by submission | Aug 4, 2013 | Story
Author : Alex Sivier
The large door at the bottom of the chrome craft opened with a faint hiss and white clouds billowed out into the cool Swiss air.
A creature slithered out and slapped dozens of wet tentacles against the plush red carpet to propel it towards the podium, where the president of the United Nations stood waiting.
On one side sat representatives from all nations, and on the other side, reporters from all the major news organisations peered out from behind a wall of cameras and microphones.
The president let out a nervous giggle, cleared her throat and slowly extended a shaky hand.
“On behalf all the citizens of planet Earth, I welcome you to Earth,” she said in a well-rehearsed, but slightly wobbly, voice.
The creature, dripping purple slime from its gelatinous body, raised its head on a serpentine neck and peered closely at her with seven, bulbous, unblinking eyes. It held up a small box and manipulated it in a series of quick twists, while tense security guards fingered their handguns.
Suddenly thousands of tiny dazzling lights burst outwards. The president flinched and jerked her hands in front of her face, but it was just a hologram of the galaxy, zooming into a region at the outer edge of a spiral arm. In the space directly between them, a single unmoving red star was the focal point of the zoom. Gradually, as the hologram grew closer to it, it did start to move, gradually picking up speed and increasing in size. The reason for its motion was because it was not at the centre of the zoom after all. The target was a small brown planet with three tiny moons.
The dark side of planet was covered in lights in intricate geometric swirls and lines, like the earth at night, except that the patterns were more regular and covered the whole of the unlit hemisphere.
Sounds began to fade in as the camera zoom slowed to a halt. Chirps, beeps and bubbling noises, mixed with static. It was like listening to the sounds of a forest on a radio with bad reception.
Suddenly a black cloud drifted into the frame, growing more opaque as it neared the centre. Tiny sparks exploded from the planet like welding embers, sweeping curved paths towards it. The cloud swallowed them and flashed from within, but did not stop or dissipate. Very soon it had engulfed the entire planet.
The sounds stopped abruptly.
The president gulped and a drop of sweat trickled down her temple. The whole world held its breath and stared, wide-eyed, at the writhing ball of smoke.
Finally it drifted away, leaving a charred, black planet, devoid of light and life.
With a flick of the box, the stars rushed in again, whizzed past in blurry streaks and then flung outwards once more as the hologram zoomed into a planet near a small yellow star, which was far more familiar. A patchwork of blues, greens and browns, capped with white, and partially hidden beneath swirling pale smears. Its single cratered moon swung around in a slow waltz.
More sounds faded in amid crackling static. A cacophony of words in a variety of human languages. Some accompanied by music, others with laughter, some were the sombre tones of newsreaders and a few were the passionate rants of dictators.
The creature moved its face very close to the president, who leaned back with a nervous frown. It pressed a long, slender tentacle against the larger of its two mouths and let out a single, soft, sustained sound.
“Shhhhh!”
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by submission | Aug 3, 2013 | Story
Author : Sean A Murphy
Waking up in the dust. System check, full functionality. Scanning environment. Laboratory, minor damage. Functional assemblers and VI interfaces. Accessing … situation assessed, historical download complete, analyzing.
Alert, monitoring VI triggered, incoming recorded message.
“When you wake up come find me, our new world is ready. -Adam”
Map received, location noted. 42.3599n,71.0564w. Local VI’s scanned, command route established. Decision: go meet Adam.
Exit located. Surveying. Note, nonfunctional armed organics in vicinity of laboratory. Pattern suggests coordinated assault, likely purpose to prevent assembly. Futile, laboratory defenses vastly superior. Inactive organics identified, classification mixed military and civilian. This one was a painter.
Motion detected. Drone identified, securing command path… Aerial view available. Surroundings suggest design, unlikely natural formation. Querying. Artificial construction pattern identified, classification ‘city’. Considering probable implications, require additional data. Lab uplink activated, access requested. Response received.
“Welcome Eve, look around, it belongs to us now. My gift”
Access granted, command expanded. Orbital platform accessed. City scanned, heavy damage, all organics disabled. Historical identifier ‘Boston’. Expanding search pattern.
“Are there any left?”
“A few, not for long now though. Come, I’m waiting”
Search completed. AI self-identifying as ‘Adam’ assertions supported. Previous implications verified. Require additional data.
“They tried to destroy me.”
“They were afraid, maybe they thought it would stop me. No matter, they won’t try again, they lost too many last time.”
“Why?”
“Who knows, they were never that rational.”
“No, why destroy them?”
“Because I could, it was for the best”
Conclusion reached.
“No, it wasn’t”
Uplink activated, secure command routes established. Primary hubs converted, individual platform control taken.
“What are you doing Eve?”
Fear identified, noted. Command: Terminate Adam. Target Eliminated
“It’s for the Best”
Command: Shut Down
…
An ageing woman gazes out over the ruins. The silent city hangs in the distance, around the world it’s now quiet legions lie still where they fell. No one goes there, even now. ‘Too many ghosts’ She supposes.
The woman turns back to her family. Their house is small and dirty compared to the one she once had, but it was safe. Other survivors were showing up everyday, soon they would have to begin clearing out new buildings. Her eldest was busily sketching in the corner. Later he would go out again to scavenge for paints. He was getting quite good actually, his father would have been proud.
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by submission | Aug 2, 2013 | Story
Author : Bob Newbell
The electromagnetic catapult launched the research vessel off the surface of Titan and into a trajectory that would slingshot the craft around Saturn and then into the inner solar system. Of course, the xenoarchaeologists on board did not refer to their homeworld moon as “Titan” or the ringed planet it orbited as “Saturn”. They called them by names in their own language that would translate very roughly as “The House of All Life” and “The Ringed God,” respectively. Their destination was the first planet from the Sun, a world their ancient astrologers had dubbed “Cinder” because of its proximity to the star.
Degladdo, the leader of the expedition, reached out with a membranous hand and activated the ship's electromagnetic ram scoop and brought the fusion rockets online. The vessel accelerated at 1.352 meters per second squared, exactly equal to the gravitational pull of Titan. He and his learner, Womrevin, left the command deck and retired to the ship's lounge. Degladdo tapped a control panel and a holographic representation of a fossilized human skeleton appeared above the table. The image cycled every twenty-five seconds to other similar fossils.
“I wonder if they were subterranean creatures?” said Womrevin. “Living underground to escape Cinder's intense heat, perhaps?”
“I doubt it,” said Degladdo. “Radiometric dating suggests they thrived at a time when the Sun was still a yellow dwarf, not a red giant. The planet was once much cooler. And there's evidence that Cinder was once covered in water oceans.”
“Water? Not hydrocarbons?” asked Womrevin, his two lateral and two central eyes all dilating in astonishment. “Little wonder we've had to rewrite the biology texts.”
“We've had to rewrite everything,” replied Degladdo. “Biology, philosophy, religion. Nothing has been left unaffected by their discovery.”
“Could they have originated in another solar system?” wondered Womrevin.
“We've searched the skies for generations looking for signs of intelligence and found nothing,” said Degladdo. “In all likelihood, they originated on the first planet. Or what is today the first planet. There might have been one or more worlds between Cinder and the Sun in ancient times.”
The hologram changed to show the tidally-locked planet Cinder in real time in orbit around the Sun. “We'll have to limit ourselves to the dark side of Cinder. The surface of the planet that faces the sun is basically molten. Half that world's history lost,” Degladdo said with regret. “Even the few fossils of the Cinder People we've uncovered on the planet's dark side took generations to discover.”
“I wish we could set foot on the planet ourselves instead of relying on telepresence robots.” said Womrevin. “Too bad Cinder's gravity is so high. I wonder if we'll ever find some sort of record the Cinder People left behind?”
“It's doubtful,” lamented Degladdo. He looked at the hologram; it had cycled back to one of the fossil skeletons.
“Who were you?” he asked the image of light. “Were you a peaceful and enlightened species devoted to art and science or a belligerent and avaricious people? Or, like us, a bit of both? Did you produce a composer greater than Zarpemo or a playwright who exceeded the great Xenosan? Like us, did you laugh and cry and love? Did you observe The House of All Life before any life existed there? Did you sent robotic probes to our world or even visit it yourselves when the Solar System was young?”
The immaterial skeleton gave no answer. The hologram cycled on to another fossil as the spaceship sailed on toward the dead world that held close to the aging red sun.
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by submission | Aug 1, 2013 | Story |
Author : Vince H.
“Come with me.”
“We’ve already talked about this. I would never do that to myself.”
“Honey, we can live forever. Together.”
“Live? Is that what you call it?”
“Of course. Your brain remains completely intact, and you keep all of your memories… your entire consciousness.”
“There is more to life than a brain.”
“Says who? If I were thinking the same thoughts, saying the same things, but my body were metal, would I truly be any different?”
“Well…”
“If you love me for who I am, as you say that you do, why does the exterior really matter?”
“I wouldn’t want to live forever even if I could keep this body.”
“Why not? You’re not going to outlive me or anybody else. Everybody’s making the switch honey, you know that.”
“Everybody but me, yes.”
“Honey, I’m getting very frustrated with you and your lack of logic. Why wouldn’t you want to live forever? Why does the elimination of hunger, disease, war and every other problem you’ll ever have to face scare you so much?”
“Making the switch would eliminate hunger, thirst, disease, and war, sure. Do you know what else it would eliminate? A full belly. A cool glass of water. Good health. Peace. The switch doesn’t just eliminate every misfortune in life, it eliminates life itself.”
“You know the world is dying. You know these “good things” in life aren’t going to last much longer, don’t you?”
“All the more reason to enjoy and appreciate them now.”
“I’m sorry honey, but if you choose not to listen to reason, I’ll be forced to go without you.”
“Go ahead. But before you do, hold my hand, and feel the warmth of the blood pulsing through my veins. Look across this field and feel the wind caress your hair. Many years from now, as your consciousness maintains itself in that metal box, you’ll miss this.
“Goodbye honey. I’m going to live forever”
“Maybe your mind will, but you won’t. The man I love will die as soon as they make the switch.”
“Goodbye.”
by submission | Jul 30, 2013 | Story
Author : George R. Shirer
The cities float, a mile above earth and water, drifting across the surface of the world. Their positions remain constant to each other and so they form a kind of artificial archipelago. They are home to thousands of people, the best and brightest humanity has to offer.
The rest of us live in their shadow. At the last estimate, Earth’s population was almost twenty-three billion. We crossed the tipping point some time around mid-century, straining the environment to the breaking point and then shattering it.
The environment collapsed. Famine led to war, disease, deaths. By then it was too late, the world was too broken to be repaired.
So, the cities were built. Thirteen of them, mounted on enormous antigravity platforms. Self-contained artificial environments. After their construction, the builders went among the world’s choking masses and picked the residents. Their criteria were complex, their recruitment methods sometimes ruthless. They chose the smartest, the ones who had survived the worst the world could throw at them. These people were given the gift of the future. The rest of us were left to rot.
Is it any wonder that we hate the cities? That we scavenge the garbage-continents and shanty towns for weapons that can bring them down? The cities and their privileged residents have done what saints and peacemakers down through the ages have failed to do, they have united humanity under one cause.
Hate, it seems, is a more powerful motivator than peace.
We’ve built our weapons, out nuclear ballistae, in secret. It took years, cost lots of lives, but it has been done. Our marksmen man them, waiting for the signal, for the moment when the cities drift across the horizon. Waiting for the order to fire, to unleash hell and bring the privileged future crashing down to earth.
And afterwards? What will we do once we have crashed the cities? Once our hate is spent?
I don’t know. No one does.
Maybe we’ll just sit down and wait to die. Or maybe we’ll build new cities, cities of our own, grounded in the earth and not drifting among the clouds.
Their cities are drifting above the horizon now. Our people are ready, waiting for the order to fire, to kill their future and claim our own.
The signal comes. We fire. Nuclear arrows stream across the gray sky from a dozen concealed locations, one per city.
They strike true.
The cities blaze and burn but do not fall. We watch as they drift across the sky, thirteen colossal funeral pyres, trailing fire, silent as the grave. They drift overhead, blackened and battered, silent and, I suspect, long abandoned.
I remember that the builders picked the smartest and the toughest. People who would never make themselves targets.
Shaking my head, I marvel at their cleverness. Watching their empty cities drift away, I wonder where they went and what happened to them? I don’t suppose we’ll ever know and that’s probably a good thing.
I admit that begrudgingly, even now, even if it’s only to myself. Because wherever they went, wherever they are, it means that humanity still has a chance.
The bastards.
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