catesbury___________________
_________________ i n t e l l i g e n t f i c t i o n. . . w i t h a s p e c u l a t i v e s l a n t
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Issue 1.0
We open ISSUE ONE with a special poem from a fellow National University alumni, Amy George,
publisher of Bird's Eye reView, an online poetry magazine.
Graphic Design Free Resources™ website are original materials created by the site author, Graphire and other individuals who granted the author permission to alter, distribute, or adapt their works for the purposes intended by this site.
Natural Interaction ____________
By: Amy George
As a child, I imagined being the wind,
holding blackbirds up
as they swooped and turned,
bursting from clouds,
in and out of shadows.
Trees bent and swayed
in a dance that I choreographed.
When the time was right,
I stripped branches bare,
showered the earth with color.
I watched leaves
as they spun and floated,
kicked them from the ground
so they fluttered down again.
I tossed pine cone seeds in the air,
just to see them spin to the ground
like dozens of tiny doomed helicopters.
I skipped rocks on pond water
just to feel the power of orchestrating
something from my fingers
that touched the wildness
of the world.
Originally published in National University's "GNU" fiction, art, and poetry review, Summer 2008. Thanks, Amy!! Amy L. George holds an MFA in Creative Writing from National University where her concentration of study was poetry. She is author of The Fragrance of Memory (Amsterdam Press, 2010). Her poems have been published in journals such as Poesia, Word Catalyst Magazine, The Orange Room Review, The Toronto Quarterly, WestWard Quarterly and The Foliate Oak Online. She also has an article in the textbook-anthology, "The Working Poet," edited by Scott Minar and published by Autumn House Press. She currently resides in Texas, where she enjoys teaching English and Writing and Publishing Poetry at Southwestern Assemblies of God University.
Graphic Design Free Resources™ website are original materials created by the site author, Graphire and other individuals who granted the author permission to alter, distribute, or adapt their works for the purposes intended by this site.
Angel W i n g s _____________
I met Audrey in the winter. I remember because she walked through the snow wearing angel wings and I thought she was the prettiest girl in the world. I walked up and waved and she waved back. I thought it was strange, a pretty girl waving to me. But then, as I found out, Audrey was a mystery. So I spoke up, the first time I’d ever spoken to a girl outside of a classroom.
“Where are your folks?” I said. The snow was dropping down and a flake caught on my tongue. It made me smile and she smiled back, even though she didn’t answer my question.
“Where are yours?” she asked. Later, I learned later that Audrey did this a lot. She called it ‘mirroring.’ She answered a question with a question, so she didn’t have to respond. I thought it was clever and tried it in math class, but all I got was a smack round the back of my head.
“Dead,” I said. I’d stopped crying after saying that word, but it had taken me a long time. Even at sixteen I had to steel myself as I spoke and was glad that the snow was melting on my eyes, giving me a good excuse if any tears fell.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “Death is only one part of life. I’m Audrey.” She stuck out her hand and I shook it. I was so impressed to be shaking hands that I forgot to ask what the hell she meant. I get confused a lot; it’s better, sometimes, that I don’t dwell on things. My teacher seems to agree with me on that; they quite happily skate over things and ignore me when it comes to answering questions. I call it ‘gliding.’ The only thing I was ever good at was writing, on account that I love looking at the words and the shapes they take on.
“I’m Todd,” I said, “Todd Williams.” Our hands were still shaking and it felt almost like we were pulling each other. I started to laugh. I always think it’s important to start a friendship on a good footing; as we were laughing, I figured we would become best friends.
And yes indeed, we did! We became what I like to call, firm friends. Audrey didn’t seem to have any friends in our class either; the school was only the town hall and there weren’t many to bully us. We sat in the back, holding our books, pretending to study, smiling slyly to each other and sharing secrets. I was big and Audrey was sharp and the rest of the world knew enough to leave well alone.
Class would finish and we would go down by the river and skim stones or make shapes from the clouds. It was the happiest winter of my life. I asked a few more times about her folks and she always ‘mirrored’ me, so after a while I gave up asking. We just went on, by the by, each of us marveling how soon winter ended and spring had begun.
‘Time flies,’ I told her, ‘when you’re having fun.’ And she smiled. Audrey never laughed, not once, but she smiled a lot. It was a smile that made me wonder, made me think because even though she was smiling, she seemed sad, especially around the eyes. One day I asked her, expecting to be mirrored but instead, she faced up and answered me.
“I’ve seen things and can’t un-see them. Even though I try.”
“What is it you saw?” I asked. My heart was trembling then, on account we had never spoken like this--solemnly--before.
“Ugly things. I guess they stay in my eyeballs, like dirt, and make them seem ugly.” She skimmed a stone something fierce then, and it must have zinged five times before it got swallowed up by the water. On any other day, I would have yelled out; but not on that day.
“No, I didn’t say ugly, I said sad. That’s a whole lot of difference,” I said, feeling weightless; had I really corrected her?
“Well, I beg your pardon, sir,” she said and smiled her crooked little smile. I was nervous. I can’t tell when people feel slighted and when they’re being genuine. I’ve heard of ‘sarcasm’ but it’s as lost on me like algebra and names of all the capitals in Europe. Everything seemed to still. Then, she leaned over and kissed me clear on the cheek.
“It’s a good thing I’ve got you to look at and keep me smiling then, isn’t it, Todd Williams?” and then she broke off and went off running into the woods. I stood, frozen, my legs just about ready to give way. Then I turned and ran straight after her.
Spring was a strange time in our town; there are barely a hundred people in it and when the fruit season comes there are less. Audrey disappeared for a day or two. I was sick with worry.
When she came back down to the river - our meeting point - well, I was just about fit to burst. I hollered at her and flailed my arms about like nobody’s business. It didn’t go on for long, this rage of mine, and after a minute or two it subsided and I felt half foolish and the rest ashamed. Audrey, trembling and frail, slipped wordlessly between my big, dumb windmill arms and went on shivering. I made to say I was sorry but she shushed me good and proper and I understood it wasn’t me that was responsible for triggering this outburst. It was something else, all right. It was something tied into those two days she’d gone missing. I asked her outright what had happened; it was an awkward way to ask, me talking to the crown of her head and her shivering.
“You ever wondered if folks are born bad?” She managed to say, in a stuttering voice that puttered like a broken toy train.
“I don’t know,” I said honestly. I cleared my throat, my heart racing like a jack-hammer. “If someone’s being bad to you, Audrey, then I’ll go after them. I don’t mind.” It was true, too. If she had pointed someone out now, what folks would call the perpetrator, I would have done my best to tear them to shreds. I’m a mild sort, by and large, but seeing Audrey like that--it teed me up into some sort of fury.
“You would, too, I know. We’ll wait, Todd, okay? When the time comes the bad folks will get what’s coming. We’re right on that, aren’t we?” Her head drew up and she looked at me. Most times Audrey looked about ten years older than me, but then, right then, she looked like a little girl. I reasoned that’s the way people get when they’ve been hurt by folk.
“That’s right,” I said, not sure what I was agreeing to but dead set on going along with any plan Audrey might have been cooking up. And like that, it was settled.
That spring was a tough season. Audrey would drift away and return days later, her eyes sadder than before. Once she mentioned the church and I tried to piece together what I could from that, but my mind got jammed up along the way and I couldn’t connect the dots. I saw scars on her arms and legs that didn’t come from any bushes and I asked her about it. But each time I did, she simply tapped the red book that she’d taken to carrying around with her all through that time and smiled.
I sometimes hated that book, though I couldn’t quite say why. I think I was jealous of it, the way it held her when she read the pages, but there was more to it than that, too. I think it was because when she read it, it seemed to fill her up some and change her into an Audrey I didn’t know. Her eyes went from being sad to full, oily things and the creases in her brow made her look about a hundred. When she read the book I had to leave, cursing it under my breath. And that was the other damn thing; I knew when she was done with it, too. She hollered to me without using her mouth but with her mind or some such tom-foolery. But I came every time, nonetheless. No choice.
When the spring was done, the bad times seemed to stop. Audrey was with me every day, the red book in the satchel. But Audrey started talking about the future, about being away from the town; some of the craziest talk I’d ever heard! I listened the way you listen to a story-telling performer. But I went along, half shaking my head and half believing every word she said and damned if I didn’t find myself dreaming about what she’d said every evening! I suppose, because it was summer, everything seemed possible. But that was the trick to Audrey--every word she said had a little steel to it, so I knew she wasn’t fooling, not really.
The only thing that shook me when she got to talking were her eyes. They weren’t sad any longer, not even when she spoke about the bad folk. No, they were something else, something hard. It was like a part of that red book had seeped into her veins and crawled all the way up into her head and there was no way of dislodging it, not come hell or high water. And when I saw those eyes flashing, all oily and full of intent, well, I don’t mind admitting that I shivered like it was all the way back to winter and I felt about as scared as could be.
The summer got to its peak around July. Where we are, it’s close to unbearable. They’re parts of the day when you have to run for cover or suffer the sun. For most folk these are lazy days, but for Audrey these were the times when her mind went into overdrive. Sure enough, that red book came back out and she’d go hours without so much as speaking a word to me. Instead she’d duck under a willow and flip those pages, possessed, moving her lips, following the words, mumbling the way people do in their sleep. I’d watch her until she shoo-ed me away and it was like watching a perfect stranger.
She’d disappear for longer spells, three or four days. It got so bad that I was the one who started to shake when she’d come back and Audrey would have to take me in her arms. It was almost like she’d accepted whatever terrible things it was they were doing to her. There were no tears left in her, only that oily steel. God save me, if I didn’t think a part of her was accepting whatever it was the folks were doing to her as some sort of test or something. I told her all these things and she listened patiently, like a teacher should but never did…and when I was done, she’d take my face in her palms and look straight into me.
“Soon,” she’d say and then kiss me. It shouldn’t have been enough, not just that one word, but whether it was the way she said it or the strength with which she forced it from her lips--somehow it was enough. Soon.
Soon became one day in July when the world felt fit to burn.
Audrey drew up to me and told me, in that way she could without speaking, that it was all going to happen on that day. I nodded, knowing that I had some part to play but needing to be told the whys and wherefores. Audrey sat me down by the water and began to explain how the plan would work. Sometimes when she spoke I looked into the reflection in the water and the thing I saw where Audrey should have been wasn’t Audrey at all. I saw what it was and knew it was wrong but I didn’t look away and I didn’t stop listening. I think that’s what love is--seeing every side of someone, good or bad, and accepting them for it. The red book sat between us like some sort of third party and she laid my hand on top of it. The book was as cool as her palm was hot. Audrey told me one last thing. It would be done at night.
So came the night.
I walked to the church, enjoying the stars and the peace of the town. On my shoulder were two thick beams of wood, heavy to some. Not to me. On the other shoulder was a bag full of clothes. I stood outside the church doors, hearing a low, strange hum and resisting every urge in me to find a window and look in. Audrey said she would “know” and I knew she wasn’t fooling. It sounded almost like singing, but changed on account that it was all adults, all men, so the songs sounded more like murmurs and fumbled prayers. I felt hot in my heart knowing Audrey was in there amongst them all, but I felt more trust than anger and waited. When the bell chimed one o clock, I slid the beams across the doors.
In the minutes that followed there was such a commotion, I almost pried the beams off and went running in after her. But then I heard the screams were all from men folk and felt oddly re-assured that Audrey was okay. I suppose others would have felt pity in their hearts and sorrow in their souls to hear such cries, but I felt nothing but a dull, steady drum of love for Audrey. The folk who had wronged her were being righted and that was the truth. Nothing would move me from my post but Audrey’s scream.
It was a scream that never came. Instead, there were a soft three taps, like we planned. I hefted the beams from the door. Audrey was red from head to toe, just as she warned me she would be. I filled a pail of water and turned my back as she washed. I heard her slip into the clothes from the bag and adjust the belt around her waist. She called out to me and when I turned, I saw she had put the angel wings back over her shoulders, like the first time we’d met. It made me smile to see her like that and she grinned back. We walked hand in hand around the church, squirting the gasoline and flicking matches until the place was burning from the base.
We walked through the town and I watched as Audrey stepped up to each door, running a nail across the wood and mumbling the words she’d learnt out of the book. By the time she was done the church at the far end of the square was little more than ash and smoke. Audrey had explained it to me, the trick with the nails and why she whispered the words. It meant the innocent and the children would be safe but the guilty would not be spared. It seemed fair to me.
I sat on the edge of the square as Audrey went about finishing her business. Sure enough, people staggered out of the houses and gently lay down on the dirt. There were about thirty in all, all still and in the dirt. The other folk, the one’s who’d not known, slept on, oblivious, as did the children. Audrey watched them stagger and fall, not blinking in the smoke, silent. She simply watched it all unfold, just as she knew it would. And all the while, she held my hand.
We’re heading west now. Audrey stole the money from the bad folks and we should be set and fine for a good long while. She told me she’d set aside the red book unless something unforeseen came up and I thought that was a fair compromise. I know some folks won’t know the truth of what went on in our town and might try and paint us as villains or some such, but if you’ve read this, I hope you believe my side of the story, which just so happens to be the truth!
That’s my story, friend. I don’t worry about what anyone else thinks because I’ve got my girl and she’s got me. We hope this message in a bottle has washed up in some far and foreign land and now you’re done reading it, you might feel like telling your own story on paper and sending it into the sea for a stranger to read.
Hope so.
Until we meet, partner,
Todd and Audrey
xxxxxxxxxxx
THE END
Chris is English but works in Greece; he has been published in various magazines and his influences include Ray Carver and Stephen King. He can be reached at chriscastle76 at hotmail dot com. Thanks, Chris!
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PROSPERITY
I had been working all morning when Parvati Jaspreet appeared at the door to my laboratory. Bent over, sweating as I made delicate adjustments to some boilerplates, I sensed the place suddenly grow quiet. I looked up to see her standing in the door. She wore a red sari and a white tunic, bracelets and arm rings, jeweled sandals on her feet. She had large, dark eyes and honey-colored skin. Her full lips were red. A red dot in the center of her forehead identified her as a Hindu. Her servant girls—two of them, one on each side—wore embroidered white dresses. She stood in the doorway with such poise and dignity I felt I should bow to her.
I wiped my hands and face with a cloth and pushed through my amazed crowd of Indian workers to greet her.
“Good day,” I said, wondering if she spoke English. “I am Lyle Durham, owner of this establishment. I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure of your acquaintance.”
She smiled. She had white, even teeth.
“Mr. Durham, I am Parvati Jaspreet. I am here because I have heard that you are in need of a translator.”
She spoke English with only a minimal accent. It sounded Oxbridge, but I did not ask if she had studied either place because I felt such astonishment at her being there. Upper-class women in India are cloistered as closely as nuns. They seldom go out in public without an escort. The two young servant girls stood near her, but no one else.
“I’m certainly pleased that you have come, ma’am,” I said, trying to get my thoughts organized. “If I seem a bit surprised it is because I have not advertised the position yet and, if I may say so, I did not expect a woman—and one of your standing—to respond to my need for a translator.”
I could tell by her dress and bearing that she was a wealthy woman. Her light skin and the marking on her forehead suggested she might be from the Brahmin caste—the highest caste in India. “Of course,’ she replied. “And I can answer both your concerns. My husband is open-minded. He gives me a great deal of freedom, more than women in India are usually afforded. I know you did not advertise the opening for translator, but in India word of mouth carriers more swiftly than the telegraph. You mentioned it, someone heard you, and soon everyone in town knew of it.”
I could hardly keep from staring at her for her beauty and stateliness. I invited her inside.
She entered my workshop, which smelled of oil and metal shavings, and was filled with tools and the detritus of failed mechanisms. The Indians I employed gaped at her, astonished. Two or three actually bowed to the ground when they saw her—a thing I attributed to her membership in the priestly class. She said something in Hindi and the men stood.
I gave her a tour and told her about my project. “I am developing a steam engine that will have enough power to enable a ship to navigate against the current of the Wardha River.”
She gazed at the boiler suspended by chains from the roof and at the gears and pipes set on worktables. I did not imagine she understood much about engineering, but she scanned the items with intelligent and curious eyes.
“You wish to bolster the trade in this city. That is the purpose of your project, I gather.”
“Exactly.”
A good market existed in the north for spices, foodstuffs, and manufactured goods. Caravans carried these things to the wealthy kingdoms there, and the Arabs and native Indians who controlled the routes and knew the territory realized huge profits from their trade. Politicians back home had petitioned the colonial government to seize control of the route, but this particular province was not under direct British control, and the leaders in Delhi did not want to antagonize the locals. “It would be good for the city and the whole area if this could be so,” she observed. “The people here are poor. Their misery has touched me. Increased commerce would ease their suffering.”
I nodded. The Wardha flowed by all the cities the caravans serviced. A small number of steamboats hauling barges could deliver cargo in vaster quantities and at lower prices than the caravans could. The only problem was the river’s swift current. A British trading firm had financed my venture. I had made some headway on the project, but not a lot. The Indians who worked for me barely spoke English and had no knowledge of boiler construction, though one had worked as fireman on a Chinese cargo ship and another had been a boilermaker in a German-owned factory in Goa. Developing a steam engine such as I envisioned was nearly impossible without workers who could understand what I wanted. I ended up doing almost every task related to production myself. “I have the calculations and a design I think will work,” I told her. “If I can construct the engine and get the right propellers, the ship will be ready for testing in no time.”
“But you have difficulty communicating what you want done.”
“Yes, ma’am—unfortunately.”
“I hope my presence will correct that situation. The inhabitants of this city have petitioned me to help, and I feel I can do so by acting as translator for you. I expect no remuneration, Mr. Durham. In fact, the customs of our nation forbid me to be paid for such an endeavor as this. I will make it, as you say, a ‘labor of love.’ I can begin to translate for you this very morning.”
Though astonished, I agreed. She spoke a few words to my workers, who snapped to their tasks. Still a little rattled by the suddenness of it all—and by Parvati’s beauty—we went to work. I accomplished more that morning than I had accomplished in the last six months. Parvati translated my instructions. My workers hurried to the tasks and performed them with a crisp efficiency I had not seen before. By noon, the place was clean and organized. I set some of the men to shaping plate for the boiler and others to threading pipe. Parvati translated my orders to them and then stepped back and observed. Around noon, when it grew too hot to work, she took her leave.
“I will be here when you open tomorrow. I hope my efforts will profit your endeavor.”
I could only smile. “With you instructing my workers like this, the project will be finished soon.” She went her way and I went back to my bungalow.
Things improved. My workers could understand my instructions and they did their tasks with dispatch. In three months we finished the plate for the boiler and molded the insulation core—the most important and difficult part of the project—using the innovations I had designed to strengthen it, thereby increasing the pressure and guarding against the boiler exploding. Over the next six months we tested the boiler and began the tricky task of cycling the steam through pipes to the piston that drove the propellers. Parvati came every morning and translated. She did nothing more than translate, but the presence of a woman from the Brahmin caste seemed to compel or inspire my laborers to work harder and with more seriousness. She stood beside her two girls—Aishwarya and Padma—and watched, almost as if presiding, as the project went on. The workers behaved as if they were under her power. I heard, too, how my employees’ fortunes had improved. The two Indians there who spoke some English told me their gardens and fields had produced abundantly and their families had been blessed with children. One of my workers came and, with the former boilermaker Krishna translating, invited me to his home to celebrate the arrival of a child.
“His wife has been barren many years,” Krishna said. “Now she has bore a son—two sons, twins. Narayan is celebrating and asks you to be his guest. Lady Parvati will be there as well.” I was touched that Narayan would have me as his guest, but hearing that Parvati would be there made me eagerly accept the invitation. Over the months of seeing her each day, I had begun to be a little in love with her.
I chided myself for these feelings and knew the impossibility of any kind of involvement with her. A married woman from a high caste and an Indian woman—the very motion reeked of absurdity. However “open-minded” her husband might be, even hinting at my affection would bring serious repercussions and scandal. Miscegenation laws declared any relationship between her and I illegal. But I could at least be physically close to her at Narayan’s gathering. I told him I would be honored to be his guest.
The celebration took place two days later. I followed Krishna through the winding, dirty streets of the city to Narayan’s home—a modest place with a wooden house and extensive gardens. The gardens burgeoned with pumpkins, beans, okra, and other plants. Several fruit trees groaned under an abundance of mango and orange. Indian music played. Narayan and his wife—holding the twin boys—greeted me and led me to the banquet. He seated me on cushions on the ground next to Parvati.
She greeted me.
“Wonderful to see that you exist somewhere other than my factory,” I said.
She returned my smile.
“I exist many places. I’m happy to see you, Lyle.”
I shuddered, probably visibly. She had never called me by my given name.
“Narayan was gracious to invite me. I’m glad you’re here—not merely as someone I know through business but as pleasant company.”
I dared not say more than this. She understood, though. I could see it in her large, dark eyes. She reached over and squeezed my hand.
“Our dealings have been entirely on the level of business,” she said. “That is unfortunate. You are a gracious man and I find your company pleasant.”
The ceremonies began. Narayan offered a prayer. Parvati did not translate, but I detected thankfulness in his tone. We feasted. Parvati spoke little and I kept quiet as well, but I felt we shared an unspoken bond. After the feasting came dance, performed by young girls in colorful costumes, and then presentation of gifts for the new mother. I had come empty-handed. Parvati sensed my embarrassment.
“Narayan does not expect anything from you,” she said. “And he will not be offended, since you do not know the customs of our people.” She pondered then said, “Here.” She held her hands out to me. A piles of gold coins glittered in each of her palms. I did not see where she got them even though my eyes had been on her all the time we talked. It was as if they had magically materialized. “Do not say you will not take them. Custom dictates that my husband, not I, give any gift that might be offered here, and he is far away. Take these as your offering to Narayan.”
Her beauty, the power in her dark eyes, the calm surety of her voice, commanded me. I cupped my hands. She slid the coins into my open palms. I presented them to Narayan, who gaped at me, astonished. I did not know if he was astonished that I had brought him a gift or that it was so generous—or both. The celebration continued. The moon rose. People danced and drank. “The evening is cool and lovely,” Parvati said after a time. “I wish to walk. Would you accompany me?”
I rose. We walked down to the riverside. The Wardha flowed, its ferocious current moving south. Palm trees towered over our heads as we walked the bank. Reeds and lotus plants crowded the pools of still backwater along the banks. A full moon hung huge and bright in the sky. The river reflected its light.
We walked in silence. Words seemed inappropriate. My longing for her filled me with poignant sadness. She said something in Hindi to her servant girls, who halted, startled expressions on their faces. They bowed and stood still as she and I walked a hundred yards or so. We stopped. She turned to face me.
I thought she might kiss me, but instead she reached out and put her hands on my head. A sensation I cannot describe went through my body. I felt well-being, warmth, a notion of security course through me. Time stopped. The few seconds her palms rested on the top of my head could have been eternity.
She withdrew her hands.
“Let us return.”
We went back to the banquet. An hour later, Krishna escorted me home through the labyrinth of crowded streets back to my house.
Parvati came to the factory the next day. She made no mention of the party or of her touching me by the river. We worked, completing the transfer assembly for the boat. I tested it, staying later than usually did. I finally went home, dined, washed, and sat in the main room of my bungalow reading the London Times, which arrived a month late.
A tap came at the door.
I had dismissed my cook and houseboy. My pulse quickened. I wondered if it might be Parvati. I opened the door and saw Aishwarya, one of her servant girls.
“Master, may I enter?” she asked.
This startled me. I had not known she could speak English. Like her mistress, she spoke it quite well. Wondering if she had come to deliver a message from Parvati, I closed the door. She made namskar, pressing her hands together in front of her heart and bowing.
“Please you, my Lord,” she said.
“Welcome to my home, Aishwarya. What brings you here?”
“I have come at the mistress’s bidding to give you the pleasure of my body.”
Her reply stunned me into silence. I stared. Aishwarya shifted uncomfortably.
“Do you I displease you in some way?” she asked.
I got my voice. “No. Of course not. I only”—I sputtered. “Aishwarya, I can’t”—I reached for a word—finally, I said, “do something like that to you. It’s out of the question.”
“I must give myself to you as a blessing.”
“No,” I said. “Absolutely not. I will not hear it again.”
She burst into tears.
“What is it? What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I don’t want to die.”
“Die? You’re not going to die.”
“If you refuse the offering of the mistress through me, I must kill myself.”
I could only gape.
“Please, let me bless you as I am instructed. Please don’t send me to my death.”
I did not know how to answer her.
“I will go and cast myself into the river. I will go from your door to my end if you will not accept what the mistress offers you.”
She turned. I seized her arm.
“No. Don’t do that. Parvati sent you here?”
“She loves you, but she is married woman from on high and her husband is from even higher realms. She may not approach you but she sends me as her blessing.”
“I understand,” I said, though I was curious about what she meant from “on high” and “higher realms”; I assumed she referred to caste. “Let me speak to her before you do anything more.”
“It is not allowed. She will not speak of this matter—not to me and not to you.”
“Aishwarya, to do such a thing as your propose is against the ways of my people and against my religion and my principles.”
A defeated look possessed her. She nodded. Tears hung on her cheeks.
“Yes, sir. I will take my leave now.”
“Wait. You don’t really mean to take you own life, do you?”
“I do not lie or deceive.”
I thought frantically. “Look—go tell her I allowed you to give me this ‘blessing’ you think you must dispense.”
“I cannot lie to her. I see there is no point in my being here if that is your will. I must bless you this night. Otherwise, this night is the night of my death because I will have disobeyed.”
“You’re not disobeying. My action, not yours, is the cause.”
“Nonetheless, I will not have obeyed, and the price of disobedience is death.”
The whole matter fell on me like a crushing weight. I deemed it criminal to exploit a young girl like Aishwarya (I thought she was about seventeen). But I could also sense she meant what she said. India was a land of incomprehensible customs.
“I must return to her before the moon sets or not return at all,” she said, fatalism in her voice. “If I sense your spirit correctly, I need to depart.”
She reached for the door latch.
“Aishwarya, wait. Don’t go. I . . . I can’t do this. I’m an Englishman, a white man. I may not consort with native women. There are laws against this. What if someone saw you come in? Or sees you leave?”
“No one saw me come here and no one will see me leave. My mistress will make this so.” She opened the door.
“No!” I shouted frantically. I saw the moon, halfway through its descent to the horizon. “No,” I said, more quietly, realizing what would have to happen. “Stay. Please stay.”
Parvati arrived at work as usual the next day. She said nothing about Aishwarya, and I knew it would be inappropriate to bring it up—and possibly a danger to the girl. A few minutes after she left for the day, Krishna appeared, pulling a pudgy European into the shop. He introduced him as Herr Geller.
“I worked for him in Goa,” Krishna said. “He is a manager at a factory that makes steam ships.”
Herr Geller spoke English. The factory supplied parts for merchant ships operating in the South Seas. The Germans had found it more efficient to produce replacement parts in Asia rather than ship them thousands of miles from Europe. I explained my project and showed him what I had done. He complimented me on my work.
“Good fortune has blessed you, mein freund. You have what appears to be the most powerful engine I have seen my entire engineering career. And I have developed the most efficient set of propellers to date. My superiors don’t think they will work and won’t put them into production. I am willing to supply you with the prototypes if you will use them in this project.”
I agreed. He departed the next day and said he would have the parts shipped to me.
Meeting him proved to be fortuitous indeed. And good fortune continued to rain down upon everyone who worked for me. They prospered. Their crops and gardens brought forth abundantly. Their families saw births of healthy children. Their own lives remained free of disease and infirmity. My luck improved as well. I opened letters from home telling me investments I had forgotten about had paid high dividends or that I had inherited land from relatives whose names I had never heard. When I visited Delhi, I found myself the recipient of attention from more than one beautiful woman.
The project continued to go well. The boiler had tested to my specifications. Herr Geller sent me the gears. I was amazed at the amount of torque they could convert. We took the boiler, the piston assembly, and the propulsion devices and installed them in the hull of an old sailing ship the company had provided. I set the test date for three days hence.
During this time, Aishwarya and Padma came to me alternate weeks. As Aishwarya had said, no one noticed their visits, not even my servants. How they managed this, or whether Parvati used her influence to keep things quiet, I was never certain. I remembered that in the Bible servant girls were often given in stead of their mistresses—as with Sarai and Hagar in the Book of Genesis. Still, the whole thing left me unsettled. This was Padma’s week. She did not speak English. I had thought the “blessing” (and indeed it was that) Aishwarya brought me was a one-time thing, but one week later Padma had arrived at my door with a note:
Padma is the one to bring blessing to you this week. Do not be the cause of her death. Next week I will come.
In the Grace of the Goddess, Aishwarya.
Of the two young women, Padma was the more beautiful. Her quietness made her mysterious. Afterward, as she lay next to me, she smiled and touched my cheek.
“Wife?” she asked me. “Have you?”
“No, Padma. I have no wife.”
“You will have. Lakshmi will bless you.”
“You’re learning English.”
“Aishwarya teaches Padma.”
After a time she went her way. The next day a delivery boy brought me a telegram from Delhi. A lovely woman I had met there named Priscilla Collier planned to come and visit me in a week.
We fitted the ship with the engine and propeller assembly. The river, swollen from rain, raged southward. Representatives from the company financing my venture arrived by train and horse. A high-ranking Colonial official and his attendants had come along as well. My workers, their families, city officials, many of the local citizens, joined in to swell the crowd to an assembly of hundreds. Parvati was there as well. I wanted to thank her for her part in the project but decided someone might misinterpret it if we spoke in public. The sailors my supporting company had brought in cast off and turned the boat into the river. The engine kicked in. The boat stood in equilibrium with the current for an unendurably long moment and then began to make headway. It picked up speed. People cheered. I breathed a sigh of relief.
The crew returned and reported that the boat handled as well as any they had known. The engine performed to capacity. As far as I could tell, my project was a success. We spent the next few weeks testing the watercraft. Its power exceeded my original calculations. It pulled laden barges easily. Neither I, nor the sailors, nor my financial backers, had any doubt as to its usefulness and its potential profitability.
Over the next year, things took a rapid course. Herr Geller’s firm in Goa produced several steam engines to my specifications. Soon we assembled a small fleet of cargo vessels to pull barges up the Wardha. In no time we controlled trade to the entire region north of us.
Chagrined at the loss of their business contacts, the caravan owners incited the tribes in two adjoining states to attack our city and province. The local ruler defeated them, but the losses he suffered convinced him he needed the support of the Colonial government. Soon the British Raj established a garrison to defend the area, billeting a sizeable force of soldiers there. We shipped so many goods that investors built a spur line to the city. Trains brought in merchandise and boats fitted with my engine pulled barges upriver to sell in the northern settlements. The company made millions. And of course the town prospered as well. The presence of the railroad and the British garrison brought jobs. Men worked on the trains and docks and in the new warehouses the shipping firm built; or worked as servants, groomsmen, and cooks for the military. New markets opened for farm products. After the company established economic order, I decided to return to England. Before I left I tried to locate Parvati and thank her. No one in the town knew where she had gone. I had no luck finding Aishwarya or Padma.
Today I am a wealthy man. Sales of my steam engine have made me a fortune. I married Priscilla. After several years of marriage, she and I returned to India for a visit. In Bombay, we toured a temple dedicated to Lakshmi, goddess of prosperity and good fortune. The priest allowed us to enter the sanctuary that housed her image. When I saw the idol, I went cold. Larger than life—I would say it was twelve feet tall—it stood in a dark space, illumined by four blazing oil lamps. Their shimmering light fell on a goddess with four arms. Two of her hands held coins, two of them held lotus flowers. The face on the image was the face of Parvati. The resemblance was uncanny.
I stared so long Priscilla touched me.
“Are you all right, dear?”
“I’m fine,” I managed to say.
“I thought you were getting a heatstroke. It is warm in here. Let’s go.”
I know, of course, that the resemblance is coincidental. The goddess Lakshmi is fabled to be beautiful, so sculptors would naturally make her resemble a woman considered beautiful in their culture. They would model a goddess on a high-caste Brahmin woman, and thus I should not be surprised that this statue looked so much like Parvati. Still, as I stand among the engines and other devices in my laboratory and consider the prosperity that has filled my life in so many ways, and the prosperity that came to the town on which Parvati said she had compassion, I can only assent to the logic of probability—unscientific though it may be.
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David’s speculative fiction has appeared widely in such journals as New Myths, Ensorcelled, The Monsters Next Door, Monday Night, The Cynic OnLine, and many others. Thanks, David!
Graphic Design Free Resources™ website are original materials created by the site author, Graphire and other individuals who granted the author permission to alter, distribute, or adapt their works for the purposes intended by this site.
I Am
By: Eric Reitz
I Am, follows the daring escape of a prisoner without a memory in desperate search for his identity. As he reaches the top of the prison, the patient must confront the men who have locked him away, but more importantly his broken memory.
There was a hill, a very large hill, probably as tall as an eight-story building and as long as three or four football fields. The lush grass danced with the breeze to a calming melody that drifted through the skies. You, found yourself at the bottom. Slowly, you hiked, ascending higher and higher; all the while, you looked ahead and wondered what was at the top. You kept a relaxed pace as you soaked in the glory of nature. You opened yourself to the cool air, and consumed that fresh grass smell until a scream pierced the sky around you.
Your heart racing, you quickly rushed for the top, and the faster you went, the less clearly you could see.
The bright greens were now hazy and mixed with the dark browns of the earth. The sound of your heavy breathing overtook the whispers of the hill, and soon you had arrived. Before you laid dozens of other hills, and directly in front of you was the boy. The young blonde-haired boy with tattered blue overalls. You never saw his face, as he was looking out at the horizon. You imagine he had plump round cheeks, ocean blue eyes, and an innocent smile. Following the boy’s gaze, you noticed something beyond the hills, something glowing even in the sunlight. A city? The City? The sound of laughter immediately brought your eyes back to the boy. He cheerfully played, you smiled and then you heard a loud, deep voice. You couldn’t make out the words; you just shook your head. And then… it went black.
A dream. What I went through. Every day.
Almost as if it was memory and not a dream at all. Was this “boy” me? Did I come from those hills? And was this glowing city, in the beyond, where I was now? This was the only memory I knew, the only piece of a past that I so desperately needed. Who I was before I became a “patient” was beyond me. Everything before this white prison was nothing more than a haze. Why I was so deep in thought while bolting through the hall was something I could not even explain, and yet I was. My thoughts in these white corridors were not of how I would escape the building, nor of where I would go once out, they were of this one memory. It was as if I had already escaped in my mind, had seen the future, and knew which turns to take, which doors to open. It was all too familiar; I knew my room was on the third floor. I knew the security codes on every door. I just knew, and it scared me. The white halls with no windows bore red flashing, and screeched sound. My absence from my “cell” had been noticed. For all my speed and knowledge of the building, I knew I was being followed. If I focused as much as possible through the breathing and pain in my legs, I could hear the echoes of the footsteps that did not match mine. The patients and I would call them Runners and for good reason. They chased down anyone who decided to make a break for freedom. And not once did they fail.
Every once in a while, when I turned a corner or climbed some stairs, I would catch a glimpse of them: black boots, black jackets, black gloves, all black. When I began my escape, I had entered the first locker room I could find. I changed out of my white clothes into anything I could find. The “patients” weren’t allowed color. We all had to wear white. So I took one of their jackets and some blue jeans. In retrospect I knew I shouldn’t have picked them, it would’ve been a better idea to wear all black. I could’ve blended in. Yet they reminded me of the memory, it was the same blue as the boy’s overalls.
What seemed liked hours were truly only minutes. Every hallway felt like a mile but in reality they were maybe sixty feet at most. Through all the twists and turns, through all the flights of stairs, I knew the end was near. I knew I was almost at the top. Soon it would be over, and there was nothing the doctors, the Observers, could do. As I journeyed up the last flight of sleek, white stairs of the building, one of the Runners attempted to surprise me. He burst out of the doors above and filled the stairwell with bright natural light. I maneuvered around him easily and pushed him down the stairs. A strange feeling of déjà vu guided me like instinct. Finally, I had pierced the top; finally, I was in the sky.
The roof of the building was just like I imagined, plain, empty, and no walls blocking the real world from view. I rushed towards the edge of the building. I was right about one thing from my memory, there was a city. I was in it. To my surprise, the prison was not the tallest building in the metropolis. The world below was full of light, even as dusk set in. Noise brought my attention to the many people and vehicles beneath me. There was life in this place, something I was never able to tell inside the white rooms. As I continued to gaze at my surroundings, I looked to the sun and stopped immediately. The hills, they were real. Did that mean, my dream was real? Was I right? Was home that close that I could see it? I had to find a way to reach it. Behind me the sounds of shuffling feet and heavy breathing dragged me back to reality. So I turned and faced the gathering crowd, the ones who kept me from the world.
There were now a dozen of the Runners, all aiming their weapons at me, ready to put me to sleep and drag me back into the white abyss. They, for some reason, were afraid to advance and overtake me. My mind did not rest on the notion that they were afraid of who I was for long, fear I have seen, this was not fear. This was restraint. The sea of black separated into two as an older man unlike the others glided towards me. Before me stood one of the mad doctors, an Observer. His white hair, wrinkled forehead, and large glasses, was so different from the Runners. Instead of pure black clothes, he wore a mixture of black and white designs with many sharp and elaborate patterns. These so-called doctors were the ones who truly called the shots in this prison. Of all the patients I came in contact with, not a single one had ever laid eyes upon these shades. We all knew they were there, they may have been as invisible as ghosts but we could always hear them. What we knew was they watched and ordered. Intervention was grunt work. It was strange; this man before me was very old. Having only seen the youthful Runners to compare to it was quite shocking to see a man not in peak physical condition. Any patient could’ve crushed this man in two, yet he had more power than any Runner could ever possess. His lab coat moved with the breeze as he took a deep breath.
“Where do you think you’re going?” The old man paused. When he noticed I had no answer, he continued.
“Do you think this roof has a lot of exits?” The Observer laughed into the wind and the Runners joined in. He put his hand in the air ¾ the laughter died instantly.
“You’re sick, Soldier. You need my help. If you just calm down and stop knocking out the guards, I can get you back to the way you use to be.”
For a short while, I thought about what he said. My memory, the boy, no longer blocked my thoughts. Where was I going? Where did I plan on heading after I got out? Was there really a reason why I wanted out? Was I only chasing some fantasy? Was it possible that I could actually be sick? I could barely contain the amount of pain that surged through my head as I tried to understand what I was doing. The Observer must have noticed the struggle as he took this opportunity and walked closer to me. He was now only a few feet away; I could look into his eyes. I could see in the warm brown colors that this man truly believed every word he had said, a belief that almost overcame me. The old man offered me his hand. A feeling of familiarity was coursing through my veins. My hand was ready to grasp his own when a strong breeze rushed across the roof. My nostrils flared. Fresh grass. The hill. The boy. I was about to take a step in his direction; I was about to throw away everything that I knew up to this point, the longing for freedom, the advice of the prisoners, the distrust of the men in black, even the memory. My insides were screaming for me to stop, but my body continued to go through the motions, like I had done this so many times before. Just when I was about to take his hand, I noticed something else in his eyes. I could see the reflection of the horizon. The sun was now low enough that it met at the level of the building. And for these briefs few moments I could see the hills again. The boy. The memory. The battle for control was over. I shook my head.
“No, I want to know who I am, I am not sick. I will find the truth.” For the first time since I had been in the white prison, I knew I had a reason, a purpose to keep going. The Observer took a few steps back and waved his hand. Runners closed in and created a semi circle around me¾No way for me to escape. Jump behind, probably to my death, or fight? The Observer spoke again, but this time he had a much more direct and stern tone in his voice.
“You have no where to go. This is where you belong. This is who you are. This is your reality, Soldier. Don’t throw that away. Resist and there will be no positive outcome.” Why was I standing there listening to that man? What was the point? I knew what he would say, and I knew what I would retort. I guess I was hoping that maybe it was all just a dream. Maybe if I waited it would end, and I would be that boy on the hills. I knew though, that I could not wait any longer. The Observer wanted to imprison me and continue playing God in his white “paradise.” The memory, it was everything. I knew in the bottom of my heart that the memory was what led me here. It gave me strength. The Runners were now ready to move in, and the Observer was ready to call the strike. Time to act.
“I am free, and I plan to stay that way.” With a quick bend in my knees, I used all the strength in my legs and jumped backwards. Time slowed down. I was able to catch a glimpse of the old man’s face. The look in the doctor’s expression reminded me of something, something I had forgotten, a look of disappointment and shame. As I fell through the sky to the glow beneath, the memory grew. I was not the boy. I was the man with the scoped rifle, with my ammunition loaded. I was the man who wore all black. I was the man who stood next to the Observer. I was the soldier. And when I took aim at the boy, I was the one who refused the order.
And then… it went black.
Eric M. Reitz is a science fiction/fantasy writer. He creates new utopias of the future as well as apocalyptic lands created from the failed present. A student of filmmaking, Eric brings unique visions to the page. His respect of the arts and love of entertainment merges together to create enjoyable high quality stories. As a writer of the new millennium, Eric invites you into the imagination of a post 9/11 youth. Thanks, Eric!
Issue 2.0 (by Derek Riggs) I hope you enjoy it Have fun D The Arrival There was a line across the stars, a blurred flash of something moving incredibly fast. The space compression drive de-activated, it’s field collapsed and the spaceship was simply there; floating in the distant night amongst the moons of Jupiter. It hung there for a few moments as its crew re-calculated for the next coordinates, then the space compression drive came back online and it vanished, completing another jump towards its final goal, Jupiter‘s second major moon Europa. A large rock body with an iron core, encased by one hundred kilometers of briny ocean beneath thirty kilometers of rock hard ice, and a gravity of one seventh of Earth normal. The spaceship was a System Transport Vessel of the Titan class. One of the biggest transports to travel the dark and vast roads between the planets. Its oval hull was punctuated by the drop-lander’s, a series of flattened spheres embedded along its side which would detach themselves and fall in a gravity controlled descent toward the surface of any world upon which their cargo was to be delivered. The latest stop on its long schedule was to be the Europa Station. A long tour science research installation, built on several levels and buried twenty meters below the surface ice. The Landing. The huge system transport maneuvered into a high geosynchronous orbit. The twilight of the distant sun shone dim highlights across its complex superstructure. Steel holding clamps silently released, and toward the icy moon fell one of the many planet drop-Landers, which it carried attached to its belly, like an insect might carry its eggs. Somewhere along its descent path the drop-lander’s counter gravity systems came online slowing its fall, and gas jets burst into volcanic activity controlling the approach to the artificially flattened spaceport field, leaving only the massive landing gear to deploy and absorb the final touchdown jolt. There was a moment’s silence, the gas expelled by the jets crystallized into ice and drifted slowly to the surface. Beneath the hull, batteries of lights flared into life, shattering the sun’s gentle twilight with a brilliant metallic blue-white. The entire centre portion of the craft began to lower itself to the surface with a strange unfolding motion. Doors opened in the cold metal hull, figures emerged moving awkwardly about in their bright orange environment suits. Slowly a large, eight wheeled vehicle rolled onto the icy surface, moved a little way forward and stopped. Some of the figures climbed into the vehicle while others returned to the spacecraft. One figure had walked apart from the others and was looking into the black sky at the orange, wind ravaged clouds of the planet Jupiter that hung just above the horizon, massive and distant. Then he turned and made his difficult way into the vehicle. The vehicle began to move toward a low structure on the surface some distance away from the spacecraft. As it moved out of the range of the spotlights its own headlights flickered alight, pushing two ellipses of brightness ahead of it, as it drove into the gloom. The vehicle stopped within the low structure and the structure began to descend beneath the surface. The magnetic levitation elevator took a few minutes to deposit the vehicle to the first cargo level where it rolled slowly into a large hangar. As the thick hangar doors slid shut, six figures disembarked and began to unload containers from a storage compartment to the rear of the vehicle. There was a sound. A violent hissing as the atmosphere was pumped back into the cargo hanger. On the other side of the hangar three figures emerged from an elevator and walked toward the vehicle. One of them spoke into a radio; “Gentlemen, you may remove your environment suits, we have atmosphere, gravity and temperature.” The figures responded by stopping their toils and removing their helmets, easily the most bulky part of the environment suit. The central of the three figures, a portly man, balding and in his mid forties with a face made for smiling, walked towards the suited newcomers, and with an appealing gesture asked; “Doctor Robert Harvie-Davis ?” “Oh, That’s me” said a tall wiry man with dark hair. He fumbled his helmet to one side and held out his hand in greeting. “I am the station chief administrator James Goldenburg” said the portly man; “Welcome to Europa” The Hardware. James Goldenburg turned off the view screen after watching his family’s weekly transmission from Earth, at least it should have been weekly, actually this was the third transmission of the week, His seven year old son, Robert, had been off school with the flu and had nothing else to do but record regular reports of how he was feeling. Mercifully these reports were topped and tailed with messages from his wife, Marie, who gave a somewhat less sensationalist view of Robert’s failing health. It wasn’t a bad flu, but Robert’s first and he wasn’t enjoying the experience, but he was making the most of it. James turned the screen to com-net mode and called his Aide-de-camp Anne Gray. The screen flashed a “Calling Anne Gray” alert box for a moment, then Anne answered and the screen came to life revealing a woman in her mid thirties with short blond hair and an intense, almost tough look to her face, belying her no-nonsense approach that had made her the most effective Aide-de-camp and Chief Technician that James had ever met. “ Hi James.” she said. “ Hi Anne, I am going to down to the construction area to see what the boffins are making so much noise about, I haven’t heard a whisper from them in three days and then I get five messages to go and see their new creation this morning. They seem to be getting a bit excited about something.” “ OK, but take a Porta-com unit, the computer brain for hydroponics one has got buggy again and the pumps have stopped this time, I might need to contact you.” “ Right, will do, I’ll catch up with you later.” “ Yeah, have fun playing with the boy’s new toys.” she said with a smirk. James laughed, turned off the screen and left for the elevator, picking up a porta-com unit on the way, the small, gold, triangular unit attached to the left lapel of the station overalls and was activated by pressing an emblem in the center. The porta-com system was designed by one of Anne’s technical team, apparently a fan of some late twentieth century science fiction TV show. Three floors down he walked out of the elevator into the large, unused storage room, which had been designated as a construction area for the project. He stood observing the scene. At the back and in the center of the room stood a large, segmented sphere about five meters in diameter, it was held within a cage of scaffolding and cables which connected it to a control platform to its left. Between him and the sphere lay what looked like some kind of unusual submersible; a perfectly smooth, flattened sphere two meters across, the surface was made from something dark and shiny with an iridescent green sheen, it had two cylindrical engines, one on each side made from a similar material, hanging beneath which were two small spotlights. the whole machine was connected to a rack of portable equipment, which was connected in turn to the station mains power supply. Five people moved around the objects shouting instructions to each other and making adjustments to the equipment. After James had been standing by the elevator for a few moments one of the team notice him and shouted something to one of the others. The head of Doctor Robert Harvie-Davis emerged from behind the control platform with the kind of sharp, alert movements usually practiced by rabbits emerging from their burrows. “Oh, Hi.” he said. Scrambling out from within a tangle of wires he wiped his greasy hands on his overalls, crossing the room he offered one of the newly cleaned hands in greeting. “Glad you could make it down, you’ll love what we’ve built here.” “ I understood you were building some kind of new submersible, but what is all this other gear?” James said , taking one of the offered hands and immediately wishing that he hadn’t. “Well, it’s not really the submersible itself which is different but the guidance systems. The submersible is a lot tougher that average but other than that, fairly ordinary.” They walked over to the submersible where Robert continued; “It’s the outer surface, the entire outer skin is one huge CCD camera. The individual elements are microscopic and etched into the surface, which is covered with a very tough transparent polycarbonate finish, the motors on each side are covered with the same stuff. In between the elements of the CCD are lights etched into the surface in a similar kind of way.” “Will they be bright enough to be any use?” asked James. “Oh yes.” replied Robert; “They are incredibly bright, if we were to turn them on you wouldn’t be able to look at the submersible, also the CCD surface is very sensitive. It can see from the ultra violet right down into the infrared. the frequency ranges of the CCD and the lights are matched and fully variable so we should always have something to look at.” “Are you sure that the pressure won’t damage the surface? There’s a lot of water down there.” “No chance, it’s the way they‘ve been made. The surface is a solid layer and really tough, it’s been pressure tested to about twice what we will need. At higher pressures the CCD surface actually becomes a little more electrically efficient. The interior is entirely open to the water so there is no hull to implode and spoil all the fun.” “Oh, fun is it?” said James with a wry smile. “Yes, but you’ve only seen half the game so far. The really good bit is over here.” said Robert, walking towards the five-meter sphere standing at the back of the room. “This is where the real fun begins.” He waved at one of his colleagues; “Dave, can you run up the viewer?” Dave turned out to be a stocky red haired man who replied in a Scottish accent; “I’ll be right on it, give me a wee moment to re-set the calibration.” Robert led James around the side of the sphere to where one of the segments was swinging slowly open revealing a room within. The room was equipped with three chairs, one at the front, two behind. The front chair had hand controls on the armrests along with a small compliment of buttons on two control surfaces. The rest of the spherical room was dark and slightly shiny. Then there was light. James almost fell over with shock, suddenly the entire surface of the room was a viewing screen, showing a picture of the construction room from the point of view of the small submersible. In front of him he could see the wall, which had been opposite the submersible, to his left, was the five-meter sphere within which he was presently standing. “This is where all that telemetry ends up.” said Robert, throwing his arms wide. “This equipment will display and record the entire event, plus all of the data from the environment sampling systems on board the submersible. It will not only record the information displayed, but the entire spectrum available to the system, so we will be able to go back and selectively enhance or filter the data later on.” Then he noticed the pale look on James’s face “I am sorry, did that startle you?” “Just a bit,” admitted James, trying hard to regain his composure. “It’s bloody marvelous, isn’t it? Where the hell did you get this kind of technology?” “It’s just been developed by the Mickey’s World Theme Park Corporation for their “Science in Education” Project. This is the first one, it was decided to send it here when your science base found some interesting chemicals in the waters below.” “So we have the prototype here?” “No, not the prototype, this is a production model. There are plans to drop similar units into the atmospheres of Titan, Jupiter, Venus and Saturn on slow descent anti-grav units. Apart from the purely scientific information to be gained, the Mickey’s World Theme Park Corporation are planning to make the pictures into virtual reality rides. So people will be able to fall thousands of miles through the clouds of Jupiter, into the great red spot, or past the rings of Saturn and into its atmosphere.” “This is going to change the way we do space exploration.” “That’s what I thought, that’s why I got involved in the project.” “When is all this going to happen?” asked James with what sounded like a cross between eagerness and awe. “Well, it‘s already happening, the carrier which I came here on is also delivering five other systems all around the solar system. and I believe there are others going out next month. Back on Earth the rides have been built and are just awaiting the data. They should be ready by the time your tour of duty ends in July.” James’s porta-com unit bleeped, he pressed the emblem in the center and said; “James here” “Hi James, it’s Anne, can you come to hydroponics two? We need your clearance to access the deep core memory” “I’ll be there A.S.A.P. By the way Anne, you really should come and see these boys, they’ve got some really cool toys,” The Drop. It was the next day when James walked back into the construction area to find the six members of the submersible construction team milling around a large, awkwardly designed, metal saucer shaped object in the center of the room. He stood a little way into the room, scratched his round tummy and said in an enquiring voice; “Hey, Doc. Where is your baby submarine? and what the hell is that tin thing?” “Hi James.” said Doctor Robert Harvie Davis “My baby submarine is inside that tin thing” “Oh.” said James, and after a pause; ”Why?” “Well, it’s a sterilizer and a drill all wrapped up into one unit. The outside will heat up and melt its way down through the ice trailing a cable behind it to bring back the telemetry information, the ice will freeze behind it and thus stop any contaminants from following it down into the oceanic environment. The heating will also sterilize the outside of the shell. When it gets through the ice and into the water the shell will break away freeing the submersible to do its thing.” “Won’t the submersible carry contaminants of it’s own?” “No, not by then. That’s the next step in the process. The inside of the shell is just about to be sterilized with microwave radiation, ultraviolet radiation and gamma rays. The process is fully automated and will take about twenty minutes. However, the shell is not designed to be one hundred percent radiation proof so we should leave the vicinity of the machine just in case.” “That shouldn’t be a problem.” said James; “All the walls of this base are designed to be completely radiation proof. They absorb or block everything except visible light. So just shutting the door will keep you safe.” “Yes, I know. I checked all the specifications for the base before we set out from Earth.” replied Robert with a smile. “We are just about to have lunch in the restaurant if you would like to join us.” “Yes, that would be nice. We are just about finished here and ready to run the sterilization program. We will be along in about ten minutes.” “OK, see you their then.” said James and disappeared through the door. Robert turned his attention once again to the job in hand. His technical team had just finished sealing the outer metal hull and was busy attaching power cables and monitoring equipment. “How is it going boys?” he said in a loud voice. Dave, the burly Scotsman spoke up in usual Scottish brogue; “Well, she’s sealed up tight and the capacitors will take about ten minutes to charge and then she’ll be ready to go. The system is set to automatic feed so as soon as you give the word I can throw the wee switch and we can all go and get some dinner.” “Then throw the switch and let’s go and get some dinner.” said Robert. With what was probably an unnecessary flourish the Scotsman threw the switch and the team quickly filed out of the room. When the door slid shut Robert stopped to count the member of the team and to make sure the door was locked and sealed and that the security measures were in force so that the door could not be opened by anyone while the sterilization process was active. “We wouldn’t want to irradiate one of our co- workers by mistake, would we.” He said; but as he turned he found that he was talking to himself. His team was already at least half way to the restaurant, chattering as they went. “Ah, the burdens of leadership.” he said to himself with a kind of mock weariness. The restaurant was in the central atrium of the station. A large area built on three levels with gardens and balconies which not only housed several restaurants but also many other shops and conveniences. It was off this area that the majority of the two hundred and fifty odd personnel had their quarters. The entire area was roofed by an artificial sky, which provided earth intensity sunlight or moonlight and was set to a twenty-four hour cycle to imitate summertime, this helped to keep everyone’s internal clocks in rhythm and prevent low light depression in the station staff. Robert found his team sharing a table with some of the station’s regular staff. They sat beneath a large willow tree by a pond in a Japanese looking garden, eating with gusto and chattering like monkeys. James waved him over, indicating the empty chair next to him. “Robert, this will be your fourth day at Europa station and this is the first time we have had a chance for a good chat.” Robert sat down and James continued; “You have met my aide-de-camp Anne Gray.” “Yes, briefly, the other day.” Anne waved a fork in hello but never stopped chewing, after a moment she swallowed hard and said; “Why are you planning to go under the ice with the submersible? What was it that last years expedition found that was so interesting you had to come all the way out here? Did they find gold or something?” “Oh, much better than that.” said Robert. “They found signs of life.” And he paused in the best dramatic fashion in order to allow the bombshell he had just dropped to sink in. After a moment, when the assembled company had picked their jaws up off the tabletop Anne said; “Well, come on. Don’t just sit there grinning like a Cheshire cat. Tell us some more. We want to hear all about this.” When he was confident he had everyone’s attention, Robert continued; “The Mission last year collected samples from all over the surface of Europa. The majority of what they picked up was just water ice with some mineral deposits from the waters beneath. Mostly iron, sulphur, magnesium, silicone and their related compounds. As you know these bubble up from the inside when the icy shell breaks under the gravitational stress from Jupiter. That’s part of what makes all the reddish brown coloring in the fracture lines across the surface. But what also bubbles up from the internal ocean, and actually created the majority of the reddish stain is life. There were quite a lot of live bacteria actually living just below the surface of the ice. And not just bacterial life either, they found some quite advanced organisms frozen in the surface ice. Several species of tiny shrimp like things and many minute free-floating animals that resemble jellyfish and hundreds of species of diatom like creatures, which can swim using cilia.” “How did all these things get in the surface ice? How do they survive? What do they all eat?” Interjected Anne. “Well, The surface dwelling bacteria, the ones that give the reddish hue to the surface ice, appear to photosynthesize. But not with chlorophyll, with some other chemical which happens to be reddish in color. The other creatures seem to have bubbled up from the inside along with the water when the surface cracked. They are not living there, just frozen solid. Preserved in the ice, maybe for millions of years. When they were thawed some of them began to swim around but none of them lived for very long, unfortunately. As for what they eat, well most of them eat each other. We aren’t really sure about the basis of the food chain, it looks like some of the diatom like creatures live on sulphur and other minerals. This is not unknown, there are a few subterranean sealed ecosystems in caves on Earth that have evolved to do something similar. We have found no evidence of photosynthesis in the ocean going life, nothing similar to phytoplankton on earth. Which is not really surprising, living beneath thirty meters of ice. So we postulate that they evolved around deep ocean hot springs similar to the ones on the Atlantic floor. There are a few other ideas but that’s where the smart money is going at the moment.” “That’s incredible. Really unbelievable.” said James. “Well that’s not really the strangest part; some of the shrimp like creatures had rudimentary eyes. Now given that no light should be able to penetrate through thirty meters of ice and seventy meters of water, especially this far from the sun. Why would these creatures need to develop a form of sight?” “What is your theory.” asked Anne. “We don’t have one. But I think whatever we find down there stands a chance of being quite interesting.” “That must be the understatement of the century.” said James “So you just plan to sink to the bottom and cruise around for days until you find something interesting?” asked Anne. Dave, the burly Scots technician replied “Nay lass. We have only two hours of bottom time before the batteries are all but dead. It takes a lot of power to broadcast all that telemetry back to the surface.” “What happens then?” “She’ll just stop broadcasting and sink, and that’ll be the end of her. If there’s cause to send another mission later in the year we may get to recover her, but until then she’ll sit on the bottom where she lands.” “Can’t you increase the power? charge the batteries for longer or something.” asked Jim, and Dave replied with a smirk; “Nay, I have her wired up like a Christmas tree as it is, she’ll ne’er take it Jim.” One of Anne’s technicians burst out laughing and Dave’s face cracked into a wide grin. James couldn’t see why that statement was so funny to them. Anne rested a consolatory hand upon his arm and said in a comforting tone; “It’s OK James, I’ll explain it to you later.” “I think I had better get back to work.” said James feeling a bit put out. “They haven’t served me my dinner yet.” said Robert. “That will be because you haven’t ordered anything yet.” replied James; “Too busy telling us stories.” “Oh, yes.” said Robert and picked up the menu. By the time Robert arrived back at the construction area the team had loaded the shell clad submersible onto a trolley and were pushing it through some large double doors. The team was being supervised by Anne; being the station Chief Technician it was her responsibility to oversee the launching of the submersible into the ocean beneath. Three members of her station technical team were dressed in environment suits and waiting patiently just beyond the double doors. The submersible disappeared through the doors, which closed with a hiss, indicating their function as an exterior air-lock chamber. It was the first of many such chambers that all together served as insulation as much as they did an atmospheric seal. After the last doors had closed the three men pushed the submersible into the long, narrow tunnel of ice that lead to the launch area. Beyond the station insulation and without heat, the temperature was several hundred degrees below zero and the walls of ice, frozen as hard as concrete, glittered with frost in the low yellow glow of the artificial lights. At the end of the tunnel was a small cylindrical room cut from the ice. Into the centre of this room they pushed the trolley. One of the men touched a button and the trolley hydraulics lifted the submersible and placed it upon the floor at about the centre of the room. Another of the men pulled a long cable from a hole in the top of the submersible shell and plugged the end into a wall box. The other end of the cable would deploy in the water beneath the ice to act as an aerial for the reception of the telemetry transmission. The three men withdrew and one of them touched a remote control on his suit chest panel. The submersible shell began to heat up and slowly a pool of liquid water accumulated around its base. Inch by inch it began to sink into the ice. When it looked as if the cable was being pulled too tight one of the men walked over and pulled a couple of foot of spare cable out of the top of the shell and left it coiled upon the floor. Then he rejoined the others. Eventually the submersible disappeared beneath the surface of the water, which immediately froze solid again in the terrible cold, trapping the cable. It would continue like this for some time, sinking slowly in the newly melted water and reeling out a little more cable as it went. Then the water would freeze behind it, sealing it forever from the world above, until, eventually, the ice beneath would give way to liquid ocean. Back in the construction area the rest of the team had been watching these events on a monitor screen installed for the purpose. “How long will it take to get through the ice and into the ocean?” asked Anne. “About seven hours I think, although we are not really sure of the thickness of the ice with any real degree of accuracy.” replied Robert. “ The craft is programmed to activate the transmission and give out an alarm as soon as it encounters the open ocean, so we can take it easy for a few hours now and just wait for the bells to start ringing.” There was a hiss and the air lock opened. The three men walked awkwardly out in their environment suits. One of Robert’s team tried to pat one of them on the back of his suit but Dave grabbed his arm, saying. “What do you think you’re doing, Laddie? That suit is still at about seventy degrees below zero, you’ll likely take the skin off your hand. Although I’ve half a mind to let you do it, It’ll teach you to read your briefing notes properly.” The young man backed off with a sheepish look. “Yes, don’t touch the suits until they have been into the temperature control chamber.” said Anne. And the three men plodded across the room to a door in the opposite wall trailing steam and bits of frost as they went. “Wouldn’t it have been better to build the temperature control into the air-lock chambers?” asked Robert. “Well, the budget wouldn’t stretch to cover the logistics of doing that without compromising the insulation of the walls. So we built it inside instead.” “And you wouldn’t want to compromise the station insulation.” said Dave; “Or she might sink through the ice and we‘ll all get a wee bit wet.” It was 6-15 am when the submersibles proximity detectors first encountered open ocean setting off the remote alarms and dragging Dr. Robert Harvie-Davis from a rather nice dream and back into the bedroom‘s stark reality. He activated the lights and stumbled into the shower. By the time he arrived at the construction area Dave and two members of the technical crew were already at their places behind the control surfaces, and the door to the large spherical viewing chamber was rolling open. “Glad to see you could make it doc.” said Dave with a grin. “Well, I thought I ought to, you know how it is...” replied Robert with a grin as he walked across the room. “Is everything working right?” “Of course, everything is performing within specifications. Why I don’t know how you can ask me such a thing. Anyone would think you do not trust me.” said Dave with mock indignation. “I, who have worked so long and hard at your side.” The other technicians sniggered. “OK Dave, I get the message.” said Robert as he entered the viewing sphere and made himself comfortable in the control seat in the centre. Adjusting the thin wire headset he closed the door with a flick of a switch. “Can you hear me Dave?” “Aye, loud and clear.” “Let’s have the screen on then.” After a second the screen came to life. It showed nothing but a few tiny red lights. Robert toughed a few buttons on the control surface in front of him and the submersible’s lighting surface began to glow softly. Illuminated all around him were metal surfaces and support ribs, the inside surface of the sterilization and heat drill casement. He released the lower half of the casement and watched it fall away into the darkness beneath him. The top half was now locked, hanging only upon the spool of cable that would act as an antenna to receive the telemetry from the submersible. He released the submersible from its locking clamps and it drifted free, adjusting its buoyancy automatically to keep itself stable and in the same place. Robert took the controls and moved the submersible away from the top half of the casement, then turned it around and increased the light level until he could plainly see the half shell suspended on the thin but incredibly strong telemetry cable. Then he released the lock on the cable spool and the top half fell away, trailing cable behind it. The whole thing eventually disappearing into the deep gloom, still trailing cable. “Dave, How much cable was left?” “There will be just under six kilometers of free hanging cable, so we should get really good reception all the way down. What’s the water like?” “It looks crystal clear, I thought it would be murkier than this. The slush layer is about twelve meters above me, how thick is that?” “The monitor says it was about three kilometers. anything else interesting?” “Well, there are a lot of really fabulous ice formations hanging down through the slush layer, like a magic castle upside-down.” Robert began to maneuver the small craft around and between the gigantic formations of ancient ice. The light of the submersible reflected strangely across perfect glassy surfaces carved and molded by water over millions of years. In some places massive ice crystals grew in perfectly formed clusters, white and opaque. Sometimes currents would make waves across the undersurface of the slush layer, giving it the appearance of sparkling mist. “Well that’s enough of playing tourist, although I could fly around here for weeks. We had better get on with the sinking part.” “Aye.” said Dave; “Set the controls to do the automatic system check and we can be on our way.” Robert complied and waited, after a few moments the system beeped and the screen said “System Check OK” “Here we go.” he said and began the long drop into the dark ocean. The rest of the descent would be automatic, with only proximity sensors active to warn of any unforeseen problems. He sat for a while looking up at the fantastic ice landscape above him as it slowly receded into the darkness, then he turned off the submersible lights. “Good Lord.” he said after a moment. “What’s the matter?” asked Dave. “Come in and see for yourself.” After a moment the door opened slightly and Dave entered, taking a seat behind Robert. “I’ll have to close the door again.” said Robert. It’s very faint.” And as he did so, there appeared a dull orange glow from the ice abo “Good Lord.” said Dave. “It must be the light reflected from Jupiter.” said Robert. “How on earth is it getting through the ice, its thirty kilometers thick.” “It must be some kind of fiber-optic principle I should think. Increase the sensitivity of the receptors.” Robert did so and the dull glow became a little brighter. “Look there.” said Dave; “You can make out the vague outline of the station.” The two men sat watching the dull orange glow fade slowly into the blackness of the surrounding ocean until it had completely gone. “I think I have a crick in my neck.” said Robert as they left the sphere. “Ah, you’re not fit enough, it’ll be all that sitting around and reading books that’s done it. You’d better get yourself down to the gym and work out till you’re fit like Me.” said Dave, flexing a solid looking bicep. “Can’t we just have a coffee in the cafe instead?” asked Robert. “Good idea.” replied Dave; “I’ll have a cappuccino with extra chocolate. Very generous of you I must say.” “Hmm.” replied Robert. The Bottom. It was late afternoon station time and Dr. Robert Harvie-Davis was in the small coffee shop to which his chief technician, Dave McDonald, had introduced him early that morning. The coffee shop was on the outer wall of the atrium and well positioned for watching the world, or at least the station personnel, go by. Which is exactly what Robert was doing, whilst daydreaming of other worlds. It had been nine hours since the submersible drop and Robert had caught up on his missed sleep, rising again just before midday. A member of the cafe staff appeared at his table. “Excuse me sir, are you Doctor Harvie-Davis?” “Yes.” “There is a call for you on the Vid.” He gestured to a Videophone on the cafe wall. “You can take it at that terminal .” “Thanks.” said Robert as he made his way around the other tables to the flattened, rectangular mechanism discreetly placed on the far wall in such a way that the screen was not easily visible to the other patrons of the cafe. The face looking out from the screen was that of Dave McDonald, his chief technician. “Hi Robert, I take it you left your porta-com back in your room.” He said with a smirk. “Not at all.” said Robert. “Oh? Why, then have I been paging you for half an hour or more and had no reply?” “Well I forgot to put it on charge before I went to sleep and now it’s as dead as a dodo.” “Oh. That’ll be it then. Well I am just calling to tell you that we are just under two kilometers from the ocean floor and I will be slowing the descent very soon now. So if you would like to join us we would be pleased to have your company.” “OK, I’ll make my way there as soon as I have finished my coffee.” “There’s no hurry, It’ll be about twenty minutes before we need to think about piloting the wee submersible so you can take you time. So I’ll see you when you get here.” With that Dave ended the call. Robert went back to his table to finish the cappuccino and pay the bill. On his way across the atrium he noticed both the station administrator James Goldenburg and his aide-de-camp Anne Gray were sitting having an early lunch in the outdoor tables of a tiny restaurant that served Mexican food. He walked over to where they sat. “We are just approaching the bottom of the ocean and about to take the submersible under manual control so if you two would like to join me in the viewing chamber we have two spare seats.” “I thought your technical staff would be using those seats.” said Anne in surprise. “Not at all, they will all be busy at their various positions, and they have the external monitors to look at. As I mentioned before the units are production units and the two rear seats are a standard configuration that will not be used in this instance. And as you are here and this is a once in a lifetime opportunity I thought you might like to come along for the ride.” “In that case, you try and keep us out.” said James with an enthusiastic smile. “The ride leaves in about twenty minutes from the viewing sphere in construction area five. Don’t be late.” said Robert and then walked off down one of the many corridors which lead away from the atrium. By the time James and Anne reached the construction area everyone else was in position and looking very workmanlike going about their various tasks. Dave indicated that they should go into the sphere and as James peered around the door Robert said; “Hi Folks, all aboard for the magical mystery tour.” They took the two rear seats and the door slid slowly shut leaving them in darkness, with just a few little L.E.D.s glowing on the various controls around Robert. “How deep are we?” said Robert into his headphones. “I got her down to six meters above the bottom, there’s no big objects, rocks, hills or the like anywhere for a couple of kilometers around.” Robert touched something and the craft’s lights came slowly on until they were at full brightness. Anne gasped in amazement, beneath them they could see the ocean floor of another world. Sharp angular rocks of various sizes lay littered in disarray as far as they could see. “It’s a bit of a mess.” she said. “It looks pretty dead.” said James. “Not at all.” replied Robert; “See those little specks floating in the water? The samplers say those are very small organisms. Let’s cruise about a bit and see what we can find.” Robert touched a few controls and the entire view changed. The total darkness of the ocean was replaced by shifting gray tones through which the shape of a horizon could just be discerned in silhouette. “What did you do?” asked Anne. “I included infra-red in the display, it will show us any hot spots so we can find the volcanic areas where living things are most likely to thrive. That seems to be a likely site over there.” He banked the submersible to the left and aimed it at a brighter than average area. The glow was brightest at the base and seemed to be heating the water above it, forming a column of brightness that wavered slowly in whatever currents existed. For some time they cruised over the seabed of broken rocks, then James said; “Isn’t that a volcanic lava pillow over there?” Robert stopped the craft and turned it to point in the indicated direction. He turned the forward spotlights on to their full beam. Illuminated in the glow were the unmistakable fat and sinuous forms of volcanic lava pillows. They had erupted from a long fissure that stretched into the distance as far as they could see. They lay on top of one another in layers spreading out some distance from the central crest of the range. “Yes, and it’s a huge one too. Looks like it has been erupting periodically for a very long time.” “Are we going to go over to it?” asked Anne. Robert thought about it for a moment and said; “Well we could, that end of it looks like it might be going in our direction.” And with that he swung the submersible around and aimed a course to follow the lava. As the little craft floated over the pillow lava it became apparent how big the formations really were. Lava pillows as high as houses dwarfed the submersible. rising above one crest they would be dwarfed by another. The strange worming, almost organic shapes covered the sea floor beneath them and built a mountainous staircase before them. Robert turned to the left and continued in a parallel course to the fissure. “We had better stick to our original plan.” He said. “We don’t want the batteries to die before we find what we came for.” As they approached the bright glow on the horizon they began to discern the shapes of tall thin towers rising from the seabed. “What are those?” asked Anne. “Those are what we are looking for.” replied Robert and headed straight for them. “Black smokers, or at least that’s what they are called on Earth. Deep-sea vents that gush hot water mixed with an assortment of minerals, on Earth they are the home of colonies of unique life forms, whole ecosystems evolve around the bacteria, which thrive in the hot, mineral rich water. Some people think that life on Earth started in environments like these. We were hoping to find something like this here.” Soon the craft was moving amongst huge columns of stone. “These must be really ancient. On Earth they only get to be a few tens of meters high but these read out as having an average height of one hundred and fifty meters, and these stacks are no longer putting out water. They have all been dead for some time.” “What will you do now?” asked Anne. “Keep going towards that hot area over there” Robert replied, and continued to weave the submersible between the massive, crumbling chimneys. After a while they came upon an area of shorter stacks, which were giving out some hot water, black with dissolved minerals it boiled up into the darkness like smoke. “I see why they call them black smokers.” said James. “Look!” said Anne, pointing at the base of a nearby stack. In the light of the submersible the surface of the stack seemed to writhe and shift. “Congratulations.” said Robert. “You are the first people to meet the indigenous life forms of Europa in their natural habitat.” As the submersible moved closer the living mass could be differentiated into individual organisms. there were masses of something very like shrimp, tiny crab like things with four legs, larger lobster like animals with four claws and eight legs. Darting here and there were small transparent fish. Clinging on to the sides of the rock tower itself were anemones, which wavered like tiny trees in the current, and others, which grew in forests and gave harbour to little fish and more tiny crabs. In between the stacks crawled larger crab like things with eyes on the end of antenna and small bodies with five pairs of very long legs. “Still no clue as to why they have eyes.” said Robert. “Maybe they can see in the infra-red like your submersible.” offered Anne. “Possibly.” “Err, where have all the animals gone?” interjected James. They looked back at the base of the towering vents and found them completely bare of life. “That’s odd.” said Robert and moved the submersible around to the other side of the stack. “They’re running away from us.” Anne said; “They’re running away from the lights.” It was true, wherever the spotlights shone the myriad life forms scuttled away into the darkness leaving the anemones alone upon the rock face to waver in the currents. Robert turned off the lights; “Lets watch them in the infra-red for a while.” As soon as the lights went out the swarms of alien creatures began to refill the gaps they had made, re-establishing their niches and territories, their shapes looking strange and ghostly in the infra-red. “Robert, could you turn off the infra-red please?“ asked Anne after a few minutes. Robert complied with a quizzical look at Anne, and from the darkness all around there emerged millions of tiny glowing lights. Some of the crab-like animals had luminous eyes, others had glowing stripes along their backs, others changed color in a spectacular display. And everywhere the animals moved across them, the anemone would glow a bright green. Robert gasped in amazement and delight; “Bioluminescence, that’s why they have eyes, everything down here glows in the dark.” “You mean like fireflies on Earth?” “Not only fireflies James, there are many, many organisms all over the Earth which bioluminess, squid, anemone, fish, fireflies are just a few, there is a species of bacteria which live in the ocean off the coast of Mexico which glow when they are disturbed by anything passing through the water. If you go for a swim you are surrounded by a soft glow in the sea. Look there...” He pointed ahead and to the left. Out of the darkness came a stream of little glowing lights, like tiny pearls in a velvet night. As they grew closer they spread out and began to move towards the bases of the stacks. Hundreds of them came and swirled around and around amongst the smoking pillars like sparks of a forest fire. All around the tiny submersible they swarmed too and fro as if caught in some pagan frenzy. “They look like little squid.” exclaimed Anne. “Or like a cross between a squid and a Jellyfish.” agreed James. The squid-Jellyfish things swooped upon the mass of teeming crabs and fish and carried hundreds of them off into the darkness. Some of the crabs ran around to the other side of the stacks only to be picked up by yet more of the weird animals. The three humans watched the luminous alien spectacle for some time in silence before Robert turned the infrared viewer back on and spoke. “They are carrying them towards that heat source over the horizon. I guess that had better be our next stop.” With this he turned the submersible and drove it at full speed after the glowing mass and it’s captives. It was not long before the submersible was left behind by the glowing squid cloud. As the last few little spots of light disappeared into the darkness James spoke; “Can’t you go any faster, can’t you keep up with them?” “No, not a chance.” said Robert. “Those things, like squid, are jet propelled. They suck water in at one end and squirt it out at the other, it’s a very efficient form of locomotion. The submersible wasn’t designed for speed, we didn’t expect to be witness to a mass kidnapping, I mean it’s quite fast, but nothing close to their speed.” “Why do you think they’re taking them away?” asked Anne. “I’m not sure, it’s quite unusual behavior, maybe as a food source for something else, like their young. or perhaps they only eat when they are in their own territory.” Robert turned the lights back on and the ocean floor, and the smoking stacks all around once more became visible in the gloom. All across the seabed small things scuttled around and away from the light. The submersible traveled for some time in its tiny pool of light, weaving in and out of giant stone columns that had stood smoking for unknown ages in the uninterrupted night. Soon the forest of black smokers gave way to a plain of coarse sand whose surface was covered in a multitude of different wave patterns. As the submersible began to cross the plain, thousands of long, thin snake like animals rose from the sand, emerging as far as their reach would allow, but never fully leaving their burrows. Each one reaching for the bottom of the submersible and snapping their sharp looking teeth. “You had better gain some height.” said James; “Some of those eels look pretty big.” “Damn right!” said Robert pulling back on the altitude controls; “And we don’t know how much bigger they are going to get.” The submersible gained some altitude just in time as a larger than average eel almost scraped the hull making James jump almost out of his seat. Anne looked at him with amusement; “Getting jumpy James?” “And then some.” replied James with a sheepish grin. “I know they can’t get me, but they still make me jump.” “I bet you get scarred watching horror films too.” “Could you tell?” Anne laughed. All across the plain the eels reached out of the sand for the submersible, waiving like fields of grass in a silent wind. “Robert, They never come fully out of their burrows, do you think they are separate animals or some kind of feeding tentacles of one, much larger creature.” Robert looked worried at this thought and turning to Anne said; “You really do like horror films, don’t you? I hope they are separate animals, but if you have any cause to think otherwise please let me know.” “OK, I will.” she promised. But quietly hoped she wouldn’t find out. After some time traveling across the plain another forest of smoking pillars loomed from the darkness, carpeted all over with sparkling light. Robert piloted the small craft through the dark city-like structure, this time mostly ignoring the strange life forms, which ran from the light. “Are you not going to investigate these creatures at all?” asked James. “No, they look largely similar to the denizens of the last black smoker forest and we are running out of battery time. We only have about twenty minutes of life left and I want to find out what is over there in that hot spot before the submersible dies.” “We’ve never been down here for one and a half hours.” said Anne in surprise. “Yes, I am afraid so.” replied Robert. “Doesn’t time fly when you’re having fun?” Robert stopped the submersible and turned off all of the lights, before them the stacks of the black smokers were silhouetted against a dim blue glow. “That’s visible light.” he said in awe. “It must be from something just over that hill which is generating vast amounts of bioluminescent light.” “Wouldn’t that have to be really huge to make that much light?” asked James. “Yes.” said Robert quietly, whilst turning the lights back on and throttling the craft up to full speed. “Let’s find out what it is.” After a few moments of weaving between the tall, dark towers they rose above the horizon and into the light. Before them, in a huge bowl shaped hollow, stood another field of black smokers, most of them even bigger than those they had seen before. Around and amongst the bases of those massive chimneys lay thousands of dome like structures, each with radial patterns, luminescing within its interior. They were connected by other, wormlike, tubular structures that also shone, and the whole mass lay upon a carpet of blue glowing anemones that waved in the currents. Pulses of light seemed to travel along the wormlike structures, which joined them together, and, occasionally, waves of colored light would travel across the whole, as if all the domes and tubes were acting like elements in one single, choreographed light show. All around the whole swam many smaller luminous animals, some swam slowly for long distances before lying upon one of the larger domes, others darted back and forth, scurrying around on some unknown mission. Things, which looked like a cross between bats and Manta rays, glided gracefully from one smoking tower to another and seemed to be tending smaller creatures, which lived upon their hot and violent rim. Many assorted jellyfish like beings floated slowly around or propelled themselves with a pulsing motion of their bodies, trailing long tentacles in their wake. Robert stopped the submersible and turned the lights out. The craft floated in the open ocean, as they watched the spectacle before them. After a while Anne spoke; “They’ve built a city! How can they be that intelligent?” “I can’t see where it ends.” said James. “It must be miles across, it just disappears into the darkness.” “I am not sure it’s a city we are looking at, not in the sense you mean anyway.” said Robert. “Look over there.” In the distance, to the far right of the craft, another cloud of the squid-like creatures came rushing towards the glowing city. They swarmed for a moment and then swooped, dropping their captured prey into one of the larger dome structures that opened like a flower in the center to receive the falling crustations. “That’s incredible.” said Anne; “They appear to be feeding it.” “You mean that those large domes are living things? But they must be ten meters across.” exclaimed James. “Yes. Like huge jellyfish.” said Robert. Then thoughtfully; “Only not like jellyfish, more like the Man-of-war.” “Pardon me?” said James; “Is not the Portuguese man-of -war a jellyfish?” “No, not really. It looks like a jellyfish but in fact it belongs to a completely different biological class. It’s called a Hydrozoa, and it is not a single entity. It’s a kind of community animal. It has many parts, a food gathering part, a swimming part, a defensive part, a reproductive part etc.. All of these parts are different animals, they live together as a community but none of them can survive on their own. I think that is something like what we are looking at here. A huge animal or a group of animals which live in a kind of symbiotic relationship with each other except in a very exaggerated and enlarged form.” “You mean that all of this huge city like thing is just one enormous animal?” “Yes Anne, basically that’s about the size of it. One enormous animal composed of many separate autonomous animals. Look there, you can see some of the squid-jellyfish things feeding from the rim of one of the domes, suckling like babies. It seems that they do not have an efficient digestive system of their own.” “So they supply food to the big domes which digest it and then feed them.“ said Anne; “Presumably they also distribute the food around to the other parts of the animal as well. Do you think those waves of colored light are something to do with transporting the food?” “Well, color change in animals is often associated with mood or emotional changes, also it has been suggested that some animals, like cuttlefish for example, use color as a form of communication, although no-one has any idea what they might be saying.” Robert replied with a wry grin. “Lets move in and get some more detailed information.” With this he started the submersible and the small craft moved slowly forward above the strange glowing city. A cloud of tiny lights swam in front of the submersible, as they came closer they resolved into tiny, jet powered jellyfish, pulsing as they flew by. “Look down there.” said James, pointing at one of the huge domes directly beneath the craft. “That one is digesting his lunch, you can see all the various bits of crab and stuff by the light of its luminescence.“ “Thank you James.” said Anne, screwing up he nose; “But I think that was just a little bit too much information.” “He’s right though.” said Robert; “Fascinating. I shall have fun processing all this information later, back on Earth.” “Look over there.” said James; “There are several of the big dome jellyfish swimming in a shoal, and they are moving this way.” The large jellyfish came a little closer to the submersible then they stopped and floated. Then they began to change color in the same kind of pulsating waves which were crossing the main city beneath. One of them broke away from the group and swam directly towards the small craft at a very high speed, pulsing its body as it came. At first it swam around the submersible trailing many long thick, transparent tentacles as well as many dozens of longer but much thinner ones and then it moved away a short distance and began a hypnotic series of light wave and pulses of varying color and brightness. The waves started at the top of the creature and emitted in radial and complex patterns outward across its body and quickly along its tentacles. Some of the colored waves went from the ends of the tentacles back to the body, others did not. “Is it talking to us?” asked James. “In a way, it may be nothing more than some kind of recognition signal to see if we are a part of its community.” “A bit like dogs sniffing?” asked Anne. “Yes, many group animals have members which fulfill the roll of lookouts, I think that is what we have here, a lookout asking for the password to the city.” “But we don’t have a password.” said James. “So what happens next.” “We could be in trouble if we were diving, but as this is a submersible and the batteries are almost dead I think we can risk upsetting him a little.” And with this he turned on the submersible lights, flooding the area with a brilliant glow. The huge jellyfish animal darted away from the light and vanished into the gloom within a second. “Wow! Did you see him go?” exclaimed Anne. “He shot off like a rocket.” The bright light changed the entire appearance of the city animal beneath. Instead of being a glowing city it became a transparent mass of tightly huddled jellyfish with lights moving and flashing in a million colored patterns and many smaller forms of life swimming around like magical transparent angels, flickering inside with a strange alien fire. When the waves of colored light moved across one of the dome creatures there was a shudder in that animal. Through the bodies of the great jelly domes the stony floor of the ocean was clearly visible. “They are really as clear as glass.” said Robert in astonishment. “Much more transparent than any jellyfish on earth.” “I think we are in trouble.” said James. The others turned and followed his glance in time to see three of the large jellyfish animals detach themselves from the main mass on the seabed and float slowly into the open water. With a slow pulsing movement of their bodies they closed upon the submersible from the rear. “What do we do now?” asked Anne. Before anyone could answer, the foremost jellyfish had completely enveloped the small craft in its cluster of long, thin tentacles. Then it began to pulse in a very rhythmical way. An alarm sounded and Robert looked at his control panel. “It’s giving us an electric shock.” he said “It’s up to 435 Volts and still climbing.” The image on the viewer began to flicker and patterns of noise and interference splattered across the image. “How much can the sub take?” asked James. “Not much more than this. We didn’t design it with this kind of treatment in mind. There we go, 600 Volts. That should be about it.” As he said this the room went completely black and they were left sitting in the dark viewing chamber in silence. After a moment his voice broke the silence. “Well, that’s it then. Ladies and gentlemen, the show is now over.” There was a pause, then; “Wow !.” said Anne The illumination came slowly up and the viewing chamber was filled with a gentle blue-white light. The chamber door slowly opened and Dave stood outside wearing a huge grin. “I think you’ll have yourselves something to write home about now.” he said. “Did you see all that?” asked Robert. “Aye, we all watched it on the wee monitors in the other room. I do believe that you’ll get your grant for next years studies Doc.” As they exited the viewing sphere they were greeted with a rousing cheer and a round of applause from the technical team. “I really will have to take my family to Mickey’s World Theme Park when I get back to Earth, and take them on one of the rides based on this trip.” said James; “They won’t believe me about this if I just tell them.” “Aye, It will be one hell of a ride.” said Dave; “It’s a shame the doctor lost my wee submersible though. I’ll remember not to let him borrow my car.” and he gave Robert a canny, sidelong glance. To which Robert looked a bit speechless and Dave burst out laughing. SM: Famed rock chronicler Martin Poppoff interviewed you for "Run for Cover: The Art of Derek Riggs." Why did the world have to wait so long for this book? RIGGS: Iron Maiden are not interested in doing anything for anyone other than Iron Maiden. The publishing of the book was accomplished and paid for by John Merikoski who is an Iron Maiden fan and not in any way affiliated with Maiden. The book only exists because the Iron Maiden fans wanted it to exist. Maiden always said that if they ever published a book of my covers that they would pay me but after almost ten years since I stopped painting Eddie it is quite clear that it was never going to really happen. During the production of the book Iron Maiden would not give us access to scan the original paintings, which are all in a vault in the bass guitarist's house. The only real practical help we got from them was a copy of the scan of "number of the beast". So the book was created mostly by the efforts of John Merikoski with a little bit of help from Martin Poppoff. The book "Run For Cover, The Art of Derek Riggs" is available from my website http://www.derekriggs.com and it is NOT available from book shops anywhere. We did look into regular book distribution but they basically don't want to pay any money for the books, so we didn't do that. RIGGS: Well I guess that must be true, there has not been anything like Eddie before or after what I did. A few people tried it on but they couldn't really make it stick. Even what maiden have tried to do since I stopped painting it has been a bit lifeless and dead. Mostly it comes down to the combination of horror and humor, without the humor it all goes up it's own ass at a rate of knots, something which most of the other artists don't seem to realize. After I stopped, the pictures very quickly deteriorated into Eddie breaking things, And pretty much stayed at that level. Basically I did the first ten years, I laid it all out for them to carry on and they still fucked it up... Oh well... RIGGS: Well there's a lot of bands that I would have liked to do covers for but after Eddie became so omnipotent either people wouldn't give me a job because they didn't want to look like maiden, or they came to me because the did want to look like Maiden. I didn't ever really want to create another Eddie-like character, I always wanted to do different things. I started off trying to be a sci-fi illustrator, but the book publishers never really got what I was trying to do, also back then my paintings were not very good, so I never got any work out of it. Then I turned out to be better at horror, but I still couldn't sell any pictures because they were all a bit too heavy to fit into heavy metal and I got actually asked to leave the offices of a couple of record company art directors. It was only when Maiden saw them that it really came together, because all their early songs were about horror movies they had seen. Their lyrics are really a bit strange, it's like those exercises you get given for school essays, "watch a film of your choice and describe it in 200 words or less" RIGGS: Well I don't really. It was a bit like the Eddie thing, I did a few, then it snowballed. People saw one and asked me to do another one and then when people wanted pyramids it was like "lets go to Riggs, he likes pyramids". People kept asking me to paint them so I did. I have sometimes used them in my own works, but that is mostly because they are a kind of artistic shorthand for ancient and mysterious cultures. If you see a pyramid you think "ooh an ancient and mysterious culture which has been forgotten and buried in the sands of time" and so it saves me having to explain it all somehow. Also it links in to that "Ancient Astronauts" thing as well, it's a part of the new age, mystical/UFO mentality. Mostly I don't bother with them much. (the pyramids I mean) RIGGS: No. I'll steal anything from anyone. Mostly I just make stuff up. I used to try to read books about mythology but I usually found them a bit boring. If you really look at most mythology it comes down to the actions of local warlords which have managed to get themselves deified somehow (I mean turned into gods). When I was doing the Maiden Egypt thing back in the 1980's I found a translation of the prayer to Osiris, and all it says is that Osiris is the meanest mother in the valley, you had better not mess with Osiris. and it says that over and over again. It's the same with all religions and mythologies, if you really look at them without all the bullshit, they are really just local warlords, and that's about it. RIGGS: I did some study into this issue over the years. This is what I have found out. If you can find someone who knows how to do it right, Magic works. I don't mean that you can turn people into frogs or anything like that. but it does seem that with the right state of mind you are able to effect the world around you, you can make it do stuff. I found out how to make it rain and how to make the sun shine and a few other things. and the effect is fairly repeatable. (not always though) but I never managed to do anything really useful with it like win the lottery or anything (and I did try). It seems that there is some direct connection between the mind and the world around you. I think that the world is not what people lead you to think it is. It's not "real" in the way that they say it is. I think that this direct connection between the mind and reality is the fundamental thing that starts all the stories of miracles and magic, religion is just all the bullshit people wrap it up in to make themselves sound important. People like being idolized and worshiped (look at rock stars) and made to feel really important when they are not (look at Paris Hilton), and this is one of the ways they get what they want. They show off a few party tricks and then say something like "if you do what I say you can do this as well". Most religions I have looked at say something along these lines "you can be a good person and you can get so far, but to get all the way to God/ Enlightenment you must now follow my very special teachings or you will never get there." So they get a load of people to do just what they want and they get to wear a big funny looking hat, live in a nice big house (of the lord) and never have to get a proper job. A friend of mine said this; If one person has an imaginary friend they call it schizophrenia and lock him away. If a million people have an imaginary friend they call it organized religion. I do not incorporate anything like magic in any of my pictures, I just paint the pictures. Actually I wouldn't know how. RIGGS: Where is Dystopia? I live in California... Actually we have always lived in such repressive societies. Religion, Violence, Warfare, Cults, Social Groups, Ethnic Groups, Political affiliations, all of these things are what the "Leaders" use to separate people and keep them apart and in small alienated groups so that they are easy to control and they can't group together and overthrow their local dictatorship and lead their own lives the way that they want to. You are not any more free now than you used to be, the control is just more subtle and harder to see than it was. Mostly because the leaders have gotten better at it. Freedom is nice if you can find it, freedom of speech is good so long as you never say anything important. If one day, by accident, you should say something important. Run for your fucking life... on the subject of control, check these links http://www.disinfo.com/2011/04/welcome-to-surveillance-hell-kings-point-new-york/ http://www.disinfo.com/2011/02/chicago-installs-virtual-shield-of-10000-surveillance-cameras/ There are conspiracy theories because there are conspiracies. paranoia is good, paranoia works... RIGGS: Well I am not really there yet. I have some more sci-fi pictures that I want to create, and some stories that I want to tell. We will have to see how it all pans out. I enjoy creating space environments and worlds that I have not seen before. I guess I am old school. The writer Jules Verne said that he wanted to take people to all the places that they could never visit in their lifetimes. I think my attitude is a bit like that really. RIGGS: I have no idea what to say to young artists. the entire world has changes since I started out selling record covers. The first thing that happened was that records disappeared, then the record companies shattered into thousands of tiny companies. and now CD's are slowly vanishing and downloads are taking over and nobody uses record covers any more, and if they do then they can't afford to pay anyone for making them. So how does a young artist go about finding someone to sell their pictures to? I really am not sure right now. If I ever find out I'll let you all know. Computer games may look like a good place to be but that ain't necessarily so. those games are made by large numbers of people and so there is no space really for you to develop your own personal vision, you end up working in a team to make something that is roughly similar to what everyone else is doing. I don't know about you, but I got into art to create the visions I wanted to create. It hasn't always worked out quite like that, but that was my original intention when I started. If there's no space for me to do that, then I am not really interested in it. I feel a bit stuck out on a limb these days, I have things to create but I am not sure how to get it out to people in the way that I want. I guess it will all work out in the end. live long and prosper (funny hand sign thingy) have fun D By: Dan Shelton In a bleak future controlled by killer robots, the survivors struggle to stay alive. They ran. Through the wreckage of the city, they ran for their lives. Through the twisted metal, crumbling concrete, rubble... Rain began to fall from the sky, making the exposed metal slippery and treacherous. The greyness of the clouds above matched the greyness of the city. Suzi was ahead of him. She was the eldest, the one in charge. He followed her obediently because she kept him safe - safe from the hostile city and its deadly metal overlords. “Down here,” she instructed. She spied what was once the basement of a building. The building was mostly demolished, the basement half exposed to the sky. Behind her she could hear her brother’s footsteps, his exhausted breathing, and the hum of the thing chasing them. She knew they had to find safety soon. He was too tired to run anymore. Once they were safe, the Halidron would give up chasing them, they always did. She thought that they just liked to chase people for fun, though she wondered if, inside that metal body of theirs, if they had any understanding of fun. She slid down a long metal beam and into the basement, landing in a puddle of stinking water. “Sis!” He didn’t speak often, so when he did, she knew it was important. He was at the top of the metal beam, his foot caught between it and the concrete ledge. She could see panic on his young, dirt-smeared face; the hum of the enemy grew louder. The beam was too steep for her to climb back up. “Wiggle it free!” she shouted. “I’m trying, I’m trying. I’m stuck!” She looked about, panic kicking in for her too. What could she do to help? “Just wiggle it,” she shouted hoarsely. A grey figure floated into view above him. Its dull metal body seemed to eat the light, casting a dark shadow over him. “Tran!” she shouted. He hadn’t seen the Halidron, but he managed to yank his foot free just as the enemy reached out a metal claw and clamped it about his slim waist. His momentary euphoria at being free turned to terror. “Suzi,” he whispered, lips trembling. “Tran,” she shouted, making a vain effort to clamber up the beam to rescue him. But she slid back onto the ground, falling back and landing in the puddle. The Halidron took off into the sky. Tran was pulled up with it, getting smaller and smaller as his captor climbed higher and higher. Moments later they were both out of sight. “I’ll save you,” Suzi shouted to the empty sky. * * * Suzi traipsed the desolate, ruined avenues of the once-great city. Rain drizzled down. She was damp, unhappy and angry; why hadn’t I been able to protect my little brother, she wondered. She kicked at the rubble with her hand-made shoes. She spun on her heel then, and levelled her gaze at the figure lurking by the shell of a building on her right. He had no time to hide. “You’ve been following me,” she accused. “I saw you, trying to keep out of my sight.” He walked out of the shadow of the building. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I just…” “You just what?” He walked a little closer, hands held out as a gesture of peace. “I didn’t want to scare you, is all.” She regarded him with the suspicion she’d learnt was necessary in this world. He looked middle-aged, with a thick but tidy beard. She couldn’t place his accent, but she knew it wasn’t from the city. Apart from Tran, he was the first human she’d seen in… she wasn’t sure how long, perhaps six or seven moon cycles. “Where are you from?” “North of here. A long way away. I won’t hurt you, I swear.” He began to walk towards her. She took a step back. “Don’t come any closer.” He stopped. Out in the street, exposed, his hair was getting wet, drops of rainwater clinging to his beard. Suzi was already soaked, but cared little. For a life as tough as hers, a little rain was irrelevant. Storm clouds rolled across the sky overhead. The rain slicked the exposed, jagged metal surfaces of the ruined city about them. “This is silly,” the man said, “We’re both getting wet. I mean you no harm.” A bird caught her eye. Its black shape glided across the dark clouds in the west. It cawed, a shrill sound. She knew this city, this wreckage she called home. Twilight was approaching, when the Halidrons made their nightly scan of the city. The bird had spotted them far over to the west where their base lay. She gave the man a distrustful look. “Come with me,” she said. * * * She and Tran had many little hideaways in the city; retreats, where they could be safe and warm, and breathe easy for a few hours. The one she took the man to was in a large, crumbling building away from the river. It overlooked a wide thoroughfare in which stood the statue of a long-dead man who had once mattered when the world had made sense. She invited him to sit but kept her distance, still wary of this stranger. He said his name was Laster. “Suzi,” she said. “How did you get here?” “I walked. From the north. I’ve been walking for weeks. I must’ve lost several kilos at least.” “I haven’t been any further than this city. It’s all I know. What’s it like where you’re from?” “It wasn’t as bad as here. There was grass, fields, but scars too. And the Halidrons. I think ours were different from the ones I’ve seen down here, like a different species or something. The ones here are more aggressive.” Suzi nodded. “They sure are.” “Are you here on your own?” “No. I have a brother too. Our parents are dead. We’re on our own. That’s how it is.” “That’s tough,” Laster said. “What are you, thirteen, fourteen?” She shrugged. “Don’t know. Doesn’t matter really, does it?” “I guess not.” “So why are you here?” “I’m just passing through. Heading south. You know what they say – well, when you meet another human, that is! The south is safe, they say. The Halidrons don’t control the south.” Suzi flicked some dirt off her jumper. “Yeah, I heard that. I heard lots of things over the years. My parents used to tell me that there was a time when the Halidrons weren’t here, but they weren’t sure when that was… seems like they’ve always been here.” The muted sunset lit the statue outside. Its bronze colour shone incongruously amongst the colourless landscape of greys and blacks; the hues of decay and destruction. “Where’s your brother?” “He got captured. We were unlucky. Whenever they catch someone they take them to their base. It’s a big spaceship that’s parked by the bend in the river, ‘bout three miles away.” “I’m sorry.” “What for?” “That you won’t see your brother again.” “What do you mean…of course I will. I’m going to rescue him.” “You are joking?” “No, I’m going to rescue him. Why would I joke about that? I can save him, I know I can. I’ve got it all worked out.” “Look,” he said, “I’m sure you think you can, but you’re just a kid, and the Halidrons will eat you up for dinner if they get the chance.” In the fading light she gave him a level stare. “I can look after myself. I’ve survived for years, looking after Tran all that time. I know the Halidrons. They’re just machines, they work to routines, they’re predictable.” “They’re dangerous.” “I can handle them. I have a plan.” She told him her plan. “At least let me help,” he said. “I’m stronger, quicker. I can help.” “I don’t want your help. Why don’t you just go. I don’t need you.” Laster picked up this meagre possessions and left, leaving her alone. * * * She descended into the city’s many tunnels and passageways after a few hours of sleep. Some were impassable, collapsed, or infested with rats. Some not. She walked along a tunnel that followed the curve of the river and emerged not far from the Halidron base. Her feet splashed in the filthy, stagnant waters that covered the tunnel floor. A glowball lit her way. Dawn would arrive soon. She knew that this was the best time to rescue Tran. At their base, they had a complex of holding cells where they kept those they captured. After their night-time patrols, they returned just after dawn and moved the prisoners to their spaceship for processing. Suzi did not know what the processing involved, but she knew that the humans who were taken into the ship were never seen again. Tran was eight, maybe nine. She wasn’t entirely sure, not that it mattered. What did age matter when your daily routine consisted of simply surviving? Suzi desperately wanted him back. He hardly ever spoke, just followed her with a sullen expression on his face. She guessed that their unrelentingly tough existence had caused that; but he was all she had, and she his. If family was important, then he was everything to her, and she felt the weight of her responsibility to care for him, but never resented it. She walked for an hour and finally reached the vertical tunnel that pointed skyward. A rushed, metal ladder ran up one side. A cool, gritty wind blew down the tunnel. Suzi began to climb. But she did not notice that the fourth rung was rusted to almost nothing. Her foot went straight through it, causing her to lose her footing and fall to the floor of the tunnel. She landed on her left ankle badly and fell backwards into the sludge and water for the second time that day. A bolt of pain exploded from her ankle and through her foot and leg. Suzi yelped in pain. The sound echoed down the tunnel. She pushed herself up on her elbows, ignoring the dampness that soaked her bottom and legs. The pain in her ankle overrode everything else. She felt a tear dribble down her grime-smeared face. As soon as she tried to put any weight on her ankle, it hurt. She cursed. But she would never give up. The ladder had three hundred and sixty eight rungs, she knew, having counted them on previous journeys. One-legged, she grabbed the ladder for support, looking up the tunnel, unable to see the top of the ladder. She took a deep breath, steeled herself, and began to climb, grunting through the pain. * * * She crested the top of the ladder and collapsed onto the grit-covered ground. Sweat soaked her hair and clothing. She stank. Blood smeared her lips from where she’d bitten them several times. Laying on her back, panting hard, she gazed up at the brightening sky as dawn broke. You can’t go on, her mind screamed. You’ll kill yourself. Then I’ll die trying, she thought back. * * * The Halidron spacecraft was a large, dome-shaped machine. It stood out like a giant wart amongst the rubble of the city. About it, a network of small buildings sprawled. One of them was the cells they used for holding prisoners. Suzi knew her brother would be held there. She knew from observing their routines that the Halidrons would be back shortly; she had an hour, maybe less. She stood, and immediately fell to the ground; her ankle screamed in pain. She spat blood from her mouth… and heard a characteristic humming sound. She rolled onto her back as the Halidron hovered into view. She gritted her teeth in pain, regarding the enemy. It hovered closer and lowered its arms, reaching for her. But it stopped. She heard a fizzle, like a crackle of electricity, and saw sparks dancing on its metal body. A loud popping sound erupted from within and it fell at her feet with a clanking thud. A figure stepped into view: Laster, with a small electronic device in his hand. “Micro-disruptor. I made it myself. Powerful enough to kill one of these things – ” he kicked the dead robot, “but it takes a long time to recharge, so let’s hope none attack again.” Suzi sat up on her elbows. Laster knelt beside her. “I had a wife and daughter. They’re dead now. I… I couldn’t save them.” He took a moment for breath, fighting back memories. “I’m not going to lose anyone else, so I’m helping you whether you like it or not.” She offered no resistance as he wordlessly wrapped her ankle in a makeshift bandage made from his shirt sleeve. He found a length of metal that would act as a temporary crutch. Unsteadily, she stood. She pointed to the cells by the spacecraft. “That’s where Tran will be. It’s quiet now, but they’ll be back soon. There’s a pathway, but we’ll have to be quick.” He nodded. “So you built that?” she asked, nodding toward the micro-disrupter. There was a touch of admiration in her voice. “I did. It’s not very powerful, but enough to get you out of tricky situations. My parents were scientists. They passed their inquisitiveness on to me. What about you?” “My parents are dead,” she said. “Don’t ask me about them again.” “Sorry, I was just curious.” “Well don’t be. When I trust you, I’ll talk.” * * * They sneaked along the pathway, slowly, eventually reaching their destination. The cells were housed in a long metal building on the nearside of the Halidron base. They were streaked with rust and worn. The Halidron had been present here for many years. Suzi directed him. “The door is over there. The cells are inside.” They reached the unlocked door and entered. Each cell was nothing more than a metal cage, constructed from thick bars. They all seemed empty. “There!” Suzi pointed to the one at the far end. In the cell they found a scruffy-looking brown-haired child, sat on the floor with an air of despondency about him. Hearing them, he looked up. “Suzi Suzi Suzi,” he yelled with delight. “We’re here to get you out.” She looked at the door. A new electronic lock greeted her. “They’ve changed the locks! Look, they’ve changed the locks! What do we do?” Laster regarded the big, electronic device on the door. He opened his mouth just as Suzi did – they both had the same idea. “The disruptor.” Laster got out the device. “Stand back,” he told Tran. He activated it and a bolt of electricity shot form the device and struck the lock, which exploded in an array of sparks. The door swung open. “Let’s go,” Suzi urged. * * * Outside the rained poured in torrents. A wind had begun too, sending the rain in at an angle, which fired at them like bullets. It stung their faces and hands. They sped from the base, the shadow of the spacecraft diminishing behind them. Suzi’s progress was slow and she tripped, sprawling on the ground in the wet and dirt. She tried to right herself. Laster threw her crutch aside and scooped her up into his arms. “What are you doing?” she demanded, her body stiffening in protest. “Saving your life.” He ran. Tran followed, keeping a keen eye on his sister all the time. As they splashed through the biting rain, Suzi directed him towards a hideout of hers. * * * He laid Suzi down on the makeshift pile of rags that pretended to be a bed. She groaned. He could see the bandage he’d made earlier was soaked with blood. Tran sat at her side, concern on his young face. Laster crouched down, regarding her ankle with a worried face. It needed re-bandaging and cleaning. “You want to help me with this?” he asked Tran. Tran was silent. Suzi rested a hand on her brother’s shoulder. “It’s ok. You can trust him.” * * * Her ankle newly bandaged, Suzi closed her eyes, feeling sleep wanting to take her. Tran snuggled up in a corner and soon dozed off. Laster watched them both, remembering his own family. Suzi was relieved that they had rescued Tran, but wished now more than ever for this life to end. The danger, the Halidrons, was all too much for her. She longed for a quiet life of relaxation and enjoyment. She opened her eyes. “How far do you think it is? The south, safety?” Laster shrugged. “When-” “Shhhhhh,” he warned. Suzi pushed herself up on her elbows, concerned, as Laster went to the slit of a window and peered out. He froze. She held her breath. “What is it?” she whispered finally. He turned to face her, ashen-faced. “We’re surrounded. I don’t think we’ll make it to the south after all.” Dan Shelton writes about whatever comes into his head. He likes Star Wars, chocolate and killer, alien androids. Thank you, Dan! Sable Mare Tales is an online publication featuring the best speculative fiction money can't buy! All of these pictures are Copyrighted and cannot be used in any media without written permission (which we obtained from Mr. Riggs!): ...about technique for these pictures. Some of them are photo-composites. They are copyright free photos that I have cut up and repurposed into a new picture. for this I use Photoshop. the 3D models I made using inspire 3D, which was a very early version of Lightwave 3D. and I rendered in Bryce, because I like Bryce. it's quick and gives me what I want very quickly. I tend not to render the picture as a whole, I render the elements individually and then combine them in Photoshop. This not only makes them render quicker (I Had a very slow computer back when I did some of these), it also give me more options when combining them in Photoshop later on. These days, for the 3D modeling I use a bunch of different software, but back then I didn't have much. Canyon Town © Derek Riggs 2008 This picture is a bit star trekkie. I got the idea for the landscape from watching the movie "Exorcist 2", the one with Bazoozoo in it. it's not a very good movie, but it had a few interesting images. I made it in Bryce when Bryce had just got trees, they are not very good trees. One day I shall make a better version of this one. Probably I should improve the space ship as well. Desert Chase © Derek Riggs 2008 I did something like the Pod Racers in star wars. It was my first real attempt at making a 3D vehicle with polygon modeling. I polygon modeled the background as well. The big spaceship at the top is just a sphere with a detailed texture on it. this also was rendered in Bryce. Sharkplanes © Derek Riggs 1997 This picture is a photo-composite.(quite an old one) I saw this helicopter and it looked like a shark so I made the sharkplane, then I had to make a background for it. So I used bits of the Taj Mahal and made a palace and stuck it on top of a rock mesa. I like photo-composites, they have a different look than you can get with 3D modeling or painting and they can look good if they are done right. You have to watch the perspective though. Space Station 1 © Derek Riggs 2008 This is another early attempt at 3D modeling, and it's rendered in Bryce. I always felt that something was missing from this picture but I was never sure what it was. Steel Place © Derek Riggs 2000 or 2010 The date on this one is weird because I made the background machine in Bryce back in 2000 but it got put aside because I didn't like the overall idea. but I liked this bit so I kept it. Recently (2010) I made this figure. I made it by using a very basic 3D head and a shape I made for the 3D coat. I used them to do many renders of different computer generated textures. I actually only used them to bend the texture around the shape. then I took all the different textures into Photoshop and cut between them to create the coat and head, adding creased and folds in the fabric as I went along. The arms are photographs that I modified. Then I added lots of little photographic bit onto it to give it some richness of detail. The stars are a combination several shots of real stars courtesy of the Hubble telescope. Hubble photographs are copyright free. I just noticed that the dates of this picture match the dates of the film by Stanly Cubrick and it sequel, written by Arthur C Clark of course. Ooooh! It must be a kind of magic, or maybe it's "sufficiently advanced science" and it only looks like magic. Strange Place © Derek Riggs 1997 I had a plug-in that would make fractals in Photoshop. they weren't just fractals, they were 3 dimensional slices of 4 dimensional fractals. Or maybe 4 dimensional fractals projected into our 3 dimensional space. Something like that. anyway they made these really cool shapes. So I made a world out of them and put an explorer into it. At some point I hope to re-visit this world and explore it some more. Maybe I should go there for my summer holidays... The Beach © Derek Riggs 2000 This one is a combination of a photo-composited background (No there isn't a place where big pyramids are between some mountains by a lake) and I added a little bit of 3D. I wouldn't call it modeling because they are just the built in 3D pyramid shapes in Bryce with a nice texture on. That's not really modeling is it? but it kind of works. This is the picture where I learned the delicate are of focus matching. I had to blur the flying 3D pyramids a bit to match the soft focus of the photographic bits or the 3D elements wouldn't sit right in the picture. All that lovely, juicy pin sharp 3D detail, and then I had to blur it all out... oh well.. the picture looks nicer for it. This picture is still under construction. I made the "Tube World" in a program called "Artmatic Voyager". this program allows you to make entire 3D worlds using a fractal designer called "Artmatic" (made by U&I software). and the world that you make is bigger than the surface of the earth (go for a walk...). So I made this. the snakey things coming out of the tubes are going to be catching flying insects, but I haven't done the insects yet (that's the "still under construction" part) The space probe thingy I made in Bryce using just the basic shapes and put the bits together in Photoshop. Image © 2000 Michael Whelan, reprinted here with permission...but it does have his logo imprint. From his site: "The fourth of my End of Nature paintings. The figure is stranded on a pillar of human folly, looking up to a symbol of technology (the lamppost) for her deliverance from the perils signaled by the oncoming storm. Will Science light the way to the future?"
A Tribute to Derek Riggs (Summer 2011)
ISSUE TWO features an exciting interview with world famous artist Derek Riggs!
Riggs is best know for his years doing renouned album covers for the British rock band, Iron Maiden. This month, he talks with Sable Mare about his latest book, a beautiful collection of his various works. He's also graciously submitted a fiction tale for you, and...if that wasn't enough...images from his vault, artwork you won't see anywhere else!
Currently, we are reviewing submissions for Issue 3, while anxiously awaiting an interview with Professor Skye Knight Dent, a Los Angeles-based screenwriter and one of my teachers and mentors! Her sound advice got me through many long days of writing and re-writing the screenplay for what was to become Veteran of Screaming Vengeance (initially titled The Crimson Web, or The Crimson Web of War).
TABLE OF CONTENTS
20,000 Leauges Under Europa (by Derek Riggs)
An Interview with Derek
To the Freelands (by Dan Shelton)
Celebrity Guest Artist 1: Derek Riggs, multiple pieces!
Celebrity Guest Artist 2: Michael Whelan's Erosion
Foreword: Below is a short story that I wrote sometime in the late 1990’s. About 1998 I think. It has a few little problems, for example; I do not think that one can stand on the surface of Europa in a space suit. I think one would just get fried by all the radiation. Problems aside it’s a fun little story. I have written a couple of short stories but I always felt that they were more like the first chapters of longer novels. In the end I stopped writing them because I found it quite hard to work within the word limits set by the publishers.
THE END
A SABLE MARE EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH ARTIST (AND AUTHOR) DEREK RIGGS!
SM: Mr. Poppoff stated you are responsible for creating "quite possibly the most beloved and recognized character rock 'n' roll has ever witnessed." Your comments?
SM: You are basically entangled with Iron Maiden forever, but if you could hit Reset, is there another band you would like to be associated with?
SM: Many of your pieces done for albums feature pyramids and ziggurats. Why the special affinity for these objects in particular?
SM: Do you have a favorite mythology you enjoy studying for inspiration?
SM: What’s the difference between religion and magick, and how do you incorporate either in your work?
SM: Some of your work seems dystopian; do we live in a dystopia now?
SM: Which project you’ve worked on, related to sci-fi/speculative fiction, are you happiest with?
SM: What words of wisdom can you impart to aspiring artists right now? 
The End
We're currently accepting submissions to assemble our first issue... see the Submit tab at the top of this page for guidelines and address to send to...
Tube world © Derek Riggs 2012
CELEBRITY GUEST ARTIST: MICHAEL WHELAN!
Erosion, 1999, Acrylic on Panel, 32" x 40"
Since 1980, Michael Whelan has been one of the world's premier fantasy and science fiction artists. He is currently working full time on his fine art paintings, but in the past three decades he has created more than 350 book and album covers for authors and artists like Isaac Asimov, Anne McCaffrey, Sir Arthur C. Clarke, Stephen King, the Jacksons, Sepultura, and MeatLoaf. His clients have included every major U.S. book publisher in addition to such diverse companies as National Geographic, Roadrunner Records, and The Franklin Mint. http://www.michaelwhelan.com/catalog/home.php
http://www.blackgate.com/2011/06/08/art-of-the-genre-an-interview-with-michael-whelan/
CELEBRITY AUTHOR INTERVIEW WITH
+Philip Palmer
Philip Palmer is the amazingly prolific author of numerous novels and TV scripts, including his latest science fiction epic, Hell Ship. Mr. Palmer was kind enough to do an enlightening interview with Sable Mare Tales! Enjoy!
SMT: Your first foray into science fiction novel writing, Debatable Space, met with good reviews. What do you think were the novel’s strongest traits, and which areas did you improve upon for your second novel, Red Claw?
PP: I wrote Debatable Space in a blaze of energy, and (from all the feedback I’ve received) that’s undoubtedly the novel’s greatest strength – sheer brio. I didn’t want a story that dawdled, and I wanted characters you cared about and cared about FAST – which is why I adoped the first person narrative approach (ie all the main characters get to narrate their own sections.) That gives huge immediacy and power. Plus it was very rude; much ruder than all my other books.
With Red Claw I wanted to rein in. It’s a ticking clock story, a single simple jeopardy; but with big ideas tied to it about genocide and the morality of terraforming. Red Claw is probably the most ‘conventional’ book I’ve written to date, though I did have fun with footnotes.
The main difference is that Red Claw is a single continuous narrative in time – stuff has happened in the past but I keep flashbacks to a minimum, and in fact (at the request of my editor) cut one entire section that dramatised the backstory – because he felt (and I agreed) that it diluted the immediacy of the storytelling.
SMT: Your Universe is pretty much a dystopia, particularly Version 43’s town of Belladonna, “a planet run by criminals and desperados, [where] death is commonplace.” Why the fascination with dark futures? Or do you think we live in a dystopia now?
PP: First of all – yes ! I do think we live in a dystopia. I won’t rant, but there’s so much crap going on now that we’ve hit the phenomenon of the Futility of Outrage; in other words, it doesn’t matter how outraged we get about bonuses/rich people not paying taxes/social injustice, it won’t make a blind bit of difference.
In terms of my SF – there’s a bit of present tense projection. The evil in my future is a massively exaggerated version of the evil in our present – for drones in Iraq, read doppelganger robots on Cambria, etc.
But actually there’s a huge slice of optimism in there too, I’d argue. I think with plentiful energy (which we would have in space – every sun is a fusion reactor) the potential for human development through space is extraordinary and WILL be amazing. But we have to think ahead to the moral consequences.
But utopias make for boring stories; I write rollercoaster pulp with a dash of [Something], and for that to work, you need bad guys and dastardly conspiracies and worlds in peril.
SMT: Which project you’ve worked on, related to sci-fi/speculative fiction, are you happiest with?
PP: That’s like asking Which is your favourite child? (Luckily, I only have the one child.) I think Hell Ship is the boldest and richest thing I’ve written so far; I could easily spin it off into a half dozen more novels, and have a gleam of an idea featuring both Sharrock and Artemis (who is the heroine of Artemis, my yet-to-be-published fifth book.)
SMT: Your latest Orbit novel, Hell Ship, is about a slave ship, with each captive being the last of its race…sort of a Noah’s Ark from Hell. Can you tell us more about it?
PP: It’s partly inspired by my love of Coleridge’s Rime of the Ancient Mariner – that idea of a ghost ship haunting the seven seas…only here it’s a space ship haunting the many universes. My aim was to create an epic without writing an epic 10 volumes; each character comes from a different universe, and each of those universes contains a near-infinite number of stories. So the reader of Hell Ship glimpses far more than is shown.
There are influences from Star Trek and Farscape; and a big influence from Robert E. Howard and Conan; so in a sense the book is a huge encyclopedia of SF/F. But mostly, it’s a story about the characters.
SMT: Your fifth and soon-to-be published book, Artemis, is following fast on the heels of Hell Ship. Do just write really fast or was there a delay in getting Hell Ship on the shelves?
PP: I’ve never written so fast! Orbit told me they wanted two books in a year and I had five months to write each of them. Hell Ship took five months and one week. That was a blast; but after so much massive worldbuilding in Hell Ship it was a relief to write Artemis, where I was effectively filling in the gaps in the worldbuilding of Debatable Space. Artemis is not a sequel; but it knits together the future histories of Debatable Space, Red Claw and Version 43 in what I hope readers will find is an interesting and thought provoking way.
SMT: Apart from yours, of course--which book do you think “gets it right” about the future?
PP: In terms of getting it right, Charlie Stross wins hands down because he’s the master of careful extrapolation based on in depth knowledge of cultural and technological trends. I love Peter Hamilton’s books but I do have a real problem with the whole concept of ‘post human’, so as an extrapolation I don’t quite go for that bit of his future universe.
Paolo Bacigalupi’s wonderful The Wind Up Girl is a futuristic vision which is so very very possible it hurts to read it.
SMT: Your books demonstrate a good grasp of physics and modern technology. Would you classify your style as hard SF? And how did you get so smart on such things to begin with…or are you just making it all up as you go?
PP: That’s a real can of worms question. As a teenager I read a huge amount of ‘hard SF’ and it’s certainly an influence. And as a matter of policy, I always research what I read – if it’s a crime drama I read books on crime and meet cops, if it’s a drama about Marco Polo or Isaac Newton (both subjects I’ve tackled) I’ll research the history of those characters and their worlds. So naturally, while preparing for my SF novels, I’ve ploughed my way through quite a number of popular physics books, focusing mainly on quantum physics and superstring theory rather than pure engineering stuff ie how spaceships are built.
But I tend to range freely among the SF/F genres even when writing books which, on the surface, are space opera. And I don’t write the kind of scientific SF that has no time for character; Debatable Space has some detailed musings about emergence theory, but much more of it is about Lena as an evolving bitch. Hell Ship has a tang of heroic fantasy to it, quite deliberately; Version 43 betrays my love of hard boiled crime novels.
And though I like the science in my books to be credible, I’m a great believer in Clarke’s law; that any sufficiently developed technology is indistinguishable from magic.
SMT: Which scientific development isn’t getting enough media attention?
PP: Anti-ageing. It will play havoc with our society economically and culturally if and when it proves possible to extend the youthfulness of life; so that we can live to a hundred and twenty and not be deaf and blind and unable to walk. But on the other hand, growing up takes so darned long (I’ve passed the half century mark and I’m certainly still not a grown up) so to extend the three score and ten seems to me highly desirable.
But let’s be honest – when someone invents the perfect rejuve – are you and I ever going to find out about it? Isn’t it more likely to be kept for the use of the billionaire elite???? (Now there’s a story…)
SMT: What advice do you offer for new authors trying to get published today, when major retails like Borders are going out of business?
My perception is that at entry level, the situation for prose writers is better than it’s ever been. Instead of vanity press publishing ( a rip off) we now have internet publishing, which is the prose equivalent of fringe theatre. And that’s clearly very liberating; as a writer, you don’t learn until your work is out there, and that’s more important than money. (Though money is VERY important.)
Further down the line, the more established writers are getting nervous. But from an unrepresentative sample of one (i.e. me) bookbuying has moved from the High Street to the Internet – in other words, I buy almost all my books from Amazon because it’s so easy. And because, brilliantly, they’ve made buying books online feel like a personal transaction.
My invariable advice to new writers is: Don’t. Oddly, that never discourages anyone.
My second bit of advice is: diversify. Every writer has to be a one person portfolio economy. I teach, write, script edit; switch from prose to drama; I even produce, when necessary. And that variety is very invigorating; but also means you don’t get left out in the cold when something doesn’t work out. If your book doesn’t sell – write comics! If you’re fed up writing comics – write short stories!
SMT: Other than perhaps the U.S. economy, what’s the biggest problem on Earth?
PP: A false sense of entitlement; i.e. people who have it all through luck (inheritance) or bullshit who believe they deserve everything they’ve got. It’s an evolving homo superior subspecies of people who in reality aren’t fit to shine the shoes of the average Joe, or Jane.
Carrion
By Holly Day