This Is Me

This Is MeRednak watched the celebrations from the window of his bedroom. The night sky pulsed with light and a torch-lit parade filled the street below. Even with the window closed, the sounds of laughter and music from the procession permeated the room as the people walked by. They were accompanied by marching bands and mobile displays depicting the historical event. Rednak should have been down there marching with them but this was the night he had chosen to tell his parents the truth. The irony had been lost on him until the moment the words left his lips and his father’s face began to contort in anger.

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The First Colony – First Contact

The First Colony – First ContactJuly 13, 2149, Hawking

Cold morning air blew inside the cavern opening, throwing drops of rain all the way to where Grant was huddled in the corner. He opened and closed his hands in a vain attempt at warming them up. The storm had raged all night, and judging by the wind and flashes of light, he had a few more hours to go before it would dissipate. The howling had raced through the valley for the first hour, and it ceased as quickly as it began. A harmony of a thousand souls, he’d thought with a shiver at the time.

He had to get back to the lander and contact Earth with some updates. They would want to know there was life on Hawking, and he knew they would also want to know about the storms. Dawn made a feeble attempt at breaking through the thick clouds and he could finally see his surroundings. It appeared he’d missed a hole in the cavern, just tall enough for an animal to crawl into. As the room continued to get brighter he saw a pile of small bones near the hole’s entrance.

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The First Colony – Seeker

The First Colony – SeekerJuly 9, 2149, Earth’s Orbit

“Sir, we aren’t ready. There are too many unknowns,” Commander Karen Bilson said to the hologram.

The Union president’s form flickered on her office table. “Commander, we don’t have a choice. You saw the images Grant sent. They are everything we’ve been waiting for. The other’s found nothing even close to a livable planet. People are dying down here. I’m making the call, and you will assist in the transport of the first selected to the Santa Maria. Understood?”

She shifted on her feet, feeling her blood pressure rise. Every decision made by the Union was rushed, and she wished for a moment that all the cost and work thrown into building the transport vessels and scouring the galaxies for a new home could have been put into saving their planet.

In the end, she bit her tongue and did what every good soldier was told to do. Follow orders. “Understood, sir,” she said with a salute. The hologram flickered and faded away with a hiss.

“Commander? What are the orders?” the ever-loyal First Officer Penner asked. Continue reading

The First Colony – Arrival

The First Colony - ArrivalJuly 8, 2149, Hawking’s orbit

The planet looked beautiful; light clouds covered the massive oceans. Grant had seen many amazing things in his life, but being the first human to see a new world was something special. He made sure the images were transmitted back to Houston. The ansible technology had been explained to him but he was still in awe of the fact they would see the pictures in mere minutes.

From here it was hard for him to tell how much smaller than Earth this planet was. When they first spotted it in the neighbouring solar system, they thought it was too good to be true. As their technology improved, hope grew as they saw green space, and an atmosphere. Then water. Grant glanced to the picture of his daughter on the console. If this place was what they thought it might be, there was hope for humanity after all.

He would wait until he’d completed the orbit around Hawking, scanning and taking images the whole way, before heading to the surface in the lander. Continue reading

Swept Away

Swept Away‘So they’ve sent another nerd-head of a cybercriminal.’ Dan turned his back on the slouching youth to continue varnishing the window frame.

‘You calling me a dumb ass?’

‘You’re the one having to do community service.’ He inspected his latest brush stroke for evenness in the varnish.

‘You don’t want me around, do you?’

‘No.’

‘I’ll be off like a shot if you’ll sign off my worksheet.’

Dan quickly suppressed his smile, carefully put his brush back in the tin and faced the youth, who held out his smartphone and a stylus towards him.

‘Doesn’t work like that.’

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A Martian Christmas, With Ghosts

A Martian Christmas, With GhostsThey saw the water carriers again. Against the Martian reddish desert sand and rocks, the mirage was hazy. The illusion was of several human-like figures marching solemnly across the sands, each bearing two large urn-shaped containers full of water. They could see the water sloshing, some of it spilling to the ground and sizzling as though the sands were hot.

The first Martian colony was populated by scientists, engineers, labourers and one historian and poet named Josiah Endicott. Josiah had witnessed this phenomenon more than once. He was in his late twenties, with a full head of dark hair and short beard, and looked almost professorial despite his age.

He approached the colony’s psychologist, Noelle Paxton, about the latest sighting. She had never seen the phenomenon.

Noelle was young and energetic, with short brown hair, soft features, a gentle smile, and a slim figure even in the bulky protective suit.

He was still uncomfortable speaking with the breather implant. “It’s always the same, three figures carrying water.”

“What do you think they are?”

“Martian ghosts.”

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Zodiac Eclipse – Revenge

Zodiac Eclipse – RevengeGertrude and the others were glad to finally return to The Sun Dancer. Their stolen gunboat, renamed The Tiger’s Eye II by Tristan, had not taken long for the crew of pirates to hijack, and they were delighted with the small arsenal of weaponry its former owner, a bounty hunter, had left them. It was a tight fit with twenty of them squeezed into a ship designed for fewer than half a dozen, and they were grateful when they were safely aboard The Sun Dancer and could escape the gunboat’s confines.

The bald, bearded, bloated form of Captain Brasidas was waiting for them.

“I was having a ship refitted, after we saw The Tiger’s Eye crash,” he told Drusus, the first officer who had been in command of the mission. “Everyone ok?”

Drusus nodded. “No thanks to Ump’gomptar.”

Brasidas scowled. “The engines are straining to get to him, and we’ll incinerate the compound the instant we drop to sublight.”

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Zodiac Eclipse – Escape

Zodiac Eclipse – EscapeGertrude stared at the tablet’s screen for a moment, scarcely believing that the Murovians had covered up the Emperor’s murder, or that Drusus was responsible, at least in part. Then she tossed the tablet onto the deck and crushed it beneath her boot. She found a coil of rope inside the gunboat, and tied it around the landing gear. It was still night time, but dawn would not be too far off.

Gertrude tossed the rope over the cliff edge and began the descent. It was a good deal easier than climbing up had been, particularly with the tranquilliser rifle and ammunition bandolier slung over her shoulders. Once she reached the base of the cliff she checked on the unfamiliar alien that had been trying to hunt down Drusus, and had terrorised the native Naxonians in the meantime. The armour-clad alien was still unconscious, but she shot his exposed reptilian arm with another tranquilliser dart just to be on the safe side.

Wep, the leader of the small Naxonian group she had travelled with, was just coming around. He shook his elongated, narrow head groggily, and washed his small eyes with his long, pink tongue. Standing on his hind legs, he towered above Gertrude’s six feet and three inches.

“This is the demon that has been plaguing you,” she said, thrusting the barrel of her rifle at the alien hunter. And then she remembered he couldn’t understand a damned word that came out of her mouth, and hoped her gesture got through to him.

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The Power of Love

The Power of LoveThere was no angel. Julius looked around the sterile, green hospital room in disbelief. The room, he remembered, smelled of disinfectants and latex; he couldn’t smell it now, of course, but his original self, over there by the bed, had locked that smell away in the back of his brain as a permanent reminder of the death of baby Cecillia. It was just as strong in Julius’s memory as it had been that day. He watched as Meg’s tears rolled down her cheeks in silent agony, as young Julius hovered helplessly. The doctor gently folded the blanket over their sweet, sweet baby Cecillia and put his stethoscope back in his pocket. Julius examined every corner of the room, again, but could find no angel. With a final, shuddering sigh, he flickered back to his own time.

Over the next few weeks, every time his name came up on the roster, Julius used his time travel opportunity to go back again. He never saw himself there, except for the one who lived it originally, for the same reason nobody else ever saw him there – each time travel event happened inside its own little dimensional bubble; no time traveler could be seen, or do anything to affect anything in the past. It was a tourist’s dream – or a scholar’s.

Professor Janes, of the history department, visited ancient Rome and stood in the Forum to watch Julius Caesar speaking. Julius Kane visited St. Mary’s Hospital and decided to stand by the door this time while he watched his daughter die.

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Zodiac Eclipse – Gunboat

Zodiac Eclipse – GunboatGertrude eyed the stranger for a long time. He seemed content to watch her through the augmented vision of his mask, and was in no rush to start the hand-to-hand fight he knew was coming. His species was an utter mystery to her. He could have been a man in exotic armour, or a robot with advanced personality software. A bandolier of tranquilliser darts ran from shoulder to hip, but he had no pulse pistol holstered in his belt. She smiled at the thought of her flint knife being the deadliest weapon either possessed. Gertrude tossed the blade aside. She didn’t know the make, but she knew armour, and the most dangerous thing her knife could do would be to shatter and get a fragment in her eye.

He ran at her and she tried to sidestep, but he was too fast. The hunter tackled her and attempted to pin her down, but he hadn’t reckoned on her left arm. The artificial limb shrugged off his efforts and grabbed his arm. She tried throwing him off of her, but he weighed far more than she had expected, and even the metallic might of her robotics couldn’t shift him. Instead, she tore off the armour covering his upper arm, revealing slimy, reptilian scales.

The hunter hissed. “Last mistake, little girl.”

She lashed out with her synthetic arm, but he grabbed the metal with both hands and gradually forced it to the ground.

He laughed at her helplessness. “Weak, like all your kind. I’m twice as strong, even if you are a cyborg.”

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