The Selection
by Eric W. Knight
I
can’t move. I can’t even resist. All I can do is stare straight ahead
and wait to be examined. And I’m not alone. There are others around me
here in the Hall of Selection. We are all frozen in place, and waiting
to be examined.
I didn’t want to come
here. No one does. But I was compelled. My mind said, “run away,” but
my body just took me to the Hall of Selection. I wait here to be
examined to see if my body is a suitable replacement for one of our
immortal public servants.
The practice of providing
bodies for our public servants began long before my day. Life for
society was out of control then. Rampant crime and government
corruption had society on the edge of destruction. Criminals committed
crimes and paid corrupt government officials to avoid prosecution.
Eventually even the corrupt officials weren’t safe.
Then someone submitted an
outrageous solution: public servants who’s only function in life was to
serve the public. They would do nothing else, and in return they would
have immortality.
There were two surprising
things: first the solution was accepted, and second there were
volunteers. I wouldn’t have given up my life like that, even for
immortality.
Within a short time these
public servants brought peace to society. Criminals were brought to
justice by relentless administrators of the law. Public works were
started and completed without the interference of corrupt public
officials. That was long ago, and they are still doing their work today.
Society prospered, and
still does. And we never think about the cost. As the bodies of the
public servants wore out, their bodies had to be replaced. The bodies
of criminals were used first, but that source dried up, because crime
truly didn’t pay anymore.
Their solution, before my
day was a lottery which is still in use today. We are in denial and
never think about it. We never believe that we will be selected to
supply a body for one of the immortal public servants. But now it’s
happening to me.
In front of me a column of
light illuminates the person being examined. Those rejected are simply
led back and released outside, I think of them as saved. Some wander
away dazed. Some collapse into convulsions. Others run away and don’t
stop until they are exhausted.
As those chosen are led
away, they look to the rest of us for help, but we can do nothing. They
look to the attendants for comfort, but they get nothing. The
attendants are some of the immortal public servants.
What will happen to me if
I am chosen? Does my consciousness just go away? What happens to my
memories? Does all that is me just disappear? I know there are answers
to these questions, but no one asks them. I didn’t want to know until
now.
When my friends see my
body, will they look away, because they too are in denial? Will the
public servant that has my body know my friends, but not even care?
I want to warn my friends;
warn everyone, but they wouldn’t listen. I have heard stories of those
rejected. For a moment, we share their joy at not being chosen. Then we
quickly forget about it, and never speak about it.
There are so many things I
still want to do; so many things I should have done. Before now I
thought I had a lifetime. Now, some public servant may have my
lifetime. Will the public servant even know who I was? Probably not,
memories get in the way of duty.
I look at those ahead of
me. Are they feeling the same regrets? Or are they just feeling the
terror of non-existence. I am feeling both, and each time someone ahead
of me is accepted or rejected, it brings the light closer to me. When
it reaches me, will I be chosen or will I be saved?
Eric Knight works in
the aerospace industry, and lives in Pennsylvania between Valley Forge
and where Daniel Boone grew up. When he is not helping out on youth
projects such as elementary school science fair, he writes articles for
an amateur astronomy association and writes occasional science fiction
stories. The rich history of the area where he lives provides a wide
range of potentials for imaginative fiction.
Top of Page
Sometimes nothing we
experience is real...
Trip at the Brain
By Scott Wilson
“Jack, is that you? It
is, isn’t it? What are you doing wandering up and down 42nd Street like that?” Luke
said the man in a crumpled, tan suit as he brushed past him.
The stranger stopped
suddenly and stared at Luke with a blank expression. He tried to
remember where he had been, who he was.
“You mean New York’s 42nd Street? Can’t be...I
haven’t been in New York for years and years. I think?” Jack said in a
strong Australian accept that sounded foreign to him.
“You look like you’ve
just woken up. Are you feeling okay, sport? Here come with me, there is
a cafe across the road. We can sit down and get you a drink.”
“I’m sorry,” Jack said.
“I don’t seem to remember who you are. Actually, I think I’d better sit
down, my head is whirling around.”
Luke ordered two
cappuccinos and some bran muffins, thinking Jack might need a sugar
boost or something.
“Where are you staying,
old pal?” Luke said. “You must come spend some time with me. Do you
remember Patricia; we got hitched two years ago and have beautiful set
of twins.”
Jack rubbed his temples.
His head pounded and his back ached as though he’d been rolled for his
wallet, which would explain the amnesia and crumpled clothes. He tried
to remember his last memory, something to let him know what had
happened.
“Are you still shacked
up with that brunette...what was her name?”
“I...I...”
Darkness came down
across Luke’s eyes and he felt himself falling. He put his hands out to
break his fall, rather than his nose, but he did not hit the ground. He
felt cold and nauseous.
“I...I...”
Jack opened his eyes and
found himself sitting at a kitchen table with a brunette and a young
boy. They seemed vaguely familiar, but he could not place who they
were, or where he was.
“You didn’t hear a word
I said, did you?” the brunette said harshly. “I sometimes wonder why I
even bother talking to you.”
“Dad, are you going to
come to see me play football afterschool today? It’s the grand finals.”
Jack nodded at the boy,
not knowing who he was, but not wanting to upset the kid’s excitement.
The boy jumped up and hugged him, then ran out of the room.
“You’d better be there,
Jack,” the brunette said. “You’ll break his heart if you miss this
game.”
“I...I...” he began to
say, then felt dizzy and nauseas again. Darkness clouded his vision
again and the falling sensation hit him like a Mack truck.
He opened his eyes. This
time there was nobody around, nobody at all. A chill ran up his spine.
He stood in the middle of a football field, alone. Not a single person
could be seen or heard.
“Hey...hey, you,” a
voice called.
Jack looked at the
player’s entrance to the field and saw a woman standing there. She
beckoned him over.
“Who are you? Where am
I?” Jack said.
“You must be a newbie,”
she said. “Did you just start taking Insu-D?”
“Insu-D?” That rang a
bell with Jack. He recognised it as an insulin replacement drug that
was supposed to cure diabetes. “Yes, yes I did.”
“Well, you’re in for a
ride,” she said. “Anytime someone speaks to you and says a key word
that you relate to your life, you’re going to end up there.”
“Where am I now?”
“I don’t know exactly.
It’s kind of between places...happens when you don’t exactly remember
the prompt. Don’t worry, once you start thinking, you’ll remember
something, or somewhere and you’ll be there.”
“Why are you here then?”
“Once you learn to
control this, you can find your way to this place whenever you want.
Comes in handy sometimes.”
Jack noticed the
Armourguard bag in the woman’s hand.
“Did you just rob a
bank?”
The woman was no longer
standing there. Jack thought about the conversation and wondered if he
was going mad.
“Just think,” he said.
“Where is somewhere I know?”
He looked in his wallet,
flicked through the credit cards, receipts, and photos. A script for
Insu-D fell out and he picked it up. When he stood up, he was no longer
at the stadium.
“Quick, grab him!” a
voice yelled.
Jack looked around. He
stood in a familiar chemist, but there were a dozen armed undercover
police officers standing around him. He felt a needle enter the back of
his neck and started to lose consciousness.
“Get him to the lab
before he wakes up,” one of the officers said. “He’s the second last
one we have to collect.”
“Lucky there was only
thirty people in this new drug trial,” Jack heard before drifting away.
Top of Page
Sometimes a doughnut is
just a doughnut. But other times...
Lucid
By Gregg Williard
“She could be one of
them.” Matt nodded toward the end of the counter. A Japanese woman of
indeterminate age with fuchsia hair and an aqua hoody sat alone with a
donut and coffee. Jake had never seen anyone eat a donut the way she
did, from the outside surface moving in, turning it with each nibble
until there was nothing but a perfect ring around the center. She
placed it on the counter to study between sips of coffee.
Matt whispered,
“She’s here every Saturday morning. Orders coffee and a cake donut,
always real careful not to bite the hole.”
Jake said, “Yeah?”
Matt leaned closer,
talking low and fast. “So let’s say that everybody and everything is a
projection of extra-dimensional forces that ‘interpret’ us in three
dimensions, OK? And if we’re all electromagnetic metaphors downloaded
from quantum data streams compressed to infinity inside the sentient
black holes that are ‘dreaming’ us, then some people, just a few people
, like that woman there, could be a black hole’s version of a ‘lucid
dream’.”
“Yeah…”
“…which posits the
donut batter as ‘objective correlative’ for plasma crushed in a torus
of solenoid magnets, pressurized and accelerated until the nuclei fuse,
which of course makes her eating the donut a representation of a
representation, an avatar of a circular particle accelerator that is,
in turn, a lower order, non-sentient expression of their dreaming us
into being, you know?”
“Yeah. But…”
“But what?”
“But don’t black
holes eat matter and galaxies and stuff? Are they dreaming us up just
to eat us? Like, you know, a chef imagining a new recipe for poached
quail eggs?”
Matt blinked. “That’s
a complete distortion, Jake.”
“I just don’t get
what they want.”
“What they want?
Jake! The question has no meaning. Even if it did we’d be incapable of
ever knowing the answer. The consciousness we’re considering is
infinitely more complex than ours. I mean, do you even ever know what
your own consciousness ‘wants’, let alone anyone else’s?” At that
moment Jake’s eyes met the woman’s. Neither looked away. Her pensive
expression softened. She smiled, and he blushed. And smiled back.
“You know what I
mean? Jake? Jake?"
Gregg Williard grew
up in Columbus, Ohio and New York, New York. He is currently at work on
a novel called Art Soldiers.
Top of Page
The immutability of the time stream has long
been a staple of science fiction. Here is a tale that shows even though
you might change the past, you still might not get the future you are
looking for!
First
Ones
by Joseph DeRepentigny
It was a cold cloudy
day on a desolate spot of land with dunes surmounted by tufts of hardy
grass. A hard wind blew across the scene stirring up carrying the sand
to scour anyone and anything in its way.
Here also stood two
men dressed in heavy woolen brown doubled breasted suits braved the
stinging wind. One was short and dumpy looking with a mustache. He had
the look of a man who lived for all you can eat buffets and desserts.
"People actually wore these things?" he said as he pulled at his collar
and fidgeted in the suit uncomfortably.
"These clothes are
perfect replicas of the genuine article." his partner said with a
frown. He was a slightly taller and thinner but without a mustache. His
similar features told the world the two of them were brothers. "If you
told the outfitters your real size you'd be a little more comfortable
Tony."
"I must have gained
some weight in the last few days John." Tony said adjusting his belt.
John sighed, "Anyway
this is the place."
"They're launching
today?"
"No," John said
looking around. "The wind is a too strong. They'll launch tomorrow."
"So why are we here
now?" Tony said turning away from the wind. "If I wanted to see a
windswept beach I'd go to Hampton not to this place."
"Do you remember how
Grandpa, used to tell us how his grandfather almost invented the
airplane?"
"Yeah, but also he
told us plenty of other tall tales." Tony said with a chuckle. "Like
the time he captured those bank robbers single-handedly."
"Well I checked this
one out and he was right. Timothy Wesel was beaten to the glory by one
week."
"Yeah, but what can
you do?" He then stopped fidgeting and looked at his brother seriously.
"You're not planning on killing these guys, are you?"
"No, the time police
would have our hides." John said shaking his head and smiling. "I'm
just adding a variable in our favor."
"What?"
John produced a dark
colored rock from his pocket. "Follow me." He then walked up to some
wooden tracks. They were made of cedar and about fifteen yards long and
six inches across. Looking like miniature rails for a child's train set
their design was to keep a vehicle moving in a straight line.
"You see tomorrow
when the wind dies down they'll load the plane onto these tracks and
roll it down into history." John said with a smile.
"I read the story
when I was a kid," Tony said with a growing annoyance.
"Well, what if this
rock somehow made its way into the middle of the track?" John said
putting the rock in place.
"They'll roll over
it." Tony said shaking his head.
"No, I tested my
theory," John said with a smile. "They'll get stuck. Additionally with
the tools they have it will take them a week to get the plane free. By
then Timothy Wesel will invent the airplane and our family will be
rich."
"What if they find
the rock?"
"I read their
biographies." John replied, "They both said they forgot to inspect the
tracks out of excitement."
"What about the Time
Police?"
"We won't be here
when it happens so they can't link us to the incident."
Tony frowned for a
minute and said, "How will we know if it worked?"
"When we get back to
our time we'll look it up in a book on aviation I have in the
apartment." John said with a smile. He then pulled out a device that
looked like a plain leather bound notebook. Opening it instead of pages
was a pad that gave off a blue glow. Pressing the pad a door appeared
in front of them. "Let's go home and see how rich we are."
The two of them
stepped through the door into a well-lit room. On the walls were
posters announcing Vacations in Time. A young woman in a tight
one-piece suit smiled at them and asked. "So how was your Vacation in
Time?"
"Awful," Tony said,
"The suit itches!"
"It is the heavy wool
and linens they used back then." she said with a nod. "It wasn't meant
for comfort just long wear. You can change back into your own clothes
in the next room."
The two of them
changed into their street clothes and rushed home in excitement. When
they got home, they found their apartment was still the same. It was
still a low rent flat furnished with cheap furniture.
"It's the same." Tony
said with a frown, "Your plan didn't work we are still poor."
John shook his head
and grabbed a library book titled "The History of Aviation" sitting on
a nearby table. "I don't understand it. It should have worked." Opening
the volume, to a booked marked page he read it and chocked.
"What's wrong
brother?"
"We succeeded."
"So why aren't we
rich?"
"Because Timothy
Wesel didn't invent the airplane in Salisbury England," he said leaning
against the shelf, "nor did the Benz brothers in Germany. Now the
history book says it was two Americans named Wilbur and Orville Wright."
"Who?"
Originally from Massachusetts Mr. DeRepentigny
now lives in the Atlanta area. A former DeVry student and computer
professional he presently works as a Government
Employee with over 15 years of service. A member of the
Georgia Writer's Association, to date he has
published 40 short stories in a variety of venues both online
and in print. (Presently Unagented)
Top of Page
By Michael Lee Johnson
Deep into the forest
the trees have turned
black, and the sun
has disappeared in
the distance beneath
the earth line, leaving
the sky a palette of grays
sheltering the pine trees
with pitch-tar shadows.
It is here in this black
and sky gray the mind
turns psycho
tosses norms and pathos
into a ground cellar of hell,
tosses words out through the teeth.
"Don't smile or act funny,
try to be cute with me;
how can I help you today
out of your depression?"
I feel jubilant, I feel over the moon
with euphoric gaiety.
Damn, I just feel happy!
Back into the wood of somberness,
back into the twigs,
sedated the psychiatrist
scribbles, notes, nonsense on a pad of
yellow paper:
"Mania, oh yes, mania, I prescribe
lithium, do I need to call the police?"
No sir, back into the dark woods I go.
Controlled, to get my meds. I
twist and rearrange my smile,
crooked, to fit the immediate need.
Deep in my forest
the trees have turned black again,
to satisfy the conveyer-
the Lord of the dark wood.
Michael Lee Johnson is a poet and freelance
writer from Itasca, Illinois. His brand new poetry chapbook with
pictures From
Which Place the Morning Rises and
his new photo version of The
Lost American: From Exile to Freedom are available at:http://stores.lulu.com/promomanusa. The original version of The Lost
American: from Exile to Freedom, can be found at:http://www.iuniverse.com/bookstore/book_detail.asp?isbn=0-595-46091-7. He
has been published in over 22 countries. Email: promomanusa@gmail.com. The
author is also editor/publisher of four poetry sites, all open for
submission, which can be found at his website: http://poetryman.mysite.com/.
Top of Page
by
Essie Gilbey
Love is a ghost that haunts me; like a
breath of cold air.
Insubstantial,
hard to describe, but definitely there.
What keeps me
here, alone in the crowd,
thinking mad
thoughts while they rush around?
Love is a cage
that tames me; I’ve put myself in chains
even as I dream
wild dreams of running free again.
Love keeps me
here, alone in the crowd,
struggling to
free myself, holding myself down.
Love is a shadow
that follows me; inextricable.
What would it be
like without it; dark and inexplicable?
It keeps me
here, afraid to leave,
though my
impatience beats with every heart beat.
Love is a cliché
that taunts me; its words are so abused.
I want to tell
you I love you, but you’ll only be confused.
Your well worn
words can’t placate me
and I should
leave before you hate me, but…
Love is my life;
it’s the very air that I breathe.
And I’m afraid
of losing it, should I ever speak.
Your over-used
words won’t see us through.
I’m longing to
be free and yet still - loving you.
Set me free,
release me,
for heaven’s
sake you’re suffocating me.
Let me love you,
please leave me be.
Please let me
love you and still be me.
DEATH CONDUCTOR
By John Grey
You want to hear that
scream, each
phrase laid out joyous and
clear
like crotchets and
semi-quavers
on a stave of music.,
You long to conduct the
orchestra
of her fear with a smooth
hand,
with the roll of your
contented body
through a stack of blankets.
There must be strings of
blood,
thumping timpani of
terror-jammed
bones, brash brass of
stricken hearts,
and that piercing cymbal
crash
when breath flies out of
the body one last time.
It must all come together in
your dreams, to the audience
of flannel sheets, down
pillows,
rhythmic, melodic, not one
thing betraying your
arrangement.
No messy, atonal gutter
slaying here,
no dissonance like that alley
where she ripped bad chords
down your tattooed cheek,
soured the tempo with
a swift knee to your crotch,
sabotaged the coda by
escaping.
John Grey is an
Australian born poet. He has been a US resident since late seventies.
He works as financial systems analyst. He has recently been published
in Slant, Briar Cliff Review, Georgetown Review, Connecticut
Review, South Carolina Review, The Pedestal. and Albatross with work
upcoming in Poetry East, Cape Rock and REAL.
Top of Page
Manic
is the Dark Night
