Transfer To Light

by J.R. Blackwell | Apr 22, 2006 | Story | 0 comments

I have agreed to this interview in order to deliver a promise. Do not be afraid.

I was seven months old when I died. My parents lived on a primitive moon on a colony that rejected the free energy and technology that the rest of the civilized universe embraced. If it were not for the intervention of an archeologist who was studying their culture, my consciousness would no longer exist.

I am the youngest to ever go through Transfer. Most Transferred minds were aged over a thousand years before deciding to transfer over. The youngest before me was forty-five. Despite the advantages of pattern Transfer, most beings are attached to their physical bodies. It was thought to be impossible, or, at the very least, cruel to Transfer a child.

An Ancient from the twenty second century raised me. When I come for these interviews, I am often asked what it was like to be raised without a body. People ask me what it was like never to be held, never to eat, never to run through sunshine. When they ask, I tell them as I will tell you now. I was held on waves of light, I have consumed acid and gas and dust, I have moved through stars. I can recall no past before the time when I was not Transferred. My memories begin on Transfer, and my first memory is warmth and light. The Ancient had raised many children, and had gone through childhood twice. Few were more qualified to raise a child.

Your people, the people of the body, seem increasingly concerned with those who are Transferred, who are free from the constraints of environment that you face. I can assure you that those Transferred have no interest in conquest, as there is nothing that we desire that we cannot find or make ourselves, and we have no interest in the governance of your bodies.

Our interest lies in the unchained world of the mind. Many minds live in bodies, many minds Transfer to unfettered light but there are minds that are lost, that have been lost, that are disappearing right now. The loss of consciousness is the greatest loss of the mind. To loose one conscious mind, even one, is an irreplaceable loss, and we who have Transferred are not accustomed to loss.

We have decided that we will Transfer every conscious mind. We will Transfer after death of whatever cause, and we will Transfer all of you. We have methods of being available in whatever space is necessary, and methods of Transfer beyond you own technology. We are light, and time has different meaning to us that you. We need not neglect the consciousness that has passed before. On the wave of time we may transfer all of you. We have already done this. We are doing this now, we will do this.

We have created a place for you, place that has been promised since before the spoken word. We will teach you to live in an infinite loop of time, your conscious desires made solid, and your dreams free. You may travel between stars, you may live your secret hopes, you may create whatever your mind can fathom.

This is the last promised land. We are delivering heaven.

Real Estate

by J.R. Blackwell | Apr 12, 2006 | Story

The couple broke fast in the mountain retreat, dining on fresh red melons and purple berries. Marta, their robotic guide, served them with diamond plates on the giant stone balcony overlooking the forest. In between delicate bites, Rae remarked that the whole residence was rather ostentatious. Bello didn’t notice her ire, he was wrapped up enjoying deep breaths of the cool morning air. Afterwards, they took the skimmer and flew over the extensive forest country.

Marta gave a running dialogue on the features of the landscape, the climate of the poles and the wildlife, her features always pleasant, operating the skimmer without looking at the controls. Rae stared ahead at the horizon while Bello hopped from one side of the skimmer to the other, pointing out features to his wife.

“Is that a wooden bridge?” he asked.

“Oh yes!” said the impeccably quaffed Marta. “Built by the native people.”

Rae afforded the bridge a glance. “Looks like real wood.”

“Oh, it is! All the sentient made structures on this world are made by natural products grown right here, and all the structures, with the exception of the residences, are made by the native peoples.”

“Ah yes, the natives. We are scheduled to see them today, aren’t we?”

“Yes. Our team worked carefully over their design, combining artistry and technical excellence to complete these charming natives. They are engineered to enjoy aboriginal environment and build their homes in the large Nobo trees that are common in this region.” Marta tapped a screen and rotating holograms popped up in the middle of the skimmer. Bellos face glowed.

“Oh! They are lovely!” he said, smiling at the pictures. Rae shrugged.

“Are they all that same color?”

Marta tilted her head to the side in an acceptable parody of human movement. “All of the native people range from a light pale blue to an aqua marine. When they reach the sea one day, they will find they are the same color as the water. We anticipate this will generate some delightful creation stories. If you like though, genetic strands can be introduced to-“

Rae waved her hand. “No, no. Blue is fine.”

Bello reached out toward the flashing holographs. “These primitive peoples are friendly, yes?”

The screen flashed to corresponding images as Marta spoke. “The primitives are very peaceful. Their religion focuses on finding inner enlightenment through nature. Tribal elders devote themselves to contemplation and teaching traditions to the young. They have yearly festivals and lovely rituals that reflect their reverence for nature. Because these are a peaceful species, we have imbedded a few defensive skills that you might find of use, should it become necessary. For example, they have a great capacity for the quick computation of numbers that would make them useful on space fairing vessels.”

Rae frowned at the holograms. “They appear rather fragile, don’t they?”

Bello scooped up Rae’s limp hand. “I think they are charming.” He said. Rae shook her head.

“I don’t know, they don’t have any hair. Don’t you think it’s odd that they don’t have any hair?”

“Rae, we can’t replace the Arrgio, even if we wanted to.” Bello put his arm around her shoulders and squeezed. “I loved them as much as you did.” He looked out onto the landscape.“It’s time for us to move forward.”

Rae’s face cracked and she leaned her head onto Bello’s shoulder. Marta ignored them for a few minutes, suddenly entranced in landscape navigation. Bello wiped Rae’s eyes with his sleeve, the fabric absorbing and evaporating the droplets into mist.

“Look,” he said, pointing. Rae peered over the edge of the skimmer and below the green and red leaves of the canopy she could see tall lithe runners moving swiftly on the soft earth. They wore no clothes, their willowy bodies smooth and graceful. They were ululating in dark, sweet tones. Rae closed her eyes and listened to their echoing voices.

“I think I could guide these people.” She said “I really do.”

“We’ll take it.” Said Bello.

The Final Voyage Of Captain Shakespeare

by Jared Axelrod | Apr 11, 2006 | Story

The crash was magnificent, heard three systems away and felt by half the galaxy. The other half were immediately informed via telepathy, televisapathy and tele-empathy, and felt as if they had felt it. Such was the impact.

The grand old captain himself, however, newly cloned and fresh from artificial endorphins and digitally inserted memories, shrugged off the whole thing. “Eh,” he was quoted. “Good an end as any. Consider that the final voyage of Captain Shakespeare, then. Time enough I was through with the whole bit.”

Time enough, everyone agreed with a sigh of relief. Time enough.

And so then did the immense interplanetary causeways of space and time breathe easy, free from Captain Shakespeare’s impulsive reality bends and left-handed turns. The day the Captain hung his helmet and started to raise begonias, intergalactic travel safety numbers rose and deaths plummeted; no mass-murder in the history of the universe had the kill rate of Captain Shakespeare with a few bolts of Lighting Hopkins in him. Space was safe again.

But at what cost? Re-Clone stations from one solar system to another closed their doors, the demand for new bodies having plummeted so. Drastic measures needed to be taken. Heads of the Re-Clone Guild left to meet with the Captain at his home, waded through the waist-high begonias, and pleaded with the Once-Scourge of the Spaceways to again throw caution to the wind and ruin some bodies of spacetravelers.

The grand old captain met them with a perfunctory amount of grace and pleasantries, offering tea and scones. Once they had all sat down and unanimously decided upon the less than edible nature of the scones, Captain Shakespeare regaled them with the story of his original cloning. How he was asked to write more plays, and not just for the theatre he was accustomed to, but also for holo- and empath-theatres, which baffled his mind at the time.

“You remember,” the Captain said, stroking his mustache. “The Baconians put up such a fuss, claiming they were right all along. Such ridiculousness!” The members of the Re-Clone delegation all nodded, unsure where he was going with this. “In any case, I didn’t want to write any more plays. I mean, if you had lived in London when I did, what with the shit and filth and…well, I won’t go into it. But if you had, you’d understand why I had to write. And why, as soon I as didn’t live there and then anymore, why I wanted to take to the stars.”

At this, the members of the delegation sat on the edge of their chairs. “So, you’ll be returning? To the stars?”

“No,” said Captain Shakespeare. “I’ve had enough. Perhaps I shall write again. Or maybe I will continue to develop begonias. If you gentlemen would care, I have a new genus in the back, cross-bred with a venus fly-trap. Managed to get it simply enormous in stature. It’s really quite breath-taking.”

The delegation declined, in no small amount due to the gleam in the Captain’s eye. Waving them off, Captain Shakespeare suggested convincing the clone of Samuel Clemmons to take up space travel.

The delegation, who had come all this way, who had waded through begonias and munched upon scones of solid rock, sagged their shoulders futher.

They would never be able convince Clemmons.