by Julian Miles | Feb 11, 2016 | Story |
Author : Julian Miles, Staff Writer
The Arnen are beautiful people, even more so when they are angry. Consequently, we have been seeing a lot of heartrendingly beautiful people killing us. We are getting slaughtered, and a few people are beginning to fear extinction. The few voices of reconciliation were lost in the trumpeting of ultra-racism – having non-humans to hate and fear turns a lot of supposedly reasonable people into bigots.
My name is Turande Givenchy, and my great-great-great-grandfather was one of the men who helped Carter unearth Tutankhamun. So, in a way, my family is one of the contributing causes to this debacle.
Archaeology loved Ancient Egypt, with its death obsession and plethora of divinities. Everywhere you went, mummies abounded and pyramids peeked from sandy concealment. The treasures were stupefying and the real mysteries easily glossed over. Reputations were made and fortunes founded, either by toil or theft.
Decades later SETI received a polite communiqué from deep space, formally notifying us that the funerary delegations of Arnen would be making planetfall in about five months, here at last to collect their dead. We puzzled over this statement until they arrived.
It seems that the creed “no-one gets left behind” is older than any thought. The Arnen version is: “we shall leave none, alive or dead, to lie alone under cold stars”. The Egyptian diaspora was one of their greatest failures, ruined by a strain of water fever that less than five percent of them had immunity to. Over the centuries, it had come to haunt the Arnen in a similar way that the Two Towers haunt America, but far more deeply seated. So when the Arnen came to collect their fallen and found them looted, discarded, displayed for public spectacle, or having been used for fuel, they became – to put it mildy – rabidly angry.
I have an ex-serviceman friend who lost relatives in 9/11. When I mentioned my puzzlement at the Arnen’s behaviour, he looked at me bleakly and said: “If I found out that my Anna had been yanked out of the ground and put on display as part of some study project, I would burn the place down around her, with the people who did it inside. Then hunt down any survivors.”
He’s fighting to save his remaining loved ones, and with me is doing it the only sensible way we can agree on: retreat, bunker up and wait it out. He and I agree that the Arnen will, eventually, relent.
How much of humanity remains at that point will decide the extinction question shortly thereafter.
by Julian Miles | Jan 21, 2016 | Story |
Author : Julian Miles, Staff Writer
CLOSED FOLIO ZERO-ONE (NEVER REVEAL)
INCIDENT GTMO-379
TRANSCRIPT 241-6064 – REDACTED – SUBJECT REPLIES ONLY
“There was a man called Zelazny who wrote of a monarchy who could travel parallel universes at will, able to switch from reality to reality by the application of simple visualisation techniques and movement.”
“Relevance? I wish it was that easy. You have to exceed a certain speed and maintain it for a certain distance. Given that many realities cannot offer methods of exceeding the equivalent of a galloping horse, my life has been interspersed with episodes of mountain climbing and Icarusian descents from said mountains, or the casual hurling of myself into canyons and other clever ruses to invoke the assistance of gravity to enable my departure from that particular clime. The fact I have always had a fear of heights is something I have to live with, as it turns out that confronting your fear, in my case, does nothing to lessen it at all.”
“Wait a moment, I’m getting there. I nearly died leaving Cassander 450, which is an iteration of Earth so far removed from the now I speak in that I may as well say “blue chased me because I stole it’s whimsy”, for all that the situation that caused my abrupt departure would make any sort of sense to you. Of course, Cassander 450 has some very fast transportation devices. Exceeding the speed for departure and maintaining it was not a problem. Arriving here and caroming through an articulated trailer destroyed the device beyond redemption and you wouldn’t have recognised it as anything bar a fancy piece of glassware anyhow.”
“No, I was unhurt because the residual slipcharge field allowed me to pass through the trailer in a semi-gaseous state, reintegrating me on the other side, when the physics of this world came to fully apply as the passage effects faded. I was not testing ‘some new terrorist attack’ and certainly have no interest in causing mass death and destruction. I’m a traveller. The ultimate tourist, if you will.”
“No, my mention of heights is not due to some post-suicide paradise belief.”
“Guantanamo? You’ll fly me? Then, quite frankly, it’s your only option. If you get me there, you can do your worst.”
SUBJECT 6064 LOST IN TRANSIT TO GTMO.
by Julian Miles | Jan 12, 2016 | Story |
Author : Julian Miles, Staff Writer
I stretch as far as I can, my blackened fingers finally finding purchase. Once more, I turn to memory to provide strength.
“Yurik, don’t be silly.” My mother, looking up briefly from her packing.
I pull myself up. Releasing the line from my belt, I turn and start hauling.
“Yurik, it’s foolish.” My girlfriend. The sensible half of our relationship to the bitter end, which happened soon after those words were uttered.
The top box came off a Dobrevny flitter: it’s ancient but strong and light. Inside and lashed to it are the makings and connections of defiance. I assemble the rig with practiced moves, saving the uplink for the last moment: gestures like this work better when they are not pre-emptively stopped.
Finally I stand and look out across my city, Moskva Napa, and see the circling lights of the Treaty Enforcers. A treaty negotiated between powers not involved in the conflict and imposed by threat of extreme force being applied to all parties involved. Yet they still hail this as a ‘peace’ accord? Hypocrites. We have the resources in this sector, and they don’t care about the populace, just about keeping their goodies flowing.
I plug in and the feedback whine makes the nearby stacks resonate. The hum comes up through my boots. With a grin, I uplink, thumping access gates wide with routines a hackmistress acquired for me. High above, I see a ripple traverse the lights. A gross intrusion like mine people can’t miss, especially those watching for it.
As my hitcount turns into a blur and extends past five digits, I grip the neck of my great-great-great-great grandfather’s Telecaster and crash into ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again’. Great arcs of power crash outward as my jury-rigged cabling turns the power towers and resonators into a petawatt amplifier. Even over that, I can hear the population roar in reply to my cry of “We’ll be fighting on the ways, with our children wielding rays, and the honour that they slander – will be done.”
The lights above swing down and turn toward me. I grin. That is the nature of catalysts: we are brief.
by Julian Miles | Jan 1, 2016 | Story |
Author : Julian Miles, Staff Writer
The room is spartan, the bed a blanket-draped exofoam block that has had body contours carved out with a spoon, by the look of it. The kitchen area is a kettle, five kilos of Nutri-Slush, half a kilo of Vita-Soy and six litres of blue market water.
Jenniser stops in the doorway and puts her hands on her hips: “Good Gates, what a pit.”
I grin as I roll our client over, dropping him unceremoniously from bed onto our medilounger. There is a hum as the contour foam rearranges itself.
“Another Olympus Rated client, Jenn. Realspace squalor, lattice prince.”
“Why don’t these uber-latticers spend a little on their dens?”
“Because realspace is somewhere they’d like to be rid of. Be thankful. Without that particular psychoquirk, we’d be out in the shanties drinking gruel and working for notes. Full care means the latticers never have to come back more than absolutely necessary. We are part of the ultimate concierge service.”
She shakes her head as she places and activates an external skull, connects it deftly, fails over the neural load from client head to spare head, then lifts the surprisingly clean mop of hair.
Her smile turns rueful: “He’s still running a Rezo Brainboard. How long has he been here?”
I consult my inhead and it runs info to my left eye, so I can see clearly to prep for a liveswap of a long-obsolete headboard.
“Looks like he probably got the Rezo from a corpse, scraped off as much of the former owner as he could, then had an offline docdroid do the fitting. Got lucky with infections and rejections. Proper ‘poor kid makes good’ movie tale.”
She barks a laugh: “We better not accidentally kill him, then. Can’t have the audience weeping.”
An hour later, Jenn fails back the neural load, and ‘Peter Smith’ is back running live from his own head. As we clear up, the door opens and two slim figures enter.
Jenn grins at the twins: “Should’ve guessed that he’d be one of yours. He looks like a slob but is as clean as a baby.”
Chako grins as Suki cuts a half-bow: “We are very good at what we do. Honouring our creators’ memories every day.”
I don’t understand parents who chose to selfclone for kids. But Chako and Suki were saved by their creators dying early-on in an aircar accident, so they’ve grown up as binary individuals rather than shadows.
‘Peter’ twitches and I raise the medilounger so we can flop him back onto his bed – after Suki has straightened his blankets.
“His new headboard needs to be watched for a week to ensure any complications are dealt with promptly. Nothing unusual, the standard bodyware care kit has everything you might need.”
They nod in unison. Suki steeples her fingers: “He will be safe in our arms.”
That line and move could go into a psychohorror vid and win awards. I conceal my shudder and catch Jenn’s eye. From the intensity of her stare, she’s sharing my creeped-out moment.
Someone tried to break into the ’lance while we were working. The access panels have been smashed, while the sentry gun has fired a burst and used a defence charge – which explains the body. The hapless accomplice tries to stop the turret turning while the seasoned crook has a go at the locks. We get to mop up a lot of hapless accomplices.
Jenn sighs: “I was going to suggest coffee and noodles. Now I’m thinking fancy vodka and chocolate desserts.”
I nod. Some days demand indulgence in their aftermath.
by Julian Miles | Dec 21, 2015 | Story |
Author : Julian Miles, Staff Writer
“What’s this, grandma?”
“It’s honey, dear.”
“Honey tastes nice. What is it?”
“It’s what the bees made for us, Matty.”
“Real bees made this?”
“Yes, dear. A long time ago, before they flew away.”
“Where did they go, grandma?”
“We don’t know, Matty. All we know is that they said they would be back.”
“How do we know that?”
“Because the beekeepers spoke to the priests and told them what the last queen said before she went. She said that when we had meadows again, they would be back.”
“What’s a meadow?”
“It’s a special grass that we can’t grow yet.”
“Why not?”
“Because the ground isn’t clean enough.”
“Is that why the cloud machines make the yellow rain?”
“Very good, Matty. They do that to clean the dirt away.”
“Where did the dirt come from?”
“The government people made the dirt and killed the flowers.”
“That’s when the corps saved us, wasn’t it?”
“Oh you have been paying attention at school, haven’t you? Yes. The bees leaving forced the corporations to step in to help us. They made the Cees that helped the flowers come back.”
“But Cees can’t make honey?”
“That’s right. They are tiny drones.”
“When I grow up, I want to be a drone pilot. I’ll help bring the meadows back.”
“You study hard and I’m sure you will, Matty.”
“Can I have some more honey, grandma? “
“Yes, Matty. But only a little. There won’t be any more.”
“Ever? “
“Maybe one day, dear. Maybe one day.”
