Joana Baker

Author : V.L. Ilian

Vice manager Hans Heidelberg exited the elevator with unusual nervousness. He knew the chief was awaiting his report but never in his life had Hans been so unsure about himself.

“Mr. DeVries… The report on the 2 hour outage of our mainframe is complete.”

“Well… get on with it.”

Hans took a deep breath imagining the scene where he gets fired for incompetence in interpreting the data.

“Less than 24 hours ago the mainframe started constructing a profile for a new employee, Joana Baker, a young graduate student who’d been accepted as a research assistant. 6 seconds into the profile build a speeding ticket threw up a red flag with the plausibility checker.”

“How can a speeding ticket fail a plausibility check?”

“It seems it had been issued exactly 54 minutes earlier in Singapore. The AI established that Joana Baker could not have traveled from Singapore to her interview in a 20 minute window. However this did not freeze our mainframe. A series of programs started running to check for mistakes, identity theft and a number of other theories.”

Hans put his thumbdrive on chief’s desk and pressed the little button on it. The file of Joana Baker appeared on the display surface of the desk in front of Mr. DeVries.

“It turned out another Joana Baker who lives in Singapore received that ticket.”

A second file appeared next to the first one that also read Joana Baker but the photo was of the same person. Different hairstyle, different clothes but undoubtedly the same person.

“The puzzle is their biometrics match 99%”

“Separated sisters?”

Hans pushed the little button again.

“Researching this other woman threw up several other plausibility errors. We discovered a third woman named Joana Bakker living in Amsterdam.”

A new file was being displayed, again of a woman who strongly resembled the first.

“Are you certain this is correct?”

Hans swallowed dryly and continued.

“All 3 women are exactly the same age and match biometrically 99%. This time the results attracted the interest of a background program that had been running continuously for 20 years. It had the credentials to prioritize itself and it did so by putting every program on hold. This resulted in the freezing of all our operations.”

“What program is this? Who gave it these permissions?”

“When queried it identifies itself as Project Harper Detector v3.2.”

Mr. DeVries changed his expression noticeably.

“No links, no ownership info and there’s no project Harper in our database. It was so firmly rooted in our mainframe we couldn’t stop it without cutting all the power. We were ready to do just that when it finished and returned the mainframe to normal operation. It… gave us some results”

Hans pressed the little button again, the first three files shrunk and the desk was filled with files. All variations Joana Baker, all 99% match to the first, spread all over the world.

“In total we’ve identified 27 Joana Baker… s. Born on the same date, in fact if we take into account errors in hospital clocks… they’re all born at approximately 13:30GMT.”

Hans waited to be fired.

In a moment that is rarely witnessed Mr. DeVries smiled broadly.

“Project Harper was a classified research initiative… we tried to create ripples in the fabric of the universe. The theory was that if we could disrupt space-time we could create anomalies that we could detect and find out how the great machine ticks. After 11 years of failures the project was abandoned but we left an AI running to spot data anomalies just in case.”

Hans looked down at the 27 files.

“…The universe threw an exception error?”

“Yes… Now we just have to figure out how.”

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Barfly

Author : Asher Wismer

“There’s a bug in my drink,” said the customer.

I lifted the glass and held it to the light. Sure enough, a little fly floated midway, almost obscured by the amber liquid.

“Sorry about that.” I poured him a replacement, and he went back to his table satisfied.

The bar was busy tonight. Several people had requested The Game on TV, and I had reluctantly turned it on. Naturally, that spawned a group of Moral Authorities to come over and berate me for allowing “pornographic filth” into a family establishment.

The Game patrons tip better. I told the Moral Authorities to look elsewhere for their superiority complex.

Over in a corner, three women were drinking too much and giggling. Occasionally, one would glance over at me, look away hastily, and giggle even louder. I knew what was coming and prepared myself.

Sure enough, after a minute one of the women came over with a twenty and a smirk. “You got a minute?” Her voice was noticeably slurred.

I nodded, and she placed the twenty on the bar. “I hear you can make a woman orgasm with one kiss.”

“Is that so?” I glanced around; people were watching The Game, and the room was loud enough. Still….

“Go ahead,” she said. “See if it works. You can keep the twenty either way.” Her eyes were heavy-lidded. I wondered briefly if she would remember. Her friends would, though.

Unless….

I quickly poured three shots of my special brew from under the counter and put them on a serving plate. “Lean over this way,” I said.

She smirked and did, and I kissed her, careful to keep my lesser libido in check. Her skin flushed, her eyes widened, her shoulders rolled. A trembling began at her loins and worked up her stomach to her head, and I placed a hand under her arm to support her.

“Take these three on the house,” I said, walking her back to the table. She sat down heavily, shell-shocked, and her friends whooped. The Game drowned them out. I winked and went back to the bar.

It was always a risk, but the special brew would make their memories fuzzy and other people would remember The Game better anyway. With luck, she would never notice the babies hatching in her body until it was too late.

Under the cover of the bar, I refilled the Brew bottle from my proboscis, then cheered a particularly good beheading.

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The GENErevolution ™ is Now

Author : Joshua Reynolds

“Are you sure this will work?” the President asked. He was broad, clumsy and permanently flustered. These were his only defining qualities, and his election was still regarded as something of a fluke.

“Of course, Mr. President.” The GENErevolution representative said confidently, clone-bank teeth blisteringly white in the finest smile medical science could provide. He gestured and the corporate doctor leaned over the President, gloved fingers clipping, fastening and generally making the President exceedingly uncomfortable. The last was not part of the doctor’s job, merely a benefit given his current circumstances.

“The procedure has become a staple of the GENErevolution services packet. We use only the finest cloned neural webs from our celebrity DNAbanks. Great men, Mr. President, great men.” The representative continued, watching the doctor work. The doctor tapped the President’s skull-implant harder than he should have, causing him to jump.

“Ow!”

“Stop moving please.” The doctor’s hands gently rotated the President’s head back into position with calm precision. Inside of course, he was seething as only a man of high education can. Six weeks earlier, the President had railroaded a bill through Congress that allowed corporations, like GENErevolution for instance, to clone and brain-bump valuable employees as part and parcel of company insurance programs. Since the clones were the property of the creating body a cunning corporate body, again GENErevolution for instance, could in fact lay-off the original employee and use his clone at cut-rate cost instead.

The doctor, a graduate of the New Bethesda surgery program and worth six-figures, had received his pink slip in the mail that morning. He had also received a gold watch because GENErevolution was like a family and all about tradition.

The watch, having been designed by a disgruntled former employee in the souvenir division and newly cloned himself, did not work.

Thus, the doctor poked the President again.

“Ow! You’re doing that on purpose!”

“Please don’t move.” The doctor said, unsmiling. The GENErevolution representative, who had not been cloned as the new practice was waived for management-level employees, leaned forward, hands behind his back.

“Don’t worry Mr. President, a complete neural overlay is nothing to fret over. It’s quite old hat these days, ha-ha-ha.” The representative’s laugh was as artificial as the rest of him. It was borrowed from a popular comedian, royalties pending, of course.

“Ha-ha?” the President said. “And I’ll still be me, right? I mean, I’ll have all the moves and such, but I’ll still be me?”

“You’ll be fine. Completely unchanged, save for the mesmerizing skills of Gene Kelly implanted into your cortex. All we’re really doing is giving your neural network a good shoring up to prevent any synaptic burn and maybe give you a few smooth moves, ha-ha-ha.”

“Good. Good. The Sin-Lu Treaty Annual Ball is tonight at the Chinese embassy and I’d like to make a good impression.”

“Oh you will, you will. Right doctor?”

“Of course.” The doctor said. He glanced at the neural tray, containing a cloned neural web tattooed with the letters ’G-K’.

These letters did not stand for Gene Kelly.

That night, at the ball, the President pulled a ceremonial Shou Dao sword, dating from the Song Dynasty, off of the wall and attempted to behead the Chinese Prime Minister while shouting “This is for building that bloody great wall, you bastard!” in ancient Mongolian.

The Board of Directors for GENErevolution could not be reached for comment.

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The Icemen Cometh

Author: Roi R. Czechvala

They think we are unaware during the Freeze. They say our brain activity is too low for rational thought. At best they say we might experience vague fleeting dreamlike states. They think we sleep. They’re wrong.

It’s been two years since our last Thaw. It has been two years in which to think. Two years to plan. Two years to become seriously pissed off.

As the Thaw begins, our orders and classes in the weapons and equipment we will be using are given to us intravenously. Small electric currents are fed through our bodies to stimulate and exercise long dormant muscles. A high protein/carbo/steroidal soup is pumped into us to get us battle ready. I’d prefer a beer.

Their failing was in thinking that we are asleep in cryo. They have no idea that the brain feed works both ways. While they are monitoring us, we are monitoring them

They never expected us to learn. They never expected us to communicate with each other in cryo, or communicate to the other ships, to the other Icemen, let alone a distant planets surface. They didn’t plan, nor expect us to have any knowledge, or even goals beyond our military download. How wrong they are. How arrogant.

Finally the Thaw is complete. Twenty nine of us emerge from our lockers. The non-cryos refer to them as “Cryo Stasis Emersion Tanks”, but they are identical to our lockers in garrison, sans the vent holes.

There are twenty nine Cryos in this drop ship, plus our lieutenant, a non-cryo, and a handful of other NCs to run the ship. We are drop troops; the Icemen. Little more than bombs sheathed in flesh; set to explode in a fury of berserker combat. An expendable weapon as far as they’re concerned. If we survive the fray, and we usually do, all the better, it means promotion, for the CO, we’re just ammo. If we are terminated, oh well, they can always grow more.

We draw our combat loads, and fall into formation to await any updates to our previously downloaded orders. Our Lt. takes command from our platoon sergeant. Funny how our commanders are all non-cryos, and therefore non-combatants. It’s like they don’t trust us. Ha, I make me laugh.

“Gentlemen”, our Lt. speaks in something less than a manly voice. “as you are already aware there has been an uprising in the Martian Confederation and we’ve been called upon to quell the disturbance. The rebels are cybos.” Cybos; he spits out the word just like somebody calling a black man “nigger” two hundred years ago.

“The reason,” the little NC prick continued, “for the soldiers treachery is uncertain at this time, but you have been ordered to eliminate the problem with extreme prejudice. You have all been issued atomics to achieve this end. You drop in twenty minutes. That is all. Any questions?” Icemen have no need to speak. We have orders. Besides, we already know the reason.

“Very well. Platoon disMISSED.” The Lt. executes a crisp about face, steps off neatly with his left foot, and crumples to the floor with a .50 caliber hole pierced neatly through his skull. I use incendiary rounds; cauterizes wounds instantly. I hate blood.

Yes, we will drop in twenty minutes, we will meet the “cybos” on the field of battle, and we will embrace the Cybernetic Soldiers as brothers in arms as we face the real enemy. The “trueborn” humans who hate us, despise us, and inherently fear us.

Mars will be ours, and what more fitting place for a race of warriors.

The Icemen Cometh…

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And The Winner Is…

Author : J. S. Kachelries

The host of the very popular holovision show slithered to the center of the stage. The thunderous ovation of 1500 tails pounding on the floor died away as the host’s three antennae motioned them to quiet down. The holocameras panned slowly from the audience to the host. “Thank you…thank you…welcome to Alien Encounters. Tonight is our final show focusing on the sentient life form on Sol-3, in the Sirius Sector. As our regular viewers will attest, these earthlings are a very entertaining species. They have to be the easiest species in the galaxy to mess with.

“For those of you unfamiliar with the show, we sent three teams of college students to Earth with instructions to convince as many earthlings as possible that ‘extraterrestrials’ exist using as little evidence as possible. The team producing the highest gullibility quotient will win an all-expense vacation for five at the Holiday Spa on Orion-3.

“Our first team, from Dorfox University, matted down a circular pattern in a vegetation field on one of the planet’s island countries. Despite the fact that no spaceship would leave such a simplistic impression, the earthlings became obsessed with wild speculations about alien visitors. The Dorfox team followed up with some really bizarre geometric patterns that had no practical significance whatever. Despite the 80/20 rule, very few earthlings accepted the simplest solution. They think we’re sending them complicated, encrypted messages. Hellllloooo. It’s not a complicated message guys, it’s ‘Get a life!’

“Our second team, from Darrvah University, shredded a weather balloon and scattered its remains across an arid silica wasteland. Not only did their news media go overboard, but they are still obsessed with the ‘alien crash site’ decades later. The really funny part is they think their government is involved in a conspiracy to cover up the incident. The more the government denies a cover-up, the more convinced the fools are that there are flying saucers and alien bodies hidden in a secure warehouse. It makes you wonder if these beings ever heard of Occam’s Razor. To this day, local souvenir shops still sell millions of little green humanoid dolls that are supposed to be us. Do you believe their arrogance? They think all intelligent races must be bilateral beings that look like them. Unbelievable!

“Finally, our third team, from Gihhel University, mind melded with an aspiring actor and had him broadcast an audio only “breaking news story” about aliens invading their planet. It was hilarious. Thousands of people were convinced we were going to turn them into slaves and sex toys. They grabbed projectile weapons to fight us off. Do you believe that? They thought they could chase away a superior, technologically advanced race with pop guns. And slaves? Why would we want intellectually challenged earthmen as slaves? That’s what robots are for. And sex toys? Hey, I’ve seen their women. I’d rather mate with a Cassiopeian swamp lizard.

Anyway, these are the three finalists. Will it be…Crop Circles, Roswell, or War of the Worlds? Which set of contestants made the most number of earthlings look like the south end of a north bound usagiuma?” The host reached into his pouch and pulled out a datapadd. He paused for dramatic effect. The audience began chanting for their favorite. He flipped open the padd and read “And the winner is…”

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