by submission | May 13, 2011 | Story
Author : Jason Frank
Reconsidering old things, as she was that week, Marlene unpacked the first robot she had built, the robot named Robot. She had not so much as thought of the robot in years and, seeing it again, was surprised to find it not so shoddy as she remembered. It powered up and passed its diagnostics. This was to be an uncertain week ending in even greater uncertainty and Marlene was comforted by the presence of the robot named Robot.
Monday found Marlene fixing a fussy unit for a wealthy collector. She did not want to jeopardize her focus by stepping away. Instead, she called out, “Robot, go to the deli and get me a ham sandwich.” Upon hearing its name, Robot turned on its heel to obey.
The small mechanical being negotiated the sandwich transaction successfully. Robot then placed it in the spare parts drawer that took up much of its lower belly. When Marlene received the greasy, smashed once-sandwich, she said, “Next time put it in a little paper bag and bring it home.”
Tuesday arrived later than it should have and Marlene’s schedule made it impossible for her to take the time to replenish her shop’s oil reserves. She called out, “Robot, get me a quart of oil from the hardware store.” Servos whizzed as the automaton went off on its errand.
Robot communicated to the clerk the type and quantity of oil it required. The little robot insisted that the clerk pour its order directly into a small paper bag it had brought along. The clerk complied with laughter. By the time Robot had returned home, half of the oil had leaked out through the paper bag. Marlene, smiling a bit, said, “Next time, put it in a can and bring it home.”
Wednesday was rainy. Marlene was tired from recent deadlines and flush with cash from the payment of several invoices that came, rather unusually, on time. Resting on her couch, she called out, “Robot, go to the optical and pick up my order.” Robot stomped out in its usual stompy way.
Robot sloshed into the optical and received the custom mirror for Marlene’s iluxtrascope. Robot then folded the mirror several times so that it would fit in the small can it produced from a storage compartment. Back home, Marlene said, “Next time, wrap it in protective coverings, lash it to a dolly, and bring it home.”
For all of Thursday, Marlene looked at old images and listened to old music. Her only commands to Robot were “Robot, perform monkey” and “Robot, headspin”.
When Friday finally rolled around, Marlene ran about her flat, alternating between frantic shiftings and long, drawn out contemplations of the appearances of things. She was hopelessly behind in her plans. She called out to Robot, “Go to the spaceport and fetch me Banyan.” Robot did as commanded.
Robot waited patiently at gate 78B2 holding a small sign that said “Banyan” on it. A man stopped before Robot and bent over. “Hey little guy, I didn’t expect to see you here. Remember me, Banyan?” Robot effortlessly wrapped the man in protective coverings and lashed him to a dolly. When Robot returned home, Marlene told it to shutdown. She gently pulled the wrappings away from Banyan’s face. He was smiling.
“Next time,” she said, “write better software.”
“This time,” Banyan said, “I’m going to do a lot of things better.”
She smiled.
by submission | May 12, 2011 | Story
Author : J. Rohr
“I’m not taking the job.”
Melissa sighed. Rubbing her temples, not relishing the impending migraine, she said, “You have to.”
“I’ll find something.”
“It’s been six months.”
“We can wait a little longer.”
“No, we can’t.”
Bob opened his mouth, rebuttal at the ready, but fell back in his seat, shoulders slumped, “No, we can’t.”
Melissa stepped over, drying her hands on her apron. She didn’t like to break Bob’s resolve. But it had to be done. The fact she’d been saving water in a bin from the dripping tap to do the dishes proved the point. Smoothing Bob’s hair back, trying to pet some calm into him, Melissa said, “It’ll be all right.”
Without looking up, Bob patted her on the hip and rubbed, “I know.”
#
“Sir, you’re next,” the tech announced.
“I know, I know,” Bob stepped forward. He felt sweat seeping through his suit. In the future he’d wait till he’d arrived and change at work. Part of him hoped the commute would get better over time, however, he knew himself too well. Even on the days his mind might stray from what it knew, held perhaps too tightly, Bob felt sure he’d always fear the Stream.
“Any solar flares today?” Bob asked the tech.
“Lets go buddy, the weather’s fine,” someone called from the back of the line. Murmurs of agreement rippled through the crowd. Old hands impatient at any delay.
Recognizing the consternation on a commuter’s face, the nineteen year old tech said, “It’s going to be a smooth ride.”
Swallowing hard, mopping sweat off his forehead, Bob nodded. These things look too much like coffins, Bob wanted to mention but impatient murmurs and tapping feet urged him forward without a word. Squeezing his eyes shut, he turned in the tiny space. He informed the tech he was ready with a quick nod.
The surge of power hummed in his ears. Sweat went cold across his body. He’d made sure to tell Melissa he loved her before leaving. At any second the machine would engage. He thought about the dry wall in the basement. Who would put it up when he didn’t come home? It felt like melting. The humming stopped. Bob tried to open his eyes. Nothing but white filled his vision. “I’ve gone blind,” he thought, “Thank god I’ve only gone blind.” Being blind certainly beat traveling the Stream, a relay of energy carrying commuters in particle bundles. At least blindness didn’t mean being scattered across the stars or reassembled improperly. One didn’t have to come back a freak with limbs in the wrong places. A few cells out of place and the brain misfires or the heart won’t beat or the skin isn’t thick enough to hold anything in or etc. His mind went over all the terrors that being blind seemed better than, all the worries that made him hate the commute.
And then colors reappeared, first as pinpoints, gradually in more defined shapes. Bob stumbled out of the Stream Port on Europa station. Fortunately, a tech caught him before he fell off the platform.
“Are you all right?”
“I’m not blind.”
The tech smiled, “First time I take it.”
“Yes.”
“Well, you’re all right now. Have a good day at work.”
“I will,” Bob said, a weak grin on his face, “I will.”
by submission | May 11, 2011 | Story
Author : Eric Poch
“When legend becomes fact, print the legend”
-The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
I’ve learned that if you put a man in a hole long enough, he’ll think of everything you could ever imagine. Put a dozen men in there long enough, and they’ll create the stuff of legend.
For the longest time we didn’t know what to call him, until one of the boys remembered a name they read in an old book. It was fitting.
We call him “La Longue Carabine”: The Long Rifle. Command swears up and down that he doesn’t exist. That it can’t be one man.
I know better.
Rumor spread fast as more and more of our boys were picked off. Slotikin thinks La Longue Carabine is a genetically enhanced soldier. He started ranting about intel that command had in its possession detailing the modifications the Reds made to their man. Some were believable: enhancements to the endocrine glands, rewired synapses for faster reflexes, modification to the pupils and iris to allow for low-light vision- the usual “super soldier” stuff. The more radical shit he came up with was frightening.
“I saw it. I’m telling you I saw it. They had pictures, man. The Reds grafted the rifle to his fucking arm. They got it wired to his brain so he doesn’t even need to use a scope. His eyes are the scope.”
Aside from the dozens of treaties they would be violating, we pointed out that the Reds wouldn’t surgically attach a rifle to a man’s arm; it would be too difficult to take off without killing him.
“You’re not getting it. They’re not planning to take it off. They’re not coming back to get him. That’s how the Reds work: They drop him out there and tell him to shoot ’till he’s dead. ‘For the motherland’ and all that bullshit.” He was getting too loud. “They wired their boy to kill, and that’s what he’s going to do. It’s not even about taking us out. It’s a fucking mind-game. Psychological warfare. Why do you think the uppers are covering it up? How come none of them get clipped? Have you ever thought about that?”
An MP overheard this and ordered him back to his bunk for a period of “mental leave.” As Slotkin was being escorted out of the mess hall he yelled back to us:
“He doesn’t sleep. How can you sleep if you don’t have eyelids? How can you sleep if you don’t have eyelids?” He just kept yelling that over and over as the MP dragged him out.
It’s been days since it happened, and Slotkin hasn’t spoken to anyone. The boys don’t know what to believe anymore… but I do.
I see him. Every day I look through my scope and there he is. Sometimes he’s bald, or fat. Sometimes he’s a woman. Today he’s short. Very young. He looks as though he hasn’t eaten in a week. He looks scared.
I watch him through my sight. He’s scanning the base… searching… looking for me. The weight of the rifle is making his arms shake. I bury the cross-hair in his chest. He keeps scanning. I flick the safety off. He’s almost got me in his sights when I pull the trigger.
No twitching or coughing up blood today. He drops, and I pack up and head to my bunk. I know there will be another tomorrow. A new legend. It will be my life against his, and they will call him La Longue Carabine.
by submission | May 10, 2011 | Story
Author : Aradhana Choudhuri
“John, I’m done. I’m getting rid of all of them.”
“Go for it. You don’t need to ask me.”
“Do you want something? There’s lots of vid, from when mom was little.”
“Where would I put it? Just…just flush it, ok?”
“Tomorrow. Federal Data Bureau will certify the wipe. Then I can sell the things. Do you want a part of the cash?”
“Nah, you keep it.”
“There’s a lot of them.”
“Wait a mo…” the vid-screen goes blank as John puts her on hold. So she counts the drives, in her head.
The oldest ones, each as big as her palm, black and utilitarian, are already on the truck. Then there are the cutsie-wootsie ladybugs and ballerinas and an entire array’s worth of koala bears from the thirties, barely a hundred TeraBytes each. They did get smaller for a while, till the superparamagnetic threshold was breached. The newest drive in the house is twenty years old, a striped orange cube the size of a small child.
The screen clears and John is back. “We’re doing ok, sis. Jill says you should buy yourself something.”
“That’s really nice of you two.”
“You’ve been paying Mom’s Datatax for years…” something in the background distracts John. “Mo…” He puts her on hold again.
She remembers sitting on the floor, playing with her bright blue rolling pin and ladle and a small sticky wad of dough, and her mother saying how Quantum Storage was just a year or so away. Then it was how Quantum ran into problems, but SpaceFold Memsisters would solve the data crisis. Give it a couple of years.
Her mother had stopped talking by the time she was in her teens. The pile of drives continued to grow, from the study into the spare bedroom and then into the hall.
The kitchen was half-full by the time mom retired. It took another two years for Social Services to send somebody around.
They all sat around the table, and the lady from Social took her mother’s hand, gently, and told her that hoarding pension payments – it took seven months of pension, by then, to buy a 400ExaByte drive – was not ok and there was more data generated every second than there was storage for it manufactured in a year, and did she really think she could save it all?
When her mother died, someone suggested getting it all into a government Anthro-study, but Nonessential Data doesn’t qualify. Some grad student, maybe from Socio-Analytics…But she doesn’t know any students. And renting a room at a Data Warehouse makes the taxrate go up not down, even if it means that she gets the kitchen back.
This time it’s Jill’s face on the screen when it clears.
“Sweetie,” says Jill, “I’m so glad you’re doing this. You need space. You need to make room for your own life.”
“It’s not that…I just can’t afford it anymore.” She hates explaining. Her sister-in-law always gets that pity-faux-therapist look on her face.
“Of course dear,” says Jill. “Tell us how it goes, ok?”
“Sure.”
“Bye sweetie!” The vid-screen goes dark. Only the sensors above the panel, visible-spectrum and infrared and audio and chem-sig, record the fleeting expressions on her face, the slight wince, the microtaste of salt in the air. Nonessential. 6:00 AM sharp on Tuesday, all phones in the 5686 area-code purge their memories. There’s a huge fine if they don’t.
by submission | May 8, 2011 | Story
Author : Jason Frank
I sure don’t mean to say that the pods they sent us here in aren’t nice. There is a chance that they might be too nice, though. I’d be the first to admit that’s a strange problem to have, but we have it. I’m not trying to say that I’m better than anyone else here, nobody would believe that. I’m just saying that having ants in my pants, like all my teachers used to say, gets me out of my pod everyday. Nobody else has so much as taken a peak out of their pod, not even after a month.
I don’t know what’s going on in anyone else’s pods. I’m sure they’ve got all the great stuff that I have in mine. Plenty of them have partners or families in there, too. At first I thought that maybe I was too bold, that maybe none of the women would let their men out after they saw how I was carrying on. That had to be my ego talking; I’ve never been mistaken for a model. More often, I get mistaken for a tall boy.
Still, I’ve been doing my part to get our potential community functioning. I started all the plants from the garden pod. That didn’t work out as expected. The soil here is very fertile but also very strange. Everything I’ve planted is already huge. There’s the strange part, too. All the pumpkins bounce away from me when I try to pick them up. I wasn’t even going to pick any of them, just hold them up to test their weight. They didn’t know that, I guess. Also, the corn emits suspicious whispers whenever I walk by. It’s not the wind, I’d know the difference. I’m just concerned because the creeping phlox is creeping close to a few of the pods and I’m worried that will just give whoever is inside another excuse to stay in.
My main goals for now are taking away excuses for staying in. Mostly I’ve been doing this by applying paint to things. I make sure to only use the most inviting colors and interesting designs (interesting to me, at least). I’ve got a giant mural that says “Welcome Out!” in the most magical colors. The light of our new home interacts with our pigments in a way that makes them look extra magical. I had to build up to the big mural. It took a while to get comfortable with ladders and scaffolding and all that. I think the extra know-how on my part really shows. It’s not that I consider “You Are Special Avenue” a bunch of junk, just an immature work. Besides, all that repetition, it must say you are special a hundred times down that stretch of road, really sharpened my skills (the later specials are considerably more special than the earlier specials).
But yeah, I’m hoping somebody, anybody, comes out of their pod. I’ve always been kind of a loner but I’ve been realizing lately that I’m most likely growing out of that phase. It would probably be good to have some other opinions out here, too. I’m not entirely sure that all of my ideas are good ones. When you have as many ideas as I do, they can’t all be winners. Just to provide one example, I’ve been really second guessing sending out the robots to find me flowers. One of them brought back what strongly resembles a piece of an alien spaceship. Oh well, that’s how things are right now, out here. Feel free to join me, Insiders.
