Story: Games with a soul

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The script of course crude it would still have to edit the title and not precisely defined. Maybe somewhere there is not dock because ten times rewrote it. Well, where do without mistakes, please do not judge strictly.

GAMES WITH SOUL

Part 1

-What The hell are you now? -krichal irritated Alexander addressed stalled in front of the old Opel owner. -Nakupyat Shit ... .urod 'continued to swear he circling the car. Yeah fuck you, signals ... pridurok- already snapped against the one who signaled to Alexander for the fact that the reconstructed lanes. After passing a couple of blocks when the phone rang.
-Yes! Alexander replied with displeasure.
Hey I learned?
Well spoke quickly learned not recognize.
Britney You're fucked?
-So what.
Well as it is?
Yeah I do not remember.
-And Then we planned on Saturday evening with someone I think is better to take Britney with him or Jessica.
-Beri Better Jessica is a real sex bomb, and Britney is so-so for the amateur.
Well come on come on.
Come on - turning off the phone began to view the notebook - who is it called? Yes Presov where are you? Again Alexander cried sharply squealing wheels stopped the car. Woman transitioned crosswalk became indignant. Alexander realized that distracted almost knocked the man lowered his eyes and exhaled heavily.
The last years in the life of Alexander turned into a nightmare, at least he thought so.
Alexandra - 37 years of successful businessman, the owner of the bank's regional scale it seemed the ultimate dream for many people, but the last time the bank's profit declined in the city was more than big business gradually affairs Alexander kotilis just down.
Does not add confidence and wife is nowhere and never has worked and constantly changed to Alexander, but to leave it would not have been at one time it was considered the most beautiful girl in town is kind was his bonus since when he has no money still I managed to marry her, and this victory he has always been proud of, though not mentioned it to none.
The outcome of yesterday's Lovelace, who changed his women as gloves, successful businessman Alexander became a loser zatyukali drinkers who have not seen in later life nothing good and somewhere far away realizing it made him even more annoyed.
In the office, we sat 4 people Aliva, she worked in a bank for a long time and probably not the only one who wanted to set the affairs of Alexander.
Martin who worked with the beginning of the formation of the bank and knew about all the sins of Alexander he was a good worker, but the last time knowing about the debts of the bank he had just gloating about it. And the two girls that Alexander took office just for decoration and intimate pleasures, they performed minor work.
As usual Aleve digging in the papers somewhere called Martin reading the newspaper, women flip through the glossy magazine that occasionally commented quietly between each other.
-Aliviya See any ads. "I buy expensive and cheesy soul-phone"
-Children Must indulge - without looking up from the papers said Aleve.
- No children with what is necessary so as to write to him to guess cheesy soul Give.
-Otmyvat Can be.



-For money?
I tell the kids Well.
-Nuzhno This internet immediately throw -Martin took out his mobile phone to photograph classified.
Well what do you do, and if someone indulges in phone and the other person will be put only fools bother to call the person.
-No Aleve you definitely do not have dibs some goat earn and go to work Mother Teresa.
The office came Alexander.
-Look Boss found where to get the money and handed it to a newspaper ad with a circled column.
-Bred Some Turn to finally deal.
-What Will collect their souls, I selling their crappy soul, won the girls well and will drive your most expensive know how much pull, sorry Aleve not join us, but she at least look that will be the main contact of the bank will solve the problem.
-But You have problems begin, if I was still a question I want you to look at these.
Martin stood up from the table went up hanger with clothes like a zombie.
-Well Girls lunch, go eat. The girls immediately jumped up and went after Martin.
Alexander came to the table Aleve.
-Zvonili More from one supermarket said that we close the account.
Alexander shook his head, picked up Martin wallpapers newspaper ad and went to him.
When the circle of problems a person is willing to grasp at any straw, for often it is not the best choice. Alexander still called on an ad.

Thermogenesis and the Thermogenic Diet

Thermogenisis is the amount of heat energy the body produces for all physiological processes, including breathing, working, exercising and metabolizing food. The body burns calories in the form of heat energy to carry out all internal and external activities. Approximately ten percent of our total caloric intake is used to metabolize foods. For example, if you consume 3000 calories per day then 300 calories would be burnt solely to metabolize the food. The metabolism of foods include all the processes of digestion including chewing, swallowing, stomach digestion, absorption, transportation, storage in the body and elimination. The thermogenic diet proposes that certain foods require more caloric energy to metabolize during the process of digestion than compared to other foods. This article discusses recommended foods to consume when on a thermogenic diet, the health benefits, dietary supplements and their associated side effects.

The Thermogenic Diet

All foods have a thermogenic effect, the amount of heat energy required to metabolize them. Generally high protein foods require the greatest amount of energy to metabolize them and therefore have a greater thermogenic effect. Carbohydrates require less energy than proteins but more energy than fat to metabolize. Fat is easily broken down by the body and consequently has a low thermogenic effect. Some foods have a negative thermogenic effect, meaning the total amount of calories in the food is less than the amount of calories needed to metabolize them. The combination of consuming high protein foods and foods with a high thermogenic effect is the basis of a thermogenic diet for weight loss.

Foods that have a high thermogenic effect include the following.

• Apples
• Pineapple
• Grapefruit
• Oranges
• Blueberries
• Limes
• Lemons
• Watermelon
• Lettuce
• Celery
• Spinach
• Sweet Potato
• Zucchini
• Cooked Leeks
• Broccoli
• Cauliflower
• Mushrooms
• Kale
• Cabbage
• Asparagus

Generally the foods above are high in fiber and low in calories which force the body to burn more calories digesting them than other foods, having a potential weight loss effect.

Proteins help to satisfy hunger for longer and reduce the impulse to snack between meals. People who eat carbohydrate and high sugar content based diets tend to sporadically feel hungry throughout the day and tend to snack more. High protein foods recommended to consume on the thermogenic diet include the following.

• Lean cuts of red meat
• Poultry
• Eggs
• Nuts
• Low fat dairy products
• Legumes

Hot peppers are also recommended as the capsaicin in them causes an increase in metabolism as much as eight percent, for two hours after eating them. Green tea is also a great thermogenic as it contains no calories at all. It is one of the best negative thermogenics you can consume and helps curb cravings for sugar and carbohydrates. Black pepper and ginger also have a high thermogenic effect.

 Restricting your intake of carbohydrate rich foods and foods with high sugar content is recommended. The foods described above have a low glycemic index, meaning they will not cause a spike in insulin release into the blood. Insulin spikes can cause nutrients to be stored as fat and can also make you feel hungry again sooner. Thermogenic foods are considered to be healthy and can provide you with additional health benefits over an above the intended effect of weight loss.

Supplements

Many supplements are available on the market that claim to boost metabolism and have a high thermogenic effect. These supplements usually contain high levels of stimulants including caffeine, kola nut, bitter orange, ephedra and guarana. These supplements are said to increase energy levels and increase blood flow that leads to weight loss. These stimulants can have unwanted side effects including addiction, anxiety, sleep disturbances, gastrointestinal disturbances and changes in heart rate. Heart palpitations and arrhythmias can be fatal if not treated immediately. It is therefore not recommended to supplement your diet with these stimulants if undertaking the thermogenic diet.

In conclusion, the thermogenic diet is a low calorie, low fat, high fiber and high protein diet. Weight loss is usually gradual and hence don’t expect to see results overnight. Including some daily exercise whilst on this diet can help towards your weight loss goals. Exercise does not have to be overly taxing; a daily 30 minute walk will work just as well. If you read about claims of negative thermogenic foods, this has been proven scientifically to be false. The only true negative thermogenic food is green tea as it has no calories and hence requires more caloric energy to metabolize it. By incorporating any combination of the high thermogenic foods and high protein foods listed above, you will be well on your way to weight loss.

 

Ascension Salad Second Place Winner in the scifidimensions 2015 Short Fiction Contest

by William Ledbetter © 2005

Jack's pulse quickened and his palms began to sweat as he stepped from the tram onto Cooper Street.  The girls and boys displayed their wares below flickering signs that relayed their corporate or university sponsorship, price and health information.  Some were dressed, some nude, but most were skinny and pale, hormonally stymied to look the part of the vulnerable street waif.

Jack's plasma goggles were good enough to make one of these knobby pseudo-girls into a voluptuous and believable Elaine if he so desired, but his hands would know.  They twitched in his pockets as if to confirm that they did indeed still remember her every smooth curve and damp hollow.

As he walked further from the brightly lit tram station he recognized some of the faces.  Surrogate Elaines who had stayed with him before, but had not impressed him, had not filled the gap between what his hand touched and what his eyes saw.  He knew that by night's end he might be forced to come back for one of them, but until then he would keep looking for the woman in whose flesh he could relive the past.

Un-forecasted rain began to fall as he neared the end of the second block.  Flimsy Mylar awnings sprang from the whore's signs forcing them to pull back close to the wall to stay dry.  As Jack opened his umbrella an argument flared between two of the young women over sign space.  Security drones swooped in and circled the combatants at a safe distance, ready to administer calming gas should physical violence demand it.  To avoid the fight, Jack stepped close to the inside wall and passed within feet of standing hookers who immediately began pandering their promises of unequaled delights.

It was there - in close - amid the flesh and synthetic pheromones that he saw the perfect Elaine.  Her signage had failed to produce protection from the rain so she stood soaked and dripping, thin clothing plastered to a firm, shapely build and dark hair hanging to her shoulders in clumps.  She didn't yell tawdry lures or gyrate her bottom like those all around her, but instead watched Jack with quiet and intense eyes of electric blue.

Elaine's eyes.

It wasn't just the color, but the way she stared with the same cool intensity as a cat eying prey it had caught but not yet killed.

"Hello, Jack."

His hands twitched and his throat clenched.

"Elaine?" he croaked.

She shook her head.  "No, but I can be... for tonight."

He stood in the rain, staring at her as people jostled past him in their attempts to stay out of the flowing gutters.  Never over the decades had he found one so close to the real thing, yet it felt wrong, she was too perfect of a match.  Of course it wasn't the real Elaine - he'd watched her die - yet when they had taken her cold hand from his, her skin had been that same color.

She pushed the hair from her eyes and held out her hand, palm up, in a gesture that could have been a plea or a welcome.  Raindrops lay like random pearls on her death white wrists.  Jack took her chilled hand, raised the skin to his lips and sucked in the droplets.

A shiver and flush brought subtle life to her face.  She even had Elaine's smile.  Her sign said she was twenty-two, exactly half Jack's age, that she had no sponsorship and preferred overnight customers. Not surprising that she had no sponsor at her age, yet her price was as high as those near the tram station.  It didn't matter.  He had to have her.

"I... I'm looking for an evening companion," he stammered.  "Your price is right.  I'm also offering meals and a bath."

She nodded, stepped under Jack's umbrella and wrapped her fingers around his arm.  With trembling hands he raised the netpad to his face, so that the lasers could make the neural connection through his eyes, then authorized the order to transfer funds.  Her broken sign registered his payment then flickered off.

* * * * *

Her name was Sydney, and when she entered the kitchen wearing the silky white evening gown he had selected from his collection, Jack stopped twisting the corkscrew mid-turn.  Her hair lay loose on shoulders still pink from the bath and the high heels put her almost even with Jack's lanky six-foot frame.  Those beautiful eyes had been set aglow by the white dress and when she smiled his breath caught in his throat.

"What's wrong, Jack?"

"Nothing... you just... remind me of someone."

"Elaine?"

He nodded and pulled the cork.  "How did you know her name?"

"Girls talk. You have quite the rep on Cooper Street and I can see why," she said and slid her hands down the sides of the silk dress.  "It's not often that a girl gets paid to be pampered."

Jack took a deep breath and poured the wine. "Oh... I didn't realize I was that popular."

"So when do you put on the goggles, Jack?  When do I get to become the woman you love?"

He felt confused.  Normally by this time he would have donned the device, replacing the faceless whore with his Elaine... but he had forgotten.  This girl was different.  It didn't feel right.

"I don't always use the goggles.  Sometimes... I just prefer to enjoy the woman I'm with," he said, wondering if she would see the lie.

"I'll take that as a compliment.  Is that for me?" she said and pointed to one of the glasses of wine he still held in his hand.

"Oh... um... yeah," he said, feeling his face flush.

When dinner was ready he led her into the dining room, seated her at the table and lit the candles.  In the candlelight she looked even more like Elaine.  The smile, the eyes, the way she tilted her head, but Elaine had died over twenty years ago.  If she were still alive she would have been... Jack's knees turned to wet clay and he sat down abruptly to keep from falling.

"Jack?  Are you okay?"

He swallowed and held up a shaky hand.  "I'm just... dizzy."

"Are you sure?  I can call the MedTechs"

"No... I'm fine.  You're sign said you're twenty-two.  When's your birthday?"

She leaned back in her chair as if trying to put distance between them.  "Why?"

"I... just need to know."

"Sorry, Jack.  I don't give that kind of information out to anyone.  Especially customers.  You can understand that... right?"

He nodded and after a few seconds rose on unsteady legs to fetch the rest of their meal.

During dinner he watched her eat, the way she gestured with her fork while talking, the way she separated her food on the plate and grew even more certain.  It had to be Elaine.  That's why he didn't need the goggles.  That is why he'd forgotten.  She had come back.  He'd never believed in reincarnation, but there were other possibilities.

He excused himself and went to the bedroom where he kept Elaine's bracelet draped over her picture.  When he laid it on the table before Sydney her eyes grew wide and she picked it up.

"Oh Jack, this is beautiful."

"Do you recognize it?"

Her eyebrows knitted together and she examined it closer.  "No... should I?"

Doubt crept up Jack's back.  He took the bracelet, a little too quickly perhaps, and admired it in the candlelight.  The small pearls were set in a hand woven filigree of hair thin gold wire.  It had been her grandmother's and she had worn it every day he had known her.  Her family wanted her buried with it, but he had selfishly insisted on keeping it for himself.  She should have remembered.

"So... will you be working Cooper Street from now on?  In case I want to find you again?"

She blinked, glanced once more at the bracelet, then picked at her salad.  "I suppose... in the evenings anyway.  Come early."

"I noticed that you aren't a student, so why only the evenings?  There's more competition at night."

She stared at him as she chewed and appeared to consider her answer.  Then she swallowed, shrugged and dabbed her mouth.  "I have a day job.  I'm doing this for the extra income.  A matter of economics really.  If I find an overnight gig, and I usually do, then I'm getting paid while I sleep and I don't have the expense of a room."

"Very clever.  You must be putting away quite a bit of money.  Are you planning an early retirement?"

"An early Ascension," she said.

He felt ice in his guts.  It was too cruel.  Did she come back just to torture him?  He didn't know if he could bear that again.  He had to stop her. "Why Ascension?"

"You don't approve?" she mumbled around a smile.  "I would never have pegged someone with your reputation on Cooper Street to be one of the religious elite that preach against the Heavens.  They're usually much more circumspect with their pleasures and perversions."

"I have no religious problem with Ascension.  They developed Ascension for those who were going to die no matter what.  But you're young and pretty and have your whole life ahead of you.  Why give that all up for a fake, digital existence?  It would be a terrible waste."

"A waste?  Of what?  This body?  Maybe to men like you who pay to use it, but it's standing in my way.  It's a bottleneck in my learning."

"What do you mean?  I don't understand."

Sydney put her empty salad bowl aside and sat back in her chair. "For some people, there is more to a digital existence than just the Heavens.  I'm a physicist... or at least I'm trying to be.  I was what some people call a child prodigy.  I graduated high school at fifteen, received my Bachelors at eighteen and my PhD last year, but I'm already behind.  If I study my whole natural life I will not learn one percent of what I could learn in a single year of digital life.  My digital peers have instant access to every scrap of data known to man, they even think at the speed of light!  How can I compete?"

"But... you're a physicist!"

"And it means nothing.  There's no place in the physical world for people like me anymore."

Jack took a deep breath and changed tactics.  "Okay, I can see your point, but what's the rush?  You have your whole life to study physics."

"Because I'm running out of time!  I'm going on the..." she stopped and looked down at her hands.  "I have my reasons."

Jack knew from the look on her face that it was a losing battle, but he couldn't stop.  She just didn’t understand.  "Don't you have family?  Why can't you live your real life first?"

"Real?" she said and pointed the fork at her dress.  "Is this real?  Wasting your life looking at hookers through plasma goggles?"

Jack stiffened and sat up straight.  Her comment stung like a slap, but what alarmed him even more was the fact that she was on the edge of her seat, with her hands on the table.  She was going to leave if he pushed it further.  He had to calm her down and stall her.

"I'm sorry," he said.

"No... I'm sorry, Jack.  That was out of line," she said and touched his hand.  "And I'm sure you didn't bring me here to argue philosophy."

He faked a smile and shrugged.  "House?"

"Yes, Jack," said a bland voice from the ceiling.

"Play dance compilation number three."

Soft music filled the air and Jack stood up offering his arm.  "Would you like to dance, Sydney?"

She blinked and smiled.  "I'd like that very much."

* * * * *

The wine and dancing had filled Sydney with new life and she little resembled the cold, stoic woman Jack had found on Cooper Street.  She giggled and teased while tugging him up the stairs to the bedroom, then took complete control after sliding between the sheets.  For the first time in many years, Jack enjoyed not directing his bedmate in the arts of being Elaine, because she already knew.

Afterward, they lay listening to the rain pelt the windows.  Jack inhaled her scent - clean hair mixed with the faint aroma of sex - and could think of nothing more pleasant.  He tried to work out how the Ascension Foundation could implant a digital soul into a newborn child.  How and why?

Lightning highlighted her naked side in stark blue and white.  He let his fingers slide down her arm to her hip and thigh.  She sighed and pulled his arm tighter around her.

"I haven't danced like that since my high school prom."

"What a waste," Jack said.

"Yeah... I guess time moves fast for things like that."

"And slow for other things."

She stroked Jack's arm. "Elaine's dead, isn't she?"

"Yeah."

"She must have been young when it happened.  I mean... you always pick young women to be Elaine, right?"

"It was twenty-two years ago," he whispered.

Thunder rumbled and Jack could feel the vibration of the old house through the mattress as she stiffened in his arms.

"Is that why you asked about my birthday?"

He nodded, his nose rubbing against the back of her head.

"What happened?"

"She slipped on the ice and hit her head.  I watched her die over the period of a month, but I wouldn't let them shut off the machines or disconnect her from the medical network while I tried to find the money to pay for her Ascension. It was new then and even more expensive than it is now.  Of course the damned Ascension Foundation wouldn't take her without the money and she died before I'd even raised half the amount."

"So that’s why you're so against Ascension," she said and squeezed his hand.  "I'm sorry.  I shouldn't have asked."

"You are so much like her."

"But I'm not her, Jack."

She didn't remember.  How would she know if she had been Elaine in a previous life?  Lightning flashed, followed immediately by a house rattling thunder. She squealed and burrowed almost under him.

"Now it's your turn," he said.  "Why the hurry to Ascend?"

She turned toward him.  He could just make out her smile in the dark. "I'm going on the Wayfarer Expedition."

Jack felt the hairs on his neck rise, the way they always did when he heard something odd.  The Wayfarer spacecraft wasn't designed to carry flesh and blood humans.  The amounts of air, water and food would be prohibitive, but they could take thousands of digital humans.

If Sydney didn't have the money to Ascend, she couldn't go.  The Wayfarer spacecraft had already taken its shakedown cruise.  It would be leaving the system within weeks.  All he had to do was find a way to stall her.

"Why is going on that expedition so important?"

"I guess I could answer that with a question.  Why wouldn't anyone want to go?  It's the first really new chance for adventure in generations.  I mean even those Ascended folks populating their fake Rome's and Dodge City's know their world isn't real.  But this is real, and it's an opportunity to contribute something important to the human race.  We'll be spending perhaps hundreds of years studying and exploring a new star system.  And who's to say that we won't build more ships and launch new expeditions to other stars?  The things we'll see, Jack!  How could you not want to go?"

How could he argue with an eternity among the stars?  He couldn't, but he couldn't let her go either.  He had to try.  "There could be lots of problems with that ship, Sydney.  There's the possibility of excessive radiation that even digital people couldn't survive."

"Humanity has only made leaps forward when we take risks.  They'll need people like me.  By becoming part of the digital collective, I'll not just be a physicist, but a super-intellect, a true marriage of machine and human mind."

Lightning flashed and he could see hard determination in her face.

"How close are you?  They'll be leaving within a month.  Will you have the money by then?"

"I'm hoping they won't leave that soon.  They've had dozens of delays already and I'm getting very close.  In another six months I'll have enough."

"Six months?"

"And if they leave before I'm ready, there are other options."

"But..."

"You know, Jack, if you Ascended, you wouldn't need the goggles.  In your digital form you could be with your Elaine construct all the time."

"That's not going to happen.  I'll never give them a penny of my money."

"You mean you aren't planning to Ascend?  Ever?"

"Of course not.  Not after they let you die."

The storm had moved to the East and for several minutes only distant rolling thunder broke the silence.  She moved away from him and rolled over.

"Good night, Jack.  Thanks for the dancing."

* * * * *

When Jack woke the next morning, Elaine was gone.  She had slipped away without a note.  He slammed his fist into the mattress and cursed himself.  How could she get out of the bed without waking him?  He went to the window and looked out, hoping beyond hope to see her coming up the walk with a bag of bagels or two cups of coffee.  But she was gone.

"House?"

"Yes, Jack?" the ceiling said in its blandly annoying voice.

"What time did Elaine leave?"

"Elaine, sir?"

"I mean Sydney."

"3:21 a.m."

"Did she do anything before leaving?  Did she... take anything?"
 
"She used your netpad to check an opnet message site between 2:51 and 3:10 a.m., then immediately used it again to call a taxi, which arrived at 3:21a.m.  She didn't take anything that I could track, Sir."

"Show me the message boards she accessed."

The wall panel blinked onto a web page adorned by a flowing rainbow that seemed to come out of the screen at Jack.  He blinked at the tacky display and ordered the house to show him the messages she had read or left.

"I'm sorry Sir, but the site is password protected.  Only members have access to the message boards."

"Well, she logged in from here; surely you have a record of her password.  What is it?"

"I'm sorry Sir.  I'm not allowed to record that information."

"Damn it!" Jack said and slammed his open hand against the table.  The house didn't comment.

"Who owns the site?"

"A group called Ascension Salad, Sir."

Jack stood up and started pacing again.  "Search the PressNets for any information about Ascension Salad.  What are they all about?"

"Here is a quote from the Boston Globe that says, "Ascension Salad is a suicide cult with a unique perspective.  They believe that everyone who dies while connected to a network automatically Ascends to a digital existence, but only those who pay for the service are allowed to interact with the physical world."

"Suicide?  No!  Elaine!"

* * * * *

After five days, the girls and boys there no longer wasted their breath trying to seduce Jack as he walked aimlessly up and down Cooper Street.  She'd said she needed to make lots of money, so she should be there on the street peddling herself.  So where was she?

He looked around at the noisy Cooper Street sidewalk.  Life there went on... the whores hocked their bodies to anyone who would pay... the alleys still stank... the cars crept by with leering drivers.  Jack sat down on the curb in front of a used electronics dealer and considered the very real possibility that he would never see her again, that she would die again because she couldn't pay the price to get into the Heavens.

After a few minutes he stood up, brushed off his pants and dropped the netpad into his pocket.  When he looked back at the washed out screens on the televisions lining the shop window, he saw a picture of the Wayfarer spacecraft.  He ran inside and turned the volume higher.

"StarCorp announced this morning that the lasers driving the Wayfarer spacecraft would fire at 7:30am GMT tomorrow, beginning the first human guided exploration of..."

"Hey you!" the shopkeeper yelled.  "You buy or go away!"

Jack looked at the ancient Asian woman, but really didn't hear her.  The news piece continued, telling more background on the expedition and their target star system, but nothing new.

"And... from our state news pool...reports are coming in about widespread suicides.  Within minutes of StarCorp's announcement, dozens of people across the state... no... this seems to be a national phenomenon.  We are getting similar reports from Los Angeles, Atlanta and St. Louis that members of a suicide cult called Ascension Salad are..."

"Hey you... man!"  The tiny, wrinkled lady switched off the old television and glared at him with fists on her hips.

He mumbled an apology and stepped out onto the street in a daze.  "Please don't die, Elaine.  Not again.  Please."

A woman's laugh drew Jack's attention to a hooker and her customer standing next to the storefront.  They reached an agreement and walked away together as drizzling rain started to fall.  He ignored them and the rain, but kept looking at the blank sign.  With a trembling hand he pulled his netpad out and turned it on.

"Netpad?  Find the prostitution transaction of September third, this year."

"Transaction displayed," the netpad said.

He selected the line and ordered a second transaction.  "Transfer two hundred thousand dollars to this same account number.  Then notify the owner of the transaction."

"Voice verification approved, please hold your right eye to the screen for retinal verification."

Jack did as ordered and tried to hold the netpad steady between quivering hands.

"Retinal verification complete. Transaction approved."

He took a deep ragged breath, dropped the netpad in his pocket and leaned against the wall.  A security drone floated by with its cameras aimed at Jack and the tiny fans sounding like drunken bees.  He sighed and closed his eyes.

His netpad buzzed and his heart leapt in his chest.  He fumbled it out and answered.  An error message flashed on the screen.  "Last transaction denied.  Recipient account was closed at 6:19pm today."

Jack had sent the money at 6:26.  He pocketed the netpad and stood on the sidewalk letting the rain drench him.  He eventually started home but he didn't have the energy or the desire to open his umbrella.  As he passed the girls and boys huddled under their flimsy awnings he no longer saw potential Elaines.  Instead he saw tired, desperate faces on hopeless young people.  It made him feel lonely and old.

As he opened the door to the apartment, his netpad buzzed.  The origin of the incoming message was from the Ascension Salad.

"Hello?"

"This is an automated, forwarded message and will not repeat.  Please stay on the line."

His hands started to shake and he stumbled to the sofa to sit down.

"Hi Jack.  Wayfarer let me have one call before we leave local space and I wanted to use it to apologize for leaving the way I did and to tell you that I left Elaine's grandmother's bracelet on the table.  Take care and please reconsider Ascension."

The message ended and disconnected.

* * * * *

Jack stepped out of the cab and looked up at the Greek columns that lined the front of the Ascension Foundation building.  He didn't know if Elaine had been reborn in Sydney or if she had actually Ascended when she died twenty-two years before.  And it didn't matter.  He raised the bracelet to his lips, kissed the pearls and went to find Elaine.
   
THE END

Fiction factory: Enti’ilu

by John C. Snider © 2000

Editor's Note: This is the first science fiction story I ever finished.  It's not perfect by any stretch, and someday I might change the ridiculous, unpronounceable title. I included it in the first issue of scifidimensions for my own personal satisfaction - and because there was nothing else to post!  Enjoy!

Toward the end, Polidorus was too ashamed to wear his medals from the Dervish War.

Pol had been a young trooper during the early days on Enti’ilu.  At first, the native Enti’ilusians (dubbed “whirling dervishes” because of their spinning, four-legged method of perambulation) had fought like banshees, throwing themselves by the thousands, recklessly, against humans entrenched with cutting beams and bugzappers.

The war on Enti’ilu had lasted less than a standard year.  The humans had arrived and taken over despite fierce resistance; then, mysteriously, the dervishes had stopped fighting.  It was never really a war, truth be told; the primitive, agrarian Enti’ilusians were no match for land-hungry humans armed with the latest in ultratech weaponry.

Ignoring protests from Earth and the other First Colonies, large settling parties had been organized, eagerly abandoning their cold, arid worlds for the slow rivers, fertile deltas, and thick oxygen of Enti’ilu.  The objecting governments were in no position - economically, politically, or strategically - to oppose the invasion and settlement.  And as far as anyone could tell, no one who had set foot on this rich, new world had objected to the land rush; nor had they raised a voice against the expulsion of the intelligent insect-like aborigines.  The humans had stolen everything, even hijacking the native designation for the planet.

Nearly 20 years later, Pol still had nightmares, seeing the man-sized arthropods closing down on him, their lower torsos rotating on four shining insect legs; seeing them explode with a pop and hiss when their exoskeletons could no longer contain the fluids vaporizing inside.  Late at night, Pol and his comrades had watched as the dervishes set aside their weapons, risking death out in the open, gathering their fallen warriors, placing them on great funeral pyres.  But his most unsettling memory was of a night on patrol, in the low hills surrounding their encampment.  He had failed to detect the dervish snare until it was too late.  With a scream of agony, he had collapsed to the ground, his right shin crushed by the booby trap.  His cutter had flown from his hand, and before he could locate it, the dervishes had appeared.  Even in the black, moonless night they were iridescent, their salmon-pink carapaces glistening, their deep blue vision-plates reflecting the stars overhead.  They quickly surrounded him, but not in a threatening manner, their cranial segments bobbing up and down slowly, inspecting him closely.  Then one of them had reached forth, like someone approaching a strange animal.  With its four mutually-opposing digits, it had briefly grasped the bare skin of his upper arm, feeling his pulse and warmth.  Then it withdrew its hand, conferring briefly with its counterparts in their clicking, whispering language – and just as suddenly as they had appeared, they had reeled out of sight, taking his weapon with them.  He’d spent three hours hobbling downhill in the darkness until the patrol found him.

The day after this incident the dervishes stopped attacking.  No one actually made a connection between Pol’s encounter and the end of the “war” - except Pol, of course.  He’d always wondered why they’d spared him.  Why let him live, when his people were little by little taking over native farmland, little by little forcing them into the purple hills?  After that, only occasionally, a band of three or four aliens would be spotted, always one carrying the body of a dead dervish, the others bearing bundles of native pink wood, which they used to build a funeral pyre, committing their deceased comrade to the rich soil.  Once in a while, an intolerant settler would take potshots at a funeral party.  The dervishes would scatter for cover, leaving the bodies until the next day, when more dervishes would arrive to help finish the work.  Eventually the authorities stopped settler interference with the funerals, at the same time keeping a wary eye on the dervishes when they appeared.  Month by month, year by year, the funeral parties became rarer, and smaller, until finally only single dervishes would be sighted, spinning slowly, bearing a body, which they would leave in the fields, making several return trips to gather enough pink wood for a proper fire.  By that time, the dervishes had become a tourist attraction, thousands traveling to the farm country in hopes of spotting a poll-bearer.  The police would always ensure that it was unmolested until its job was done; and the farmers would ensure that the remaining ashes were worked into the earth on the next run of the plow.

The few xenobiologists who took a serious interest in the dervishes were sorely disappointed in the amount of data they could gather.  Seeing a dervish in the wild was almost as rare as seeing a bigfoot, and only a scant handful of bodies had been recovered.  Very little was known of their language and customs; absolutely nothing was known about their reproductive habits.

Several years after the war, the end had come for the dervishes.  There had been no sightings in three or four years.  Their strange, pink crops had given way to the green of human crops – grains and vegetables and other useful plants.  Then one day, some children were out playing in the fields, and they spotted it.  A solitary dervish picked its way carefully out of the tree-covered hills.  The children, frightened, ran to their respective homes, and soon the whole village was roused, gathering to watch from a safe distance.  Pol was the Town Speaker by then.  Upon arriving at the scene he consulted with a pair of cops, who were sitting on the hood of their flicker.  One of them he instructed to call the university to get a xeno quick, the other he asked to accompany him.

The dervish had made its third trip from the forest, where it had apparently been hording dry wood.  Much of the pyre was comprised of wood from invading species, trees the humans had brought with them. Mixed in, here and there, was native pink wood.  Either the type of wood made no difference to the dervish, or it had little choice in what it collected.

The two men came within eight or nine meters of the dervish.  “Stay here,” Pol told the officer, and approached the dervish slowly.  It stopped rummaging in the pyre, its cranial segment swiveling in his direction.  The blue vision-plate shined brightly in the sun, reflecting white clouds and green crops.  It remained absolutely motionless as Pol came within three or four meters.  He could see his image in the visor, hair blowing in the breeze; arms in the air, showing he was unarmed.

“Hello,”  he said, feeling a bit foolish, but trying not to show it.  “Can you understand me?”  The dervish appraised him, still motionless, saying nothing.

“Can I help you?  Is there something we can do?”  As the warm afternoon air buffeted his clothes, he was suddenly filled with deep remorse.  How many of this creature’s kind had he killed, dicing them with a cutter, or boiling them inside-out with a zapper?  They had taken their land, pushed them out, with no attempt at coexistence.  The xenos – the only ones with any serious interest in the indigenous species -  had arrived too little, too late.  There was nothing left to study when they got there.  The native Enti’ilusians, scorned as primitive bugs, had become folk tales, laughing stocks.  How many jokes had Pol heard, or told, about “the Illusions”?  The planet was dotted with high school sports teams called the Whirling Dervishes, or the Anti-Illusions.  On weekends, out on a flicker ride, he could see weather vanes on farm buildings, cut out in the silhouette of a dervish; four legs and two arms, one hand outstretched to point with the wind.  How many flicker helmets had he seen, metallic pink, with a blue reflective visor?  He looked at the ground, sick with regret.  They had taken everything away from this species without learning a thing from them.

He looked back up.  The dervish raised one arm, slowly, the four-fingered hand pointing at him.  “You have changed,” it hissed, in heavily distorted Standard English.  Pol was astonished.  His mouth fell open, hands dropping to his sides.

Before he could reply, the dervish carefully removed something from the small woven pouch it was carrying.  It climbed, with surprising agility, to the top of the pyre, and laid down.  It reached beneath itself with one arm; the hand fiddled briefly, and a fire sprang into existence.  Pol was aghast, briefly considering saving the creature, but he relented, backing away slowly as the fire quickly engulfed the mangle of gray and brown and pink wood.  The dervish carefully folded itself, like a pocket knife, as the flames licked against its gleaming exoskeleton.  Pol was vaguely aware of the shouts and shrieks and moans of the gathered townsfolk.  He felt as if he would faint, but by then he had reached the police flicker, steadying himself on it.

The police busied themselves, herding the crowd back, encouraging them to disperse.  Children cried.  Parents consoled them, looking both alarmed and angry that this creature had immolated itself before their very eyes.  The xenos arrived, late as usual, and there was a terrible argument as Pol tried to explain to them what had happened, why he had spoiled their last chance (perhaps) at capturing one alive.  Finally Pol lost his temper, shouting a stream of expletives at one of the scientists as the cops held him back.  The other xenos ran toward the burning pyre, which had reached its apex, and raised their arms in disgust.  Nothing to salvage.

The next day Pol called the xenos to apologize; also to give them as much detail as he could recall about the creature’s behavior.  He neglected to tell them what the dervish had said.  Why had it spoken to him?  What did it mean?  Surely this could not be one of the group that had snared him years ago!  There seemed to be no other explanation.  Despite being the object of its reproach, he took secret pleasure knowing that he was the only human who had ever communicated with this beautiful, graceful, and now - most likely - extinct species.

You have changed.

“I have changed,” he thought.  Once, he had been a young, ignorant grunt, perfectly happy to do his job for three squares a day, a pension, and a land grant from the conquered territories.  So what if that job meant the dispossession of another sentient species?  But, bit by bit, over time – too late perhaps – he had drifted, morphed, into a man with enough thoughtfulness to look back with regret.

The years passed.  No more dervishes were spotted.  The general consensus was that the native Enti’ilusians were truly extinct.  The scientists timidly picked at the few frozen partial corpses in their possession, treating them like holy relics, doling out tissue samples by the fractional gram to various experts for analysis.

Then the Sickness came.  In less than two weeks, virtually the entire population was seized with fever, nausea, tremors, paralysis, and finally - coma.  Mercifully, and miraculously, there had been no deaths – but no recoveries either.  As Town Speaker, Pol worked around the clock with panicked officials, trying to organize doctors and police in an effort to contain the plague and identify its cause.  But before they could make any progress, they too were taken ill.  Pol was barely able to drag himself into bed, next to his comatose wife; they had been forced to stay home due to the hospital crowding.  In his delirium, he laughed bitterly, smitten by the irony that, like H. G. Wells’ Martians, they too had won the war, but lost the peace to an unknown and unknowable opponent.  He lost consciousness.

#

He awoke.  It was night.  How much time had elapsed, he could not tell.  Oddly, he remembered something his mind had dredged up during periods of half-remembered consciousness.  Or perhaps a strange dream.  Not the nightmares of years past, but a new dream – almost like a revelation.  The scientists had been stumped by the lack of identifiable dervish genitalia, or any other clue as to their methods of procreation.  But Pol remembered watching an ancient documentary, made centuries ago on Earth before the Diaspora.  Primitive humans, living on remote islands, had practiced a form of ancestor worship.  They had taken the bodies of their deceased loved ones, and after reducing them to ashes in a great funeral pyre, had mixed the ashes with something or other, then drank it down, thinking that this brought them together with the spirits of the dead.  He couldn’t remember all the details, but it was something like that.  Then his mind connected the dots.  The dervishes always cremated their dead, and always in the lowlands near the rivers.  Why?  Perhaps because the crops they raised absorbed the essence of the dead.  Reproduction by absorption? By osmosis?  Each dead individual mixing into the soil, rejuvenating those who remained?   And perhaps, from some of the remains, their young grew out of the ground like plants, emerging periodically, en masse, like the locusts of old Earth!

His mind returned to the other great puzzle.  Why had the aliens stopped fighting, all those years ago?  They had fought like cornered animals, then, without explanation, they had simply retreated to the hills.  Abandoned their fields, the source of their rejuvenation.  Abandoned their young, lying unborn deep beneath the soil.  Why?  With a shock the answer came to him.  We are compatible!

Pol felt weak, but better.  In the dark, feeling strange, he arose from bed and staggered to the bathroom, knocking over a small end table, scraping items off the dresser.  He turned the light on, and looked in the mirror.  A deep blue visor gleamed back at him; a four-fingered hand steadied him against the basin.

He reeled out into the street to join the celebration.  His wife still slept in bed, folded like a pocket knife.

END

Fiction: The Omnichron of Ingersoll

Editor's Note: I wrote this as a submission for a time-travel short story contest.  In my attempt to create an "air-tight" plot that retained consistency in the face of the inevitable time-travel paradoxes, I neglected good storytelling and characterization.  Nonetheless, I've included it here for your enjoyment.

John James Ingersoll was a model criminal and a model inmate.  A model criminal in that he had cleverly eluded the police for 13 years until his unexpected capture in 1998.  A model inmate in that he had actually improved himself, spending the subsequent 23 years in a federal penitentiary, performing volunteer work, staying out of trouble, earning degrees in engineering and law, and obtaining special privileges by participating in the highly secretive Omnichron Project.

The circumstances of Ingersoll’s capture were shrouded in mystery.  The fact that the Feds had captured him, not the state police, led many to speculate that Ingersoll had been (or had run afoul of) a government agent involved in some sort of cloak-and-dagger project.  At any rate, deals were made; publicity suppressed - the end result being that Ingersoll was sent to a maximum security federal facility, which afforded certain luxuries not readily available to the average lifer, in exchange for his total cooperation - in Omnichron.

Two hundred seventeen technicians, engineers, bureaucrats and observers (not including the infamous Mr. Ingersoll) had gathered in the Omnichron facility, 12 stories beneath the Western desert.  The technicians and engineers knew why they were there, but not where.  Their drivers, who had delivered them in vans with windowless passenger compartments, knew where they were, but not why.  The bureaucrats and observers pretended to know both, but none knew if the others knew, or how much, or why.  And what Mr. Ingersoll knew, or thought, or why, was anybody’s guess.

The culmination of the project was the Omnichron Matrix.  The function of this massive machine was, quite simply, to move objects back and forth through time.

Ingersoll was escorted into the lab.  At fifty-something, he was impressively fit and neatly dressed.  Clean-cut and polite, it was hard to believe that he was the same unwashed, overweight heathen a jury had convicted 23 years ago.  His only questionable physical feature was an angry scar which ran across his forehead, just below the hairline.

The technicians had prepped him for his excursion.  A number of nanoprobes had been implanted in his body.  Over the last few weeks, he had been periodically injected with a special solution which would allow the Matrix to lock onto him.  He was dressed in 1998 period clothing: brand-name blue jeans with matching jacket, white leather tennis shoes, flannel shirt, and a baseball cap.

Doctor Mary Bennett Doyle, Principal Engineer and Assistant Director of the Project, thoroughly hated Ingersoll.  First, Ingersoll had been shoved down her throat as Test Subject One at the last minute, on the personal authority of her boss, Project Director Thomas Skarbek.  Second, she objected vehemently to a career criminal being offered the historic opportunity to become the first human being to travel backward in time.  She was perfectly happy to let Ingersoll travel forward in time, at the same pace as everyone else, until the gods saw fit to remove him from existence.  And she didn’t give a flying goddamn (and had said as much) if he’d become the Pope since his capture; she didn’t trust him any further than she could kick him.

But Doctor Doyle knew that today’s test would proceed, with or without her, so she swallowed her pride and played along, albeit reluctantly, not willing to be absent during the greatest technological achievement in human history.

As technicians fussed around Ingersoll, making final checks of his implants, the doctor reviewed the mission objective with him.

“When the transfer occurs, you should materialize upright and on the ground – but be prepared in case you take a tumble.  You’ll be in a warehouse in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1998.  You should have memorized the floor plan.  Find the safe we talked about.  Open it – you do remember the combination?”

Ingersoll, quite professional, recited the numbers drolly, ignoring her obvious animosity.  “…And I will retrieve the pair of sensitive temporal tags, and keep them on me until I am automatically retrieved by the Matrix four hours later – my time.”

“That’s right,” Doyle replied dryly.  “The excursion will be instantaneous from our viewpoint.  As we discussed, once you’ve secured the tags, you have plenty of time.  Just relax, and for God’s sake don’t go outside.  The building is secure, so you shouldn’t run into anyone - but if you do, say as little as possible.  At least get out of sight so they don’t see the transfer take place.  The last thing we need is some freaked-out citizen stirring up trouble.  We’ve checked police records and the local papers for that time period and it doesn’t look like you will be – uh, were - spotted.  Just don’t take any chances.

“One more thing.  No matter what happens, don’t part with that hat.  It’s loaded with nanotech sensors that will make an audiovisual record of your excursion.  And the button on top contains the miniaturized transfer scanner.  Once it’s activated by the Matrix, it’ll scan you, and bring you back in one piece.”

“You hope,” finished Ingersoll, winking at her.  She made a disgusted sound through her teeth and turned away.  Ingersoll laughed.

Project Director Skarbek stepped forward.  Skarbek had been with the Project for nearly 35 years, longer than anyone else.  “One last thing, Mr. Ingersoll.  I feel I must remind you, per your agreement with the federal government, that if for some reason you are not retrieved, and find yourself stranded in 1998, you are to say nothing to anyone, and contact me immediately at the phone number you have memorized.  We’ve given you $200 and a counterfeit driver’s license, in case we can’t get to you right away.  If you try to evade us, our security agents – when they find you - are authorized to eliminate any threat to the secrecy of the Project.”

Ingersoll nodded, making a dismissive gesture with one hand.  “Let’s get this over with.”

Technicians helped Ingersoll into a spherical chamber just big enough to allow him to stand upright.  The dignitaries donned protective eyewear and huddled around small view ports to observe the procedure.

#

It was over so fast they could barely believe anything had happened.  At a signal from Doctor Doyle, a technician activated the Matrix.  There was a flash of light, so brief it was almost imperceptible to the human eye.  Ingersoll’s position changed, as if he were a film clip with a bad splice.

He put a hand against a plexiglass view port to steady himself, smearing a bloody palm print across its surface.

“Oh my God!” gasped Doyle.  “Get him out of there!”

As medics extracted Ingersoll, who was obviously reeling with nausea, Doyle turned angrily to Skarbek.  “Damn you!  This bastard has done it again – and you let him!”

Skarbek ignored her, wading into the confusion, shouting commands. “I want those tags authenticated!”  he ordered a technician.  To the medics:  “Get him out of here!  Sedate him!  And run a sample of that blood – I think you’ll find it’s his own.”

A medic glanced skeptically at Skarbek.  “No wounds on him – not even a scratch.”

The technician called from a test station.  “The tags are authentic, sir.”

Doyle was absolutely livid.  Skarbek briefly considered having her sedated as well.  “Please, Mary - calm down.  It’s not what you think!”

“Not what I think!” shouted Doyle.  “You send that maniac on a mission like this, and you expect him to do as he’s told?  He’s probably been waiting 23 years for his big chance to have another thrill!  Jesus…” she trailed off, hugging herself.

“Please,” Skarbek was now speaking louder, addressing the shocked group of observers.  “I assure you there’s a good explanation for all of this.  If you’ll just move into the screening room, we’ll take a look at his recording.”  Skarbek held the baseball cap aloft with both hands, then handed it to a technician.

#

Had it not been for its historical significance, the video would have been so boring as to be unwatchable.  The view of the Omnichron chamber’s interior blinked instantly into the interior of a dim warehouse.  The image weaved, as Ingersoll fought off the initial disorientation and waited for his eyes to adjust to the dark.  He looked at his watch.  Five o’clock.  He went into action, finding the safe and pocketing the temporal tags.  All in less that two minutes.

Then he broke a window and climbed outside.

Doyle went berserk.  “I told you this would happen!  He’s going off program!”

They watched impatiently, not daring to fast-forward the recording.  But to their astonishment, Ingersoll simply walked to a small streetside café, and proceeded to have a beer and a burger, enjoying a beautiful, sunny spring day.

“That son of a bitch is going off program!” reiterated Doyle, provoking a barrage of shushes from the dignitaries.

After enjoying his food – presumably his first restaurant meal in 23 years – Ingersoll strolled casually to a payphone.  As the receiver rang in his ear, his gaze followed a young, attractive woman as she jogged by.  A surprised voice on the other end greeted him.

“Mr. Skarbek.  Hello,” said Ingersoll.  “The Omnichron Project is a success.  Please send your agents to 1272 Pinewood Court at nine o’clock tonight – no earlier.  That is all.”

Every eye in the screening room turned toward Skarbek; every mouth fell open.  Skarbek, unperturbed, pointed back to the screen.  They watched as Ingersoll walked to a nearby hardware store, where he purchased some heavy cord and a large hunting knife.

“Son of a bitch. Son of a bitch,” Doyle repeated under her breath, until Skarbek cast her a shut-up-or-you’re-out-of-here look.

Ingersoll took a taxi to 1272 Pinewood Court, an unassuming little saltbox house in a “mixed” neighborhood.  He paid the driver, walked nonchalantly around to the back - and kicked in the door.

A young man, somewhat overweight, unkempt, unshaven, and apparently drunk, appeared in the hallway to see what was the matter.

Despite being older, Ingersoll quickly overpowered the younger man, beating him senseless, dragging him to the basement, and tying him to a heavy chair.

The young man cursed and struggled.  “What the hell do you want?”

Ingersoll jerked the young man’s head back by a handful of hair, and drew the hunting knife hard across his scalp, cutting a deep gash that bled profusely. The young man shrieked; his breathing became heavy and ragged.

“How does it feel, you little bastard?  To be the victim?”  Ingersoll rummaged around and found a hidden box, laying it at the young man’s feet.  He opened it, revealing a number of shocking instant photographs, some women’s intimate items, locks of hair.  “I know your dirty little secret, Johnny.”

“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

“Oh really?  Would you like me to call the police and straighten this out?  I’m sure a model citizen such as yourself wouldn’t mind.”

The young man said nothing.

Ingersoll began to remove the contents from the box, recounting the gruesome particulars regarding each item.  Johnny stared straight ahead, his face a shining mask of blood.  Finally, Johnny had heard enough.

“Who the hell are you, man?  Do I know you?”

“Look at me closely.  See any resemblance?”

The young man squinted hard for a few seconds, then his eyes opened wide.  “Who are you?  My father or something?”

“Or something.”  Ingersoll looked down, lost in thought for a moment.  “Listen, do you remember Captain Ahab?”

“Who?”

“Captain Ahab.  From Moby Dick?”  Ingersoll sighed with exasperation.  “You should read more.  He couldn’t let go of the past, and ended up destroying himself.”

“Look, what the hell do you want?”

“I want you to think about the past.  Most people give up thinking about the past, about the wrong they’ve done.  You can’t go back, right?  Well, I got a chance to actually change the past – a little piece of it anyway.  At any rate, this time Ahab gets his whale, because he is the whale.  Or was.  Do you understand any of this?”

The young man trembled, swallowed hard, shaking his head.  “No.”

“Well, I know you’ll figure it out.  Now, listen carefully.  In a few seconds a couple of fellows will arrive.  They’re here to help you.  Ask for Skarbek.  Mention Omnichron.   Can you remember that?”

“Yeah.  Skarbek.  Omnichron.  Christ.”  Johnny looked down at himself, covered in blood and sweat.

Ingersoll glanced at his watch.  Nine o’clock.  The clip-clop of hard shoes sounded overhead.

“We’re down here, gentlemen!” shouted Ingersoll.

Two plainclothesmen came down the steps, cautiously, guns drawn.  “Mister, put down the knife.”

Ingersoll complied.

“Now, put your hands behind your head, then kneel on the floor.”

“That won’t be necessary, Agent Reynolds.”

“How do you know my name?  Get those hands up!”

“Take care of this young man,” said Ingersoll.  “I’ve waited 23 years to set him on the right path.  He has a promising…future.”

At that moment the officers and the basement disappeared in a brief flash of light.  The interior of the Omnichron chamber reappeared.

#

Skarbek ordered the recorder turned off.  The audience sat in stunned silence.

“Now I can tell you what I’ve known for 23 years.  In 1998, I had just been promoted to Director of the Omnichron Project.  As you all know, it was top secret.  Only a dozen or so individuals knew what it was about.  At the time, it seemed ludicrous to funnel money into, what, time travel?  Funding was increasingly impossible.  Then one day I got a mysterious call, at my unlisted number, from someone claiming that Omnichron was a success!  I was dumbfounded.  I ordered two security agents to Pinewood Court.  They found him, as you saw, tied up, bloodied, but otherwise none the worse for wear.  And at his feet - enough evidence to convict a young and reclusive John James Ingersoll of nine brutal killings.  The agents also had some cockamamie story about a middle-aged stranger in a baseball cap who disappeared into thin air.  But that was enough.  The Project was saved.  So, we pulled a few strings.  Got Ingersoll placed into our custody.  And the rest, as they say, is history.”

Mary Doyle looked as if she had been struck a heavy blow.  “But why did you believe him?  Didn’t you consider that some other agency, even another American agency, could have pulled this off as a hoax?”

Skarbek gazed at the blank screen.  “Well, as you’ve seen, it wasn’t a hoax.  I really didn’t believe him at first, but let’s just say that Mr. Ingersoll is – or will be – a well-traveled man.”

END

Forever, Goodbye

Editor's Note: This story is the result of an experiment in which I hoped to create a "hard science fiction" story that evoked pure emotion in the reader.  I submitted it for a short story contest, but the story was not accepted.  Enjoy!
I drove my kid sister to Kennedy yesterday.

It was a cool Florida spring, so we drove with the windows down.  I could smell the ocean.  Kathy looked silently out the passenger window, cupping her right hand against the buffeting wind, gazing at the fluffy clouds that crawled across the early morning sky.  This was the last time she would see the clouds of Earth.

As we drove up to the gate, gravel hissing under the tires, I could see one of the new shuttles sitting on the runway.  The Express, they call it.  Soon it would take her up to the orbiting starship, bound for Alpha Centauri.

#

I was two years older than Kathy, but she was smarter – much smarter.  I was no slouch, mind you, but Kathy came along right behind me, trumping every accomplishment with ease.  I was on the Dean’s list; she got a 4.0.  I was All-State in baseball; she pitched in the State Championship.  I resented her bitterly, and was petty and cruel to her when we were kids.  But, as we grew up, I saw that she persevered with an innocent grace I found impossible to hate.  She never put on airs, never touted herself above others, never downplayed my accomplishments.  As a matter of fact, she was often embarrassed for me at how people fawned over her.  She went out of her way to include my victories in dinnertime conversation, or among her friends.  Eventually I realized that I had inherited the same fine traits she had – intelligence, wit, athleticism – but she truly had the best qualities of both our parents.  Such a rare gift of genius that I made up my mind never to be jealous of her again.

After that it was great between us.  I grew prouder of her than if she had been my own child, rather than my little sister.     When she graduated from high school she really went into overdrive.  MIT and Berkeley on scholarships.  Two doctorates.  Research grants.  Patents.  Then her years in orbit and on the Moon.  My kid sister!  Funny how I still thought of her that way, though we had both advanced well into middle age.

But always, through the grown-up years, regardless of how busy she was, she would keep in touch, come see us when she could.  Kathy never had time for a family of her own.  So, I had the life she never allowed for herself.  I had a wonderful marriage, a successful career, kids – boy, the kids were crazy for Sis.  We saw each other once a year or so, usually for only a day at a time, but it was great.  She was so alive, so bright, so ambitious - and so happy.  It hurt every time she left, especially after Mom and Dad passed away, but every time I knew there would be a next time.  Maybe a year, maybe two, but always a next time.  Even the Moon wasn’t too far away for her to come back once in a while.  In between visits, I would see her on TV or in a magazine, but then it was the world’s Dr. Katherine Grey, not my Kathy.  Nothing could substitute for the times we were together.  We would talk, just the two of us, early in the morning, over coffee, while everyone else was still asleep.  She’d catch up on what the kids were doing, or how my work was going.  And I’d hear all about her adventures and her research.  Half the time I didn’t know what the hell she was talking about, but I just nodded my head and was glad for her.

Then, finally, she was selected.  My Sis would be one of 250 people who would travel to Alpha Centauri to form the first colony there.  Kathy says it’s 4.3 light years away.  Twenty-five million million miles.  No chance, ever, for another goodbye.

#

Kathy flashed a badge to the guards, and we drove slowly up to a low, colorless dormitory.  Neither one of us spoke.  I parked, and we got out.  She didn’t have any luggage – only a small case with some family items I’d collected for her.

“Well...” she said, smiling nervously.

“Well...” I echoed, and then we hugged each other desperately.  I patted her shoulders with one hand, fighting back tears.  After a few seconds we held each other out at arm’s length.

“You take care,” was all I could muster.

“You too, Jimmy,” she said hoarsely.  Her eyes were red; the corners of her mouth turned down.  Neither of us had the courage to say much beyond that.

Abruptly, she turned on her heel and headed for the dorm.  At the entry, she spun back toward me, raising one small hand, palm forward as she took the last few steps backward.  I returned the gesture, and then she was gone.  Off into the hands of waiting technicians, where she would be dressed in a jumpsuit and given one final medical check.

#

The new shuttles could take off from almost any runway, but the bureaucrats had decided to do it at the Cape, for old times’ sake.  Grandstands had been erected so select officials, the press, and family members could observe the launch.  It was going to be one of the biggest media events in history.  Kathy had gotten me a ticket, but I’d decided some time ago not to use it.  I got back in the car and headed for home.

The Express would take her up to the starship, where they’d put her in stasis for the long one-way trip.  She will sleep for 65 years.  For her, only a few moments will have passed; but for me, an entire lifetime.  No chance to talk again.  No chance to sit together in the quiet pre-dawn moments, sipping coffee, laughing, her hand on my arm.  She will awaken to a new life, but I will be dead and the stars will have stolen my sister.

#

I pulled off onto the shoulder of the road.  Tears flowed down my cheeks as I fought back painful sobs.  In my rearview mirror the Express rose, stretching the thread between our souls thinner and thinner and thinner.

Goodbye, Kathy.  Little Sister.  Sis.

Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye, goodbye, goodbye...

END

Fiction: A Servant of the Bureaucracy

Editor's Note: This story (written by your humble webmaster) was originally published in the webzine Demensions (no relation, and no, that's not a typo).

The hill commanded a magnificent view of Happiness City, on the moon-world of Hesperia.   The new town’s plump, prefab houses were arranged in patterns hypnotic to the eye when seen from a distance.  The River Jaylam traced its sinuous route through the heart of the city, reflecting the white wings of the kabuki birds as they twisted and spiraled over its waters.  The isabella trees, genetically engineered to grow only in this fertile valley, swayed lazily in the warm breeze, their leaves dancing and glistening in the sunlight.  The gas-giant Magnus, three times the mass of Sol’s Jupiter, filled one quarter of the noonday sky; its cloud-bands alive with powerful, churning hurricanes of yellow, purple, and tan; its slowly changing patterns freckled with tiny disk-shadows, indicating the presence of other satellite worlds.

Shakey Havkak sat on that hill, with easel, canvas, and brush - painting a banana.  He used a considerable amount of blue (having long since run out of yellow during his previous rendering of an eggplant).

Havkak ruminated on his current assignment as he waited patiently for the paint to dry.  The Guys Upstairs had decided to drop the Big One on Happiness City – on the whole moon, in fact.  Strictly top secret, of course.  Predictive analyses showed that the gentle folk of Hesperia would almost certainly vote for the Opposition in the next election, and it wouldn’t do to have a disaffected electorate mucking up the business of Government.  So, before the tragic and “accidental” demise of this tranquil little world, the Guys Upstairs wanted to do the fiscally responsible thing and collect on delinquent accounts – while the collecting was good.

Thence came Shakey Havkak.

Havkak was a Servant of the Bureaucracy who had risen up through the ranks with alarming regularity.  He possessed the uncanny ability of obtaining - through logic, coercion, or pillage – overdue funds from citizens who had the staggering shortsightedness of putting their own petty interests above the ne’er-ending necessities of the State.

Being a conscientious civil servant, he’d arrived a day early and (per policy) checked into one of the seedier establishments on Hesperia, where he would be perceived as taking less dubious advantage of the public’s generous, if not altogether voluntary, goodwill.  After a good night’s sleep and a greasy breakfast, he had rented a nice cherry-red Grav-A Convertible (disappointed that the economy models were already taken) and headed for the overlook, where he had spent the morning in creative mode.  Having thus girded himself for the day, he would spend the afternoon fleecing unsuspecting (but he was sure ultimately thankful) customers, taking the red-eye out of Happiness City a few days before it would be stricken from the political map.

#

Havkak gathered up his stuff, carefully placing the unfinished portrait in the trunk of the vert.  His first stop this afternoon would be a visit to one Mr. DeLano, a wealthy accountant who lived in a spacious customfab on the other side of the hills.  This unannounced appointment would score big-time credits for the Office, and would further solidify Havkak’s reputation as a ruthless remora for the State.

As Havkak arrived at the DeLano residence, he was greeted by a furious commotion.  Mr. DeLano was running repeatedly from the house to the family sedan and back, each time carrying a hastily gathered armload of possessions.  The car hovered on four grav units, which whined in ever-rising tones as lamps, books, clothes, toys, appliances, and other bric-a-brac were crammed into the trunk and back seat.  Two household droids whirred and sputtered in DeLano’s wake, nervously snatching up any kibble or morsel of debris that happened to fall from his overburdened arms.

Mrs. DeLano kept their two jabbering children in check, as the family fox terrier orbited Mr. DeLano, barking and slapping the ground with her front paws, tripping him up and biting at his pant legs.

“Ah, Mr. DeLano,” opened Havkak, sticking to protocol.  “Good afternoon!  Shakey Havkak, Servant of the Bureaucracy, Department of Revenue, Office of Delinquent Collections - at your service.”  He extended his right hand expectantly.

“What?” shot DeLano over his shoulder as he again headed for the house.  “You’ve got to be kidding!  We’re getting the hell outta here!  Haven’t you heard?”

“Heard?” Havkak blinked nervously, unsure of what to do with his unrequited hand.  “Heard what?”

“Good God, man!  The Guys Upstairs are gonna tap a Big One – right here on H-City!  Somebody leaked it!  Now the Opposition newsfeed says they’ve moved up the timetable.  A Force cruiser will hit orbit any minute now.  The spaceport’s jammed, but I got a private...” DeLano cleared his throat.  “Anyway, mister, I got a lot more to worry about than some damned audit.  You better get the hell outta here, too, if you know what’s good for you!”  DeLano went back into action.

Havkak stammered, uncertain as to how to proceed in the face of this unexpected glitch in the anticipated routine.  “A leak?  Oh my – that’s not supposed to happen!  It - it can’t happen!  I’ve got – I assure you, Mr. DeLano, this will only take a few minutes...”

DeLano’s mouth fell open incredulously.  “Get lost, mister!  I don’t have time for this.”  He looked at his wife in exasperation.  “Oh, screw it.  Honey, get the kids in the car.”

Havkak was flummoxed.  He had seldom been presented with such a persistently uncooperative customer.  “Mr. DeLano, I am authorized, as a Servant of the Bureaucracy, to collect on your delinquent account – today.  If you attempt to avoid your obligation, I do have the means of forcing the issue.”

DeLano laughed.  “Force away, Ace!  We’re gone!”  With that, he hopped into the sedan, its grav units wailing, and began backing out toward the road.

“Oh dear,” muttered Havkak.  He removed a portable commlink from his vest pocket.  He tapped a few quick commands, and the DeLano family car stalled, the grav units slowly dying, bringing the massive load to rest on the driveway.

Despite the presence of his children, DeLano let fly an ear-searing progression of expletives - some threatening, some amusing, most anatomically improbable.  He paused only to reload with ragged gulps of air.

Havkak shook his head ruefully.  “Mr. DeLano.  You forced my hand.  I’ve been granted access to your operator’s license and vehicle registration accounts.  As of now, both are suspended, and will remain so until our business is concluded.  Now, if you’ll just step inside for a moment...”

DeLano exploded from the car, his face scarlet, launching an indecipherable cacophony of gibberish in Havkak’s direction.  It sounded like Standard English, but it was more strung together, and accompanied by far more guttural sounds and spittle, than is customary during civilized discourse.

Mrs. DeLano, apparently the brains in the family, pulled the children from the sedan and stood in the middle of the yard, looking perplexed.

Havkak was unimpressed, having endured similar encounters in the past.   “Tisk, tisk, Mr. DeLano.  Please, don’t make me call the police.”

“The police!”  shrieked DeLano.  “They were the first to bail!  They’re probably on the other side of Magnus by now!”  Suddenly DeLano glanced over Havkak’s shoulder.  Mrs. DeLano was pointing furtively at the rented Grav-A Convertible.

DeLano relaxed and smiled, taking Havkak by the arm.  “Tell you what, Mister – Havkak, is it?  Why don’t you seize my estate – right here, right now?  How’s that?  Surely enough to cover the delta, wouldn’t you say?”  DeLano faced Havkak, grasping him by the shoulders, holding him at arm’s length.

Havkak was pleasantly taken aback.  Now, that’s more like it.  “Why, I...”

At that moment, DeLano feinted right, dodged left, and was behind Havkak before he could reply.  DeLano high-stepped it across the lawn and leaped into the driver’s side of the vert, dragging the kids in after him.  Mrs. DeLano vaulted, with surprising agility, into the passenger’s seat.

Trailing twin vortices of dust, the vert shot away, outdistancing the pursuing fox terrier as it topped the hill.

Havkak was stunned.  Such impertinence!  Well, if the police were not available, he, as a loyal civil servant, was duty-bound to give pursuit.

He tapped the appropriate commands into the link, reactivating the DeLanos’ sedan.  It whirred to life, but this time the grav units protested, unable to gain the momentum to lift the car off the driveway.

He dropped the link in the grass and began throwing objects from the back seat.  By now the terrier was back, going to work on Havkak’s pants as he desperately tried to lighten the load enough to get mobile.

The household droids went into action again, whizzing about, reloading the car even more neatly than before.  Havkak objected, but after a while the droids refused to let him near the car, silently shooing him off by flapping their metallic arms.

Havkak threw his hands up in defeat.  Retrieving his commlink from the lawn, he trotted down the road, harassed by the terrier, back toward town.

#

Hours later, as evening approached, he found himself, winded, sweating, caked in dust and grit, on the same hilltop where he’d spent the morning.  Magnus loomed oppressively overhead.  He could barely hear the honking horns of the cars, far below, headlights flashing, crawling slowly out of the city.  He saw shuttles rising over the hills on the opposite side of the city, gleaming in the setting sun, escaping on columns of smoke.

In an instant, the sky began to boil.

“Oh dear,” chided Shakey, as Armageddon marched across the valley.

END

The Final Exit of Homer Bellwood Wiggington

by John C. Snider © 2011

“Ahhh, fuck off!” rasped the old man.  “Go on! Get the fuck out of here!”

I breathed a silent sigh of exasperation.  The nurses told me he’d be this way.

"Now, Mr. Wiggington, I just want to chat for a bit,” I replied, trying to sound as pleasant and soothing as possible.

In response, Mr. Homer Bellwood Wiggington pursed his lips, knitting up a gob of spittle.  He lifted his head slightly off the pillow and tried to fire the gob at me; instead, a near-dry fleck of white foam barely escaped his creased lips and missing teeth and leaked out across his chin.

I was tempted to wipe it off for him, but I decided to let it stay put until I could determine what his mood was today.  Our first meeting.

“Mr. Wiggington, my name is Meredith Chan.  I’m your new patient counselor.  I just want to talk with you for a bit and see what I can do for you, see how you’re feeling.”

He laughed, a dry repetitive sound, like an old car trying to start.  “Yeah, that’s what the last little bitch told me.  I doubt you’ll listen any more than she did.”

I crossed the room and arranged myself on the chair near his bed so I could get a good look at him.  So old.  So frail.  The skin on his bald head was stretched tight; his liver-spotted scalp shined like a marbled bowling ball.  His face was impossibly creased; his arms covered with thin, flabby, freckled skin.  A tube ran out of a slit in his throat; other tubes exited or entered various natural or man-made orifices.  Except for his face and arms, his body was neatly covered by clean white sheets.

I noticed his eyes.  Pale, pale blue, still glistening with life.  Shining with hatred.

“Mr. Wiggington, they say you’ve been... difficult... lately.  Do you want to talk about it?”

“Difficult?  God damn it, if they’d just do as I ask there wouldn’t be any difficulty!”  With that, he locked eyes with me, grimacing as he filled the bag at his side.  I tried not to show my revulsion.

“But Mr. Wiggington, the President wants to meet with you next month, but I’m afraid that won’t be possible if you continue to be...upset.  Don’t you want to meet the President?”

He laughed again, this time provoking a barrage of dry coughs.  “No, hell no!  I met his predecessor, and his predecessor, and his predecessor - going back twenty-five years, when I broke the record.  Fuck that pipsqueak.  I didn’t vote for him anyway.”

I managed a wry, patient smile.

“Can you believe that shit?” he continued.  “I go 125 years without meeting so much as a mayor, then the fucking President of the United States comes waltzing in, on my birthday, like he’s taking credit for it.  Shit, they doped me up good for that one.  All smiley happy.  I barely remember meeting the bastard.  And they do the same shit every five years.  Well, all I want is to be left alone, to be let go, and I could give fuck-almighty if the President wants to see me this time.”

“But, Mr. Wiggington, if we let you go, you’ll...”

“Die?  Ha!  That’s the idea!  Enough’s enough.  One hundred and fifty years is enough for anybody.  How many sitcoms can you watch?  How many baked potatoes can you eat?  How many pretty girls can you fantasize about before it just gets old?”  With that, he looked me up and down suggestively.  “After a while, it all just gets old.  Day.  Night.  Eat.  Sleep.  Watch TV.  It’s all just the same old shit, after you’ve seen it enough.  Besides, it’s not like I can do anything about any of it.  My body’s shot.  Can’t even move, not even to wipe my own ass, which I think they sewed up - probably before you were born.  The body just goes, young lady, like a fading calendar in the barber shop window, just going, going, but never quite gone, until you get sense enough to throw it away.  Can you believe I retired early?  Early!  Fifty-five and nothing to do!  At least, not ‘til the wife decided I was loony as a stooge.  Put me in this place.  God damn - retired early so I could get ninety-five years of this shit.  Now they say I’m nuts so they can’t let me go.  But then they get all concerned because the President wants a photo op.  Well, fuck that bastard, fuck all of them, and fuck you!”  He laid his head down on the pillow, as if to say that’s that.

I waited a few seconds to respond, weighing various responses, various tactics.  Difficult situation.  Mentally unstable, way back when, anyway.  Very, very intelligent.  Wily.  Who could have guessed he’d end up being the oldest human being on record?

“Mr. Wiggington.”  I cleared my throat.  “You must understand.  You’re very special to us - to everyone.  You know – we’ve told you before – we can’t let you go.  You know you have a history of...problems.  But now, you can’t take care of yourself.  You need people to help you out.  We have an obligation to help you.  So, why can’t you just be a little...nicer?”

“Nicer!  I tried nicer.  Goddamn.  Nicer and nicer, for years – decades.  Apparently not “nicer” enough to get the fuck outta this place.  I tried nicer.  Now I’m trying nasty.  Hoping some orderly or doctor will get fed up – just enough to choke the ever-lovin’ shit out of me.”

“Please...”  I began, but he interrupted me.

“Fuck fuck fuuuuck fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck!  F! U! C! K!  Fuuuuuuuuck!” he chanted like a spoiled child.  “Piss piss piiiiiss pisspisspisspisspisspiss!  P! I! S! S! Peeeeeeeee-yuuuuuusssss!”  I think he would have stuck his fingers in his ears if he could have.

I could see this was going nowhere fast.  “Well, Mr. Wiggington,” I said loudly as his chant progressed through “shit”, “goddamn”, and “asshole”.  “I’ll see you tomorrow.”  He ignored me as I shut the door on my way out.

#

Several days later the admin buzzed me in to see Director James Arbill.

“How’s our favorite patient, Ms. Chan?” he asked happily.  He knew I’d been assigned to work on our “special case”, and I could tell by the expansive look on his face that he was expecting good news.

“It’s about Mr. Wiggington,” I said.  “I’ve been spending quite a lot of time with him, and...well, I’m not making any progress.  He’s still being...uncooperative, and I’m going to recommend we have the President visit with Mrs. Potts.”

“What?” he practically screamed.  “Potts?  Good grief.  What would be the point?”

“Well, we could tell him that Mr. Wiggington is a bit under the weather; and besides, Mrs. Potts is 143.”

“Look.  Meredith.  Second oldest just ain’t gonna cut it.  The President wants a photo op with Numero Uno.  Wiggington is a source of tremendous fund – pride – at the Institute, and if we can’t show that he’s getting the very best of care, then, well, what will people say?”

“Mr. Arbill!  It’s not a matter of what people say.  We’re here to take care of these people.  Now, as I said before, I’ve spent a lot of time with Mr. Wiggington over the last couple of weeks, and...I don’t think he’s actually crazy.”

“Not crazy?  Wiggington?  That old bird has been giving us fits for decades.  He’s as loony as they come!  We go through the same thing every five years.  The President wants a photo op.  We talk Wiggington into it, or we give him some medication so he can handle it.”

“Medication?  You mean drug him up so he plays nice, don’t you?  Are you really concerned about him, or do you just want the publicity?”

“Now look here,” he shot back, pointing a finger and walking around to the front of his desk.  “I’ve been running this place for nearly 30 years.  I know how to strike a balance what’s beneficial both for our patients, and for...everybody.  I don’t need you to tell me what’s what.”

“I’m not trying to tell you your job.  I am telling  you that in my professional opinion Mr. Wiggington is not insane.  I’ve looked over his records, and while it’s true that he did have some emotional problems a long time ago, his most recent medical write-ups don’t match with what I see.”

Arbill laughed.  “My God, if he’s not crazy, why’s he act the way he does?  Every other word out of his mouth is sheer vulgarity.  He won’t eat or drink, except through a tube.  If he wasn’t paralyzed he’d need even more medication so he wouldn’t hurt himself.  Would a sane man do that?”

“Yes,” I replied.  “If he was tired.  I think he wants out, Mr. Arbill.  I think he’s just old, and he’s tired.  He has no family left, no one comes to visit him.  I think he’s tried every other way out and all that’s left him is to heap abuse onto a system that’s ignoring him.”

“Okay, look,” said Mr. Arbill.  “I’ll order a full review as soon as this President-thing is over with.  How’s that?  Meanwhile – calm him down.  Talk some sense into him if you can, but if not...we’ll have to medicate him.”  He sat back down at his desk and looked down, straightening a stack of papers.

“Fine,” I said.  “After... the President-thing.”  He glanced up briefly from his make-work as I showed myself out.

#

I came in as usual, this time making a brief detour to the monitoring equipment, carefully switching off the audio alarms.  Mr. Wiggington was too busy heaping his usual abuse upon me to notice.  Then I took a moist cloth and carefully wiped his face.  He tried to make it hard on me, but he could only move his head and neck so much.  I then sat carefully on the side of the bed, leaning over him.  I was no medical expert, but I knew enough to select just the right tube.  I reached down and pinched it.  Mr. Wiggington stopped his profanity and looked at me with surprise; then, darting his eyes quickly to the closed door and back to my face, he suddenly raised his eyebrows and pursed his lips, like a schoolboy who suddenly realized he was participating in some naughty activity.

He mouthed something I couldn’t quite make out, as his breathing became more difficult.

"Ah, fuck off,” I said gently, brushing the back of my free hand against his temple.  He laughed windlessly, but it was a happy, mischievous laugh.  Then he laid his head back, closing his eyes and smiling even as his body struggled against the inevitable.  I continued talking to him, pretending to chide him in a raised voice, lest some passing nurse or doctor notice the absence of the usual circus.

Pretty soon he relaxed completely, and the lines of the monitor stopped dancing.  I stood up and turned the audio back on.  The long steady tone brought me back to reality.  I called for a nurse in a now-very-real panic, and stood off to one side, hiding my mouth behind a clenched fist as the technicians worked half-heartedly over him.  I knew there would be little concern aside from the untimely publicity for the Institute.

A nurse glanced over her shoulder at me.  “I think you can go now, honey.  There’s nothing more you can do.”  As I walked triumphant into the hallway, I heard a technician say, “Looks like Mrs. Potts will get that visit after all.”

END