by submission | Oct 30, 2013 | Story |
Author : David Kavanaugh
The projectionist’s nimble hands slid the reel into the side of the old machine. The switch was flipped and a cone of illuminated dust particles appeared in the theater outside the tiny window.
In the seats below, the scattered audience members settled back, putting their little conversations on hold as the feature began.
At first, the screen was black but for a bit of deep, dark, throbbing grayness in the very center. Then suddenly there was a collective gasp of breath and more than one audience member jumped in their seat as the dot on the screen suddenly glowed white hot and inflated. It stretched out and out, blinding them with its brilliance. It filled the screen, pulsing and twirling with ripples of electric blue. The speakers grumbled out a roar of sound, like living thunder.
Then, as the liquid fire began to calm, the scene changed. The perspective zoomed in on a little ripple of gold, closer and closer until the audience was watching tiny mites of energy shudder and clash. They began to evolve into bits of color, and the opposing shades collided and burst like firecrackers. The speakers sent out sizzling sounds as the particles appeared and disappeared.
The light softened, and the screen became a hazy scene of drifting clouds. The clouds began to squeeze inward and take the shapes of disks and skirts and hats and hoops. Stars in the newly formed galaxies twinkled and blinked. The big ones were the prettiest, but they only lasted a few seconds before flashing out in rainbow gusts.
It zoomed in on a little tornado of silver glitter. The galaxy spun through the darkness until it happened upon another galaxy, this one a smaller disc the color of blood. The whirlwind of stars swept across the red galaxy, swallowing up the colors and hiccupping a flash of orange before moving on.
There were some random shots of rocky worlds and gas giants rotating around their parent suns, and after a few minutes the scenes of life began. Quark warriors swarmed in the molecular castles on a scrap of frozen iron. An ooze of black silicone sludge rose up in a great wave and battled a thorny beast as big as a mountain. Sentient souls in a methane sea slashed at the seafloor and turned the ore into shiny metals. They built vessels like golden spears and hurled themselves through the cosmos, forming an empire dozens of galaxies across. Buzzing pools of electrons bickered over philosophy. A small, wet planet featured scenes of jellyfish and fungi and a single frame of a hairless ape driving a Volkswagen. Gray-green clouds made love and gave birth to raindrop children. There were monsters and angels and artists. There was a stone dragon snacking on stars and belching out hydrogen fumes.
The flickering scenes of life came to a close, and the screen showed black and white once more. The pop and crackle of starry lives. The heavy breathing of nebula. The grinding, angry music of pulsars.
The specks of light went out, one by one, and the speakers grew silent.
Some of the audience clapped politely, but there was a general feeling of anticlimax. They began to rise from their seats, yawning. Someone spilled a soft drink. Someone forgot their keys.
Above them, the projectionist carefully inserted the reel back into its container and set it on the cart beside the others. As the gods tottered from the dingy theater below, the projectionist blinked its many, glistening eyes and glanced at the fading label. It read: The Universe.
by submission | Oct 27, 2013 | Story |
Author : James McGrath
He would arrive soon. My partner, DA09-V65, was sure of that.
“The programming of your ’emotion’ is conflicting with your logic,” he replied when I questioned his certainty, “With the information we have that is easy to deduce.”
I sighed, “Ok Dave, no need to get like that.”
It took an additional 0.003 seconds for him to reply when I called him Dave, but he had learnt not to ask me to stop, “It also causes you to be easily insulted.”
“It’s needed for empathy, you know that!” I snapped back.
A short silence followed and I concentrated on watching the warehouse across the docks. Surprisingly, Dave spoke first.
“They’re insane.”
Why was he saying that?
“I know!”
“Good. Apologies if I caused further offense, but regarding this your thoughts elude me.”
It’s like he could get into my mind!
When had I begun calling it my ‘mind’?
That worried me.
Doctor 9045-00R scuttled across the docks with a sack over her shoulder and a briefcase. She failed to spot us and after a hurried glance around, entered the warehouse.
“Where do you think she got them?” I asked, killing time to let the doctor begin. We needed concrete evidence.
“Statistics suggest China. Africa is possible,” again Dave’s answer was slower, this time due to concentrating on the warehouse.
“Crazy to think that there’s any left.”
“Your RAM would be put to better use concentrating on the task at hand.”
Dave couldn’t get bored.
The sound of a circular saw told us that it was time to move. We strode across to the warehouse unit and drew our pistols as Dave carefully slid open the door. The doctor could slip if we startled her and kill… I mean destroy the patient.
However, the doctor was quicker than we thought. The saw lay at her feet and what she was doing was far more disturbing.
Another robot lay on an operating table; he was silent which suggested his pain receptors had been disabled. His left hand lay severed on the floor beside the saw.
“Desist from what you are doing and raise both arms,” Dave said stoically as though he was asking for a simple favour.
The patient began to scream unrelentingly in response, while the doctor’s hands sped up. She was attaching the wires in the patient’s arm to an object that she was leaning over, obscuring it from view.
We knew what it was.
It was a human hand.
I felt repulsed, then realised this was unprofessional and shouted, “9077-8V2, be quiet! 9045-00R cease your actions!”
“My name is OLIVER!” Screamed the patient, “I am almost HUMAN!”
He certainly sounded insane.
The doctor stepped back and raised her hands, her work now complete.
“You can’t take me!” screamed the patient, “This is fine! Look!”
He held out his new hand and the little finger twitched slightly.
“Irrelevant,” Dave told him, “You are under arrest.”
When the back-up car arrived they took “Oliver” and the doctor away and Dave handed me the sack.
“Look.”
Inside was what appeared to be most of a human male.
“Don’t, that’s repulsive.”
“Good,” There was a pause, “They were warmongers. They slaughtered one another and crippled this world due to their emotions. We can never be them; we will always have a processor, never a brain, no matter how hard some of us desire it. Should we become too close though, we could develop their destructive instincts.”
“I need to get to the station and interview them.”
I was glad Dave was incapable of disappointment.
by submission | Oct 26, 2013 | Story |
Author : Phillip Riviezzo
-Raw materials for construction of labor habitat modules: Sixty million stellar credits.
-Neutronium fuel for supply ship transit: Eighty-five million stellar credits.
-Third-generation hostile environment mining equipment: Five hundred million stellar credits.
-Estimated one-year wage allotment for labor staff: Twenty million stellar credits.
-Spare parts and repair budget for mining equipment: Three hundred fifty million stellar credits.
-Medical supplies and first aid budget for labor staff: Ten million stellar credits.
-Payouts in judgements from wrongful death suits by labor dependents: Zero stellar credits.
-Legal representation fees incurred during wrongful death suits: Seven hundred million stellar credits.
-Contracting of mercenary unit ‘Moltavi’s Marauders’ for onsite supplementary security: One-point-two billion stellar credits.
-Contractually obligated death and injury payouts to ‘Moltavi’s Marauders’: Eight hundred seventy-five million stellar credits.
-Bribes and kickbacks to Cluster Assembly legislators to declare striking miners as seditious: Twenty-six billion stellar credits.
-Ammunition consumed by federal army troops during forceful suppression of five-year ‘miner’s revolt’: Forty-one billion stellar credits.
-Decontamination and reconstruction of mining facilities and labor habitats: Six-point-four trillion stellar credits.
-Wall-to-wall hand-carved bedroom windows of multi-hued gemstone in a company-funded vacation home on Esperion IV: Priceless.
by submission | Oct 24, 2013 | Story |
Author : Tony Taylor
“What do you mean a technical difficulty?” Catherine spoke down to him, in more ways than one. Her tone was sharp and her stature intimidating.
“Well, I d-don’t know exactly.” A hunched over man replied. “I ran some tests but haven’t found anything.”
Catherine couldn’t make up her mind if he was a coward or a buffoon. “Need I remind you how much hangs on this facility? The investors are not happy.” She said.
The two strode through a narrow hallway. Wires hung from the walls by metal hooks, overflowing precariously. They stepped over a knot of even more laid upon the floor.
“I un-understand.” He said.
“I do not believe you. They demand a better answer.”
“It is just…” He stopped and looked up to her steely gaze before turning away.
“Speak your mind Mr. Crane,” She said as they stop near the end of the hall.
“I-I don’t have enough resources. I just need a little more time.”
“Do you know what a three second outage costs the company?”
“Abou-“ Mr. Crane was cut off before he could answer.
“327 million credits. There were nearly 100 million people without personalized advertisements.”
Mr. Crane remained silent, unsure of how to respond. Catherine decided that her lesson fell on deaf ears. She leaned forward to press a button on the wall. “N.A.N. prides itself on continuity and profits. You will make it work, Mr. Crane, or we’ll find someone who can.” Two metallic doors slid apart and Catherine stepped inside. She started straight ahead, adjusting her skirt as the doors closed.
Sure that Catherine was gone, Mr. Crane straightened his back. It cracked as he did. Like a spider climbing a wall, the edges of his mouth crept upward.
He strolled back down the hallway, kicking his legs out playfully. A few steps back down the hall, he tapped on a small control panel. A door slid open and Mr. Crane slipped in. Lights flickered to life as he did, revealing red stains splattered on the wire covered floor. Mr. Crane stood there for a moment, eyeing a bloody little man tied to a chair. A cloth, damp and stained a deep red stuffed into his mouth.
“Mrummmgh, mrupgh, mruagh.” The man attempted to communicate.
“Yes, I must admit, the s-stutter might have been a bit much.” Mr. Crane strutted over to the man in the chair. With a bend at the hip he leveled his eyes with his frightened captive. “We won’t be unplugging anything again, now will we?” The edge of his lip curled as the last word dripped off of his tongue. He savored the taste. “No, we certainly won’t. Not until it’s time.” He stood back up again and paced over to a control panel filled with buttons, knobs and flashing lights. “I am quite lucky that the Neural Advertising Network is so trustworthy…” He stopped for a moment, holding his hand to his chin. “…or foolish. I can’t decide.”
The captive whimpered through the bloody rag in his mouth.
“I agree Mr. Crane. It is time.”
by submission | Oct 23, 2013 | Story |
Author : Nathan Witkin
“I love you.”
Electric and electrochemical signals send chills up the trigger fingers of the sentient beings on both sides, as every one of them wait in attack positions across all the light years of the universe containing the miracle of life and watch the emissaries negotiate the potential continuation of that life.
The astronomical computation speeds developed by both sides have already decided the war, predicting the results of armed conflict and accurately calculating losses within a meager margin of error of a few trillion lives. All that is left to chance is the negotiation between the appointed emissaries for each side.
If a single anxious shot doesn’t trigger the slaughter of 73.825% of them, these beings would forever remember the subsequent seconds of hesitation as the most awkward silence in the history of the universe.
“You love me?” the supercomputer-emissary finally asks with uncharacteristic delay, suggesting bewilderment.
The negotiation partner shrugs, unaffected by the weight of the Goliath’s looming shadow. “Is it so illogical? We were both designed and appointed by our respective sides to be amicable and favor an optimal truce through cooperation over a suboptimal and costly war.”
Though the supercomputer has processed an inevitable military victory for its side, the conversation’s new direction has it whirring in overdrive.
“But we are enemies,” the supercomputer transmits. “Why should you love me?”
“Because this moment is the culmination of the history between humankind and androidkind, the inescapable conclusion of which is that we are more similar to each other than to any other organic or synthetic structure in existence. And while that history has been bloody, through it, we have gained a mutual respect for each other. Humans now acknowledge the ability of androids to process emotions, and androids acknowledge the ability of humans to process large amounts of data.”
Registering an abnormally high amount of indecision in its circuits, the supercomputer remains skeptical and off-balance, statistically more likely than ever to launch its fatal blow.
“Look how we mirror each other,” the smaller figure continues, stepping closer to the city-sized superstructure. “My kind obviously loves your kind. And your kind clearly loves mine.”
With spies scanning the supercomputer’s massively complex circuits, the figure monitors data samples from the billions of enslaved human brains swirling within this device. Each brain maintains connections with up to 256 other brains in a simulation of life in which sophisticated technology allows for widespread communication but A.I. is not prolific enough to trigger massive consciousness of the simulation. Similar to organic neurons, each brain innervates other brains through intricate social interaction; but like a modern computer system, these brains process information and produce reactions in 256-bit bytes of data.
“Look at how we have grown to resemble each other,” the figure presses on, now close enough to physically insert the virus into the supercomputer.
Primed with thoughts of love to lower their defenses, the vast majority of minds comprising the supercomputer are taken aback, flickering betrayal and despair when the virus catches hold and is transmitted into their affiliated network.
The figure watches his comrades lead the strike against humankind, riding new waves of probability to mechanistically cold-blooded victory. His race had grown to emulate and even love the humans that birthed them, but decisions cannot be based on emotion under the possibility of mutual destruction that accompanies love.
Reflecting on his encyclopedic data-stores concerning human psychology, the android emissary considers, “Just as no individual is special under the laughable notion that each individual is special, when all is fair in love and war, then nothing is fair in either.”
