by Patricia Stewart | Feb 8, 2012 | Story |
Author : Patricia Stewart, Staff Writer
“Bring us to membrane distance,” ordered Commander Richards.
Yeoman Miller deftly maneuvered the UESS Kenar toward the subspace membrane separating the primary universe from the adjacent multiverse where they were currently operating. “Membrane distance, sir,” he reported.
“Extend the perasensor. Put it on the main viewer.”
Ensign Dexter launched the tethered perasensor through the membrane into primary space. Seconds after the small probe popped into primary space, it began transmitting a 3D holographic image of the enemy fleet. A galaxy-class Vegan destroyer appeared directly ahead.
“Oh, God,” whispered Richards as he rose slowly from his command chair to stare at the hologram. “It’s the N’ubok. Quickly, prepare four subspace torpedoes. Range, sixteen kilometers after emergence. Bearing, two degrees port, zero vertical. Maximum yield. Fire when ready.”
Four seconds later, the tactical officer reported “Torpedoes away, sir.” The four subspace torpedoes plunged past the membrane and streaked through normal space at a hundred and twenty thousand kilometers an hour. A half second later, they slammed into N’ubok’s hull. The nova-like explosion marked the end of her tour of duty.
“Target destroyed, Commander,” Dexter announced. “However, they’ve triangulated on the emergence point. Three hunter-escorts are heading our way. They’re powering up sub-space charges.”
“Retract the parasensor. Shields up. Get us out of here, Mister Miller. Evasive pattern delta. Be sure to hug the membrane,” he added. “The Tet’s are not happy that we patrol in their multiverse. They have threatened to destroy any primeverse ships trespassing in their space. I’d like to limit our battles today to only one adversary.”
“Aye-aye, sir. Evasive pattern delta.” As the UESS Kenar turned and accelerated, sub-space charges began to plunge through the membrane and drifted into Tet space. As they detonated, they released deadly gamma ray burst that spread out in a spherical pattern the size of Mercury’s orbit. “Sir,” reported Dexter, “it looks like they’re picking up the reflection pattern from our shields. As long as the shields are up, we’re sitting ducks if we stay next to the membrane.”
“Very well,” relented Richards. “Mister Miller, take us deeper into Tetian space. Sensors at maximum. Give me a forward view, Mister Dexter. Eyes sharp, everyone. The Tetians make the Vegans look like pacifists.”
A few minutes later, the Kenar entered an uncharted asteroid belt. “All stop,” ordered Richards. “Where the hell did those asteroids come from?”
“Uh-oh,” said Dexter. “They’re not asteroids, sir, they’re mines. The Tetians must have deployed them along the edge of their multiverse.” Several of the nearby mines began to drift closer. “Damn, they’re homers too. Sorry, sir, but we can’t stay here.”
“Well then,” mused Richards aloud. “I see only two options: We can penetrate the membrane and take on a fleet of angry Vegans singlehandedly, or we can go ‘old school’. Personally, I was never an advocate of suicide missions. Lower shields. Mister Miller, turn about and retrace our path, flank speed. Lieutenant Burt, the second we turn parallel to the membrane, shut down all systems, including propulsion and life support. For this to work, we can’t emit a single photon of energy. Let’s see if we can coast our way out, right under their noses.”
“It’ll be a piece of cake, sir” said Miller with a grin. “The Vegan’s don’t have noses.”
Outwardly, Richards smiled at the bravado, but inwardly, he was nervous as hell.
by Julian Miles | Feb 7, 2012 | Story |
Author : Julian Miles, Staff Writer
“A is for Android, B is for Blood,”
They chant so happily, without a care in the world. I love them so much, but that is exactly why I am crèche matresse. The room is huge and covered with colourful pictures of all the neo-heroes and the choices available to those who succeed.
“F is for Fractal, G is for Grunt,”
Jemima is clapping in time with perfect rhythm, tapping her heels on the off beats and nodding the quarters. She will be an entertainer. Natural gifts and predilections are so essential to a healthy adult purpose. I am better than any at spotting the indicators.
“K is for Kill, L is for Longevity,”
Gregory’s pupils dilate when he says the word ‘kill’. I always suspected that he was a cleaner like his father. Others had been squeamish when he flushed his mother for emotivating. I knew that he had merely found his vocation before his time.
“P is for Perfection, Q is for Quality,”
They are so delightful, so innocent, so soft and so very fragile. The empty chair shows where poor Michael discovered that he couldn’t take the fast way down from the family apt like his adult brother. Stupidity is genetic and in this society, self-erasing.
“U is for Ultimate, V is for Valour,”
Tomorrow they are having a trip to the bioengineering facilities, to see this year’s graduates receive their adult states. Tracey will not be coming back. Her extra-sensory abilities merit quantitative analysis. Vivisection will allow rapid assessment.
“Z is for Zanjero; this is the Alphaset.”
They finish with a shout and laughter. I raise my hand and they fall silent.
“Nigel, define Xenium for us.”
He stands up, hands by his side, head back. Excellent form.
“Xenium is what the Cygress requires of humanity, the gift of adulthood. We give it so that our emotional excess can never cause mass destruction again.”
I nod and he sits quickly.
“Samantha, define Deviance for us.”
She stands up, arms crossed and feet a shoulder width apart. I had been wondering where her predilection placed her and now I see. She will make a fine grunt.
“Deviance is when a human does not submit Xenium. The Deviance movement has it origins in the resistance to the cyber-statutes of 2419. It was confirmed as a unified resistance in 2505. While it suffered losses with the institution of the cleaner programme in 2630, today it is considered a viable threat to the Cygress. It is gaining ground and its signature is raids of incredible daring and high risk under the aegis of Commander Connor -”
She stops a fine summation to stare behind me at the portal to the crèche. I rotate my head to see which luminary has decided to join us today.
He is dressed in a brown duster coat with a neural defence headset. His utility harness is festooned with weapons and guerrilla insurgency technology. He is smiling and his eyes are clear blue. Behind him I see the rest of his team securing the corridor.
In my near-field, I can see the tip of the shell at the base of the barrel underslung on the Jensen Suppressor EMP gun. It is a massive piece of anti-cyborg hardware and I feel fear for the first time since I went to receive my adult state. His voice is a rich baritone.
“That’s as fine an introduction as we need kids. Schools out.”
I see his finger tighten on the trigger and the pulse
fragmen
ts
me…
by Duncan Shields | Feb 6, 2012 | Story |
Author : Duncan Shields, Staff Writer
It’s a unique experience to be involved in an explosive space decompression. If you survive, you never forget the sound.
It’s like something turns the volume down sharply in the middle of the explosion. The screams, the shattering of glass, even the rushing wind, all suddenly has nothing to express itself with. The air becomes thinner and disperses. The medium through which noises travel expands to the point of non-existence and you’re left with the silence of space. Even while all around you people are screaming and flailing, alarms are wailing, and everything that was in the room is now clattering and colliding as it spins out into the starry blackness.
And I should know.
We were on our honeymoon in a Galactic Class 8 Yacht on the starboard promenade eating lobster while the musicians were setting up onstage. The bank of space-facing windows were massive. The official reports said there were four hundred and thirty eight people in the hall with us, relaxing and talking to each other. Most of us were wearing our fanciest clothes, pretending that we were wealthy even though this was a discount cruise. Alison and I had waited long to get married. She was thirty-five and I was going to turn thirty-eight in ten days. She looked beautiful as she turned to signal to a waiter for another coffee bulb.
Perhaps the ship was old. Perhaps it was poorly designed. Maybe a safety inspector was hungover and missed something at the previous inspection.
A sharp crunch like someone stepping hard on a champagne flute right by ear and suddenly the wall to my right became ‘down’ and we all fell into space. Fail safes failed, blast shutters jammed and circuit breakers broke.
That is why my nightmares are silent. When I wake up screaming, it’s from seeing my darling wife bloat, freeze, and rupture. In the dream, she screams as soon as the viewing plate shatters, pluming glittering glass dust into space, and keeps screaming as we are both pushed by strong forces into the black. Her hair whips crazily and she kicks like a first time skydiver, reflexively trying to get her balance in mid-air with no up or down. Her scream starts like a fire alarm and very quickly whips down to silence even though her mouth is still wide open. He throat is still vibrating but her voice can no longer travel to my ears.
Other patrons screams, the clinking of silverware and plates, furniture colliding with the instruments of the musicians, they all fade to nothing and the last thing I hear is my wife’s screaming. The last thing I see is her mouth filling with popsicle blood as her lungs shred in their freezing rush to fill the vacuum.
I see it often. Her mouth is a tattooed O on the front of my mind. The nightmare is down to two or three nights a week.
The sticky safety cables that fired out managed to grab me but they missed her. I was reeled in sharply like a fish and I survived. I was one of only six that did. All six of us were paid a lot of money by the company to keep quiet about the accident. We all agreed to take it.
I am back home now with no need to work for the rest on my life. I’ll never go into space again. I need noise around me at all times, even when I sleep.
I cannot stand silence.
by submission | Feb 5, 2012 | Story |
Author : Barry Reimer
I remember falling. Somehow, I saw it coming seconds before it happened, but I had no way to stop it. Snap. The rope severed. The top of the towering spire of rock began to fall away. During my freefall, time became surreal. Each moment stood alone; an encapsulated eternity. The idyllic scenery of Utah’s canyonlands passed in slow motion around me. Rich orange alien rock formations fused with the light greens of the trees and shrubs.
Crash! The Earth swept my soul from its mortal flesh with impartial efficiency. It was like being sucked from a pressurized chamber into the vacuum of space. There was no tunnel, no light – unless you count the bright blazing sun overhead.
These images still surround me, but they are clouded by a dense fog – a thin veil that I am unable to pull back. My soul has stayed behind. Is this purgatory? Perhaps I am suspended in the memory of my death. I lie between worlds, unable to move on, although I know not why. I pray for the veil to be lifted.
Time stands still. I think to myself, if I am to remain here, let me see my surroundings clearly. I loved this place in life; it was the one place where the horrific memories of war were not as vivid. A maimed special ops officer dying in my arms as I struggle to extricate him from an ambush. My knife at the throat of another assassination target. The explosion that left half of my team dead. In this place, I was almost able to find some peace from these scenes of death. The green and orange stained canyons remain eternal and unchanging in the haze. For a second it seems there might be a thin clearing in the fog above me.
“Doctor Schmidt,” the senior military scientist says, peering over his spectacles at the younger man. “Is the transfer nearly complete? We can only keep his soul in the stasis field for so long, and I don’t want to have to procure another subject.”
The junior scientist looks up from the computer. His cherubic face is alight with excited anticipation, having repressed the horrific reality of the project’s implications long ago. “This is the last pathway to calibrate, sir. We’re almost there.”
“Good,” says the older man. A thin smile forms on his lined face as he looks down at the shining metal of the android lying on the cold steel table before him. It is a masterpiece of mechanical engineering, glistening under the bright fluorescent lights of the lab room. A series of wires connect its body and head to the supercomputer.
With a final keystroke, Dr. Schmidt completes the last pathway. The transfer sequence is initiated. The two scientists watch the android with rapt attention. The anticipation is palpable, like an approaching storm.
I’m not imagining things. There is a thinning in the fog. A hole is forming in the veil at last. I wait with eagerness either for the clarity to return to my majestic surroundings or for what lies beyond. Time is meaningless now.
Something is wrong. I sense it before it happens. The sky is torn violently open in a great cataclysmic gash. My world is suddenly filled with light. Bright. Unnatural. Merciless.
I try to scream. Before the sound can escape, I am sucked through the great wound in the sky. My vision is filled with the terrible light. I hear triumphant human voices. Terror fills me as the beauty of my world vanishes and my soul is trapped in a metal hell.
by submission | Feb 4, 2012 | Story |
Author : Mark Ehler
Lt. Bernard sat, arms crossed, in a 15,000,000 credit coffin. The nuclear battery shorted out and now, without engine power, his ship was just another object in space. Interceptor Pilot Protocol dictated that he stay with his vessel and wait for a patrol to pick him up. That might have worked for downed pilots centuries ago, back on that sandbox called Earth; but here, in the vastness of space – rescue was slim to nil. Bernard slammed the fists of his environment suit into the control panel and called it a “…lousy floating space cow.”
Those who knew him, well, didn’t. Bernard never went out while at the academy because he had seen what happens to students caught drinking, similar reasons kept him from going out with the other pilots when his ship was docked. His whole life was spent with strict adherence to the rules; rules were important, they were the standard and criteria by which he was judged by his superiors. Certainly not superfluous things like flair or creativity. If it weren’t for his strict observance of the rules he might never have been chosen for flight school, might never have been granted the honor of serving at his station, might never have been selected for this mission. Now the rules told him to sit and wait.
The more he thought, the less sense it made. His whole life had built up to this day, this mission; but now, like a novel with a great back story that only fizzled as it progressed, it was over. At least he had a good view of the cosmos… Bernard chuckled to himself. You see, there is this saying that claims some people don’t truly live until they are on their death bed and Bernard finally understood what it meant. Now that his rules had been shattered he remembered why he chose to be an interceptor pilot. All the things his wealth and pedigree could have given him and he chose the life of a soldier, for it was the best way to follow his dream. Every night as a kid in his luxury apartment he dreamt of the stars. The void of the cosmos and the universe’s array of colors in subtle pinhole form was such a stark contrast to the orbital colonies of Mars. With his hand on the surface of the inactive display he pushed himself forward until the dome of his helmet connected with the glass of his cockpit, then he sat and stared in bewilderment. It was indeed ironic to him; all this time he spent reaching for the stars and this was the first time he had really stopped to admire their beauty.
He lifted the emergency eject and the cockpit sprung right open, the atmosphere in his ship rushed out and he was now the closest he had ever been to the stars. Here he lingered clinging to the wing of his downed bird, not a thought for the rules as he found the brightest star in sight. It was a nearby red giant and it too was close to the end of its life where it would explode into a brilliant super nova; such an explosion of vividly colored gas simply makes it the most powerful act of nature in the universe. He had let go of the ship and started drifting towards the giant. He could stretch out as big as possible without fear of touching another human and he could finally look all around him without the walls of mankind.
Bernard curled up as the cold seeped through his suit, taking one long look at his star. As he closed his eyes and drifted into one last sleep a smile crossed his face; satisfaction that he had finally achieved peace swelled from his heart like a tiny explosion in space.
