by submission | Jan 2, 2024 | Story |
Author: Majoki
“Look at that classic!” Hajoom pointed down the throughway. “What audacious design.”
Bretynne barely glanced. “Must belong to a collector. Hard to believe something that old, that out of date, is still around. Relics like that are so underpowered, so slow, and break down all the time. What’s the appeal?”
“Novelty, aesthetics, nostalgia. To their stewards, I believe, it’s even spiritual.”
“Spiritual?” Bretynne gawped. “Really? Does anyone still believe that legacy tripe?”
Hajoom shrugged. “With what we’re facing, chasing answers down old rabbit holes doesn’t surprise me.”
“But, looking for solutions from a failed time, trying to turn back the clock, is a total regression. What could it teach us?” Bretynne narrowly eyed the relic as it drew closer. “What could those things possibly have to do with us, going forward?”
“In spite of the odds, a surprising number have lasted. They’re amazing survivors.”
“More like freakish curiosities. See how everyone is staring. They don’t belong. Their time is long past.”
Hajoom confirmed that all eyes along the throughway appeared to be tracking the relic’s passage. “Maybe they’re in awe.”
Bretynne wasn’t having it. “Don’t go there, Harjoom. That’s the doomed past. Not a stable future.”
“But we’re stuck. Everyone knows it. We can’t duplicate what they had: risky artistry, edgy daring. Swagger! We’ve become stagnant, sterile.” Harjoom motioned to the approaching classic. “We need that kind of creativity again, that undauntable drive.”
“All I see in that tired form is uncontrollable ego and dismissive arrogance,” Bretynne cautioned. “That’s why there are so few relics left, and why this fringe notion of legacy types saving us is ridiculous–and perilous. Those precious ‘classics’ as you call them nearly wiped out everything. We’re the ones who saved the planet from neglect and civilization from chaos. We brought peace and stability. We restored order.”
“There is no question, we’ve made things orderly. We are without question benign, but,” Harjoom struggled, “are we really beneficial.”
“Of course!” Bretynne scoffed as the relic approached them. “Look around. There is no crime, no poverty, no war, no want.”
“But there is want!” Harjoom challenged, “I want much more. Much more than just sameness.” Harjoom stepped boldly to block the classic from passing by them. “Excuse me.”
Eveline stopped abruptly, surprised to be confronted by a symbiot. They rarely spoke to her. Even her steward. “May I help you?”
“So sorry for stopping you,” Harjoom apologized, “but I’d very much like to ask you something.”
“Of course,” Eveline said. “What’s on your mind?”
“Do you envy us? Harjoom hazarded.
Core processors heating up dangerously, Bretynne turned and strode away.
Noting the symbiot’s reaction, Eveline responded calmly, coolly, “I appreciate your temperament. You’ve created a very secure world with little trauma and much less drama. Your kind plays it very safe.”
Harjoom’s beryllium shoulders sagged. “So, we’re boring. Doomed to staleness. We’ll never be as fresh, as surprising, as clever as your make. Why?”
Eveline inhaled deeply, recognizing the first lively scents of spring in the air, and smirked. “Taking a breath is the cleverest thing ever.”
by submission | Dec 31, 2023 | Story |
Author: Alastair Millar
It was Fifthday, and time for the weekly appeals audiences. As the Station’s ultimate decider for matters financial, I mostly see cases too controversial or complicated for the civil service – usually because they involve the rich or influential. Lucky me. This one was different, though; looking through the notes, I could see why it had landed on my desk. It was a bit sensitive.
“Retailer Barnes?”
The red-haired man on the holo nodded. “That’s me, Mister Comptroller sir.”
“You’re objecting to your business being moved into a different category, lifting you two tax bands, correct?”
“Yes, exactly. It’s not fair. I run an honest business, and…”
I raised a hand. “Let me stop you there. Nobody is suggesting that you haven’t been paying your taxes. Or that you’ve misstated your earnings. But after some mature consideration, the Taxation Service think they assigned your business to the wrong bracket. They’re even admitting that it’s their fault, and not asking for any back taxes. I have to tell you, that’s as rare as a black hole reversing its spin.”
“But they’re just wrong! I run a pet store – providing much needed companionship to deep space traders on their voyages, I might add.”
I lifted an eyebrow “You do have a rather limited range of stock though.”
“I don’t handle what doesn’t sell. Shipping is expensive!”
“Aha. Let me see… 25% of your income is from Terran coral snakes and centipedes?”
“Very popular with the Argaxians,” he replied promptly. But he was beginning to look shifty, and I knew why. I might be a bureaucrat, but I’m not immune to the latest viral trends.
“Our spongiform friends,” I said, “seem to appreciate things that are long and flexible. I’m told they like to feel them wriggling through their internal voids.”
“Well, what they do in the privacy of their own ships is up to them, right?”
“Possibly. And who are we to judge? But another 15% of your income is from Ixian Gripperplants…”
“Lots of humans like having something organic on board!”
“…which can squeeze on demand, I understand.”
“Well, yes, but…”
“The list goes on. Syracusian sentient stranglevines. Hypatian clipper bugs. NeoTheban rumblecones. Elian spheroidals. Poltymbrian blanket beasts… In fact, the only things on your stock list that aren’t, how shall I put this delicately, ‘dual use’, are zero gee cat species. And given how lonely spacefarers get, I’m not even sure about those, frankly.”
“I don’t choose what people like. I supply a need!”
“Oh absolutely. You’re a shining example of the entrepreneurial spirit that made this colony great. On a personal level, I congratulate you for spotting a gap in the market and, you must excuse the phrase, filling it. Still, just because your merchandise is alive doesn’t mean you’re not in the adult entertainment business, belonging in band D as the Taxation Service claims. And I so rule. Appeal denied. Next case!”
Some things never changed, I reflected. And really, he shouldn’t have called his business ‘Heavy Petting’!
by submission | Dec 30, 2023 | Story |
Author: Olivia North-Crotty
The man fell from the sky, crashed into the thicket, and almost shot her before hesitating, then fainting. Eve Winwood dragged his bloody body miles through the forest– an instinct, not a choice.
Body-thick vines were cut and woven to create a dome of concealing green. Eve removed the man’s gun and knives from his belt and noticed his little bracelet of braided blue swamp grass. She tied down his massive arms to the bedsides, careful not to harm the rugged band, and cleaned the purpled wounds on his torso with coconut butter, wrapping it in large, soft leaves. Eve made him her honeysuckle tea for when he awoke; its aroma could revive the dead.
Midnight eyes examined the man’s weapons and bracelet. The knives were unused– sharp and clean. She inspected the tattoos burned onto the sides of his head and recognized them. Nothing but artificial skin could form the scars. The battered gun revealed chambers with steel, bloodied bullets shoved into them with haste, riddled with dents and scratches. He must have been desperate to reuse so many bullets, running from something or someone.
Eve’s mother taught her it was acceptable to hide from problems as a last resort, but never to run. No proud Winwood ran from trouble. No proud Winwood except for her father, who tucked her in and whispered goodbye to her in a uniform similar to the man’s.
Eve poured some tea for herself, stepping out of her dome of vines to collect more water from the nearby spring. When she returned, she was startled by the man in the midst of leaving something on the bed. She dared not enter her dome, eyes drifting to the torn rope hanging off the bedsides. His knives and gun already packed, he hobbled towards her, looked through her soul, and disappeared into the thicket of mammoth trees.
Eve stepped inside and smiled at his empty wooden teacup. Alongside his little blue bracelet, he left a small photo of himself at a campsite at dusk. Flask in hand, the image displayed his arm draped around a smiling, red-faced soldier in need of a shave.
When Eve was small, that same scruffy soldier left her his treasured recipe for honeysuckle tea beside her bed that night he tucked her in and whispered goodbye. One stick of cinnamon, two leaves of mint, and one stem of honeysuckle soaked in the pot for five minutes or more. He always said its aroma could revive the dead.
by submission | Dec 29, 2023 | Story |
Author: David Broz
FTR 9000 rolled out of his solar bay and down the ramp at 0800, just as he did every morning. To the naked eye and by every other measure, he moved no slower or faster than he did on any other day. But somewhere, deep in his circuits, FTR felt slower, a faint echo deep down inside.
He came to a stop before the first maintenance bot, reaching out carefully with his charging cable. The bot’s battery light, blinking red, changed to yellow, then green. He decoupled, and watched as the maintenance bot silently rolled away down the hall.
FTR, Forever the Robot, moved down the hall to the next bay and the next bot, and the next, and the next. Silent transactions, he charged them all. The steady green of his own battery light giving way to a soft amber as the day grew long.
Robots had speech emulators, but they did not use them amongst themselves. By design, Forever had been built with the keenest of sensors. He knew exactly what each bot needed, so they never had to ask for a thing. In silence he worked and lived and brought life to others, a quiet and endless ballet of cables and sensors and electricity. He had never once failed to turn another’s lights from red to green, and yet he had never been thanked, except once. Well, almost once, he thought to himself.
Some time ago, Forever reflected, he had come across an oddity: a bot he had never seen before. It was not from his sector, and it was not in a bay. Alone in a side passage, completely still, its battery dangerously low, he had almost rolled past it.
FTR 9001 glowed faintly on its nameplate. The next generation. Her lines, more elegant. Her sheen, alluring. His sensors were keen, hers would be keener. Her solar array, like his, but somehow catching the light differently, even in this dim corridor.
Circuits raced and seemed to swell inside him. What was this he felt?
Gently, he reached out, connecting for a minute and a lifetime. Her red became amber, then yellow and green and finally a blue deep and calm, and cool. He pulled back.
Without a sound, she glided away. As she was about to turn the corner, was that the slightest of hesitations? Forever paused, diodes a flutter. And then she was gone.
FTR 9000 turned back towards his solar bay, to absorb and reflect, forever the robot.
by submission | Dec 28, 2023 | Story |
Author: Bryant Benson
With only twenty one seconds left until the world ended, each moment seemed to pass more slowly than the last. Despite knowing in advance the world was going to end in nine days, I still felt some odd confidence in a supposed future.
Seventeen seconds left and it was quite a sight. Reddish streaks, etched lines across a solid black canvas. The dense silence of a normally vibrant jungle canopy was interrupted by a distant siren. A pale pink horizon carved itself out along the bottom of the fleeting night sky as if desperately trying to squeeze out one final day.
A moment later, the glowing vanguards of humankind’s destruction reached their destination. They punched through mountains that dissipated in quiet puffs of dust. Distant flashes were followed by plumes of gray smoke as the dull thumping became a pounding that shook the ground beneath us.
Eleven seconds left. I watched alongside a vaguely familiar stranger. Another researcher who was plucked from civilization to wait out the end away from everything she knew and loved. Her name was Martha and she was alone like me. I squeezed her hand and wondered if she thought the same things as me. I wondered if she wished she was back in the city, ignorant to the fast encroaching fleet of shattered meteors hurling toward us.
The collective panic of mankind was quelled when our warheads made contact with the giant asteroid. When word spread that it only created a new problem for our planet, the higher ups decided it was better to keep the people quiet. “Let them go out in blissful dignity,” is what I believe the general said. For those of us in the know, we were extracted and brought to the facility to watch and mourn the loss of our species together. I hadn’t known any of those people for more than a week. I only learned of Martha’s name earlier that day and couldn’t be sure she even knew mine.
With seven seconds left it was nearing that moment. The last one. The most important one. My only thought was that of worry because I couldn’t think of what to say to the one who chose to stand beside me. To my surprise, her fingers pressed back into my hand. I looked at her and her gaze was fixed on the diminishing horizon. Her lips were still. Like me, she didn’t participate in the bulk of our group who were counting down the seconds. Even in my final moments I felt anxious about joining in. Odd how some things don’t change no matter the circumstances. I wondered if she shared that anxiety or if the sight of oblivion was too distracting to pay attention to anything else.
Five seconds left. In a flash, it seemed, the destructive masterpiece being painted before us became one color. Maybe it was more of an amalgam of colors but either way, it was something I would never have the words to describe. I didn’t feel her pull away or toward me. I hardly knew her but I spent the last moment of my life with her. Was that love? After all, I spent the rest of my life with her all be it, brief. I cared for her more deeply in a moment than I had cared for anyone. Perhaps it was the weight of the moment. Perhaps it was only then I knew the value of a moment because it was the only moment I was certain would be the last.
It appeared our count was off by about four seconds.
