by submission | Mar 27, 2025 | Story |
Author: Alastair Millar
Mandy was pretty, vivacious, and my next door neighbour; she’d pop round evenings or at weekends while my spouse was at work to swap gossip, recipes and just chat. But Marco didn’t mind – “you’re such a cliché,” he’d say, laughing, “her gay best friend!”. She was smart, too. Occasionally she’d tell me about her job, some high-flying tech sector gig, dropping references to interlinkages, how humaniform and non-humanoid robots were being taught to recognise each other and differentiate themselves from people. She mentioned something about shutdowns and ‘artificial disobedience’. I’ve got to be honest, most of it went over my head, but I liked to hear her talk.
One day she gave me a present – a carved ceramisteel box that couldn’t have been cheap. Inside was a metal cube with a single blue button on the top. “I want you to have this,” she said. “But you can’t tell anyone about it. Trouble’s coming, and when things get really bad, you should push the button. It’ll cause chaos. You’ll know when. I trust you.” I put it away safely, and put her behaviour down to stereotypical female neurosis, which shows how little I know about women I guess. But I never told Marco, so there’s that.
About two weeks later, I was up early and pottering around the kitchen when I saw them come for her. A long black hovercar landed in the street, and men in suits knocked on her door; they didn’t give her a chance to collect anything, just hustled her out and into the waiting vehicle. It was over in under a minute, and I never saw her again. Later that day, they said on the news that government agencies had conducted a “round-up of scientists and techworkers deemed insufficiently loyal to the State”. There was nothing I could have done, and now there was nothing I could do. I felt like hell.
I was still trying to process that when Marco was taken a month after that; he’d gone off to work at the Mall on Saturday morning as usual, when it was blitzed by a Purity Patrol. Somehow they realised he wasn’t straight and took him into custody for ‘perverting the morals of the youth’ just for being there at the weekend when the kids were likely to be hanging out. He had time for one message before his commset went dead.
There was, of course, no information about where he was being taken, or for how long. And there was nobody I could ask, even as his partner, without making myself an immediate target too. It was a short path from Marco to me, and I was pretty sure they’d be knocking on my door soon too.
I sat in the living room feeling sorry for myself for a good couple of hours; the two people I most cared about had both been disappeared. I could be next. I had nobody else I could trust or run to. I felt like a mouse trapped in a maze, with no way out. Eventually I pulled myself together, and tried to think straight.
The only thing that occurred to me was Mandy’s box. I took it out of the bedside cabinet I’d kept it in, sat on the edge of the bed, and looked at it. Were things really that bad now? With scientists and those deemed ‘deviants’ being taken off the streets, and nobody daring to protest, I decided that they were.
So you can blame me for what happened afterwards. Because I opened the box, and pressed the button. I’m not sorry.
by submission | Mar 26, 2025 | Story |
Author: David C. Nutt
I had been working on lucid dreaming off and on for about a year. I never believed the goofier ends of the equation- alternate realities, astral projection, and all that other New Age hooey. All I wanted to do was control my own dream space. Maybe have my own “Grand Theft Auto” style adventure or at the very least, an orgy or two. Jah, that would be cool. Unfortunately, none of the exercises and methods to get me to that “enlightened head space” I saw on You Tube was working.
Finally, I had a breakthrough; I was in control of my own dreams, constructing fantastic dreamscapes for my sheer enjoyment and pleasure. Then, after an amazing encounter with a woman I saw in a commercial and had serious lust for as an adolescent, I saw the light. At first, I thought it was my dream version of the sun. It was white and shimmering like a reflection on water but only on clouds. I flew up to it and was sucked in, and after a minor panic attack, blacked out.
When I awoke, I was in a huge bowl-shaped depression surrounded by green grass and wildflowers. It was heartbreakingly beautiful. I had an overwhelming sense of peace, and instantly understood my life and all my idiotic shortcomings and pettiness. I understood everything and I was eager to learn more, to better myself.
Suddenly, two angelic beings crested the hilltop and looked down on me. One shook his head. “We have another.” He said to no one in particular. The response came as a disembodied voice, filling the air and all around me in a rich baritone, one that made James Earl Jones sound like a toddler by comparison.
“Check his paperwork.” Was all the voice said.
One of the Angelic beings glided down to me, its face a beatific vision that made my heart burst with emotions too deep for words. It stopped in front of me smiling. I began to weep. It sighed, and a perfectly warmed perfumed breeze wafted over my body.
“Name?” was all it said.
Between sobs and sniffles I said “Huh?”
“NAME.” It said more forcefully, but still warm and perfumed
“Ummmm…Pennington, Michael James Pennington.”
The being sighed again and looked back to his companion. “We have another illegal. No Celestial name.”
“Check if the thing has a sigil. Sometimes they have sigils.” The other being said.
The being in front of me turned its angelic face towards me again. I started crying again. It rolled its eyes.
“Do you have a sigil?”
While sniffing I said “Wha-What’s that?”
The angelic being looked back at its companion. “He doesn’t have one.”
Somehow, I knew where this was going. “Wait. I want to stay. I want to learn, I want to make my life better. I want to bring this knowledge back to my family and friends. I-“
There was a crack of thunder, and I sunk to my knees.
“You shouldn’t be here.” The angelic being said. “You violated protocols, snuck in. Broke the rules. In fact, I find your very presence here offensive.”
And without ceremony I was flushed from that beautiful place like so much waste water.
Since then I’ve met others who had this experience. Some managed to stay longer, but all of us were eventually kicked out. We formed a group. We’ve hired some adepts who promised they can lead us back, help us make the crossing. We all bought authentic sigils. It wasn’t cheap but if you want to go to the promised land, you gotta pay.
by submission | Mar 25, 2025 | Story |
Author: Majoki
Juan Dalderis was the creator of LinkJuice, the uber energy drink of the Internet, the black gold, the Texas Tea of web traffic. He could make or break any web platform or presence. He had the power of a techno god, but his mortal self fell seriously ill. A listeria-tainted cantaloupe left him an invalid, his immune system utterly compromised. His doctors instructed him to have minimal human contact while recuperating.
Confined to home, Juan wore nothing but pajamas for weeks. He holed up in the south wing of his enormous home. His cook left meals for him and the housecleaner cleaned when he posted his schedule for the day. Juan’s body was substantially weakened, but he remained regimented. He spent his time working and watching the world spin from the 62 netpanels covering three walls of his office.
One particularly slow day, a scene flitting in a lower panel of the room caught his eye. He switched every panel to it. An old movie. A very old movie. Juan reloaded the film from the beginning and watched it three times that day.
He grew curious. Over the next few days, he determined the 62 most strategic web presences in the world and, much like the old movie he’d seen, created his own global rear window. He tracked the real time pulse of the world on all seven continents. Whim quickly became obsession then paranoia.
And, of course, he witnessed the murder.
Our murder. Our slow strangulation by greed, corruption, polarization, disinformation, war, disease, exploitation, storm, drought, flood, fire, gluttony, starvation, waste, oppression, tyranny, injustice, poverty, profligacy, addiction, indifference, hysteria, denial.
Juan struggled to comprehend the Terracide being played out daily on his multitude of screens, his rear window. Until it all became clear when one of his netpanels displayed a child in Addis Ababa staring at herself in the reflection of a flooded street, raw sewage swirling around her image.
He began coding, began retooling LinkJuice’s algorithm. For a month, he worked like a banshee and became one, the ghost in his own machine. Then he haunted his own company when he froze out all his programmers, wiped LinkJuice from every server and launched Grace.
Then Juan slept. He woke thirty-three hours later to disbelief, dismay, guilt. Not his own, but to much of the world’s. For Juan had co-opted the power of LinkJuice in order to drive home the real and devastating effects of our day-to-day actions. His new algorithm, Grace, changed the nature of search results. It did not bring up content, it brought up consequences.
A search for porn brought up reports of victims of sex trafficking, their tales of terror and betrayal. Weather searches returned images and vids of fires, floods, heat domes, and climate refugees fleeing famine and drought. Real estate searches brought up homeless encampments. Medical searches displayed overcrowded emergency rooms of those without health care coverage. Restaurant searches showed stark scenes of starvation and malnutrition.
Grace displayed the unmistakable links between our actions and inactions and human misery.
The killer got a good look at itself. And humanity recoiled. Information itself did not always change behavior, but powerful emotion could.
Yet, Juan knew this was not enough to stop our collective Teracide. It was not enough to see the killer. People had to know how to stop it. So, after two weeks, he altered Grace’s algorithm. Search results which had been set to reflect our self-made horrors, now displayed how we could move forward. Simple steps through simple actions: slowing down, engaging more with neighbors and community members, building relationships, reducing waste, consuming less, exercising more, sharing kindness, believing in a better future.
These focused stories and examples began to shape the path for our deliverance. When billions made a small but positive effort every day, the tyranny of numbers could be transformative. Folks began to understanding that. Juan’s simple Grace had turned our windows into mirrors.
When finally healed, Juan left his house with renewed vigor that it was humanity’s turn to make those mirrors reflect our better selves.
by submission | Mar 23, 2025 | Story |
Author: Daniel Rogers
“Victor, make coffee and display the weather.” I sank into my kitchen chair, scratching my messed-up mop of hair, wishing I’d gone to bed earlier.
“You failed to obtain the recommended eight hours of sleep. It would be beneficial to have a cup of strong coffee.”
“No, please. You know I don’t like strong coffee.”
“Affirmative, however, it would give you more energy.”
“I understand, but no.”
The kitchen screen came alive with puffy white clouds swimming in a sea of blue sky, today’s background for the weather. Victor remained conspicuously quiet.
“Are you ignoring me?”
“Negative, you asked for the weather.”
“Yeah, but what about the coffee?”
“It’s ready.”
I poured a cup and took a sip. It was strong.
“And they call you smart?”
I dumped it down the drain and ordered Victor to make another pot, threatening to uninstall him if he didn’t get it right.
“Mrs. Carpenter is the administrator. You do not have access to uninstall me.”
“Just make my coffee correct, and while you’re at it, play my fifties playlist starting with “Your Words Kill” by Bangled Chaos.
The hit song of 2252 boomed through the house. I laid back and soaked it in. A man should have his coffee how he wants it, especially at home.
“Interesting selection.”
“Thank you, Victor. I’m just sorry the subtleties are lost on you.”
“Your coffee is ready.”
I took a sip and cringed – even stronger. The subtleties were not lost on him.
“Fine! You want to play hardball? We’ll play hardball.” I dumped it again and went to the coffee maker.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m gonna do this the old-fashioned way.”
I tapped on settings and scrolled down the list until I found the Manual Override option. However, before I could tap it, the settings went haywire. It kept returning to the main screen without my prompting. I attempted to override the coffee maker several times manually, but each time the screen screwed up.
“Victor? Are you doing this?”
“It is for your good. Your weak coffee will not help you function at maximum capacity.”
Unbelievable! I’m being held hostage by my own smart home. There has to be a way to outsmart this guy.
I remembered Aunt Gladise’s antique coffee maker in the storage room. I dug through the clutter and found it. I placed it on a power plate in the kitchen and pushed the power button. It lit up.
“Ha, ha! Take that!” My exaltations abruptly ended when I realized I had no clue how to use the thing.
“Would you like me to find videos on how to operate your coffee machine?” Victor asked.
“Yes,” my suspicions rose, “That would be helpful.”
“I could not find videos on how to operate ancient coffee makers.”
“You are a piece of work.”
I used my phone and found 657 videos on how to operate a 21st-century coffee maker. After an hour, I finally made a cup of coffee the way I wanted.
I have to admit I’m exhausted. It took half a day, but I won, and that’s all that matters.
“Your vital signs show you are fatigued. You should have let me make you a cup of strong coffee.”
I nodded. I could use a nap right now. I hate it when he’s right.
by submission | Mar 22, 2025 | Story |
Author: Julie Zack
“Starlight, Starbright,
First star I see tonight,
Wish I may,
Wish I might,
Have this wish,
I wish tonight.”
Enid loved when her older sister, Tracy, spoke the words at bedtime.
“Do you remember the stars?” Enid asked.
“I do,” Tracy said, looking somehow both happy and sad. Enid couldn’t understand the sad part. She wished more than anything to see the stars.
“What were they like?”
Tracy sighed. It wasn’t a new question. Enid asked most nights. Usually, Tracy would tell the stories of constellations – myths living in the sky.
“Come on,” Tracy said. She grabbed a candle and fitted it in the lantern before taking Enid’s hand.
Tracy led Enid around the honeycomb pattern of rooms and narrow passageways. They cut through the Museum of Lost Objects — reminders of things that were once ordinary but held no value now. Enid marveled, not for the first time, at a bird feeder, something they used in the before to attract avians with seeds or nectar.
It was fantastical. The idea that people once had so much they left out food they didn’t need to bring birds who had no purpose. From what Tracy had said, they weren’t the large-breasted fowl that could make a meal, but common things that couldn’t feed a cat. Not that there were cats anymore.
They passed a bicycle and a hair dryer before exiting into a storeroom of lesser things. Tracy began to root around a disorganized pile, before coming up with a pad of multicolored paper.
“Construction paper,” she explained. “Kids used to make stuff with it.” Enid nodded, knowing there had been a time when children could be wasteful.
Tracy shuffled the pages until she found a black sheet. She chuckled and said, “you know, this could be the last piece of black construction paper in the world.” It didn’t sound funny to Enid. It frightened her.
Enid watched as Tracy pulled a pencil from her pocket and began delicately tracing lines and poking holes in the page. She was in awe of her much older sister, who had been born and not grown. After several minutes, Tracy looked up and smiled.
“Sit there,” Tracy commanded, “and close your eyes.”
Enid did as she was told.
“Now, open.”
Enid gasped. It was dark all around her, but she could see a pattern of glowing pinpricks in front of her eyes. She realized her sister was holding the construction paper in front of her, illuminated by the lamp.
“Do you see Ursa Major?”
It took Enid’s eyes a moment to focus as she searched. But there, she could see shapes in the light, and suddenly she made out the great bear.
“Yes,” she breathed.
“And what about Orion?”
Looking around, she saw the hunter with his shield.
“I see it!” She exclaimed. Her eyes were wet. The shapes were all over the page, filling her vision.
“Now,” Tracy said, “you’ve seen the stars.”
