by Oliver Smith
“Beginning pre-jump stimulation,” came Rani’s voice. It was necessary to raise Hannah from the depths of her torporific state to a less-sedated level so her mind and body could react as desired to the shock that would prompt their teleportation.
“James... James...”
He glanced over at Sarah, but she seemed intent upon her console.
“Rani, that you?”
“That me what, sir?”
“Did you just call me?”
“No, sir. Is everything okay, sir?”
He was a silent for just a moment, then said, “Yes.”
“One minute to go,” he said, making a final check.
“Aye aye, sir,” they called back.
“James... James... it’s too late... you are trapped...”
“Who is that?” Campbell demanded.
“Sir?”
He looked at Sarah, who had turned from her console towards him.
“Was that you?”
“I’m not sure I understand the question, sir. Are you okay, sir?”
“I thought... it doesn’t matter...”
“Do you wish to abort the jump, sir?” She was clearly concerned. “I could call Rani to attend you.”
“Belay that. I’m... fine. We will not delay.”
“Affirmative, sir.”
“Ten—nine—eight—” he counted down to one, and they jumped.
The lights dimmed.
There was a sensation he couldn’t quite describe, then his eyes snapped open in shock and he screamed.
It was, if anything, worse than waking from DSE.
Sarah was screaming. Looking over, he was shocked to see an explosion of sparks as a tangle of wires fell from the ceiling and wrapped about her, binding about her almost as if alive.
Campbell struggled out of his grav couch, but it was too late; the wiring had bound tightly about her, crushing and asphyxiating her. He struggled to free her, but couldn’t.
“Rani! Rani! We need you! Sarah...” He was silenced by her terrified screams. “Rani? Rani?”
Something was wrong, terribly wrong.
“James... James..” The voice was singsong, like a child’s. “You’re going to die...”
There was the sound of footsteps coming along the corridor towards the bridge. There was somebody out there, somebody who meant him harm. He shivered.
“Who’s there?” he demanded, gazing into the darkness.
There was no answer and the footsteps halted. The silence was worse. Then, he became aware of a sound like scratching or slithering outside on the hull.
“Rani? Andrew?” he hissed into his wrist comm..
“Rani is dead.” The voice was hers, but the tone was leaden and strange.
“Rani? That’s not funny...”
“Rani is dead...” This time it was the mysterious voice that seemed to come out of thin air.
“Andrew? Andrew!”
“Sir,” the engineer hissed back. “There’s something in here... like a... a spider...”
“What?”
“Spidarrrrrrghh!” His scream was replaced by whimpering, then silence; a silence broken only by the strange slithering sounds on the hull, and a scuttling within the bridge. Whatever was outside the ship was also inside and stalking him. He felt cold sweat run down his neck, his back, like icy fingers caressing his flesh.
He’d read a paper by one theoretician who postulated there might be entities in hyperspace or whatever medium they might travel through during the jump.
The scuttling sound grew louder, then he spotted a silhouette. There was something large clinging to the ceiling and coming closer. He wished he had a gun, but Rani was the only crewmember who was armed.
Had been armed.
The thing dropped to the floor, and as it fell he had the impression of a segmented body with too many legs.
It scuttled closer as he retreated, backing into his grav couch. He stumbled, fell.
A tendril, whipped towards him, wrapping about him, binding him tight. It had a texture like metal. The thing loomed over him and he saw that it was angular, more like a machine than a creature. From its underside extended a long, sharp needle, thrusting at him.
He closed his eyes, waiting for the death blow.
It never came.
Captain James Campbell’s eyes snapped open in shock and he screamed.
The lights were up, and for a moment he wondered if he’d had a nightmare during the jump. He looked over at Sarah and saw the wide-eyed look of terror on her face and that she wasn’t breathing. Something had happened. There was no evidence of the wires that had entangled her, yet she was dead and showed signs, as far as his limited medical training could tell, of having suffocated.
“Andrew? Rani?” He tried the intercom, but received no response. He had no doubt they were dead. How he had managed to survive, he had no idea.
Dazed from the shock, he turned his attention to his console and checked the ship’s position. They were in the Alpha Centauri system. The jump had been successful.
Campbell laughed, bitterly. A seventy-five percent casualty rate and here he was thinking of it as a success.
He supposed that was something for the scientists to worry about. He wished he knew how he’d managed to survive while the others had died, and that he could be entirely certain Mentalis had brought nothing back with it.
Modified
By Tim Jeffreys
A whispered hiss sounded from one of the surrounding cubicles: “Whoa! Check it out!”
Kedwood glanced up from his screen.
Another hushed voice, from a different cubicle, said: “Look! Look! Nina’s had an upgrade!”
Kedwood pressed a button to save the data he’d been working on to his finger-flash, unplugged himself from his workstation, and half-rose in order to see over the top of the partition walls.
His boss, the Division Manager Nina Som, was walking down the centre aisle toward her office with every pair of eyes in the room following her. Kedwood only knew it was Nina because of her distinctive orange-colored hair with streaks of blonde because the majority of her face was now covered.
“New headset,” someone said. “That’s an IG40. 15Y capacity. That’s a hell of a lot of storage space. And she’s had the eyes done.”
An excited voice chipped in which Kedwood recognized as belonging to his cubicle neighbor Speakman. “Never mind that! Check out the legs!”
Kedwood raised himself further and peered over the cubicle wall just as Nina approached her office door. He managed to get a glimpse of her legs before she disappeared inside. Her own legs, the legs she’d had on Friday when she left the office, had been removed just above the knee. They’d been replaced by J-shaped prosthetics, the kind that had once only been sported by athletes in the Special Olympics, but which were now the latest must-have body-adjustment desired by just about everyone. And Nina had them. They made her look a bit like some strange animal, something out of a children’s book, a fawn—that was it. She looked like a fawn. Half-turning, he caught his neighbor’s eye.
“Those things are made out of carbon-fiber,” Speakman said. “Not cheap. But then she’s a keen runner. And she’ll be fast now. Much faster than those of us stuck with the old hydraulic legs. Sure, the hydraulics are fast and they take a lot of strain, but they’re heavy too. Wish I’d waited to get some of those carbon-fiber things. Just think, with those she’ll be able to sprint between meetings. She won’t have to wait for the monorail. That’ll save her a lot of time. It all adds up, you know. Five minutes here. Ten minutes there. I’ll bet you that’s why she got them. Makes her more efficient. Jesus wept; I wish I could afford a pair of those.”
With a sigh Speakman sat down, disappearing from view. Kedwood too returned to his workstation. He stretched his legs out before him and looked at them. Of course he, like Speakman, had had the hydraulics fitted. About three years ago, everyone had been getting them. He felt now a dull anger and shame. He wondered how much thos
e legs of Nina’s had cost. Then he told himself there was no point thinking about that because he couldn’t afford them. He’d splashed out a few months ago on the new headset and the hard-drive that had been implanted into the back of his skull, and of course the finger-flash. And he’d only got those because all the management jobs he’d seen advertised stipulated them as a requirement. He glanced around at the grey cubicle walls, thinking how much he’d love to be sprinting around like a fawn as Nina did on a pair of those carbon-fibre blades. He imagined how proud Nina must feel just walking down the street. She’d be the envy of everyone she encountered. He’d thought once or twice about asking Nina out on a date as he’d always had the impression she was fond of him. She wouldn’t look twice at him now, not while he was stuck with the old, passé hydraulic legs instead of those magnificent blades. How would he ever meet anyone, for that matter, anyone to truly care for him when he was still reliant on the eyes he’d been born with; and how would he ever climb the career ladder when he couldn’t even afford a head-screen?
Pretty soon, he thought, I’m going to end up like those poor saps living downtown; the ones who can’t even afford to have their phones implanted in their ears and still have to carry them around everywhere they go.
Naturals.
With a deep sigh and a shake of his head, he plugged himself back in. As he brought up the data he’d been working on earlier, there was a ringing sound in his headset. When he touched a pad on the side of his head, the ringing stopped and he heard his mother’s voice.
“What is it, Ma? I’m working.”
“How’s the office today, son?”
“Same old same old. What do you want? I’m busy.”
“Do you think you could take a detour on your way home and pick up some of that nice fish we had last week? I’ve got the Rodmans coming to dinner on Wednesday, and I’d like to give them something fresh. Katherine wants to show off the new hands she’s had fitted.”
“I’m going to have to drive downtown to the docks. And you know I hate going down there.”
“All right. Well, if it’s too much trouble I’ll go myself this afternoon. You know there’s muggers down there, and car thieves. I’ve heard people say if you don’t move quickly, they strip the implants and accessories right off you as you walk. But I’ll go. I’ll be fine. I’m sure no one will bother me. I know you hate going out of your way. I’ll just…”
“Oh all right. Enough with the guilt trip. I’ll go.”
“Look, if it’s too much trouble…”
“I said I’ll go.”
Touching a finger to the pad on his headset again, he ended the call.
Closing down his workstation that evening, he stood and glanced about the office, realizing that all the other cubicles were empty. He liked being the last person to leave. He thought it showed commitment. But then as he headed for the door, he saw that a light was still on in Nina’s office.
He crossed to her door and knocked. Instructed to enter, he opened the door and stuck his head inside. Nina was at her workstation with her back to him.
“What is it?” she said, without turning around.
“Everyone’s gone,” Kedwood said. “I’m going home myself. I thought I’d say goodnight.”
“Goodnight,” Nina said, without turning around.
He started to back out of the door, but then he stopped. “I’m sure you’re tired of hearing it, but I just wanted to say congratulations on the upgrade. You look marvelous. I wish I could afford to…”
She began talking in a loud voice, interrupting him. After a moment he realized she was not talking to him but to someone in her headset. He lingered a moment, unsure why. Then Nina, still talking into her headset, twisted in her chair and faced him. The tinted screen that covered her eyes revealed nothing, but her mouth was fixed in a scowl. He was struck by the memory of what nice eyes he’d always thought she’d had. They were warm, compassionate. They’d had a sparkle in them. Looking at her face now was like looking at a blank screen. Literally.
She waved a hand, dismissing him.
Making apologetic gestures, he closed the door.
Thinking it safer, he parked his pod-car under a streetlight, unplugged from the dash, then climbed out. He’d had the ignition key implanted into the thumb of his left hand, but there was always a chance someone would try and hot-wire it. Downtown, pod-cars were conspicuous. The people here, if they drove anything, drove cumbersome iron and steel contraptions with no interfaces whatsoever, which meant you had to turn a wheel and press pedals with your feet in order to maneuver them. Kedwood had often tried to imagine that, but couldn’t. It seemed absurd. When he wanted his car to go right, all he had to do was think: go right. His plug-ins did the work. It was like becoming one with the car. It had to be a nightmare trying to steer one of those great hulks manually.
Better buy the fish and get out of here as quickly as possible, he thought. Walking in the direction of the docks, he saw a gang of children playing with a ball in the street ahead of him. Their dark complexions betrayed them as foreigners. Most of the people living downtown were foreigners, many of them illegal immigrants. They were smuggled in on boats from some less advanced country out east. Seeing the children, he felt a flash of pity. Not only were they shoeless and dressed in raggedy clothing, but they didn’t have a single modification between them. Then he remembered what his mother had said: I’ve heard people say if you don’t move quickly, they strip the implants and accessories right off you as you walk. He wouldn’t put it past these kids to do that either; they looked desperate enough. He’d have to keep an eye on them, keep them from getting too close. He steeled himself, but soon realized he had nothing to worry about. When the children noticed him approaching they scattered into the alleyways, some of them screaming.
Weird, he thought. Then: Of course, they don’t have modified people where they come from.
The sea air tasted ripe and unpleasant. In the market, people stared or eyed him with surprise or suspicion. He saw one or two other modified people amongst the crowds, but mostly it was naturals. He pitied naturals. He wondered how people could live without modifications, reliant only on flesh and bone and the bits and pieces they were born with. And because they couldn’t plug into anything they were forced to work for a pittance as laborers, or they preferred to rob and steal in order to get by. Whatever it was they did to survive, they really were deprived.
Approaching the fish stall, he saw that there was a different person manning it than the previous time he’d visited. Then there had been a grunting, swarthy-looking man presiding over the day’s catch. This time there was a beautiful, olive-skinned girl. She couldn’t have been much more than a child, fifteen or sixteen years old. Before she noticed him approaching she had been standing with her arms folded, watching the passing crowds and smiling. Her smile was innocent and hopeful. She had the kind of body that looked like it was used to work: lean and tanned. Her skin, was radiant; her face kind. The sun was already sinking into the sea at her back and her outline glowed with orange light. Kedwood was almost forced to stop and stand still for a moment, so taken was he by her beauty.
Her smile dropped away when she saw him. She looked startled. She ran her eyes up and down his body and fixed her gaze on his various attachments with an expression both of fascination and repulsion, as if he were a burn victim or horribly scarred instead of sporting various bits of expensive hi-tech equipment. Then she looked him in the face as if confronted with something she did not know whether to flee from or attempt to shoo away.
He showed her a smile, hoping to put her at ease. I must be a shock to her, he thought. Remember, they don’t have modified people where she comes from. It will take time, but she’ll see the sense in it eventually. She might even get modified herself, once she’s got some money together. But then he had a thought which surprised him. He thought: no. No modifications required.
He was stunned to have thought this, and for a moment he couldn’t speak
.
His initial friendliness seemed to have relaxed the girl’s manner somewhat.
“You want something…from here?” she said, gesturing to the array of fish.
He pointed and said, “Four of those.”
The wind coming in off the sea tugged her long dark hair this way and that, sometimes lifting it up into the air, sometimes blowing it forward over her face. He watched her as she wrapped the fish for him, unable to draw his eyes away. She made quick, unburdened movements. When she raised her eyes and met his, that fearful expression had returned to her face, and he felt a sudden sense of shame.
“Do you mind me asking…what’s your name?” he said.
“My name? It is Jade. Why you ask this?”
“Jade,” he said. “How long have you been here in our country?”
She glanced from side to side, suddenly suspicious. “I arrive here two days ago. I have papers.”
“That’s all right,” he said. “I was just being friendly. How much do I owe you?”
She told him the price and he paid her. Her eyes still had that dark look of pity and repulsion. He began to turn away, but then she stopped him by speaking again.
“Can I ask…please…why you…why you do this to yourself?”
The question stopped him in his tracks. She had said it as if compelled, as if it had leapt out of her against her own will. He didn’t know how to answer. He’d always thought that if a natural felt anything towards people like him, it was envy. He’d always thought the only reason they didn’t get implanted, or modified, or accessorized, was because they couldn’t afford to. It had never occurred to him that they might not want to.
Shrugging, unable to answer and unable to bear her look of fascinated disgust any longer, he hurried away and lost himself in the crowds.
On the way home, unsure exactly why he was doing it, he made a detour back into the heart of the city and stopped at the New Somatics Superstore. Only when he arrived did he realize, dimly, why he’d gone there. In that place, no one ran from him or looked him up and down in horror and pity. The store was full of modified people. Modified business men and women. Modified couples hand in hand. Modified families. They walked the aisles, smiling and gazing around as if they’d stumbled into paradise, touching screens and examining the electronic equipment on display. They were dreaming. And it was right to dream. It was right to want to improve oneself and advance. Wasn’t it?
