by submission | Apr 22, 2011 | Story
Author : Wasco Shafter
“Thirty minutes until heart failure” chirps a voice in Mark’s head. He flips through the internal photographs on his heads-up display, but there’s nothing new there. His heart is a confused, rotting lump of electrified meat rattling his ribcage. Five minutes has not done much to change this.
Beyond his display, surgeons twiddle their scalpels. Mark can see one chain-smoking on the observation deck. The surgeon closest to him waves a breathing mask in his face. Mark shakes his head, then returns to the medical feed on his earpiece:
vaccine for brain flu … cure for cushing’s disease … bionic arm … Ping!
“TOKYO: NEW PROSTHETIC HEART OPERATES AT 10X EFFICIENCY”
He drags the figures around in his mind. Three minutes for the 3D printer to assemble one, twelve minutes to do the surgery, fifteen minutes to play with.
“I can wait.”
The surgeons throw up their hands and sub-vocalize queries into their own earpieces. The pieces obediently sift through the sum total of human knowledge, aggregate relevant data into feeds, whisper the results into their ears. They listen to baseball scores, celebrity gossip, the whereabouts of their spouses. Mark listens to the steady march of biomedical research:
cure for anorexia … vaccine for hopelessness … bionic eye… Ping!
“Twenty minutes until heart failure.” The surgeon in the observation deck puts out his cigarette. He moves his lips, and his earpiece’s sensor reads them. Mark hears,
“Ready?”
“I can wait,” he replies.
The surgeon digs around for a lighter. “You’re really letting this go down to the wire, guy.”
“The wire keeps moving. Got a ping just now tells me a new type of heart takes half the time to install.”
“Great,” Says the surgeon, “Get it. We’ll have you out of here in nine minutes.”
On the operating table, Mark shakes his head. “I don’t want that heart. I want the time its existence gives me. Can’t afford to get surgery, just to have a better heart come out fifteen minutes later.“
Mark sets his earpiece to ignore the surgeon and focuses again on the medical feeds:
cure for addiction … vaccine against starvation … bionic breasts … Ping!
“Fifteen minutes until heart failure.” Six minutes left to find a better heart. Information pours into Mark’s skull through his ears, his eyes. He mutes his death-clock, places it in the corner of his display instead. Eleven minutes, twenty seconds. Scripts comb the torrent, highlighting breakthroughs of tangential interest:
cure for heartlessness … vaccine for heartworm … bionic blood … Ping!
“3-D PRINTER SOFTWARE UPGRADE. PRINTING TIME REDUCED TO THIRTY SECONDS.”
He teaches a widget to calculate the time until his point of no return, places that countdown directly beneath the death clock. Two minutes, forty seconds.
He sees the mirrored image of his death-clock on the surgeons’ displays.
cure for common cold … vaccine for impure thoughts … bionic hair …
Nothing.
Thirty seconds. The surgeon with the breathing mask moves in. Mark flails his arms. He can’t speak, but his earpiece reads his lips:
“NO! NOT YET!”
Ten seconds until point of no return. One. Negative five. Mark doubles the breadth of his searches, combs four datastreams at once. The surgeons solemnly disconnect from his feed one by one, and file out of the room. The surgeon on the observation deck crushes out his cigarette, and then he too leaves.
And four minutes later, when Mark finds a new prosthetic heart in Beijing that operates at 100x normal efficiency, and can be easily installed in the time he has left, there is no one to do the surgery.
by submission | Apr 20, 2011 | Story
Author : Clint Wilson
Even though the thing had now had a couple of weeks to absorb our language I didn’t really think it could understand me, but all the same I still uttered the pre-scripted line.
“Living Being… I address you as a devoted protector of the Terran empire. Know now by proof of this official proclamation, that I have one duty and one duty alone.”
I absent-mindedly massaged the butt end of my still holstered but ready and deadly razer.
“I am to keep an ever-watchful eye as you interact with my fellow Terrans, and should you ever once make any move that I perceive as threatening in the slightest, it is my sworn duty to immediately exterminate you at will and without prejudice. You have been fairly warned.”
The thing was squat and wide, with rough grey skin as tough as rock. But it also had surprisingly hominoid features, two binocular yellow eyes, quite ape-like indeed. It probably stood straight up half a meter shorter than me, but was easily twice my mass.
And what then was its preposterous response to my official yet ludicrous proclamation? I swear to god the thing actually smiled at me.
Still I have never once left my post. I was raised for this position in the empire. I’ve spent every waking minute of every single day with this seemingly somewhat intelligent alien up until now. I have gotten to know it, even developed a respectful friendship with it I guess you could say.
But over the last two and a half years I have never once broken protocol. I go where it goes. I sleep when it sleeps. I have never once turned my back on it as scientists and business magnates alike cajole and frolic with the happy-go-lucky beast. And even though it is officially named, Specimen 3249A, we affectionately call it Clyde.
Yet as always my duty remains the same. I stand at the ready; hand never far from the handle of my razer. I shall never relax my attention.
And as I stand here in the new solarium with its variety of alien trees and foliage I can’t help but let my mind wander to all the happy times I have experienced thus far keeping guard over Clyde, as he readily explores his new expensively sculpted world.
And it is in that exact same moment that I realize in sudden and utter defeat that I have let my guard down.
I had always suspected that Clyde was more intelligent than he had let on to be… but also always remained optimistic that all of his mysterious idiosyncrasies were part of some sort of harbored wisdom reserved for our eventual discovery.
But alas I failed to recognize what I have always been so extensively trained to spot; the telltale signature of alien clandestine maneuvers afoot. In other words, the unexpected.
So what an opportunity for him in this lovely garden paradise, to take final advantage of my failure to adhere to my duty as a protector of the all mighty Terran empire.
I feel a warm breeze caress my face as Clyde drops down on me from the foliage above. The last two words I ever vocalize are, “Oh shit,” as, in an instant, a set of claws not unlike a panther’s, tear my throat to ribbons.
by submission | Apr 19, 2011 | Story
Author : Jake Wagner
Space was our grandparent’s final frontier.
Nobody really noticed when the satellites started falling. And even if they did, nobody cared. They burst into flames, streaking brilliantly across the night sky as they tore to pieces in our atmosphere. But nobody cared enough to look out their windows to see.
Space grew so much colder and darker and so much more infinite in our lack of knowledge when we turned our attention away. Sometimes my grandfather would visit and we would talk about how exciting space was back in the day. About how they sent people to colonize other planets, and that as he spoke there were people out there begging to reach out to us. To make contact.
And I would laugh at him. The idea was ridiculous.
People out there!? Why would anybody want to go out there? It’s so cold, and boring and empty.
Old timers and their stories of outer space. Distant planets. Stuff of the past, full of planets and galaxies, and universes. I’m sure it was cutting-edge once. I’m sure it was interesting once. But like I said, that’s just old people stuff. They can continue searching out that way as much as they want.
Nobody cares anymore.
Inside. That is where the excitement is.
Thousands and thousands of people make the transition yearly. They sign the contracts, say good bye to their friends, and give their homes and objects away. They don’t need money where they’re going. They don’t need homes, or food, or pets, or clothes. None of that is important when you transition.
I learned in school that every week newer and better things are added inside. That they have automated programs that keep their body and mind in absolute perfection as they just go around living their lives. Inside you don’t need to worry about being hungry, or needing to pee. Things like cancer and diseases don’t exist. Everybody is happy inside. Everything is perfect.
My teacher said that in three to four years it’s expected that everyone will have made the transition inside. Everyone will be living in the new space. Except a few old timers or crack-pots who think that the real world is better.
This won’t be the real world after long. In there will be.
Eventually, I suppose, only a few of us will even remember Earth. The oceans, and mountains and stuff. I guess some aspects have been brought inside, recreated to mimic the real world. But in there it’s just so much better. Colors are so much more vibrant. Everything is so fantastic and exciting inside; as opposed to the dull things out here. Or the cold boring out there.
Grandpa says that when mom and dad and I make the transition next week, he’s going to stay outside. He’s going to watch over the Earth and watch the sky as all of us march inwards.
He says that after long people won’t even remember the magic and beauty outside holds. And he says that my children would think I was stupid for ever even living outside. He says that they will look at Earth the same way I look at space. Something old, and boring, and forgettable.
But I mean, what’s so great about out here? Or even out there? It’s nothing but emptiness.
Inside is so much better.
by submission | Apr 17, 2011 | Story
Author : Marlan Smith
Rob ran into the bar and slammed the black leather bag down on the counter.
“Done! Gimme!” His eyes were wide with fear.
Hal looked at him, then down to the bag. He casually emptied his drink between thin lips and then smiled. “You know the arrangement. Not until I count the money.”
“Come on, Hal. This isn’t funny anymore,” Rob was trembling, a silent countdown running through his head. “I did everything you asked.”
“Oh, I agree,” said Hal. “Next time though, maybe you’ll think twice before claiming such an extravagant loan, eh?”
He looked at Rob from down his long, thin nose. He thought for a moment then presented the liquid-filled, synthetic diamond glass, which Rob snatched away from him.
It was a yellow mixture, on the rocks, and slightly cloudy from the millions of nanomachines that swarmed inside the liquid. Each tiny device, no larger than a single cell was a hunter-killer drone designed to track down and destroy the same number of microscopic robots currently swimming through Rob’s bloodstream. Only Hal knew the exact number.
Rob lifted the glass, but Hal gripped his arm abruptly. A shrill little whine escaped Rob’s lips as he thought he might spill the drink. Even one drop lost could mean thousands of artificial prions roaming unchecked through his brain. He estimated roughly a half hour before they began burrowing like tiny drills through his soft gray matter.
“It had better all be here,” said Hal, his cold eyes level on Rob’s. “Maybe next time you’ll toast a business deal a little more carefully, eh?”
He laughed and released Rob’s arm. The glass trembled. Rob gripped it in both hands, carefully lifting it to his lips. The cocktail slid frictionless over the nano-tempered glass, specially engineered to allow every molecule to pass over its surface unscathed. Not a single drop was wasted.
Rob swallowed greedily, slammed the glass down and ran a hand through his spiky hair, crunching the ice in his teeth. He swallowed and let out a long, lip-pursed breath, a silent “whooooo!”
Hal opened the bag, blinked. “I think we have a problem here, Rob. You’re short.”
“I think you have bigger problems than that,” said Rob, now smiling. “About how much Mad Cow Special would you say someone could purchase with all that money?”
Hal scowled back at him, knuckles white on the handles. Then suddenly his expression softened. His eyes went wide, then glassy. Hal blinked. Looked up at the bartender. The tall man winked back. As Hal’s hand began to tremble, Rob stretched lithely along the bar.
“It can buy quite a bit,” Rob said. “And with money left over to bribe the barkeep.”
A tick formed along one side of Hal’s face as Rob stood up, adjusted his collar and took a second bag, handed to him by the bartender. He then bounced out the door as Hal slumped in his stool, staring at nothing.
by submission | Apr 16, 2011 | Story
Author : David Bastin
It was the third year of the drought of 2130 when San Francisco rebuilt itself, put out to sea, and sailed away.
***
At first, when they heard what San Francisco meant to do, everyone laughed. Nobody thought that the people of San Francisco were serious.
“Do you expect it to float?” they asked.
“Yep!” said the people of San Francisco.
They kept right on building.
***
The people of San Francisco were simple and practical, and they built San Francisco that way. They built it with plastic and teakwood and glass. They shaped it in spheres and donuts and coils, and they put a promenade deck on the top; and they capped the whole thing with a city hall and a bridge and a mast with one sail.
“We’re not in a hurry to get anywhere” they explained.
San Francisco was self-contained and self-sufficient.
“We’ve got everything we need,” said the people of San Francisco.
***
At the end, when San Francisco cast itself off, some people got scared.
“What about the commuters?” they cried. “What are the commuters supposed to do without any San Francisco?”
The mayor’s voice, amplified by a bullhorn, answered the question across a widening expanse of water.
“Berkeley!” said the mayor. “Send the commuters to Berkeley or tell them to Oakland!!”
The mayor’s voice was now fading and faintly audible.
“Or tell them to go to ….”
His final words were lost, carried away on winds blowing onto California’s coast from beyond the Golden Gate.
