The Ultimate Collection of Science & Speculative Fiction Short Stories (Short SSF Stories Book 5)

by Nicholas C. Rossis

  Recognition hits me. I’d seen him plenty of times, hanging around in the port or the jetties. I say nothing, not daring to interrupt him.

  “With the economy being what it is, I sold my trawler and retired. Nowadays, I only go out to sea when a kindly soul lets me tag along. It was like that today. This is my nephew’s ship. He offered to take me along for the ride.” He runs his hand through his white hair, which is surprisingly thick for his age. “It was a morning like any other. We had a nice catch. Then, I suggested we try the reef. There’s always plenty of fish around here. That’s when…” His voice trails off.

  “What happened?” I ask, my voice as gentle as possible.

  “We heard music,” he says after a while, his eyes dreamy. “Sweet, sweet music, like I’ve never heard before.” His face flushes. “And the women…” He licks his lips. “Best looking dames I’ve ever seen in my life.” His voice is now filled with excitement.

  “You mean, sirens?” I ask, not bothering to hide my disbelief.

  “Sirens…” He rolls the word in his mouth like a candy. “I warned them, I did. I’ve heard the stories. Never believed them, of course, but when you hear music at sea, you gotta see with your own two eyes, don’t you?”

  Great. He’s gone off the deep end. Whatever had happened, it was obviously enough to push the old man over the edge.

  “You don’t believe me, do you?” he asks, as if reading my mind. “I don’t blame you. I wouldn’t believe me either.”

  “I believe something happened to you. Something confusing.”

  He shakes his head. “It was confusing, all right. Everyone jumped overboard to reach the girls. I tried to fight it, but the music…” He let out a sigh. “But I’m old. I stumbled down the stairs. Broke my leg. By the time I reached the deck, the women were gone. Instead…”

  A visible shudder rocks his body. I hope he’s not going into shock!

  He swallows loudly. “Instead, there was a gold ship on the reef, like a donut. And creatures. Squid-like, only big. Like, twice as tall as any of us. They grabbed my nephew. The crew. The screams…” He rubs tears from his eyes. “They put them in some sort of cage. I couldn’t look. I hid. When I looked again, they were gone. Everyone gone.” He swivels and punches me in my chest. He’s surprisingly strong. “Where are they? What will I tell my sister? That I was too much of a coward to save her son?”

  There’s so much pain, so much anguish in his voice. Tears stream down from his eyes. I take him into my arms, wait for the sobbing to stop. I don’t know what you’ll tell them, but the pirates are starting to sound pretty damn good to me.

  I push my secondary tentacle through the control and our spaceship makes a gentle turn, overshooting their lonely moon. I stare absentmindedly at the blue dot disappearing fast into the blackness of space.

  “Will you eat yours?”

  “What, the humans?” My skin turns brown in disgust. “Ew! You know I don’t eat that. They’re for my son. He loves playing with them.”

  My friend opens the eyes in his back to marvel at their captured prey. “Can’t say I understand the appeal. They look so… dry. Wish they had some slime on them. Perhaps they wouldn’t look so weird then.” He pushes his body into a resting tube. “Anyway, where will you keep them?”

  “We’ll figure it out. Habitats aren’t all that expensive anymore. Urban, suburban, jungle; take your pick. And we can always get more humans if these die. They all look alike; my son won’t know the difference.”

  As if he understood me, a human starts screaming in terror behind me. Soon, they are all wailing and thrashing about in their cage.

  “Can’t you do something about the noise?” my friend complains.

  I twirl the control and the screaming stops.

  “Nice.”

  “I had noise canceling installed in the cage after the first time my wife joined me fishing. She couldn’t stand all that clamor. Wanted me to catch and release instead. Chances are she’ll have me throw these back, too.”

  Iridescent colors travel across my friend’s skin, showing his amusement. “Wouldn’t surprise me. Women. They’re so cute. Didn’t you explain that humans feel no pain?”

  “Wouldn’t make a difference. And don’t joke about women. What do you think our bait was?”

  His four eyes widen. “Those screeching things were females?” The iridescent colors deepen in laughter. “They’re so ugly! Plus, I’d think that anyone hearing that clamor would run in terror.”

  It’s my turn to turn iridescent as I chuckle. “Hey, to each his own. Have you collected all the tackle?”

  “Yes, yes, I collected it all. Just like you asked me a dozen times, remember?” He swivels his body in the tube to make room for me. It’s a long way home, so we might as well make ourselves comfortable.

  “Sorry.” I push him farther down the tube as I squeeze myself through the narrow opening. “I just wouldn’t want to lose any of those female lures. They’re the perfect bait.”

  YOU’RE IN FOR A RIDE

  The world is not made of atoms.

  It is made of the stories we tell about atoms.

  Copyright © 2016 Nicholas C. Rossis. All rights reserved.

  Illustration by Dimitris Fousekis. Copyright © 2014 Dimitris Fousekis. All rights reserved.

  Cover by Alexios Saskalidis, 187designz.deviantart.com. All rights reserved.

  ISBN: 978-1530756704 (print edition)

  This is an original work of fiction. Any relationship to real people is unintentional and a coincidence.

  You’re in for a Ride: Prologue

  The impregnation euphoria is slowly wearing off. I watch my latest victim’s body sink into the mud as I wait for the buzzing in my ears to fade away. Soon, darker thoughts fill my head like crawling insects. My gaze darts round the cavernous basement. I count twenty-seven bodies. Twenty-seven possible offspring. That means two, maybe three survivors—if I’m lucky. Not nearly enough. I need at least another one.

  I pinch the bridge of my nose, the weight of my responsibilities weighing heavily upon me. The good news is, the building’s mine. Has been for centuries. But I need to renovate it, to make sure that no one disturbs us for the next few decades. Until the next cycle.

  Even worse, I’ve only located forty-eight possible hosts this time. Twenty-one had proven incompatible. Twenty-one! I hid their bodies away, but the police have already unearthed thirteen of them. How long before they catch up with me? Even if they don’t, how long before there are no compatible hosts left? They used to beg us for our seed. Now they chase us, call us monsters.

  How long before mankind discards the last of its forgotten gods?

  You’re in for a ride: Part I

  A man’s gotta make a living, so I cruise through the rain, even though I doubt anyone will be crazy enough to be out and about in a night like this. Which is why I almost miss the middle-aged blonde in the red coat, seeking shelter under the bus stop. She flags me down with both hands, flailing her arms up and down.

  I stop a few yards down the road, and she yanks the door open and rushes in. The wind pushes a few stray raindrops into the cab, but I don’t mind. I’m just happy to get a customer.

  She squishes into the warm seat. “Thanks.”

  I nod a half-greeting, half-question. “Where to?”

  She gives me an address in the better part of the city and I repeat it into the cab’s autopilot. The car turns left onto an empty street. Blurry neon lights reflect on my windshield as we drive away from the city center. I make myself comfortable. There’s really no need for me to be behind the wheel. Just waiting for legislation to catch up with technology. Maybe in a year’s time, more likely in a decade or two, cabbies will be obsolete. I’ll be obsolete. What happens next is anyone’s guess. I suppose some passengers will prefer having a real human being in the car with them. Who knows—our presence, once not required, may become a luxury only the rich can afford. At least, that’s what we cabbies tell ourselves.

&
nbsp; I shake my head to chase away chilling thoughts, and glance at the mirror. She pushes her lipstick against her lips, then shoves it back into her bag and smacks cherry lips together. Her mouth looks ready to break into an easy smile. I like that. Then I notice her jittery gaze darting around the empty, showery streets.

  My brow furrows. “Everything all right?”

  She lets out a nervous chuckle. “Yes, it’s just…” There’s that easy smile. A bit on the nervous side, but cute on her. “With everything that’s been going on…”

  She doesn’t finish her sentence. Doesn’t need to. We’ve all heard the news. They’d found another one of the Phantom’s victims last night. “What’s that, twelve?”

  She shakes her head. “Thirteen. Assuming they’ve found them all.”

  Thirteen dead in as many months. The police, clueless. Each victim, mummified. Drained of life. It only took the Phantom a few minutes, the coroner had said. How, no one knows.

  Comedy clubs roar with laughter as comedians joke about the return of the Mummy. At night’s end, though, when the doors open and I pick up tipsy patrons, fear hangs over them like a putrid overcoat.

  “Looks like he only strikes once a month,” I console her. “We should be safe until next month.”

  Her lips tug upwards again. “I guess.”

  I like her smile. Half bitter, half joyful. Would love to promise her she’ll be safe. But how can I?

  “I heard about a professor in the news,” she says. “He claims it’s an ancient species. One that hibernates for hundreds of years. They were once worshipped as gods, he said. They’ll eat their fill, then return to their slumber.”

  I let out a nervous laugh. “Does he know why?”

  Her smile evaporates. “He speculates they need our life force—chi, he called it—to survive.”

  “Some imagination he has.”

  “I don’t know.” She purses her lips. “He sounded pretty convincing. Said he’s already unearthed enough evidence to go public. He’s close to getting final proof.”

  “Sounds like a nut job to me,” I mutter. “Have you even seen him?”

  “I don’t think anyone has.” She chuckles. “He’s about as hard-to-find as the Phantom himself.”

  We spend the rest of the short ride in awkward silence. That professor and his theories have soured my mood, and the empty streets unnerve me. Not even joyriders—the suicidal idiots who find driving thrilling and race the streets at night with disengaged autopilots. Even they have stayed inside on a night like this.

  When the cab pulls over at the curb, she opens her purse and pulls out her cell. It blips as she makes a quick pass over the dongle. I check the transaction. It includes a healthy tip. I beam her my warmest smile. “Have a lovely night, ma’am.”

  “You too,” she says and walks into the rain and out of my life.

  My head slumps against my headrest. I watch her through the mirror pull her collar over her head and rush toward a well-kept house. The kind with the manicured lawn. She probably has a family waiting for her. Husband and three-point-five kids. And a flamingo in the backyard.

  I swallow a yawn, then remember there’s no one around and let it out in the open, not even bothering to cover my mouth. A quick glance at the dashboard tells me it’s been sixteen hours now. Way too long a shift, even if I’ve spent most of it sitting comfortably. I instruct the cab to drive itself to the nearest train station. Maybe I can catch one last fare before calling it a day.

  The sound of the rain drumming against the car and the swish of the wipers lull me to sleep. I do my best to keep my eyes open as the car drives through the vacant streets, but as soon as the cab comes to a gentle stop next to the train station sign, I stretch my hands and put them behind my head. Then, I shut my eyes and drift into an uneasy sleep, filled with strange dreams…

  A Crystal Too Far

  The sergeant wipes thick beads of sweat from his brow with fingers trembling with exhaustion. “It’s useless, sir. There’s no way we can get to the crystals in time.”

  The colony delegate—a member of the royal court, no less—glares at the alien force field separating them from their objective. “And you’re sure there’s no opening?”

  “My men have searched every inch of it. There seems to be no way in or out. Just a groove at the top. When we first discovered it, everyone thought we’d cracked it. But it’s sealed. Won’t budge an inch.” His face twitches. “All of our attempts to enter have been in vain.”

  “How about making an opening? What have you tried so far?”

  “Everything we can think of,” the man says with a resigned sigh. “Chemicals. Brute force. Private Jenkins here even tried chewing through.” He points at a man massaging his swollen jaw.

  The delegate spits on the ground. “I don’t need to tell you how badly the colony needs those crystals. You have no idea how low our stockpile is by now. We may not survive the winter without them—and spring is still a long time away.”

  The sergeant’s face drops even further. “Yes, sir.” He rubs the back of his head for a few awkward moments. “Your orders?”

  The delegate casts him a distressed glance, then starts pacing back and forth, mumbling. He only pauses twice: once to curse at the transparent material that seems to be mocking them, and once to curse at the aliens who have placed it there. The all-powerful creatures who have built their fortress next to the colony, paying no attention to its inhabitants and their needs. The enigmatic neighbors have brought much-needed supplies with them, but have steadfastly refused to share—or even acknowledge the colony’s continuous pleas for cooperation.

  The first delegation had been ignored. The second, stomped on. Whether on purpose or by accident was the subject of much heated debate in the colony. Whichever it was, it had led to this ill-advised attempt at thievery.

  “Let’s face it, sir,” the sergeant whispers once the man runs out of swearwords, “the creatures have won this round.”

  “Impossible,” the man snaps at him. “We have the fiercest arsenals of weapons. We have conquered every corner of this planet. We have brains and brawn. There must be a way.” The delegate stops pacing and whirls around. “What about digging underneath? How far below the ground does the barrier go?”

  The sergeant stomps one foot to emphasize the ground’s stiffness. “It stops at the surface, but the ground isn’t the usual soil one might expect. We’ve never seen anything like it. Our diggers’ best estimate is that it’d take us months to break through.”

  “By which time the crystals will be gone.” The delegate explodes in a fresh barrage of curses, this time shaking his fist at the soaring barrier. He freezes in the middle of a particularly nasty—and unlikely—accusation involving the alien who had invented those hellish materials, certain members of his family, and a cucumber. His eyes light up. “We lift it.”

  The sergeant presses his lips together and examines his hands, rubbing out an invisible smudge from his palm. “Already tried it. No use. We couldn’t move it an inch. Even with our entire colony pushing, it won’t budge.” He discreetly wipes the delegate’s spittle from his cheek as the man starts screaming more obscenities at the obstacle.

  Finally, the man hangs his head in defeat and hunches over, placing his hands on his lap. “Who will inform the court?”

  The sergeant and a dozen privates behind him all take an involuntary step backwards. No one speaks a word.

  The delegate looks at them with dark eyes. “Who will inform the court?” he repeats in a low voice. After a moment of awkward silence, he shakes his head and straightens his back. “Very well. You may return to the colony. But we leave behind sentries. As many men as you can spare. Sooner or later, the creatures will need their crystals. I want to know the moment that happens.” A glimmer of hope shines in his eyes. “Maybe they’ll forget to drop the force field. Or they’ll leave an opening unguarded. Who knows? Perhaps we’ll get lucky.”

  As the sergeant starts barking orders, the del
egate stares with greedy eyes at the amazing sight of a whole mountain of energy crystals, a mere hand’s reach away. “One way or another, we’ll get our hands on you,” he whispers. “That’s a promise.”

  The old woman reaches for the tea cup and clicks her tongue. “Where is my head?” She turns to the young man sitting opposite to her. “Be a dear and fetch me some sugar, will you, darling? It’s on the kitchen top.”

  The man pushes back his chair and stands up. “Of course, Auntie.”

  “Be sure to close the lid,” she shouts after him as he walks into the kitchen. “The ants around here have gotten a bit… antsy lately.” She chuckles at her own joke.

  “Yes, Auntie,” he shouts from the kitchen. He returns a moment later holding a large glass jar in his hands. “You weren’t lying about those ants. There’s at least a dozen of them on the kitchen top. It almost looks like they’re guarding the sugar cubes.” He pushes the ornate silver tray covering half the table a few inches to the side and places the jar next to the steaming teacups. “You should get an exterminator.”

  She gently smacks his hand. “That’s a terrible thing to say. They have as much right to be here as you and me.” She lifts the lid and skillfully picks a cube with a fine silver tong. The sugar cube splashes into the hot tea and immediately starts melting. “As penance, you’ll leave a cube outside for them when you take the jar back,” she says as she lifts the cup and stirs her tea.

  The young man chuckles and glances at the kitchen. “Well, that should make a few ants very happy.”

  You Can’t Fight a Prophecy

  “You can’t fight a prophecy,” the wrinkly shaman says and gives me a toothless grin. The shrug accompanying his words shakes the feathers around his neck, making him look like a frail old bird trying to give flight.