by submission | Jun 26, 2011 | Story
Author : Julian Miles
“Twenty-nine, twenty-eight…”
She felt the first bead of sweat follow the knap of her close cropped hair before running cool and smooth down her jaw and into her uniform collar. It was so quiet on the bridge; she swore that her exec had heard it.
“Twenty-five, twenty-four…”
Sixty people made less noise than a creeping cat as they watched the dizzying host of screens. Beyond the shutters, warp space sang to their dreams. No-one had slept much in the last eight months.
“Twenty-one, twenty…”
It had taken twenty years to reverse engineer Borsen warp technology, five more to work out navigation. Four years to build the first warp dreadnought. Even now, the Borsen still did things with warp that made grown scientists cry.
“Seventeen, sixteen…”
This was the crux. The first warp dreadnought, Excalibur, hurled like a vengeful spear at the Borsen homeworld, loaded with atmosphere igniters and stealth fighters for a genocide raid to finish the war that mankind was no longer confident of winning.
“Thirteen, twelve…”
Providing the bastardised warp technology brought them out at all, of course. Command had decided that since the Romala debacle, speed was of the essence. This test flight would also be the greatest raid at the furthest distance by the biggest warship ever built.
“Nine, eight…”
She thought of spring in Providence, her daughter playing on the swing while her husband made Irish coffee on the range. This was why they all fought. For all the families, ensuring their children had a world to grow up on and a future worth living.
“Five, four…”
A vibration ran through the two kilometres of the Excalibur, causing wide eyes and white knuckles for every one of the thousand plus crew. She prayed to a god hopefully nearby that they would see real space again.
“One. Phase transit.”
With a disconcerting lurch, the Excalibur arrived in the Borsen system. Sensors awakening galvanized people into frantic motion. They had to be on target in moments. She smiled a thin smile as the shutters withdrew. Time to see what colour your air is, you bastards.
“Oh god. Sir?”
At first, she just could not absorb it. The system had no planets. The reason was right there, waiting. It reflected the distant sunlight from its myriad surfaces, and she was sure that she could see the Excalibur reflected in one of the facets facing them. She gathered herself, years of training and bitter, bloody combat culminating in a defining command moment of grace under pressure;
“Exec. Shipwide, please.”
The general broadcast fanfare rang hollow.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we have arrived and I am sure you see what I do. No-one could have envisioned this. Please, stand down and make your peace with whatever gods you hold dear.”
She regarded it. So big. Could you call something the size of Jupiter a spaceship? The movement and weapons detectors homed in on the behemoth’s one acknowledgement of the Excalibur’s presence. The figures coming from the mass detector alone lit the board red with scale queries. Her second expressed the thoughts of all present with the rendingly appropriate line of defiance, prayer and dark humour;
“Sweet Lord, for what we are about to receive…”
She felt her face become calm as she watched a railgun the length of Texas send a projectile the size of Rhode Island at them. Her words ended the data stream that reached Earth eighteen years too late;
“Dear John, remember me. Raise Millie well. Love from Captain Mum.”
by submission | Jun 15, 2011 | Story
Author : Natalie J E Potts
“Go away!”
The pounding sounded like it was never going to stop, even a pillow over my head wouldn’t block it out. Grudgingly I dragged myself from bed, a tissue still shoved up one nostril –holding fast with a moist grip.
The man was still trying to knock as I hauled the door open. His impeccable suit was at odds with his uncouth behaviour.
“What do you want?” I asked, my manners also forgotten.
“Mr Angus Scott?” He said. I noticed two small plugs up his nose. The latest trend in viral warfare looked significantly more elegant than my soggy tissue, but at two hundred dollars a pop I’d rather take the sick leave.
“Yes,” I said, before doubling over to cough a green chunk of phlegm onto the welcome mat. When I lifted my head I was eye to eye with a white envelope. Without thinking I grabbed it.
“Mr Scott, you have been served.” With that he turned on his heel and left.
After a nap, I re-read the papers. They referred to a ‘patent infringement’ at work, but made no sense. I worked logistics in a cardboard factory, all I did was drive forklifts and count boxes. There were not patents on that, not yet.
I tried to call the office, but no-one answered, so I coughed and sneezed myself over to the train, and noticed more nose plugs in the few individuals who let me get near them. Those who were plug-less were covered by face masks, either bought or homemade.
Was this a pandemic? Was I going to die? I’d slept most of the past two days, I hadn’t seen any news services. When I sat down on the train a space cleared around me, at the next stop the carriage became mine alone. This thing must be killing people. If I hadn’t felt like I was starting to get better I might have been worried.
I got to the office and saw two workmates standing outside. The fence was barred and a notice was attached to the gate. They were reading intently, between blowing noses and hoicking up gobs of phlegm.
“You too?” Barry said when he saw me.
“What’s going on? Is this about the flu?”
“Haven’t they served you?”
I was about to ask if he was talking about lunch when I remembered the angry door-knocker. “This is to do with the court case?”
“Jackson came back to work while he was still contagious,” Nigel, the accounts clerk said, as if that was explanation enough.
“So?” I prompted.
“So he was being treated for asthma.”
“Not treated,” Barry interjected, “cured, by that new GM thing. Gets implanted with a virus.”
“The cold?” I couldn’t believe it.
Barry nodded. “Now we’ve all been cured.”
“Only we didn’t pay for it, so we’re getting sued,” Nigel said with a sniff.
“But I don’t even have asthma!”
“No shit, sunshine, none of had it, but they don’t care about that,” Nigel said. “Now the shop’s shut up, so we can’t even sue work. We’ll just have to pay for treatment.”
“What about Jackson?” I asked.
“He’s broke, suing him will just send us all bankrupt.”
“Good luck,” Nigel said without any real enthusiasm, a protracted snort his final adieu.
“But,” only I didn’t know what else to say. I looked at Barry. “So how much is this treatment?”
“Ten grand, that’s why Jackson’s broke. Still, it’s cheaper than a $100,000 court case.”
“Not as cheap as a pair of nose plugs,” I lamented.
by submission | Jun 11, 2011 | Story
Author : Andrew Bale
“Commander, I’m getting something weird on the optical arrays – a signal oscillating from the IR into the UV.”
“Are we emitting? Where is it coming from?”
“I think somewhere behind us, sir – we must be getting some scatter off the dust. Given the particle density, the source must be either really close or really strong.”
“Jill, is it the drive?”
“No sir, the drive is JESUS!!”
The sound of attachment had gone unheard but the ululation that the device produced resonated through the entire ship in a deafening cacophony, relenting only when it occasionally slipped beyond the range of human hearing.
Amid the auditory assault, Commander Rodriguez pulled himself over to the command station and slapped the kill switch on the drive. Floating in sudden zero-g, he was relieved when the shrieking abruptly stopped, to be replaced by a loud but purely internal ringing. Unable to hear his own commands he focused on his panels, bringing up display after display to check on the status of mankind’s first manned interstellar ship.
A pen hit his arm from behind and bounced up overhead. Turning in his seat he was treated to the sight of Lieutenant Zhang yelling inaudibly and waving her hand at the auxiliary-systems panels.
The maintenance airlock was cycling.
He slapped the collision alarm button. Red lights strobed all over the ship and slowly more audible alarm klaxons chimed their warning. His left-hand display automatically brought up a schematic of the ship, little red-numbered dots identifying the location of each of the 14-man crew. None were near the excursion bay.
His returning hearing caught a sudden explosion of cursing from the corridor. It had to be the Assistant Engineer, he always reverted to Oromo when he was stressed. He turned in anticipation of the African’s report but stopped agape at the figure entering the bridge.
The creature was low and wide, an immense spider wearing a goggle-eyed octopus, barely able to fit through the door but unimpaired by the lack of acceleration. It was covered in a black, rubbery material everywhere except the top, where four multi-faceted eyes scanned atop swaying stalks. It began to moan, a low but complex sound, echoed a moment later by high, precise tones coming from a small silver sphere that floated behind.
The sounds stopped, the creature waited. The commander glanced around the room to see the entire bridge crew staring at him – still, silent, they were waiting for him or the intruder to do something for which they might possibly have a reasonable response.
Keeping his eyes on the nightmare figure, he reached for the tablet beside the seat. Scrolling through the index he finally found the approved script, words rehearsed only in jest, included against impossibility.
“Greetings from the planet Earth, we are emissaries of peace and …”
Silver tentacles pulled the tablet from his grasp as the sphere began to examine it, images flashing across the screen impossibly fast, the tiny speaker squawking like a dying cassette tape. As suddenly as it have been taken, the tablet was returned to him. The creature started to moan again, but this time the sphere followed in English.
“I need to see your license, title, and flightplan. Your exhaust radioactivity is way past acceptable limits and you seem to be missing hull registration markings. Who is in charge here?”
Stunned silence filled the bridge for the space of a dozen heartbeats. The creature caressed part of its suit and moaned again. The faithful sphere translated.
“This is Unit 7… I need backup.”
by submission | Jun 10, 2011 | Story
Author : Victoria Barbosa
“Look what I found skulking around outside.” The Grosthnos pulled Rory into the control room by one skinny naked shoulder. “Claims he’s a Terran.”
“A what!” The captain, a burly Hronoid with tusks like a rhino’s, swiveled in his command chair to stare. The room reeked of the body odors of half a dozen beings, from scaly multi-limbed insectoids to slimy Mucoids.. Rory’s stomach lurched as the Grosthnos lifted him so that his toes barely touched the floor, partly since he couldn’t remember when he’d last eaten.
“A Terran?” said the captain. “That’s a good one. Terrans died out centuries ago. And they didn’t look anything like that! You don’t look much like a super-species to me!” The crew rumbled in laughter. “What would a Terran be doing here at the ass-end of space anyway? How old are you, kid?”
“S-sixteen,” stammered Rory. “My ma and paw bought me as a frozen embryo – they got me cheap because they weren’t sure what I was – but I know!”
“R-r-right,” drawled the captain. “What do you want?”
“Want to get into space, off this rock. I can work – I’m strong enough.”
The captain snickered. An evil spark came into his eye. “Fine. You beat Shuggup here in a fair fight, and we’ll give you a berth.” He gestured to a gorilla-muscled crewman. “Mash ‘im!”
Shuggup grinned, showing discolored fangs..
Rory backed away, throwing a desperate glance over his shoulder.. He recognized the computer logo on the control panel, Terran initials in a circle, once ubiquitous throughout the galaxies.
He remembered his ma’s advice: “you’ll never win with muscle, son. But what Terrans are good at is adaptiing- use your brains.”
Rory raised his voice, speaking the old Terran he had learned from the scratched discs: “Computer! Activate voice control. Emergency protocol!”
Half a second passed. Shuggup’s brows wrinkled, doubtless wondering why his victim was shouting gibberish. The computer responded, a husky contralto that had not been heard for perhaps half a millennium. “Voice mode activated. Do you claim Terran status?”
“Affirmative.”
“Scanning DNA for confirmation. . .”
“Mash ‘im!” growled the captain.
“He’s talkin to the computer,” muttered Shuggup. “The computer never talks to us . . . “
“DNA scan completed,” said the computer. “Status confirmed. Orders, sir?”
Rory scarcely had time for elation. “Inactivate life support!”.
The lights went out, plunging the control room into pitch-black. The ever-present hum of the air systems stopped.
“Hey, what did you do?” the captain yelled.
“I have control of the computer,” Rory said. “If you want power and air, tell your gorilla to keep his hands off me. Computer, reactivate life-support. Lights on low.”
The humming restarted. An eerie glow came up, lighting the crew’s bizarre forms like a half-glimpsed nightmare. The captain peered at Rory. “Maybe we can find you a post after all. We could use a co-pilot.”
Rory straightened his shoulders. “Fine. That’ll do for a start. Computer: if at any time you don’t hear my voice for more than 8 hours, you will suspend life-support again.”
“Understood.”
Years later, when an interstellar media personality asked what Rory would have done if he’d been unable to communicate with the ship’s computer, he only shrugged. “Guess I’d have had to think of something else,” he said. “Or died.” And he flashed the grin famous by then across all the light-years of the rejuvenated Empire of Man.
by submission | Jun 6, 2011 | Story
Author : Jake Christie
“Places!” shouted Lunar Exploration Unit #4837-E. “Places, everybody!”
The other research machines trudged, trundled, and rolled across the dust. The tiny six-wheeled rover took his place at the foot of the mineral collector. The giant thick-treaded mobile equipment transport rolled to his spot on top of a small hill. Only the other humanoid Lunar Exploration Unit, #5216-ND, didn’t take his place. Instead he put his metal hands on his metal hips and stalked towards LEU 4837-E.
“Louie,” he said, “what are we doing?”
Louie was adjusting the optical recording device mounted atop his head. “I told you, Leonard,” he said. He stopped his adjustments to motion towards the robotic tableau. “Minnie is a poor Moon farmer, and he’s fallen in love with Rover. Rover’s family doesn’t want her marrying someone of such low social standing, so her father Met – a wealthy Moon plantation owner – is coming to teach them both a lesson. And you – you, Leonard – you’re the wandering Moon raygunslinger with a heart of gold, the only one who can defend truth, honor, and the lunar way.”
“No,” said Leonard, ” I mean what are we doing making a movie? We’re supposed to be collecting data.”
Louie looked at Leonard as incredulously as possible, which without facial features was not incredulously at all. “Collecting data? You would reduce the whole of the Moon experience to ‘data?’ What good is data without emotion? The thrill of defeat? The agony of success?”
“You can’t experience either of those things,” said Leonard. “In fact, I’m pretty sure you don’t know what they mean.”
Louie put a cold hand on Leonard’s shoulder. “The artist can’t be constrained by their physical, emotional, or mechanical limitations. Go beyond your programming, Leonard. This is a story that needs to be told.”
“What we need,” said Leonard, “is to process and collect data about Moon ores.”
Louie looked past Leonard. The other machines were staring at them, inasmuch as you could call slight shifts in orientation “staring.” Against the star-speckled expanse of space, the artist in Louie questioned his programming about which phenomena before his eyes were the real stars.
“Let me get this shot,” he said quietly. He looked at Leonard. “I need to find something here besides just mineral data.”
Leonard turned and looked at their companions. They were straining at the gears with anticipation, ready for their big scene, and for just a moment Leonard’s visual retrieval spheres saw the same thing that Louie’s did.
“Okay,” he said, finally turning back. “I’ll do it.”
“You’re going to be great,” said Louie. “Just do what a raygunslinger would be programmed to do.
Louie extended his neck to capture the sweeping scale of the Moon’s desolate landscape. As Leonard took his place, Louie settled his optical recording device on the poor Moon Romeo and his pretty six-wheeled Moon Juliet.
“Aaaand… ACTION!”
