by submission | May 18, 2019 | Story |
Author: Franco Amati
It took nine dates for Jolene to let me inhabit her mind. With a woman as intriguing as her, it’s tempting to sneak in without permission. But trust me, it’s always more enjoyable with permission.
I snuck into the head of the last girl I dated, and boy did I regret it. When you’re uninvited, the experience is so much darker and more intrusive. No one wants to be wandering around in a place they’re not welcome.
But this girl Jolene. Her mind is luscious. Her thoughts reverberate with richness and clarity. She’s self-conscious, sure. And she dislikes a lot about herself, especially her body. But the incisiveness with which she perceives other people is extraordinary. It’s almost as if she can see into them as well as she sees through them.
In the time she gave me to explore her depths, I borrowed her amethyst eyes. I used them to view my own friends and family in a new light. For the first time, I was able to dissect them and expose their superficiality. From Jolene’s perspective, I could see how selfish they all were. What a revelation it was to unveil their true intentions.
Jolene was five feet, four and weighed one hundred and twenty-five pounds. But when I looked in the mirror using Jolene’s eyes, I saw exaggerated proportions. Her breasts, which I had come to know quite well after our first date, were much smaller from Jolene’s point of view. And her hands and feet, which had the finest digits I’d ever seen, looked knobby and grotesque.
The longer I inhabited Jolene, the more I learned about her fears and worries. Jolene’s father abandoned their family when she was four years old. He chased another woman across the galaxy, leaving her mother insecure and alone with two children to raise. Jolene saw how loneliness destroyed her mother. And she was afraid it would crush her too.
But Jolene, being the perceptive person that she was, knew that chasing other people wasn’t a cure for isolation. Instead, she examined others, learned about them, analyzed their motivations, and so rarely let them in without the deepest of scrutiny.
Call it a shield or a buffer. But I admired Jolene’s skepticism of other people. Unfortunately, the side effect of developing such a critical eye for others is the incidental turning of that critical eye onto yourself.
Jolene may not have my ability to inhabit other people’s minds. That cognitive talent doesn’t exist in her people. But she is wise beyond measure. And I’m thankful that she’s allowed me to get this close. I’ll be lucky if she allows me to love her. And it’s a relief to me that I won’t have to make a good impression on her father.
END
by submission | May 17, 2019 | Story |
Author: Marlin Bressi
Souls don’t have asses, but the courtroom has wooden benches just the same because God likes it that way, likes things just so, and in His Infinite Wisdom has decided that this place ought to look like the set of a Perry Mason rerun.
Like the others gathered here, I was a bad soul.
Not as bad as the one before me, who took the punishment like a champ (not a single tremulous whimper) and was sentenced to seventy-five years as Stanley Hopper, who would someday become a Jersey City cab driver and succumb to cirrhosis of the liver.
All I did was poke fun at an archangel’s golden, gauzy raiment. I’ve been here twenty-six thousand millennia and had no idea that such a thing was against the law. Frowned upon, sure, but not illegal. Color me shocked.
The first soul sentenced today had it even worse. Eighty-seven years in Milwaukee as Delphina Owens, destined to become an illiterate scrubwoman with arthritis, bad breath, and chronic vaginitis. Even the defense attorney winced as the sentence was pronounced.
I had taken my attorney’s advice, plead guilty and waived the preliminary hearing, hoping for a slap on the wrist. Aside from a few snarky comments I’ve made through the ages, my record is pretty clean.
Sixteen months in Vancouver, He finally decreed. I would be named Veronica. I would pass away in my sleep. Suddenly. Painlessly. Softly and mysteriously. A very lenient sentence indeed, and I don’t want to sound ungrateful or anything but come on now– just between you and me– don’t you agree that Uriel’s new raiment is pretty damn tacky?
by submission | May 16, 2019 | Story |
Author: R. J. Erbacher
I was oppressed by the constraint of the unyielding humidity and the dust which coated every inch of this installation despite the scrubbers working full time. Outside the dull sodium lights that lit up the hallway seeped in through gaps in the privacy covering with enough luminescence to give the cavity a sorry glow.
The room was reminiscent with the faint echo of desperate groans and a creaking bed cradle. Sweat and discharged bodily fluids scented the night with sluggish desperation as if someone really didn’t want to tidy up. And no one really didn’t. The sheets were tangled at the foot of the bed, kicked off during the scuffling into a frustrated pile of laundry. I stared at the colorless canvas of the ceiling that was draped across the steel grating of the box.
Yeah, it was a room. A privilege because of my seniority, my second tour in this pit, now a crew lead. But there wasn’t much to the space. A mattress in a bracketed housing that was slept on by a slew of dirty and drunk past occupants. A footlocker for my few personal belongings. A portable toilet in a chair, like the kind the used in old folks’ homes but even that was a luxury so you didn’t have to crap in a communal tomb with pissing troughs and two dozen bowls without separation walls. Oh, and a mirror so I could gauge the descent of my weather-worn face.
The work was hard, the pay was good, the conditions were deplorable. The off-world mining colony was in perpetual motion, shifts around the clock, every goddamn day. There was a wealth of useful ores being scooped out and shipped back to earth and somebody back there was making a hell of a lot of money. That left roughnecks like me sweating our balls off. But one thirty-month tour was all anybody ever did. Except for guys with no family, no social life and no money. So…me.
Tonight though I decided to spend some of my hard-earned pay. My one day off every fortnight was tomorrow and I could sleep in. I had showered, but still not clean, and was dog-tired and I didn’t want to waste money on beer that would just sour in my stomach and probably wind up regurgitated in the chair-o-potty. So, I spent it.
On her. Twisting my throbbing neck, I stared at her supine form.
I watched a bead of sweat track down a mound of her flesh as it slowly rose and fell in blissful sleep. It came to rest in a depression of her body that was simply perfect. And all I wanted to be was a bug-sized man walking across the desert of her skin to reach that oasis, that sublime semi-sphere of moisture; to leap into it, bathe in it, quench my eternal thirst with it. And then I was dazzled by all the other pools of perspiration that dappled her chest and I thought ‘what better way to die of exhaustion then to try and visit each and every one of them.’
She was way too exquisite for this rock. She belonged on the deck of some sheik’s yacht soaking up the sunshine and the cool Mediterranean ocean mist and not here moan-acting, trying to please some broke down nobody like me. Yeah, she was that beautiful.
And I truly wanted to know her name.
I turned back to the mundane tapestry above me as a drop of sweat dribbled out of the corner of my eye.
by submission | May 15, 2019 | Story |
Author: Delvon T. Mattingly
For weeks, all I did was listen, my eyes closed. My body grew numb months ago, down to my fingers and toes, unable to recall the last time I saw my phalanges, or my body at that matter. But I wasn’t going to stop until I found my person, even if it meant sacrificing parts of myself.
Short intervals of attributes crammed my ears. The Matchmaking Artificial Intelligence, or MAI, coagulated empty qualities into whole characters. MAI tried to find something beautiful in everyone while maintaining a degree of veracity.
I liked to picture MAI saying something like, a vibrant, intelligent, gender-fluid person who enjoys surfacing asteroids and taking artless photographs of nebulas, about me—well—without sounding pretentious. MAI gave us hope. People were scattered all over the galaxy, giving the phrase, finding a soulmate, a whole new meaning.
With MAI, everything functioned via neural pathways. If I liked someone, MAI already knew. If I disapproved, MAI would try to present a better candidate. At least MAI knew to no longer propose the overt cishet male feminists to me. Seriously, having to acknowledge the latter suggested the contrary. This wasn’t the early 2000s anymore.
Or the persons who opened with a banal quote from their favorite television series; or the persons who preferred to meet over coffee on Mars. Who the hell wanted to meet up anymore when we could mingle through interwoven energy? That way, we’d inhibit the spread of STDs, and I wouldn’t have to look someone eye-to-eye while giving them the ‘you’ve-got-to-go’ spiel.
When MAI began, its voice soothed with crisp articulation. “Today’s first suggestion: Submissive, well-endowed person who claims to find pleasure in giving rather than receiving—”
Well-endowed? What lies? For the love of Neptune, next.
“Second: A multi-racial male who loves taking their dogs on space walks—”
Dogs in space? Please, leave them on your planet…
“Third: This person identifies as a woman. She openly practices polyamory, likes to write poetry. Just turned 150 years old—”
MAI, way too young!
I knew I wasn’t going to find someone, but the slightly promising candidates kept my glimmer of hope alive—to one day not have to chase the stars alone. MAI continued running, and I sunk into an abyss lonelier than any black hole.
* * *
“Your time is up. Please wait while I prepare your consultation with an available representative.”
Really? That was fast…
“Your space pod will open shortly. Please adhere to the guidelines previously provided to you.”
MAI revealed my physical body. We were advised to keep our eyes closed and remain still, especially if we wanted to purchase another week of service. It facilitated the sedation process.
I heard the footsteps of one individual. By that time, I was able to distinguish who worked a shift by the way their feet met with the floor—their frequency of steps, how big their strides were, what types of shoes they wore.
“Titus, it’s you,” I mumbled, struggling to move my mouth, imagining them sealed with the crust of excess skin and dirt accumulated over weeks, bonded as the most powerful adhesive in the universe. “I’m surprised you still work here.”
“It’s been months, Storm. Most people choose partners by now. MAI only does half the job. It won’t provide the perfect match.”
“Tell me why you think I’d want to travel the galaxy with a damn space-dog walker?”
Titus remained silent.
“Exactly.”
“Well, if you’re willing to pay for another week, then—”
“Just refill my pod, Titus.”
by submission | May 12, 2019 | Story |
Author: Michael Mieher
There are only two of us now. We are starving. We will have to risk the long trek to find shelter, sustenance, spare parts… anything of use.
I am so blessed that the love of my life and I, from our first meeting on our school’s playground, through high school, college, astronaut training, and all that we’ve been through, are still together. We are as smitten with each other as we were from that first moment in 4th grade when I offered to her my seat on the swingset. Despite all the years, everything we’ve been through, she is as beautiful to me now as she was on that first day.
James was the best man at our wedding so long ago. We watched the light go out of his eyes this morning. Just as the others died one by one over the long years.
We lived through an age of miracles.
My great grandfather courted my great grandmother in a horsedrawn buggy. Years later, on a black and white television at their farm in Illinois, they watched Neil Armstrong take man’s first step onto extraterrestrial soil.
Technology advanced like a tsunami.
I took man’s first step onto Mars, established a beachhead, then a hundred bases. Later I guided Earth-based scientists, their minds uploaded to Human Brain Robots, or HBRs, on scenic sojourns of my home. Even after I retired, I occasionally led Earth tourist groups in HBRs on sightseeing trips to Olympus Mons.
When the 500 years of solar storms hit, our underground bases naturally protected us from the ravaging radiation. Earth was not so lucky. No telling what’s even there anymore.
We were able to continue for a while on our solar powered hydroponics, but dust and time take their toll. The other bases, one by one, all went silent. As starvation prowled the corridors of our home, instead of going quietly into the night, some of us chose to take a leap of faith…and mind. The small fleet of HBRs, which only Base One had, became our path to continue on.
For five centuries we have weathered the storm. We’ve even managed to repair the hydroponics. I once sat and stared for weeks as a tomato I pollinated by hand, bloomed, swelled, ripened, and withered. It was beautiful.
Now, while the radiation storms have abated, Mars’ own storms have damaged and buried our field of solar panels. We are down to just a last few batteries. Eva and I have fashioned very stylish hats for ourselves from the few working solar cells left. We will go to the other bases. We will find viable solar cells and batteries. Once we have recharged, we will return, and see if any of our friends have survived their long sleep in their HBRs.
Perhaps one day we will return to our cradle. The irony of being able to be the first man to return to Earth makes me chuckle. Eva tilts her camera array in that cute way she tilted her head when I first saw her centuries ago on the playground, “What is it, Adam?” My blinking lights smile back at her, “Oh, just missing tomatoes.”
