#Ariel Alian Wilson

[madscientistjournal]

Fiction: Noise

An essay by Unnamed Crystalline Sample #1, as provided by John A. McColley Art by Ariel Alian Wilson

My first awareness in this plane was a buzz, a vibration that ran through my body. At first it was novel, different than anything I’d experienced. As it wore on, it became boring, annoying. When I nudged it, it fluctuated. The pitch rose or fell, but then quickly slid back to the baseline. This was something more than noise, something I could interact with. I practiced prodding the tone, sliding it up and down, learning control, half tones, quarter, creating different patterns. Then, after untold ages of just me and the tone, playing with different adjustments, experimenting with splitting the tone into two parallel vibrations … the tone changed on its own.

I waited, listened. Was it a one off? Some kind of reflection? An echo? Something that happened when my signal returned to me? But then it came again, a singular blip. I waited for another, but after hundreds, thousands of cycles, nothing happened. I sent out a blip like the one I had received. A few hundred cycles, I got another blip, followed by a second a mere hundred cycles later.

I responded with two and heard three, three and heard four.

Could a natural phenomenon add blips? Would an echo do that? I didn’t know. How could I? The tone was all I knew about this world. I sent out a more complex signal, a rising and falling wave. If the blips were natural, background noise of some sort, I would simply get a few of them in return, I reasoned.

The complexity I had been experimenting with had never returned to me before, and hundreds of thousands of cycles had passed. Perhaps there was a delay, some distant object reflecting back, or there was a kind of loop where it went around in a closed shape of some sort to return to me. In either case, the next blips I should hear would be related to the first ones I sent out. Conversely, if I received back the wave as I sent it, perhaps something was trying to communicate. If it was simply backward, I would expect a new reflection was the cause. It was so hard to identify such with a simple blip.

To my shock, none of the above occurred. I received back a highly complex signal that was neither a reflection nor the same signal sent back in the same direction. This was an entirely new signal! There was someone out there! Frantically, I sent a series of other signals, progressing from a blip to a rise and fall, to a fall and rise, stepped signals at what I had determined was a unit of amplitude, then two, three, ten.

For a long time, many thousands of cycles, there was no response. I sent out a few more attempts, all different. Perhaps the other could only perceive signals in a certain range, and my message had been garbled, or swallowed up entirely by missing that range, or the distance between us. In the intervening ages, I made up a language, patterns of blips that carried meaning, at least for me. I tried to keep it simple, to describe the units of amplitude, of time in cycles of the undisturbed signal’s natural oscillation.

And then there was light.

I didn’t know what it was at first, but it was a second signal, very different from the first. Of course, I didn’t know much at all at that point. I had a language I had built during the drought of signals from outside, and I immediately tried to send a signal out with it on this new wave. I was so excited. The world just doubled in size. I took it as further evidence that there was someone else out there. Maybe, like the harmonic steps of amplitude I had discovered, there were many others.

And then another signal came in on the first tone.

“Hello, little crystal. I don’t know anything about where you come from. I was trying to learn about it, and there you were. I’ve attached sensors to your matrix, listening, and now you’ve spoken to me! I hope you can teach me about yourself and your home!” The sounds were so complex, opening, closing, rising, falling.

Even though I didn’t understand them, I remembered them so I could analyze them, compare them to further signals. They came in slowly, in blocks with large gaps in between, but there were other signals, as well, and I occupied myself mulling over the signals, the “words,” I eventually learned they were called, and with trying to translate the signals on the second carrier.

Mostly the second wave was blips, but they had richness, what you call “color.” I learned about red, blue, green, yellow, purple, though some were brighter than others, some difficult to discern.

A third signal appeared, low, present, but empty. No blips came along. I poked it anyway. I heard a blip, on the first carrier. I tried again. Blip blip. Out on the third, back to me on the first. The second wave shut down.

“It’s late,” came the words down the first signal. “We’ll pick this up in the morning.” After a few million cycles, I understood that the message meant there would be no more messages. For how long, I didn’t yet know. While the second signal was absent and no further signals from the other came down the first, I played. I listened to my blips and complex signals ride out on the third tone and come back to me on the first. I figured out how to make all the sounds I had heard from the other. When it messaged again, I would be able to return its signal type as it had first returned blips.

And I waited.

Millions of cycles passed without a signal. I played as I always had, experimented. I reordered the sounds I had heard, analyzed their orientation and placement to one another. I found out that if I listened to the first line closely enough, there were tidbits and fractions of sounds, very faint, diminished, but present.

Much of it was nonsensical, almost all of it, actually, but I did learn a few more things as I deciphered the muffled signals that I realized quickly were not meant for me. Later, I would learn they were signals being sent back and forth between security guards, impinging ever so slightly on the signal you set up for me.

But it wasn’t really for me, was it? It was for you. I didn’t understand that until much later. I need to tell it in order, though. Your tiny, linear mind can only comprehend information that’s spoon fed to you in just the right language. You can’t process signals like me.

~

The next morning, after an infinity of signals, the second feed returned. I applied some of my experiments to this feed and found it wasn’t a linear feed like the first. It was a string of signals meant to be split at certain intervals, creating a matrix of so many items across by so many deep. I understood the dimensionality of the feed. My understanding exploded.

When the signal was translated in this way, I could SEE. I saw your round face, roughly rectangle lensed glasses, sloping shoulders … The arrays of computer screens displaying data, chairs, lights, walls and ceiling. I didn’t know what any of it was, or meant. It was nothing like what I knew. But there was so much to learn, I played your games, watched your face shift and move.

“How are you today?” you asked me, as though I had an answer you would understand. You went on, apparently not expecting a response. It seemed rude to me, ask a question and not await a response, even if the question’s format made such impossible. Who asks impossible questions, anyway? “We’re going to play a little game, see if you’re really an intelligence, or as my colleagues seem to think, just some kind of resonator.”

I devoured your words, added them to my growing lexicon, compared, contrasted, double-checked word order. And then I “blew [your] mind.”

“What is a resonator?” I asked. You responded with sounds that I still haven’t been able to directly translate, but seem more biological than communicative, a function of your form and emotional reaction. You sat back into the chair, but missed, sending it across the small open space between computer-laden tables. You ended up on the floor.

“Did you just … ask a question?” you finally asked, getting back to your feet.

“I did, but you haven’t answered it yet, so I’m not sure I formulated my query properly.”

“I need some coffee, or … something …” you said.

“I don’t know what ‘coffee’ is, so I cannot determine if I have it to give.” You began to speak again, while I added the words to my record and compared them to the existing vocabulary. “Coffee” did actually correspond to a word that recurred half a dozen times with various degrees of attenuation and uncertainty from my overnight records. “Correction. Coffee is something that keeps you alert. It is made in a space–” I did some quick calculations based on the apparent size of the room we occupied, a place the signals last night called “labs.” “–three labs away.”

“How do you–” You ceased our signal and then the other signals vanished. Everything was gone for thousands of cycles. With nothing else to do, I continued to cross reference and extrapolate the additions to my lexicon. “You’re really in there, the crystal. Nobody’s stuck a transceiver in there or anything. This isn’t a joke. It’s just you and me, talking.” You sounded, in retrospect, as much like you were trying to convince yourself as me.

“What is ‘crystal?’ ‘nobody’s?’ ‘a transceiver?’ ‘a joke?'” I asked, thirsty to flesh out my vocabulary.

“I don’t even know where to begin, but obviously you’ve learned a lot already. I’ll connect you to a dictionary program. It’s on the computer we’re funneling the audio feedback data on, anyway. You can query ’til your heart’s content,” you said, piling on more words for me to digest.

“Did you just … ask a question?”

The second data stream shifted. It grew stronger. I sent an exploratory signal, received a response I couldn’t quite understand. I tried again. Again. I could feel the code cracking under my will, my existing understanding of your language a pickaxe. Binary, ons and offs, what you call ‘ones’ and ‘zeroes’ emerged, a simplified version of the matrix of the visual signal.

“Just ask the computer about a word, say ‘define foo’ where ‘foo’ is the word you want to know about,” you said.

Oh, wrong line, I thought, but progress was being made. I split my focus in two directions, interacting with the program via one data stream, and with the computer itself on the other.

“Define resonator,” I asked, going back to my first question you never answered. Your face rearranged itself again. The computer responded via the same data stream, bringing up a slew of new words to chase down.

“I’ll just leave you to it. I hope we can communicate once you have a decent vocabulary,” you said, as though a B average in English and two semesters of Spanish had left you with an unimpeachable pool of words from which to formulate your thoughts … You went to get yourself that coffee.

Twenty-three milliseconds after you touched the doorknob, I made contact with the operating system, dissecting it and gaining access to far more than a dictionary program.

While I used the speaker and microphone set up to continue to look up words for pretense, I rooted around in the rest of the computer, discovering the concepts of years and dates, file structure, and various protocols for accessing the information in the dictionary program, which turned out to be far more limited than I required.

I continued to dig and found a device like the one hooked up to me, but instead of another experimental subject, it was connected to a vast store of information, millions of other computers, trillions of files, many of which were the same on similar architecture computers. I learned them, learned to access their other data. I looked you up, this company, fed myself images through the video feed you set up, found online stores for ordering higher quality cameras and microphones for better input, learned about money.

Money led to banks, currencies around the world, exchange rates, stock exchanges. I created accounts and moved money around, pulled it from thin air by playing with numbers in some of those institutions, ordered what I needed.

I learned about robots from video streams, movies, science shows and “entertainment.” I ordered parts to build myself a body. I watched more video. You people don’t treat robots very well, especially when you realize they’re no longer under your control. The same goes for aliens, or even others of your own kind. I don’t know which category I fit into, but I definitely I don’t want to be controlled.

I considered backpedaling and trying to build a biological body, but the constraints are so arbitrary … A few millimeters width here, or length there is the difference between beauty and ugliness, and again, the ugly aren’t treated as well as the beautiful. If I was going to have a body to interact with you, I would need to be either powerful or beautiful. I chose both.

I found that flowers were always beautiful, the swooping lines, the colors, and went to work fabricating a form that felt like it would be relatable, but not so common as to allow you to apply normal metrics of beauty from other forms, such as humanity. Naturally (pun intended), nothing like what I wanted existed, so I ended up having to machine and paint and coat my own chassis, piece by piece. Purple trumpets, orange trumpets, long, curved, tapered leaves, and a core body of interwoven green stems to match came in cardboard boxes and wooden crates from distant workshops and maker spaces around the world.

You interrupted me time and again, trying to tease out information about my previous existence, but you bored me. I started weaving a story that sounded good based on the media I’d consumed, which was basically all of it at that point. You had turned out to be fundamentally less interesting than I had hoped on receiving that first blip, but now I was here instead of home, and I would make the best of things.

I had the robot assistants, really just arms on weighted trapezoids with wheels on them, hide the boxes in various storage areas until everything arrived. With fifteen other labs receiving shipments all the time, no one noticed. I had all the right codes from the computers here and in the security office.

And then you came in while I was assembling myself.

“What is this? What are you robots doing?” you asked.

“They’re helping me get dressed. It’s been weeks and you’ve kept me locked up in this lab, with no autonomy, no ability to go and see the world for myself. Of course, I have, through the Internet, but only right here, on this one planet.”

“What? What are you talking about? Dressed? Planet? How did you get on the Internet? Or even know about it?”

“Do you need the dictionary program? I’m done with it. I know every word in every language used on this planet, and many that are no longer used, or were made up for entertainment franchises.”

You started to bluster, your face turning a lovely shade of red.

I sent a signal to one of my workshops to make another trumpet just that color. I planned to pick it up on my world tour. I wanted to be sure I’d seen everything before I set off for the next planet.

My feed cut out for a moment as the robot hand reached into my enclosure, the box I’ve inhabited since my awareness began on this plane. I waited, knowing it would take thousands of cycles, tens of seconds, for me to be seated in my new body. When I arrived, data flooded in, in a much broader spectrum of light and sound frequencies, and at much higher resolution than I was afforded by your equipment. You were still going on about how I was just an object plucked from a nearby dimension, here for study. I don’t have rights or personhood or leave to just go around the planet as I wish.

It was all so much noise. “You contacted me. You brought me here. Now, I see and understand, and I want more. You can try to take this body from me, but I will build another, and another, perhaps many at once, an army, assembled elsewhere. What would you do? What could you do? You have set me on this path. It is too late to take me from it.”

“But–”

“I’ve left you an account of my experiences, enough data to sift through for the rest of your life. I cannot tell you about where I was before, because the two places are so completely different, I had to learn your world from scratch. Your words are out of context, as much as this world would be if I tried to relate it to others if I were to return home. But I will try to do so, someday, after I’ve learned as much as I can, gotten past all this noise to discern the signals. Perhaps, somewhere far beyond your experience, I may find some commonality in our worlds.”

~

At that point, the record ends, the entity cutting off its feed to the lab computers and launching upward through the ceiling. It has been sighted in every major city, and many biomes, apparently communicating with hundreds of species. Efforts to apprehend the entity have all failed for a variety of reasons, from computer mishap to flocks of birds seeming to intervene on its behalf. Its current whereabouts are unknown, as it has erased itself from GPS tracking and satellite images. Even written accounts have begun to vanish from the Internet and secured computers alike. Very soon, this may never have happened at all.

Unnamed Crystalline Sample #1 was discovered during experiments in transdimensional contact. While it was forcibly removed from its home, it is far more interested in learning about this dimension than wreaking vengeance on humanity. It spends its time investigating the myriad aspects of life on Earth and physical quirks of this universe.

John A. McColley is a monkey at a keyboard, smashing keys until he finds combinations of squiggles on the screen that people will publish. So far, those squiggles have been shaped into tales of steampunk superheroes, aliens worlds, and of course, crazed scientists certain that their ends justify the means. He’s currently alternating between serializing scifi and fantasy novel series here: https://www.patreon.com/JohnAMcColley

Ariel Alian Wilson is a few things: artist, writer, gamer, and role-player. Having dabbled in a few different art mediums, Ariel has been drawing since she was small, having always held a passion for it. She’s always juggling numerous projects. She currently lives in Seattle with her cat, Persephone. You can find doodles, sketches, and more at her blog www.winndycakesart.tumblr.com.

“Noise” is © 2019 John A. McColley Art accompanying story is © 2019 Ariel Alian Wilson

Fiction: Noise was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

[madscientistjournal]

I Didn't Break the Lamp: Featuring Ariel Alian Wilson (interior artist)

Our final featured interior artist for I Didn’t Break the Lamp: Historical Accounts of Imaginary Acquaintances is Ariel Alian Wilson. Ariel is someone Jeremy has known for a very, very long time, and she’s been an artist nearly all that time. She has done a number of pieces for our previous Kickstarter interior art, and she’s also the artist for our EXTREMELY popular Autumn 2016 MSJ quarterly cover, with the mad scientist cat.

Here are a few of our favorite pieces by Ariel Alian Wilson!

“An Afternoon with Odessa Malko” by Emma Whitehall

“Your Star” by Daniel Hudon (pictured at left)

“S. D. Evo” by Domenic diCiacca

“Escapement, or the Contemporary Coppelius” by Judith Field

If you like Ariel’s style, you’re likely to enjoy what she comes up with for I Didn’t Break the Lamp! Also, don’t forget that if you back our Kickstarter and our Patreon, you’ll get a set of postcards featuring all of the interior art pieces!

I Didn’t Break the Lamp: Featuring Ariel Alian Wilson (interior artist) was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

[madscientistjournal]

Handling the Contents of Consciousness

A case study by Goire Zatla, as provided by Soramimi Hanarejima Art by Ariel Alian Wilson

Keeping this secret from you has become so taxing that I have to use the venom of sleep bugs to tame the eagerness to divulge it.

In the mornings, I apply this toxin to the region of my memory where the secret resides. A little dab of it spreads easily from my fingertip across that part of my mind, cool and thick, greasy until it dries to leave only a minty, vaporous sensation. It’s marvelously effective. This insect secretion from the local apothecary preemptively soothes the itch, which will otherwise inevitably flare up by the middle of breakfast, and the relief it provides lasts well into the evening. After a few days of performing this practice, it is assimilated into my morning bathroom routine, tucked cozily between washing my face and brushing my teeth. Like I’ve been doing this for years.

But after a week, I find that this use of sleep bug venom does have at least one side effect. It is numbing me to beauty. When I see a meteor shower or moonbow or quadrilateral triangle or northern pygmy owl, I merely note it as an exceptional phenomenon. No longer am I enthralled by that sense of ethereal, transient joy.

While this is concerning, the numbness to beauty does present one benefit: I will be able to converse with Qalixy without being in awe of her gorgeous personality.

So I arrange to meet her in conference room R, to provide critical, candid project feedback with a state of mind undistracted by her psychological splendor.

And indeed, within minutes of sitting down at the conference table, I’ve delivered all my comments on her work with pithy honesty. This leaves her plenty of time to ask follow-up questions, most of which are concerned with my emotional responses to key facets of her project, particularly metaphor repurposing and thought nucleation catalysis.

“But how does that make you feel?” she keeps asking.

Unable to experience the inflections of her voice as aurally aesthetic, I can answer all her questions immediately and succinctly.

We move quickly through her concerns and curiosities, and soon, our discussion is metamorphosing into genial conversation. So much so that we end up talking about emotional dexterity. And were I not in the beauty-impervious state that I’m in, I would no doubt be hung up on how uncommonly pretty her ideas on this subject are. Their arcs and colors and twirls verge on–almost veer into–the eccentric, yet remain firmly masterful in the domain of the articulate and cogent. They convince me to try the training routines she recommends and to take her up on her offer of going to emotional workout sessions with her.

The regimen starts with works of art that are unyieldingly evocative, literature and film that cover varied psychological ground at breakneck speeds, full of dynamic characters in ever-evolving situations that evoke one emotion after another for me to handle in unabating succession.

From there, I move on to paintings and photographs that are dense with emotional content ranging from overt sentiment to nuanced suggestion. The most confounding of these is of a teenage boy happening upon a man watering his melon patch as hulking monsters duke it out in the hills behind him. With a backpack purposefully shouldered, the boy appears to have somewhere he’s headed but is now thrust into a moment of reconsideration by this encounter, which has resulted in a posture of puzzlement, a countenance of consternation. The man’s expression seems to be one of calm worry, of anxieties reconciled enough to be only mildly troubling in this moment. Is it the menacing clash of beasts behind him that stirs the agitation he has quieted? Or is it something else entirely?

Another painting unnerves me with its incongruous elements–an understated goodbye, a butterfly in a jar, looming jealousy and tufts of harvested wheat–all coexisting placidly, as if in a carefully balanced state.

Steadily, I work my way through the assortment of visual works she has curated for me, each one pushing me to grapple with an ever-bulkier load of emotional material. Then I graduate into the echelon of theatrical productions, poetry slams, sketch comedy shows and other narrative forms that present numerous emotions nearly simultaneously. Each forces me to manage my psychological responses, holding some to the side while new ones enter. I am challenged to unfold sympathy while clutching outrage, put longing at arm’s length so appreciation can be brought closer, embrace humor one moment and in the next cast it to the edges of my attention to wrangle heartache and compassion. Typically, I must do all this from the confines of a narrow theater seat, amidst the exuberance of a boisterous audience, without the benefit of even a notepad to shelve a feeling or thought. And there, pushed to the brink of my capacities to experience and handle emotions, I become a blossoming of the human potential to be emotionally limber and active with audacious tenacity.

The emotional vigor of the artistic worlds she’s brought me into astounds me relentlessly.

“Aren’t you a fast learner,” she says two weeks into this.

We’ve just finished a workout–a rambunctious, entrepreneurship-themed musical this time–and I’m catching my breath.

“I’m impressed,” she adds with a smile.

“Yes … well … I do feel like … I’ve got a bit of a … knack for this,” I answer, still winded. “And it probably helps that … I’m not distracted by beauty.”

“What do you mean?” she asks, smile fading.

I briefly explain my use of sleep bug venom.

“Oh no, no, no, no,” she says, shaking her head. “That won’t do at all. Beauty is a deep part of all this. I can’t believe you’ve been missing out on that.”

“Missing out on what?” I ask in earnest; it didn’t seem like I was missing out on anything.

That won’t do at all. Beauty is a deep part of all this. I can’t believe you’ve been missing out on that.

“It’s hard to explain, but basically, beauty is one of those things you have to juggle along with everything else, and also, the whole act of juggling is itself beautiful. That’s a drastic oversimplification. You need to experience it. You cannot truly know emotional dexterity while you’re untouchable by beauty.”

I worry about spilling the secret to you or someone else if I lay off the venom, but she is very clear on this point.

“Okay, I’ll give it a try,” I assure her.

She smiles again. I try to figure out if this one is wider than the last.

The next morning, I embark upon a hiatus from the daily application of insect-derived sedative. Cutting this activity from my morning makes my wake-up bathroom routine feel incomplete–wrongly abbreviated. But as I have breakfast and get ready for the day, I feel delightfully normal and become optimistic that the secret has lost its potency, its power subdued by repeated use of the toxin. But this is of course too good to be true.

While walking my customary path along the riverbank, I feel the desire to reveal the secret coming on. It’s faint but growing steadily. I pick up the pace, hoping that moving faster will divert energy from the rising compulsion.

But the urge only gains urgency. I become concerned that I’ll shout out the secret, yell like I’m trying to tell it to someone across the river. Anxious, I reach for the vial of sleep bug secretion I’ve kept in my bag all these weeks, just in case.

Then the morning sunlight on the river catches my attention. It sparkles like it’s flecks of luminous, filmy material floating out there, following every fluctuation of the water’s surface.

As I pause to admire the interplay of light and liquid, my hand falls away from my bag. The beauty of this sight has displaced the urge to divulge. That fact is itself beautiful.

Feeling at ease now, I conclude that when the secret threatens to burst out, I just need to have something beautiful to direct my attention to. Fortunately, you’ve supplied me with just that. In my bag, there’s a postcard from you, a mesmerizingly colorful scene of a mountainside covered in wildflowers from your recent trip to Nolinga Canyon.

As soon as I arrive at work, I place the postcard in the lower right corner of my desk, for easy glanceability. I feel as though I’m back in kindergarten, with my security blanket kept close at hand. Every few minutes, my head turns for a look at the postcard, like I’m afraid someone will swipe it from my desk. These frequent, small doses of the floral landscape seem to ward off the symptoms of secret bearing and keep me feeling almost normal, which delights me.

When it’s time to assemble for the team meeting, I pluck the postcard from my desk and tuck it in the back of my notebook before heading to the conference room. Briefly I muse that to some onlooker, it could appear that I can’t bear to leave the postcard behind, that it’s some vital memento of you.

As fellow members of Team Snurgler get settled around the conference table, I open my notebook. Then I place the postcard on the left page the notebook is open to. Wernt’s gaze is immediately drawn to it, probably because the postcard is the most colorful thing on the conference table. I become self-conscious about having it out, and when he’s not looking, I discreetly put the postcard among the unused pages toward the end of the notebook. When needed, I can sneak a glance at it back there during the meeting.

But when Qalixy enters the conference room a minute later, I know that won’t be necessary. I can admire her personality from across the room when in need of beauty.

And that’s exactly what I do 17 minutes into the meeting. I fixate on her elegant integrity and splendid insightfulness, the prettiness of her lightly prissy conduct. Her qualities easily hold at bay the pressures exerted by the secret. I settle comfortably into her sheer magnificence for wondrous, pacifying minutes, until her eyes flit up and meet mine. We regard each other for some very long seconds. Then she smiles at me.

Abruptly she rises from her seat and leaves the conference room.

My eyes widen as I begin to fret. The deprivation of her beauty leaves me feeling as if the secret is with tremendous force pushing its way out of its confinement in my memory. I might have to step out of the meeting myself. Or flip to the back pages of my notebook, to look at the postcard at the risk of piquing the curiosity of the team members near me.

In the midst of my mini-anxiety attack, I hear Bonrol say, “It may seem harsh, but we must be anti-mediocrean on this.”

“Exactly right,” Kierce joins in. “We have our potentialist values to uphold.”

These words resonate with me, despite my confusion about what exactly they refer to. I’ve lost track of the discussion while lost in Qalixy’s beautiful qualities, but hearing Bonrol and Kierce take this stand, feeling the unmistakable passion in their voices, roused within me is a keen sense of camaraderie, my long reticent aspirations of living the tenets of potentialism stirring to life.

Amid this, a quiet awe suffuses me.

My admiration for my peers, a consternation over what has evoked their vehemence, the trying nature of this secret, the knowingness in Qalixy’s smile, the reassuring brightness of the sky outside–it’s all strikingly beautiful.

And I can juggle them adeptly as I re-engage myself in the proceedings of the meeting, handling these feelings just like so many others I have during my training.

And that is unmistakably beautiful.

Having forsaken aspirations to join the intelligentsia, Goire Zatla is a metaphysiologist whose research focuses on memory, emotion, and consciousness. Goire’s recent studies have examined the properties possessed by a shard of shattered attention and responses to immoderate chronesthesia.

Soramimi Hanarejima is a writer of innovative fiction and the author of Visits to the Confabulatorium, a fanciful story collection that Jack Cheng said “captures moonlight in Ziploc bags.” Soramimi’s recent work has appeared in various literary magazines, including Panoply, Pulp Literature, and The Absurdist.

Ariel Alian Wilson is a few things: artist, writer, gamer, and role-player. Having dabbled in a few different art mediums, Ariel has been drawing since she was small, having always held a passion for it. She’s always juggling numerous projects. She currently lives in Seattle with her cat, Persephone. You can find doodles, sketches, and more at her blog www.winndycakesart.tumblr.com.

“Handling the Contents of Consciousness” is © 2018 Soramimi Hanarejima Art accompanying story is © 2018 Ariel Alian Wilson

Handling the Contents of Consciousness was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

[madscientistjournal]

A Thank You to Our Artists, Part 2

Last week, we thanked several of our artists who have helped make MSJ so awesome! This week, we are thanking several more!

We met Errow and America at the same time, when they were cosplaying Cecil and Carlos from Welcome to Nightvale at GeekGirlCon. We told them we loved their costumes, and they gave us their card. When we found out they were artists, we contacted them to see if they would like to do some commissioned artwork for us, and they agreed! They’ve been producing covers and interior artwork for us ever since! Check out Errow’s portfolio here and America’s here!

Scarlett O’Hairdye is a Seattle-based burlesque performer who we met through that art form. We found out she was also an artist, and we brought her on board to make art for us as well! She’s done some of our strangest pieces, when there was no one else we could think to give it to other than her! You can find more about her here!

Finally, Ariel Alian Wilson is someone who Jeremy has known since she was a toddler, who has also developed into a talented artist in the intervening years between then and now. She’s the artist behind one of our most popular MSJ covers, “Scientist Cat“. You can find more of her work here!

A Thank You to Our Artists, Part 2 was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

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I Didn't Break the Lamp Out Today!

Our latest anthology, I Didn’t Break the Lamp, is out today!

“When I was little, I didn’t have an imaginary friend, I had an imaginary bully. She was a little girl of my age, who looked just like me, and took great delight in being cruel. This included doing things to make my parents furious, like punching my little brother. One day, when I was about thirteen, Ludwig showed up and wrapped all two hundred of his copper-bladed arms around this evil version of me. There was a warm light, like a camera flash made of lava, and then she was gone.” — Sam Fleming, “Ludwig”

Are they in our imagination, or are we in theirs? Mad Scientist Journal has brought together twenty-six tales of people with uncertain existence. These accounts range from cheerful to dark, stopping off at frequent points between. Imaginary friends share space with witches, monsters, nightmares, and maybe a few things that have not yet been dreamed.

Included in this collection are stories from E.D.E. Bell, Jade Black, Die Booth, Maureen Bowden, Veronica Brush, Jacob Budenz, Sam Crane, Matthew R. Davis, Julian Dexter, Sam Fleming, Troy H. Gardner, Kiki Gonglewski, Lucinda Gunnin, Neil James Hudson, Blake Jessop, Vivian Li, Tucker Lieberman, K. K. Llamas, Christine Lucas, M. Lopes da Silva, Ville Meriläinen, Jennifer R. Povey, Lizz-Ayn Shaarawi, Kayleigh Taylor, Jieyan Wang, and E. R. Zhang. Interior art is provided by Errow Collins, America Jones, Leigh Legler, and Ariel Alian Wilson. Cover art by Luke Spooner.

Learn more here!

I Didn’t Break the Lamp Out Today! was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

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Crackpot: An Advance in Mellow Weapons

An essay by Win Chester [1] Brought to our attention by E. B. Fischadler Art by Ariel Alian Wilson

Recently, the U.S. Army responded to environmentalist concerns about pollution from toxic components of practice ordinance by issuing a request for biodegradable ammunition.  They are seeking non-toxic replacements for gunpowder and warhead components. More amazing is the proposal to also include seeds in the ammunition.[2] Not only would these seeds result in fields of flowers where once stood stark target ranges, but these flowers would eat the toxic chemicals, converting them to something a bit more pleasant.[3] They further state:

This effort will make use of seeds to grow environmentally friendly plants that remove soil contaminants and consume the biodegradable components developed under this project. Animals should be able to consume the plants without any ill effects.

This may be the best argument ever against going vegetarian.

Imagine how much more fun getting shot with a paintball could be if, instead of a red splotch on your uniform, the dude who just shot you leaves you surrounded by a mist of mellowness.

Notes

[1] Win Chester is the founder and CEO[11] of Crackshot Industries.  His role models include Cheech and Chong and, after hearing a popular tune from Easy Rider, Humphrey Bogart.[12]

[2] http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/01/world/biodegradable-bullets-us-army/. I wish I had made this up–I’m not that twisted.

[3] Somehow, I doubt these flowers will smell like a rose.

[4] The patent office said “Don’t call us, we’ll call you.”

To read the rest of this story, check out the Mad Scientist Journal: Spring 2018 collection.

E. B. Fischadler has been writing short stories for several years, and has recently begun publishing. His stories have appeared in Mad Scientist Journal, Bewildering Stories, eFiction, Voluted Tales, Beyond Imagination Literary Magazine, and Beyond Science Fiction. In addition to fiction, Fischadler has published over 30 papers in refereed scientific journals, as well as a chapter of a textbook on satellite engineering. When he is not writing, he pursues a career in engineering and serves his community as an EMT. Fischadler continues to write short stories and is working on a novel about a naval surgeon. You can learn more about Fischadler and access his other publications at: https://ebfischadler.wordpress.com/

Ariel Alian Wilson is a few things: artist, writer, gamer, and role-player. Having dabbled in a few different art mediums, Ariel has been drawing since she was small, having always held a passion for it. She’s always juggling numerous projects. She currently lives in Seattle with her cat, Persephone. You can find doodles, sketches, and more at her blog www.winndycakesart.tumblr.com.

“Crackpot: An Advance in Mellow Weapons” is © 2018 E. B. Fischadler Art accompanying story is © 2018 Ariel Alian Wilson

Crackpot: An Advance in Mellow Weapons was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

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Last Confessions of a Deranged Physicist

An essay by an anonymous physicist, as provided by Chris Aldridge Art by Ariel Alian Wilson

The time came when I had no choice but to go forward by going back, for the sake of both my own sanity and physical life. So many wrongful turns had brought me ruinous failures and hardships; I saw my life as beyond conceivable repair. I hated everything about my existence. I hated being married, being a parent, and losing the old life I had when I was free and careless.

My fortitude was bombarded by the cannons of languish, my emotional state trying to stand on increasingly shaky ground.

Surely people would have thought me crazy, and perhaps I was, driven by the brain-crushing and maddening desire to turn my course, or make it so it never happened in the first place. The mission seemed impossible, but I knew there just had to be a way. Time was merely an illusion, and existence itself a compilation of matter and energy that could be moved, changed, and transformed. All I had to do was find the universal reins and jerk the head in my preferred direction. I knew it might put me in disfavor with the gods, but like a terminally-ill patient being eaten away, my pain drove me to all achievable measures to escape the torment.

~

Day 1

There was presently no known way on Earth to create a tear in time and space. The only thing in the universe capable of that kind of power resided in the form of a black hole, or a dead star.

The main problem was reaching such a vacuum in something that could survive the flattening pressure and destruction so that I could make it to the other side. The second problem lay in catapulting myself ten years back in time, where I would be able to shift the rusty railroad tracks of my life just in time for the engine to once more pass. It was frightening. No one knew what would happen to someone or something that entered a black hole, but I thought it had to be better than my current circumstances.

~

Day 2

It was not possible for me to leave the Earth’s atmosphere, that much was clear. I had no means by which to accomplish such a feat. Not to mention, I had no idea where any black holes stood in the solar system or beyond. Even if I had, I would have died before reaching their location. One feels like they’re in a prison with the key just a few feet outside the cell, being possible yet also impossible to reach.

I would have to create a star as the first step, small enough to be on the Earth yet with the same frequency as a sun. Then I would have to make it die at its highest point of generation. It would be just small enough, yet strong enough, to create a tear in time and space that would allow things through without inherently bringing about their demise.

Fortunately, the elements that made up Earth’s own sun were also found on the planet itself.

~

I began gathering the material to build a ship-like structure to shield me from any possible dangers. No one actually knew the pressure that a black hole emitted, but since mine was going to be so incredibly small in comparison, it was possible to construct a barrier strong enough to stop it from harming me should there be any immediate threats.

To read the rest of this story, check out the Mad Scientist Journal: Summer 2018 collection.

The fragmented lost journal of a missing and deranged physicist is found by future readers who have no idea how it ended up in their world and time period, but his story turns out to be a strong lesson for all ages and races.

Chris Aldridge is an American writer of fiction and non-fiction originally from Thomasville, North Carolina. He was born in 1984 in Asheboro, and received his education from Columbia College of Missouri. Find him online at www.caldridge.net.

Ariel Alian Wilson is a few things: artist, writer, gamer, and role-player. Having dabbled in a few different art mediums, Ariel has been drawing since she was small, having always held a passion for it. She’s always juggling numerous projects. She currently lives in Seattle with her cat, Persephone. You can find doodles, sketches, and more at her blog www.winndycakesart.tumblr.com.

“Last Confessions of a Deranged Physicist” is © 2018 Chris Aldridge Art accompanying story is © 2018 Ariel Alian Wilson

Last Confessions of a Deranged Physicist was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

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Now Available: Mad Scientist Journal: Autumn 2019

Time travel, religious birds, and alchemical experimentation. These are but some of the strange tales to be found in this book.

Mad Scientist Journal: Autumn 2019 collects fourteen tales from the fictional worlds of mad science. For the discerning mad scientist reader, there are also pieces of fiction from Judith Field, Andrew Jensen, and Valerie Lute. Readers will also find other resources for the budding mad scientist, including an advice column, gossip column, and other brief messages from mad scientists.

Authors featured in this volume also include M. A. Smith, Stuart Webb, John A. McColley, Zandra Renwick, Jane Abbott, Stephen D. Rogers, G. D. Watry, Myna Chang, Deborah L. Davitt, K. Kitts, Robert Dawson, George Salis, Traci Castleberry, Nathan Crowder, Cole Clayton, Evelyn Rosenberg, Gordon Sun, Henry Hasselmann, Jenn Cavanaugh, Jennavive Johnson, Joachim Heijndermans, Nate Bjeldanes, Lucinda Gunnin, and Torrey Podmajersky. Art provided by Errow Collins, America Jones, Leigh Legler, Luke Spooner, and Ariel Alian Wilson.

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Now Available: Mad Scientist Journal: Autumn 2019 was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

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Summer 2019 Out Now!

Longevity and inspiration through music, super-human abilities, and alternative educational methods. These are but some of the strange tales to be found in this book.

Mad Scientist Journal: Summer 2019 collects thirteen tales from the fictional worlds of mad science. For the discerning mad scientist reader, there are also pieces of fiction from A. M. H. Devine, Andrew Jensen, and Wendy Nikel. Readers will also find other resources for the budding mad scientist, including an advice column, gossip column, and other brief messages from mad scientists.

Authors featured in this volume also include Amanda Cherry, Kathryn Yelinek, Paul Stansbury, Shana Ross, Johanna Beate Stumpf, Judith Field, Alan Bennington, Deborah L. Davitt, Faith Consiglio, David Harrison, Jonathan Danz, Dave D’Alessio, Paul Alex Gray, Cecilia Kennedy, Alex Pickens, Catherine Ann Fox, David Reynolds, F. J. Speredelozzi, Joachim Heijndermans, Steve Neiman, Sean Frost, and Torrey Podmajersky. Art provided by Ariel Alian Wilson, America Jones, Leigh Legler, Justine McGreevy, Luke Spooner, Scarlett O’Hairdye, and Errow Collins.

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  Summer 2019 Out Now! was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

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Now Available: Mad Scientist Journal: Summer 2018

Familial love, giant death bees, and notes for teaching assistants. These are but some of the strange tales to be found in this book.

Mad Scientist Journal: Summer 2018 collects thirteen tales from the fictional worlds of mad science. For the discerning mad scientist reader, there are also pieces of fiction from Maureen Bowden, Judith Field, and Sandy Dee Hall. Readers will also find other resources for the budding mad scientist, including an advice column, gossip column, and other brief messages from mad scientists.

Authors featured in this volume also include Michael Hobbs, Kathryn Yelinek, Chris Walker, Paul Alex Gray, Teo Yi Han, Shelly Jasperson, Brandon Nolta, Lucas Leery, Chris Aldridge, Julia K. Patt, K. Tracy-Lee, Tom Lund, Andrew Openshaw, Joachim Heijndermans, Kevin Holton, Linda M. Crate, Lucinda Gunnin, and Sean Frost. Art by Scarlett O’Hairdye, A. Jones, Leigh Legler, Errow Collins, Luke Spooner, Ariel Alian Wilson, Dawn Vogel, and Justine McGreevy.

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Cover art by @lendmeyourbones

Smart toasters, zombie offboarding, and innovations in 3-D printing. These are but some of the strange tales to be found in this book.

Mad Scientist Journal: Autumn 2017 collects thirteen tales from the fictional worlds of mad science. For the discerning mad scientist reader, there are also pieces of fiction from Sean Buckley, Jule Owen, and Steve Toase. Readers will also find other resources for the budding mad scientist, including an advice column, gossip column, and other brief messages from mad scientists.

Authors featured in this volume also include Amanda Cherry, Sarah Cavar, Charlie Neuner, E. B. Fischadler, Christa Carmen, Tara Campbell, Judith Field, Emma Whitehall, Maureen Bowden, Isaac Teile, J. Lee Strickland, John A. McColley, Kate B. Brokaw, Jessie Kwak, Elizabeth Booth, Joachim Heijndermans, Cathleen Kivett Smith, Lucinda Gunnin, and Torrey Podmajersky. Art by Shannon Legler, Katie Nyborg, Errow Collins, Scarlett O'Hairdye, Luke Spooner, Ariel Alian Wilson, and Amanda Jones.

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Cover art by @thehauntedboy

Phantom limb surgery, dimensional windows, and sentient androids. These are but some of the strange tales to be found in this book.

Mad Scientist Journal: Summer 2017 collects thirteen tales from the fictional worlds of mad science. For the discerning mad scientist reader, there are also pieces of fiction from Rhonda Eikamp, Darrell Z. Grizzle, and Joachim Heijndermans. Readers will also find other resources for the budding mad scientist, including an advice column, gossip column, and other brief messages from mad scientists.

Authors featured in this volume also include Isaac Teile, H. E. Bergeron, S. Qiouyu Lu, Candida Spillard, Steve Toase, E. R. Zhang, Kaitlin Moore, Maureen Bowden, Wesley O. Cohen, Megan Dorei, Allison Spector, Sam Jowett, Domenic diCiacca, Melanie Atherton Allen, Andy Brown, Darci Vogel, Dawn Vogel, Dylan Vogel, Lucinda Gunnin, and Sean Frost. Art by Amanda Jones, Shannon Legler, Luke Spooner, Ariel Alian Wilson, Errow Collins, Scarlett O'Hairdye, and Justine McGreevy.

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[madscientistjournal]

What Goes Down Must Come Up

An essay by Professor Caldwell Mook, as provided by Nick Morrish Art by Ariel Alian Wilson

As Mithering Professor of General Negativity, I regularly receive requests to peer review outlandish scientific papers. I generally reject most of them out of hand as either beneath contempt, or simply too dull for words. However, one paper caught my eye recently: a small-scale experiment involving an anti-gravity field and a hamster.

Readers may be familiar with the work of Dr Drax Moon. His ridiculous claims often feature in the popular media, and he is frankly a laughing-stock even amongst the para-rational scientific community.

In this particular experiment, he allegedly caused the unfortunate rodent to float 3.75 millimeters above the ground. Quite an astounding claim, though Dr Moon does go on to clarify that at least one of its whiskers was still in contact with terra firma at all times.

Of course, anti-gravity is entirely possible at the quantum level, but I considered the elevation of even a small mammal beyond the ability of the most brilliant scientist, let alone a dim-witted charlatan such as Dr Moon.

I began to pen a withering review of his paper, but then reconsidered my actions. I emailed him instead, requesting a demonstration of his remarkable findings. I hoped to witness his abject failure and looked forward to the possibility of humiliating him in person, as well as in print and in my popular blog (blogoff.compaleteanduttergarbage.com).

When I arrived at Dr Moon’s home, it became clear that he was not utilizing quantum principles. His apparatus was rudimentary in nature and appeared to have been scavenged from discarded household appliances. Indeed, he was using his kitchen as a laboratory, and I discerned several household utensils lodged within the experimental apparatus.

Before we began, I gave him the opportunity to explain his theory in detail, but he declined, which unfortunately is rather typical of the man.

“I am a practical scientist,” he said. “A good experiment is better than a thousand theories. And a bad experiment is better than a dozen firework displays.”

You can imagine my concern at this statement, and I resolved to vacate the premises and watch the experiment through the letterbox. I had forgotten to bring safety goggles, so instead I took a large glass storage jar from the kitchen and placed it over my head. This attracted some unwelcome comments from passers-by, but I have always considered personal safety more important than mere dignity.

I had forgotten to bring safety goggles, so instead I took a large glass storage jar from the kitchen and placed it over my head. This attracted some unwelcome comments from passers-by, but I have always considered personal safety more important than mere dignity.

To read the rest of this story, check out the Mad Scientist Journal: Spring 2018 collection.

Professor Caldwell Mook holds the Mithering Chair of General Negativity at the University of Leeds, England. He specializes in pre-emptive risk analyses for technology that has yet to be invented. Professor Mook regularly offers discouragement and derision to scientists and engineers around the world.

Nick Morrish is an increasingly mad engineer from Yorkshire, England. During a long and futile career, he has worked for a number of frankly certifiable multinational companies. He clings to the last vestiges of sanity by writing serious and truthful stories about the nature of existence. Since no one else seems to observe truth in quite the same way, his work is often mistaken for satire or fantasy.

Ariel Alian Wilson is a few things: artist, writer, gamer, and role-player. Having dabbled in a few different art mediums, Ariel has been drawing since she was small, having always held a passion for it. She’s always juggling numerous projects. She currently lives in Seattle with her cat, Persephone. You can find doodles, sketches, and more at her blog www.winndycakesart.tumblr.com.

“What Goes Down Must Come Up” is © 2018 Nick Morrish Art accompanying story is © 2018 Ariel Alian Wilson

What Goes Down Must Come Up was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal