by submission | Nov 13, 2022 | Story |
Author: Majoki
I called it Stig for obvious reasons. But, I shouldn’t have had to name it. It should’ve been identical to the other units. Nondescript. Interchangeable.
Like termites, ants, or caterpillars. Creatures that deposit signals in their environment to create a form of indirect communication and leaderless cooperation among themselves.
That’s how the units were designed to behave. Did behave.
All but Stig.
After it consistently lost touch with the other units in the lab and in the field, I studied it closely. Stig would always start out with the other units and appear to be following the path established to reach the programmed goal, but inevitably Stig would veer off on its own. Sometimes in the complete opposite direction of the rest of the units.
I observed how Stig established a separate search grid, methodically mapping the area it had arrived at on its own. It laid down markers as it was programmed, though only randomly did other units respond to its signals.
Stig had me stumped. I ran diagnostics. I wiped its drives. I reinstalled the default software. Stig still wandered off.
So, I began talking to Stig. “Where are you going, little one? What are you looking for? Why don’t you stick with the others?”
And the more time I spent with Stig away from the other units, the more I began to wonder what I was looking for, where I was going, why I hadn’t stuck with others.
My research had led me into a solitary search not unlike Stig’s. I’d never been good at following subtle social signals or indirect behavioral cues. I missed many of these markers.
Perhaps, Stig did as well.
Perhaps, that was the real path to explore. Not how creatures learn to follow one another, but why they sometimes cannot and must strike out on a very different path and boldly map their own way forward.
Stig had not followed my lead, but perhaps I could follow its. And develop a new cooperation between disparate beings. A road much less travelled that will make all the difference.
by submission | Nov 12, 2022 | Story |
Author: Tyler Barlass
You rest the stock of the gun on your shoulder, place your finger on the trigger and shoot. You’ve done it so many times that your aim has become impeccable. The bullet whizzes through the cold, barren landscape until it meets its target – the reflective glass visor of a uniformed enemy some 100 yards away. These faceless adversaries had been coined “snatchers” by those who hadn’t been taken. You’ve killed so many that you can’t remember a time that you weren’t fighting these mysterious abductors.
That may not be entirely true. Your memory of when the world died is there somewhere in your head, rattling around in the repressed depths of your mind. You remember being on your back porch, with your best friend, watching monolithic buildings collapsing in the distance. You were young then. You’ve grown up in this new world and the struggles that have come with it. You don’t have the time or energy to get wistful about the past or what might have been. You now spend your days protecting the shoddily assembled camp that you call home, along with an ever-dwindling collection of survivors, from the grasp of the malevolent snatchers. Your friends, camp elders, even children, all taken by these interlopers without warning.
Recently, during an expedition to retrieve supplies from a neighboring camp, you and your fellow protectors were ambushed and everyone, except yourself, was captured and hauled off by the snatchers. You found a way to escape and decided then and there that it was time to stop protecting and start fighting back.
Not far beyond where your most recent quarry had fallen, you approach your destination. In front of you is a sprawling white plastic-walled compound that sits like a gleaming beacon on the charred land and dark sunless sky. Your heart jumps, you’ve never been this close.
The polyethylene walls are thin enough that a long, serrated knife pierces into it without much trouble. You crawl through your makeshift entrance, wincing at bright lights that emanate from above. You cough, the air is different here, it reminds you of your youth. Long forgotten memories, familiar faces, come rushing into your mind.
You ready your rifle and move slowly through the blindingly bright halls. Everything clean, white, pristine. It stands in stark contrast to the dismal, ash-covered living spaces that you’ve gotten so accustomed to. Sounds reverberate from somewhere nearby, you grip your gun tightly.
Turning the corner, you see a man in uniform but he wears no helmet, no visor, no mask, nothing to cover his pale skin. Even from this distance, you can make out his face. You see that his hair is brown like yours but kept short, the shape of his face is round but not plump and his eyes are a deep shade of blue. It stuns you, for you’ve never seen them with their mask off. Based on some of the stories that had been passed around camp, you weren’t sure that the snatchers were even human.
Shouting wakes you from your reverie. The man at the end of the hall notices you, yells something unintelligible, reaches for his own holstered gun and comes running down the hall. Despite your state of bewilderment, you must act. You rest the stock of the gun on your shoulder, place your finger on the trigger and hesitate.
by submission | Nov 11, 2022 | Story |
Author: David C. Nutt
It was good to be back in the Pacific again. Darting through the kelp beds, rolling through the surf, gathering at our sacred rocks. I knew in about 30 days this would wear thin on me. Then it would be back on land. A hike up Shasta, the desert and dawn with a lover, Aspen for some deep powder. Then that would wear thin.
The only thing constant in my life was the stars. When I am in the ocean, from the middle of the pacific, I see them burn bright. On land I climb mountains to be nearer to them. Then back to the sea, and back to the mountains, and then the sea. In both worlds I am no closer to the stars I crave.
Once, while gazing up into the night sky, in the Pacific, a killer whale popped up next to me. I thought that would be it. Too late to react so I just floated there waiting for him to devour me.
Instead, we just floated there. Eye to eye we shared a moment. He rolled over on his side, eye fixed to the stars. We stayed like that for almost an hour, and when the sun started to break over the horizon, we both nodded to each other and went our ways.
A month later I am in San Diego at some cliché college bar. I was attracted to a strange man. I knew something was different about him. I did not let him see me. I followed him. I could tell where he was going, I could sense it… the beach.
He stood on the end of a rocky out cropping. I saw him take off his clothes and fold them to a bundle. I saw him leap to what would be certain death, the tides and surf I knew so well would cut him to ribbons against the reef and rocks. My skin was near by so I slipped it on and went after him, eyes fixed on the spot he would surface. I raced there fast as I could but instead 500 yards out an Orca breached and I panicked. I rolled over and sped back to shore. The Orca followed me and I knew I could not make it. As I leaped to shore, I shed my seal’s skin as the orca devoured it. Skin gone, there was no way back.
I saw the Orca surface just beyond the surf line. He saw me naked, crying on the beach. I cursed him, shook my fist at him, stomped my foot on the sand. The orca buried its head to the waves and began swimming to the beach. At the last possible second, it breached and beached itself with an enormous thud, sliding forward with the last inch of surf. It’s skin split open and the man from the bar burst out, leaving just the skin of the orca which melted away until all that was left was a portion of the dorsal. We stood naked, face to face. He handed me his dorsal and without thinking I took a bite, and then devoured it all. After that we made love.
That was a lifetime ago.
Tomorrow my Orca and I go to the stars. We will stay at the space a station for a month while we train to go to the deep space array. We both know it is a one-way trip but neither of us we can ever be in our oceans again. But that’s OK, for together we have traded the oceans for the stars.
by submission | Nov 10, 2022 | Story |
Author: Bill Cox
It was a surprise to us all when Callum volunteered to inwardly migrate. We all knew a ‘friend of a friend’ who’d done so, but Callum was the first in our extended family.
I’ll be honest, I was disappointed that he’d signed up without consulting me. As brothers, we’d always been close. I’m not saying we didn’t have our secrets from each other, but inward migration was such a huge life decision that I would’ve expected at least a discussion.
I see the sense in it, given all the immigration from the Mediterranean countries and the pressure that puts on our resources, even in this quiet corner of Scotland. You can’t walk down the High Street these days without hearing conversations in half a dozen different languages. I understand that the Warming has rendered these places unsafe for human habitation, but home feels less like home every year.
Callum seemed happy with his decision and once you sign up that’s it, so it wasn’t as if he could change his mind. He’d the usual two weeks to put his affairs in order before reporting to the Migration Centre. He did his best to avoid me for that time, attending a seemingly endless procession of parties, but finally I got him to myself just two days before his migration. It all boiled down to one simple question. Why?
“I’m just fed up,” he explained. “Each year things get just a little bit worse. More blackouts, more shortages of food. More crowds, more disease outbreaks, more crime. You’re not stupid. You can see the way things are going.”
“But why inward migration? You’ll lose everyone that cares about you!”
“Don’t you remember what it was like when we lost Mum? She had breast cancer and twenty years ago they could have cured that. Now, everything is a death sentence. No chemotherapy meds, no radiotherapy. We had to watch her fade away in front of our eyes. I don’t have the strength to do that again. Don’t you see? The way things are going, the inevitability of it all, I’m going to lose everyone I care about. This way, I won’t have to see it, I won’t have to live through it. Instead, I’ll be living in a world without limits, without shortages, without death.”
Ultimately, I couldn’t agree with his decision. It felt too much like cowardice to me, running away from reality. Nevertheless, I still found myself by his side, on that final day at the Migration Centre’s reception area. The rest of the current crop of volunteers were there too, with their families, crowds of people laughing, crying, saying their goodbyes.
I hugged my brother one last time, then watched as he joined with the rest of the volunteers passing through the doors of the clinic. I thought about the machines waiting behind those doors, where Callum would be anaesthetised and have his brain scanned, one slice at a time. I knew that bodies were never returned to the families, as those who underwent inward migration weren’t considered to be legally deceased.
A version of Callum will live on in a virtual world, where time runs at a much faster rate. Fleeing from a collapsing civilisation, where energy and resources are at a premium, these digital refugees will live extended lives in paradise. As uploaded humans, their energy use and ecological footprint will be but a fraction of their biological counterparts.
The government tells us that they’re heroes who’ve made a sacrifice for the greater good.
All I know though is this.
I miss my brother.
by submission | Nov 9, 2022 | Story |
Author: Bridger Cummings
She walked along the path in the forest glade. Idyllic, towering trees of various species lined the wide path like a gauntlet all the traffic flowed between. Mossy rocks dotted the sides of the leaf-blanketed path. She walked amidst a herd of animals: elk, ostriches, gorillas, and even bears on two legs. They all shuffled along while a stream of bigger animals ran by to her left. A stampede of rhinos, horses, bison, and elephants ran in one direction, rushing past her. Curiously, another stampede of similar animals ran in the opposite direction just past them, creating two rivers of animals running parallel against each other. Beyond the dual stampedes, another thin herd of elk and ostriches and other various animals milled before the thick trees with the ruins of crumbling stone walls obscured in the shadows.
She stopped to look around and smile. The animals snorted and huffed while the buzzing of insects filled in any moments of otherwise silence. All the animals walked by each other in peace, and she couldn’t stop from smiling at the harmony. But the smell was off: diesel and gasoline fumes, sewage, and the general mustiness of civilization. It clashed with what her eyes and ears experienced. She sighed and looked up at the blue sky dotted with marshmallow clouds. Her face twitched; something unseen pecked her face.
The green number in the corner of her vision was harder to ignore against the blue backdrop. It ticked down intimately close to zero. She closed her eyes at “one” and waited a few seconds before opening them. But the illusion had already shattered. The sounds of wildlife and rustling leaves were replaced with cars, people talking, and the buzz of a city that permits no silence.
Her eyes opened, and a sheen of gray clouds releasing a light drizzle replaced the blue sky. Her face twitched with each splat. She looked at the road and her shoulders slumped at her true reality when she ran out of credits. An ugly city, lined with concrete buildings and trash in the street that honking cars inhabited. Some rushed people frowned deeply as they marched by, but most wore similar AR googles on that she wore, and most of them looked drunk-happy as they ambled down the street in a reality of their choosing.
Only one way to easily get more credits; she waved her arms in front of her, moving around some digital menus only she could see. She activated the advertising layer, and every possible surface became a billboard. Every other person became NASCAR drivers of ads, and suggestions on which product would make her the most beautiful whispered in her ear. She tried to ignore it all as the green counter in the corner of her vision started counting up, and she continued her commute to work, eager to afford another visit in her forest.
by submission | Nov 8, 2022 | Story |
Author: Majoki
My forehead tingled as the woman walked by and an ice pick stabbed between my eyes. I couldn’t see, couldn’t scream, couldn’t subvocalize. All routines froze. Datalocked.
She was unbeheld.
Unusual. Almost impossible. Even the crisp pain couldn’t distract me from the improbability. Unbeheld.
Reflexively, I massaged my head, fingers finding forehead and temples. The pain eased, sense returned, subroutines rebooted. My shakti was restored, energy flowed, perception spread, data channeled, function found, and I stood as before. Three eyes on the world.
An other self would have chased down the woman. Challenged her. Marked her. For shivakind demands that. To make visible, to be known, to lay bare the interior world. Beheld.
Yet this self could not. The pain, sensory loss, datalock were not an assault, not a warning, they were an invitation. A door opened, a path cleared, a mystery offered. The woman was shivakind and more. Beyond beheld.
Where was that to take me? Shivakind was meant to pierce the veil, reveal all, and one woman walking past scoffed at the illusion. In a glance she pierced the implant in my forehead, pierced shivakind. My superiority, my complacency, my arrogance: all telling to my failure of imagination. What I believed of minds and machines was a parody of thought.
None of my selves understood what shivakind promised: to tap akasha, the aether of information, of knowledge, of being. The unseen made seeable.
Yet, this woman, this parvati, this equal and complementary force of being, rendered all my selves powerless. And therein it turned. The wheel. Unspun. Uncharged. Chakra depleted, shivakind bereft. All unbeheld.
I wandered the hot, dusty streets of the city for a time, reviewing the encounter, spooling, collating, quantifying, but not thinking. Unbeheld thought felt dangerous. And then she was there. Sitting under a tree whose broad canopy slowed light, welcomed shadows, stilled the air. Head bowed, she beheld. But not as shivakind.
I kneeled at her rough feet, sensing the power of one well travelled, though not in my world. Her energy did not flow as my data did. She was connected elsewhere. The longer I knelt, the less I felt of myself. The implanted third eye of shivakind was to bring clarity, true knowing, beyond karmic memory. To behold oneness.
In her presence, I felt separated, though not separate. Alone, though not lonely. My third eye shut down. My world was unbeheld, but hers was before me. She lifted her head, her pupils sparkling like diamonds. Like Vjarasana.
I saw. I had only to clear my cache.
