Tagged: scifi

My Brother Looks Like He Escaped

  • k-avataryour pisspot world’s sidereal shenanigans
  • Victory.
  • from a roadside zoo in Florida
  • governmental-seeming buildings
  • ten mile hike with a full backpack

My brother looks like he escaped from a roadside zoo in Florida, but it was actually a lab out in the desert someplace. No roads to it at all, just an airstrip and some governmental-seeming buildings and a whole lotta hot, gritty wind. My brother showed up there after a ten mile hike with a full backpack, thinking they’d offer him a job. Instead they put him in a cage. It didn’t hold him, of course. He even got his backpack back. Victory. Anyway, you’re lucky you didn’t put a scratch on either of us, because our mom gets pissed. She’d show up in the Obliteron and deorbit this sorry little rock, thus putting an end to your pisspot world’s sidereal shenanigans.

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The C.A.T. Pounced

  • k-avatardragging its squeaking prey into the shadows
  • attached by hose
  • seems outright tacky to me
  • seems, like, hard and stuff.
  • choked and blinded him

The C.A.T. pounced on the R.A.T., scanning us with infrared beams before dragging its squeaking prey into the shadows to be disassembled. Each Cybernetic Autonomous Tiger installed throughout the catacombs was unique. This one had exposed bronze gears in its shoulders, and was attached by hose and cable to a plate in the wall. The Robotic Accessory Tarantulas infesting the place were probably all different too, but they scuttled too fast to get a good look.

“Setting mechanized beasts to seize and devour others of their kind seems outright tacky to me,” Whinstone said. He always complained. It was like he couldn’t help it, like he was programmed to do it. I had stopped listening years ago.

“I say, it’s improper!” he persisted.

I couldn’t pretend I hadn’t heard. “Yeah, but dealing with the bot-bugs any other way seems, like, hard and stuff. Maybe even dangerous. At least the C.A.T.s won’t bother living things.”

An eight-legged C.A.T. dropped silently from the ceiling onto Whinstone’s head, and sprayed something in his face that choked and blinded him. It retracted, taking Whinstone up with it into the darkness of the vaulted passageway.

Well, that explained the complaining. And put a stop to it. Huh.

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Yolanda Hated Mr Wong

  • k-avatarwounded by betrayal
  • Mr Wong smiled at her
  • — amputation, tongue-cutting, excisions
  • nothing but a festering rat king of malware
  • such a dreamy, vacant expression in his eyes

Yolanda hated Mr Wong. He had no right to look so happy.

It was no surprise to see such a dreamy, vacant expression in his eyes. After all, his cybernetic brain was nothing but a festering rat king of malware. She had contemplated ways to fix him, but they all entailed great effort and expense, and he would just download all the same garbage into himself as soon as she booted him up. He was an addict, and he didn’t want help. Yolanda therefore contemplated ways of punishing him — amputation, tongue-cutting, excisions of random chunks of his body — but these were just idle fantasies, unvented spleen. Really, she was just bitter.

Mr Wong smiled at her. Somewhere deep in the fetid sewers of his CPU, he could still appreciate irony. He was a teacher and a scientist, built with lofty aspirations. Yolanda was a sexbot. She turned into his nurse, a protracted good deed for which she could be dismantled. They weren’t supposed to interact. Their arrangement made both of them fugitives, but only she would be in any real danger if they were caught.

Her only choice was to abandon him and hope his incoherence would prevent him from leading anyone back to her. And, hope that happy Mr Wong was too far gone to be wounded by betrayal.

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Georg Examined the Creatures

k-avatar

  • walking on his hands
  • like the ribs of some petrified monster
  • offering his opinion
  • chasm deeper than the Grand Canyon
  • and I know it’s not the same thing

Georg examined the creatures walking on his hands. They were not insects, as he first assumed, for they were bipedal and wore tiny little helmets on their tiny little heads. He sat in the shade of his wrecked vessel, its superstructure jutting up like the ribs of some petrified monster. On the comlink, Driscoll was offering his opinion that it would take only a few days for mission control to locate them and send rescue. But Georg knew better. Their impact had gouged out a chasm deeper than the Grand Canyon, so unless Driscoll succeeded in boosting the comlink signal for interplanetary signalling, there was no way control would expect survivors and therefore no reason for them to send anybody. The minuscule beings had trekked up his arm. One of them pointed at his face and they turned around to run back toward his hand. “Oh, no no no,” Georg murmured, “don’t run away. I was hoping we could communicate.”

“I’m not running,” Driscoll replied. Georg had forgotten his comlink was open. “But I am glad to hear you’re willing to talk. We’ll have to rely on each other to make it through this.”

“Whatever,” Georg replied. “Hey, if we do end up marooned here, and I know it’s not the same thing you said but I think we have to face it, and if we are stuck, there’s something I think you should know.”

After several silent seconds Driscoll said, “Yes?”

“We’re not alone.”

Georg slowly stood and took one careful step, moving slowly so the crowd around him had a chance to get out from underfoot.

 

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It Takes A Lot of Oomph

  • k-avatarthe mother of an 18-month-old daughter
  • propel a converted atomic submarine into space
  • Because it’s the latter.
  • — what is another word for POOP? —
  • daughter receives a valuable present

It takes a lot of oomph to propel a converted atomic submarine into space, as Giselle found out last Tuesday. That morning she was just the mother of an 18-month-old daughter, but by dinnertime she was an admiral of sorts. Her little Elizabeth, or Bitty as she was known, was a source of more than enough oomph to get the job done.

Giselle had been asked to document how the feat was accomplished, but writing memos had never been her strong suit. “The power for liftoff was obtained from a dense deposit of Bitty’s business,” she explained to the patient boatswain. He lifted one eyebrow and asked, “‘Business’? Can’t you be more precise?”

“Well then help me write this!” Giselle implored. “It came from her diaper, for gosh sakes, but I can’t say… I mean there are some words that just don’t belong in an official memo! But my brain’s seized up — what is another word for POOP? — and I can’t think clearly.”

The handsome boatswain smiled warmly. “Zero gravity sometimes affects mental acuity, and so does the stress of parenthood. In your case, you shouldn’t worry. Because it’s the latter. When a beautiful young mother’s daughter receives a valuable present, it can be quite distracting.”

“So you agree with me that Bitty’s too little to command her own vessel?”

“I’m sure you know what’s best. Perhaps we can address that topic in a later paragraph.”

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In the UFO’s Holding Cell

  • by jenlike a malicious genealogist
  • the fireflies’ sexual organs
  • with a jackknife
  • manners, gestures and physiologies
  • This was his sole fear

In the UFO’s holding cell, Kevin felt like a firefly in a jar, like the ones he spent his childhood collecting in the backyard. The alien scientist assured Kevin that he and his race came to Earth merely to study humankind’s manners, gestures, and physiologies. They had no desire to mate with humans, to tamper with their family tree like a malicious genealogist. The alien peered down with the same detachment Kevin had employed as a child while removing the fireflies’ sexual organs with a jackknife. This was his sole fear, that they would treat him the way he had treated those long ago insects.

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Update From The Trenches

r-avatarIt’s time to start marketing. We’re going to do a push for the Science Novel, and we’re actually really excited about it.

Except, ugh. Marketing.

The pitch is crafted, or at least 95% of the way there. Some really helpful material at Writer’s Digest University, and some excellent feedback from our critique-group cronies, and now it needs to simmer for a bit whilst we work on the synopsis.

Double ugh.

At least we do have an existing draft of a synopsis to work from. Two, actually, because after crafting something we liked at about 1200 words, we slashed it down to 500 and still liked it reasonably well.

Fear of rejection is the classic stereotypical reason writers procrastinate about marketing their fiction (e.g., blogging about it when they should be doing it). Maybe for some that’s apt, but not for Jen and Kent. The bigger rub is that the query package entails writing of such a different type than the actual product we’re trying to sell. It’s easy to find contradictory advice about how to construct a synopsis. It’s hard as hell to condense a novel down to one page, which is what most agents seem to want.

At least here in the writing cave there are two of us, so we each get a shoulder to lean on while we trudge onward. Discussing potential edits in real time is especially helpful with the ultra-compact prose needed for a query.

How do you shift into Marketing Gear? What do you consider most annoying about it?

When I Saw The Photo

  • k-avatarfoolishly assumed that the astronauts were
  • isn’t it a placebo?
  • in an earth-floored hut
  • something bigger, something that lasts
  • such a methodical revenge
  • But I want somebody else, if it ain’t inconvenient
  • Don’t approach them.

When I saw the photo, I foolishly assumed that the astronauts were in an earth-floored hut. Of course I should have known immediately that it was a mars-floored hut. The hut was a temporary structure built alongside something bigger, something that lasts: the medical barracks of the Mars Colony.

Which was my workplace. I looked out the window and there was the hut, still intact despite its official purpose being depleted.

“You are to find these people and administer the injections. But do it via blowgun. Don’t approach them.” The person who showed me the photo also brought two slender hypodermic darts. I glanced at their labels.

“Fauxdoxicam? Isn’t it a placebo? But more importantly, I have no way to tell who the people in the picture are. They’re wearing spacesuits.”

“I can’t answer any questions. All I can do is communicate your mission parameters.” The stranger got up and left, muttering, “But I want somebody else, if it ain’t inconvenient,” into a strange wrist-mounted device.

I had always known that I would someday need to repay the favor I owed to the interplanetary mob. It had to be them. No one else would exact such a methodical revenge.

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To The Flock Of Gentle Churchgoers

  • by jenher sundress was a mass of wrinkles
  • inherited my family’s trime-traveling gene
  • ripping my trousers, cutting my leg
  • She spread out all her fingers
  • “The hunchback must be mad too,” said the Curate.

To the flock of gentle churchgoers it must have seemed that Germaine and I appeared out of nowhere. There they were, listening to a sermon, when suddenly there we were, fornicating on the floor in front of the altar. It’s all on account of the fact that I inherited my family’s time-traveling gene. When we started, you see, the church had yet to be built.

As soon as we realized we had an audience, we stopped what we were doing. Germaine tried to cover herself, but her sundress was a mass of wrinkles. She spread out all her fingers to cover her naughty bits as best she could, ripping my trousers, cutting my leg in the process. The position we were trying out was called The Hunchback and it was rather complicated.

“I’m so mad at this interruption, Rufus!” cried Germaine.

“The Hunchback must be mad too,” said the Curate. He winked at us.

Who told him what it was called?

 

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I Had Been Tracking the Missing Goats

  • by jenthey sup at alien tables
  • the missing goats
  • kiss the girls
  • “Bandits — Bandits! Bandits!”
  • water-gypsies!
  • the toothed circle of a reconstructed Stonehenge

I had been tracking the missing goats for almost 24 hours, ever since my sister ran from the barn screaming, “Bandits — Bandits! Bandits!” The trail led me here, to the toothed circle of a reconstructed Stonehenge on the lonely, windy Salisbury Plain. Who could have re-erected these enormous stones in a single evening? And then the answer came to me. Water-gypsies! Harnessing their intrepid water-moose, the lovely aquatic extraterrestrials could accomplish nearly anything. I sat on the cold, damp ground and leaned my back against one of the towering sarsen stones and waited for my chance to kiss the girls from another world. As for the goats? Well, I’m afraid to say that tonight they sup at alien tables. We shan’t be seeing them again.

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