by submission | Apr 24, 2014 | Story |
Author : Tony Taylor
A klaxon blares again in Suda’s ear, dragging him toward consciousness. His groggy eyes strain open to find error messages flooding his helmet’s display. Replaced by fear, the fog of his mind begins to part. A distant scream snaps back into the foreground of his mind, louder with every passing second.
“Suda, wake up!” Fera shouts from behind him.
“I’m back, I’m back,” Suda says, gripping the control stick in front of him. With a wild twist the airframe screams through superheated air. It whips one way and another, tumbling out of control. Small jet streams flare from various locations on the craft, timed with Suda’s movements.
He pushes the throttle forward with zeal. The craft groans and airfoils lift and turn, stabilizing its flight. Suda exhales audibly.
Without a second to rest, a blip appears in the corner of his display. It glares with bright red importance amid a sea of yellow warnings. Before he can read it, a lance of light pierces the sky from above. It darkens the horizon in comparison to its grand brilliance. The plane twists to the side and the beam spears into the sea far below, flash boiling the waters. A mushroom cloud of steam blossoms into the sky.
The airplane spins again in midair, pointing up to the source of the attack, still sliding along its old trajectory. Suda and his copilot are held in their seat by unseen forces as the craft defies physics. In this silent moment, Suda thanks the inertial dampeners, without which they would be red jelly.
“Looks like your plan didn’t work out so well,” Fera spits.
“Shut it,” Suda says. A black, elongated tear drops from a short wing of the aircraft. In a flash of light, it disappears. A bright white cloud rips apart as the device passes through faster than Suda can track it. A blinding light shines through as the explosive hits home and Suda smiles, satisfied with Fera’s abilities yet again.
“Target destroyed,” she reports, “632 remaining.”
“You sound like you don’t have any faith Fera.”
The ships thruster’s unleash a torrent of flames as it streaks away, a blur. “We’ll make it through this.”
The craft makes another abrupt turn. Dozens of beams streak down from the heavens. Suda jerks back and forth, piloting his machine in ways that shouldn’t be possible. Large thrusters burst to life in sequence, flinging it through the air at strange angles and speeds.
“Their targeting isn’t very good through the cloud cover. We should sta-”
Suda flicks a switch, twists his flight stick and works pedals, turning his ship turns toward the sky. As perfect as the craft they fly, Fera senses his intention and takes advantage of the maneuver. A swarm of dark shapes release from the wings, sparkling in the fading light, zipping away toward their targets. The sky ignites, a hundred suns ablaze.
Bucking from the shock wave, the aircraft is reined in once more and forced into a steep climb.
“Not an option at this point.”
The airframe erupts up from the clouds into a wide open sky, painted orange by the lowering star on the horizon. Time slows and Suda appreciates the spectacle, time spread thin by adrenalin.
In the distance, swarms of angry black shapes encircle, hawks waiting for their prey. The spiky black predators begin changing shape and hundreds of bright stars come to life. The predator’s weapons take form.
Suda feels his heart leap into his throat, his fate within reach. He tries to push the words from his clenched larynx but only has time to form the letter s.
For a brief instant a display of fire and light hangs in the sky. Then, the shards of twisted metal and charred flesh rain over the uncaring sea.
by submission | Apr 23, 2014 | Story |
Author : Ian Hill
They all gradually woke up, rising from the steely cradles to stagger to their feet and peer around in confusion. The mismatched assortment of befuddled people shuffled around the large circular room, taking in every detail of their surroundings while trying to find someone they recognized. A haze of the unknown settled firmly over them all like an unholy cowl.
A few of them woke up screaming, their already forgotten nightmares transitioning into what was presumably the real world seamlessly. As hours passed the people clumped up together in cliques. Some of the groups were ethnically similar, some were comprised of people of comparable height. The people naturally sought out those who they could relate with most.
They waited for a change. The domed room around them was featureless and sterile. The rounded ceiling parted at the middle to rain down a glorious beam of sunlight. There weren’t any doors, hatches, cracks, or crevices. The only break in the monotonous stone grey was the circular port that allowed light in from the foreign outside realm.
“What do you think is going on?” a thin, unhealthy man asked to his quickly acquired friends.
One of them looked up from and frowned. “Maybe we got kidnapped.”
The man shook his head and glanced all around at the large group of chattering people. “Why us though? What’s the common factor?”
Territories were subconsciously formed and the cliques became fewer as larger masses absorbed smaller groups into their fold. Occasionally a would-be leader stood up and silenced everyone with their booming voice. They called for a combined effort to continue the search for any sort of detail that would open a hidden door or something to the same effect.
Someone’s stomach grumbled. He laughed uneasily. “Getting a little hungry.”
His wan friends gazed at him suspiciously.
A day went by. Nights were always the worst under the dome. The few that could sleep were plunged into unrelenting nightmares that caused them to wake with an outcry of fear. Subtle blue moonlight drifted down to meet the middle of the bleached basin.
Rain came like a halcyon, sending torrents of precious liquid down to the ground. The desperate people all clambered to hydrate themselves. This was where the first whispers of competition arose. Some were thirstier than others, but the most powerful and driven of the pack filled themselves without pause.
There was a sect of nervous people that paced around the circular chamber on a regular basis, hands thrust into pockets and heads trained on their faded shoes. Tempers wore thin and arguments broke out nearly every hour. Cliques disbanded as schisms formed and smaller amassments compartmentalized themselves to form invisible partitions. No one crossed the unspoken boundaries.
The inevitable finally came on the third day. One of the thinnest walkers stumbled to the side and collapsed to the ground in a pitiful heap. After a brief moment of hesitation a flock of scavengers surrounded the prey and began to harvest his flesh.
Chaos took the reins as the large group of wayfaring strangers descended into a free-for-all. The concrete ground became encrimsoned with the blood of the weak. All human decency was set aside for the individual’s greater good. However, flesh was a finite and dwindling resource.
After some unknown period of time went by there was only one left. An obese shadow of a man, laying in his filth and gazing up through the distant port to the alluring sunlight beyond. An ocean of picked bones sat strewn about around him. What was once necessity became gluttony.
by Julian Miles | Apr 22, 2014 | Story |
Author : Julian Miles, Staff Writer
“Yngtranzian Harvester incoming! Genghis Class – it’s huge!” Janice sounds terrified, but she’s new. She’ll get over it.
Many pre-spacers compared the depths of space to the seas of Earth. Truly prophetic words. A wise man once said: “The ocean is the only café where the food fights back.” Fortunately, in an environment renowned for big-eats-little dynamics, humans were a decent size. Unfortunately, in space we’re only just medium sized and nothing out here thinks we’re cute and worth protecting.
The ‘blip’ on the screen is about the size of the Isle of Wight. It’s filled with six-metre tall tripeds with wide mouths full of sharp teeth. They have a cookery book dedicated to making a whole range of delicious meals, for any time of day or night, out of human. Including several recipes where we go into the hot and/or sharp part of the process conscious. Apparently you can judge the succulence of human flesh by certain tones in the screams emitted by the owner.
“Alright, it’s big, but it’s not bigger than a Dobberil Grinder. Set up a pair of point-three light triple-stage boosters; add countermeasures packages Alpha Cream Nine and Pete Echo Four. Slap a teraton warhead on the second one. Fire control to me.”
The Dobberil are like whales in size, and that they like their food small. Minced, to be precise. They drive whole herds of people out of cover into open ground using sonics, then a Grinder class vessel swoops in, mulches them up – along with a decimetre of whatever they were cowering on – and serves the whole mess fresh with a splash of peroxide.
The Harvester comes straight in, ignoring the defensive batteries on the Moon and on Moon Two, the defence station that orbits opposite the Moon. But we’re on patrol today, back at last from persuading the Slavyesh that humans are not for drinking. We had to knock the society back to their stone age to do it, but they will think twice before squeezing one of our colonies for their morning juice again.
The fire control comes online and I wait. Yngtranzians are fussy. They’ll want to line up before entering atmosphere, and that’s when I can clip them.
Two, one… “Fire one!”
The missile leaves me, accelerates like nothing on Earth, leaves a rainbow contrail in high atmosphere and slams into the Harvester at a several hundred Mach. The Harvester pitches and yaws out of orbit, station-keeping drives and stabiliser fields spitting. By my head, trajectory calculations are coming in faster than they are correcting their yawing vessel.
Tick, tock, tick, tock, tick, tock. They have passed the orbit of both Moons. Time.
“Fire two!”
The night goes bright just as the concussion of launch fades. The first missile was slowed by atmosphere, its control systems keeping it from going to relativistic speeds. The second had no such limitations. No-one on this ship saw it go and nothing on the Yngtranzian saw it coming. For a few seconds, we have a third, supernally bright moon. I’m glad sound doesn’t travel in space. That would have been loud.
“Northern Hemi Control, this is Orca One. Please alert Russia for debriteors and add an Yngtranzian Genghis to our kill tally.”
“We hear that, Orca One. Orca Two has risen from Mars Base and will relieve you in twenty-seven hours.”
That’s the good news. A kill means we get a couple of days shore leave.
Slowly but surely, the predators of this ocean called space are learning that the tiddlers from Sol Three are vicious and have really big teeth.
by submission | Apr 21, 2014 | Story |
Author : Jorge Mendoza
The gash on her forearm stopped dripping thanks to the two ounce can of epithelial hemming gel she stored under the bathroom sink. Survival instincts simmered down as muscle memory seized control over the bandages being wrapped across the exposed flesh. There was a dominating theme in the oncoming stream of thoughts. How did this happen? How did I just survive that? How do I get back?
Colonization aboard the Mars Terraforming Station was supposed to be the solution to Earth’s impending problems. The human population had sky rocketed far above the planet’s capacity as natural resources dwindled, wars erupted, and disease spread. The red planet symbolized a new beginning for a select thirty two thousand seven hundred forty seven souls.
Starring up at the fading blue sphere through the transparent wall of her living quarters, Marissa never thought she’d miss the claustrophobic conditions of the mega-cities. She’d dreamt of the vast openness of space from the day the pioneering program announced it was accepting applications.
“You’re crazy,” yelled her mother. “You’d go and not be back by the end of my lifetime child!”
“I know,” replied Marissa. “It’s just that I finally have an opportunity to make a difference. I can finally be someone, not just one in twenty some billion.”
A thin smile and loving gaze accompanied the tears running down her mother’s worn face. She knew her daughter’s ambition was a giant sequoia, unswaying at all requests and dismay.
Just once, perhaps I should’ve listened thought Marissa.
Marissa longed to float alongside the rotten sea weed in the murky green waters of the salty Pacific. She wanted to feel the light warmth of the sun’s rays breaking through the smog. She missed the feeling of the grains of sand between her toes and even the pricking sensation of stepping on washed up plastics. The petrified wood of the board walks and piers was a different feel from all the smooth steel and glass that made up the space station.
The drowned slapping sounds of hand on metal on the opposite side of the sliding doors grew stronger, the groans and moans progressively clearer. The number of infected collecting outside her room continued to increase as did the pace of her heartbeat. Thoughts of what they’d do to her if they broke in buzzed in her mind like an irritated bee hive. So long as she wasn’t ripped to shreds it didn’t matter if she starved, nothing seemed to stay dead for long on Mars.
by submission | Apr 20, 2014 | Story |
Author : C. E. Page
Silt rained over her as she crawled from her hiding place; a pocket of air in the pile of rubble that had been her habitation tower. Others, some familiar, were emerging from the crumpled buildings to bay at the sky and drag grey hands over their anguished faces. The ground shuddered again shaking the rubble pile. It convulsed like a dying creature, collapsing in on itself, cutting off screams and creating more dust. She huddled against the ground gripping her shins, her face pressed against her knees; silently counting, pretending the roaring earth was thunder:
One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand. . .
The tremor passed and she continued to rock. Icy fingers scoured her chest to grip her heart. She had to breathe. The air wheezed over her lips and down her throat to hang there like a jagged bone. She swallowed to shift the blockage. Still the air she gulped in short sharp breaths refused to fill the bellows of her lungs. Trying to ignore the fire that prickled up her spine and flooded the back of her skull she forced herself to crawl forward. Shale shifted under her hands and she slipped, her mouth filling with dust and blood as her chin cracked against the ground.
The others had started to hulk forward some missing limbs, some beaten and bloody, with glass embedded in their faces and angry red gashes where skin and muscle had been torn away from bone. They clawed towards her pleading for help. Asking: why, what, who?
Another vibration started in the earth bouncing small pieces of shingle and stirring clouds of dust. It seemed to be gaining power the closer the others got until it became a shuddering wave of force that rent the earth in two. The others fell, scattering among the churning debris screaming, roaring, and dying. She was tossed into the air and her hands torn open as she landed in a tangle of steel reinforcement wires. She pulled herself free and rolled to avoid being crushed by a column of steel of stone. Heat rolled over her as the gas cylinders in the maintenance quarter exploded, adding their echoing boom to the cacophony. Chips of stone and glass showered over her slicing the skin of her face and arms.
Then everything grew still. The screams of the dying and the roar of the earth sounded distorted and far away, like sounds distilled through water. She lowered her arms and a shining light blinded her grit filled eyes. Shielding her face she crept towards the source of the brilliance.
The cool planks of a wooden door met her questing fingers. It stood, haloed by light, amidst the ruins of an unrecognisable building. It was old and ornate trimmed with bronze fittings and ancient scrolling carvings. The door seemed to hover in a bubble of still air despite the destruction of the city around it and the light radiating from it washed away the pain and fear, beaconing her to pass through the door to see what wondrous world was on the other side. Her blood stained fingers gripped the gleaming handle and the door swung open to reveal a tunnel of soothing light. She looked back at the dying world then stepped over the threshold.
Cold clean air and fragrant grass waited at the end of the light soaked tunnel. A verdant meadow: calm, quiet, and eternal.
