I wound it just before we set off.
I lift my head and look to my right. I can’t see Sasha, but I can see her arms where they play across the control panels mounted above her chair.
“Did we do it?”
She raises a finger in a ‘wait’ gesture. Time crawls by.
“Lewis, we’ve succeeded.”
Lifting my head again, I see her green eyes sparkling with tears. Triumph! We took a chance to do something people said was impossible, and it worked!
“Where are we?”
She stops smiling, looks puzzled.
“No idea. Beyond charted space.”
I roll myself up so I can gaze her way without straining my neck.
“What do you mean ‘beyond charted space’?”
“You remember the speech that Doctor Krakor gave? The one where he said that while wormholes were navigable, we had no way to tell the endpoint because the act of traversing a wormhole would collapse it?”
“Yes. But probes…”
She shakes her head.
“We couldn’t send a probe because that would collapse the wormhole.”
How on earth can you go somewhere without knowing where you’re going? GPS navigation doesn’t do that.
“So where are we?”
She shrugs.
“A long way from the planet we grew up on, and all its woes.”
This is why I hate working with people who can’t grasp the complexities of life.
“That I know. How do we let them know I was right?”
Sasha just stares at me.
“Alright. How long to get back and deliver the news?”
“Longer than the lifespan of anybody on this ship.”
I release my upper belt so I can sit up.
“What? How can we not live long enough to get back when we got here so quickly?”
“Did we? My ten chronographs show varying elapsed times. The lowest is one second. The highest is 18,142 years. We may have inadvertently outlived human life on Earth.”
We what? The woman is babbling.
“Let me spell it out for you: find the wormhole and take us back.”
Sasha grins at me.
“What wormhole? It collapsed when we used it.”
I thought wormholes collapsing was like fuel. Not the one we were using!
“Then find another!”
“No point. The chances of finding one that will deliver us back to Earth within a reasonable time frame at that end are negligible. Plus, you’ll need to go and tell our single-use Casimir-Bordeg field generator to stop being dead metal.”
‘Single-use’…!
“So we were never going to be able to go back?”
Sasha rolls out of her chair and floats across to me.
“What part of ‘one-way trip’ did you not understand? How many of the rich backers who joined the mob of scientific misfits I recruited are expecting to get home for tea?”
“I don’t know. I gave each of them the same manual you gave me.”
She folds herself about to sit cross-legged in mid-air.
“Let’s hope they paid attention. We’ve got about a year to find a habitable world. There won’t be waiters, waitresses, or concierge services for a very long time.”
Sasha leans forwards.
“All the life replication equipment is keyed to people I trust, and none of it to me. We’re going to make a better society, not another hell on Earth.”
by Julian Miles | Nov 1, 2021 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
My name was Walt. I hunted. Drank beer. Drove a truck. Met my wife, May, skinny dipping down at Hodgeson Creek. We married. Had kids. Lost two sons to wars in foreign countries. Lost a daughter to a war in another state. My other son, Rufus, came back from a war, then met his boyfriend skinny dipping at Hodgeson Creek.
I had trouble with that. Coming on top of my cancer, it didn’t seem fair. Then my youngest, Maisie, told me she had cancer. That broke May. She admitted she’d got the same diagnosis. Something had been seeping into the waters of Hodgeson Creek for a long time.
We mourned for each other as a family, then looked for ways to change things. No vengeance. Saw what that did to my father. We set out to make things better for those who didn’t have cancer yet.
Doc Moses, he saw it first. Some Professor at a fancy clinic over in Russia. Had tried it on animals. Started human trials. They were closed to the public. There were awful rumours, but Moses said he understood why.
Cashed in just about everything we had, took a flight: us, Rufus, his boyfriend, and Moses. Went to a place I couldn’t pronounce. Not surprising: the cancer in my throat meant I could barely talk.
The clinic was set in acres of mixed forests. It was beautiful.
Professor Ed was a nice man. Couldn’t speak English worth a damn, but his assistant was really good at it. She explained why the process was hidden from the public. We sort of got the idea, but Ed said that if we were interested, we had to see before we could join.
May liked the idea. Maisie too. We signed and went to see the changing room. After that, we were all different. It’s not a thing you want to see, until you know where it leads, and what it offers. We talked it over and decided to do it. For the future.
The day came and Rufus formally introduced me to Terry. My boy said he thought it was a wonderful thing we were doing. I called him a poof. He called me a bigot. We laughed. I kissed my son and gave him my blessing, then took May and Maisie’s hands. We went through the hissing doors to our next life.
It’s not death. Those who object are wrong. We’ll grow for centuries. How can we be recognisable to anything that lasts only ninety years? Sure, we talk to each other. We can’t communicate with you except by using devices like the one that created this article. Experts from the clinic brought it. They come by every few years to check in on us. All too easy for doubters to say it’s made up.
If you believe, trust me when I say the change is hard. You can’t wait until you’re about to die. If you die during the vivilig transformation, your corpse will be partially lignified. The process doesn’t stop all neat and tidy because your soul lit out for sunnier climes. Your kin will be left to bury a coffin full of stinking compost.
If you don’t believe, kindly let people have their peace amongst the trees planted in memory of their lost ones. Take your hate away. Better still: let it go.
Rufus and Terry visit the three of us every month, down in the copse on the shore, our roots slowly leeching the toxins from Hodgeson Creek.
by Julian Miles | Oct 25, 2021 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
I crouch by the fire, gazing across at the mass of blue curls that bob and sway as she works.
“You can still escape. Shake off the ghosts of the past. Fly higher.”
She smiles sadly at me.
“Did it ever occur to you that I don’t want to fly?”
“You don’t have to limit yourself anymore.”
Reassembling her pistol, she shakes her head.
“You’ve supported me from slave to free trader. Always had my back. Never doubted me, even when I couldn’t believe in myself. But we’ve come far enough like that. I’ve come far enough.”
She loads the pistol, then holsters it.
“There’s a point where your determination to free me so I can be everything I could be, from your never-repressed view, becomes the very thing I cannot escape.”
How dare she! I launch myself to my feet.
Her other hand comes up, slivergun gleaming in the lights of the fire.
“Down, Brutus.”
At this range, the charged load won’t have time to fully open up. But a quarter-metre hole blown through your chest has the same net effect as a half-metre one. I settle.
“I knew this would be difficult, so just hold still and listen. I’m already far more than I ever thought I could be, back when I was licking boots and mopping floors on Cragryn. Your certainty was my only strength. Without it, this journey would never have started. That certainty changed to became my support as my own strength grew. We all have bad days. Your quiet assurance prevented them from defeating me. You’ve been the wall at my back as I worked out how to be an individual beholden to no-one. You became my companion, but you never stopped pushing me. I thought your vision of me being a star fleet owner was a dream. Then I saw it was possible. Finally, I realised I didn’t want it.”
She raises a calming hand. It’s a politeness I appreciate. The slivergun hasn’t wavered.
“It’s not that I can’t go that far. It’s not that my past is playing on my insecurities. It’s just that I know what I want.”
The smile that comes is the one that lifts my hearts.
“You gave me this: the freedom to choose.”
Firelight reflects in her amber eyes as she leans towards me.
“So let me choose, and accept the choice I’ve made. You’ve been my will for so long. Now, at last, I can decide for myself. Live your life. I’ll live mine.”
I sit and weave the light between my claws – not that she can see that. All humans see is a Draconian ‘wiggling its fingers’.
She’s right. In my determination, I’ve come close to being a source of oppression.
I release the light.
“Meriel, you have the right of it. Be free of my dreams and live your own.”
There’s a little laugh and the slivergun is lowered.
“I still need a Master at Arms, Brutus.” She grins. “There’s no way I can bring the Tangaris down if they get rowdy.”
“I recommend broad-beaming them with stunner on its lowest setting. It takes their edge off.”
She stares at me in shock.
“All this time I thought it was your mighty presence.”
“My teacher always told me that influencing brute force requires more than greater force.”
Meriel bursts out laughing.
“And until you work out what he meant, you’ll use the stunner.”
I grin at her.
“A bitter truth.”
“Better put this campfire out before the cargo bay fire alarms trigger.”
“True. Let’s get back to having fun and making a living.”
by Julian Miles | Oct 18, 2021 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
Flickering light fills the clearing, reflecting in the wide eyes of five people in restraint sleeves laid out next to a pair of freight containers.
I wait until they turn their attentions to me.
“Good morning. Welcome to Dantalius Nine. The sunrise is particularly beautiful, isn’t it? The rays interact with tiny crystals in the thermosphere, providing a magnificent lightshow to start the day. It does persist, but is best seen at dawn.”
The mother is looking about. The father is going from scared to angry, and getting angrier because he’s been scared. Both daughters are quiet, the older one showing early signs of digital withdrawal. The son, youngest of the siblings, is watching his father with a look I’d not want directed at me.
I crouch down and continue in my best news presenter manner.
“Hi. Right now you’re wondering what’s happened.” I gesture to all of them except the father. “You four are here because he,” I point at the father, “is being given a chance to demonstrate his extraordinary skills at colonisation.”
All attention falls on daddy dearest.
“Milo Wilkins, I’m delighted to say your persistent efforts are being rewarded. Only last month on FNXN you commented at length in reply to the ‘Colonies Beg for Aid’ article. You insisted the colonists were bleeding Earth dry because they were ‘too damn lazy to work for their privileges’. Your revolutionary ideas regarding crop growing, medicine, hunting, and the frontier family attracted a lot of attention. I must admit I thought some of your counter-arguments a little weak, but the approbation your comments received was startling. Your loud lamentations about not being able to ‘get out there with my family and prove them scroungers wrong’ were noted.”
If his wife’s eyes get any wider, they’ll crack her skull.
“I also noticed you commiserating with your followers regarding how a ‘truly independent thinker’ who ‘refused to fall for government and media lies’ would never be allowed to emigrate. That gave me an idea. What better way to prove that opportunity and justice for all still exist in this century than to give you that very chance?”
He’s gone very still, and very pale.
“Naturally, this can’t come entirely for free. After all, the exploration and colonisation of space is meant to be a co-operative effort. To realise something from this largesse, we’ve established a network of monitors, so your ground-breaking ideas and techniques can be codified to create a new guide for future colonisation efforts.”
The oldest daughter is starting to show signs of shock, on top of her withdrawal.
“You see those two containers? They’re settler pods. Each one contains enough gear and supplies to sustain six people for twelve weeks, plus the basics to get hunting, gathering, agriculture, and your homestead started. The restraint sleeves you’re in can be used as sleeping bags after they’re relaxed, which is done by an injection to change the state of the material. That process takes about an hour to complete. I did that just before I woke you to watch the dawn.”
Milo glares at me. I shrug.
“I’ll be in orbit before you can move. Also, any form of rescue would be prohibitively expensive, but I’m looking forward to watching desperate crowdfunding attempts.”
I stand and stretch.
“The live stream starts in about two hours. I’d recommend getting the louder recriminations over with before then.”
Turning away, I give them a casual salute.
“You’re going to be famous. Not only that, but one of the outspoken commentators on your stream will provide the next object lesson. Good luck. Goodbye.”
by Julian Miles | Oct 11, 2021 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
They’re sitting in the middle of the road, a bearded older gentleman facing a young girl in a saffron tutu. He’s sitting cross-legged, she’s kneeling. His hands move as he talks, face a picture of concern. She’s gazing at the ground, head down, dirty blonde curls stirring slightly in the freshening breeze.
I can see the woman who called us behind the controls of the flitcar stopped a coach-length beyond the pair of them. She’s beckoning to me, then pointing at them.
“Control, this is A614298. Please connect me to the reporting unit for Incident BB14-8092.”
“Will do. Anything we need to prep for?”
“No. Just comms and the usual safeguards, please.”
There’s a click, then a ringtone. I see the woman tap her ear to pick up the call. It rings again. I see her pound on the dash. The ringtone stops abruptly.
“…oddamn stupid tech- Oh. Hello?”
“Good afternoon, ma’am. This is Officer Gonzales of the South East England Rapid Response Unit. You called in an emergency?”
“Oh, thank God. He’s got this girl in the middle of the street and is threatening the poor thing. There’s some useless plod just stood watching! It’s heart-breaking. Are you going to be here soon? If not, can’t you get him to step in?”
Always nice to be appreciated…
The guy makes a ‘wait a moment’ gesture to the girl. The other goes into his pocket.
“Oh god, I think he’s going for a knife. Isn’t there a riot drone you can send?”
Not that again.
The guy’s activated the personapad in his pocket. It links to my dutypad. I request IDs. Stepfather and daughter. Looks like she’s got medical issues, poor kid. My interference won’t help.
He pulls out an inhaler with an attached spacer.
“He’s offering her something! This is terrible. Just like you see on ‘Real People, Real Lies.’”
That well-known source of largely fictional ‘reliable’ information – including riot drones. I particularly liked their documentary entitled ‘The British Police Have Been Replaced by Androids’.
The woman is gesturing angrily at me.
The daughter slowly reaches for the inhaler.
“I have to save her. I’m going to ram him.”
Glad I asked for safeguards. I disable her flitcar.
She starts thumping on the dash again. There should be a big ‘Police Override’ banner flashing right where her fist is landing.
“My car’s died!”
She tries the door.
“I can’t get out!”
“Please stay calm, ma’am. We’re working on that.”
The father pantomimes how to use the inhaler properly. The daughter nods. She takes it from him and uses it, face a picture of concentration. Her hands slowly drop into her lap. A beaming smile spreads across her face. She looks about, then hands the inhaler back to him. He pulls a hydropouch from another pocket and indicates she should rinse her mouth.
She does so. Keeping the hydropouch clutched to her chest, she stands up and offers the other hand to him. He takes it. She grins and leans back. He stands up, grinning at her. They walk off, hand-in-hand.
Good luck to you both.
I enable the flitcar, noting the woman couldn’t flit over the pair because of a three-month aerial activity ban for ‘aggressive queue jumping’.
The flitcar pulls over next to me. She glares, then registers my name tag. This could be amusing.
“You related to Officer Gonzales of the South East England Rapid Response Unit?”
Best not to say anything. Just nod.
“He obviously inherited the balls and brains in your family.”
She accelerates away.
Always happy to help, ma’am.
