by Kathy Kachelries | Jun 9, 2006 | Story
Doctor Bell crouched behind the bulkhead as a burst of plasma fired past his head. His friend, Basil Casa (the renowned “consulting detective” for the Galactic Yard), scrambled out of Engineering and took cover next to him. “Well, this is a fine predicament, Mr. Casa,” Dr. Bell said despondently. Using the fingers on his right hand, Bell began to tick off several irrefutable facts. “The reactors will lose antimatter containment in five minutes. We are millions of miles from Earth. There are three of us left on this ship, and there are only two escape pods. And to top it all off, our greatest adversary, Professor R.T. Mori, is the only one with a weapon. And, tell me Mr. Casa, why in the name of Sol didn’t you take one of the escape pods when you were in Engineering? There’s no sense both of us dying at his hands of this maniac.”
“Poppycock, old man. I wouldn’t think of leaving you behind. Besides, who else would chronicle our little adventures in the Subspace Times? But, fear not. You know my methods. All will be well.” Casa cupped his hands on either side of his mouth and yelled, “Hallo. Professor, I’d like to discuss the terms of your surrender.”
Three quick bursts of plasma ricocheted off the bulkhead. A few seconds later, Professor Mori stood up and slowly walked toward Engineering, keeping his plasma gun aimed toward Bell and Casa. “I can’t say I envy your bargaining position, Mr. Casa. Nevertheless, I am inclined to turn down your generous offer. Surely you see that an intellect as great as mine will never tolerate incarceration. However, I will make you a counter proposal. I consider your lesser mind the second greatest in the universe, and would hate to see it vaporized. Therefore, I will leave you the second escape pod. You can choose to save your friend, or to avenge his death by saving yourself in an effort to ‘bring me to justice.’ Personally, I hope you chose the latter, for I would miss our little cat and mouse games. Cheerio, gentlemen.” With that, Professor Mori ducked into Engineering. Bell and Casa raced after him, but they arrived only in time to see the escape hatch slam shut, and hear the whoosh of decompression as the hatch jettisoned into space.
Dishearten, Dr. Bell turned toward Casa. “I absolutely refuse to take the last pod. You are the only one who can catch Mori. You have to save yourself.” Dr. Bell had never seen such a mischievous grin on the face of his old friend. He knew something was afoot. He tried another tack. “At the very least, we should draw straws.” Bell would fix it so the Casa got the long one.
Casa broke into a fit of laughter, put his arm around Bell’s shoulders, and led him toward the far wall. “Thank you for your kind offer, Dr. Bell, but it is not necessary. We will take these two perfectly functional escape pods over here.” He motioned toward a set of unopened escape hatches.
Flabbergasted, Dr. Bell stuttered a response. “B-b-but, I don’t understand. I saw Mori enter a pod. I heard it leave the ship. Were there three pods all along?”
“No, only these two,” Casa replied nonchalantly.
“B-b-but, how?”
“It was simplicity itself, Dr. Bell. When I was in Engineering earlier, I switched the identification signs. It appears that the ‘Universe’s smartest human’ inadvertently ejected himself out the antimatter disposal chute. Now, let’s hurry along. We must make good our escape before the ship explodes.”
by B. York | Jun 8, 2006 | Story
Another blast, and that one nearly scorched away Wemble’s shoulder. He was trying his damndest to keep out of sight, tucked behind an old medipak crate. Battle had been going on for almost a year now and they were close to extinction. The enemy might have outnumbered them, but the worst of the rebels’ problems were those damn anti-ray shields.
“Fuck! Selba! Do you have any of those electromagnetic displacers?” Wemble ducked his head down just before another blast sizzled against the wall next to him.
The girl yelled out from behind a large pile-up of crates across the warehouse, “All out! Better hope their batteries die soon!”
“Great,” Chief Wemble muttered to himself as he looked at his belt of flame-ray ammunition and thought it to be akin to attempting to destroy a planet by flicking peanuts at it. The guards were no doubt closing in by now; each had a scanner locking in on their location.
Peeking up over the cover, he fired a few rays at the one in the lead and watched the bolts of red dissipate around an invisible shield wall a few feet from his body.
“He’s over there!” he heard one shout, but Wemble wasn’t about to wait around. He heard the lasers and ray guns going off behind him, pounding into every object he passed as he bolted for the large pile of crates. Sweat rolled down his face as he dove behind a them, narrowly missing a shower of lasers and heated ions. The three soldiers following him were getting closer…he could hear them chattering about possible locations.
Wemble’s eyes skimmed the floor around him, looking for something, anything that could afford protection. Scrap metal, fragments of shattered Chinese vases, bits of painting fluttering away from him.
It was then that the last Chief of the Moon Rebels found Eureka.
A soldier turned the corner just as Wemble knew he would and raised his weapon as if preparing to put down a wounded animal. One grunt and a gurgle later, he was dead on the floor and a crazed Chief of the Moon Rebels flung himself out from the shadows, “For the Moon!” Like a possessed warrior, he swung the artifact of power over his head and downed the remaining patrols in a matter of seconds.
When Selba finally arose from her hiding place she found Wemble covered in blood, clutching the thing of great destruction and power in his left hand. “What… the hell is that thing? And what the fuck did you just do?”
With a grin, the Chief looked to his bewildered tech officer and hefted the metallic thing up onto his shoulder, “This is a 21st Century artifact called a sword,” he said. “And I just found the key to winning this fucking battle.”
Selba blinked wildly and the Chief walked around the room, examining the remnants of battle. “Hm…let’s start with stripping the metal off the walls.”
by J. Loseth | Jun 7, 2006 | Story
“I got it!” Dave cried, exuberant, brandishing a cheap plastic comb as he burst into the dorm room. “Jake! I finally got it!”
Jake looked up from his fuel cell textbook and eyed Dave, unimpressed. “So your hair will finally stop looking like a rat’s next. Great. The world will rejoice.” He didn’t budge from his reclining position on his bed.
“No, you numbskull, not the comb. It’s what’s on the comb,” Dave corrected. He brought it over to his desk and fumbled in the top drawer for tweezers and a small Ziploc bag, still holding the comb carefully, almost reverently, between thumb and forefinger.
“I don’t get it,” Jake said flatly, watching Dave’s antics only because they were slightly more entertaining than his homework.
“The hair on the comb,” Dave elaborated, holding the plastic piece up to the light while he carefully tweezed a single strand of gold from between the comb’s tines, then sealed it up in the plastic bag.
Jake sat up, frowning, and let his textbook fall back against his chest. “Whose hair is it?”
“Arnold’s,” Dave answered, his lit-up eyes never leaving the bag. “It took a while, but I finally got it. Now I can go to that place in the Slats and give this fucker what he deserves.”
“You mean the revenge business?” Jake’s attention was how fully focused on Dave. “I thought you were joking about that.”
“No way. I told you, I’ve been saving up for this for month.”
Jake watched Dave gloat over the hair with a growing sense of unease. “Why don’t you just commission a hologram?” he asked. “Hell of a lot faster, and cheaper, too.”
“I did that last year. It’s worthless. Holograms don’t have bones to break.” Dave began searching his desk for an envelope and pen.
Jake flinched, though he knew Dave was too distracted to notice, and a few seconds passed before he could form his reply. “By the time they finish growing that thing, you won’t give a shit about Arnold anymore, so what’s the point?”
“Shows what you know. They’ve got speed vats now. If I put in my order today, I can have him in two weeks.” Dave labeled the envelope, then slid the plastic bag in and sealed it tight.
“That’s illegal.”
“Is not. They’ve got all the documentation at the lab. It’s legal as long as you grow the clone without a functional brain stem. Here—” Dave rummaged through the papers on his desk and tossed a glossy brochure onto the bed next to Jake. “Read it yourself if you don’t believe me.”
Jake didn’t move. He stayed silent for several minutes as Dave pulled out a stack of forms and began filling in information. At last, Jake looked up at Dave’s back and asked, “So… what are you going to do with it once they grow it?”
“Well, you only get one hour,” Dave replied without turning around. “I haven’t decided exactly…” Jake could see Dave’s eyes narrow in profile as his roommate’s hand clenched on the pen. “But he’s going to be sorry he ever thought about touching Julia.” The bitterness in Dave’s voice sent a shiver down Jake’s spine.
“How can it be sorry without a functional brainstem?” Jake asked, his voice oddly thick.
“Oh, well he can’t, of course,” Dave said with an embarrassed laugh. He turned to face Jake for the first time since he’d come in and flashed a sheepish grin. “But close enough, right?”
Jake didn’t answer, and after a moment Dave turned back to the desk. “Well, I’m gonna go put my order in. Wish me luck.” He didn’t wait for an answer before he left, which was fortuitous because Jake didn’t have one.
In the wake of Dave’s departure, the rushing in Jake’s ears seemed even louder. He stared at the brochure for several minutes without touching it. At last he stood up, letting the fuel cell textbook fall harmlessly on the bed, and moved over to open the window. For a few moments he stood still, breathing in the chill. Then he picked up the small comb from his dresser and threw it out the window as hard as he possibly could.
by Jared Axelrod | Jun 6, 2006 | Story
They called the ship a Widowmaker, a relic of a time when the black of space was scarred by the war and the machines that made it possible. There were no windows save at the top and few doors; little was done to make the metal monstrosity look like anything other than the heavily armed coffin it was. It towered over the edge of the city, and Fire Chief Jaime Olmos felt cold and clammy every time he had to drive beneath its shadow. He had argued with the city about taking it down and scrapping it. But no one saw the tower of metal-encased kindling on insufficient struts, a danger to the community around it. They only saw a tourist offering, a landmark.
“We can’t tear down such a monument of our rich heritage in space.” Olmos was told. “That ship represents heroism.”
Olmos had served on a Widowmaker, back when both of them were considered space-worthy. He sadly shook his head at the connection of such a ship and heroism. “I pray there isn’t a fire,” he said, and walked out of city hall with his shoulders slumped, his head down.
The night the rusting hulk’s innards did catch fire, every truck was called to surround it. The ship’s supports were already bending due to heat, and it would only be a matter of time before the colossus toppled onto the buildings surrounding it. The fire had already burst the viewport windows, and a jet of flame like a angry beast tore across the starry sky.
“Same as it ever was,” Olmos thought to himself, and ordered two men to the upper levels of the ship to either contain the fire or give it a way out. The men’s shadows danced violently in the flickering light.
They did not return. One of them, Cheeverly, who loved his garden of exotic flowers as much as he loved his motorcycle, called on the radio saying he was lost, his voice distorted by his oxygen mask that shuddered as it ran out of air.
Olmos sent in two more men, confident he could count on Jacobson. Jacobson may have been a prankster off duty, but he was as serious as they got once in uniform. He reminded Olmos of his old messmate, Hopi, back in the war. Jacobson didn’t get a chance to radio back. Despite Olmos screaming into his receiver, there was no response. “Hopi died in a Widowmaker, too,” Olmos said.
The ship was winning, the damn monstrosity taking his men two by two. Olmos turned his back to the gangplank. Fifteen firefighters were crowded in front of him, tense with adrenaline, the heat of their eyes competing with the flames at his back.
“No more,” Olmos said.
No one said anything for one second, and then two. And then the roar of the fire was overmatched by the roar of men. “They’re still up there, god-dammit!” they howled, surging forward, a mass of rage. “They’re still in there!”
Olmos pushed his hands into the chests of the men, sending each one that came too close to the ground. “Listen to me!” he bellowed. “You listen to me! We’ve already lost four. We’re not going to lose any more.”
Olmos watched as his men contracted, their shoulders slumping, their heads bowing. They seemed so much smaller, their twisting shadows seem all-encompassing, devouring the men as they walked away.
The fire was contained, leaving nothing but a blackened husk, a monstrous, smoking skeleton, so immense it blotted out the coming dawn.
by Kathy Kachelries | Jun 5, 2006 | Story
How are your studies progressing? The liaison asked, once he was within range of the professor. The professor, a hoary man whose moustache seemed to be made of white wire, glanced up before placing his stylus on the desk beside his tablet.
They’re progressing, he answered, taking full advantage of the psychotonal range of telepathy. He seemed frustrated, rushed, annoyed to be interrupted, but ultimately hopeful and satisfied with the development of the project. It was a lie: the professor was not at all satisfied. As someone who had spent decades studying telepathic linguistics, however, he was more than qualified to fake it.
We’re still waiting on your report, the liaison reminded. The Department of Communications is-
The Department of Communications can wait. It took a great deal of skill to interrupt a thought, but fortunately, the professor possessed a great deal of skill. This is a sensitive matter, and I’ve only been given enough funding to test on English speakers and Japanese speakers. If I had more linguistic diversity in my test pool, the research would progress much faster.
Two native languages should be more than enough, the liaison argued. Your language isn’t related to either of them.
It’s not just a matter of language. Come here.
The liaison stepped to the desk, where his eyes followed the professor’s moving stylus across the glowing tablet. A fresh line of symbols made their meaning apparent: language is only the beginning.
You can read that, the professor observed, and the liaison nodded. How?
That’s your field, he replied.
It’s because your concept of beginning and your concept of language fall within the range of understanding. Your lifestyle and experiences contextualize the meaning. What’s a beginning, to you?
The start of something.
The start of what?
I don’t know. A project, maybe.
Like a research project?
Or development. The beginning is the blueprint, the business plan.
To some people, the beginning is the spring in the mountain that feeds their village’s river. In order for those people to read this and find the same meaning that you did, the word “beginning” has to represent both of those concepts.
The liaison nodded. But why would we need to communicate with people like that?
The professor blinked, answering with mental silence.
We have no reason to trade with them.
Language is for more than trade.
You’re being paid to create a written form of telepathy that can be used for international relations. International relations means commerce.
The professor etched a quick note that was immediately swallowed by the tablet.
If you want funding, you have to produce something useful. Talking to jungle tribes is all well and good, but this is applied linguistics, not theory.
I’ll redirect my research, the professor replied without psychoinflection, again scrawling something onto the glowing surface.
What are you writing?
I’m reworking the symbol for language, the professor answered. Apparently, I’ve been misinterpreting it for years.
by B. York | Jun 4, 2006 | Story
The expedition team had watched the aliens closely with devices and kept their bodies far away from any pathogens. Never before had anyone seen something quite like this. Today they’d be getting the special privilege of first contact. With all the alien races out there, however, the team was less than enthused.
“Are they monks?” Ferris joked as he sipped his coffee from behind a flat screen running another routine check. The scan showed up negative for pathogens or viruses almost immediately.
Taylor rolled her eyes and checked her nails with her feet propped up on the back of Ferris’ chair. “Just because they don’t speak doesn’t mean they follow some cult. It could just be genetic.”
“This is your pilot speaking,” Caldwell chimed in from overhead. “We’ll be touching down in thirty seconds next to their camp. Also, Ferris, if you drop any of that filthy fluid onto my deck I will use your blood to get it out. It stinks to high heaven when you do.”
“Ah shut up, Cal, the shit don’t stink that bad.” Ferris took another sip as he sat up and checked the readings one more time. “You ready to go, chica? A whole new race of people that look just like us is waiting.”
“You’re so narrow minded, Ferris. They might have new tech for us to bring back to base.” Taylor had already started gearing up for the land. It was only moments later that they touched down with a light shaking of the room and then the distinct sounds of de-pressurizing all over the main deck.
Ferris smirked as he sipped more of his coffee before downing the rest and tossing the cup. “Ah, yeah, gotta love those hut-dwelling tech-gods. One of them is going to try and mate me, you’ll see.”
“Oh for fucks sake, Ferris. They will get one whiff of you and run away.” Both had begun walking out onto the ramp as it opened up. The air, surprisingly, was quite clean. Both inhaled deeply and then looked at each other as if trying to spot a reaction. Taylor just smirked. “Damn, you’re still alive.”
Just then a group from the village wandered near the craft, eyes wide. Noting the presence of the expedition was hard not to do with a two thousand ton skimmer parked in their backyard. Taylor sighed when she saw them close in. “Now, just let me do the talking… assuming they speak at all.”
Taking a deep breath, Taylor began to explain that they had come from a far away place to make contact and that they were happy to see this was a peaceful place to live. It was a very long speech and offered very little gesticulation. Meantime, Ferris just looked confused.
“Well? Going to explain it to them or what!?” His brows pushed together as he just looked insulted that she was standing there looking back at him. Ferris’ nose twitched a bit and he wiped it a second, allowing him to relax before replying to Taylor’s comment.
The discussion lasted no more than five minutes and both had learned all they could have ever wanted from this silent group of alien people. In addition, Ferris found out that Taylor really did have the hots for him this whole time but it was clear from what Taylor communicated that he had a long way to go to get any respect from her. Both said their piece and walked back onto the ship leaving the villagers there. Not a word having been spoken.
