by submission | Nov 2, 2013 | Story |
Author : Richard Halcomb
Life Itself…
The electrostatic bubble crackled to life around the travellers; two scientists, a politician and a pair of media photographers. Dr. Tim Bilcks, Team Leader of Project Tempus, held the controls of the Temporal Transport Platform, as the sphere of energy surrounded them. “My friends, we are making possibly the most astounding journey in human history; to the birth of Life on Earth itself!”
“Most previous time experiments failed to grasp that ANY Time Engine needs to be able to accurately navigate in the traditional three dimensions, as well as in the temporal fourth dimension. Destinations are constantly in a state of movement through time, and failure to consider this aspect cost us many great, pioneering minds.” Dr. Bilcks paused, to make sure that his genius was understood. “This device, the T.T.P., incorporates a navigational computer which ensures that you land on the coordinates of your destination, at the temporal coordinates of your choice. We also have a terrain scanner, to avoid appearing inside a rock, or a tree!”
“All very good, Doctor. How long will this take?” Science Magister Tompkins had an important meeting planned, with a blonde reporter of questionable morals. He had worn his best kilt suit for this journey, and hoped to be rid of it by 2pm.
“Technically, we won’t be gone at all. We arrive back a nanosecond after we leave. It’s all a part of the genius of the…”
“Excellent!” Magister Tomkins interrupted, “The beginning of life itself! I can’t wait to breathe the Ancient air!” Or, he thought to himself, to smell the cologne of that reporter, whose name he had momentarily forgotten. Steve? Sven? Something with an S…
“Ah, well… the air of the time that we are visiting would be highly toxic to our evolved lungs! My assistant will give you one of these filters to inhale.”
Bilcks’ long suffering assistant Penny Worthington handed out small, black marbles. “Once this lodges in your throat, it will filter out the toxins, and balance the remaining gases, to give you the air that you need.” she explained. Dutifully, the marbles were inhaled, feeling unnatural as they descended towards the trachea. Dr. Bilcks deftly flicked the transit switch; the T.T.P. crackled a crescendo, and flicked out of existence.
For the travellers, all they saw was a blur. Then their new reality solidified around them, the crackling subsiding. They had arrived. Primal Earth was strangely beautiful. Water covered most of the view around the rocky outcrop where the T.T.P had landed. Sol, Earth’s sun, was a deeper orange in this time, and the rocks reflected it as a red hue. The Magister admitted to himself that it had been worth the trip. He inhaled deeply, as the photographers stepped out to document the moment.
“Damn,” Magister Tomkins beamed, “I was saving this for later, but this seems much more auspicious!” He took the cigar and lighter from his sporran, inhaled deeply, and lit up.
The mainly methane proto-atmosphere flared around the Magister. None of them had time to feel a thing. The T.T.P. was torn apart by the force of the explosion, and the five temporal travellers were ripped into millions of their composite pieces.
Quiet resumed, Earth’s natural soundtrack. In the surrounding puddles, the small carbon-based molecules scattered around started to change. They had a very long journey ahead of them.
by Desmond Hussey | Nov 1, 2013 | Story |
Author : Desmond Hussey, Staff Writer
He was sitting in his chair exactly where I’d left him six hours ago, looking out the window of the impeccably reconstructed early 16th Century workshop. His plate of fruit, bread and cheese remained untouched. I glanced at the blank canvas and sighed. He’d been in this workshop for three weeks now and hadn’t drawn even the simplest sketch or touched his carving tools. This project was already way over budget. Unless this over-priced, over-hyped, gene-resurrected artist produced something, anything, he was destined for the chemical vat and I would be out of a job.
But artists, particularly Italian Renaissance artists, especially THIS Italian Renaissance artist, were a sensitive lot and don’t respond well to economic pressures.
“Good morning, Leonardo,” I said in Italian, suppressing my frustration and getting into character, “are you feeling ill? You haven’t touched your breakfast.”
“I have no appetite of late, Francesco,” he said, not taking his eyes off the holographic representation of the Chateau D’Amboise beyond the window, the exact view he would have had from his workshop at Chateau De Cloux in France during the last years of his life. “Food does not taste the same to me anymore.”
Could he actually recognize that the food was synthetic? If so, a gross oversight on my part, but one that couldn’t be helped; real farms were a thing of the past due to environmental pollutants. Everything was now grown hydroponically from cloned hybrids deep underground.
“Mi amore, you must eat,” I entreated, cooing like a mother hen. “You must work. The King grows impatient.”
Leonardo dismissed my lie with a flick of his hand and remained staring out the window, waiting for something. After a moment’s silence he spoke. “I’ve been having a dream, Francesco, every time I sleep.” He was so quiet I had to step closer to hear him. “I’m in a strange, dead land, familiar, yet unknown. The sky is the color of ash and weeps black, sooty rain. The trees are stunted, barren of leaf and flower. Beauty has fled the world. The shrouded sun brings no joy to the starving soul, no color, no life.”
Did he suspect that he too was a cheat, a facsimile of the man he was? Could he somehow sense that his original body lay buried under the radioactive ruins of Chapel Saint-Hubert and had been for the last seven hundred years?
“But you’re awake now, Master.” I knelt beside him and pointed out the window. “Look, the sun shines! The trees are in bloom! The sky is clear as sapphire! It’s but a dream that troubles you, amore – A ghost of the mind.”
“There!” He said, pointing suddenly at a passing blackbird, “Every hour, the same bird flies the same path. The clouds too are different, but the same. I’ve been watching. Its like I am looking at a moving painting, rich in detail, but devoid of God’s touch.”
Damn! Some programmer just lost their job. I would too if I didn’t get Leonardo to produce a new masterpiece. “You must paint,” I implored, “or feel the carver’s chisel in your hands again. Then you will rediscover the world’s beauty.” So would we. “It’s been too long, Lolo.”
He looked at me then with cold, loveless eyes, which scrutinized every wrinkle and contour of my face, reconstructed to resemble his most beloved pupil.
“Inspiration is dead, Francesco,” he whispered with deep sadness. “This room is artifice. This view is an illusion. Even you, amore, are an imposture. My heart knows this. How can I paint a lie?”
I had no answer.
by submission | Oct 31, 2013 | Story |
Author : Glen Luke Flanagan
Scarlet wings aflutter, painted faces twisted into masks of hate, the pixies descend. Their prey writhes on the ground, eyes bulging in terror as the tiny carnivores begin their feast.
Fluorescent light filters through golden pixie dust, casting an eerie haze over the scene. Crimson blood stains a concrete floor. Screams of terror fill the soundproof room, reaching no ears but tiny pointed ones.
Their only thought – to kill. Their victim – a human soldier, now a living skeleton. Flesh hangs torn from skeletal cheeks, ripped away by tiny teeth.
Behind shatter-proof glass, men and women in lab coats watch with satisfied faces. One breaks the silence, speaking to a stern-faced companion.
“So, General. I expect we will get the contract?”
by submission | Oct 30, 2013 | Story |
Author : David Kavanaugh
The projectionist’s nimble hands slid the reel into the side of the old machine. The switch was flipped and a cone of illuminated dust particles appeared in the theater outside the tiny window.
In the seats below, the scattered audience members settled back, putting their little conversations on hold as the feature began.
At first, the screen was black but for a bit of deep, dark, throbbing grayness in the very center. Then suddenly there was a collective gasp of breath and more than one audience member jumped in their seat as the dot on the screen suddenly glowed white hot and inflated. It stretched out and out, blinding them with its brilliance. It filled the screen, pulsing and twirling with ripples of electric blue. The speakers grumbled out a roar of sound, like living thunder.
Then, as the liquid fire began to calm, the scene changed. The perspective zoomed in on a little ripple of gold, closer and closer until the audience was watching tiny mites of energy shudder and clash. They began to evolve into bits of color, and the opposing shades collided and burst like firecrackers. The speakers sent out sizzling sounds as the particles appeared and disappeared.
The light softened, and the screen became a hazy scene of drifting clouds. The clouds began to squeeze inward and take the shapes of disks and skirts and hats and hoops. Stars in the newly formed galaxies twinkled and blinked. The big ones were the prettiest, but they only lasted a few seconds before flashing out in rainbow gusts.
It zoomed in on a little tornado of silver glitter. The galaxy spun through the darkness until it happened upon another galaxy, this one a smaller disc the color of blood. The whirlwind of stars swept across the red galaxy, swallowing up the colors and hiccupping a flash of orange before moving on.
There were some random shots of rocky worlds and gas giants rotating around their parent suns, and after a few minutes the scenes of life began. Quark warriors swarmed in the molecular castles on a scrap of frozen iron. An ooze of black silicone sludge rose up in a great wave and battled a thorny beast as big as a mountain. Sentient souls in a methane sea slashed at the seafloor and turned the ore into shiny metals. They built vessels like golden spears and hurled themselves through the cosmos, forming an empire dozens of galaxies across. Buzzing pools of electrons bickered over philosophy. A small, wet planet featured scenes of jellyfish and fungi and a single frame of a hairless ape driving a Volkswagen. Gray-green clouds made love and gave birth to raindrop children. There were monsters and angels and artists. There was a stone dragon snacking on stars and belching out hydrogen fumes.
The flickering scenes of life came to a close, and the screen showed black and white once more. The pop and crackle of starry lives. The heavy breathing of nebula. The grinding, angry music of pulsars.
The specks of light went out, one by one, and the speakers grew silent.
Some of the audience clapped politely, but there was a general feeling of anticlimax. They began to rise from their seats, yawning. Someone spilled a soft drink. Someone forgot their keys.
Above them, the projectionist carefully inserted the reel back into its container and set it on the cart beside the others. As the gods tottered from the dingy theater below, the projectionist blinked its many, glistening eyes and glanced at the fading label. It read: The Universe.
by Duncan Shields | Oct 29, 2013 | Story |
Author : Duncan Shields, Staff Writer
YOUNG DOMESTICATED HAND-RAISED HUMAN BEINGS
FREE TO A GOOD HOME
I have 5 young (13 Earth Years) DOMESTICATED pet humans that are looking for loving nest hives. These humans have been handled since birth, have no problem with tentacles, and love us blogdors. Humans make great pets for blogdors of all ages, are very affordable to care for and their short (60-80 Earth Years) life span leaves no long term commitment. These humans are extremely social and love to cuddle. They are (mostly) litter box trained, and will eat nearly anything you feed them. Humans do best in pairs, and can get very depressed without a friend. Although, if you have a lot of spare time, humans make lovely solo pets as well.
These humans ARE NOT KORRA FOOD. I understand that korras need to eat, too, but so much time and energy has went into raising and domesticating these little ones that it would be a waste of such precious tiny lives.
Experience with offworld animals is recommended, but as long as you are willing to provide a loving home, they can be a great beginner pet.
Supplies needed to adopt pet humans
-Airtight, pressurized cage (at least 10 square tentacle-lengths)
-Water bottle
-Oxygen/nitrogen mix with transposer
-Litter box (with litter obviously)
If interested, leave pheromone trail near the pupae farms before second moonrise.
by Julian Miles | Oct 28, 2013 | Story |
Author : Julian Miles, Staff Writer
The sea of faces looks like a spattering of pale raindrops against the dark pastiche of their clothing. This demonstration promised to be ‘a spectacular denial of President Lacorn’s policies’ and it is. The estimates place the heaving crowd at over a quarter of a million people. There are snack vendors and even souvenir stalls!
“No tyrants! No tyrants!”
Their cries are consistent, carefully orchestrated. My people have confirmed that all the lobbyists and hardcore groups have come in force. Speeches have been given.
“Ninety seconds before optimum is exceeded, sir.”
I look up at the ceiling. This will be a defining moment in the campaign. I walk over to the console.
“Stand clear. There will only be one with blood on his hands today.”
They look at me in surprise, relief plain on their faces. This may be necessary, but the scale is stupefying. It has kept me up vomiting into the early hours for a month. I think that nightmares will replace nausea after this.
“Sixty seconds.”
There is silence. Some of the para-military elements in the crowd have noticed the lack of official presences or watchers. They are starting to wave their hands to get attention when I reach down and press the button.
Thermobaric weapons are devastating. The fuel-air bomb is unbelievable in enclosed spaces, but used in the open it merely sentences a lot of people to an agonising death instead of pulverising them. The one slung under the media stand at the centre of the gathering has an augmented warhead to make it more deadly, not more humane.
I watch it all. Ignoring the tears streaming down my face and the sounds of my staff retching into waste bins behind me. People turned to flaming mist, people suffocating in a vacuum then screaming in silent agony as burning fuel fills the place where air should be. At the edges of the demonstration, I see people with blood shooting from their ears, noses and mouths. Then firestorm follows pressure wave. Obliteration rolls across the view.
“Close the borders. Implement Emergency Procedures.”
My staff stare at me. They have had the luxury of only bracing themselves for today, the start. I have not.
“This act will be condemned globally. Closed borders and martial law will make them hesitate. When we don’t do anything against them, they will hide behind their words and do nothing.”
“Sir. The fleets?”
Exceptional thinking in extremis. I nod to acknowledge the quality of question; although the answer is something I have had for weeks.
“All fleets are to co-ordinate with overseas bases to lift our entire presence, then return to international waters as soon as possible. Bring our boys and girls home.”
They kept on insinuating they wanted us to stop meddling. So we will gather in and see to our internal strifes. Intercontinental trade agreements with China will supply what we cannot make. The Chinese rulers have withstood nearly three millennia by being insular. Let us see how we do.
The rest of you? You’re on your own. Good luck.
