by submission | Jan 8, 2017 | Story |
Author : Beck Dacus
My eyechip surprised me while I was eating breakfast by telling me about the traffic on Bernadette. There was a parade blocking the street, and I needed to use Bernadette to get to the grocery store.
“Oh.” My wife looked up from her eggs. She’d just gotten the same notification.
“Yeah. No using the car.”
“So… you’ll go tomorrow?”
“Store’s closed on Sundays. You know that.”
“Monday?”
I gave her a look.
“Please no,” she said. “Don’t take the hover.”
“We’re out of milk.”
“And butter,” my son said. “And chips.”
“All right,” she sighed. “But no chips.”
“My thoughts exactly,” I said, picking up the keys and walking out the back door. To my right was a car-sized metal pad, the hover parked on top. I hopped in and started the engine, feeling the hoverbeam emitters lift me up. I started the vehicle toward the grocery store, coming over the top of my house to see my disapproving neighbors shaking their heads and urging their kids inside.
Whatever. They’re all paranoid.
Making my way to the store, the whole city had the same attitude as my neighborhood. Rarely-used anti-aircraft turrets unfolded, but they didn’t aim at me. They wouldn’t do that unless I got within 300 feet of their premises. Too many 9/11 repeats had occurred at the hands of malicious drivers, or drunk ones, when hovers first came out, so one building every half-mile armed itself. Well, they needn’t worry about me.
When I arrived, I could see employees below freaking out. The instant they saw me, they ran inside. I knew they were telling their superiors, and I was ready when I got the call on my dashboard.
“Hello? Is this the hover driver?”
“Yep. You wanna take control of my car?”
“Yes. You understand, we can’t trust just anyone to, um… to land on our store.”
“I understand. It’s not my first time.” Though it had been a while.
“Okay. Well, a very important man is coming in on a helicopter later, so we can’t let you use the main pad. Sorry.”
“It’s all right. Just take me to the secondary one.”
I pressed the button on my dashboard, giving consent to let the store take control of my hover. They drifted me a few hundred feet to the backmost part of the store’s roof, where they started talking to me again. “Unfortunately, close-up, the hoverbeams on your car damage the store, so the secondary pad has an inflatable platform. Which we’re going to drop you on.”
“Wait, what?”
Too late. I lifted out of my seat, fell for probably half a second, though it felt like thirty minutes, then slammed back into my chair.
“Ohmygod ohmygod! Ugh!” I was kind-of pissed for them surprising me like that, but my anger had cooled off once I stepped out of the hover and onto their giant balloon. I decided to get this shopping trip over with and go home.
Midway through my shopping trip, my hover sent me a notification. It was being stolen.
“What!?” Without another word, I ran out and climbed back up to the roof. Instead of my car, I found a couple of uniformed employees, one with a radio in his hand. The other one came to me and said, “Sir, your car was stolen by a thief fleeing the store. You can understand his choice of vehicle. Anyway, he was too dangerous in your hover, so we had no choice. We radioed one of the nearby buildings to shoot your car down.”
Oh, God dammit.
by submission | Jan 7, 2017 | Story |
Author : Tony Sandy
‘Get out and stay out!’
Robert looked out of his window. His neighbor was in his drive, surrounded by suitcases and other personal paraphernalia. He leaned out of the window.
‘Thrown you out again?’ He said, not so much as a question but as a statement of relentless fact. Bill was always getting thrown out of his own house and this was just another instance.
‘I’d ask you in Bill but you know how it is?’
‘Yes, I know.’ (Silence followed). ‘How’s Kate?’
‘At her mother’s. How’s Sally?’
‘At her mother’s with the kids. I’ll come out.’
They talked on Robert’s drive.
‘Damn these robot houses – who do they think they are?’
‘Yes but what can you do about it?’
‘Not much.’ Silence fell again.
‘I’d heard that there was a revolt in Forbes Town.’
‘Feeble. Waste of time.’
‘What can we do about the situation?’
‘Nothing it seems. They’ve taken over everywhere. They were meant to be our servants, not our masters.’
‘Isn’t that the problem though? We thought we could opt our of responsibility, by getting them to run everything for us and now they have, including us.’
‘Ain’t that the truth!’
‘We’ll take care of you, they said and did. Free will is dangerous in the hands of children, who don’t understand it. We’ll protect you – save you from yourselves.’
‘Citizen, is everything okay?’ A robotic black and white car had pulled up beside them, silently.
‘You know the congregation of two or more human beings is prohibited by law?’ It continued.
‘Yes officer but my friend has just been thrown out of his house as you can see.’
A laser beam scanned the suitcases.
‘Even so that is no excuse.’
‘I was offering to let him stay at my house, temporarily.’ Robert said, trying not to let any emotion show because as he knew once registered as hostility, that would be it. Arrested as a subversive, taken into custody, questioned and ‘altered’ to make him a model citizen again. They’d seen it with Frank – taken away screaming and shouting one night,by the robotic police. Now he was back with a permanent smile on his face and no temper tantrums. No house would throw him out, ever. He was the perfect law abiding citizen since they’d messed around with his amygdala, the emotional center of his brain.
‘God,why do they keep us alive? Why do they need us?’ he thought to himself and went back into his house with Bill.
‘Billeting is allowed by law but only temporarily, remember citizens.’ The hollow, metallic voice reminded them, with all the concern of, well, a robot. All must be controlled, was the hive mind prime directive and all would be, eternally.
by submission | Jan 6, 2017 | Story |
Author : John Pedersen
I do beg your pardon, sir. Please forgive the inconvenience.
Oh, no sir, I assure you we are not out of anything.
Well, sir, the National Weather Service has issued an atomic advisory, and we must insist all our customers move away from the windows at this time.
I know it’s dreadfully inconvenient, sir, but I am afraid we must insist. It’s national safety code.
Oh no, sir, I do assure you that our windows meet all the regulations and are of the highest quality.
I’m not sure what mesh our windows are constructed with sir, but they do meet the regulations, and when combined with the other building requirements, your safety is most assuredly guaranteed.
Because sir, it’s national safety code that you move away from the windows.
No, sir, I don’t think they will blow out, I’m just following the proper protocol.
There’s the first of them, sir, I’m going to move over that direction. I must ask you again to come with me.
I have noticed that, yes sir. The colors do look a bit like a sunset. A cloudy one, perhaps?
I’ve never been to a beach, no sir. But I do imagine the sunset over the ocean is a stunning sight.
Bright orange clouds you say? I can see how you’d make that comparison.
I’ve never really seen the ‘mushroom’ in a mushroom cloud either, sir, tell you the truth.
You’ll know when the blast wave hits, sir. The whole building rumbles.
No, we do have shock absorbers built into the foundation. It’s still a pretty big rumble.
No, I’ve never been in an earthquake either sir, but that does sound like what we’ll feel here in a few moments.
No, I’ve never been to the coast at all, sir.
I’ll bet the buildings there are of the highest-quality construction, sir. Do you mind me asking how frequent the bombings are out there, sir?
I do believe a gentleman of your caliber, sir, is quite experienced with all this nonsense.
I see what you’re saying about the sunset now, especially seeing several of them together. It really is a very pretty shade of orange. There’s some deep reds in there too.
There’s the rumble. You can hear the glassware vibrating behind the bar. You should hear it in our kitchen! All the pots and pans start shaking, the cooks reach up and grab them and scowl until it’s over.
If I can speak freely sir, and maybe a little crassly, I think they are targeting us. They never give up, and we’re well-shielded, we spared no expense, so I think it’s a little stupid that they’re so persistent.
It does sound like an exercise in futility, sir. Well-stated.
Honestly? Someone told me once that they used atomic explosions to propel their ships through space, and that’s how they got to our planet, but I don’t know much about that.
No, the rumbling never lasts very long, We’ll just have to see if there’s a third volley of explosions.
I do believe that was the worst of it, sir.
Yes sir, you were right, we didn’t need to move away from the windows,
No sir, I’m not sure why the government feels the need to make so many regulations either. I’m sure there’s a bean-counter out there somewhere who thinks he knows better than anyone else.
Yes, sir, everything does seem to work out for the best.
Your martini looks a little low, sir. May I fetch you another?
Very good, sir.
by submission | Jan 5, 2017 | Story |
Author : Eric Spery
27 December, 2033
A thin sunbeam streamed through a crack in the blinds. It lit John Kohl’s pregnant wife Angie as she snored quietly in bed.
He sat at his desk drinking coffee. Watching her.
His pack leaned against the door. Yet another business trip.
Steam rose in crazy ribbons from his cup as he sipped it and sighed. This was no kind of life for a married man. Soon enough a father.
He could see the green Temporal Manipulation Agency patch glinting on his jacket on the bedpost.
“More like Assassination Squad,” he muttered. “Almost always an assassination.”
“I’m tired,” he whispered.
Tired of killing. Tired of traveling into the past to change the future.
A copy of his resignation sat beside his final mission dossier.
They hadn’t been happy about it. Not happy at all. He’d been with the Agency since 2020. The same year he met Angie.
They tried to keep him, but he insisted. Finally, they gave him a transfer to the Department of Labor after this last mission.
He picked up the dossier, tore the seal and opened it.
Adjustment Target: Angelina Kohl – 2019
His eyes widened in horror and he looked up at the bed.
But, of course, it was empty.
Why was that strange? He couldn’t recall.
He looked down at the folder again and wondered who Angelina Johnson was.
by submission | Jan 4, 2017 | Story |
Author : Russell Bert Waters
It’s not easy being a psychopath.
I don’t care about others, but I also don’t care about myself.
I’ve never felt a connection, and I’ve always been curious about what would happen if I did certain things to people or animals.
So, I did all of those things, and so many more.
Normal people trample one another during Black Friday sales.
I behead the homeless.
I feel I’m doing society a favor.
I’m not sure what the Black Friday people think they’re doing.
I joined the military fresh out of high school, I felt that I would be an effective killing machine.
I was.
Did I save a few of my fellow soldiers? Yep.
Did I do it because I cared about them? Nope.
I was captured once, and I enjoyed it very much; inasmuch as I’m able to enjoy anything.
The enemy soldiers would often play Russian Roulette.
I was incredibly curious, and I couldn’t care less about the men who died.
I was the only captive grinning from ear to ear.
One enemy soldier, with soulless eyes, recognized something in me that he knew, deep down, about himself.
We sort of clicked.
They never allowed me to participate, but this guy got it.
He got me.
He always made sure I had a good view.
When we finally escaped, I locked eyes with him while slowly gutting him with his own knife.
He didn’t wince or cry out.
We had an understanding.
He didn’t care about himself, and he enjoyed spending his last few moments with a kindred spirit.
That is, if he were capable of truly enjoying anything.
Fast forward to today, I’m in a medium-sized village in Ireland, to which I have traced a solid portion of my ancestry.
The year is 1673, and one of the men in this village will eventually marry one of the women in this village. They will have six or seven children together.
I know, I said “fast forward to today” and yet I’m a good three hundred and some years before today.
But, it’s still today, good people.
Wrap your minds around that for a second.
This morning, I awoke in 2017, and, later this same day, here I am in 1673, a long distance from my home.
Tonight?
Well, I’ll be home again, in 2017, and it will still be today.
Kinda hurts your head, doesn’t it?
Good.
Whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.
Also, as I said before, I don’t care about your head, your comfort, or you.
Last year I murdered this babbling homeless man, and, before he gurgled on his own frothy blood, he mentioned that his backpack was vitally important.
Turns out he was right.
After tossing his head into a culvert, I found a device, and a journal, in his bag.
The device is what I have in my satchel, today, even as we speak.
It’s why I’m able to be here, in my ancestral home.
Once a week I come here, pick a random stranger, and end his existence.
Then I hit the [return] button on the device.
One day I’ll hit that button, and I’ll just disappear as though I’d never existed.
It’s the ultimate game of Russian Roulette.
I can almost feel the thrill.
by submission | Jan 3, 2017 | Story |
Author : Rollin T. Gentry
“Argh! You…you hammerhead-shark-looking son of a bitch!”
I yelled aloud for the first time since I’d started playing this alien’s stupid game.
“You took the cows. You took all the cows?!” Steaks … gone. Butter … gone. And nothing to dunk my cookies in — forever. Over the telepathic link, he laughed for the first time.
Until then, I’d been playing it cool. He took my wife; I took his hoard of concubines. He took my two kids; I took all four hundred fifty of his spawn. He took football — the American kind — I just laughed. “I’m a geek, wide-eyes. Take football. You just wasted a turn.” But actually, it was a pretty good idea: robbing an entire planet of a major pastime.
So I probed his mind, scouring his home world for anything that looked like a sport, but Take-Take seemed to be the only game his species ever played.
But then I came across what looked like a music festival, a la Woodstock. One of the band members was throwing swag into the mellow, swaying crowd, and the hippies were loving it. So I took the performers and audience members alike — planet-wide. But I should have zoomed in closer because the hippies weren’t even the same species as wide-eyes. They turned out to be a major food source on his world. And that’s when he took the cows.
OK, technically, he hadn’t taken anything, not yet. Everything was still safe and sound on Earth: the cows, the wife and kids, even the NFL. All of my losses simply hovered above my head as tiny holograms, a scoreboard of everything that would cease to exist if I failed to surrender ownership of the Earth before the clock ran down. Of course, wide-eyes was under the same pressure. Think intergalactic staring contest.
With only five minutes left, I knew I had to dig deep. Maybe wide-eyes had a monkey on his back? My mind flew over the surface of his world taking anything they were drinking, smoking, snorting, or injecting. I even grabbed some weird pharmacological goo they dunked themselves in every night.
True to his strategy, that smug bastard did the exact same thing on Earth. He even snagged all the coffee beans and the trees that grew them. One minute remained on the clock. I waited.
Fifty-nine seconds…
Beads of sweat dripped from the sides of his ugly shark face. And I waited, thinking about folks with kidney stones, crying out for a pill that no longer existed, and junkies doubled over puking their guts up. I even thought about baristas in the unemployment line. Then I waited to see if anything remotely close to empathy came bouncing back across that telepathic link.
Thirty-five seconds…
Nothing. Not a damn thing. Wide-eyes was focused on that “thing-I-took” that he told himself he could quit anytime he wanted. Just not today.
Fifteen seconds…
He probed my mind. He saw the rock bottom me, the recovering me, the relapsing me. Rinse and repeat. He did the math. “Yeah, that’s fifteen years sober, wide-eyes.”
Five seconds… He screamed “forfeit” in his native tongue. I felt myself being whisked away to Earth.
In my backyard, I looked down at the blue-green, pulsating crystal in my hand. The deed to wide-eye’s planet? Too bad nobody on Earth would know what it was. Oh well, maybe one of those tinfoil hat types would be willing to trade for it. A planet full of shark-people for a laptop; that sounds fair.
