Dark Water

by | Mar 3, 2008 | Story

Author : J.R. Blackwell, Staff Writer

“When the Surface became too crowded, Man had already hollowed out great caves in the crust of the Earth, mined for metals with which to build his towers. It was simple for those who desired space to move downwards, found the first cities of the UnderEarth.”

-Excerpt from The Laws of the UnderEarth

Testimony of Arla, The Insane

Eleanor was burning, her pelvis felt blistering to touch. Her breath came out wet and hot, like steam from a kettle. She stumbled forward in the darkness, one hand on her swollen belly, the other clutching the cave wall

Eleanor thought again of turning back, of the hospital of Under Shanghai, it’s doctors clad in sunflower yellow. Then she felt the Fury, like before, that wash of emotion that had driven her deeper into the uninhabited caves. She stepped forward into cold, wet mud and the Fury abated, as it always did when she obeyed.

Eleanor cried out with another burning contraction and stumbled into the mud. She crawled forward, the blue light of her glow necklace showing only her muddy hands and darkness. Eleanor heard the soft gurgle of water ahead and the sound made her thirsty. She wanted to embrace the water, to be surrounded by it, to drown.

Eleanor touched the surface of the lake. She slid into the water, like a bubbling volcano meeting the sea. The light of her glow necklace reflected off the surface of the dark water. The caves extended farther than her light could reach, deep and long.

Eleanor leaned her head into the mud on the shore and let her body float in the water. Her contractions quickened and she felt her molten center squeeze, pressure building. She cried out, feeling herself tear, her blood leaking from her, the head building, pushing out from inside her body.

She felt the Fury approach, close, closer and then there was cold flesh, snaking around her legs and arms and neck. She struggled, burning, her baby fighting inside her. The wet flesh slapped against her neck, pulled her under and pushed her up, gasping. Eleanor screamed. The Fury pulled on her throat and Eleanor sobbed. She pulled off her necklace, her only light, throwing it back the way she came, back into the dark.

The Flesh was soft now, supple, supportive. It cradled her. Eleanor felt something scratch the small of her back and relaxed, cold and calm. The contractions were coming fast now. Eleanor felt her body pushing and some other force pulling the child out of her. Instead of the Fury, Eleanor felt the silence, vast and old. Then she was empty.

There was a splash of moving water and Eleanor felt something rise before her in the darkness, something massive. The flesh around her quivered and she could see, in dim outlines, thin shapes snaking towards her.

Her eyes adjusted and she could see a black outline in the dark, tentacles and the shape of her baby. Eleanor squinted and thought she saw glistening eyes and dark moving shapes. Eleanor reached out for her child, towards the huge, alien shape.

The baby’s eyes opened. Its pupils were red as lava. Eleanor felt the flesh around her quiver. The mind that had touched hers, great and old was deciding if it should keep the baby or sink back into the water. Eleanor felt her mind go clear, go dark.

The UnderEarth God enveloped the baby for a long moment. Then it held the infant out to Eleanor. She took her baby and brought its molten mouth to her breast.

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Go out with a Bang

by | Mar 2, 2008 | Story

Author : Christopher Kueffner

“I thought you didn’t smoke,” she asked.

“I did, and I quit,” he replied through a bluish cloud, “but it seems an appropriate time to pick up the habit again.”

“Really,” she drew the word out as if stretching it like taffy. “That could very well be the most ridiculous statement I’ve ever heard from you, and that’s saying something.” She got out of the bed and walked over to the kitchenette. She filled a glass with water and drank it, unworried by her nakedness.

The man, also naked, took another drag from his cigarette. “A cigarette after sex is nice.” He contemplated the little pillar of ash at its end. “I’ve found something.”

“Oh?” She absently picked a feather from the bed off of her right breast.

“Yup.”

“What?”

“An asteroid.”

“Oh, come on,” she sniffed. “Ever since that asteroid missed us a couple of years ago, everybody’s talking about asteroids.” She sat down on the edge of the bed and handed him the glass. He sipped, looked fondly at her body and handed the glass back to her.

“Well, I found one, nevertheless.” He stubbed out the cigarette in a saucer on the nightstand. He leaned over and kissed her side where the waistband of pants would normally be. He kissed his way up her ribcage.

“What was it called, Aprophis or something?” she asked.

“Apophis was the one that just barely missed us in 2029,” he stopped kissing her body and lay back. “This one is not Apophis; it’s a different one.”

“What, is it going to hit us or something?”

“Well, yes.” He drew another cigarette out of the pack.

“You’re kidding, right?”

“I’m sorry, but I’m not.” He lit the cigarette and dragged deeply on it.

She put the water glass on the nightstand and rested her hand on his chest. “What will it do? They said that last one, Aprophis, I mean Apophis, would have wiped out a big city.”

“Yes, but life on Earth would have continued. This one gives every appearance of being bigger, denser and faster.”

“I thought they were looking out for these things,” she furrowed her brow, “I thought they had all these asteroids charted out.”

“There’s an awful lot of space out there, and an awful lot of stuff flying around. The prevailing theory around the office is that this is a charted asteroid, but it got close enough to another one for its orbit to change.”

“Around the office!” she blurted incredulously, “You mean other people know about this?”

“Yes. We’ve all checked and rechecked the data. The Director has been informed, too.”

“So the government knows, too,” she got up and grabbed the robe from its hook on the bathroom door. She wrapped it around her body and held it close as if it were woven of asteroid-proof cotton. She looked at him again. “You’re not bullshitting me, are you?” Her tone had acquired a bewildered, accusatory edge.

“No,” he shook his head and sat up.

“Well, what are they doing about it?”

“I’m not sure anything can be done. There wouldn’t be much point, other than to cause mass hysteria.”

“You mean they can’t shove it out of the way or dig some shelters underground?” She paced and gestured sharply with her hands.

“Not in six hours, no.” He put out the cigarette. “Would you take that robe off and come here?”

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Parasite

by | Mar 1, 2008 | Story

Author : Lucas Atkinson

In my dream I am wandering through Babylon. Prostitutes linger on every street, thieves wait at every corner. Barefoot children look at me as I pass; shopkeepers watch me too, from shadowed doorways, behind flags and tables piled with weapons and fruit. In the distance buildings rise – the courts, full of judges with grins and thick expensive robes; their eyes narrow as they smile, the markets with a subtle finger cheating every scale , the temples with their rows and rows of idols shaped like writhing snakes or women with many breasts or birds with teeth and human hands. The Babylon of my dream is also the New York of my childhood – the pickpockets dressed in rags mingle with gangs implanted with flashing fluorescent tattoos. As I pass them, their smiles are them same.

Every night, I wander through those streets again. On the ship, the narrow corridors seem lonely, and I am afraid the next turn will lead me there, to that place, and the scrubbed metal will give way to the mud, the brick, the littered streets. Sometimes I think I can smell the city – perhaps, behind the sweat of the crew and the scent of engine oil, might that be the faintest hint of the city’s open sewer? Of sun-baked stone? Of sour incense?

I can see it in the eyes of the crew as well. They are dreaming of the city too. They too are afraid that they will turn a corner and find themselves in the market, or one of the many shadowed alleys. When we eat meals together, the crew does not converse. The city is our other cargo, an unwanted twin to the one in our hull.

When we first met them they only farmed. They could not transport food more than a few miles; none of their villages numbered more than a few hundred. When we gave them what we knew – techniques, know-how, theory – their villages moved, changed, conglomerated. The largest was not far from where the ship landed. “We call the city Babylon,” they tell me in fluting voices. They pause. They are smart; they can read human faces already. “Is this a name you know?”

In the dream, behind the markets and the temples, there is a great structure. It was a tower once; now it is collapsed. Its form against the blue sky is ragged, like a wound.

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Secrets of the Universe

by | Feb 29, 2008 | Story

Author : Scott E Meyer

“Some of what you are about to read you will think is science fiction, ” said the front of the dust jacket, “But I assure you, dear reader, that it is not. It is based on sound scientific principles with which we are all familiar.” Edgar skipped on. The book looked dry, windy and boring, but Edgar liked dry, windy and boring. He amused himself, picking out the long words to see if he could pronounce them, words like “supersymmetry,” “quantum fluctuations,” and “unified field theory.” For a minute, he allowed himself to be absorbed by what this Dr. Ledbetter had to say. He imagined the world as Ledbetter imagined, a world of free energy, travel to the stars, transmutation of matter and all the dreams he had ever had coming true.

Edgar looked up, curious as to which section of the bookstore he had stumbled into. To the left were Bigfoot Sightings, UFO’s, and the Loch Ness Monster. To the right were alien abductions and government conspiricies. Not an auspicious place to find the missing secrets of the universe. He flipped to the back of the dust jacket, the author’s biography. It seems this Dr. Ledbetter had been laughed off stages and out of seminars for years before finally vanishing only a few years ago. He had only published one book, the very book Edgar held in his hands.

Edgar frowned. As much as he wanted to believe, wanted to be caught in the mystery and play with the secrets Ledbetter claimed to reveal, he couldn’t bring himself to take the man seriously when the entire scientific community had already laughed him into obscurity. He placed the book back on the shelf, determined to find something of value in this bookstore.

The secrets of the universe would have to wait for another generation.

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The Supaida Snare

by | Feb 28, 2008 | Story

Author : Patricia Stewart, Staff Writer

The SS Furai was traveling at warp three through the Supaida Sector on a survey mission to look for planets that were suitable for human colonization. A decade earlier, an unmanned probe had passed through the sector and reported numerous habitable planetary systems around two Type G stars, and four Type K stars. Each of the star systems all had at least one terrestrial planet orbiting in the habitable zone, sometimes referred to as the “goldilocks zone.” The Furai’s mission was to determine if any of the planets meet the criteria for human colonization; the plant-to-animal biomass ratio had to be 98.5 or higher, and no indigenous animal species could have an Intellect Potential (IP) above 64.2.

The first two star systems they surveyed were non-viable due to exceptionally high concentrations of animal mass. They were approximately one hour from the third system when the ship unexpectedly came to a dead stop. Fortunately, the inertial dampeners responded instantaneously and prevented any serious injuries. “What the…,” snapped the Captain? He pressed the intercom button. “Chief, why have we dropped out of warp,”

“I don’t know, sir. The warp engines are still on-line. They’re straining like hell too. Did we hit something?”

“Unknown, Chief,” he replied. “Shut down the engines until we figure this out. Ensign O’Toole, any idea what stopped us?”

“Sensors readings are normal, sir. Nothing unusual in the electromagnetic spectrum. Graviton activity is typical. Charged particle density is low. Huh, this is unusual. The quantum chromodynamic sensors show a tiny spike in the strong interaction color confinement. But it’s barely above background. I can’t believe that has anything to do with our situation.”

“We need to be sure, Mister O’Toole,” responded the Captain. “Take a science pod out, and have a look.”

Fifteen minutes later, O’Toole reported in. “Captain, I’m approximately 10 klicks aft of your position. I’ve adjusted my sensors to detect baryon waves. It appears that you are caught in a 2D matrix of some kind. From here, it looks like a large net that extends for light years in the Y and Z directions.”

“Mister Kline, did the probe report this phenomenon?”

The science officer quickly accessed the records. “Captain, according to the logs, Earth lost contact with the probe before it surveyed this corridor. It was presumed lost. However, since the probe had mapped 95% of the sector, Central Command determined that it was not cost-effective to send another probe to complete the survey.”

“What? Protocol requires complete sensor mapping before manned vessels can enter a new system. This is…”

O’Toole’s voice interrupted the captain in mid sentence. “Sir, I’m picking up a huge flux of fermions. The density is increasing fast. It’s off scale. Sir, it looks like the signature for quark matter. But I’ve never seen it this intense. I’m transmitting the sensor data to Lieutenant Kline.”

“Put it on the main viewer, Mister Kline,” ordered the captain.

The viewscreen at the front of the bridge showed an unmagnified image of the Furai entangled in a faint 2D network. Suddenly, a glowing semi-transparent anomaly three times larger than the ship entered the field of view. It moved toward the ship and began to encapsulate it with long string-like filaments similar in appearance to the 2D net.

“Damn. Red alert,” shouted the captain. “Raise shields. Charge the hull plates, maximum intensity. Tactical, bring weapons on-line. Target that creature and fire everything we have. Helm, full impulse power, and initiate a barrel-roll, maximum sustainable RPM. Chief, I need warp engines, now. If we can’t break free of this web, we’re all dead.”

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