by Julian Miles | Jan 3, 2022 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
The chaos on the streets is nothing compared to the chaos at headquarters. In the end, I give up and hop from desk to desk, then jump down and barge through the queue into his office.
“You called, Chief?”
Clarence Christie, Chief of the San Francisco Special Operations Bureau, grins at the shouts of outrage at my queue jumping, then gestures for Rales – the gent I pre-empted – to close the door.
“One day you’re going to meet someone you can’t get by.”
“Probably.”
He shakes his head, then scoops a file off his cluttered desk and throws it to me.
“Find this man. You’ll have anything you need to make it happen.”
I open the file. There’s an interview document, some psych evaluation notes, a blurred mugshot, and some CCTV stills of him being carried from a building by four sanatorium orderlies. I check the location and dates. Los Angeles. Four years ago, almost to the day.
“How does this loon link to what just levelled Los Angeles?”
Clarence gestures to the SD card in the plastic bag stapled to the inside of the folder. He pushes his laptop over.
“Slot and play.”
I do so. It’s a short video. The figure is dressed in a ragged T-shirt and chinos. Manacled and chained to both chair and table, he glares from the screen. I can almost feel his rage as he starts to speak.
“One more time for the hard of believing: I come from a time 176 years ahead of this today. We’re told The Singularity has happened for those deserving of it. The EHAI – Enhanced Humans and Artificial Intelligences – created a supposed utopia in which there is nothing for the unmodded to do except work in factories accruing credits towards enhancement. Production lines are human powered because we’re better at maintaining and replacing ourselves than machines.
“Some of us unmodded decided to carve out a future for ourselves: an independent nation where we could live free of implants. At first, EHAI ignored us. Then they laughed. Then they legislated. That’s when the riots occurred. Soon after that, the resistance started. Fortunately, leaders rose to turn UnMod into a cohesive force. We won: got ourselves a decent size island. We’re getting more and more disaffected coming to join us. People are shutting off their enhancements and leaving EHAI.
“The ruling polity decided to stop the UnMod movement. Tracing the bloodlines back, they found a critical point where the ancestors of many key UnMod figures were in geographic proximity. They’re going to send something back to deal with them.”
An indistinct question comes from off-screen. There’s laughter. The soldier looks confused, then angrier.
“Why would they send a cyborg assassin? It’s simpler to send a K-bomb.”
He stares at the screen.
“They’re going to erase Los Angeles sometime in the next five years.”
The video ends. I look at Clarence.
“You have got to be kidding me.”
He shrugs.
“Four years ago, the name he gave was Kevar Jykson. After transfer and evaluation, he did two stints at Langley Porter Psychiatric Hospital right here in San Francisco, then some new therapy worked. He was declared sane and released eleven months ago.”
My boss sighs.
“Yes, I think he played along to get released. Question is, why? What did he know that could have prevented the five hundred square miles containing Los Angeles from being vapourised?”
I tuck the file into my jacket, then smile at him.
“More importantly, does Mister Jykson have a Plan B?”
Clarence sighs.
“That’s the essential question. Go find him and ask.”
by submission | Jan 2, 2022 | Story |
Author: Majoki
“The old rage in colder ways, for they alone decide how to spend the young.” – Pierce Brown Dark Age
The toy soldier guarded the corner of the commander’s makeshift field desk. The faded tin sentry with chipped red jacket, high peaked cap and bent bayonet stood upon the order.
Especially in the age of cyberwar, such an order was on paper. Hand written. Delivered by flesh and blood. A reminder of what was real and what was to be spilled.
The commander concentrated on the little toy. Its eyes fixed and sure. A plaything of the past, a steadfast harbinger of battles to come. War made fast in the hands of children. It changed little. An order given. Received. A decision needed. A sacrifice demanded.
His tactical screens displayed the grids under current assault. A counterassault had been ordered: a hype and wipe. Jacking systems beyond their breaking points, then a massive takedown of security redundancies and fail-safes.
Homes, hospitals, schools, critical infrastructure and industrial sites would implode, explode. Many would suffer.
Though not the commander. Not his soldiers.
What were soldiers anymore?
In cyberwar there was only the enemy. The other side. Imaginary lines within which the ordinary comforts of modern life—all manner of integrated systems, machinery, devices, appliances, transport—were turned against any and all. Faces pressed into pillows or pushed out windows. Silent and fraught.
That was the commander’s charge: take it down, take them down.
Them.
He imagined them. No different than himself. So much like the teenage daughter he’d lost to them. A casualty of an attack intended to jack fleets of spy-and-die drones. High on a mountain pass in winter, her autonomobile’s systems were collaterally blitzed. Her vehicle accelerated wildly and plunged into a deep ravine. Lost in snow and ice, she froze. He did not know how slowly.
He picked up the toy soldier from his desk, from atop the order. He held it lightly in his bare hand. Felt the chill of metal. A shiver of recognition.
The commander gave his command. There might have been other ways, but he did not know them. There might have been some who did not need to pay, but he did not owe them.
He put the toy soldier back in place. Upon the desk. Atop the order. In the middle of war unlike any other. Still child’s play.
by submission | Jan 1, 2022 | Story |
Author: Lee Hammerschmidt
April 29, 1976, 11:53 PM
“Don’t answer!” I said as I felt the muted phone throbbing in my cargo shorts pocket. “Do NOT answer!”
I answered.
“So, Chalk,” Aurora Nirvana, my boss said. “Would you care to explain to me just what in the name of the Cosmos you’re doing in Graceland? In the Jungle Room no less?”
“M-m-m-me?” I stammered “I, uh, well…”
“Don’t try to squirm out of it. We pinged your phone. You’re supposed to be in Portland monitoring the Swine Flu situation, But surprise, you’re in Memphis. This better not be another one of your souvenir gathering side trips. Like the baseball card incident.”
About six months ago I had detoured from an assignment in Seattle to my family home in Oregon. I knew my folks were out of town at a wedding and the younger version of myself was in California. No chance of awkward or disastrous face to face confrontations. My mom had stored my old baseball cards and comic books in a bin out in their garage. Two years later, when I had moved to out, she gave them all away!
“But they were my cards!” I said. “Mickey Mantle! Roger Maris! Sandy Koufax! And a shitload more! And the comic books. Do you know how much all that stuff is worth now in 2067?”
“It doesn’t matter whose they were, Chalk,” Aurora said sternly. “As an Agent of the Department of Inertial Cosmic Kinesis you are strictly forbidden from profiteering off antiquities picked up in your travels. I don’t need to remind you that you’re still on probation for that offense.”
“No, Ma’am.”
“So, what are you doing in Graceland?”
“I just wanted to see the place before it got all touristy, that’s all. You know I’m a big fan of the King.”
Aurora sighed heavily, not believing me for a second. “You didn’t cross paths with anyone there did you?”
“Nope. Elvis is in Tahoe, and The Boys are out front kicking Springsteen off the property. Perfect timing.”
“Well you get your ass out of there, pronto! You dig?”
“I dig.”
“Good. Remember you will be fully scanned on your return and if you bring back so much as a roll of toilet paper, you will be sent right back for three years. You know what that means?”
Oh, boy did I ever. The heart of the Disco era! I don’t think I could live through that shit again, even with the extended longevity that came with being a D.I.C.K. agent. I’d go mad in a week!
“Comprende, Chief,” I said. “See you in a jiff. I’ll…”
The phone cut off before I could finish. Wow, testy today aren’t we. I reached into my messenger bag and pulled out an old, yellowed copy of Rolling Stone magazine. The date – September 22, 1977. Just over a month after Elvis died. Roughly 16 months from today. It was the memorial tribute issue to the King The cover was a portrait of Elvis, with the dates,1935-1977.
I put the magazine on the piano where I knew he would see it. Sure, he’d probably just think it was a joke. But maybe he might open it up and read the in-depth article on his demise and start making some lifestyle changes. Cut out the fried foods. Exercise. Lay off the pills. Ditch the jumpsuits. Maybe he would live longer and get back to making great music again.
Probably not, but I had to give it a try. Aurora said not to take anything. But she didn’t say anything about leaving something behind.
by submission | Dec 31, 2021 | Story |
Author: Chana Kohl
“When Dr. Helena Athanasiou took the lectern, I could feel the hair on my arms prickle, as if the electrostatic potential inside the auditorium increased several Coulombs. It wasn’t just because she was a brilliant geneticist, a sharp intellectual, and a breathtakingly handsome woman. She exuded the most dignified sangfroid as if a Greek bas-relief had sprung to life.”
“Dr. Baram,” Tamar Levy, an Interpol intelligence agent with the Jerusalem Central Bureau, massaged the pressure point between her eyebrows as if staving off a migraine. “Just try to recall the facts, please.”
“I’m sorry. Forgive an old man for romanticizing the past. It was more than fifteen years ago.”
“It’s OK,” her tone softened, “Please, continue.”
“I remembered Helena from our graduate school days in the 90s. I always fancied her back then, but, for her own reasons, it never went anywhere.
“As I recall, her presentation that day was on genomic imprinting. Her lab had silenced the genes prohibiting the development of a parthenogenote—that’s a viable embryo developed completely from the mother, with no genetic contribution from the father. It was a remarkable breakthrough.
“I approached her after the talk to congratulate her on decades of hard work. She seemed genuinely happy to see me, or maybe that’s just my own wishful thinking refracted through the lens of time. I had hoped to get a chance to catch up before the end of the conference, so I asked if I could buy her a drink later.” He took a sip of tepid tea, “Whoever said chivalry was dead, never dated Aryeh Baram.”
Detective Levy continued to record notes on her tablet, keeping her thoughts to herself.
“That evening, we toasted her success overlooking the coast of Caesarea. I do remember asking what she hoped would be gained from her research. It seemed beneficial only to women.”
“And what did she say?”
“It was very odd, actually. She spoke in generic terms, mentioning that parthenogenesis was a biological fail-safe developed by nature for times when the male population was absent or unfit.”
Levy’s eyebrow lifted, “Do you know what she meant by that?”
“I’ve no clue. I assumed it was all theoretical. But it’s not a secret that many women of her generation had it rough going through the gauntlets of academia. Can you blame her if her life’s work took a feminist slant?”
Detective Levy slammed the tablet down, “The U.N. Sanctions Committee issued a notice pursuant to her violations of resolution 59-280.”
“The ban on human cloning?” Baram thought he was helping a missing person case, not a criminal investigation.
“Among other human rights violations. Reports track her to the US, under an alias, Dr. Helena Pallas. She’s part of a secretive group of dangerous women who indiscriminately blame men for society’s woes. They’ve been on our terrorist watchlist for some time. So, I will ask again. Is there anything else of importance you can remember?”
“There was one thing. The next morning, I came downstairs and noticed a young woman in the lobby. At first, I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me. She looked just like Helena.”
“Perhaps her sister or a niece?”
“No. She looked exactly like ‘my’ Helena, back when we were younger. Except…”
“Go on.”
“Except she was somewhere in her second trimester.”
When the interview was over, Dr. Baram, shaken, hailed a taxicab. He couldn’t help wonder what would have happened, all those years ago, if he had told Helena how he felt about her. If he had mystified her less and defended her more.
The world will never know.
by submission | Dec 30, 2021 | Story |
Author: Matthew Goldstein
The ancient skull peeked out of the ground like a shy creature waking from an interrupted slumber.
“Hey, Davoh, check this out!” Shielding her eyes from the glaring sun, her body tense with anticipation, Jarab brushed off a few more particles of parched earth to see it better.
“What is it?” Davoh patted the dirt off her hands as she walked over and crouched beside Jarab. “Is that…? No, can’t be.” Davoh’s hand drifted reverentially towards it, then jerked back as if shocked. “It looks intelligent,” she said, the awe clear in her voice.
“My guess is at least comparable to our own.”
“I’m afraid to get ahead of myself, but if that’s true, then – I mean, just think about it. We’ve always stared at the stars, wondering if there was ever any intelligent life out there, and yet the evidence was right below our feet the entire time.” Davoh shook her head. “How old do you think it is?”
“Only one way to find out.”
They worked the rest of the day to excavate the entire skeleton, tempering their anticipation with practiced professional care. As soon as the sun dipped below the horizon, the air began to cool, a sweet relief from the desert heat.
At last, they carted it to the on-site lab and continued working through the next day, until there could be little doubt. They had found an intelligent species on an evolutionary branch that was thought to have died out over a hundred million years ago.
Jarab and Davoh laid it out on a table and stared at it as if they had unearthed a god. Jarab’s eyes were watery, her knees weak. “It’s so beautiful,” she whispered.
It was almost twice as tall as they were and had only four limbs. From its shape, it appeared to walk on two legs, which was as fascinating as the twenty digits between its hands and feet.
Jarab stared down at her four fingers and flexed them slowly, wondering how different it would feel to have an extra.
“When were these dated again?”
“Huh?” Jarab dropped her hand. “Oh. One hundred-thirty million years ago, give or take fifteen million.”
“That’s the same time as the Great Extinction.”
“Makes sense. Most species died then. This one may have even been new at the time.”
Davoh didn’t respond. She opened the window and sat beside it, staring out at the dust clouds swirling in the dying light. Jarab began an analysis of the bones to determine the cause of death.
The landscape had been swallowed by darkness before Davoh stirred. A thick cloud cover had come in, making the darkness nearly absolute, their little tent a lone beacon of light in an endless, empty void. Davoh turned away from the window to face the specimen. “Do you think this species had anything to do with the Great Extinction?”
“Why would you think that?”
Davoh turned back to the window, and a minute passed before she responded in a distant voice, “I don’t know. Just a feeling.” She paused, then, “Did you know this whole area was a forest a hundred years ago?”
A chill breeze blew in through the open window. At the same moment, a beam of moonlight broke through the clouds, illuminating the side of the skull and seeming to vaporize the godlike aura that had surrounded it. It must have been a trick of the light, but Jarab could have sworn the skull was giving her a malicious grin.
by submission | Dec 29, 2021 | Story |
Author: Matthew Ferguson
Earth 106 AB (2077 AD) – Blamazon Prison #654
Hamish, an older man, and Janie, a young woman, wait in their cell for lunch.
“Eat your bleep and lament your bleep of robotic bleep”, intones the robotic jailer. The robot deposits two trays of grey food into the cell and rolls away.
Hamish picks up both trays and hands one to Janie.
“So why are you in here?” Hamish asks, as he sits on his side of the cell.
“They thought I wanted to join the resistance”, replies Janie.
Silence.
“Well, did you?”
“Nah, I was looking for renaissance paintings on Blamazon, when brime drones smashed into my apartment and sentenced me to life in Neon Bust’s martian manual labour force”.
“Wow, but why did they think you wanted to join the resistance?”
“I misspelt renaissance”, replies Janie.
They eat in silence for a few moments before Janie asks Hamish, “So how’d you end up here?”
“Similar story really. I posted on Breadit that Blamazon Brime wasn’t worth $120, and I was going to cancel it today.”
“Bleep, they’re really making it hard to cancel these days”, replies Janie.
Silence regains its foothold in the cell as they continue to eat lunch.
A robot jailer rolls up to the cell bars, “Bleep you inmates, you’re gonna suck my bleep bleep”, and rolls away.
“You know it’s so weird they keep bleeping rather than talking”, says Janie
“You’ll get it when you’re older”, replies Hamish.
They finish lunch. Janie takes both trays and slides them out of the cell. Turning theatrically to Hamish, “You know I really can’t stand this food, I need three thousand calories a day to keep up these guns”, as Janie flexes her arms.
A robot jailer rolls up to the cell door at high speed. “Inmate Janie are you saying you’ve got a gun?”
Eventually, after a substantial awkward silence, the robotic jailer rolls away.
Janie, exasperated, sits on her side of the cell and says, “This whole setup is so 1984.”
“You know I heard one in three people haven’t read 1984”, replies Hamish.
Both characters look at the fourth wall.
“It’s fine. I know a trick to getting out of here”, says Hamish. Then clearing his throat, he begins talking in excessively loud theatrical whispers, “I believe billionaires are job creators and shouldn’t pay tax”. The sound of robot tracks starts to slowly approach the cell.
Hamish points to Janie, “Oh, I get it… I’m gonna buy so much Nesla stock when I get out”, says Jaine with her stage voice. Hamish then adding “Nelsa to the moon!”. Tracks start moving away from the cell. They must be Blamazon review bots, Hamish mutters.
Janie leaps to the cell door and shouts through the bars, “Blamazon brime is brilliant, five stars, its original video content isn’t the height of mediocrity, it’s definitely not simple stories cut with ridiculous amounts of landscape and slow-motion shots to stretch content out, in a vain attempt to make the audience feel like they are getting value for money”.
At this point, two Blamazon robots rush to the cell door, crashing into it and exploding, destroying the cell door and themselves. “Bleep-ing Boggle maps”, mutters Hamish as they both leap over the burning robotic remains.
Turning and running down a corridor marked ‘Exit’, the cellmates find a dead end. Robotic jailers bleep insults at them as they close in and block retreat. Raising their lasers rifles against the cellmates. Jaine closes her eyes, obviously afraid.
Hamish smiles, “Relax kid, disintegration is easy, comedy is hard”.
