by submission | Jun 17, 2018 | Story |
Author: Janet Shell Anderson
I married for money, wasn’t much good at it. I used to hunt.
Last week, driving west from Valentine on 20, I noticed the roads were empty. Not a stock truck, horse van, pickup. Not an old rez beater, though we’re pretty far south of Pine Ridge. There’s not much population up here, but some. It was odd. I turned north at Merriman, crossed the state line. No one waited at my house. Divorce is lonely country.
Matthew and I got divorced last month, and the neighbors must have disapproved or something. I haven’t seen any around.
Well, they knew what I was.
Now I’m going south on Highway 81, just screwing around, left the outfit for a while, bored, and still, no traffic, unless you count plate-sized turtles sunning on the late-evening, still-warm blacktop, and five very stubborn pronghorns, young males that refuse to give me right of way. They stand there, all five of them flicking their tails, and look at me with eyes glassy as if they’d already been turned into trophies on some wall of some Twin Cities’ dentist.
They know I don’t hunt them.
I texted Matthew this morning because I thought we were going to split the money from the three mares we sold. He owes me a check, and he’s a good guy about things like that. Got nothing back from him.
He’ll pay me. It’s fair. I used to hunt in the big coastal cities. Mostly money. Not always. We’re all what we are.
The sky’s full of sunset, high strawberry cumulus, ruby-red cirrus above the arc of the Earth. Long shadows. It’s June. Late. Lavender sky overhead that will fade to a nameless color.
Pheasants whistle. Settling in for the night?
Odd there are no lights at the Wickmann house as I pass it. The big trees around their homestead have heavy shadows, night in there already, and all the birds gone to their nests. Not even one swallow slices through the windless sky.
On a whim, I cross the state line, drive to Merriman. I don’t really know anybody there but Grant, with his gold earring and too-good looking face. He might be at the gas station, somewhere playing cards, drinking at the casino up by Mission. I don’t know.
No lights on in the twenty houses. The gas station’s closed. Jacob Scott closes it down whenever he feels like it, which is whenever he’s going to the casino, so I figure he and Grant are there. The town looks odd. Dark.
A late hawk whistles down over the cottonwood trees by the little creek, dives on roadside prey. Rabbit? Probably.
A robodog, looking like the plastic articulated skeleton of a small bear, made of thin white pc pipe and plastic ties, with twenty legs and a blunt snout, digital, intelligent eyes, trots onto the highway, lifts its pale head, vocalizes. It sounds almost like a coyote but is much bigger. Matthew had one, but it was savaged by something, a cougar, we thought. The robos aren’t aggressive, can’t fight, even to save themselves.
Sunset’s lighted half the western sky now, rays of cerise, purple shoot up, Venus glitters over the dusky rose prairie.
The plastic creature comes to the door of my truck, puts its strange feet on the fender, wants to get in. I open the door.
by submission | Jun 16, 2018 | Story |
Author: Palmer Caine
Every hair on Dexter’s body stood erect, his pupils dilated and his ears began to twitch. Xians’ caused this reaction in humans when on the hunt, it was defensive. In memory time would slow, every sense overloaded.
He’d been working the Plaza all morning without incident. No matter the time of year pockets are easy to pick in the Plaza. He was up sixty Earth reputes by lunch and treated himself to a gourmet sandwich and Belgium bun at Prestige Pastries. As he munched at a window table, Dexter watched crowds of shoppers, so many marks. If he picked enough this season he planned to visit his sister on Behemoth. He’d only been into orbit twice, once as a child and once when mother died.
The Xian took its time. It knew the thief was close. It learned from Uuman acquaintances that fear and suspense cause havoc to the nervous systems. As a hunter, it knew any creature that chose to hide was full of fear.
Dexter had thought it was human, an affluent human. The problem with a Xian is it reflects the things you want to see – sometimes good, sometimes bad, but always confusing. It’s what makes them great hunters. The only thing a human can trust is the fight, flight or freeze response. Dexter had a sudden urge to flee.
The huge extractor fans at the back of the Coliseum kicked in, venting directly into the park. The stench of fried food, corn, chicken and vaporised brine from jelly-like sausages filled the air, Dexter watched it condense in the trees – he could taste it on his lips. It confused the Xian’s senses, clinging to olfactory filaments. Xians’ like to smell their prey.
Dexter searched his pockets and pulled out the Xian’s pilfered belongings. A trinket – he thought it had a stone in it, something alien worth a mint. He studied it – a scaly rabbit’s paw. What he thought a stone was a luminescent disc of bone.
The Xian sensed the Uuman’s turmoil, confusion, fear and something else. It searched for stability, an image, memory – the process innate. It had been a long time since the Xian had hunted and it had never hunted Uuman. They were supposed to be adaptable, intelligent and aggressive like all mammalian casts. This one was a disappointment. The Xian’s toughened exoskeleton shone like living armour, appearance intensified by a layer of thickening sausage brine.
Dexter knew little about Xians’ – he’d heard of their hunting prowess but never thought he’d play prey. Just another galactic cast going about their business, he thought. His breathing increased.
The noise of the giant extractor’s ceased, both creatures listened intently. Now the Xian could taste it’s prey, sweet meat. Dexter stalled his urge to run momentarily, then, before he could move, the Xian was upon him. He saw a great insect looming in for the kill, his projection. The Xian grabbed for him and Dexter dodged its arms. He made a break for it but tripped over a hidden tree root. The Xian moved in staking him to the ground through his jacket, not his flesh. It stood over him.
As the projection fluctuated it gave a glimpse of the creature beneath. Dexter’s breaths were fast and shallow. The Xian bent forward, took the trinket from Dexter’s white hand and paused, staring deep into the Uuman’s eyes – fear, confusion and something else, something better than everything else.
The following morning Dexter was working the Plaza. No matter the time of year pockets are always easy to pick in the Plaza.
by submission | Jun 15, 2018 | Story |
Author: Alzo David-West
Allen Etter was stranded in deep space. The propulsors of his small hypercraft had exploded, and he was thrown off course. His initial hope had been to make geostationary orbit in the gravity field of the nearby artificial planetoid Beta until the autonomous rescue vessels there arrived, but that was no longer an option.
His electrostatic radiation shields were down, and he knew that overexposed, he would be susceptible to the high-energy emissions that swept through the soundless emptiness. An apparition of smoke expanded and dissipated from the end of the craft. He sent out a distress message:
“Gamma, Contrast, Alpha, this is Navigator. Wolfdog has hyperbolic propulsor failure. Do you read me? Over.”
There was no response. He suspected the transceiver was not transmitting, yet he could not reconcile himself to sit helplessly. He had to do something, and that was to go outside with his manual ion thruster to generate counter-momentum for the craft to move in the direction of Beta.
He laughed at himself and secured his white helmet, green spacesuit, and yellow oxygen tank. The craft door opened. He turned on his illuminators and, with a tether, floated aft in the breathless darkness. A charred distortion of mangled metal and melted plastic came to his view.
The illumined surface was extremely hot, he thought. Still, he considered where he could position himself. As he hung weightlessly over a fractured propulsor chamber, an invisible blast of magnetic repulsion suddenly struck him like a tidal wave.
He was in a daze, not knowing exactly what had happened, and then he realized with a shudder that his craft was gone, his tether was broken, and his ion thruster was lost. He was drifting. A stern agony attacked him, and his heart grew sick. He panicked and struggled instinctively, lashing his arms and legs around ineffectually in the frictionless void. He grew tired, and after regaining his calm, a pensive quietness fell upon him. He spoke into his helmet transceiver:
“Gamma, Contrast, Alpha, this is Navigator. I am overboard and drifting at unknown velocity. Wolfdog is somewhere in the radius of 0.31 astronomical units from Beta. My suit locator is activated. Over.”
He looked at his flow meter and gauge. He had consumed a generous amount of oxygen in his panic, but with a small auxiliary supply and a rebreather fitted into his spacesuit to recycle the exhaled air, he was not particularly worried. His more pressing concern was the space radiation, which the softness of his suit could not withstand indefinitely.
He drifted for ten hours and, growing weary and lightheaded, decided to ingest a liquid sedative through one of the feeder tubes inside his helmet. His eyes closed, and his breathing slowed.
As he sank into a torpor of semi-awareness, his mind mused freely on thoughts of his wife Kristi, his two sons Zack and Max, the tribes of his kin, and his blood-brother Haig, and unconsciously, he wondered if, in the flight of all his years as an independent navigator, he was now destined to make his last bed in the shroud of the great solitude stretching between Andromeda and the Milky Way.
He drifted deeper into the expanse. His individual being retired. A long train of nothing passed.
“Navigator Allen Etter,” a mild voice called out, “this is autonomous rescue vessel Gamma. Contrast and Alpha have retrieved hypercraft Wolfdog. I have identified your position and am approaching. Stand by for rescue. Over.”
His eyes opened thinly, and he saw the illuminators of the vessel. The wobble of the light was like a phantom in a dream.
by submission | Jun 14, 2018 | Story |
Author: Rick Tobin
“May I speak frankly?” Preston Daniels stood before Secretariat Chrisom, ruler straight, staring at the Marscape beyond his superior’s office windows.
“With care, Preston. You always have delicate propositions, often nothing to do with our mission: input, output, and throughput. So if it doesn’t have to deal with those three, step lightly.” Chrisom’s crest of graying hair topped his lanky, weathered face and chiseled frame. Fat was an annoyance he never tolerated.
Daniels cleared his throat while noticing Chrisom rest his palms down on his imposing chair, covering arms like eagle talons. Chrisom’s knuckles squeezed tight. Daniels felt like prey.
“The Union should carefully reconsider moving deeper into Cassini crater in Arabia Terra. A continued movement of crop development there is driving indigenous life forms to migrate into agricultural outposts. Cerra Cordova was nearly decimated by Strongian mites two months ago. Survivors are still being treated. We’ve just removed the pestilence from soybean crops. That was a major output loss, sir.”
“Yes, yes…history. We’ve managed it. Get to the point. Do you need funds for more spraying? Those funds are tight this time of year, but if needed…”
“No, sir,” Preston interrupted. “It is far more serious. If we push into Cassini we’ll encroach deeper into breeding grounds of the Talus Worms. Those monsters…just one bite on the ankle. Many would perish without the antidote from Berthold. People say he lives in Cassini.”
“Berthold! Berthold! How many times must I remind you to not mention his name here? For six months, I’ve pulled this planet together, while all I’ve heard is that ridiculous myth—a phantom that cures field workers and then disappears. Rubbish! And then I receive a message that he is demanding reparations for ill peasants working in advancing territories. I’ll tell you, Daniels, it’s the beginning of another worker uprising. They’re using this imaginary fairy tale to extort company profits. Well, I won’t have it!”
Chrisom leaned forward, slamming his fists on the red stone table. Just then, his administrative support popped her head around the meeting room door.
“Sorry,” she whispered lightly, fearful of her new boss’s temper. “Your wife’s called several times in the last ten minutes. She says it’s an emergency.”
“Damn her, anyway,” Chrisom snapped. “I told you not to interrupt me! You’ll learn. It’s always an emergency for her. She hates this place, new garden of the cosmos or not. Should have left her and my daughter to sweat out the summer in Canada. Tell her I’ll get to her in a few minutes…now go!” He twisted back to pounce while glaring at Preston.
“I’m sorry for the imposition, sir,” Preston continued, “but my research shows that Berthold descended from The Thirty. If that’s true, and he’s alive, using our clearing weapons on Cassini could kill him. Our Mars Charter specifically protects his genetic line for all time. Besides, his secret worm anti-venom would die with him. Those creatures are reportedly already burrowing through our strongest walls, invading the central city. If Xanthe became infested, none of us could survive.”
“What thirty colonists did three-hundred years ago is of no concern to me. I don’t care. Engage the clearing weapons. There will be no more discussion. Do you hear me? Keep quiet about Berthold, The Thirty and those stinking worms. I don’t need any rumors reaching Earth.” He pointed to the door.
“All right, sir.” Preston pushed a button on his arm computer. “Done. Drones have started bombardments.” Chrisom’s distressed assistant rushed past Preston as he cleared the doorway.
“Secretariat Chrisom, please contact her. Something serious has happened to your daughter.”
by submission | Jun 13, 2018 | Story |
Author: Helena Hypercube
‘Ndrea pressed herself into the blood-soaked ground and swore under her breath. She had never had a peace-brokering mission go this badly wrong before. Someone in the Central Office had severely underestimated the volatility of the situation, and she was the one left trying to stay out of the crossfire until the two groups of sentients either got tired of shooting or killed each other off. And all this, over the mining rights to two moons that nobody had cared about until some new substance was discovered on them.
She relaxed slightly as the whine of laser bolts died down. Keep calm, she reminded herself. You cannot broker peace if there is no peace in your heart. The platitude sounded hollow today. She had been patient, calm, considerate, and understanding, right up until it became necessary to hit the ground. Now her famous reserve was beginning to fray. The calmer she stayed, the more agitated the delegates had seemed to become. It was time for a new tactic.
‘Ndrea heard the field command officer in front of her order his troops to secure their weapons, and a few seconds later, the field command officer behind her gave the same order.
She bounced to her feet. “HEY!” she bellowed, anger clear in her voice. The officers turned to gape at her in surprise. “DO YOU KNOW WHY I’M HERE?”
The top negotiators turned and picked their way toward her, avoiding the bodies and parts of bodies littering the ground. When they were close enough for easy conversation, the Balikanti leader stated, “I thought you were here because the Central Office sent you to try to prevent a war.”
“That’s why they sent me. I came because I can stand to see the results of beings throwing grenades at each other, but I DON’T LIKE IT!” she snapped. “I hate seeing beings suffer unnecessarily.”
“You are angry.” The Balikanti leader sounded surprised, and pleased. “I did not think a Central Office Peace Broker was capable of caring enough about a pair of minor feuding groups to become angry. Or are you only angry at the failure of your mission?”
“I haven’t failed, yet. Admittedly this will not look good in my report, but by the Central Office’s criteria, this situation can still be satisfactorily resolved. At least, it can if you are willing to resume talking.”
The Balikanti leader looked at his Itnakila counterpart and nodded. “I believe so, if we are permitted to yell properly.”
“The Central Office Peace Brokering Manual states that belligerent groups should be discouraged from violence in any form, including speech, but if you wish to amend the Code of Conduct for this negotiation, I am more than willing.”
“Good. How else can we communicate the depth of the words, except by using the full range of possible expression?”
“Well, then, yelling shall be permitted in these circumstances. What about name-calling?”
“Of course. Shall we proceed?” The Balikanti leader looked at the Itnakila leader again, who made a majestic gesture of assent. “My aides will find us a more pleasant place to meet, while the medics tend to the wounded and the priests tend to the dead. And I must remember to have someone extend a formal invitation for you to participate in our next Shouting Match. My people have never heard a Peace Broker yell before. I think you have a very good chance of winning.”
