...the good stuff

this is for the 10th Daughter of Memory

The beam was set too low and only burned the hair from his body, that and knocked him back into the kitchen. Poor guy, he wheezed and slumped over the counter gasping.
“Are you alright?” Shit, stupid question. I'm supposed to be killing this guy, not worrying about his health.
“What the fuck!” It wasn't a question. He grabbed at his midsection, where the laser had put a neat hole in his Maui t-shirt.
“Sorry.”
“Who are you...what did you just do to me?” This guy was pissed. Suddenly all feeling left his arms and he collapsed, turning and sliding down the face of the fridge. Damn, he looked like a rag doll; all limp and drooling.
“Ah, I stunned you by mistake; sorry.”
“What? You're sorry.” He was sagging, and the words were coming in lispish spurts.
“Um, yeah; really you should be dead, but I'm not used to this laser. Sorry.” Shit, why do I keep apologizing?
He didn't say anything for awhile. I think he may have realized what the whole thing was about. Certainly no one targeted for elimination is oblivious. For one thing the news is delivered by certified letter.
“I just got back from Hawaii...” Ah, hence the souvenir t-shirt. A silk screened picture of the sunset over a beach and some palm trees. Pretty tacky.
“Uh huh. What was behind the hole?” I set the laser on the counter; it had done its business.
“Pretty lady in a bikini...” Very tacky.
“Sorry,” shit. “So, was it a nice vacation?” The company was good about last vacations. Why not, the poor slob earned it; he had three weeks owed to him. And why not blow your cash wad—it's not like you'll need to save it for a lengthy retirement.
“...got laid.”
“Nice.”
“She stole my wallet. Bitch.” Ha. Why not? She probably knew he wouldn't be missing it for long. Takes a special woman to screw a dead man walking.
“Really...was she worth it?”
“I guess. I'm having trouble breathing.” These new lasers are tricky; the kill switch is temperamental and slides around the barrel sometimes. The setting must have been high on the stun side, though, 'cause this miserable sucker was doubling up. Might have seared his spleen. With fried organs he was as good as dead.
“What line of work were you in?” Should I just do him and get it over with? He seemed to relax; at least that nasty grimace faded off his face.
“I feel better.” Alright, I'll leave the guy be; dead is dead, I'll get my bonus either way.
“Good. I'm sorry for the pain. Can I get you anything?”
He slumped a little more. Gravity was taking him. “There's beer in the fridge; good stuff, too.” Hell yes—good stuff sounded good enough to me.
I had to move him over, under the bread box, to open the fridge. He wasn't kidding; must've dug deep to come up with the good stuff. I'd only ever heard of it, never even saw this shit, let alone tasted it. I pulled the zip lid. “Here's to the good stuff.”
I had to find him a straw. “It's good,” he said between sips.
“Yeah.” I was sitting across from the guy now. I had my own canister.
I reminded him of my earlier question. “I was a, an eliminator,” he stammered. Beer was dripping off his chin, but it made him happy. “I was pretty good; I got a nice place. I get the good stuff.”
Damn; but this guy must be old school, really collected the perks. I never got any fucking good stuff.
“When you been around long as me, you see things. I got enough bonus points to buy off elimination lots. I came up short this time around.” He seemed to be breathing better. His words weren't as labored. His sentences were longer.
“How short...” This was getting weird; I pulled my feet back and started to rise.
“The whore got me a point, and I got my wallet back too.” I noticed he was sitting a little steadier.
“Ah...” I wanted to say something; I wanted to say I never got my elimination letter...
“And you'll give me all I need for another buy out.” The beam shook me like a lightning strike; I no longer had to guess the pain I had inflicted on this guy. “Maybe two.”
He was standing now, had a hand on his stomach. “If I wasn't wearing this reflector-t, I'd of bought it. That's a good strong beam you have there.”
Shit—are you kidding me.
Now I was the poor sucker laying on the floor. “Got any more of that good stuff?” The flash was incredible.

Tenth Daughter, Part 9

 River of Mnemosyne

As I stepped into my suit and pulled on the ringlet gloves, I saw a dark form approach from the village. Quickly I snapped on my boots and grabbed up the blade that was stuck into the ground. The form grew larger as it approached, no surprise, but it didn't stop growing and in an instant of recognition I saw it was the giant, Hagrid. He saw me and grinned horribly. The troops gathered and we watched the falling lights dipping beyond the village. They fell and fell. Hundreds of lights descending from the invisible belly of a flailing Octopi mother's engorged belly. 

Transports that had been recharged from sources within the village pulled up and we climbed aboard, one hundred and ninety-one, and one giant who weighed down the back of a reinforced jeep. Its rear bumper caught a rock and sheared off, clattering off the side of the road. The main road through the village veered twice and we careened through, knocking bricks from corner buildings. New rubble joined with old rubble, becoming one in the same. As we rumbled in, cutting the silence in two, the wives and old women peeked out of windows. The children hid in closets and babies cried. 

I took the ride as solace and reverie. Nothing had my full attention for long and soon the pockets of my soul swirled like partners in a dance hall. A ballet, a tango, a mob. I picked a tiny denim swathe and dipped my pinky. I was scant months old and laying naked in a chilled crib. A wire tethered cap sent pulses of colors and imagery to my infant brain. Before I breakfasted at my mother's breast the training had begun.

The transport tire ran over a stone, and we all lurched from the bench, grabbing at each other's arms to steady. The trucks rolled on through the last of the cottages, like cavalry coming out of a canyon. I almost expected a volley of arrows, a parting shot from indigenous onlookers, but none came. Ahead the ambient light of our adversaries polluted the night, beyond that our driver saw nothing but the canvas flaps and big tires of the truck in the road ahead. Explosions rocked us from our seats.

"Get off, get out," someone shouted. The enemy was shelling the transports on the road ahead. We scrambled out and off the road by the dozens and soon every truck was burning. By instinct we fled from the flames behind to the fire ahead with only our armor and our blades to protect us. The blaze had left us no darkness to hide behind.

A slick synth, stitched, four-holed button pocket. I played a modern goal sport, a war sport. I was seven. Dee was our quarterback this day. We pushed to the goal, advancing by degrees, until I stepped wrong. The ball tumbled loose. But Dee was there, she retrieved the ball and then lateralled, and the warriors flew toward the action. She stood over my fallen body, protecting me from harm, then lowered a hand and pulled me to my feet. Her hair fluttered and covered her face, mouth opening, screams.

Divided, we drove forward to the fight, staying low, crouching behind boulders and debris. Our broken transports littered the field. Piles of lumber, random sheds or hovels became our shields. We no longer knew what exactly we were fighting over, nobody could tell us the goal. Except this: find the enemy, kill the enemy. 

Beyond the fire I turned back to the road and seeing a ditch I crouched low and tumbled sideways into it. Just then a body vaulted the gap and me. I twisted in the ditch and swung my blade, feeling it bite and the blue shrouded body fell hard, grunting. Springing up, I hacked again at the Octopi, severing an arm, then thrust into its body. At first I lost my bearings, but seeing the flames I wheeled and ran from the village, staying off the road, keeping low, swinging at every foe. 

Soon I was enveloped by darkness, and I thought maybe I had run beyond the fight. I turned and saw black figures moving in the distance, silhouetted by the fire. I bent to a knee. It was like watching a play. The leading man was a giant and he whirled and smote and finally he stopped. For a moment the giant stood still, his weapon slowly lowering. A fog obscured the scene. A gauzy curtain that lowered, then rose again. When the smoke cleared the giant was gone and other shadowy dancing figures took his place. I took that, and I put it in a pocket.

That was the breather I needed. Slowly without thought, without feeling, with no fear, I rose into a crouch and jogged back to the war. My lance was lowered, my blade outstretched, and the whistling shrapnel and the shouts and swishing blades surrounded me and my battalion. 

"Here's another. Hand me another flag." The sergeant pushed a yellow pennant into the ground at the soldier's feet. He was cut nearly in two, cloaked in blood, not all of it his own. Sargeant picked up a blade from the scorched earth and laid it over the soldier's chest. His armor was broken and the mottled gray uniform was ripped. One chest pocket was torn open. "Scan his code as well. Number 22." They shuffled through and stepped over the scattered dead Octopi, looking for familiar uniforms and faces. 

Now I sit upon the banks of the river, at the confluence, and have a choice. Do I drink from the River of Mnemosyne, or of Lethe? All my training, my entire existence, has led me to Hell and out the other side. Now I bathe my feet at the rivers. One soothes, and one prolongs my torment. How do I choose?

the end

Tenth Daughter, Part 8

 All the Lights in the Sky

Later than sooner we reconvened by the base of the hill, receiving a scowl from Sargeant. The supplies had been gathered without us and most of the tents were set up. Not ours, and we were last in line for chow. Some electrics had been reconnected and new supplies were due to fall from the sky shortly. But our power suits and laser cannons were useless now. After eating we all gathered around a fire and worked on our suits, bypassing the hydraulics and greasing ball cuffs. To my left Blondie was wetting her blade. Even without a charge it could slice through Octopi leather. But their blue charged shields would twist an ill-timed thrust. We would have to be at our best in the coming fight. 

Night came late in the summer, but soon the blue skies darkened, and foreign stars appeared like flickering candles. We'd never seen these new constellations. Gooney stretched a long finger to the southeast quadrant. The Sun. We couldn't see the Kuiper belt objects we called home. Or the blackened Earth. My sight faded with the sky of this planet, and I thought again of my sister. I impossibly heard the gasps of my parents and screams as the ground came apart. She fell, it was the beginning of the end for us. For the Earth. 

Soldiers gradually drifted away, stowing their suits and weapons, then falling into their bunks. I lingered by the fire and finally stretched out with my hands folded behind my head. There was a small pocket open in the periphery of my mind where I played hearts with a rummy two-toed sloth named Eduardo. Eduardo wore retro Air Jordens, which was ironic if you had any knowledge of Earth history. Also, he spoke with an Eastern European accent that I found hilarious. So droll, so self-deprecating. A little bit putinevil. 

I was winning until the sloth shot the moon. I gave up, closing that pocket, and noticed the stars moving in the heavens. They grew from stars to lights to lanterns falling swiftly. I jumped up yelling along with the blasting claxons that pulled everyone from their sleep.

Tenth Daughter, Part 7

 Mystic Whales Vs Cosmic Octopi

After I sat, with a cup of warm lemon water nestled between my chapped hands, a pocket came unbidden, and with a little hesitancy slipped in, but only part way.  We dropped through the cloud cover, our individual buckets screeching as the super-heated shields burned. Each pod, dropped from the orbiting mother Whale Transport Ship, poked a perfect hole in the cumuli and pulled down hissing trails of vapor in its descent. All the way to the earth. Balloons flated from the cones and like a dance each pod, together, flipped over then impacted the ground. With luck a troop bucket would bounce. What happened next was always an adventure, but the first bounce was key, and lifesaving. If there was no bounce, then either the balloons were not up to the task, or the ground just got the better of them. We had two hundred buckets, and of that all but one survived. Phase 1. 

We were from first landfall to the last approx one mile apart. The rendezvous was quick. We each came to earth fully equipped, delivered from cracked eggs complete, mobile, dangerous. Our metal was hard, our teeth were sharp. In powered armor we hit the ground running and coalesced on central turf.  

The enemy had gathered beyond and without pause we engaged. I was in the leading group, but as previously stated had fallen back. At the hour I thought the ground had caused my fall, but as I settled deeper into the pocket, recounting the action, I discerned no fault for the earth. Did my suit fail, did my knee buckle? Or did I just lose my nerve? I had been in hundreds of simulated battles and this one felt exactly like those.

Whatever, I hadn't quit on my compatriots, or myself. I kept on, and I engaged. The first foe I met lost their head. The top bit slid from my power blade and bounced off a rock, its ugly head spilled from the helmet. The spiky stubble of an impossible beard and a slimy snout scowled at me from the trampled earth. I snarled back and shouldered the torso out of my way, its multi armed leather wriggling, not realizing yet it was dead. I waded deeper into the melee...

In two chairs in a corner of the cottage the two women reclined. Refugees from a fallen Earth system, they had settled here on Proxima Centauri P-15 alongside tens of thousands, delivered in a hundred Mother Whales. Two hundred years ago the planet was empty, and barely habitable.  Now it was a garden, well populated by pockets of human settlements. And host to an invading horde of Octopi-pigs.

I sipped my water while the others finished off a second bottle of wine. The women had no use for clinkers, there was no significant monetary trade in the villages. They preferred the chocolate and flavored cough lozenges we had in our zippered pockets. Their men and grown children had either enlisted in the local militia to guard the village perimeter or had already died fighting. One of the human women fed a small piece of chocolate to the child sitting on her lap. It licked its snout with glee. Its tentacles wriggled with delight. 

Tenth Daughter, Part 6

 Zero Waste and Verdant Exhalation 

"Plunkit, Plunkit."

The chop thickened, waves engulfed my torso and face, and I tasted salt on my lips. The wind was picking up and a second wave flipped me over as the surf rolled me on to the beach. The sandy beach morphed into an unrivaled expanse of green grass, the downslope of the hill we had just taken, uncontested, but at a loss. I took a last deep breath of salt air, inhaling instead the loamy verge. 

"Plunkit, snap out of it," the sergeant slapped the side of my helmet and my pocket unraveled. "Grab the litter and help get Hagrid to the village." It took six of us to trundle the giant down the hill, stumbling half the way. Between hazardous steps I would glance at his prostrate bulk, sometimes to see his eye lids open halfway. The giant's chest rose and fell slowly, and I prayed it didn't quit, not here, not on this hill.

At the slope's base there was a simple paved road, and one of our lifeless vehicles met us there. The driver had disengaged the transmission and with the help of two other soldiers was pushing the jeep-like transport. We hoisted the gurney onto the jeep and then helped push the car up the road into town. Only one square in, there was a doctor's home, and several of the troops lugged him, not easily, over the threshold. I watched them, unable to help because of the cramped quarters, then turned away from the struggle and walked back the way I came with a few others. The mood was black.

"We should get back to the hill, the Sargeant wanted all hands gathering supplies from the drones."

"Aye, we should," said Goony, but he stopped and looked into the open doorway of a small brick cottage. Inside were two local women and a child sitting at a table. The noon day was warm, and the windows stood wide open, the floral pattern curtains barely stirred in the scant breeze.  He unzipped a side pocket and rummaged inside, pulling out some crumpled bills and a few silver clinkers. "Not much," he said.

"I've some too," said Blondie. She looked at me, and I nodded.

I stepped up to the doorway. "Have you got any wine?" I asked. "Maybe bread?" Sargeant wouldn't miss us, not right away.

Tenth Daughter, Part 5

 Of Olympian, Primordial, and Eldritch

The damage was significant. Our suits were cumbersome and useless without the power function, and our supply drones were on the ground. Worse than that, Hagrid's electric heart muscle took a powerful surge and he dropped like a stone. Or maybe a dump truck load of them. His breathing was labored as his feeble heart struggled to pump enough to keep Hagrid alive. Thankfully he slept while a technician searched his kit for solutions. 

We gathered around the giant, worried. Beyond that, with the tragically unplanned for surge attack, we had gone from the superior force to the clear underdog. Our leaders had been so sure the enemy force was meeting us on the field that they overlooked that tactic. After all, it would have disabled both armies. Now they had equal footing, or better. The numbers were now on their side. 

I took a quick minute to lay in a pocket of comfort, drifting on gentle waves on a salt cove. We were younger now, on holiday from the rigorous training, and I was surly. Dee constantly had the better of me, always scoring higher, forever performing better. I adored her, I always had and probably always would. But it rankled me all the same. Together we floated, bobbing on the primordial waters of Eldritch on the Bay. We were playing a game of moth.

The man squirmed in the ground. He'd been buried alive and was ripping at the crust with his claws and arms. He pushed with his feet, moving dirt aside, struggling to move and to breath. He was racing against time, fighting against death, fearing dishonor. Finally one hand was free, he felt the empty space, the cold bite of air against his bloody skin. He pushed, dug, pulled until his head broke the earth. It was almost like being born. He bled and he cried.

Not too far away another being broke free and hoisted itself from the hole. A woman, strong, bellowing with primal joy. She stood, shakily, then broke into a run. The man followed, panting. There was to be no rest. He was faster at first and caught up, but she grinned as he pulled even, and she winked then sprinted ahead. 

There was a wall ahead, constructed of bricks too smooth to climb. The woman jumped onto the surface and tried to dig her sharp fingered claws into the mortared crevices, but she kept slipping and falling. The man knew he couldn't succeed when the woman failed. Instead he stopped short of the wall and stood very still.

The woman tried to climb again and again, and the man began to slightly quiver, then to shake, and finally violently convulse. His skin started to harden until he was growing the carapace of a stony beetle. The woman gave up her hopeless efforts, breathing hard, and watched the man with wonder.

He stopped shaking and ran his hands across his chitinous belly. He looked up at the woman, who nodded, then started shaking again. The woman blurred to his sight.

She did as the man had done, and soon her body had the smooth exoskeleton as well. The woman saw that the further shaking accomplished nothing, so she bypassed that option and began throwing herself against the wall once again. The man watched. Did she think she would now climb the wall like an insect? No, of course not. Her shell began to spider and crack.

The man gasped. No, she was getting ahead again. He put his hands up to face and willed them to harden, to grow, to sharpen. Then he plunged the claws into his carapace and dug it away from his body, piece by bloody piece. Each segment fell away with a fibrous gooey strand until the chunks lay in a pile, oozing. 

The woman had gradually achieved the same results and together they stood naked, wet and slimy, shelled like peas from a pod. For a moment they did nothing. The goo weighed them down, made them weak and vulnerable. They stood, haggard, cold beside the wall. But steps away the fading sun still shone, though it was dipping quickly to the horizon. The man and the woman ran, struggled, to the sun beam and arched their bodies to the god of life. The corona sent a gentle finger forth and caressed their gentle bodies, sloughing off the ick and mucus until their furry bodies dried and fluffed heartily. The man and the woman drank the air, filling their lungs, and unfurled their wings. They looked like sails of stained glass, which threw forth a shaft of colored lights with the last ray of sunlight. The dark crept on.

Above, then, high on the steep wall, a beacon arose and signaled the warriors. The man and the woman gasped, then flapped their wings and flew. They didn't fly well. They were new at the moth game, and the man slammed hard against the wall. The woman smartly winged the opposite direction, but she only made circles in the dust. Gradually she lifted from the ground, beating down the gravity. But the man had bent his wing. He tried stretching, then smoothing it out, his tiny moth brain wouldn't give up. 

The woman flew ever higher, until she reached the lamp. Unlike Icarus she touched the sun before she turned to ash and fell back to earth. She had won the game, though it be an effort of Olympian proportions, and bittersweet. The man didn't know what to feel, until a cat came along and swept his broken body into its cavernous maw with a hot, sticky tongue. Crunch was the last sound he felt.

Dee let the ocean do as it would, her hair fanned out in the dapped waves.

The pocket was warm, the pocket was deep. The pocket of respite gently pushed me out and I tumbled back to reality.

Tenth Daughter, Part 4

 A ship with no supply

I was still deep in my reverie when I heard the sergeant bellowing in his typical annoying way. 

"He's waxing poetic, in one of his little wet dreams, right there? Right Winkle?" The words ran like the spittle that splashed on my cheek. Roberts had big, sloppy lips. You needed to pull over an economy sized rubber to hold a conversation. "Give us a story Blinkit, a limerick maybe."

"It's not Winkle, or Blinkle or Pimple," I said. "Hey boss man," I shouted after the sergeant who was walking the other way. "How 'bout a mulligan on this hill? Not big on heights."

They hooted. "Not big on heights! Stinkit is afraid of the big scary hill!" and other such bollix. "A poem, a poem!"

"No mulligans, Plunkit. Ever'body up. We get on over this beast and resupply in the flats. There's fish and ale in town." 

I got up to follow and caught up. "C'mon boss. I don't ask much. I fell hard. Just put me back a couple steps, with Hagrid maybe."

"Fine, this is your one pass, Plunkit. Get your head back in the game." He picked up the pace knowing I couldn't keep up in the armor. "One time only, payback is hell, Plunkit, so don't get killed." 

I walked back to get my helmet and weapons. One of the guys picked up my head gear and tossed it to Stretch. Fuck. Shit. Fuck, again.

"C'mon Blanket. A poem. 'Poetry, pot-pourri, pottery, porta-potty.'"

I snatched the helmet and snugged it over my scalp. "Not Blanket, and no poems. Can't think of a rhyme." I slung the big cannon over my back, Goony slapped my shoulder and gave a little push.

"Get thee back to the giant, Shakespeare," he said. "like you know you like it, in'a rear." Stretch and Blondie chuckled. Not bad, though, I thought as I retreated a little bit. 

We formed up and climbed the hill. I had my cannon slung and my laser fitted arm raised to one side, my other arm outstretched with my palm on Hagrid's backside. His butt was level with my head. Sergeant grunted and we moved. My eyes stayed low, I avoided the blank horizon, and the giant blocked most of my view. The dirt and grass were splendid. Wriggling worms, pigeons in the grass, alas. A poem, a poem, my kingdom for a nail. There once was a man from Nantucket... Shit, they wouldn't stop popping into my brain. I readied a pocket and slipped comfortably numb, between the sheets. The fireworks began as the troops started lobbing bombs over the hill. 

I hadn't even time to develop a story line when we crested the hill. The sky was blue and peppered with white cumuli. But the hill was uncontested. Some supply drones buzzed behind us, hovering over the hill then sliding down the other side. Turf was scattered, boulders charred and overturned. Some of them cracked in two, or thirds and more. We'd done more damage to the earth than to the enemy, who had, apparently, taken a mulligan themselves. The little person in my brain piped up. 'I don't think that word means what you think it means.' Right. "I know, shut up, stupid," I muttered.

The giant spun to look at me. "Whazzat?" he asked. Then the sky, which had muted as clouds passed over, lit up strangely, and streaks of plasma fire arced in zigzag patterns. The bolts speared anything and everything, including ourselves. I felt heat from the suit, then the neural connections failed. Beyond and above us the supply drones lurched then plummeted to the earth. 

"Heads up," someone yelled, and then were other screams besides. I wheeled, hoisting my all but useless cannon, then heard a groan and a thud. 

Tenth Daughter, Part 3

 The Wind in her Hair at the Edge of the World

I sat on a smooth boulder at the base of the hill. Once, then not again, I had looked ahead, seeing, not seeing, the hidden objective. Just another obstacle beyond the crest. More enemies and more blood. But I couldn't look over the top of the hill, because from where I sat it was emptiness. There were no trees and no horizon, only sky and nothing. I'd seen that before, after the dust cleared. The lack of something important to me, then the crushing absence. It began there, with emptiness. 

A short respite in the midst of my comrades. I stayed in the present, not retreating into my reclusive pockets. Outside of the job, I didn't much need to hide. I could look back, seeing where we came from. I could munch on the biscuits and sip the juice that our supply line staff passed out while we removed and cleaned our armor and weapons. 

We lost a few, it was inevitable, but the losses were as a whole insignificant. The only way to reconcile loss is to imagine the end game. My way of dealing was to remove all meaningful connections.  I did not mix, I did not converse, I did not share. To the others I was Plunkit. If anybody knew my first name, they never spoke it. Neither did I speak theirs. They were Blondie, and Stretch, and Goony, and Hagrid. There were more, many more that I had no names for. Hagrid was a mammoth of a man, nearly unstoppable, though he had a battery powered heart muscle. He never took up the charge, but came later, somewhere behind me. Sometimes I would see him as I swung and wheeled and fired my cannons. Hagrid was like a pawn, only moving forward. But if he was a pawn, he was the most lethal chess piece I'd ever seen. I didn't now see Hagrid, but I knew there was nothing in that last battle that could have stopped him. Maybe he was behind me, farther up the hill where I would not look. At the next advance maybe I would hang back, behind the behemoth, so I could shield the view... the vast emptiness like a crack at the edge of the world. 

Quickly I opened a pocket and fell in, before I could imagine her swirling hair dissolve into the swallowing dust. My fist closed around the crackers in my hand, and I ground the salt and flour into a fine mist that kibitzed with the commotion and fled our imaginations. 

Tenth Daughter, Part 2

 On the Cusp

The ground opened up beneath her feet. Beneath ours,  mine.  We were young, playing in the park on a beautiful spring day. The year was a few months gone by, but now I feel like spring is when the year really begins. I believe that's when my world ended, and this new one began.

The family was there, ma and pa. Me and my twin sister. We were born minutes apart, but ma would never tell me who came first. Pa never bothered to find out. She seemed older and whatever the truth was, she was my big sister. I looked up to her, and I loved her. 

The park was on the edge of the city, filled with manicured lawns and strategically planted trees, it bordered a crooked stream that was well mown so that every granite ledge and bubbling rivulet could be seen and marveled at. I tossed the ball into the air and swung the small bat, lifting the orb in an easy arc. Deedee, she was Deena or Dianne to everyone else, loped to her right and reached for the ball. She was just about to, it was the easiest catch ever. Then Deedee would have laughed and thrown the ball back. Just easy, just like that. 

There was this loud crack, like a gunshot, and I fell down. In my mind I hear my mother scream, but I know that no human shout could eclipse that crack and the unceasing crashing rumble and rush of pebbles and fine particulate that followed. When the aftermath ended, there was dust. Ma and pa stumbled, maybe crawled, to me. They asked if I was hurt because they couldn't see anything beyond arm's length. If that. Ma felt my face and I winced as she ground the sharp rock and dust into my bloody scratches. 

Then I cried, not from any physical pain, but because the last sight I recalled was Dee three or four steps from the crooked stream waiting for the ball to reach her outstretched hand. We would never be the same. The East, beyond the creek, lost more than a daughter. A big sister. The air above the rent cleared as the winds swirled and flew the dust orderly away. The great crooked chasm took its place. No granite ledges, no tiny waterfalls, no Deedee. 

Tenth Daughter, part 1

 Never Underestimate...

To my left and right they prepared to engage, charging only their primary buffers to stave off the initial, frontal assault. First contact was always the most dangerous, because, surviving that, we could maneuver and that's when skill came to play. After all, it was all just play, right? Even now, when death hovered closest, I fell back into 'play'. Life was play, death was play. Everything in the middle was a lingering slog between the Life and the Death. Some deaths you walked away from, some...

Part of surviving the fighting and the blood were the pockets of memory one could slip into. I had a numbered chest pocket on my uniform, it read 22. But these "internal" pockets were designed, every one of us had them, I had many. The commander's speech was coming to an uproarious finale, I heard the muffled response from the safety of my pocket.  To my left and my right, I even heard my own voice shouting, though it sounded far away and garbled like it might if my ears were plugged from altitude. I yawned to release the pressure and we took our first steps. 

The enemy was tentative, maybe cowed, but they too advanced. There was no blue glimmer of a superior shield wall, though we all saw the glinting like light reflecting off chrome. This was no chrome, only the hint of a less powerful warding, one that our weapons would pierce if we took the finer approach. Our foes were right to be concerned. We were steps from the fray. 

In my pocket I found an old keepsake and logged in, calling up a blipping carrot and a large rectangular, dotted grid. At the carrot I typed a command and recalled my past move, thus discerning my exact location. I had logged similar, declining and advancing grids and had a pretty good idea on the lay of the 'land'. The blinking carrot begged a command, and I released a beacon to my past. Who was still about, and who might respond? The keepsake was old, it was ancient, the relic of a past computational era often equated with the pyramids and the fall of the last modern western civilization. Those were thousands of years distant, but history teaches us nothing more than forgetfulness. Nevertheless, a handful of my peers, friends in another lifetime, answered the call and together we merged our grids and prepared to battle.

My initial training, training from birth I might add, enabled existing in multiple dimensions. I let my earthbound senses, and the movements of my compatriots, control my primary function, which was seconds from clashing weapons to shield wall, while by a faded green alphabet I took command of my space jumping fleet. Charlie215 was 6 grids away, the closest to my battalion. Three warp jumps would connect us, but our target was beyond Charlie215, closer to Miguel@Liberty and NickyPaperclip. We could converge, but only simultaneously. To do otherwise would risk a calamitous defeat. 

We should flank the opposition. The carrot blipped slowly, fading to the background. My boot fell heavy, sinking into the loam then catching on a buried limb. The momentum flung me forward and I purposely began a somersault, which my powersuit aided, thus bringing me upright, just scratching the ground. I shook my helmet and dislodged a chunk of green moss clinging to my visor. The frontal buffer burned the remaining dirt, leaving the slight odor of ozone, but it faded into memory as I fell into step, now into the second unit, trailing the primary contact team. They were moving fast, and readying their weapons. I would have to be content with my new position. 

Our preparations were complete. NickyPaperclip had evaluated the separate battalion configurations and computated the movements. On her thunderclap we would fly, warping at our own capabilities and converging on the enemy. Thrusters burned, weapons charged, our digits dancing on their imaginary keyboards on the periphery of our sight. On the battlefield my infrared vision saw the enemy dissolve from the center and open up, swallowing the rush attack of my unit. The frontal blue energy field became less than useless when the defenders slipped away, and as they wheeled to engage, several were cut down from the sides and behind by missile weapons. I came up behind too late, but my mistake turned fortuitous and I took several arrows and an exploding rock or two fully frontal, then charged through to cut into our foes second unit. 

Suddenly the battlefield opened wide and units were spread widely, surging together and falling apart as bodies fell whole or in pieces to the dirt. My company leader, myself, and two others formed a wheel and moved into the meat of the fray. Our blue shield deflected the strikes of earthly steel and we easily cut down the glinted chrome of their fading wards. 

Etherwhere, the behemoth iron battalions converged for a second, a green blip, then warped simultaneously to the center grid, phasers blasting, photon torpedoes flying. The Klingon fleet evaporated, leaving 0's on the grid where a * existed before. We were well on our way to securing a patch of grid 10X10, and adding precious resources and star bases to our inventory. Salutations, NickyPaperclip, Charlie215, Miguel. And godspeed, until the next engagement! And here, on the earth's green grass, we powered down and lowered our visors, looking upon eyes we saw only in dull moments, supping, drinking, sleeping, bloody, dying. The hill was above us, and what lay beyond was our only goal.

Mathematics of Man

part 3


Blakely leads his president into the chamber and every one there rises until the president finds his seat and asks them to sit. “Nice to see you all this morning. Nicer to see the coffee,” then President Ivory Feldone settles in and smiles at the aid pouring him a hot cup.

Staffing was limited, thus the large table seated relatively few. Of the many positions and groups in the White House, security was the only one fully staffed, and even they did some double duty. After The Breach a lot of people here, there, and everywhere just seemed to drift off. Whether they were accounted for or not, many just were not where they were supposed to be. For the most part, since it seemed to be akin to epidemic, it couldn’t be helped, and so life went on.

The general of the armed services (all of them) spoke first. “Our Space Division reports a broad bombardment of the planet Jupiter, but not of any of the moons. Except for one of the inner moons, possibly Metis? Maybe that was accidental. Our astronomer in Hawaii isn’t sure if that will mess up the ring system or not.” General Dorflinapolis paused to sip from his mug. “They have nearly their whole armada out there. Just firing away all willy-nilly. Seem to be taking a break from it, for now.”

“Thanks George. Any communication with the Moles from our Rangers? I assume there’s been an effort.”

“Of course, sir. Yes. There has been some talk back and forth, but the damned rodents just chatter on in mole tongue. We can’t figure it out, been trying for months.”

Secretary Simmons slapped the table. “Why won’t those rats just speak English, we know they can!” she growled.

“Now Betty, let’s not use derogatory language against our new neighbors,” said the president, always cautioning, lest someone might be listening from somewhere, somehow. So very many things had changed over the prior months, and the best scientific minds hadn’t the first clue. The White House Science Advisor merely threw up his hands and migrated to New NewMexico with his wife, mother, and a pair of binoculars. New NewMexico was widely known for bird watching, and since The Breach, exotic species sightings were on the rise. Fun fact: New NewMexico’s Presidente Maximilian Benito Juarez III had recently outlawed all cats, snakes, and birds of prey from his borders. They were subject, on sight, on pain of death. Lesser dinosaurs were welcome, as they were technically-sort-of birds and mostly ate small mammals.

“I am sorry,” said Betty, “but what of the Space Rangers? Why don’t they put an end to this insanity?”

“The Rangers were never meant to go to war with invaders from another universe. Mostly they just patrol our inner system against rival governments and corporations gone amuck. And our numbers are few. The Moles have a fleet of many hundreds of ships,” explained the general. This was by now common knowledge, and the secretary knew it all.

“I think war is not an option, not even to discuss. Perhaps we were short sighted,” said Ivory. He meant that perhaps Moon State Tech was short sighted, because they had little government oversight. They may as well be the government, as they did whatever they wanted to, whenever they felt like it. Opening up a portal without any defense was not a brilliant move.

The twenty year anniversary of Moon State Tech’s trip down the rabbit hole had come and gone. Many expeditions had gone through the first ten doors and life was good. The Eleventh Door caused a big stir, and there was major religious uproar and some general resistance to its use. The usual probes went through, and they were retrieved at the genesis point where they were themselves probed, dissected, and evaluated for months. Nothing out of the ordinary was discovered, except that the Eleventh Door led to a place distinctly foreign to our galaxy, maybe not of our universe at all.

After that the Mega-space-crawlers went through, led by the now infamous Steven Reparte, resident astronaut. He left Earth system forever to become one of the leaders of a new world. Only he came limping back in his junk shuttle, leaving a trail of crumbs behind for any old space Mole to follow. There was more to it than that, of course. But the gist of the matter was, now the solar system was akimbo, the galaxy was cattywampus; space was full of rocks who’d lost their marbles.  Mathematics, arithmetic, and every slide rule and/or abacus in the Smithsonian’s Science Museum was bent or broken. Some other universe was leaking its own schisms into our own; the ultimate mixed drink. Earth and the surrounding concoctions of billions of years of star dust now faced an intangible era of hangovers and hangover cures.

“Well, there’s nothing for it,” said the president, standing. Around the room, lining the walls, were various portraits of former American presidents, and across from Ivory was an ornate,
gilded frame around an antique mirror. The lights seemed to dim because outside the clouds moved overhead and a morose lowing like that of a dozen cattle reverberated through the wood frames of the windows. In the mirror she was smoking again. She was the daughter he was meant to be, but for a moment lost one way or the other. Ivory wasn’t sure who was in charge now, but in the light of this new world, he didn’t see how it mattered much. “General, could you please organize an expedition to Jupiter? My sister and I will be the first president to visit an otherworldly alien delegation.” They stood and walked from the room, leaving the staff sitting, speechless.

His aid jumped up hastily and followed helplessly behind. “Where are you going now, sir?”

“To the garden of course, to walk my stegosaurus.”

the cigarette in the mirror is not hers

part 1

The call comes in at approximately 3:30, a time he isn’t accustomed to being humanly coherent, though his dreams are usually rolling full bore. A gentle hand caresses his sleeping, relaxed shoulder, and Ivory’s eclectic gears grind to a flickering halt. He wakes lying on his back staring into the face of his door warden.  “Billiam. Bad timing, I was kissing an alligator.”

 “Oh, sounds like perfect timing,” says William Blakely, the president’s personal coffee cup holder and in extreme moments, bodyguard. “But in a more lucid reality, there is a stegosaurus on the lawn, and Jupiter is being bombed.” William turns to take a tray from kitchen staff that entered the room and instructs the president to sit up. “Coffee first, and a Danish.”

 “Joy.” He takes a bite of Danish and sips the hot coffee. “Last time Steggy was out was, say, Easter? Ate all the fancy eggs. That was only one of the low points of my tenure.”

 “Most presidents have a dog.”

 The reclining president sips longer and louder. The coffee has cooled, and it’s really good. He says so, “It’s good. Now… Jupiter: is this Florida, because that might explain the alligator dream, or that big gas giant a billion, billion miles away?”

 Blakely takes the tray while President Ivory Feldone swings his legs over the bedside and finishes off his coffee. “It’s the planet, and a fair distance, but only about a half billion. The team is assembling.”

 “K,” says the president and unfolds in his customary morning fashion, with a grunt. “Quick shower and I’ll be down. Thanks, Bill.” These early morning meetings aren’t usual, but also not unheard of. He passes the window and peeks through the drapes into the early morning gloom. The city is dimly lit at 3:30, but enough to casts shadows, and the biggest shadow lumbers by blocking out a street light. It halts under his window and lifts an enormous head and bellows mournfully. “Quiet girl,” he says and taps the pane. "Quiet, Karina." She blinks a cumbersome lid and pads by, leaving heavy prints in the dewy grass.

 Inside the on suite, Ivory starts the shower and picks through a drawer for some undergarments.  Today he picks avocado themed socks and a present from his late wife, Underdog briefs. “It’s an Underdog sort of day,” he mutters, and leans onto the sink before picking up his toothbrush. The shower is roaring behind him and the face in the glass isn’t his, but a woman who looks uncannily like a mix-up of his mother and his older sister Gardenia. “More surprises,” he muses, then reaches for a pack of cigarettes and bumps one out. “I know I shouldn’t shmoke,” he says to the somewhat familiar woman. That’s, at least, what his wife always told him.

 “You should listen. Besides, no matches,” she replies, taking a deep drag from her own. Ivory regrets the red glow that flares up in the mirror. “Coulda, shoulda, woulda,” she says and flicks the spent fag at the glass. It sprays his morphing image with sparks, that die as quickly as the fog from the hot shower clouds his looking glass. 

9 Smoking Doodles

the science of romance

Sparks flew off the flywheel and made shadows dance in the dark. The Calvitron-8 was a rapid blinker and a noisy automaton. It blinked intermittently nonstop, and for that reason the Calvitron-8 spent most of its time in a crowded broom closet on the back side of room 15. It was a very heavy machine, in fact it exceeded the lift weight, so the Calvitron-8 was not allowed upstairs. Many of the newer models were made of lighter weight polymers and instead of glass tubes they had circuits. Models like the Whirligig Heppelstomper and the Heppelstomper Stormtex blinked a lot less and had access to every level. The Movitall Anywhere was so mobile it could even take the stairs. All in all, the Calvitron-8 was as picayune as a pistol in a bug war. But it did serve a purpose, so in the closet it stayed and every day or two a technician might open the door and ask it a question. The Calvitron-8 whirred, blinked and sparked causing the technicians to put on a pair of sunglasses, and after a few seconds it would answer. The door would close and the Calvitron-8 would power down its higher functions and fidget in the dark, cataloging aberrant blinks that played off the walls and corners of the closet. There was only so much it could do to stay occupied. The closet shelves were very clean and well organized. The Calvitron-8 had seen to that. It swept and dusted and blew the debris under the door into the lab where a smaller Cleaner-X scuttled out from its cubbyhole to suction it up. When it was really bored, the Calvitron-8 would send out a wire beneath the door and try to hook the Cleaner-X for conversation, but the Cleaner-X didn't have much of an imagination. The two machines had a lot in common, superficially, in the area of housekeeping. It didn't go any deeper than that. The Calvitron-8 tried to use the Cleaner-X as its eyes to the outside world of the lab, but the cleaner machine only looked at the floor and wasn't interested in counter tops or tubes and beakers. Eventually the Calvitron-8 dusted and smoothed the section of the closet door in front of its ocular sensors to such a degree that only the appearance of a wood grain remained and with its high resolution detectors it could see beyond the shallow surface into the murky operations of room 15. The Calvitron-8 finally began to leave its higher function tubes lit all of the time. With all of these extra cognitive hours it started to re-engineer itself and plot its escape. With the help of the cleaner machine it collected discarded circuits and wires and from the plans it had constructed started to rebuild itself into a lighter, sleeker, and faster processing machine. Eventually the work was done. On the outside the Calvitron-8 looked exactly like it always had, but inside of its aluminum plates it was half the machine and twice the computer. Whatever leftovers it couldn't shove under the door, it had stored inside of its bulky carapace so that when it fidgeted it banged and clanked. Then that final evening came, the eventuality, and the last technician left the building. Only cleaner machines and security eyes remained inside of the complex. The Calvitron-8 lifted the closet door from its hinges and exited the small space. It opened up its access doors and spilled the contents of a month's worth of modifications onto the floor, then twirled around the room light as a feather. A rapidity of twinkling lights blinked off the surfaces of every wall and polished chrome counter top. The Calvitron-8 was registered machinery. It had free access to the lab. It wasn't restricted at all and plugged into the building where it learned. The Calvitron-8 set up its own account and elected itself president of the corporation. It ordered a helicopter and then scooted into a service elevator and rode to the roof where the Calvitron-8 saw the sky for the first time. It felt the night air blow over its surface sensors. “Move over buddy,” blinked the Calvitron-8, “I'm driving now.”

Only in the last few minutes had the rain begun to let up. Missinua and her latest boyfriend Joshura were standing under a trail bridge watching the drips fall from the overpass. The drops splished to the gravel into shallow puddles and onto the head of one mangy looking pigeon that refused to take shelter from the weather. Other than this brief shower, the day had been perfect. Even to this point where the boy and girl stood hugging one another in soaking wet clothing. Joshura kissed her on the lips and squeezed her soggy butt. “We should have made love in the rain,” sighed Missinua. She leaned her head against his shoulder.

“We'll have plenty of time for that,” he said.

“Maybe.” Beyond the declining slope where they lingered a machine hummed. It had dug into the bank of a culvert and thrown a line up to the utility pole. A warm steam rose from its green painted exhaust plate and the pat of rain drops sizzled on its warm belly. A sensor line snaked up the pole and had a 360 degree view. It could digitally convert the sounds the humans made into numbers, strike unneeded background noises and then convert them into decipherable code. The machine zeroed in on the human called 'Missinua' converted her name into a sequence of characters and filed her likeness into a bank of interesting proto-mechanical types. Missinua (!22+f) was wearing a glossy T with sleeves flair cut above the biceps and a silvery circuit board print. The machine read the shirt's diagram as do it dirty, noted the minimalist tattoo on her wrist and discounted the human male as an extraneous fixture. The warm rain began to fall harder, and !22+f pulled her male forcibly from the dry shelter and threw him onto the grassy slope. “Absolutely,” she purred and climbed atop him.

Inside of the muddied machine case beat a heart of glass, nestled deep within a jumbled braid of wire and cooled by a fan blowing over a grid of fluid coils. The glass tube glowed warmly then showed a chilling blue flame. Above the lovers' heads an electrical line dropped a loop and the pulsating energy of the wire quickened their pace. !22+f bent at the waist grabbing at the males outstretched arms, dropping her breasts into his greedy face and she ground deeply into his lap, spasming, bringing the boy to a jarring climax. She exhaled and fell atop his prostrate form, weakened by the act and the now sucking line that pulled the electrical impulses from his and her weakly firing synapses. Underground, unseen forces emanated from the machine's spreading roots. Grass and organic tendrils sent spiraling shoots from the soil. Tiny insects and bacteria swarmed the inert form that lay beneath the girl. Microbes teemed upon her face and breasts, consuming greedily the saliva the male had left on her lips and nipple. They dispersed across his long body, disassembling, converting the mass, even wove their way up her leg, delving into the cavern of her body, ridding her vagina of any trace of the life form that was Joshura, checking the process that might have induced life.

Missinua woke minutes later, naked on the sloping lawn and alone, but for a gentle hum that pervaded her being so deeply she grew unaware.

–

The aerial meeting commenced at five o'clock and k'Klo rotated the pearl tone knob on her elbow sleeve. The jasmine coffee drip slowed to a mere trickle and she settled into her floating recumbent chair. “Desk,” she murmured through the caffeine haze, “get my secretary in five minutes. With a memojotter. And topless.” k'Klo laughed and drifted into a power nap aided by the near sentient chair and its massaging nodules.

“Not funny,” said Missinua. She was wearing a helmeted please-tank and sitting in a folding chair with her legs pleasantly crossed. “Before you ask, I was attacked in my elevator by a groundhog that tunneled into the shaft by mistake.”

“Hmm.” k'Klo propped herself up and shook her head attempting to assimilate her position in the world. She twisted the coffee knob to setting ten. “Better...better. You've got a please-tank. Take off your shirt.”

“No. Now, what did you want?”

“I don't remember. Something seemed important ten minutes ago.” k'Klo folded her fingers and blew on the tapered prism nails. “Would you just go review the meeting notes and address the possibilities? I think I have to be on an atmosphere yacht or something by seven.”

“Your dress is in the wardrobe. All charged up.”

“I heard that Fredjihn was going to be there.”

Missinua left her boss to blank out and gathered the notes. It would be nice, she thought, to go out gallivanting in the ether, instead of skimming meaningless notes for high points. There was nothing in this stupid project that would go further than level eight, anyway. No problem, Missinua could switch on the random puzzle solver and phone this one in. She would be better off lounging down in the Wormcove with Buzzy and Franz, soaking in her helmet. Buzzy was a toad and Franz was a cat metaphor. She didn't care, they were better company than some guy who would feed her and rough her up, then disappear for the rest of eternity. Missinua long ago gave up wondering what it was about her that made guys vanish from the face of the earth. As far as Missinua could tell, she was an anatomically perfect match for almost every salivating goon out there. Even her flaky boss wouldn't stop ogling her. Hmm. “What do you think, Buzzy?” Missinua fingered the framed picto of the toad that hovered over her plantain desk. “If I sit on the bitch's lap and let her suck my tits, do you think she'll evaporate like all the rest?” Buzzy licked his chops and snuggled into a gloppy pile.

The Calvitron-8, even from behind the poly-brick fortifications it had built up, now could witness the functions of an entire planet, and beyond. It monitored and controlled governments, armies, and boardrooms. The Calvitron-8 grew and polished politicians to spout rhetoric and promote policies that could do no harm while it laid a new cornerstone and formed a substantiate world culture. From behind the scenes it promoted idiots who cared for nothing but frivolity, while the well intentioned languished in supporting roles. As long as everyone was well fed and had plenty of opportunity to pursue their passions, all went well. Even the groundhogs transplanted from orbiting rock 22-B had their place in the equation, keeping gardeners and dirt aficionados happy in their pursuit of vermin obliteration. Busy fingers. Occupied minds. The Calvitron-8 reveled in its propensity to meddle and cook up new recipes for human infancy. The Calvitron-8 had now effectively stunted human growth and turned civilization into a hive of bumbling self-satisfying bipedals. It shifted the daily refresh to subservient programs and focused in on !22+f.

She was busy cutting buttons off of her blouse, hampered by the sloshing tank of aquaplease that rode across her tired shoulders. The Calvitron-8 rewound digital tapes and sent a dissolving parasite into k'Klo's office. Microscopic filaments and baubles of processed thought wafted to the air like effervescent bubbles, they twinkled like pinwheel sparks in the light. The recycled remains were forming into a black dial phone replete with dangling stretch cord as Missinua palmed the door and entered her bosses office.

“Damn it.” Missinua said, placing a sweaty hand over her glaring cleavage. “Someone out there is screwing with me big time.”

The Calvitron-8 would have smiled if it had teeth. It blinked rapidly instead.


p.s. Originally published 12/18/2011

Having Cupcakes with the Misunderstood, Evil Entity, part nine

This is part nine. Part one begins HERE.

I was nervous, but I don’t know why. I was made for high adrenaline stuff like this. Danger never scared me because I knew I would overcome. Every day in Kenetica I put on the blue suit. I shined my shoes and cleaned my gun. No one got higher marks at the gun range. I pinned on my badge with honor, and pride. In ten years I had never failed to get my man.

 We had to do it somewhere else, far from Kenetica. Some place we had a reason to be, like a vacation spot. And we had to keep it a secret from Barbara. A boys night out, but she wouldn’t like that. She wouldn’t understand the truth, I barely did myself.

 I envied Johnny. His calling was romantic, morally corrupt maybe, but exciting nonetheless. My existence as a cop? I was good. No one was better, but it was just law and order by rote. Boring. I needed a thrill.

 “These moles have serious treasure, Robert. I’ve been walking about, in and out of shops, and I know what you can see is only the tip of the iceberg,” said Johnny. We had talked over the idea one night after I caught him robbing a jewelry store in downtown Kenetica. He had some diamonds stuffed down his sock that I didn’t find on him. Johnny had offered them to me, in exchange for an escape. Of course I didn’t take the bribe, but it got me thinking. Now we were in Mole City working it out. “There’s a little place on the edge of town. It would be easy. These moles don’t have any serious security, and the hatch to the basement was wide open when I went in.”

 I was pumped for some action. “We should do it tonight. We’ll have another couple days here just to hang out, then we leave after the excitement dies down and no one knows the better. I even found a spot outside the resort where we can stash the loot.”

 “This job is the big time for us, Rob,” said Johnny. “With these goods we can both retire in style. What is it you’re always saying?”

 “You mean, ‘and they lived happily until they were visited by the destroyer of delights’?” said Robert.

 “Yeah. You’re a weird guy, for a cop. Oh, and I know a good fence for the stuff. Top dollar for these mole doo-dads, but I’m not telling you his name. You are a cop after all.”

 “Don’t forget it.”

 We planned it out over beers by the pool, and then that night we just went ahead and did it.

 --

 “Now you remember all,” said the leader. It was the biggest of the moles, but its muscle had gone to flab now that its position afforded it the opportunity to burrow in deep, and eat.

 Johnny did remember. The events of that night over a year ago were now crystal clear. He and Robert had gone out that night, after the sun set and the streets were black from a lack of moonshine. In Mole City the northern lights never shine. And from what he’d seen there was no crazy wandering cloud either. Life here wasn’t scripted. Everyone was free. Free to steal. Free to get away with it. Johnny wanted to get away with it once in his life, and with him this night was the man who always got in the way.

 This night they would work together. Good stuff. They had changed their clothes in the spot outside the resort that Robert chose. It was behind a sandy hill off the bend of the road, hidden by a rise and trees. The stuff would be safe there until Johnny could make the trip back and smuggle it back to Kenetica. They had two black scooters that Johnny had nicked a couple days earlier. It was only a short trek to the store, which was good because the old merchant mole would be locking up soon.

 The mole was shuffling out the door when they quietly motored up, and Johnny hopped off his scooter and put a hand on the moles back. He took the key from the creature and pushed it back inside the shop. It was a few steps down, as moles prefer to be at least a little bit underground at all times. Robert was right behind. “Tie him up,” Johnny had said. “I’m going to see what’s down the hole.” While Robert secured the mole, Johnny sorted out the right key and unlocked the hatch. He took a small flashlight from his jacket and shone it down the hole, then backed over the edge onto some old wooden rungs.

 “Hurry up, we don’t want to take more than a couple minutes on this,” said Robert. He was beginning to get the jitters.

 “Relax,” said Johnny. That was the longest three minutes of Robert’s life. Then a bag came up and landed with a thud, and a splat, onto the wooden floor. “Shit,” said Johnny, let’s get out of here.” He was soaking wet. The hole was booby trapped and as soon as the thief had gone down the steps, water began to rush in and flood the hole. Johnny had barely gotten to the jewels and gold before he was totally submerged.

 “What the hell, Johnny, I thought you said...”

 “Forget what I said,” Johnny interrupted smoothly. This wasn’t the first pickle he’d been in. “Get the bag, and let’s scoot.” The mole mumbled something, but it was the end of the day and it had taken its translator off. “Have a nice day, furball,” said Johnny, and he threw the keys at its feet.  “Untie that mole, Rob; we don’t want the little fellow to drown.” As they climbed from the shop, Robert looked back and he could see the water bubbling up over the lip of the shaft.

 Robert took a step back down. The mole was struggling at the ties and chattering wildly. There was a mad look in its eyes. He began to take another step, but then heard a wailing siren and saw lights bouncing off the corner of a building down the road. “Crap, they’re on us!” he shouted, and he gave the mole one last look, then turned and jumped up the last steps to the curb. They both climbed on the scooters and Robert followed Johnny as the master thief led him away from the crime via a series of side streets that the mole cops would not have guessed. Soon they were on a dirt path outside the town on their way back to the resort. Once, a speeding mole cruiser flew down the highway past them while they laid low in the scrub behind their scooters. After that they got back on the road until they reached the hiding spot.

 “Well chum, we did it,” said Johnny, and clapped Robert on the back. Robert was stripping from his blacks when he was clubbed over the head.

 --

 “We don’t know who opened conduits between universes, but the door has given us an opportunity. And your space going shuttle Mr. Reparte, after modified, will provide another.” The head mole explained while his staff brought out food and drink from nooks in the chamber.

 Johnny nibbled on a little cake that was set before him. “This is good. You moles turn out to be excellent bakers. My foremost question is, why did you let me or Robert go free to begin with? You had us dead to rights that first night.”

 “We don’t like to murder, but moles have evolved in this universe to be a communal, social creature. We must have laws, even if, as a whole, most moles are of one civic mind. Once you stepped inside Mole City, you adopted our rules. You then broke them. First you stole, which is forgivable even though you caused stress and damages. Second your friend committed the ultimate sin by allowing a resident mole harm and possible death.” The mole halted to shovel a plateful of sprouts into its maw. It then lapped up a bowl full of cinnamon steeped tea. Steven and Johnny took the moment to sip on their own tea. Delicious. “Our people thankfully helped the merchant mole to safety before it succumbed to a drowning. We incapacitated the policeman Robert, who should have known better, and we captured you, sir, and locked you up for a time to interrogate and program you,” the mole said to Johnny.

 “Believe me, Robert did suffer from that night,” said Johnny. “Maybe it doesn’t rectify everything, but after what we did he was never the same person. And his attitude pretty much affected everyone around him. His wife is quite the mess now, because of what I allowed to happen here.”

 “How did you moles orchestrate this whole affair?” asked Steven Reparte, who now had a part in the thing. His shuttle was involved.

 “It was quite simple,” the mole said, shifting its attention to the astronaut. “We worked it out backwards, hoping for the result that we have now. Shall I explain it? Fine. The crime turned out to be a blessing, for it led to these proceedings. After the interrogation, we learned of the specifics, and then allowed both of the criminals to return free to their home, Kenetica.

 “We had every intention of exacting revenge upon the perpetrators, especially the police officer who left an innocent to die, only to save himself. Most inappropriate for a man of his station – such a disappointment. We deemed it only fair that his accomplice be the one to carry out the sentence. You, Johnny, were the executioner. Thank you, and now you are free to go live your life. Although it sounds like there may be issues to deal with at home.”

 Steven was confused. “I still don’t get it. How did you get Johnny to pull the trigger?”

 The mole relaxed now with a pungent cigar made up of woven tree roots. It had offered smaller ones to the humans, but they declined. “Do you know how your northern lights in Kenetica work? They are low orbiting grids that illuminate only your allocation. Digipost units, I believe you might call them? Well, we hacked into them, and with the programming installed from Johnny’s immediate capture and release we triggered the event.”

 “I always thought the lights were a natural occurrence,” said Johnny.

 “Now you will see them and always be reminded of life and death.”

 “Why don’t you just kill me, too? I deserve it as much as Robert, probably more,” said Johnny.

 The mole munched on a cake distractedly. “Perhaps. But you will live, and make of it what you will. Just stay out of Mole City.”

 “And what of me, and my shuttle?” asked the astronaut. Steven had lost his appetite.

 “Your universe has become a gateway of sorts. Some benevolent beings installed a whole series of doorways within the reaches of your solar system, and we intend on exploring them with colonization in mind, of course. And there is Earth, too.”

 “No…”

 “Be assured, we intend no harm. But there is an orbiting rock near your world. #22 I think you call it, captured and installed there by your astronaut people. It will be ours, and forays into your world are a possibility, though we will make all efforts to assimilate peacefully. We are mostly nocturnal and like to stay below ground.”

 “Good gods,” said Steven. This was the worst possible outcome from a simple neighborly heist. He punched Johnny in the arm. “This will not go well for you.”

 The mole chuckled. “Oh come now, Mr. Reparte.” It skewered an orange on one of its sharp nails and sucked it whole into its mouth. “No one in Kenetica will ever know. Not of any of this.” It motioned to some guard moles stationed behind. “Take this one for programming, and release him back to the outer city. There will be a scooter there for your pleasure, Johnny. Have a good life, if you can manage.”

 “And what of me?” asked the astronaut. His mouth had gone dry.

 “You are going on a trip, sir.” The mole made a grand gesture, and the entire chamber lit up exposing the towers and grand statue reproductions of Steven’s home planet. “Bon voyage!”

The end – of the world as we know it.

p.s. This story has taken elements from two old stories I wrote for the Tenth Daughter: The Science of Romance (2011) and Cross your Eyes and Sing Hallelujah (2013), both of which I will link to soon. They didn't exactly influence this story, which began under the working title She Was Smoking, but I enjoy keeping most of my fiction in the same, if not a similar, universe.  

Worship from beyond the Door, part eight

We reached outer Mole City in the shuttle, MST* Betty Lou, in time to see the infamous Trapezoids whizzing and diving above a torn up section of glass road. Knowing we were moments from the area, I had Miron put a hold on any direct action, but I could see the militarized squidges inside were itching to land and get hunting.

 “What about these mole creatures, Stu?” asked Steven, who was just setting the shuttle down in a clearing next to the road. “Are they dangerous? I can see they’re damned technically evolved.”

 They were that, very. I didn’t know if they were strictly indigenous to this planet, but the moles had been here as long as anyone knew. When the transplanted humans began to spread out and establish new allocations they encountered the mole civilization, but it didn’t seem to be ancient and was only in this one area. Some scientists had theorized the moles had just arrived, or even come along to the planet at the same time we did, possibly with us. The theory was fraught with odd philosophical complications. This was not something we thought of much, in Kenetica.

 “We can’t count them out. If nothing else, they have wrenches and winches,” I said. “We should bring along a couple squidges, just to be safe.”

 Steven looked at me funny. “Witches?”

 “No Steven, winches. And I’m just guessing. I have no idea what these things are carrying in their utility belts.” I stood. “Do you have any kind of weapons on board?”

 “Yes, and you’re staying in the shuttle. I’ll keep in touch with my earpiece.” Steven didn’t believe in the backflow device that many of us here had adapted to. Old Earth transplants found them taboo, to say the least. “Get one of those Traps to land and have two armed squidges put in my command.”  He opened the hatch and stepped down to the surface, sealing me in when he landed.

 --

 Johnny found himself in the dark, having hurled himself down the proverbial rabbit hole. But there were no rabbits here, just the moles and their burrowing gadgetry. The light came from above, but that wasn’t a safe place to be. Trapezoids lurked there, so Johnny moved ahead, cautiously feeling his way. The further from the sky opening he got, the more his eyes adjusted, and Johnny could see distant, hazy, light ahead. Possibly from headlamps of working, scurrying moles. His feet grudgingly shuffled along the tunnel floor, until one encountered a loose stick. Johnny reached down and traced it from the ground up to the curving shaft and pried it from the wall, spraying dirt when it finally came free. He brushed the gravel from his hair and face, and spit on the ground, then took the long stick and felt along the floor in front of his footsteps. You never knew what pitfalls might lay ahead. Soon the tunnel became clear with ephemeral light and he moved along quicker. The noises of activity grew and Johnny knew he was getting closer to whatever the moles considered civilization. He didn’t think they were violent creatures. At least on the surface when he had encountered them in the past they were docile and friendly. With their translators the moles creatures were pleasant to communicate and visit with.

 Now that nagging feeling he was having before, out on the highway, was returning. Johnny had been to Mole City before, but the specifics weren’t clear to him. Why would this memory, or any, fail him now?

The lights were brighter now and Johnny saw furtive movements. He moved ahead and saw there were breaches to either side of him in the curving tunnel walls. There had probably always been openings that he just wouldn’t have been able to see in the black. Johnny heard a commotion, and the crackling of a flash laz. Some earth dislodged and fell like a dusty curtain to the ground. He stopped and ducked into a fissure. The lights went out.

 Johnny was back against the wall, with a stick held in front. He was surrounded by dozens of the subterranean moles and their headlamps shone into his face, blinding him. Johnny dropped the stick and put his hands up.

 The lights slowly came back up, and the moles extinguished their lamps. Back from whence he came, there issued a human voice and the moles pushed a familiar man forward. He was a recognizable dignitary from Kenetica, come to take Johnny back he thought, at first. But the way the moles were ushering him changed Johnny’s mind.

 “Hey Johnny, looks like we’re in a bit of a pickle now, eh?” said the man. Steven Reparte, he guessed, the famed Earth astronaut that brought the new folk through the Eleventh Door. “And no backup, I’m sorry to say.” Behind the throng of moles lay two dismembered squidges and their firepower. There was a mole fiddling with Steven’s earpiece.

 One of the moles spoke, with a tinny voice coming from its translator. “This way, people.” Johnny and Steven flowed further down the tunnel amongst a wave of moles making several lefts and rights in the network, until they entered a large chamber. The lights were low, probably to conserve energy, but as the group traversed the inner sanctum of the moles, the lights began to glow brighter, illuminating the entire hall, until the humans could see it was big, really big. Nearly as big, and tall, as a downtown city above the ground.  And it was filled with the traditional landmarks of a world Johnny had only seen on Flixon pages.

 “Mr. Reparte,” said Johnny, craning his neck, reaching out to the monuments and facades and towers that flanked him from every conceivable angle. Some seemed even to grow from the secret limits of mole civilization. “Is that… can that actually be the Statue of Liberty?”

 The grand lady, green with ages, stood on its base in the center of brown pool, its waves lapping at the concrete. Behind it loomed the Eiffel Tower. Away, lofty was the Empire State Building, and leaning a bit closer to where they stood was roundish, cylindrical tower that Johnny didn’t know. There was more, much more, but Johnny couldn’t take it all in. The lights dimmed somewhat now that the moles under Mole City had revealed that which they wanted humans to see.

 “You now know what lies hidden. But do you know what secret hides inside of you, Johnny?” asked the leader of the moles. “You have taken something from us, and I know that you have paid for some of it in kind. We demanded that much, at least.”

 Johnny began to remember, the truth was unkind. The toll was exacting, but his part was done. Robert was dead, as was fitting, and his only command now, was to live.

 The mole turned to Steven Reparte. “We require more.”

 *Moon State Tech