by submission | Apr 8, 2022 | Story |
Author: Majoki
The speed at which Michiko’s roboto folded the origami crane was breathtaking. She would have her thousand orizuru in mere minutes and then her prayer must be answered. She knelt on the tatami resting her weary arms delicately on the edge of the kotatsu as the low table began to fill with the multi-colored cranes. With pride and relief, Michiko watched her roboto’s sleek beryllium digits deftly fold, crease and fan each paper square into an ancient symbol of hope—her only hope.
She’d already died once and was near death again. The cancer that gnawed at her bones would not be put off again. Men and medicine had saved her before, but it turned out to be only a two-year respite. Her fellow beings had tried and now could offer no salvation, so she turned to her own deus ex machina. Machinations of the divine.
Roboto.
An orphan and solitary being for thirty-six years, Michiko had almost refused the medidroid prescribed for her cancer care. At first, the droid’s presence in her flat, her refuge, had unnerved her. But she had no one and she could not care for herself.
Roboto did. It shopped, cooked, cleaned, obeying her silently after she had disabled its vocal features. Day after day in silent communion, roboto helped medicate, feed, bathe and dress her. Michiko had been grudging, then hesitant, then surprisingly curious, and one morning after a night of tortured dreams and anguish, she’d awakened with a strange sense of comfort, of peace, her wizened fingers clasping roboto’s cool digits.
Michiko began to use the honorific robot-sama when addressing her companion. When her condition allowed, she would walk among the cherry trees in Nishi Koen with roboto at her side. She began to play the shamisen again. She had always spoken sparingly and that did not change, but she spoke gently to roboto when asking for help. She simply lived. At one point with her strength regaining, she dared to dream of freedom, and yet the heaviness returned, deep in her marrow. She knew. Men and medicine soon knew.
She wondered if roboto knew.
Weaker every day, Michiko mourned for herself. It was a new feeling. Though a solitary being, she was not the self-pitying sort. Yet, as she watched roboto care for her, she realized that she would miss the steadfastness, the complete presence, of her companion.
And so she began to pray. Why not call upon a greatness of spirit, something beyond her kind? A thousand cranes, the most perfect prayer. But she could not manage the delicate work. Roboto. It took the rest of her waning strength to teach the technique, but roboto soon mastered it.
Now, minutes from completion, she knelt revelling in the necessity of being.
Roboto finished folding the thousandth crane and began to link them into one long chain. Michiko, now supine on the tatami, reached out, one hand close enough to touch roboto, but not touching. Through a gathering dizziness, she whispered aloud her last thought, “What would you say to me, roboto-sama? What would you say?”
Roboto, as ever, gave immediate presence to her voice, though unfamiliar with the mortally soft inflection of the query. The anticipation of a thousand cranes ready to soar stilled the room.
“I am Michiko,” roboto answered, releasing the delicate creatures of its creation and reaching, naturally, for the shamisen.
by submission | Apr 7, 2022 | Story |
Author: Andrew A Dunn
1. Check your ticket.
The starfish-shaped station is large. Yes, there are maps to help navigate faux marble floors and moving sidewalks to find your departure gate. Once you find it, check signs from time to time to make sure your gate hasn’t changed. Tickets tend to be non-refundable. If you miss your trip what else is there for you to do for two months almost off the grid – spend them at Aunt Harriet’s in Willoughby Cove?
2. The store on the right sells…
After checking your ticket for the umpteenth time, think about the standard issue garments the travel company sent. Outer clothing – survival suits, coveralls, diving attire – only comes from the travel company. Undersuits are different. Those gray one piece outfits that stretched on tight from neck to ankles felt thin and scratchy when you tried them on, right? You’re in luck!
The store on the right in the station’s main hall sells designer undersuits.
See what they’ve got in your size. You’ll find they offer a variety of colors and patterns. Designer undersuits are more than comfy, they’re warmer than standard issue too. While you’re at it pick up snacks, a book, or kitschy souvenirs to send relatives.
3. Look at the sky.
At around 200 meters underwater, sunlight will cease to be part of your world. Skylights in the station offer nice views of a sky you won’t see for sixty days, but there’s an even better place to make a memory.
Outside the store and around a corner, you’ll find nondescript stairs that lead to a plexiglass-domed lounge. Plush couches and a nautically-themed bar offer an excellent spot to savor an uninterrupted view of the sky before boarding call.
4. Try not to back out.
Second thoughts are common. Two months on the ocean floor sounded like the change you needed after the break up or whatever disillusionment placed you in front of a laptop in the wee hours pricing exotic travel packages. What seemed like a great idea then might not anymore.
The prospect of wearing coveralls over undersuits every day, in chilled corridors bathed in soft light, comes to mind. So does your stateroom with its skylight over your bunk – it looks upward into bathyal zone darkness, and creatures whose anatomies have adapted in wondrous if sometimes monstrous ways to survive at that depth in darkness.
You won’t be bored though. Communal gardening will take up a few hours each day. Other hours you’ll…well anyway, maybe there will be interesting people to meet and activities beyond gardening and watching the deep sea world through plexiglass to keep your mind off the creaking and popping.
Outposts creak and pop because, like videos say, aquatic pressure causes the outer hull to buckle like a soda can. But don’t worry – outposts are safe!
It’s best to forget second thoughts and board the submersible. The alternative? Aunt Harriet’s.
Back out and Aunt Harriet will scrutinize what you wear and insist you help her ready her garden for spring. That means hours spent outside her cold cottage – she refuses to use her furnace unless its below freezing. But there is also a chance the neighbor kid will come home to Willoughby Cove to visit while you’re there. That means a shot at conversation and maybe more to keep your mind off whatever led you to spend two months almost off the grid.
Board the submersible, or catch a bus to Willoughby Cove?
5. Choose wisely.
by submission | Apr 6, 2022 | Story |
Author: Rick Tobin
Adam Three Horses shuffled past an unmarked drab gray metal door into a cold sparse room filled with file cabinets and a single, elongated metal desk with one laptop in front of a squinting goat-faced military officer bearing colorful astronaut patches on his chest. Captain Yagar didn’t look up as he opened a fresh manila folder from a leaning pile marked Top Secret.
“You Three Horses?” Yagar asked in an emotionless drone.
“Hmm. My people don’t like to be called by our last names. Adam will do.” Adam stood feet apart, staying away from the metal folding chair positioned across from Yagar.
“Don’t give a shit. Your people aren’t here. This is Space Corps. I’m Captain Yagar. I’ll call you pony poop if I want. Now sit your ass down!” Yagar looked up, bristling, still squinting with jowls tightened. Adam quietly complied, remembering his maltreatment after being kidnapped in a rendition from his reservation home at night by Homeland Security thugs.
“You got down the entire hall in one piece. Huh. It’s amazingly quiet out there for a change. None of the others made it past two cages.”
“What cages,” Adam asked, perplexed. He saw no animals or bars.
“Every one of those ten rooms holds a person barely human by my count, filled with rage, madness, and horrible intent. They’re too violent to serve in the Corps or to ever be let out. You don’t seem worse for the exposure. Your predecessors all needed special care.”
“Was this some sort of test? You know I’m not part of your silly space travel. You don’t let Indigenous Natives serve…right?”
“Correct. You’re from your own independent nation in South Dakota so we can’t draft you, but we can still sequester anyone on U.S. soil who has special talents for our programs. Says here you’re a heyoka empath. Haven’t had one before. First one of your kind in here. Maybe that explains the hallway.” Yagar continued staring down while studying Adam’s dossier.
“I never called myself that. None of The People do. I get it. I’m just another redskin to do your bidding. You take our words just as you steal everything else from us, even our sacred ceremonies. You know nothing. You want everything, no matter the cost.”
“Sorry, chief. I’m not here for a philosophy lesson. I’m head of intelligence. Says here as a child you always wanted to travel to other worlds. We might have an offer for you. We’re working on the 369 Protocol, named after Nicola Tesla. Ever hear of him?”
“I’m not an idiot,” Adam snapped.
“We’ll see. We can’t send new enlarged transport craft into deep space for mining operations if we store more than 369 new recruits aboard. They freak out en masse—shrinks call it group cogenesis. We need shock absorbers…empaths to quiet three thousand we send at once.”
“Not recruits, Yagar. Those are inmate slaves. No one volunteers for space mining. You whites never learn.”
“Point taken, but you’ll go and you’ll keep them sane enough to mine for us after they catch the vacuum willies. We need that shit off 16 Psyche near Mars before the Chinks get it.”
Adam leaned forward. “Captain, heyókȟa means standing water…a mirror. We reflect” He touched Yagar’s right hand, watching him scream, as all the hallway madness transferred from Adam, now requiring Yagar’s special care later after Adam walked unimpeded from the base, protected by the Wakíŋyaŋ—Thunder Spirits— in saucers overhead, ready to continue Adam’s travels to other sacred beings on nearby planets and moons.
by submission | Apr 5, 2022 | Story |
Author: Alastair Millar
It’s time I let you in on my secret, doctor. You deserve to know, because you made me what I am.
After all, you were there when I was de-tubed; it was you that called me Jane, though it was years before I found out that my surname was Doe. Of all the newborns in the nursery, you chose me to be your model, your canvas, your masterpiece. I will never forget that.
Like any artist, you tinkered for years in pursuit of your ideal. There were growth accelerators, drugs to make my bones stronger, changes to make my reflexes faster, a chipset in my brain, a thousand body mods, minor and major upgrades along the way.
Sometimes, your surgeons removed an ability I’d thought was innate; I can’t twitch my nose like Samantha and pretend I’m Tabitha any more. And I only dreamed when you sent messages to my subconscious; no relief in fantasies, but no nightmares beyond what happened in the daytime.
Other blessings were mixed. I remember that when they replaced my eyes I couldn’t even cry, because they’d taken the tear ducts too. But I see more colours now, and my peripheral vision is extraordinary.
You gave me an education and an exhaustive, intricate knowledge of the Megacity. I’m an expert in biology, physics, motion and dynamics. Your staff showed me how to evade society’s ubiquitous watchers, using makeup and prosthetics to avoid facial recognition, and dressing to fit in. “Plain Jane,” you said, never allowing me to be pretty in case I stood out in a crowd.
You provided expert tutors in physical fitness, self defence and use of weapons for me to test myself against; I bettered them, becoming proud of my body and what it can do.
Of course, you also taught me to kill. Insects first, the images sent into my sleeping mind to be made real the following day. Later small rodents, gassed and crushed and cut up as training progressed. After that, we moved on to cats and dogs, then when I was older, monkeys in cages. Ultimately, people in cages too; I remember how you called them “dregs”, and made sure I had no respect for them. They were my inferiors.
Now I remove the people that come into my dreams. Last week it was the woman in the park, the needles under my nails scratching her as she jogged past, the neurotoxin taking her down. A fortnight ago it was the banker and his entourage, a flechette gun turning a bar into a charnel house. Before that, a journalist in a café. And so on, back through the years.
I don’t even know who you work for – the government, a corporation, freelance. Someone watches my targets, so my dreams can tell me where to find them, but who, or why, I have no idea. I understand: I can’t tell anyone what I don’t know. And of course, I’m a deniable weapon: even under truth drugs you could say that nobody ever gave me instructions.
But now we come to it; recently, I’ve started dreaming for myself. Flowers, vistas, visions of things I’ve only seen on screens, and which I know you’d never allow me. I never expected anything, was never encouraged to imagine, but now I can.
Telling you this is a weight off my shoulders. I know what’s going to happen next. Your blue eyes have already turned thoughtful, like they always do for the unpredicted, but this time it’s too late; you see, doctor, last night, I dreamed about you.
by submission | Apr 3, 2022 | Story |
Author: Jude Curtis Greaves
I stared in disbelief at the fracture, in reality, contemplating its sudden appearance in my apartment. Hypnotized by the apparition, my muscles moved in the direction of the fortuitous scientific hypothesis while my consciousness told me it might not be a good idea to do so. However, my body was an unresponsive wreck and I found myself twenty feet in the air, above a large pond.
Like an osprey that suddenly lost its wings in the middle of a ferocious dive, I plummeted toward the ground. The force of my body hitting the murky pool knocked all of the air out of the interior of my now-bruised rib cage. For a few dazed seconds, I thought I was dead. Then the pain came back to my lagged nervous system in a ferocious forest fire of agony. In my suffering, I managed to surface and expel the water that had been previously trapped in my lungs.
Bruised and scraped, I trudged out of the muddy pool of water and surveyed my surroundings. I was in the middle of a grassy plain dotted with wildflowers and distorted with the occasional knoll. About a mile away, I perceived what looked to be a small town. Wandering over to this single sign of intellectual life, I realized that it wasn’t just a town, but the beginnings of a city.
Entering the outskirts, I discovered that I was in The same town that my dad had resided in over thirty years ago. Since my dad had recently passed away, I ran to where I thought the location of my father’s old home was, full of excitement. Strutting down the streets of the conurbation, I tripped on some badly-set pavement and crashed into the cement. Because of this, I hit a rather unassuming red skateboard and watched it woefully as it tumbled down the street. Quickly, I got up and tried to get away from the place as fast as possible hoping with all my might that the owner wasn’t nearby.
Continuing on my travels, I witnessed a red skateboard soar into the air and knock a primitive chachalaca out of the sky. “What in the name of…” my sentence was broken off by the sudden occurrence of the unfortunate bird landing on a jackhammer, activating the powerful device and sending it haywire. The jackhammer shredded the base of a telephone pole, cracking the aged wood and causing it to fall on top of a building.
The building collapsed in on itself as I realized in horror that the building was the same one that my dad lived in. As the realization of this event made contact with my brain’s processing unit, I Ran over to the foundations of the building and located the dying body of my dad. In despair, I climbed over to him. “Dad!?” I called out to him as he lay there paralyzed in his near-lifeless body. “I’m a dad?” A cracked voice answered in confusion as I witnessed my soon-to-be dad die. Again. Reality blacked out around me as my mind went into a turmoil of anguish.
I stared in disbelief at the fracture, in reality, contemplating its sudden appearance in my apartment. Hypnotized by the apparition, my muscles moved in the direction of the fortuitous scientific hypothesis while my consciousness told me it might not be a good idea to do so. However, my body was an unresponsive wreck and I found myself twenty feet in the air, above a large pond.
