Social Service

by Kathy Kachelries | Aug 13, 2007 | Story

Author : Kathy Kachelries, Staff Writer

It was a no-call assignment, and Carson hated no-call assignments. Attempts to contact the McCaulty family through conventional mail had been unsuccessful, though he noted that the lever of the mailbox had been raised, indicating recent use. They had no telephone, of course. Carson shifted the car to manual control as they left the grid and pulled onto the gravel trail.

“Are those real cows?” Kristin asked. He nodded. Her eyes were wide.

“You’ll get used to it. Is your defo shield charged?” he asked. The car came to a stop behind a rusted-out manual pickup truck, and Carson yanked on the emergency brake. Kristin nodded and followed him up the gravel path and he looked her over one last time before ringing the doorbell.

Long seconds passed before the door swung open a few inches, and a portly woman ran her eyes over the two of them. “Are you Mrs. McCaulty?” Carson asked as he flipped open his wallet. His badge caught the light and projected a holographic image of his face.

“I got no business with you.”

“We’re here to discuss your son.”

Mrs. McCaulty squinted suspiciously. “There’s nothing wrong with Herbert.”

“Then you won’t mind us asking him a few questions.”

“He don’t talk yet.”

Carson reached for his report pad and scrolled through the relevant information. “He’s nearly five, correct?” he asked as he moved his foot into the crack between the door and its frame. “We’re just gathering information about the case.”

“There’s nothing wrong with Herbert.”

“Are you familiar with the Re-Ability program?”

“You’re not sticking nothing in my son’s head,” she said, this time with an edge of force. Mrs. McCaulty leaned against the door, but Carson didn’t let it close.

“I think you might be misinterpreting this visit,” he said. “I’m here to tell you about the federal assistance program. Your son may qualify for-”

“You ain’t sticking nothing in my son’s head,” she repeated.

Carson revealed no evidence of frustration or unease, though Kristin had tucked herself behind him with a nervous expression across her youthful face. “Re-Ability implants are no different from pacemakers or any other medical device,” he said calmly. “If he’s struggling, there’s a solution. Surely, as his mother, you’d want him to have the best life possible.”

“You ain’t-”

“I’ll just leave you with this information,” Carson said. His hand slid through the crack in the door, holding a bouquet of holo-readers. She snatched them from his grip, and he barely retrieved his hand before the door snapped shut. Carson’s frown was almost invisible as he turned back to the car.

“She isn’t going to read those,” Kristin said as she grabbed the door handle.

“You’re learning fast.”

“So what do we do?”

He slid into his padded seat and yanked the door shut with a little more force than necessary. “Level two,” he said. “Forward it under neglect and endangerment.”

Kristin gave a short nod as she slid in and pulled her door closed. “Are they going to-”

“If he doesn’t have that implant before he’s six, he’ll be permanently delayed.” Carson snapped as he threw the car back into manual and it spun. “Don’t feel sorry for her. He needs treatment.”

“Alright,” Kristin said. Her voice was meek as she reached for the console panel.

“Label it priority,” he added. The car jerked abruptly as it reached the end of the driveway and reunited with the grid.

The Little Nothing

by submission | Aug 12, 2007 | Story

Author : Adam Wiesen

White. Sterile. No roof, no walls, no floors. No shadows. Make a sound. Hear anything? Of course not: no acoustics. You look nervous, Ben. Don’t. We’re not there yet. This is just a test. Plugged into your parietal lobe, running a line into your implant. The real deal takes way more power than I have in this little box. No, for a full-on semiotic transplant, you’re going to sit in the Big Chair down in Valley Stream, and they’re going to plug you right into the Nassau County grid, along with the rest of the recalcitrant douchebags who can’t seem to stop shitting in society’s mouth.

You’re sweating, Ben.

That’s okay.

I’d be scared, too. I mean, this little corner of eternity’s hardly scenic, and you’re slotted for a good thirty years. Where do you sleep? Oh, Ben, you really don’t get it, yet, do you? The whole point to this is you don’t sleep. Don’t eat, don’t talk, don’t hear, don’t listen. It’s just you and the the long white nothing. The Little Bardo, they call it. No sleep. What’s sleep when we’re technically plugged into your REM mode, anyway? No, you’re doing your full thirty wide awake. The Nassau County grid dumps into the National Readjustment Processor down in Quantico, where your personality will sit in happy reconstructed nothing for the entire stretch of your bid.

It could be worse, Ben. In the old days, they filled the Little Bardo with all sorts of terrible stuff. The best bits from the Bible, used to scare you to sleep at night. Fire and brimstone. Punishment, y’know? Retribution. No one really came out of that in one piece, though. Lot of catatonic freaks. Couldn’t control their piss function. Terrible smell. Lots of screaming. Then they tried to pamper them with a Heaven meme. That worked like bunk. I mean, for half you rotten sons-of-bitches, Heaven is raping kittens and stabbing nuns. Ever see a smiling coma victim? I hear half the Federal budget that year went to buying clean sheets, just to cover up the number of wet dreams you freaks had. So, then they came to this. Nothing. Nada. Nirvana, baby, for thirty years. The Little Bardo. Time to think, right?

Ben, we have a toilet for going to bathroom. Someone’s going to have to mop up after you. That’s not very considerate is it?

How are you going to receive visitors? Your mother? Ben, look at me. Does this place look like it’s got the facilities to hold your toxic miserable ass for thirty actual years? We’re going in through the parietal lobe, champ. That controls time sense. You’re going to be in and out of here in twenty minutes.

Glory Star

by J.R. Blackwell | Aug 10, 2007 | Story

Author : J.R.Blackwell, Staff Writer

The old man may have looked like Santa if he smiled, but red faced and spitting he was closer to a vengeful devil than the spirit of giving. The old man cornered Uill with his sizable bulk. “You are not a poet.” He said, stepping closer. He stunk of rotted food and oil. “You are The Krugar, a War Lord, the greatest military mind of my generation.” The old man gripped Uill’s lapels and shook him violently. “Snap out of it General! Come back to us.”

Uill trembled. “Mister, please just let me go, I’m going to be late to class.”

The old man kept one of his meaty hands on Uill’s thin shoulder and used his other hand to reach into his coat pocket. He pulled out a bronze metal and pinched it between his stained fingers. The medal had a half opened eye impressed on its surface. As always, these kinds of medals made Uill feel sad and angry, a press of emotions that intensified the stabbing pain in his head. The man shook the medal in front of Uill’s face. “I earned this after you commanded us on Mars. Do you remember Mars? You remember the Driell and the fire?”

Uill could feel the headache coming, the pain that always came when people talked about his old life. “I’m not The Krugar. I never commanded you. That man wasn’t me. I was reborn. Now I’m a student of poetry.” Uill held up his left hand, where his university glowed on his ring finger. “Look at my ring.” He waved his hand in front of the old man’s face. This is the Capital University student ring. The Krugar went to military school, right? I can’t be him. I go to Capital University.”

Shaking his head, the old man rummaged in his coat. “Don’t try to confuse me. I know who you are. I know what they did to you. I know they tried to make you reborn. But you are The Krugar. You wouldn’t forget, not with all the machines in the universe.” The old man pulled a knife out of his coat and flicked his thumb on the blade. The blade began to spin. “You’ve got to be in there somewhere. Maybe I can cut you out.”

Uill held up his hands. “Please. No. Poetry. I do poetry. Cloudless climbs and starry skies, suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, do not go gently into that good night.”

“Forget poetry Krugar.” The old man waved his hands around his head. “Forget it. Don’t you hear the news? The Driell are returning. They are coming back. Only you can beat them. Like you did last time, remember?” The man lifted his arms where the lights of the city sparkled against that velour sky. “There!” he said, pointing excitedly to a streetlight, dropping the knife. “That star! There, that glory star. ” The knife blade sparked on the pavement as it spun. The old man didn’t notice. “You remember the song, Glory Star?” The old man put both his hands over his heart and closed his eyes. Then he began to sing, his voice surprisingly clear. “Glory Star, Glory Star, bright and bold The Krugar’s Company.”

Uill knew the words. All eighteen verses. He heard them in his wild dreams, those spastic glimpses of long stretched hours of tension followed by moments of terror and then after, long, brilliant songs, his mind on fire. Uill ran out of the alley, back to the university, back home to his life.