by submission | Feb 11, 2012 | Story |
Author : Peter Andrews
The unmoving city. My city.
The boy is frozen now, four, maybe five, feet from the ground, cheeks pulled by inertia’s invisible fingers.
It is up to me–he might never turn into viscera, his limbs and neck at deathly angles. His family might never have to mourn. This day need never end. The sky could remain forever that shade of blue. People moving along the street might never reach their destination.
I walk away down the center of the road, litter lifeless in the air. The blur of tears makes the world a haze that need not exist. In still cars people are mid-conversation. I try to guess what about. Something about children I imagine, something happy. I do this sometimes, freeze the world and piece together my own understanding of it. The only time I have peace. Everything ceases to be, no one calls for me. There is no family wondering why their son/ wife/ baby/ whatever hadn’t been saved, why the Guardian hadn’t stopped that mugger/ rapist/ arsonist/ drunk/ whatever. Just bouncing around in their grief to find something — anything — to focus the loss on.
I am very old in a way. I stopped aging decades ago. I had a destiny: Humanity would die away — plague/ war/ earthquake/ floods/ meteors/ whatever–and I would be left here, alone, in peace.
Now it is different. The blood I cough up is dark, thick. They can’t do anything–their blades can’t cut my skin, their beams bounce off me. I have lived life as an immortal, now they tell me I will die. They wonder: How can a man who cannot be harmed develop cancer? They ask each other, shake heads. One of those things. They don’t think to ask me.
But so long as I do not release time, I have my eternal destiny, my black passenger in stasis.
But no more. I am human enough.
The boy hits the ground. He feels nothing, deep into shock. Another cluster of black cells in me.
I walk the city streets that have given me a life, and a death. Both are gifts.
by Clint Wilson | Feb 10, 2012 | Story |
Author : Clint Wilson, Staff Writer
The Neptune was a first class luxury star liner, the finest of everything from stem to stern; from her massive chandeliers hanging from cavernous twenty meter and higher ceilings to the never-ending filigree of intricately wood-carved railings and archways. The richest of the rich gathered in her grand ballroom, the behemoth ship orbiting the young star Epsilon Eridani close enough to see its violent magnetic storms through the tinted plexi-panes along her port side.
A whistle sounded and the crowd turned to the grand entrance stairway where the captain was descending with the president of the federation. The people ooed and aahed while applauding heartily. Both men were escorted by lanky, scantily clad, fem bots. Large security bots kept the masses at bay as the two celebrities and their posse made their way to the captain’s table.
“But I must get through, they have to be warned!” a voice came through to the inner circle.
The gruff metallic voice of a security bot stated sternly, “You’ll have to step back sir! Autographs will be signed at the meet and greet session at o-twenty-two-hundred.”
“You lumbering rotard, I don’t want autographs, I must warn the captain!”
As two security bots began to escort the interloper away roughly and without empathy, the federation president asked the captain. “Do you know who that is?”
Captain Rexxon looked both bothered and put out. “He used to be my chief science officer but the new budget cuts caused him to be transferred to a different post at a lesser wage.”
He turned to one of his assistants, “Where is Higgins working now?”
The intern answered, “In the galley sir. He has been learning his new trade of…” The assistant double-checked his hand held, “Cook’s helper.”
The president’s brow furled. “You had your chief science officer transferred to the kitchen? Well that doesn’t make sense at all. Maybe we should see what he’s trying to tell us.”
“Don’t worry Mr. President, he’s obviously disgruntled about his sad but necessary career change.” Then the captain rubbed his hands together. “Ah good, our round of drinks is here!”
By then the poor distraught man was already out of the ballroom and down an access hallway headed for the brig. It made no matter anyhow. Even if the captain had listened to and believed the former science officer and his sudden prediction that a massive bombardment of solar wind was on its way with unknown ramifications, there was no possible way to get the ship into hyperspace in time now.
And as the door slammed shut on the all-purpose cell and the SS Neptune’s newest cook’s helper, Jonathan Higgins, stumbled to the white padded floor, the flare hit.
A gasp came up from the startled ballroom crowd as the entire ship shuddered momentarily. Then there was the briefest instant of stillness followed by a sudden violent shaking as Neptune’s hull was bombarded by the surging wave of radiation.
And then it happened. Up became down and down became up as the surge suddenly cut through the tree trunk thick focused beam inside the ship’s gravity generator, separating it momentarily and then instantly reversing its poles.
In the ballroom and in other parts of the ship’s grandiose causeways and parks people suddenly found themselves falling from a sky of endless carpet, through twenty to sixty meters of air toward harsh landings on metal ceilings and endless chandeliers of diamond and glass.
Inside his prison Higgins sat up dazed but unscathed on the cell’s white padded ceiling; while all around him elsewhere on the ship people were screaming and dying.
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.
