by Patricia Stewart | Aug 19, 2010 | Story
Author : Patricia Stewart, Staff Writer
There were many heroes that day; men and women, drones and gynes. Two evenly matched warships, each led by brilliant military commanders, and crewed by battle hardened soldiers. Fighters swarmed like angry hornets, as antimatter torpedoes and photon cannons unleashed their furry. For eighteen hours, the two massive starships engaged in their mortal bout. But in the end, they had only succeeded in destroying each other, and the two lifeless battlecruisers drifted aimlessly apart. However, amongst the halo of debris and floating bodies, two lone fighters faced each other like old west gunslingers, waiting for the other to draw first.
The human activated his head-com and translator. “Okay, cockroach, prepare to meet your Queen.”
“And you Satan,” was the crackling reply.
But neither adversary fired. What was the point? They were both dead already. Neither fighter could survive without the mothership. If they killed the other, they’d die alone in the cold empty void of interstellar space. Nothing to do but listen to subspace static until your oxygen ran out.
“Well, what are you waiting for?” snapped the earthman. “Let’s get this over with.”
“Are all humans so eager to die?” inquired the drone.
“What? No, of course not. I don’t want to die. I have a wife, and two kids.” He glanced at the holograph to the left of his instrument panel. “I want to see them again. But that isn’t going to happen, is it?”
“No. I suppose not,” was the solemn reply. “I too will not see my family again. Hundreds of my brothers and sisters have died today.”
“Hundreds? Oh, that’s right. I forgot that you’re all related. It must be hard having family die before your eyes. At least I can fight knowing that my family is safe, back on Earth. Listen, this isn’t personal. I’m just a soldier, doing my duty. Hell, I don’t even know why we’re fighting this war. Look, if it means anything, I’m sorry about your family. If it’s okay with you, let’s talk a little while longer. I’m not ready to have it end like this…”
Just then, the alien ship exploded as a missile slammed into its port side. “Wooooeee. Great work, Joe. You had him so distracted, he didn’t see me coming. I think that was the last one, buddy. Looks like we won, eh?”
by Roi R. Czechvala | Aug 18, 2010 | Story
Author : Roi R. Czechvala, Staff Writer
Paul was nervous. His hands shook violently. Petals from the bouquet of daisies and indian paintbrush he had picked for her fell to the floor. Get hold of yourself man, he thought to himself, you’ve been talking to Lucrezia for over a year now. What about that night you spent together? He managed to control his hands, but the butterflies were still flapping like mad in his stomach.
He had met her by body proxy in a Farovian bar and soon they would meet for the first time in the flesh. His own flesh. He shivered in anticipation. Her shuttle was in orbit, waiting for glide path confirmation into Port McAuliffe. For the umpteenth time he made his way to the ticket counter and inquired about the status of her flight.
The young woman, noting his approach, sighed, rolled her eyes and affixed a plastic smile to hide her annoyance. When will flight 0968 arrive, he asked.
Sir, I’ve told you, all information is regularly updated on the board. She gestured to the information display floating above the waiting area.
Yes, I know, but I thought…
Yes Sir, if I hear anything, I will let you know. The indulgent smile had become a gruesome rictus. He thanked her, looked expectantly to the hovering display and took his seat.
Her family were an adventurous lot and had emigrated to the first planet humanity had colonized; Faroff. The name, according to history, was a witticism of one of the original survey crew. Paul was a groundhog and proud of it. His family had never left Earth and he was damned if he would.
They had met in ether. They both held a fascination for early twentieth “movies”. Their correspondence was casual at first, comments and observations on early DuoD cinema. Casa Blanca, Rashomon, Citizen Kane and The Seventh Seal were mutual favourites.
Their banter over celluloid entertainment soon gave way to personal inquiries; mutual respect became affection and inevitably blossomed into love. She wanted to meet and after long talks he agreed to meet her by body proxy. He hated the idea of using the body of another. It stank of prostitution to him. What foul loathsome individual would allow his body to be used by another. But his love for her trumped his disdain. If it was possible, their love grew stronger. He never knew what became of the proxy after he severed the link.
A blast of sound shocked him from his reverie. Flight 0968 now arriving at shuttle gate 87, was announced, blaring into his aural implants. The embittered ticket girl smiled warmly at him.
His love was easy to spot in the crush of disembarking passengers. At two and a half meters, she easily towered above the crowd. He rushed to the embrace of her many, triple jointed legs. He barely managed to get his arms halfway around her carapace. She stroked him soothingly with her antennae and exuded pleasant pheromones.
Her mouth parts moved in a seemingly disjointed fashion. Strange clicks and whistles issued forth. The translating device affixed to the hard bony plates of her abdomen spoke. Oh Paul, I am so happy.
Tears of joy ran down his face as he smiled up at her. I got us a room, he said winking.
As he climaxed and filled her gonads with his seed, he looked into her multi faceted eyes. I love you, he said happily.
And I love you; she replied. With loving tenderness, she embraced him once more and ate his head.
by submission | Aug 17, 2010 | Story
Author : Kent Rosenberger
The vidphone at the other end picked up on the second ring. “Family Affairs, how can I help you?”
“Customer number 26337NS-24.”
The attendant typed in the numbers in her computer. “Ah yes. Mr. Johnson. How can I help you?”
Johnson gave a wan smile. “Look, I’m glad you’ve been working with me at that end, but I just can’t keep up with the payments anymore. Tough economic times and all that.”
The attendant nodded. “I understand, sir. Did you want to downgrade to a cheaper program? Just until you get back on your feet?”
Johnson shook his head. “No. No, I think at this time I’d just like to cancel my subscription, if you don’t mind.”
More typing. “Of course, sir. Did you need some time, or should I make this effective immediately?”
Johnson had already made up his mind. “Immediately would be best.”
“Of course, sir. You’re paid up through the end of the month. I’ll backdate to today’s date and we’ll send you a refund directly to your account for the difference. We will inform all of your contacts on our end; work, school, church and so forth. Will there be anything else?”
“No. No, I don’t think so.”
“Alright then. If you ever want to re-subscribe, just give us a call. And sir, I am sorry for the loss you are about to suffer.”
“Thank you. Goodbye.”
“Goodbye, sir. And have a good day.” The screen went blank.
Johnson turned away from the video viewer just in time to see his wife and two children, gathered in the living room with him, wink out of existence in a static-filled blue haze. The artificial family he had come to know and love for the last twelve years was suddenly gone, more victims of the crumbling economy.
In less than a second, Bruce Johnson was no longer a husband or father. As he sat in the abrupt loneliness of his home, he wondered if he would now be considered a bachelor or a widower.
by submission | Aug 16, 2010 | Story
Author : Chris Amies
Mewi Lupa suli sat and inspected the heel of one boot, which had come adrift revealing an odd honeycomb pattern in the structure. With her tongue she dislodged a small piece of carrot between two teeth – the relic of her morning’s teethcleaning. On Hydris the only use of carrots was to clean teeth. Mewi had never known it otherwise. She was shipborn, a daughter of the ‘Long March’ who had never set foot on a world until she was three years old.
Her work was to produce books for the community. The new language had taken root like a plant aboard the ‘Long March’ and all books previously aboard – in English or in Chinese – had been used for fuel as soon as their tongues’ last speakers were too feeble to protest. Instead the 120 root words of Toki Pona were used, spoken, written down in various combinations; you could say most things in them. Mewi had originally been called Mavis, and her surname ‘Lupa suli’ had been ‘Trench’: ‘Lupa suli’ was literally, ‘big hole’.
In the new language you had to weigh words very carefully. The elders remembered the old tongues and how dangerous, how imprecise they had been, and they told Mewi and her age-clade all about them.
Mewi’s hair was spiky and orange. She washed it in the null-grav washer in the ship – an affectation, but she had few others and she was still young. The null-grav sphere was fun and the power that drove it wasn’t about to run out any time soon. Those who were shipborn gravitated back to it time and again.
That evening as the orange and violet sky of Hydris was darkening, Mewi and her friends Luka and Ewani regretfully left the null-grav sphere and stepped out into the echoing grey space of the ship. Ship was home for the elders; Mewi and her age-clade, a foot in each camp, slept in bunkhouses down below on the planet’s surface. But the ship drew them back, especially now they were becoming adult and their games had changed.
The oval door of the ’Long March’ led to a ramp, and the three walked down, hand in hand.
The scents of the night-blooming trees filled the air and some strange creature – a scaly thing that in ten million years might evolve into a bird – shrieked.
There was a small knot of children at the bottom of the ramp, nine-year-olds or less, planet-born. As the three said ‘hello’ to them, they chattered curiously. Mewi thought their eyes glittered yellow but it must have been the light of the setting sun.
The children followed Mewi and her friends, talking between themselves, but although Mewi tuned in –
“Listen to them,” she said, “can you understand what they’re saying?”
“Not a word,” Luka agreed.
“Me neither,” said Ewani.
The children streamed past them, strange words hovering in the air and fading away.
by submission | Aug 15, 2010 | Story
Author : William P Sanders
The man trod the dusty, broken path, poorly-shod feet disturbing the detritus of a hundred years of decay and rot, sending up small plumes of filth as his heels impacted with the grime and rose again, each step propelling him onward into a future full of uncertainty and doubt and the weight of the knowledge that whatever lay beyond the next rise, it was as cold and uncaring as the earth he traveled.
Night came with a sense that nothing was different, that no changes, good or bad, were in the making, and that the dawn would come, grey and pitiless as always, a bright and yet dull point on the eastern horizon, if only he’d wait for it.
He did.
That morning, he pushed himself into a crouch and then stood, loose dirt falling from the sleeves of his coat and back to the shape he’d left in the scummy earth, that of a man curled up as though a child, a shape that would likely lay undisturbed until changed by the wind and the rain, the rain that never seemed to come, and the earth would once more forget his passing.
He trod onwards, down the same broken road, over gently rolling hills topped with brittle vegetation and the scarce whispers of a time long gone, pieces of metal or other materials shaped specifically for tasks that none were able to perform anymore.
Minutes went to hours and they in turn were lost to the vast infinity of time. He’d no notion of whether he’d covered inches or feet or yard or miles and when he thought maybe he would turn to look over his shoulder, to see if the hills were still visible, his neck ached and he stopped thinking about it.
The dull bright point hung low in the silvery western sky when a time came that he’d reached a great divide in the earth where once a bridge had spanned from one side to the other, and it came to him that this had been a river but he didn’t know how deep or wide, and anyway it didn’t matter because he couldn’t see the other side or the bottom and every muscle and fiber in his being hurt and the idea of trying to cross this, now or ever, made him physically ill.
The man sat down on the road, slender, aching back against the metal ribbon of a guard rail long gone into rust and all full of holes, and closed his eyes.
The night passed in silence with nary the chirp or chatter of even the smallest creature, and when the dull bright point rose slowly and lazily in the east after the passage of the hours, the earth found its population reduced by one.
by submission | Aug 14, 2010 | Story
Author : Daan Kogelmans
Harry has wrapped a tentacle around his inner lobe, which means he is thinking deeply. Two of his cigarettes have gone out, he squints in the orange smoke. Then he coughs.
“You smoke too much,” I say.
“I know, I know,” he extinguishes the cigarettes in the hole and scratches his lips. “It’s just that… I can’t stop thinking about these poor things. He points at the glass dome.
I bend over and peek inside. The aliens crawl around in the mud. “You have two of them?”
“Yeah, a couple… They mate sometimes, but without success.”
“They are active though,” I say.
“I gave them some sokaputty to see how they would react.”
“Oh,” I say. One should never expect too much of sokaputty. “Two eyes,” I say looking at them, “let’s see… that’s only three dimensions, isn’t it? Which makes them…”
“Practically blind,” Harry says nodding and lighting a few more cigarettes, “that’s what I worry about so much. Because with two eyes… Man, I would die with loneliness.”
“No contact?”
“Not a flitch, not even a flicker.”
“Than how can they live?”
Harry shrugs, smoking. “It makes me so sad, you know. To be so lonely, all your life crawling around in darkness.”
“Maybe their species doesn’t need any contact?”
He spits on the raster. “No man, they crave for contact all their life. I’ve seen them mating man, they try to touch, they try to lick, they look each other in their two eyes, but they just can’t do it, man, they are lonely as hell. A rock has more contact than these wretches.”
I shake my head and look at them crawling in the mud. “Poor things.”
“Yeah man,” he puts his cigarettes in the hole, “I should quit smoking.”
