Ambrosia

“Oh my God. Peter, you didn’t.”

Peter smirked at his wife’s gaping stare. “You bet I did,” he told her smugly. “Nothing’s too good for our anniversary.”

“It looks fabulous.” Beatrice’s eyes shone as she ran a finger over the plastic wrap, feeling the smooth depression her movement caused. She giggled a little. “But I don’t even know how to cook synmeat. What are we going to do with it? Look at it?”

“Don’t worry,” Peter reassured her. “The guy who sold it to me told me how to do it.” His smile increased its girth; he couldn’t hide the secret any longer. “And it’s not synmeat.”

Beatrice looked at him oddly. “Then what is it?”

“It’s real.”

Beatrice gasped, eyes wide now with horror. “Peter… you could get arrested for that!” she hissed, grabbing the mushy package from him and glancing wildly around the room as if PETA enforcers were going to burst through the walls at any moment. “I didn’t even know you could get real meat anymore!”

“Honey, calm down.” Peter frowned. He’d expected his wife to be pleased. “A guy at the office tipped me off. I swear it’s untraceable. Just look at it! Real beef! This might be the only chance we have in our lives to get some.”

Beatrice seemed unconvinced. “I don’t know… isn’t it sort of… barbaric?”

“Darling. Stop believing all the crap the government tells us. People were meant to eat real meat. It’s the way we were made. If we ate like this every day, we wouldn’t have to get protein injections anymore, that’s for sure!” Peter was getting more upset. “Come on, I went through a lot to get this, okay? It’s our anniversary, and the thing is already dead. We might as well make the most of it.”

Beatrice agreed in the interest of matrimonial bliss. She watched nervously as Peter cooked the beef, searing it as he’d been instructed, and worried about whether their neighbors would pick up on the smell. Peter eventually made her set the table to keep her from getting in the way.

At last the meal was served, and Peter bit into it with gusto. Beatrice followed suit more hesitantly and both chewed for a few moments in silence.

“It’s sort of… stringy,” Peter said at last, swallowing a bite with some difficulty. His expression of joy had faded into an uncomfortable frown. “You can really tell it’s, ah, real.”

“Mmm… yes, you can.” Beatrice swallowed her own forkful with an expression of bliss. She opened her eyes as the rich taste settled into her senses and looked at her husband with an expression of true love and devotion. “This is the best present you’ve ever given me.”

Dust In The Wind

Day 192
Passed by that star today. The charts say it’s called Erigo, but it might as well be Antarctica. Nothing. No inhabited planets, no probes, no satellites. No sign of life. No useful supplies, either—most of its planets are gas giants, and there’s no way I could get enough oxygen out of them to help. I doubt I’d even make back what I’d lose by changing course, so that’s out. Just another useless system.

Repaired that intake valve. Turns out all it needed was a good cleaning.

Day 197
Still in the outskirts of the Erigo system. That’s E-R-I-G-O if anybody’s listening, forty-three radians and twelve thousand light-years, give or take, from galactic center. Watched the last onboard recording today. Some shit documentary about moon formation, but at least it was something. Now there’s nothing on this damned ship I haven’t seen.

Oxygen still good, but running low on real food. Started alternating with ration packs to make it last longer. Had a slight fever today, but there were some injections for that in the medkit, so I took one and it’s gone now. Engine running clean but hot. I shouldn’t have gone into Erigo’s gravity well.

Day 203
Out of the system. Good riddance. Clipped toenails today as they were getting a little long. Looked through the charts, but there’s nothing around here that I can make it to without more fuel. It’s just black space for light years and light years in all directions, or at most, a little uninhabited star system. After the Erigo fiasco, have decided against checking any more stars listed as uninhabited. Set a course for the nearest sure bet, which is Aschelon. Barring some miracle where the hyperdrive spontaneously comes back online, I’ll never make it. So hi, anybody listening. Could really use a hand here.

Threw a fit yesterday and chucked a ration pack under the console. Felt good to scream my heart out, but afterwards I realized I’d used twice normal oxygen. Figures. Slept an extra twelve hours to compensate and didn’t wake up once. Considered sleeping more often, but that feels too much like dying. I’d rather stay awake.

Day 214
Nothing left but ration packs. Losing weight steadily, but not quickly. Had another fever two days ago. Two injections left in the kit. Hope nothing worse happens.

Gave in and decreased oxygen to nineteen mole percent. Increased sleep cycle to 11 hours. So many stars in the window, but I can’t reach any of them. I want to scream, but I don’t want to die. Someone please get this soon.

Day 228
Recorded more log entries, but they were mostly cursing, so I deleted them. Don’t remember making them. Must’ve happened while I was sick again, ‘cause this time I didn’t use an injection. Dumb idea. Kids, don’t try this at home.

Running out of fuel. Turned the heat down to try to save power. Increased sleep cycle to 14 hours. Always tired now.

Day 235
Fuck! Fuck you, you fucking assholes! Why won’t anybody come? I know you can hear me, damn it! I know it! Fucking… hell damn shit motherfuckers! I know you can hear me!

Day 237
I’m so… it’s so cold. So hard to stay awake. I have to keep talking just to keep from sleeping. I’m so hungry. It’s cold in here. It’s so cold.

Eye For An Eye

“Arthur Lewis Jacobson of Earth. You are here and in the presence of these Justicars found guilty of engaging in sexual conduct with Ilexya Eiin Dephryn without her consent. By treaty #84753 between Earth and Ungöthein, you are hereby relinquished to the Justicars for sentencing and punishment. Have you any words to say before the sentence is pronounced?”

Artie waited for the mechanical translation piped into his holding tube to finish, then sneered at the device. He still couldn’t believe that Earth had agreed to a treaty that deprived a free Terran citizen of his rights while off-planet, but there was no use arguing now. No one had been sent to defend him, and the one brief message that the UN had tendered had said “You’re on your own,” in exactly so many words.

Artie was no lawyer, but he still knew better than to say anything. The judges hadn’t believed him the first time he’d said the chick totally wanted him, and they wouldn’t this time, either. It wasn’t like he hadn’t told her what alcohol did before letting her try it. It was just another case of some dumb slut thinking she could ‘take it back’ after she’d already fucked a guy. “No,” he said shortly, glowering at the Justicars as he heard their own translator box spout some sort of gibberish that must have equaled a negation.

The chief justice nodded gravely, the turned to address the court secretary. “Arrange Arthur Lewis Jacobson’s transport back to Earth for tomorrow morning, first hour.”

Artie gaped. All of that hype for this? The trial, the holding tube, the Justicars… and here he was getting sent home tomorrow! What a lucky break. His grin was so wide with relief that he almost missed the chief justice’s next words as the creature turned to face him.

“Arthur Lewis Jacobson, as is the custom and the law, you are now bound to receive as punishment the same wrongdoing that you have perpetrated upon others. This sentence will be carried out immediately following your discharge from this courtroom. You will then be returned to your home planet.”

The same… what the hell? Artie blanched as he listened intently to the translator, then swallowed. His smug demeanor dropped instantly, replaced by a cold sense of foreboding and a stomach-turning knot of fear. Oh my god… they can’t actually mean they’re going to… “That’s barbaric!” he cried out. He knew sodomy was all right by some people, but he wasn’t one of them, no sir.

The chief justice continued without pity or emotion. “Since your action took advantage of the female nature of Ilexya Eiin Dephryn, to properly experience the victim’s role your body will be surgically altered to reflect the feminine characteristics of your species.” One elongated hand raised as the justice gestured to the technician. The smaller creature nodded and started pressing buttons, and Artie felt the floor in his tube descending.

“Wait!” he cried out, terrified and desperate now. “You’re going to turn me into a girl? Will you put me back? How am I going to—No! Stop! Help!”

The justices remained implacable as Arthur Lewis Jacobson fell away, turning their attention to the next perpetrator in the tube.

The Vanishing

The nurse held Jeremy’s left arm with a practiced gentility that would have been motherly if it wasn’t so detached. His real mother was in the waiting room, wearing the kind of plastic smile that adults paste on when they’re the most upset. Jeremy was used to that smile. People did it a lot around him, especially his mother. He was getting really sick of it.

The nurse’s smile wasn’t like his mother’s. She wasn’t upset on the inside; she just didn’t care, which Jeremy figured was part of the job. Doctors and nurses couldn’t go around caring about their patients or they wouldn’t be able to do their work. He watched her gloved hands carefully lower his arm into the vat of softening solution. As usual, it tingled, and he winced.

“I know this hurts,” the nurse cooed, “but if you just tough it out we’re going to get you all fixed up, okay?”

“It hurt more when I made them,” Jeremy muttered, but he didn’t take his eyes off of the scars on his arm. The marks were still pink around the edges, new and raw, but they were already softening. In ten minutes they’d all be gone again, washed away with the rest of his failed attempts to make his mark in life.

“All right, you can take that arm out now.” The nurse turned aside to pick up the smoother, checking its power before turning back to Jeremy. Her eyes were on the clipboard in her off hand. “It says here you’ve had this procedure… seven times before? So this must be old hat to you, huh?” She smiled at Jeremy, who stared back at her sullenly. “I guess you don’t need the restraints, then.”

She pushed aside the soft straps that were used to hold patients’ limbs in place for their first or second scar removal and put the clipboard down, taking Jeremy’s wrist in her hand. The other hand brought the smoother down and turned on the power. A low hum was all that came from the device, but as she pressed it down and ran it slowly across the marred skin, all of the imperfections smoothed beneath its tip. Jeremy could feel the scar tissue breaking down. The sensation was distinctly different from making the cuts; while that was a sharp pain, bright and alive, this was the dull sting of conformity.

“Seven times, huh? So this is number eight?” She was smiling again, trying to make pleasant conversation. “You must get hurt a lot, huh?”

Jeremy’s eyes never left the slowly diminishing scars. “Yeah. I do.”

The Gun Show

“Mom! Mom, I wanna look at this one!”

Stephen was pulling on his mother’s arm, straining against it with that eight-year-old lean that kept him just within the bounds of parental supervision, since he wasn’t allowed to let go of his mother’s hand, but created the same effect as the puppy-dog eyes he was giving her now. “All right,” Marie laughed, letting him half-pull, half-drag her over to the booth. “Go ahead and look, Stevie, but don’t touch anything.”

“Hello there, ma’am,” said the booth owner, a grizzled, baseball-capped lug of a man. He smiled at Marie and then chuckled at Stephen, whose eyes were practically sparkling at the sight of his wares. The vendor wiped his greasy hands on a cloth. “Looking for a new piece for your son?”

“Maybe,” Marie said, letting her eyes wander over the rows of gleaming black metal.

“Mom! Look at this one!” Stephen was on his tiptoes, eyes alight and mouth open in a huge grin.

“That’s a semi-automatic flux rotating laser pistol,” the man informed them. “Special anti-shielding matrix that also works against adaptables. Changes frequency so fast they won’t even get a chance to shift.” He chuckled. “It’ll take out a raid party of two at a thousand yards with auto-target turned on. Your son’s got a good eye.” He grinned at Stephen.

“I don’t know…” Marie was frowning. “Isn’t he a little young for an automatic?”

“Mom!” Stephen protested, looking like he was going to throw a tantrum. “He said semi-automatic! All my friends have them!”

“Stephen, shush,” Marie cautioned him, then looked up at the shopkeeper, an embarrassed flush on her face. “He’s eight,” she explained. “He still thinks guns are just big toys.”

“All the more reason for him to learn early,” the man told her soberly. Marie looked shocked at this change of demeanor, but he continued before she could protest. “Did you know that eight is the minimum age for the mines?” Marie’s mouth dropped open in a soft “o.” Stephen had already moved on to another gun model. “If a raiding party gets him, they’ll ship him underground right away. Unless you live in a military base, it’s best to get the boy a man’s weapon. I don’t need to tell you what will happen if he’s captured by those monsters.”

Marie shook her head, eyes lowering. “His father was taken from us in one of the first battles, right when the war started,” she said softly.

“All the more reason for his son to learn to fight, and learn early. If it was men we were dealing with, I’d say to let the kid live a little…” The man shook his head. “But these creatures aren’t even human.”

Marie was quiet, head still down, until Stephen interrupted with another excited burst. “Mom! Mom, look at this one! Can we get this one mom? Please?” Marie looked from her bright-eyed son to the sober face of the merchant.

“Let’s try it out first, honey. You want to make sure it’s light enough for you to shoot.”