Delightfully Twisted Tales

by Nicky Drayden

  DELIGHTFULLY TWISTED TALES:

  VOLUME ONE

  CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE WORST KIND

  by

  Nicky Drayden

  SMASHWORDS EDITION

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  PUBLISHED BY:

  Nicky Drayden on Smashwords

  Delightfully Twisted Tales:

  Volume One

  Close Encounters of the Worst Kind

  Copyright © 2011 by Nicky Drayden

  Robot Photograph by Sebastian Lund, Creative Commons

  Discover other Delightfully Twisted Tales by Nicky Drayden at Smashwords.com:

  Volume One – Close Encounters of the Worst Kind

  Volume Two – Fire, Fangs and Brimstone

  Volume Three – The Weirdos Next Door

  Volume Four – Wisps, Spells and Faerie Tales

  Smashwords Edition License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Winning Streak

  Memories and All That

  The Pudding Master and I

  Wrath of the Porcelain Gods

  WINNING STREAK

  BY NICKY DRAYDEN

  First Published by Daily Science Fiction, 2010

  Seven security gargoyles stare at me from atop the elaborate sandstone columns lining the casino's walls. Their sharp eyes and oversized talons flex ever so slightly in anticipation of snatching up cheaters like unsuspecting prey. They've moved closer since I first sat down at this slot machine, the only place in the casino that hadn't had line-of-sight thanks to a fortunate arrangement of overgrown palm fronds and the gritty haze from a gaggle of feathered Gwiffahs smoking silvawax from a hookah. But the gargoyles have been swarming to my location ever since my machine passed 87,000 kalax, its blinking lights and wailing sirens announcing my winnings to the entire casino.

  The pit boss watches me too, now, and for good reason. I'm an Ittari after all, a shapeshifter, just as they'd identified me with the DNA scan when I'd entered this fine establishment. Traleel Az, their biometric readouts had said, and along with my name and race, they'd listed half a dozen details – birthdate, gender, height, mass, skin color, eye color – all inaccurate and irrelevant to my kind.

  As I redouble my winnings, the management must really be sweating. They tempt me with free drinks and tickets to an impressive buffet featuring delicacies from every corner of the Cascade. They'll do anything to knock me out of this winning streak.

  "I don't drink," I tell the waitress, a Krellian girl with silver skin and a prehensile tail holding a cocktail that looks strong enough to peel the paint off the hull of my space cruiser. "I don't eat either, actually." Not humanoid food anyway.

  They'll have to do better than that to stop me. I pull the lever on my slot machine again and watch the symbols fall into a line – three Bulouvian cherries, all in a row. Jackpot. Now I stand at 415,000 kalax.

  When I hit 1.2 million kalax, the pit boss comes down to congratulate me himself, a six-footed Crawvite, a smile on his long equine face. But he can't stop his nervousness from showing as his hooves clack apprehensively on the casino's slick granite floor.

  "I'd like to offer you a three-night stay in our penthouse suite," the pit boss says, shaking his luxurious mane in an obvious boast. The suites here are renowned across the Southern Cascade, not a single amenity overlooked. "Why don't you get a little rest, then come back to the floor when you're refreshed?"

  I smile back at him. "No thanks," I say. "I'm sort of on a roll here. And besides, Ittari don't need sleep. I just hope your casino has enough money in the vault to cash my voucher."

  And with that, I pull the lever, and what do you know, another jackpot. I can't lose! The gargoyles flock to my machine, dozens of them, heads cocked, eyes sparking like struck flint, muscles tensing beneath stone. But they only suspect. The crowd behind me cheers me on, eighty or so witnesses that make any illicit means of prying me from this seat pretty much out of the question. Losing thousands of kalax is one thing, but having a reputation for strong-arming patrons would be even more damaging to the casino in the long run.

  Nevertheless, three consecutive jackpots later, I'm being scanned and poked, prodded and searched.

  "He's a no-good, dirty shapeshifter!" the pit boss says to the disconcerted crowd, as if that would get them on his side. They gasp at his words, and I roll my eyes ... I mean literally pop them out-of-socket and into the palm of my hand. I close them into my fist, and when I reopen it, they're a pair of dice. I give them a shake, then toss them into the crowd. My audience shuffles out of the way as the dice tumble across the floor, then finally skid to a stop.

  "Lucky seven!" an old Gwiffah biddy clucks. She's so excited that her yellow feathers molt all over the place, and she can barely keep her wingtips from shaking as she scoops the dice up for a souvenir. They won't be much of a souvenir once she's on her way home, though – just a small puddle of oily, black goo when the dice leave the range of the coalescence field that allows me to hold my shape.

  "You let me in here knowing what I was," I say to the pit boss with a sneer. "In fact you're the only casino in this system to let Ittaris gamble. You claim your machines are tamperproof, or is that just a marketing ploy? I'm good enough to play your games as long as you're taking my money, but suddenly if things are reversed, I must be a criminal?"

  The crowd applauds me, and I know I've got them in my pocket. Suddenly the casino is on the verge of some very bad press.

  "Of course not!" the pit boss whinnies, trying to save face. "Our slot machines are tamperproof. But what you've done is impossible!"

  "Improbable, yes, but not impossible. I figure the chances of hitting eleven jackpots in a row is one in eight billion, two hundred fifty million, six hundred twelve thousand, three hundred and fifty-four."

  "We know you're cheating, Traleel," the pit boss finally accuses, drawing his pink gums back to expose gleaming white teeth. "Tell us how and we won't press charges."

  "I'm not cheating. The machine is hot, that's all." I morph myself a new set of eyes, then nod at the machine. "Why don't you give it a spin?"

  He looks at me dubiously, then trots over and pulls the handle. Jackpot!

  The pit boss shakes his head in disbelief then orders the machine dismantled. Without warning, stone talons grip me, and I'm whisked away to the pit boss's lair for more questioning. A tinted glass wall overlooks the glitzy casino floor where thousands of patrons from hundreds of homeworlds plink their hard-earned kalax into stingy machines. We're all chasing crazy dreams of striking it rich, though what sets us apart is how much we're willing to sacrifice to make those dreams come true.

  I'm feeling smug, maybe a little cocky as the pit boss paces the length of the room. At the center of his lair is a strikingly intricate desk, which I can't help but notice is carved from a Brahvian mammoth skull. Insanely expensive. Highly illegal. Most people might take this as a threat, but it's difficult to intimidate an Ittari. Can't exactly torture someone who can slip into a semi-liquid state, and forget about using those primitive lie detectors on me.

  "So maybe you won't talk," says the pit boss, pulling a pistol out from a pewter box sitting on his desk. The pistol's bloated barrel is streaked with white light converging into a puckered tip. "But once my crew is finished dismantling t
hat slot machine, I'll know the truth, and you'll be nothing but a puddle of sewer sludge."

  I almost flinch, but I keep my cool. I hadn't thought oride laser technology had made it to this edge of the Cascade. It's the only frequency of light that can nullify my coalescence field. We lock eyes like adversaries across the pink felt of a Brahvian Hold'em table. The pit boss's wide nostrils flare. Maybe it's a tell, maybe just a twitch. But I decide to call him on it, because one, I've never been the type to play the odds, and two, he's holding the pistol backwards.

  "You can't prove anything," I tell the pit boss, "because there's nothing to prove. Not even telepaths can tamper with your machines, much less a no-good, dirty Ittari like myself. You really think I've got the smarts to crack your encryptions?"

  He raises an arrogant eyebrow and gives me a long once-over. "Absolutely not."

  "Well, unless you've got anything else you'd like to accuse me of, I think I'll collect my winnings now."

  "A six million kalax payout would cripple us," the pit boss admits, and I almost feel sorry for him.

  "Not necessarily," I say. "Just think of all the press coverage you'll get! ‘Local shapeshifter wins big' the headlines will read. ‘Hits eleven jackpots in a row!' People will be swarming in here like Guruvian flies on a pile of dung to play on that machine!"

  The pit boss hems and haws and whinnies, his nostrils flaring in disgust. Finally, he places the pistol back in its box. "Maybe we can make a deal. One million kalax paid now and the rest paid over a five-year period."

  I bite my lip and entertain the offer. "Two million," I dare to say. "And the rest paid over a five-year period including twenty percent interest."

  The pit boss rears his hooves up, then claps them back down on the floor. His tail swishes vigorously. He's aggravated beyond belief, but what choice does he have? "One-point-five million and fifteen percent interest," he finally says.

  I extend my hand and we shake on it. "You drive a hard bargain, sir," I say. "But I can assure you I'll only give glowing reviews of your establishment. This is my favorite casino in the Southern Cascade. And I'm not just saying that because you're the only one who lets me in."

  The pit boss grimaces, then escorts me to the vault. It takes three gargoyles to haul my winnings out to my space cruiser. Once I'm loaded up, I wave goodbye to the pit boss and blast off, still a no-good, dirty Ittari, but a rich one.

  I feel my coalescence field straining, first just a tiny tug the size of a pair of dice. A sharp pain runs through my core as I lose that part of me, and somewhere in that old Gwiffah biddy's purse, the pair of souvenir dice turns into two oil puddles.

  I laugh, wondering how I of all people had pulled off the scam of the century. I'm definitely not smart enough to tamper with those machines, though I doubt anyone is. They truly are the most encrypted in the Cascade. But there is one thing I'm good at and that's shifting. I can imitate just about anything, from something as small and simple as those dice, to something as large and mechanically complex as a personal space cruiser, like the one I'm flying right now.

  I ache again, this time much more intensely. The coalescence field is straining one last time as I break the planet's orbit. Before the bond severs completely, I give the lever a final spin. Somewhere in the pit boss's lair, three Bulouvian cherries blink all in a row, announcing a final jackpot before the slot machine melts into an oil slick on the casino floor.

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  MEMORIES AND ALL THAT

  BY NICKY DRAYDEN

  First Published by Space Squid, 2009

  Cul-de-sac. Manicured front lawn. White picket fence. Every robot's dream. Not even the boxes stacked floor to ceiling in the garage could dampen KATH-090's mood. She ran her giddy smile subroutine, hands clasped against her alloy chest.

  "Don't just stand there," said BIT-772, all-terrain conveyor wheels spinning like mad and extendo-pincers loaded with an array of interchangeable parts. He carefully hung the attachments on a peg board, organized by size and function. "Wanna give me a hand?"

  KATH-090 unscrewed hers and took her husband's side. "Can't you let me enjoy this moment? It's not every day we get to move into our own home." She handed him the hand, standard traction grip #54, and stood back as BIT-772 used its fine motor skills to polish his collection until the chrome cast nicks of light in each direction.

  A check sum error jolted KATH-090 upright, and she examined the peg board closely. "Dear," she said, "I thought we got rid of those blender attachments in the garage sale."

  "Changed my mind. They might come in handy."

  "You haven't used them in eight upgrades. I hardly think you'll need them now."

  "But they're some of the first parts we bought together, remember?"

  KATH-090 felt BIT-772's wireless interface protocol rev up, no doubt trying to guilt her into nostalgia with dusty memory addresses on hard drive sectors long forgotten. It wouldn't work. He'd promised a dozen times that he'd pare down his collection, and she wasn't taking any more excuses.

  "Give it to me. Now." She held out her still-attached palm.

  "But the neighbors might stop by. Wouldn't it be nice to whip up some strawberry-banana smoothies to break the ice?"

  "Fancy drinks aren't going to stop them from noticing, BIT." KATH-090 knocked on her torso, resulting in a dull metallic clank. "In case you haven't realized, we're the only non-organics on this block. Maybe we should have stayed at ROOT. Got a nice little condo overlooking Neural Net Bay."

  "Don't be silly, sweetheart. This is our dream. Right here. Right now. We've finally made it." BIT-772 reached out and brushed KATH-090's backlit cheek.

  She felt a tingle surge through her circuitry. Maybe things wouldn't be so bad. She had BIT after all, and that's all she really needed. They'd endured this arduous journey together, and if he wanted to keep his blender parts for sentimental reasons, she'd overlook it. Just this once. "You're right. Our neighbors will like us for who we are, and if they don't, their loss."

  "Damn straight."

  KATH-090 returned to a half-empty box, her over-clocked processor humming, eager to get everything unpacked and in its place. She reached inside and pulled out a rusted branding iron bearing the insignia of BIT's college frat, Iota Beta Mu.

  "Dear," KATH-090 said, her voice output raised an octave. "I thought you got rid of this thing."

  "Can't, honey. Memories and all that ..."

  KATH-090's jaw came unhinged. "Seriously? This isn't some sort of parody, BIT! What in the mecha gods' green earth would we need with a branding iron in the suburbs?" She attached the part in frustration and sent signals to the heating elements. "You're being selfish, taking up all this valuable space. You promised we'd commission offspring next year!"

  "We will. We will," said BIT-772, hand and pincer thrown up in submission. But KATH-090 brought the rod closer, red-hot iron rippling the air. BIT-772's heat sync whirred as it kicked into overdrive. "I promise. I'll get rid of some stuff."

  "Good." KATH-090 was about to disengage the rod when an organic's voice startled her.

  "Excuse me. I'm not interrupting, am I?"

  KATH-090 spun around, rod swinging wildly. Off balance, she lurched forward, molten iron plunging right into the forehead of a rosy-cheeked woman wielding blue oven mitts and a cake pan. She screamed bloody murder, steam rising from scorched flesh. KATH-090 immediately retracted the rod, the acrid smell filtering through her nasal emulators.

  "I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" KATH-090 said over and over until she thought herself to be caught in an infinite loop. The woman's pan slipped from her grip, colliding against the garage floor, sending freshly made circuit loaf and synthetic oil icing all over the place – icing that had once read "Welcome to the Neighborhood."

  The woman curled into a shivering lump. Neighbors exited their homes, craning their necks to locate the source of the disturbance to their suburban oasis. KATH-090 stood there, grimacing at the mess she'd made. "I'm sorry! I'm sor
ry!" she said again.

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  THE PUDDING MASTER AND I

  BY NICKY DRAYDEN

  Nobody in the whole of Dury, Colorado had batted an eyelash when the Rynoss came to town. After all, we'd had an Anchovian president going on three years, and after the brouhaha over renovating the White House into a giant aquarium had settled, people became a lot more complacent about the alien populations cropping up in their neighborhoods. We were cordial to the Rynoss, but there'd just been three of them, then.

  "Don't stare," I'd hear mothers say to their children as they passed the Rynoss on the streets. It was hard for them not to stick out, being two tons each, covered with gray hide as thick as AT&T's Intergalactic phone book. Their horns were intimidating, I'm not going to lie, jutting up from their wide snouts. But that's not why people stared.

  It was the hot pink legwarmers and 80s platinum blonde wigs that did it. Not to mention the Rynoss had a tendency to screech Boy George and Cyndi Lauper lyrics suddenly and without warning. Apparently they were trying to fit in, but their research on American trends had somehow directed them to the 1980s instead of the 2180s. Being an amateur historian to that era, I didn't mind, but when the Rynoss finally noticed they were being laughed at, they tossed all their glam fashion and reverted to their natural state: walking on all fours and crapping wherever the hell they pleased. Nobody said a word to them, because they still had their immense horns, polished and sharpened into a fine point.

  Dury, Colorado is best known for its hot springs, and the Rynoss sure made good use of them. At first I didn't mind sharing, because there's nothing that'll bridge an interspecies gap like stewing together when the weather dips below freezing. I tried to make conversation, asking the Rynoss more about their culture and what brought them to Earth, but they only stared back and snorted. One of the Rynoss took out a small cardboard box and emptied its contents into the spring.