#science fiction stories

[whereserpentswalk]

You're working on an interstellar ship. You're currently monitoring a planet from orbit. As one of the six species with the ability to create faster then light ships, every nation of your species has agreed not to interfere with less advanced civilizations. It's for the best they say.

The planet you’re monitoring is dying of a plague. They don't understand germ theory down there, they've barely invented things like the printing press or gunpowder. It's not like they're less intelligent then you, they just didn't have as much time. The researchers on the ship think the plague is going to end their species. It's not certain it'll happen but it's looking like it.

The researchers on the ship talk about the people there like they're animals, they sneak into villages the plague entirely destroyed and steal corpses to experiment on. They treat the bodies as if they were never people. They talk about the actions of the people planetside like the natrual instincts of beasts and not the choices of rational creatures. "According to their primitive ideas about reality they burn bodies killed by plague." "A female is given the right to mate with her male as she pleases after their marriage ritual." "They lack the capability of understanding the proximity of our ship."

You eventually decide that you've seen enough corpses, and that you've seen too many people act as if there weren't people down there. You steal an escape pod one night and go down to the planet to tell them what's happening. You don't have a cure for their illness but mabye you can get them on the right track.

You see them alive for the first time, not just bodies in a lab but people going about their lives, talking to eachother, buying and selling goods at their markets, mourning their dead. They look different from you of course, your body is serpentine with your only limbs being the four long tentacles near your mouth, their bodies are insectoid with four wraithlike arms and four long skinny legs, their dark metal exoskeletons contrasting the white of your scales. You remind yourself that they're no lesser then you, that you have no right that they do not.

You don't pretend to be a god or anything like that, you want to be as honest with them as you can. You go to someone practicing medicine in one of their temples. She's a student, her species doesn't have a lot of knowledge of medical science but it's not just superstition, she's learning how to do surgery and make medicine out of plants as best as her culture understands. You think to yourself that she'd probably be a premed student had she been born into your species, mabye the type to go to a fancy school off planet, mabye the type to voluntarily turn herself into a cyborg. She's scared at first but she eventually calms down, you explain to her everything you know about the virus and how her species could prevent it from spreading, you treat her as an equal, and explain things in terms she understands but in as much detail as possible, without making anything up to make it easier. It's the best that you can do.

You eventually have to leave. You're found out pretty quickly, you needed your ID to unlock the escape pod. You very quickly are fired, and become internationally infamous. It's agreed that to not violate any treaties you're never allowed to leave your homeworld again, you can never so much as set foot on a starship. Years go by. You don't have a medical license anymore so you find work teaching medicine at a local college. You sometimes wonder what it would be like to have the girl you talked to on that planet so many years ago as a student. In a way she was your first student.

People sometimes want to interview you about what you did. You refuse most of them. There's a small but unpopular movement to make contact with less advanced planets who hold you up as an important figure. Saber toothed emothians, and soft fleshed earthlings, and many eyed galdians all come to you. They want you to endorse them, but it never feels right. The official narrative is that the planet you tried to saved as killed off by that virus, everyone says that the species you tried to help wouldn't have understood what you told them, and that the virus would have been their end a few years after you made contact.

Years go on. No spaceship ever had a reason to come to the planet you tried to save, so you never get any confirmation. You always look for that hope but eventually you give up, there's no reason to believe anything else. As your story gets further and further in the past you have no legacy, there are governments and corporations who make sure you're not remembered in public consciousness, and only a few online forms and academic historians really talk about your life anymore. Occasionally activists will scream your name, but the news never reports on it.

It is hundreds of years after your death. The species you saved all those years ago has finally created faster then light travel. All across their world statues of you exist, every child on their planet knows your name. The first planet they visit once they make first contact is your honeworld, and the descendents of the woman you explained germ theory to visit your descendents. They posthumously give you their highest awards, and thousands of them come to see your grave. Nobody there forgot what you did, you're credited with saving their species from existence. They wish they could tell you, everything was ok in the end, your compassion was not meaningless.

[oakendesk]

Science Fiction Stories Nov 1956

Edmund Emshwiller

[stone-cold-groove]

Meanwhile, back at the 1939 New York World’s Fair...

[t-lane-writes]

WIP: Black Wings, Chapter Five (snippet)

WIP: Black Wings  Genre: science-fiction  Tag line: Humans’ efforts to terraform a planet are thwarted when some decide to save intelligent indigenous life.   POV characters: Kenaed, Zoe Irene, Mattan Nuada, Siesell Keeva  Snippet from: Chapter Five, Mattan Nuada’s PoV 

First Chapter 

#.

The return of the rangers could be felt throughout the vehicle when they docked their cruiser. A deep vibration shook the Wagon, equipment rattled. Eka Isa didn’t even blink, but Mattan stood up in anticipation. It still took several more minutes, while Angeline and Kenaed locked the soil samples in the carrier and doffed their EV suits in the airlock. When hermetic door finally hissed and opened, Mattan asked without preamble, 

“How many spots have you marked?--” but Kenaed was louder and more urgent. 

“We saw something out there!” He almost knocked Mattan over, aiming straight for the monitor with his recorder in hand. 

Mattan froze for a second. Getting in the way of agitated Kenaed could end badly. It was best to give him space. 

He looked for guidance in Angeline, ‘what happened?’ was his silent question. She shrugged, ‘leave it to me,’ before moving closer to Kenaed with a wary expression. 

“We don’t really know what it was,” she said in an even, quiet voice, hoping to maybe slow him down. To no avail. 

“I know what I saw!” He bared his teeth at her.  

It looked scary. A man his size could easily become dangerous. He didn’t intend to, of course, and he worked hard to keep his anger in check. At the moment, though, whatever happened, clearly threw him off more than usual. When he seethed, “It was a person!” Mattan understood how that could be disturbing. There were no people out here other than the five of them, and they were all gathered in the small workspace of the Wagon now. Ch’Ari, drawn by the commotion, emerged from the back compartment, spatula dripping with tomato sauce in hand. He took a step back to put it away and licked the sauce off his fingers. 

Mattan again exchanged glances with Angeline, as Kenaed finished attaching the recorder to the monitor. Usually so patient and calm, she looked quite exasperated now. 

“We can’t assume--” 

“Don’t tell me I’m--” 

“Whoa, whoa!” Mattan finally raised his hands and stepped between them. [...] “Why don’t you two take a breath!” he screamed over the both of them. Angeline took a step back, but Kenaed looked like he was about to hit Mattan. He restrained himself, but his fists were curled. Mattan stood his ground and glared at him. “How about we take a look at what’s on that recorder?” he spat into Kenaed’s face. 

“That’s just what I’m trying to do!” Kenaed responded, mouth tight, his whole body vibrating. 

“Good. Keep at it!” 

Kenaed turned back to the console. He was hitting the keyboard with much greater force than it deserved. Eka Isa stood up in the meantime, and now waited, frozen, plastered into the corner of the room. Unable to pass by the agitated Kenaed with enough distance for her comfort. Mattan nodded at her, giving her the acknowledgement of her precarious position. She had no intention of changing it, though, as long as Kenaed was upset. 

[...] 

Finally, Kenaed finished setting up the feed. 

“See?” he pointed at the screen. “The last one, it moves differently.” 

The view was distorted by the heat emanating from the ground and the figure Kenaed was pointing at, was partially obscured by other shirukens. 

“They all move weird,” Ch’Ari noted. “Kind of like Eka Isa on the dancefloor.” 

Eka Isa snorted. 

“That’s something to analyze,” Angeline said. 

“It’s like they are herded.” Kenaed run his hand through his hair. “Maybe we should add the view from your recorder and from the cruiser, to get a 3D of the situation.” 

“I didn’t see much. Was behind that fixture. The cruiser, maybe?” 

They imported the data from two other recorders, but 3D view didn’t clarify the image – made it more incomprehensible, rather. Kenaed finally noticed Eka Isa standing in the corner, and he moved out of her way, showing her with a gesture to pass. He seemed to have lost some of the rage that powered him and just looked annoyed. Mattan thought it might be a good moment to try and reason with him. 

“It’s natural,” he said, “that when you see something weird, your mind interprets it as something else, more familiar.” 

“Are you saying I’m seeing things?”  

“No. I’m saying that those shirukens were acting odd, possibly because of the changes in the atmosphere. Perhaps they were hurt. Damaged. You saw one with only four appendices and your mind provided a familiar interpretation—a humanoid.” 

“He stopped, half-turned and looked at me.” 

“Found you interesting?” Ch’Ari asked. “Must have been desperate.” He tried to diffuse the situation in his own way, using depreciating humor. Usually, the three younger members of the team would mock each other relentlessly, but this time Kenaed only gave Ch’Ari a glare. Ch’Ari shrugged his one good arm. “Can’t see that on the film.” He gestured with his right hand 

“Because I wasn’t moving!” Kenaed exploded again. “So they wouldn’t attack, right? I was standing still, and they walked beyond the range of the lens!” 

“And only then that mysterious shepherd gave you a wink?” 

Kenaed’s fists clenched again, and his eyes narrowed. He struggled to focus on taking deeper inhales and longer exhales. 

“Ch’Ari cut it out.” Mattan took Kenaed’s side. Ch’Ari’s attempts at humor fell flat this time. At least he knew when to stop. 

“Sorry.” He nodded and raised his right palm up in apology. “I shouldn’t have said that, Keen.” 

Kenaed nodded, but his fists remained clenched. 

Eka Isa, now safely posed half a step behind Ch’Ari spoke suddenly, in an ominous voice, “There are tales, you know--” 

Everyone stared at her for a few heartbeats. 

“What tales?” Angeline asked first. 

#.

Thank you for reading. :) Tagging @hithelleth, @echo-bleu, @drippingmoon, @did-i-do-this-write, @jacqueswriteblrlibrary

If you want to be added to the list, let me know.

[dnschmidt]

Character Select

Greg and Erin were sitting on a hill, looking down at the park. "Ever wonder if this is a simulation?" he asked.

She laughed. "I love you, but you need to stop listening to silly podcasts."

"I'm serious. What if there's a better world out there - genuine, high resolution reality? Or it could be worse. We could be in a VR prison, or part of some science experiment."

[mollyanncarruth-blog]

Coming in January... "Looking Over The Cliff" Issue Two: Dark Fantasy. Get Issue One before Issue Two comes out, you can find it at

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/looking-over-the-cliff-william-levert/1146283478;jsessionid=C6F7D59C17E335866D5EC775C0AD3278.prodny_store02-atgap07?ean=9798331474386

[sevenworldtales]

Quitter

Frank Rivers took a drag of his cigarette. His last cigarette.

He felt blessed to have come to this place, but the smoking habit now made him very self-conscious.

People born in Unitopia did not smoke. They had quashed the habit as a collective using intensive drug, therapy, and eugenics programs.

They had given him several packs when they saved him from captivity, and gave him a pack more every month for the last three years.

For a society of non-smokers, they certainly had a lot of tobacco, and a lot of knowledge about the stuff.

Frank was born in Freetopia, where tobacco use was so pervasive, Unitopians actually think it’s compulsory there. Frank was pretty sure no one ever forced him.

As a child soldier in Freetopia, some of Frank’s fondest memories were associated with tobacco.

He was traumatized by his earlier life, but to him, smoking was what he did when he wasn’t being forced to commit atrocities. Smoking was the one repeated activity that didn’t involve the participation in or witnessing of any war crimes.

So Frank associated it with the calmer, if not wholly pleasant, memories from his childhood.

He’d been in Unitopia for three years. He’d tapered off his habit out of pure convenience. You weren’t allowed to smoke anywhere in this place.

He had been given a standard dose of Unitopia’s powerful cessation drug, Biogen Compound T, or brand name “Quit”. He hadn’t taken it yet.

He had cut down from 2 packs per day to 2 cigarettes per day, but he couldn’t keep himself to just 1 per day.

The native Unitopians urged him to quit, and gave him a dozen and a half reasons to, but they still had tobacco for him. Their research showed that removing it from him would only backfire.

He looked at the white tablet on his coffee table. Tonight was the night.

The way The Quit Pill worked, Frank had been told, was through a one time “readjustment” of body chemistry.

He was assured that the days or weeks of discomfort and sickness associated with quitting cold turkey were circumvented through this process.

he was instructed to take the pill in the late morning and then relax, and stay in his dormitory room until the next day.

He popped the pill in his mouth and took a sip of his water bottle.

They told him he could get a little dizzy. They told him he could have some strange dreams.

What the Unitopian natives did not tell Frank, is that this dizziness was not little, but massive. What they did not tell him is that he would be wide awake for these “strange dreams”.

Two hours after taking the pill, his sense of balance was incredibly off. As it intensified, he hurried to the bathroom. In his head he was going to try to take a piss before he was too dizzy to stand.

It was a good instinct because he got to the toilet just in time to vomit up his entire stomach.

It could have been 15 minutes of retching. It could have been 3 hours. He had no perspective on time.

He felt less nauseous, and there was certainly nothing left for him to throw up.

He stood, shaky at first. The dizziness had lessened, but was still present. He looked in the mirror. For a moment he saw his face morph, grow younger. He shook his head violently. The dizziness! He retched again. Just bile, he spit it in the sink.

He wanted to lie down. He opened the bathroom door but his bedroom was gone. The bathroom looked normal, but it opened up to the outside. And it wasn’t Unitopia by the looks of it. It was Freetopia. Out in the desert.

He closed the bathroom door and it stood there alone in the middle of a dirt road. Nothing on the opposite side. He opened it, and like a portal, his bathroom was on the other side now. Still just a flat door if he walked around it. He tried going back inside the bathroom and closing the door and reopening. Still a portal.

He had no clue how any of this was possible. Frank had tried hallucinogens as a teenager but this was very different. He felt very lucid, and tried to work out how he could actually be in his dorm, but able to explore this outdoor environment in such detail.

He wandered around in the general vicinity of the bathroom door for what seemed like hours. He eventually recognized the locale. He was not five kilometers from where he was born, the outskirts of the city of Freemark.

He saw a young boy and an older man walking towards him. It was too late to hide they were too close. He waved at them as they walked. They did not see him. They continued walking as he shouted and pantomimed, which he soon realized was useless.

As they got closer, he recognized them. It was him as a child, and his former drill sergeant, Randal Murtry. They walked right past Frank and the door, taking no notice. The younger Frank was six or seven years old. This was the day he smoked his first cigarette.

It was right here on this dirt road. The instant he saw his younger self light up, Frank collapsed to the ground unconscious.

Frank Rivers was wide awake. He had to be. The rebels were advancing. He was 17 again. He had a vague memory of being 25 and living in Unitopia, but that must have been a hallucination from all the stimulants they took when they performed these six day assault marches in the arid heat of the Freetopian steppe.

He was the forward action attendant for Commander Michelle Stockton. The rest of the squad was already dead. His job was to make sure that if Michelle died, whoever did it had to kill him first.

As the mortar fire went off at semi-regular intervals Frank secured their small sniper’s nest. Michelle returned to their defensive position. “We’re clear.” She said, taking two cigarettes from her helmet pocket. She offered him one.

The dream of his life in Unitopia was over. He was here in this war, and he had to protect the commander. A cigarette break meant they were safe. A cigarette break meant the coast was clear.

As they lit up, she smiled flirtatiously at him. Stockton was 10 years his senior, but it was an open secret that the only reason she wasn’t already an admiral was her long record of sexual harassment of her subordinates. Frank’s adolescent mind had a hard time seeing it as harassment. He found her incredibly attractive. He wanted to be the next person she harassed.

In the old days, she would have already been kicked out of the armed forces, but Freetopia was no longer in the habit of letting good soldiers go to waste just because of some ethics violations.

“How old are you private Rivers?” She asked.

“Seventeen, ma’am” he replied, smiling.

“You got a girlfriend back in Freemark?” She asked, flicking her cigarette.

“No ma’am” he replied, attempting for an ironically formal tone.

“Listen private, it’s just you and me now.” she said. It was still an intimate tone but all levity was gone. “Call me Michelle, Frank.” She put her hand on his arm and drew him close.

The mortar fire had moved closer to them. The newest high pitched falling noise sounded louder than any of the rest all day. Frank looked up, cigarette in his mouth.

In an instant, their general surroundings changed drastically. The blast must have gone off within 15 meters of their fortified position.

Their fortified position was gone. Both Frank and Michelle had been put on the ground by the blast. Frank looked up and saw the bottom layer of sandbags, and a few of the branches he had used for the roof. The fort they had worked most of last night building was now just a pile of ash.

He looked to Michelle. She was back at her feet before him. He stood. She was Commander Stockton now.

“Get the packs, let’s move.” She commanded.

Frank grabbed their gear and began running south, Commander Stockton leading him with her assault rifle.

They heard the hissing sound of mortar fire again as Commander Stockton turned around. She was maybe twenty meters ahead, taking cover by a bush.

This shell hit not 2 meters from her. Frank was blown back again, he felt shrapnel hit him in the thigh.

The pain was searing. He couldn’t stand. He took out a cigarette. If he was going to die, he’d die with a cigarette in his mouth. It was so hot out. He closed his eyes.

Frank awoke freezing cold. He was on the floor of his dormitory in Unitopia. The AC left the place a chilly 16 degrees Celsius. He was wet too. His face, shoulders, and torso were covered in what he could only guess was stomach bile and sweat. It smelled disgusting. It smelled like tobacco.

He stood up, and was met with an incredible wave of dizziness, which subsided quickly enough for him to actually catch himself before falling back down to the floor.

He looked at his clock. He had only taken The Quit Pill 2 hours ago. Why did they tel him to stay in his dorm the entire night?

He went to the bathroom, leaving the door open this time and splashed his face with water. He took a shower.

As he was drying off, he didn’t speak, but he thought to himself:

“What a strange trip. Thank god it’s over”

“Over? Are you kidding?” Frank recognized Randal Murtry’s voice coming from the bedroom.

He went back out and standing there was sergeant Randal Murtry, and Commander Michelle Stockton. Frank knew they were both dead, but here they were, in the flesh.

“Kid, we’re just getting started” Stockton said, with a flirtatious wink.

[gameraboy2]

Science Fiction Stories, July 1943 Cover by Milton Luros

[pulpsandcomics2]

Thrilling Wonder Stories August 1939

[evydraws]

An illustration I just finished for Fusion Fragment

Painted in acrylics on gesso panel.

[constructbreakdown]

Childhood 2269

Short video story I made for my new channel, Construct Breakdown.

Apologies for the bad aspect ratio. It's a skill issue.

[adastra-sf]

Alternate history, IRS edition.

In 1967 the government discovered that specific syllable structures combined with specific vocal tones and ultra-low-frequency sounds could speed up the process of unconscious internalization by over 1500%. This became particularly useful for teaching low-level employees large amounts of information, as "hypnophonic learning" could be done while the subject was asleep.

Hypnophone use became standard for new employees of the IRS and SEC, as it made large scale memorization of tax code and financial law significantly cheaper and easier than traditional conscious education.

However, long term use causes the subjects long term memory to atrophy, requiring nightly repetitions of hypnophone use. Some enterprising employees found that the effects could be counteracted with low dosages of LSD to preserve neuroplasticity.

Roughly 1 in 7 employees encountered a strange phenomenon: Mild financial clairvoyance.

One in roughly 50 employees experienced more significant effects, generally those ensconced in large isolated IRS warehouses, which seemed to replicate the monastic lifestyles of historical sages, depriving subjects of ordinary stimuli in favor of becoming attuned to minute changes in the sub-finantial background grid.

Once it was learned that these "enlightened" employees could predict market trends before they happened, the technology was bathed in funding, patented, and made the soul property of the IRS.

Now, these "Plutophants" are kept in nigh-perfect sensory deprivation at all times, fed a constant hypnotic fugue stream of psychic conditioning in the form of "radiosonic neuro-induction" which contains a special form of the United States Tax Code modified for recursive hypnophonic induction, as well as a ticker tape wired directly into the users spine.

The effects achieved are nothing short of stunning. The invisible hand is no longer invisible to us. The market can be fine tuned with surgical precision. The price of bread has maintained a perfect 0.002% +/- variance for over 25 years now, and those who attempt to disrupt the guidelines are regulated by the SECs crack psychonautics division, who are now able to hunt market manipulation via their disruption in the financial dreamscape.

Very rarely, a Plutophant can become so attuned to the guidelines that they achieve a sort of catastrophic neuro-depatterning, their synapses begin to produce a counter-signal to the neuro-induction frequencies; jamming, and eventually overpowering the machine. Study is still ongoing, but it is believed that they somehow perpetuate their own neurological fingerprint into the financial causal background grid itself, literally becoming "one with the market."

Study is ongoing.

[oakendesk]

Science Fiction Stories Nov 1958

Frank Kelly Freas

[t-lane-writes]

WIP: Black Wings, Chapter Three (snippet)

WIP: Black Wings Genre: science-fiction Tag line: Humans’ efforts to terraform a planet are thwarted when some decide to save intelligent indigenous life.  POV characters: Kenaed, Zoe Irene, Mattan Nuada, Siesell Keeva Snippet from: Chapter Three, Kenaed’s PoV

First Chapter

#.

“I know.” He cut her off. Then, “Sorry,” he muttered. 

“What’s going on with you?” 

“Nothing.” 

Angeline knew him best. They had worked together for six-and-a-half years now. Patrolled the hostile terrain outside the first terraformed zone, at first as part of the Explorer mission. Then Mattan Nuada, Angeline’s partner, organized this thing. 

The planet – they called it Angerona, same as the spaceship that had brought their ancestors here, seventy years ago – the planet was fixed for terraforming by Heritage. A powerful interstellar organization which was searching for new systems and planets suitable for human kind to settle. They prepared those planets, changed their soil, water, and air, made the environments survivable for humans. Then, they took people who wanted to leave the planet they had lived on – usually because the planet was slowly losing its human-life-supporting characteristics – and transported them, in stasis, to their new home. 

The cost of such operation was huge. Enormous. Kenaed didn’t even fully understand what it would take to be allowed to re-settle and he doubted anyone in Angerona could comprehend it. Only the richest, the best-connected citizens of dying planets could afford it. The rest was doomed to eventually die along with their worlds. 

Angerona ancestors refused to agree to that fate. They had learned about this world, packed their belongings onto the spaceship and took up a grueling journey through the vast expanses of space. Five hundred years later the children of the children of those who had started it, had landed on the surface. Their ancestors were heroes and the people here had a home now, thanks to them. 

According to the interplanetary laws, though, they were trespassers. 

That was a disturbing thought. One that might send Kenaed into a spiral of fear and anger and memories he couldn’t handle. 

He had to find a distraction. 

“Are we there yet?” he breathed out. 

Angeline turned to look at him through the visor of her helmet, troubled by the tension in his voice. 

“The next spot is just over that ridge.” 

[...] 

“Here we are,” Angeline announced. “Are you going out, or should I?” 

Kenaed was ready to go, but he hesitated with his palm on the handle. Outside, the heat would be even more unbearable. 

“Is it because of that girl of yours?” Angeline asked.  

“What? Who?” He turned back to her. “Zoe?” 

“Weren’t you supposed to meet her kid last sundown? Did you? That why you’re upset?” 

He and Zoe had been seeing each other for almost a boulder-a-round, and she decided it was a good moment to introduce him to her daughter. She didn’t want to wait longer, because, as she said, Maisie’s opinion was a make-it or break-it. 

“Yeah, I met her,” Kenaed nodded, “but-- It was fine, there was nothing-- Maisie is a sweet girl. If a four-years-old can be sweet, that is, she’s pretty rebellious.” The memory made him smile. “No, I’m-- It was okay.” 

[...]

“I better go,” he forced out. He didn’t like where this conversation with Angeline was going. He trusted her, unreservedly, but he couldn’t talk to her now. 

The outside wasn’t as oppressive as he’d expected. The sun had just passed the zenith, so those were the hottest hours, with temperatures rising close to forty degrees. The insulating layers of the EV suits and photochromatic visor cheated his receptors to some degree, making it feel like it was just above twenty. Spending hours inside this rubber-and-polyester tin-can, breathing the filtered air, that was what made it uncomfortable. 

Kenaed pulled the containers from the back compartment of the cruiser and, following the indications on his sleeve-screen, found the right spot. Just as he was about to kneel and start digging, he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. 

At the same time Angeline screamed in his earpiece, “Keen, don’t move!” 

He froze. 

#.

Chapter Four

Tagging @hithelleth, @echo-bleu, @drippingmoon, @did-i-do-this-write

Thank you for reading and for your previous comments and reblogs *huggles*.

If anyone else reads and wants to receive updates on this story, please let me know and I'll tag you too. ;)

[dnschmidt]

New science fiction short story: The Proper Care and Feeding of Humans

Is it still an invasion if the aliens only want to help?

When a highly advanced and seemingly benevolent alien species arrives on Earth, the world rejoices. At last, someone to solve all our problems while we watch TV! Jack and Amy are among the few questioning the Shepherds' intentions as the world eagerly embraces their gifts of technology, medicine, and freedom from grownup responsibilities. Even without death rays and flying saucers, alien invasions can still be destructive. As the world grows dangerously dependent on its new guardians, what happens when we can no longer survive without them? Is a world without bills and laundry worth giving up our freedom?

Grab your copy at Amazon!

[adastra-sf]

far-future person: Oh geez, why would an AI core be lying loose on the ground? Might it be from before or after the Machine Wars? Did a battle destroy the rest of its spaceship body in orbit and this is all that remains of a vast planet-killer or our ancient planetary defense? Was it a monster punished for a great crime, left to rot in the dirt? Or perhaps a simple household assistant, abused to the point of destruction? If I place this into my old spare bot chassis, will it become grateful friend that helps rebuild our frontier planet or vengeful spirit that resumes its destructive mission?

Copper–Agate