FSF, September-October 2010

by Spilogale, Inc

  I made myself bend down, made myself put a hand to the mattress. Cold. I staggered up and hurried to the kitchen, the common room, going over the last few hours in my head. Had I heard the front door open? No. But I had been there, right next to it, asleep in the chair. If she had gone out, it would have woken me. I lit each of the oil lamps and candles at the front of the house. Maybe she was hiding in the shadows, or under the table, playing some kind of game. I walked back to her room and yanked the curtain aside. Yellow light fell over the messy sheets, the repurposed apple crates, the matching pairs of hiking boots on their sides at the foot of the bed. I squinted. Hiking boots. Had Ian gone out barefoot, then, the day he disappeared?

  The dark wood door pulled at the corner of my eye. I tried to look away, pretend it wasn't there, but the draw was too strong. My eyes flitted up. It looked wider somehow, like it was bleeding itself onto the surrounding rock. Chill air brushed my skin and my arms prickled with gooseflesh. The door was ajar.

  "Mom?” My voice sounded hoarse. I stepped closer to the door.

  Nothing but silence. I reached out and pulled the knob toward me. Dense blackness welled up on the other side. I took a shaky breath.

  I set my lantern on the floor, pushed the door open as wide as it would go, and shoved the futon frame against it, pinning it to the wall so it wouldn't swing shut on me. I picked up the lantern again, and stepped into the cold room. The wick burned steadily, but its light clung to the glass, doing more to blind me than light my way. My feet knocked the collection of tins and bottles to the side. I cast my free hand out in front of me, into the darkness. Several steps in, the space narrowed and the slick walls brushed my arms. Any second, my fingers were sure to meet the back.

  Without warning, the floor dropped away. My foot slipped. I let go of the lantern. It clattered down, rolling over the steep, water-worn stone slope that opened up below me. A narrow, shoulder-wide crawlhole worming its way down into the rock. The lantern smacked into a bend in the tunnel and wobbled to a stop. Its glass casing splintered, but the light didn't go out. Below it, I could make out a steep grade leading deeper into the earth. I glanced behind me at the array of candles and lamps burning at the front of the house. Their light looked far away and dim.

  I turned back to the cave. “Mom?” I called. The rocks swallowed my voice.

  Slow and steady, Ren.

  I eased myself into the hole, feet first. My shoes slipped over the damp stones. I landed hard on my tailbone and started to slide, but my jeans snagged on a rock, and I threw out my arms and legs to stop myself. I lay on my back, breathing hard, my limbs braced against the narrow walls.

  Breathe, breathe.

  I bent my knees and let myself creep downward, slowly this time. The air grew close and stale, the musty, mildewed smell of clogged drains and crawlspaces. It touched off a memory: finding Toad's body among the drooping insulation and spider nests beneath our house two summers before, carrying him out to Trey to be buried. I blinked and kept myself moving, scraping the heels of my palms on the rock as I worked my way down. The lantern's glow grew bright below my feet, and then it was beside me. Hairline fractures crisscrossed its well and casing. I couldn't chance moving it, but at least it hadn't burned out. The tunnel bent left. It still sloped downward, but the passageway widened enough that I could crawl on my hands and knees, rather than slide on my back.

  "Mom?” I whispered again. “Ian?"

  Nothing.

  I rose to a crouch and inched forward. Icy water pooled in crannies and indentations in the rock. The lantern light slipped away behind me and the cave continued on. My arms shook with the deepening cold and the effort of keeping myself from slipping face forward onto the rocks. My fingers burned, then went numb.

  I should go back, I thought. But any moment I could come to the end, find Mom.

  I reached forward, blind in the near dark. My hand passed through empty space. I groped along the contours of the tunnel. Ahead, it began its sharp descent again, but the walls were too close for me to turn around and slide feet-first.

  Just a few more yards, and then I'll go back. If I don't find her, I'll go back.

  I dragged myself by my elbows along the frozen floor. The light behind me wavered and abruptly, complete darkness clamped down. I panicked, picturing the walls collapsing, all the weight of the mountain above bearing on me. I couldn't breathe. There was no air, only rock and wet and cold. I gasped. I tried to remember Corrine and the waterfall, but I couldn't grab hold of it. I flailed forward again into the void and my hand came down in something wet and viscous, the consistency of seaweed. I thought of my foot breaking through the slick cake of mud at the bottom of High Rock Lake, where we sometimes went swimming in the summer.

  I closed my fist around it. It separated into strands as it ran through my fingers, each section coated in slick. What the hell? I tugged on the strands netted in my fist, but they held fast to something. And suddenly I remembered the feel of Corrine's hair after we passed under the waterfall, slicked back and heavy with moisture, how it slipped through my fingers. I jerked my hand back.

  I wanted to scream, but my voice wouldn't work.

  A popping, tapping, the fingernail sound, clicked up from the dark ahead, only a few feet from my face.

  "...hhhhuh stteppsssss..."

  My body bucked in panic, and somehow I found myself squeezing around in the close confines of the tunnel, turning to face the other way. Granite ripped at my palms and the skin along my backbone as I scrabbled for handholds. I pushed myself up, slipping and kicking, toward the surface. A waft of spilled kerosene stung my nose and the tunnel angled up sharply. I dug my nails into the rock, not caring that it split them down the middle, only that I was heading upward. Blindness pressed on my eyes. Something skittered behind me in the dark.

  I reached the sharp drop in the rock and heaved myself up, sending cans and tins clanging down into the abyss below. I heard my left wrist pop and pain shot through my arm like a hot steel rod. This time, I screamed. I rolled the rest of my body over the ledge into the cold room. Dark. Still too dark. Had the candles and lanterns gone out in the room ahead? I pushed myself to my feet and thrust my good hand toward the doorway. It came up against cold, damp wood. The door. It had closed, sealing me in.

  I pounded my fist on the wood. “Trey!” I screamed. “Trey! Open the door, please. Open the door."

  The ticking sounded in the darkness below the ledge.

  I tried to breathe, but it came out as a sob. I backed against the wall. Glass from a broken milk jar crunched under my feet like snow. “Oh, God. Mom? Ian? Trey, please!"

  "...hhysstthskonn...."

  Cold spread from the wall into my flesh, so deep it licked my skin like fire, burned away the pain in my wrist. A heaviness, an icy numbing, reached through my back, past the muscle and bone, and touched my lungs. I tried to cry out, but my chest and throat had gone rigid, the blood frozen in midstream.

  Drowning, I thought. My heart pushed harder. Spots of light cartwheeled on my eyes.

  "...ussshhlaa...."

  And then, a rattling from the other side of the door, the sound of a metal latch disengaging. The door heaved open. Trey stood in the gap. He gripped my Maglite in his hand, and behind him, the array of lanterns and candles blazed bright as ever.

  "Ren? What are you doing?"

  I didn't answer, only shoved past him and slammed the door closed behind me. I leaned against the wall, cradling my head in my hands and trying to breathe in something other than shaky gasps. My lungs ached with thaw.

  "What happened?” Trey asked. “Where's Mom?"

  I tried to clear my throat. “Mom's gone.” My voice cracked.

  Trey wiped sleep from his eyes. “What?"

  "I woke up and she was gone,” I said. “I know she didn't go out the front, so I thought she went down there.” I looked at the door.

  Trey stared at me. He looked from my ruined fingernails to my swollen wrist to the bloody grazes along my for
earms.

  "It's really deep, Trey. And I found...I don't know. Something else."

  "What are we supposed to do?” Trey's voice trembled.

  "I don't know.” My gaze flicked around the house, lighting on the pairs of hiking boots, the lanterns, my useless cell phone, and finally, the wall me and Trey and Ian had begun to build. A stack of unused cinder blocks and several bags of cement mix waited outside our room.

  I stood. “Come on. Get the wheelbarrow."

  "What are we doing?"

  I looked back at the black door and felt the cold begin to crawl up my skin again. “Building a wall,” I said, and walked on unsteady legs to pick up the first cinder block.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Short Story: F&SF MAILBAG by David Gerrold

  Over the last eight months, F&SF has gotten letters from Papabear accusing us of homophilia, an unsigned one implying that we're homophobic, Rebecca O.'s note suggesting we have a bias against women writers from the west coast, and Mark B.'s 12-page missive about why he won't be renewing his subscription. Thank goodness for folks like Jesse W., at78rpm, and David Gerrold for making the mail a joy to open!

  February 12th

  Dear Gordon,

  Re: Your recent announcement that you will be outsourcing the jobs of domestic science fiction writers to cheaper-working authors in parallel dimensions.

  I take pen in hand to object most strenuously.

  Yes, perhaps some of those other writers are more prolific, having access to advanced technology like typewriters or even home computers. Nevertheless, the traditional science-fiction story, handcrafted by a dedicated artisan, will always have a unique charm to it that no machine-produced work can ever duplicate, let alone surpass.

  But even more important, a Resnick or a Robinson or a Willis story written in a parallel dimension will take the bread out of the mouths of our own hard-working Resnick, Robinson, and Willis.

  Quite frankly, it speaks volumes about your character. How will you sleep at night knowing that our children are going hungry?

  Sincerely,

  David Gerrold

  * * * *

  June 23rd

  Dear Gordon

  Re: Your recent request to borrow my timebelt.

  I must regretfully, but most emphatically, say no. Absolutely not. No way. Don't even think about it.

  I have bounced forward several years to see what you would do with access to portable temporal transport, and frankly, I am appalled. You will be bouncing forward yourself, two-three-four years at a time, to purchase copies of your own magazine at the newsstand, even before the stories within have been written—you will then publish those stories with only token payments to the authors.

  How do I know this? My future self is very upset with you for publishing “Unstrung,” “The Mouse King's Motorcade,” “A Day at Crater Park,” “The Lifeguard at Cassy Beach,” “Uncle Morris,” and my personal favorite, “The Patient Dragon."

  Despite your efforts to be fair, I believe you have created a philosophical conundrum as well as an ethical one. If I have not written the stories that you have published, then who did? If no one did, then isn't it immoral for me to accept payment for stories I have not personally created? Yes, you are paying for the use of my name, but is it right for me to put my name on a story that I haven't written yet?

  And yes, I can argue the other side of this too.

  Many of your future authors will be grateful, receiving payments for stories they would have written, but now don't have to write, so they can write other things instead, thus doubling or tripling their actual output; but I worry that raiding the future for stories will have a long-term destructive effect on the field because it will deny authors the necessary process of experiencing their own creative energy at work, living through the authorial process, and evolving through that writing into more mature literary voices.

  While this may be only a subjective opinion, I truly believe that if you were to have access to a timebelt, the result would be a disaster for the science fiction genre. By keeping authors stuck in the immediate rewards of their unwritten work, they will not be moving forward into the experience of actually creating results and the lessons to be learned from such labor.

  Call me old-fashioned, but I love science fiction too much to allow you to stunt the literary growth of its finest practitioners.

  As always,

  David Gerrold

  * * * *

  August 19th

  Dear Gordon,

  It is not my job to tell you how to run your magazine. I'm merely a reader and a sometime contributor; but I feel obligated to comment about your use of a synthesized-sentience intelligence engine to generate stories “in the style of...."

  Yes, the first two or three times it was a fun experiment. I admit it, I enjoyed the recreated Heinlein story “The Steel Feather.” And I'm sure a great many fans of Fritz Leiber were thrilled to see a new Fafhrd and Gray Mouser story, “CSI: Lankhmar.” And if truth be told, the synthesized Sturgeon tale “To Kill a Unicorn” actually brought a tear to my eye.

  So no, I do not object to the occasional reinvention of the voices of the past as a way of paying honor. It's a chance to revisit the heritage that delivered us to the present. But I believe that when you reinvented Harlan Ellison, you went too far. Yes, there's no question that “Screaming Ice Flowers” was a brilliant demonstration of the technology—but Harlan Ellison is still alive! Using a computer to recreate his unique vision puts him in the position of competing against his mechanical self.

  Gordon, where does it end? It is a very short step from here to a nightmare situation where flesh-and-blood writers become totally unnecessary.

  I foresee a day when each new issue of the magazine isn't edited—it's generated. You could simply decide which authors to emulate, how many words to produce, and what themes will be explored. The magazine could be synthesized faster than you can print it out and read it.

  From a publisher's point of view, the possibility is tempting, but it strikes at the very heart of the editor/author relationship upon which this entire field is built. I strongly urge you to reconsider your decision to publish any more synthetic stories.

  Your pal,

  David Gerrold

  * * * *

  October 3rd

  Dear Gordon,

  This morning, a close friend sent me a very distressing email. If what he says is true, I am appalled and disturbed.

  I hope it is only a vicious rumor and I hope you will take the time to clarify the circumstances for me, but according to my friend, you are now hiring illegal aliens from 3-Grxl-90, Horta VI, and Brunnehilde 4.2 to write stories for the magazine.

  In fact, my correspondent was quite clear that these illegal aliens aren't even writing fiction, merely their own personal life histories. So how can you call this work either Fantasy or Science Fiction? It puts the hard-won credibility of the magazine at risk.

  Please tell me that this is not the case. Or if it is, please tell me that you will cease and desist immediately.

  Writing from the heart,

  David Gerrold

  * * * *

  November 35th

  Dear Gordon,

  I suppose I should congratulate you on your decision to clone the most popular writers in the field, so as to increase the output available to you and other editors. It's a bold and audacious step.

  But frankly, it smacks of assembly-line production. Duplication removes the uniqueness of the artisan. It destroys the concept of authenticity and authorship. Did Larry NivenPrime write “Ringworld Reloaded” or did it come from the duplicated soul of Larry Niven1? How is the reader to know if a story came from the actual author?

  Even worse, what is the reader to make of conflicting stories from dueling clones? I refer you to the unfortunate incident with McCaffrey5 and McCaffrey7 and the readers’ confusion about the authenticity of “Blood Feuds of Pern.” Which story is canon? Which is apocryphal? That part
icular argument hasn't ended yet and probably will never be resolved, now that McCaffrey5 is charged with beating McCaffrey7 to death with a Best Novelette Hugo.

  Consider this, Gordon. If you continue with your cloning program, pretty soon you will be publishing so many stories from the cloned masters of the field that there will be no room left in the magazine for new and upcoming writers. You could put the entire science fiction genre into a literary Klein bottle from which there will be no escape.

  With much fear and trepidation,

  David Gerrold3

  * * * *

  "Who are we kidding? You're not a unicorn and I'm not a virgin."

  * * * *

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Novelet: THE LITEROMANCER by Ken Liu

  If you go online to www.kenliu.name, you'll learn that Mr. Liu is, “A writer, a lawyer, a programmer, an American, a Chinese, a Christian, a Daoist, a Confucian, a populist, a libertarian (with a small ‘l'), and above all a liminal provincial in America, the New Rome.” His short fiction has appeared in Strange Horizons, Science Fiction World, Polyphony, and The Dragon and the Stars, a recent anthology of fiction by writers of Chinese ancestry. His F&SF debut takes us back to China fifty years ago with a hard-hitting tale. Parents are advised to vet this one before sharing it with young readers.

  September 18, 1961.

  Lilly Dyer anticipated and also dreaded three o'clock in the afternoon, more than any other moment of the day. That was when she returned home from school and checked the kitchen table for new mail.

  The table was empty. But Lilly thought she'd ask anyway. “Anything for me?"

  "No,” Mom said from the living room. She was giving English lessons to Mr. Cotton's new Chinese bride. Mr. Cotton worked with Dad and was important.

  A full month had passed since Lilly's family moved to Taiwan, and no one from Clearwell, Texas, where she had been the third-most popular girl in the fourth grade, had written to her, even though all the girls had promised that they would.

  Lilly did not like her new school at the American military base. All of the other children's fathers were in the armed forces, but Dad worked in the city, in a building with the picture of Sun Yat-sen in the lobby and the red, white, and blue flag of the Republic of China flying on top. That meant Lilly was strange, and the other kids did not want to sit with her at lunch. Earlier that morning, Mrs. Wyle finally lectured them about their treatment of Lilly. That made things worse.