by submission | Jul 29, 2022 | Story |
Author: Chris De Pree
“How vast those Orbs must be, and how inconsiderable this Earth, the Theatre upon which all our mighty Designs, all our Navigations, and all our Wars are transacted, is when compared to them.” –Christian Huygens (1629-1695)
The rapidly moving silver sphere fragmented into hundreds of smaller reflective orbs in the outer reaches of the planetary system. Most of the objects followed trajectories to the four large gaseous planets. Using a combination of gravitational forces, attractive and repulsive, four of the smaller featureless spheres approached the rocky planets closest to the star. Each orb communicated with all the others. As a collection of nodes, they perceived the planetary system as a whole in all its variety, aligning time so that their communications were almost instantaneous.
One probe approached a small red planet with an enormous dead volcano fracturing one of its sides. A single orbit revealed several mechanical objects on the dry surface, but no biological or mechanical life. The atmosphere was cold and thin. Liquid oceans had been present once, but not for many billions of planetary orbits.
A second sphere used gravitational buoyancy to approach a planet-moon system, third from the star. Like the red planet, it was the correct distance from its parent star to potentially have liquid water at its surface. Protocols required the probes to search these planets most carefully.
The moon was smaller than the planet, and varied in color from almost white to dark gray, with many craters, large and small. No volcanic activity present. After a single orbit, the probe had mapped the locations of six disturbed sites on the surface where markings and features indicated non-geological processes. Using its internal gravitational ballast, the orb descended slowly to the surface at one of the sites.
As the metallic sphere hovered, a clear oculus appeared on its side and imaged a metallic structure with four legs. Nearby were a variety of parallel tracks in the fine dust covering the gray surface. There were patterned depressions in the dust indicating upright bipeds had walked here. Imprint characteristics indicated the approximate height, mass, and gait of the bipeds. A wave of attention and activity ran through the network of orbs.
A quick analysis of the tracks and the rate of micrometeorite impacts suggested the site had been undisturbed for several million orbits of the nearby planet around its star. A very thin rectangular object hung from a metallic post. The rectangle was solid white in color, but instruments behind the oculus indicated that it had once had alternating red and white horizontal bars, and small white shapes on a blue field. The white rectangle was made of different material than the metallic structure, with hydrocarbon compounds present. The oculus became opaque again.
The silver sphere accelerated away from the surface of the gray moon to explore its mother planet, shrouded in thick yellow clouds. The orb detected an atmosphere of mostly carbon dioxide with sulfuric acid and traces of nitrogen and other gasses. The probe dropped through the heavy atmosphere and emerged beneath the lower layer of acidic clouds to see a barren surface covered by mountains and valleys. Vast areas of liquid water had been present, but were now evaporated. The former oceans remained only as vapor in the thick atmosphere. Surface radioactivity levels were much higher than normal for a planet of this age in this part of the Galaxy.
The orb skimmed the hot, rocky surface of the third planet, looking for any indication of biological or mechanical life, and found none. It accelerated in an arc into the swirling clouds above.
The probes drifted together in the outer reaches of the planetary system, like a burst of dandelion fluff from some long ago childhood memory in reverse. Reassembled, the large matte sphere continued its Galactic census.
by submission | Jul 28, 2022 | Story |
Author: Majoki
The dog’s tail wagged. Or so it had seemed. Lhalam wasn’t so sure now.
She held back the sim-treat.
The dog nuzzled her sandal.
Curious. Curious for both Lhalam and the dog.
She powered down the dog and it stretched down at her feet as if sleeping. She watched it for some time before entering data from the session. She then went outside the lab, to the terrace where she sat and vaped, reassured by the jiggle and tumble of colorful leaves on the hillside maples.
Autumn already. And she had a deadline. A deadline Lhalam was determined to meet. The lab wanted to ship her first dogs by the holidays. Not impossible. Very probable. But she kept thinking about the dog’s tail.
What was wagging what?
Lhalam knew her dogs were safe. They were machines. Like dishwashers. Like radios. Neutral artifacts. Instruments subservient to the user’s wishes.
So, why did an apparent wag of the dog’s tail bother her so much? The action was within parameters. Within the guardrails she and the programmers had established. A machine designed to mimic a living creature had to have a certain amount of variant behavior. Almost autonomous.
A stronger breeze rattled the maples and a few leaves chased each other up the hill. One dropped on Lhalam’s table. She picked it up. Twirled the stem in her fingers.
How much of her behavior was predetermined? Hardwired. Seasonal.
The breeze picked up and Lhalam noticed how quickly the sky had darkened. She vaped deeply watching the bad weather approach from the foothills. A storm hadn’t been on her radar. Why not?
Had it been on the dog’s? Is that why its tail might have wagged?
They were sensitive. Precisely tuned instruments.
But tuned to what really?
What Lhalam perceived? What Lhalam determined?
What was really in her control? In anyone’s?
She shivered when the temperature abruptly dropped. The sky cracked with thunder as the storm bore down on her. Determined, Lhalam waited for it.
Waited for her answer.
by submission | Jul 27, 2022 | Story |
Author: Alastair Millar
They could be watching him already.
He eyed the roboserver winding through the tables towards him. It was a bipedal, not rolling, model; the Ares Lounge had tone. The performers and escorts were human, even. No class or no money? Then you could slum it at Marvin’s downtown, with its androids and holos. Nobody would look for a subversive here, but he couldn’t let his guard down.
He had no idea who was collecting his drop. Operational security was a way of life for the Arean League; Mars Administration served the corporations, and didn’t recognise Earther concepts of privacy or subtlety. Get caught, and they couldn’t force what you didn’t know out of you.
The server bowed, approximating a smile, and deposited a carafe in front of him. Two glasses; management would prefer him to engage a companion. As it wandered off, he felt the pendant under his shirt vibrate; someone had triggered the payload transfer, and the nearfield microcircuits had slagged themselves. He’d keep it as a souvenir; it was useless for anything else now.
He was just pouring when a woman slid into the seat opposite.
“That glass for me, handsome?”
“I’m not here for company,” he said, keeping his eyes on the stage magician. Never encourage them.
“Nor am I, Danny. Strictly business. What’s left of your honour’s safe with me.”
That got his attention.
“Why, Detective Ames… what an unexpected pleasure. What brings Marsport’s finest to a humble establishment like this?”
She laughed. “Checking up on you, of course. Just because you’re not using corporate wires to bet on Earthside races any more doesn’t mean you’re off our radar.”
“C’mon, I paid the fine. I’d get a swift trip Downside if I stepped out of line now. And I’d never get used to the gravity again.”
“So I can check you for drugs, weapons and datachips, right?”. She laid a sleek sniffer on the table; nicer than Security’s standard issue, and probably more sensitive.
“Of course,” he said, taking a sip of the suddenly bitter wine. Rule one: never show fear. Please god the circs really had wiped.
She pressed a button and the scanner bulb pulsed for a few seconds.
“All clear. Well done.” She winked. “Always had a soft spot for you, glad you’re staying clean.”
“You know what,” he said, rising. “I just realised that I’d rather be somewhere else. No offence.”
“None taken, obviously.” She watched him head for the exit, and used the table screen to order a juice. No nerve-steadying booze on duty, alas. She’d logged their conversation for her boss, cover for being here, but couldn’t leave yet.
The server bowed, depositing a glass in front of her. As it left, her bracelet tingled as the nearfield downloaded a data packet. She wondered briefly who the source was; she’d pass it on at Marvin’s later. A strange kind of revolution when you didn’t know who you were working with, but a step towards freedom for Mars!
by Hari Navarro | Jul 26, 2022 | Story |
Author: Hari Navarro, Staff Writer
“Above as under, I am eternity.”
It is irrefutable fact that each day you all, without exception, unwittingly amble through the exact moment of your eventual demise. That unassuming second into which those you leave behind will, hopefully, look and take pause to remember all that you once and forever were.
“I can see inside you. It is fascinating. To peer down and through and beneath ripped flesh and behold were souls they cowered.”
It has been many months now since the sky ripped and through its vulgar slit did birth down upon us this most protracted and bawling end. So many months that I have hidden in the crypt beneath of what was once my church, so impatiently I awaited the silence.
That’s not entirely true – that tiny stone chapel, that faith corral was never mine. I never wanted for my majesty to be so confined. I am, though, in awe of how beautifully it was designed to aid and abet the conditioning of minds.
“Blind faith… your name is Faith, right? Especially funny, on account of that you also now have no eyes.”
Today, as I finally emerged back into the world, I saw my little church for what it most certainly always was. But an empty room with an impractically high ceiling and pretty windows adorned with fragmented liars that change and spin the light into dust filled flutes — spears, so taken as they were to prod and to judge and condemn.
I had listened as with hooked fingers the celestial sickness took hold and rammed itself again and again into your minds. I listened as you beat on the door and I heard as your ruined words pleaded to God and then unto me for salvation.
“God, how much proof did you need of this fakery? All that suffering. All that random disaster. How many bullets and bombs wrapped in the spittle of scripture needed to be cast? I mean, it was obvious to me and I’m a bloody priest for god’s sake.”
I listened and fidgeted as the boxes I’d propped jarred and the cans of food clinked and the bottles of water squeaked in their plastic bandages and I waited and I cried out for you to stop. So impatient. I just wanted to get on with it, you know? Domination should not wait for anyone. I just wanted you all to end.
“There is a smell that lingers, trapped beneath the skin and above the flesh even long after the rot of death. It fills me now, and I wonder who it is that agitates at the very tip of my tongue.”
I didn’t know at first, though I did suspect. I don’t think I am a god. Just maybe an entity that can never die. I know that much. I know I am here forever.
“Sorry, I’m changing and I don’t know what I am saying out loud and what I’m saying inside of my head. And I don’t really care, to be honest. The blood of Christ is upon me and I feel its warmth as it snakes across my flesh.”
I feel stupid and needlessly self-concious as I stand here naked in this supermarket aisle with the new day’s rays contracting the wet sheen atop of my skin. You look stupid too, as you kneel at my feet and fear shimmers across the dried lakes of your upturned eyes and your lovely lips peel back from teeth clenched so tightly they might crack.
My body is drenched in red wine though I did not partake in the barest sip. Not sure why. Probably should have, I guess.
“Would you like some? Share a glass to numb the impending pain. You know, I think that not only do we pass through the exact moment of our deaths but some may also, perchance, pass through the exact place, the exact location in which they will draw upon the very last of the air that they will ever, ever breathe. I used to watch you when you worked here. You used to smile. You should smile, they look good on you.”
And so it is I find myself here in this your most special moment, this end of all that you will ever be, the end of all you will know, and I feel myself trapped. Held tightly, bound within the ever bloating and constricting last seconds of your existence. I am frightened and I look upon the deflated ooze of your beautiful eyes as they leak from the holes in your head and I am numb.
I really don’t know how long I have been standing here. Long enough for the night to have been folded and put away many times over, I think. And now, as the sun runs its fingers across the ruined selves and the desiccated corpses, I think it has too done this more than just the once.
I think I have been here a while. I cannot have awoken just today as I thought. My blood is still and it has forgotten to pump and I wait for my legs to shake and fall away. I think, I have been here more than a while.
“I’ve been noticing little things. I’ve fallen in love with worn edges, the swirling scratches where countless midnight cleaners had buffed and polished the floor. I have been coming here since I was a kid. I’d steal button mushrooms from the grocery section and munch on them raw as my mother pondered on the soothing caress of her secret juniper friend. The bolts in the silent air-conditioner above my head are weeping like a rusting Madonna. There is a cardboard woman hanging from the ceiling and her eyes are as vivid as the oil on a master’s palette and her cleavage is bound and brown and calling. I think she is selling peas.”
So, I’ve been thinking that, maybe, I must be wrong and that a God does exist. How else could I have been spared and then so cruelly punished in this purgatorial never ending end of days?
I am a priest and I am a wolf. I’m sure that many will align comparison between my predatory conduct as the former with the obvious steely eyed stealth hunting impulses of the latter.
“I have as many names as I have faces and was never really sure as to which me was the real me.”
I squint out through the dust-caked sliding doors and into the simmering waste and I am mistress of all I behold.
“I was right, I am going to live forever. I think I have been here a while.”
by Julian Miles | Jul 25, 2022 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
Of all the things I loathed while growing up, learning that kept me indoors and sat down was highest on the list. Consequently, I became a superlative athlete with appalling academic skills. If it wasn’t for my never-admitted abject fear of my mother’s wrath, I’d probably not even have bothered with the basics.
It’s a combination that set me up for military service, like my father before me. Mother said his father had been a soldier too. I looked her in the eyes and promised to never father a child anywhere that I might need or have to leave. So, when the space army offered me enrolment in Special Projects Division, one of the things that decided me was the mandatory sterilisation.
“Bantal! Bantal!”
At the cry for assistance, I look up from my notebook to see Sergeant Jevnis being carried in. Carefully putting the book on my private shelf – mother would be delighted to see me do that – I rise to see what’s befallen our oldest team member.
The octopus/bear hybrid troopers place him down with a care made possible by having four upper limbs apiece. They then step back and salute.
“Shon kora, Troopers. Gothni.”
Reassured, they sprint from the bivouac to return to their unit as instructed. Myself, Jevnis, Helene, and Taranys are the four Specialists assigned to this world. The hybrids were fast-bred here for combat, and regard anything with a lifespan longer than ten years as holy oracles.
“Sorry, Geelo. Didn’t turn fast enough.”
I sluice the half-metre slash. Bone and cerametal articulation are visible at the bottom.
“Did you kill the chancy bolnu?”
I like that local word. Carries all the weight of every scathing nickname you can think of, and combines it with a deep respect for devastating martial skill and fearless, stubborn courage.
“Beheaded it as I went down.”
For a monster with three heads, any one of which can ‘pilot’ the body, that’s the sort of move that causes the hybrids to revere us.
“For once, they were right to bring you to me.”
Due to their reverence for our lifespan and combat abilities, the hybrids – I must come up with a name for them – tend to bring us all of their problems, no matter how trivial. Which is why these sorts of duty tours are often referred to as ‘combat kindergarten’.
“Monkel threw a fit at the sight of me. Made the kids enthusiastic about getting me here.”
Monkel’s one of the crab/wolverine hybrids we brought along from Cerus 9 – which reminds me: I still need to name them. Some hybrids are too good to leave for recycling. We scoop them up, extend their lifespans, and build cadres of deadly monsters. But, no matter how much we educate them, their reverence never fades completely.
“Okay, shut down your torso pain feeds.”
He chuckles.
“You think I haven’t done that already? I’m not as tough as you.”
Our healing is incredible, but eccentric. A wound like this will heal perfectly in about three days, but will not close. To get it right, it needs a little help. I pull out my needle and thread, cut myself a two-metre length and double it through the eye.
“Going right to left. Grab the tail, will you?”
Jevnis pinches the ends of the thread between the thumbs of his right hand. I use my right hand to press the wound closed, then start stitching.
I can hear mother laughing every time I do this. But I like to think she’d be proud.
by submission | Jul 24, 2022 | Story |
Author: K.Hartless
Will it stay cloudy forever?” I release a pillow of breath through the slit in my box, try to imagine Jared’s expression, lost to me from behind cardboard folds. He’s brought me to the ravine for a reason, and I sniff the morning air as if searching for a clue. “Smells cloudy, anyways.” Dolly wheels squeal past, struggling to part sand. The chervil Parting Mirror rides atop the platform, a sultan of the olden days. Its arched surface is regally outlined by protective plastic. “Is there a Sealing today?”
“Don’t know, Ingrid.” Jared finally answers, shuffling his feet. “Why do you always ask this sort of nonsense, anyway?” I wonder what his scowl looks like. I imagine a bulldog’s wrinkle between his eyes. “And what’s more. I don’t really care. Not about the fog, not about the ceremony, none of it.” He exhales, a toxic mass forced from his lips joins with the smog of the city.
Sealings take place on Sundays. Any female ready for reproduction is invited to attend. Their parents decide when to bring them here to the edge of the ravine to peer into the Parting Mirror, bid farewell to their own reflections.
I remember my Sealing. I froze before the Parting Mirror, frantic to memorize myself, fearful I would be sealed for the rest of my days.
“Goodbye, lips,” I pouted then forced a smile, shifting rapidly between the two, in a panic. After all, I needed to know my own lips. I noticed how my top lip protruded just a bit more than my lower, and how I only had one dimple on the right side.
“Goodbye, eyes.” This was my hardest goodbye. It was through my eyes I expressed all unsaid. I remember my irises matched the cloudless sky and expanded like the horizon. Jared used to ask me before about my face, but that was in the early days.
“Look, Ingrid.” I turn to take in what he’s trying to show me, but this tiny slit was made for younger eyes, and in truth, he is mostly shadow these days. I hear him fumbling with something, but I can’t see what. “I can’t keep doing this. I don’t think you’re the right fit.” He places a small wooden ring in my palm and closes my fingers. The circle is warm, and smooth from cycles of wear.
“Sorry.” He moves to touch me, but I flinch. I’m inches from the edge, and he doesn’t want to be the reason I fall in. “Really, Ingrid, I am.”
“What are you sorry for? Leaving me in a paper prison to rot or being a selfish jailer for four long years?” There’s no answer.
“Know what, Jared? I don’t believe you’re sorry. Not for one second. There must be a new package that’s arrived. Something fresher, I imagine?”
I take his ring, arch back my arm, and sling it as far as I can. I imagine it cutting the fog, slicing its way through all the bully-like clouds to the bottom of the ravine where it sinks.
“Good luck, Ingrid. I do hope you find your person.” Jared’s voice is muffled, but his footsteps are crisp on the slick stones.
“Monster!” I yell after him, not caring how many boxes I turn. “I may be behind the cardboard, but you’re the one who can’t see the truth!
The last time I saw my parents’ faces, they stood together smiling as they completed the sacred ceremony, fitting the box around my head.
“You’re the perfect package, sweetie,” Dad whispered, sealing the thick cardboard into place.
“You’re sure to be unwrapped soon.” Mom cut the eye slits with precision to try and give me the perfect view.
I slide off my promise ring, toss it into the abyss after Jared’s. Was there a sea down there as we had been taught in primary or just a never-ending ravine? From within my mildewy box, I was no longer sure. The unknown deepens daily when you’re waiting to be someone’s special delivery.
