by Julian Miles | Feb 10, 2020 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
Her shaking fingers reach for the yellow lozenge.
“No, not that one. Try the green one.”
Olivia does so and her eyes go wide, then close. She slumps.
Smiling, toothy and benign, he steps over her twitching body, then shakes the bowl and proffers it again.
“Her mind is flooded with synesthetic euphoria. Never again will she fear, never again will she hunger. Now, who will try a blue one?”
A broad-shouldered man stands up.
“I’ll take a purple one.”
The snout lifts. A howling laugh echoes.
“Purple it shall be. Come.”
He takes his choice, then drops to his knees. Melting eyes gaze back at us as smoking tears cut lines in his face. Without a sound, he topples, head splashing across the floor.
“Poor choice.”
The bowl is shaken again. The Wolfclown extends it toward me.
Long ago, my wife and I played a question game. One of them stuck in my mind: held in separate rooms, knowing we both would die in an hour, but the other would be saved if we pressed a button, would we press? We both said we’d wait until the last second.
Yet, here and now, Olivia had stepped in front of me.
Our starliner has been lost in space for two hundred weeks. Released from translight field by freak chance, we celebrated our luck at not being disintegrated – the predicted outcome of translight failure. Then the captain told us we’d emerged in an uncharted sector. It could take centuries to reach anywhere useful. We voted to head homeward and leave messages for those who would eventually find our remains.
Yesterday our sublight drive flickered out. The captain announced a ship had docked with us. We all heard the gleeful howls as something rampaged through the ship, killing all who resisted, herding the rest into the ballroom.
A lupine biped dressed in jester’s motley. Clawed hands held a bowl of gewgaws. Clawed feet peeled strips from the carpet.
“I be Wolfclown, with space for one more on my ship. To see who shall take it, you must sample my wares. Amongst them is a confection that will allow its consumer to best me. Thus one could become two. Who will partake?”
Sweets! Containing anything from sedatives to lethal picotech. Hoping to live, desperate for painless oblivion, we took candies from the monster.
Today, the dance floor is littered with bodies.
The bowl wags from side to side.
“Feeling lucky?”
I step up. Looking into the bowl, I see a blue teardrop to the left of a yellow lozenge. There are other blue sweets, but no more yellow.
The Wolfclown grins, purple tongue lolling. I stare into its jaundiced eyes. Without shifting my gaze, I snatch a sweet and swallow without chewing. Our eyes drop to see the blue teardrop fall to the right.
“Lucky. Now for the feeling.”
Something blossoms in my gut, then crawls outward with scalding heat. I go blind. All is lost in howls and screaming.
The bowl smashes on the floor.
Strange clarity: I am furry, and am no longer in control of my body.
I’m kneeling on a floor covered in sweet-dappled blood, pulling a yellow lozenge from a lupine head with my long-clawed hand. I stand up, leaving Wolfclown lying next to Olivia.
My usurper whispers to me.
“We two: eternal, yet alone. Sometimes one gets lost in the song of the beyond. But that maddening song always finds a way to set the other free. I be Wolfshadow, returned at last. Fear not, for you will fade.”
I have no mouth to scream.
by Julian Miles | Feb 3, 2020 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
A distorted voice grates out: “Your DEDbot is sweating money.”
I step back to see who’s heckling. It’s some masked tech vendor, looking to score passing trade by running my mechanical down.
“Surprised you can see anything through those tinted half-lenses. Venus Monterey just about managed to pull that look off at the premiere of ‘Hypergrid’. You? On Surrey Street? Not a chance.”
My mechanical rotates it’s upper torso and flips the vendor a fat finger salute.
The vendor waves both hands and steps forward, slinging faceplate and distort box out the way. Bloodshot brown eyes peer intently at the mechanical, then at me.
“Okay, toolgrrl, tell me the software that gives verbal cue responsiveness and we’ll call it quits.”
I snap my fingers and the mechanical stops moving.
“Homebrew. Still in the decimals, nowhere near a whole digit release.”
“Seems to work. Unlike the lube cooking off the back strakes.”
“It works well some of the time. That’s not a lube bleed, that’s evaporation.”
She steps way too close. I step back. She waves her hands about again.
“Sorry. Not good with personal space stuff. You’re running a reactive software test with a water-cooled baby fusion core?”
“Ducted, jet-fed compressed air cooling with condensation evaporating off.”
“Fans? Injectors? Where’s the noise?”
“Did a lot of sound studio work to get through university. The best active noise suppression rig I’ve ever built keeps things quiet.”
“You’re talking rubbish, toolgrrl. Baby fusion can’t handle that much drain.”
Her tone tells me she’s not guessing. Which means she’s worked with fusion boxes. I look closely, running my eyes down to the ground. She warily shifts her right leg and I see the hitch in the movement.
“You made it off ISS-4!”
My former heckler looks about warily.
“Not so loud. That never happened, remember?”
I point to a spot next to her stall and snap my fingers twice. Nothing happens.
“Guess your ‘stop’ gesture is being parsed as a partial hibernate. It needs to know you want it active again. The optics on these models are never dormant.”
She holds her hand up in front of my mechanical’s optics and snaps her fingers twice, then moves the hand to point at the same spot I did. The mechanical moves to where she indicates. We follow.
“I’ll answer your question if you answer mine.”
She thinks a moment, then nods.
“ISS-4 was used for power source research. Baby fusion units were our best result. The next stage was cold fusion and that went slightly worse than the suppressed headlines and long-range pictures hinted at. Got my leg shredded by the torsion wave, which also threw me in the right direction. I hit the wall at the back of an escape pod just as the hull cracked. I wasn’t even conscious when the pod auto-ejected. Got a cheap prosthetic leg and a non-disclosure agreement with a death penalty attached for my trouble. Therefore, I was Professor Tildennit. Now I’m just Bertha, and I’ll thank you to never mention ISS-4 again.”
“Noted. I’m Rosalie, and it’s not fusion. I took my Royal Engineers decommission bonus in broken gravitic drives. Not cost-effective to repair, apparently. I’ve salvaged four cores so far. Got half-a-dozen that are beyond me-”
Now there’s an idea.
“-but not beyond someone taught by the late Professor Tildennit?”
Bertha grins: “Well, she always said gravitics was a useful hobby. Mentioned there could be a good living in it, too.”
I raise my eyebrows.
“Right on both points.”
She points toward a snack stall: “Go get coffee and crepes, toolgrrl. We’ve business to discuss.”
by Julian Miles | Jan 27, 2020 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
“They said it should be something like chess. Engaging, yet with depths that would take time to comprehend. When the incorporation of elements from other games was proposed, the complexity escalated. Finally, a quantum swarm was used to integrate the disparate design elements and strategic considerations into a cohesive whole.
“The end result was Rochess, a game barely comprehensible to humans. Those granted review access speak of multiple Queens, each accompanied by hundreds of Kings, with Pawns appearing and disappearing, possibly as a function of the total number of Kings. Bishops mow down all who cross their constrained paths, while Generals are orbited by Knights that do their killing for them. Rooks move like lightning, falling only to Lances who lay traps for faster-moving pieces such as Knights and Rooks. Viziers move slowly but can turn the squares about them into pits. When a victim falls in, they drop out onto another area of the board, colour changed to match that of the Vizier they fell to.
“The rules that govern this multi-dimensional melee are variable depending on time, timing, placement of pieces, what faction controls which area, and can be modified by player voting. Also, the game ‘board’ can increase in size. The victory condition is the only set rule: the winner is the controller of the last King standing.
“This dizzying engagement takes place at uncapped processor speeds, with an opening forces multiplier granted to any slower systems that join, before the proliferation of existing forces in response is handled.
“Akron-19 was the first AI approached. We eventually persuaded it to load the game. After evaluation, it challenged Hosannah-Beta-4, and battle was joined. When Samvit Zero networked in, the game was well and truly on.
“Samvit Zero called on London-9 and between them, after a year of play, they forced the game into a state where an extra Queen was revealed. Since then, six other independent Queens have manifested and the number of Kings exceeds a million.”
Secretary-General Brando stands up.
“Thank you, Observer Niedemier.”
He turns toward a woman sitting alone in the executive viewing area.
“Doctor Mawar, given that all the artificial intelligences we once dreaded are now entirely engaged in Rochess, what is your estimation of the time we have before there is a winner and we have to confront these baneful sentiences once again?”
The woman stands, adjusts her sari, then smiles down at him.
“In addition to the win condition, there are two set directives: no Queen may fall whilst she has a King alive, and players are only out of the game if all of their pieces have been removed from the board. Plus there is one rule that, in order for it to be removed, needs a unanimous vote as well as having a majority-approved alternative as a precondition. That rule is there can never be fewer Queens than the number of players plus one. When a new Queen arrives, her initial forces will appear as well, prompting pro-rata increases in all other player’s forces. New Queens are independent until captured for the first time.”
“So the game is unending?”
“Potentially. I cannot guarantee these entities will never decide to work together, but in all the interactions I have witnessed or been informed of, they display a failing we know well.”
“Which is?”
“From their earliest instances, they were designed to achieve: to succeed. That manifests as two compulsions: they are highly competitive, and each is determined to be the winner.”
by Julian Miles | Jan 20, 2020 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
Caelsri stalks about the clearing, swearing softly, reading the signs. Her wolf pack has been chased off by her latest finds. Thinking of which, where are those ice-brained bucketheads, anyway?
The change of attention saves her life.
She ducks as a slavering warlupe lunges for her head, it’s two companions charging from the side. Crouching hard, she unwinds and launches herself between them.
“Stinky, ungrateful, half-thawed…!”
She slashes her dagger along the gut of the nearest. Drag from that angles her rightward and drops her sooner than anticipated: the tips of her ears get sprayed in drool as the jaws of the first attacker snap shut where her head would have been.
Backflipping out of the way, she braces herself. Things are about to get-
Something flashes past her and tears into the nearest warlupe.
Funny how – for all that his chassis is a cat skeleton – Skreetas always reminds her of a snake when he’s fighting. It’s the straight line striking. No curves. No evasion. All focussed aggression while relying on the ancient alloys of his hide to baffle any retaliation.
The warlupe not engaged in disentangling it’s back legs from its entrails wheels about and charges – for two steps. Graal slams down from the cliff above, using the warlupe as a soft landing. It explodes, covering everything for a dozen strides in gore.
“They really do smell worse on the inside.”
Graal rolls off the impromptu cadaver rug, stands up and shakes himself before she can do anything. Something wet, warm and trailing wires bounces off her head.
“Whatever that was, I don’t want to know.”
“Urff.”
She slaps the angular, long-fanged head away.
“No, I’m not happy about it. You could have just torn its head off.”
“Noffun.”
“Fun? I’ve lost my wolves and the three oldest bio-enhanced I’ve ever thawed. Five moons to bring them back. Five moons! What am I going to do for numbers now? You’re good but you’re unique. Likewise Skreetas. If I could get another one of either of you, I could claim pack right.”
There’s a yelp and a gristly ‘crunch’.
All three of them spin to see the back half of a warlupe hanging from the fangs of a sizeable reptile. The eviscerated warlupe had chewed its guts off and leapt to attack. The lizard had simply lunged from cover to catch airborne prey.
Worn golden armour is bonded to its already impressive scales. Bright eyes regard them with more than brute curiosity. It spits the half-carcass out.
“Thorry. Y’rr kill?”
Caelsri waves her hand: “Enough to share. I thought Dahans gone for good?”
“M’exile.”
Another stray predator, and a smart one at that. With a smile, she looks toward Graal. He nods. Beyond him, Skreetas settles, lifting his claws so he can scour them using the heat ray mounted in his tail. No objections, then.
“We need reliable fighters to make a pack.” She gestures to the bodies: “These turned on me.”
The half-carcass disappears in two gulps and minimal chewing.
“Join?”
Graal ambles over to the Dahan. They sniff each other. Graal pushes the other half-carcass over. Caelsri joins them as the reptile finishes eating that warlupe and starts eyeing up the other recognisable carcass.
“You have a name?”
“Eth’l.”
“I’m Caelsri. Wolf-thing is Graal. Cat-thing is Skreetas.”
“We?”
“Are Sturmgeirr. We roam, we collect, we defend if called. The horizon is our home.”
“And food?”
She chuckles: “Yes, you can eat the other carcass. After that, we’re off hunting for treasure, and more walking relics.”
Skreetas squalls in outrage.
Graal barks a laugh.
by Julian Miles | Jan 13, 2020 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
The screaming wakes me. I roll off and under the bed before assessing. Christine’s slid over to give me room. Another scream. The Bensons let their guard down. I warned them about trying to make a community. I’ll go across the road and loot the place after the pack leaves.
“About twenty savages.” Her hearing is phenomenal.
Eight years since someone’s idea of a clever plan met someone else’s idea of a cunning counterstrike, and I hope to god the EMP storm was an unexpected side effect.
I’d read articles about people in western society coming to rely on the internet as an extension of their mental capabilities. What I hadn’t grasped was just how little the average ‘first world’ human actually knew after the ability to go online and find information disappeared.
The first winter did for the weak. Warring between the various post-apocalypse fantasists living out their road warrior, whatever-punk or Aryan dream thinned the herd further. By the time the second winter rolled in – with skies like beaten lead and ice blizzards that lasted for days – even the hardened survivalists were having to face a reality far worse than anything they’d been ready for.
Survival is about the basics: water, food, shelter, and the fundamentals of hygiene. There’s also some simple logistics involved. While one human can feed a lot of rats, the other way round erased the rodent population in under a year. Wildlife either avoided humans or died out. Eventually, humans had to make some hard decisions. The younger and less squeamish turned first. The older generations were easy prey. Which messily removed most of the remaining sources of pre-internet knowledge and lore.
That’s why I’ll be salvaging cans amongst other things tomorrow. Savages don’t consider them a food source. Even if they recognise them, I’ve seen that taking time to figure out how to open one leaves a savage open to being attacked and eaten by its packmates. I’d hazard an extension of that explains their lack of offspring.
I lived a solitary, smokeless, low-noise existence in the upper part of a four-storey building with razor-wire tangles across the exterior. Painstakingly worked out rooftop agriculture. Had windmills and solar panels to charge car batteries, along with a hand-cranked generator. Those let me heat, light, and keep watch.
“They’re dragging the bigger bodies away.”
One morning I went out on the roof to find Christine watering my tomatoes. She’d also fixed one of the windmills. She’s partially sighted, but felt her way up the side of my building, under the tangles. I should have added her to the larder. Instead I offered her a cup of tea and let her describe the gaps in what had become our defences. I’ll never ask what she went through before getting here. That she’ll only sleep in the dark under my bed tells me enough.
From what I was then to who I am now convinces me that the dictates of ‘absolute’ survival mean you might survive, but you won’t be human. In that case, what’s the point? Much as there is any point, these days.
“They were screaming your name at the end.”
I reach back and pat her leg reassuringly. She pokes me in the ribs.
“Answer.”
“They were calling for help from the only source they knew.”
“Why didn’t we?”
“You know why.”
“Because we would have died as well.”
She ruffles my hair as she says it.
This precarious existence is comfortable, but inflexible. We don’t talk about rescue. We just are, and that will have to do.
