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Aliens Part 1

A Lecture from The Institute for Scientific Fictions.

“Back in the 50s, 60s, and 70s Science Fiction authors and screenwriters (and here I am generalising for brevity) were worried about bases and leaders. Where did this concern come from? The obvious answer is the Cold War, and the use of Aliens as an analogue for the Soviets; however, I feel it was a result of an over-active paranoia, linked to a subconscious petrified of the unknown, hidden behind the gulf of space (aka the Iron Curtain). Aliens capable of travelling between stars in a reasonable time frame would presumably have their own leader, and there is a maximum number of leaders any invasion needs per group of beings—even if they were socialist. Nor are bases likely to be required. These Aliens can travel through space, between stars. I suspect that our bases would cause very little trouble to these aliens: between teleporters, interplanetary nuclear weapons and lasers of a cataclysmic scale, I foresee very little use to these technically advanced invaders for our bases. Furthermore, their Materials Science would be far in advance of our own, allowing for, at least pseudo-theoretically, the mass production of incredibly complex and programmable pocket-sized folding bases, usable in any condition and fully furnished and supplied for years of fully supported warfare.

King Ethelred IV Part 13

The king grudgingly sent Albert to fetch the artefact’s carriage. It had been placed at the end of the train because it looked jarring next to the beautifully crafted court carriages.

When it arrived, the king told those in the keep, through horn signals, to stand in the designated space. All sharp angles and steel, the artefact had a door on one side and a button that glowed red when a switch was thrown. Depressing the button caused a terrible racket to emit from the room inside it, before a bang was heard and the item in question would be transported to a location entered according to a tome that the merchants had supplied. Out of the door stumbled the first group of twenty-five from the keep. “We shall have to renegotiate payment after this,” the chancellor said, “there is naught of the mountain left to mine to pay for this ‘shipping’ as they call it.”

“We shall do so when next we see them,” replied the king.

“I suspect that it shan’t be long.”

As the sun rose the next morning, the chancellor was woken by exclamations of shock outside his carriage. As he was dressing, there came a knock on his door. “Yes?” he asked.

“Lord, the merchants are here to speak with you, and there is a large... cloud is not the right word, perhaps fortress is better. It appears to be made of iron. In any case it fills the sky and dwarfs the keep!”

“I shall be out in but a moment, bring them refreshments, and thank you for waking me.” He changed his mind on what he would wear, and put on his nicest robes—those reserved for dignitaries.

A quarter of an hour later, the chancellor exited his carriage and was struck by the chaos that he saw around him. Many lords, ladies, and servants stood about, their tasks abandoned, staring at the sky. Or rather where the sky ought to have been; instead there was a huge and pendulous steel coloured blob that filled the all the space above the valley. From mountain tops to mountain tops on both sides, and it stretched down the valley to where it turned. It appeared to the chancellor like a metal facsimile of his own barrel-chested and overweight frame: bulbous and prickled with hair. Though he could not guess at what the hairs on this beast could be. Emblazoned on its side, in the language of the merchants he had been learning in secret, was written: Hypotenuse Shipping: Moving Monads Through Space, Not Time.

Meanwhile, in the eternal shade at the bottom of the pit, King Ethelred IV—last of his line—died alone and unnoticed in the commotion, a knife in his heart. A name was etched in the pommel: Otto.

King Ethelred IV Part 12

“Are you well rested, Lord?” the chancellor asked.

“Indeed, I am not, sir, for I have been in communiqué with the fortress through the night, and we still do not have a solution.”

“Perhaps I might make a suggestion?”

Ethelred looked sceptical, “perhaps you might.”

“Your highness could ask all the court if they’ve any ideas.”

“That is... an excellent idea,” he said as his shoulders slumped, and he gazed up at the fortress as it flew overhead.

The chancellor smiled, “shall I send messengers to call the lords forth for a parliament? Is here a reasonable place, on the edge of the pit?”

“Yes, send messengers, and here will indeed be fine,” Ethelred said in a quiet voice.

A few hours later, the forty or so lords and ladies of the court were gathered for the parliament; there were only a few on the king’s right hand side. “I have called you here to attempt to our current dilemma: how shall we transport those in the fortress to the ground. Have you, my lords and ladies, any ideas?”

“I suppose it is too far for a ladder or a rope?” Asked Lord Harold, who was responsible for the Summer Keep.

“Indeed,” King Ethelred IV responded. At that one word answer the assembly began to talk all at once amongst themselves and within their factions.

“Lord King,” one voice rose above the others. One the king thought he should recognize, but couldn’t place until Albert’s lord, drunk as usual, forced his way to the front of the assembly and said, “Lord King, perhaps we should use the artefact? It would solve this issue in no time whatsoever.” There followed a cacophony of voices as all the other nobles as every one of them hurried to be the first to approve and or disapprove of the idea; everyone except the chancellor who smiled and the king who did not.

King Ethelred IV Part 11

Isabella nearly screamed, her heart was in her throat, beating loud in her ears and she was frozen in place. The hand was not hard, nor unkind; it just prevented her from moving any closer. She tentatively glanced over her shoulder, and saw Albert. He put a finger to his lips, and drew her back from the carriages, before walking a ways with her back towards the servant’s train where he said, “It’s best not to be caught knowing too much about court politics, and even better to know nothing of my son’s and lord’s affiliations.”

“But,” she faltered, still reeling from the shock, “should we not tell the king?”

“Neither you nor I have the influence to meet with the king in private, and certainly, not enough to reveal this plot openly.”

“But, shall we do nothing?”

“We are caught, lass, between an obligation to the king and a need to stay alive: which imperative do we follow, particularly since there may be something more concrete that may be done in the future with less risk or to stave off greater danger to the king.”

Isabella thought for a moment, “I shall endeavour to learn more in that case, to be ready.”

“Isabella, I truly think this unwise.”

King Ethelred IV Part 10

As she passed the front of the servant’s train and began to make her way among the gaudy carriages glittering with gold and silver filigree and constructed from exotic hardwoods and with heraldic crests emblazoned on their sides strung out along the road. And as she walked she saw lords and ladies busying themselves by ordering servants about in the hope that they might will more space on the narrow road that they might set up their tents for the night that was fast approaching.

Isabella saw Otto from between two carriages, one of them belonged to his father Albert’s lord and the other a servant’s carriage for the court. Just as she was about to call out she stopped herself. Something about the way Otto was talking and listening at the same time. Almost furtively, if one could talk that way, a sort of skulking, skittish energy. She peered closer to who he was talking to and caught a glimps of Albert’s lord just as his booming voice exclaimed, “ he has to use the device! We will lose everything if he doesn’t.”

“Of course, but if I tell him directly, he will suspect that there is something afoot.” That from a voice she did not recognise.

Otto said, “if he doesn’t already.” Just as a she was about to move to see who had spoken earlier, a hand gripped her shoulder.

King Ethelred IV Part 9

Isabella, the serving girl, was walking up the road from the carriage she and the rest of the palace waiting staff had been riding in, looking for Otto, Albert’s son. They had been exchanging brief glances when-so-ever they saw each other, and while she understood the implications of being caught—unemployment being the least of her worries—she was hoping for more. What that was or what it looked like she had no idea, though the older and more adventurous serving girls had told her that she ought to “Carpe virum!” whatever that meant. Further that any chance at enjoyable time with young men was time well spent. All she was certain of was that Otto gave her weak knees and lightness in the pit of her stomach, thrilling but entirely confusing.

The valley down to the left was deep enough that the river that raged over the stones at the bottom never saw direct sun light. Isabella saw that there was a great deal of snow below while higher up the valley walls spring flowers and the rest of the early greenery was already dying beneath the later blooming plants of early summer. The summits on the other side of the valley were stark white, steep and glistening with snow. The late afternoon light just beginning to shift into a pleasant rose that lit the waterfalls, snow, and azure tarns a striking gold as the sun continued to set.

King Ethelred IV Part 8

The castle floated above them, wisps of white cloud streamed from the battlements, and standards wiped in the wind. Amidst the bright silver flashes of iron, there was the sudden gold of a horn’s bell catching the light as it was lifted in to view. Three long and mournful blasts followed.

Ethelred laughed, “It seems, sirs, that we are to rally to them. Hmmm, their position while very defensible would leave us trapped. Herald, sound the retreat!”

“Lord,” the Chancellor said, “while I appreciate the humour, what are we to do with them?”

“That is our largest problem Chancellor? Not that the keep is flying? Not that a whole mountain went missing, and not even that the edge of this pit is both inexplicably hard and sharp?”

“My king, these are indeed mysteries, but those soldiers will die without rescue.”

“True enough, Chancellor. Have you any ideas?”

“Does the keep move, Albert?”

“Nay lord, it only appears to from the sun’s wheel, and the movement of the clouds. It is stationary and over the center of the pit. It is perhaps four hundred man-heights above us, and a further three hundred above the floor of the pit.”

“Chancellor, can the architects build a structure seven hundred my heights tall?”

“I should think not, lord. Though I shall inquire, there must be some solution.”

“Indeed. Herald, find out how long they can survive.”

King Ethelred IV Part 7

“I shall send for Albert, as I believe his eyes to be the strongest of the menservants’.”

“Chancellor, is this the self-same Albert whose carriage was placed before mine, and whose lord is a drunk and a charlatan?”

“Indeed lord”

“And who was instructed to be there by a most trusted member of the court?”

“I... believe he may have misunderstood his instructions. At least, according to the version I heard.”

“Indeed, Chancellor.” A runner was sent to find Albert and a short while later he joined them by foot. As he approached, Ethelred was struck by the particular tilt to his head as he gazed with consternation at the sky. “What, good sir, are you looking at? The pit is at your feet, have a care or you’ll find yourself at it’s bottom.”

“hmmm? Oh yes, I was in fact looking at that very odd cloud.”

The sun then went behind it, and the Chancellor cried out, “Lord King, the Keep of Mount Ethelred is as a cloud!”

“What, are you mad? You claim that the keep is flying, all I see is a most peculiar cloud.”

“Nay, my lords,” Albert said, “that is indeed the keep.”

“What other powers do these merchants posses, what crimes will they perpetrate next?” The king was pacing back and forth fuming, muttering and sputtering. Dangerously close to the edge, he seemed to have forgotten his earlier concern with it entirely. “Are there any men upon the walls, that either of you can see?”

“Nay, Lord.”

“And you, Albert?”

“Aye, there are perhaps a hundred. They are waving a flag and ahh! They have a horn.”

King Ethelred IV Part 6

The journey to the Summer Keep would take three or four weeks depending on weather. There were over four hundred lords, ladies, servants and other support staff, and nearly a thousand soldiers both on foot and on horse. The supply train was over a kilometre long.

Ethelred rode with the vanguard for most of the journey, though he rode in his carriage once the road began to climb into the mountains. On the seventeenth day, Lothar, a scout from the vanguard, returned to share the news that the vanguard had reached the pit of Mt Ethelred II. Ethelred called a halt and rode to the head of the column. The road was narrow, and horse handlers were attempting to keep their charges calm. It was not a long ride, and when he arrived, Ethelred dismounted, approached the edge and knelt to inspect it.

The edge of the pit was cut shear, and while the ground around it was loose dirt, the sides themselves were hard and vertical, descending hundreds of yards into darkness. Ethelred placed his hands on the edge and leant out and tried to see the bottom. He moved to grab a stone to toss into the pit, and only then noticed the blood welling from deep cuts in both his palms. “This edge is incredibly sharp, sharper even than a barber’s knife! Chancellor, take note that the merchants have broken the agreement, as they have mined deeper than the foot of the mountain. Send for a physician, I will have need of him for these cuts. Gods, they are deep.”

King Ethelred IV Part 5

When at last only the King’s carriage was left to join the procession, Albert was having a lunch of bread, cheese and watered wine—which were the remains of his lord’s lunch—he watched with considerable consternation as the King’s carriage drew up behind his own, and the King disembarked. There was no possible way that his lord ought to be in front of the King. On most journeys, sucking the King’s dust and breathing the heady fumes of the King’s horses’ manure would have been too great an honour. This was not going to go well.

“Good Sir.” King Ethelred said in a voice filled with anger. Albert jumped to attention, eager to avoid displeasing the King anymore than he already had. “I see from the heraldry upon your carriage that you are in the employ of Lord Merovine. I remain impressed that he can afford so talented a manservant as yourself and this resplendent carriage, while gambling and carousing his fortune away.”

“A fact that baffles me as well, your highness,” Albert bowed deeply.

“Indeed. Are you aware that your dissolute lord’s carriage is in the wrong location, and should be the last before the supply train?”

“I had thought so as well; however, the Chancellor insisted.”

Ethelred’s face turned a bright shade of red. “Do you believe in an afterlife, Albert?” He screamed, “if you are among those who do, you may wish to reconsider your position, because you clearly feel that your mistakes in life shall be of no consequence!”

“My King, I assure you that I was but following instructions. I shall move my carriage to the side and rejoin at the appropriate position.”

“Excellent. Do reconsider your foolish ideology that excuses proper behaviour. I cannot abide the uneducated philosophies of the underclass. Now, be gone.”

King Ethelred IV Part 4

It wasn’t until the next day that the court and its entourage were ready to depart. Albert and his lord were the first in position by virtue of his lord sleeping in the carriage with his latest concubine. Albert had hoped that she would have left by the time it came to leave, but it turned out that she was even more indolent than his lord and remained in the bed of the carriage (especially outfitted at the lord’s insistence) even longer than he could abide. Albert’s lord emerged, and sat on the buck board next to his man servant and said, “I am defeated, there is no way that woman will leave my bed, and now I fear that she may be fixing to wed me.”

Albert thought this would probably be for the best, but he dared not say as much. Instead, he said, “mayhap we can leave her at the Summer Keep, or leave her in the arms of another, more suited to marriage than yourself.”

“Excellent plan, Albert! I feel refreshed.” He cocked his head to the side and listened to the sounds of stirring within the carriage, and continued, “If you’ll excuse me, I believe she will be ready for another round.” Albert’s smile of encouragement quickly faded to disgust as the noises grew louder and the carriage began to rock rhythmically.

Post Fail 1.5

So,

My wife`s laptop died just days after my new computer arrived... as such I haven`t seen it in days. (She`s writing a rather large essay)

And, tomorrow I`m leaving for an 8 day hiking trip to the interior. On the 27th I should have 3 posts for you all.

In happier news, I`ll be at V-Con in Vancouver Oct. 1-3. I won`t have a table or panels, but if you recognize me, say hi.

Duncan

King Ethelred IV Part 3

As Albert returned to his lord’s chambers, he finally noticed what had disturbed him about the frenetic atmosphere. Its goal was to produce no effect, never had he seen so much work done to achieve nothing. It was clear that someone had caused a great stir; however, Albert, had no idea who, why, or indeed where all the excitement was for or to. His lord, in his exceedingly finite wisdom had decided that carousing in the city casinos and brothels was far more constructive than visiting with the court who ignored him in any case. Albert did not see eye to eye on this particular point with his lord, particularly today when everyone was upset about that thing that had occurred, that shall be studiously ignored, until such a time as it goes away. Ethelred IV was a stubborn king, and was unlikely to change his mind, whatever that was at the moment. At the very least, his responsibilities would be completed, and the other lords could attempt to regain the favour that they would lose.

As he was musing to himself he narrowly avoided running down Elsa in the underground servant’s hallway that travelled the length of the palace. The corridor was nearly abandoned. “Lass, you’ve nearly killed me with fright. As this passage is plenty big enough to fit us both with a great deal of room to spare, why are you under my feet?”

“Pardon me, sir. I wished to inquire if your son would be travelling with you to the Summer Keep.”

“He is.” He said over his shoulder, as he continued towards the far end of the passage.

King Ethelred IV Part 2

The next morning dozens of pages, squires, and aides were attempting to organise the departure of the king and his retinue. Among them was Albert, manservant to a minor noble whom, when not forgotten, was dutifully ignored. Albert, in observing his many cohorts bustle about, was struck by how much energy was being spent. There was no precedent for such frenzied activity in the marble halls, at least not for the last twenty years that he had worked in the building. He was speaking to the Chancellor’s aide, who was often the most useful in matters of royal logistics. “Can m’Lord, receive instructions as to where in the procession his carriage will be located?”

“No, indeed he cannot have that information.”

“And why, sir, may he not?”

“Aahhh, well there is no known ordination of carriages at this juncture, and so I cannot inform you as to where to put said carriage.”

“Indeed... might you hazard a suggestion?”

“I suppose that I shall at that. Your lord may follow Lady Hillary, which I believe will put you forth in the line.”

“Are you certain sir? That accords my lord far too high a standing.”

“Yes, I am certain. That is precisely where you should position your carriage. Now be gone, the Chancellor will be upset that I have achieved anything whatever towards this morning’s departure.”

Post Fail

Apologies,

But my computer is being problematic, I hope to have a double update next week, or when ever my replacement computer arrives. (Its ordered so it should be soon).

King Ethelred IV

He’d made a mistake. King Ethelred IV admitted that now. His court had told him as much the week before when the discovery had been made. The whole mountain had gone missing. How was that even possible? The merchants with whom he had traded mining rights hadn’t seemed so numerous as to need to take the whole thing. But then the deal had been pretty good: magic transfer of supplies from the plains below to the mountain fastness, in exchange for one unremarkable peak within the boundaries of the kingdom. Now, of course, Mt Ethelred II was very remarkable, in that it was a rather large hole. He’d lost a great deal of honor in the past few days, enough that he might even have to concede to a parliament. He decided to remind them of how awful restocking the keep had been. Yes, tomorrow, the court would lead a train of wagons up to the keep. And no one would be allowed to use the magic artifact.

He sighed, and said to the hall full of nobles, “I agree, the artifact was certainly not a good exchange. As such, we will not be using it for this summer’s journey to the Summer Keep. Therefore, we must depart at the earliest date, in order to arrive on time for the summer festival.”

From the various knights, lords and ladies, and courtiers there was stunned silence. At last, after several tense moments of silence, the Chancellor, Sir Lenard asked, “And when is it that we shall depart?”

“Tomorrow, shortly after breaking our fast, and we shall all travel together.”

“Surely, m’Lord, the ladies should precede the royal party via magic to prepare the keep for your arrival?” the Chancellor continued.

“Nay, Chancellor, for if we are to no longer use this contrivance then why pray tell should we continue to use it?”

A Ship Cursed Part 7

‘Bon,’ he glanced around once more, ‘I must be careful, because what happened to the rest of the crew, c’est horrible.’ He took a draught from his fresh bottle. Then he continued, ‘after the first week of fishing, there was a week or two where we did not catch anything. At the end of this time, the cabin boy, he died.’ He leaned close to me, and whispered, ‘the captain, he was going to bury him at sea, but someone, I think it was the cook, he said “oi, lets eat the bugger.” He was from England. At this, the captain, with some others, argued with the cook and his group.’ He downed half the bottle, and barely able to stay in his chair he pressed on, ‘there was a terrible fight, many on both sides died, but the cook did not. When it was all done, there were more survivors on the cook’s side. The captain was dead. So, the cook won. When we had eaten our fill of the dead, we elected the cook as captain. He selected who would be the next meal. But, I worked in the galley, so I was never picked. At the end, I kill the cook, and the next day, the wind, it started again. But I remember no more.’ Pierre stumbled off, muttering something about le pissoir. I waited patiently, there was only one thing left to ask.

When Pierre returned, I asked, ‘what happened to Sam, the young deckhand?’

‘Ah oui, La Puse, I liked him very much.’ Pierre licked his lips.

A Ship Cursed Part 6

I knew he was reticent for a reason. Tortuga has no law, so what had happened must be something which would cause him to be cast out; a mean feat among those who lived, debauched, and killed on this island. ‘La Joya Del Sol, it was a beautiful ship wasn’t it?’

He gave me a sideways glance and said, ‘Oui. Beautiful, seductive, vite… euuh, she was very fast, but all this hid a coeur noir.’

I leaned closer, ‘a… black heart?’ I guessed, ‘How so?’

‘This ship, she was cursed. We were two weeks into our journey from Tortuga, to raid Barranquilla, when the wind ran out. The food was enough for the trip there. Then after the raid, we would take what food we needed. But we never made it.’ As he said this, he waved the barkeep over and demanded another bottle of wine. ‘After two weeks, the food, it ran out.’

‘But your ship, you said it was becalmed for four months.’

At this, he glanced around nervously, ‘oui, for a week we fished. We caught a few, and ate them, but it was not enough. We were always still hungry.’ He glanced over his shoulders, clearly uncomfortable. Finally I was going to find out what had happened on the ship, and why he had refused to talk to anyone.

‘Personne. You can tell no one. Not a soul.’ he said. He looked at me intently. He had death in his eyes—his own—he was living only because his body demanded him to.

I nodded.

A Ship Cursed Part 5

‘My name is Pierre,’ he said with the slur of a man who’d been down on his luck and at the bottom of bottles for weeks. He was in his mid-twenties, but it was difficult to tell—the stubble, and dark bags under his eyes, and the skin of a seaman made him look old. This man had aged fast in the last few months, faster than a eggs left in the sun.

‘I have a… story, but you’ll not hear it.’ He struggled with the words, and his breath reeking of stale red wine, his teeth dark with it. Slowly, he grinned. His grin was that of one troubled by his past deeds and conflicts.

‘Good,’ I said, ‘I’d really rather not hear a frog speak.’ I motioned to the barkeep for another beer.

He mumbled something, then, ‘I am not a grenouille; because, if I was, I would not have stayed on that maudite ship for four months of hell. I would have swum home, jusqu’à la France.’

I leaned forward, so as to hear him speak. My French is very limited, but I have learned to understand a bit, if I catch it right. I took a long pull on my beer before I said, ‘go on,’ trying to sound encouraging.

‘There was no wind: it stopped, for a whole four months,’

‘Four months?’ I could hardly believe it, it took a conscious effort to stop gawking, ‘but how did you survive?’

‘Non, I will not tell you,’ he said. His hands ran over the rough grain of the bar, until they found his bottle. It was half empty as it went to his lips. When he put it down, there was none left.

A Ship Cursed Part 4

During this time, some of the residents and I searched the vessel, and while there was evidence that there had been fighting on deck, below was very clean. The galley, other than the dishes, was spotless. There were no crumbs anywhere. This didn’t surprise us, because the young man had obviously not eaten in a long time. But what was odd was the total lack of spices: no salt, no pepper, none of the local herbs. All of these had been packed-so the supplier of the ship claimed. So where had they gone? Later, we found the empty bags that had held the salt, pepper, and the other spices. There had not been enough food on board for the crew to have used all the spices. This was most curious.

Since that day, no one has entered the ship, what weapons there were-the cannon, swords, and rifles-had been left to rot. The ship truly was cursed, indeed, everyone who boarded the ship with me that day has gone to sea, never to return.

Pierre claimed he was from Toulon, but his English was bad and my French only extends to telling thieves where to put it. He could have been saying anything. He didn’t much talk about the La Joya Del Sol, and if I’d ask him he’d retort with, “Va te faire foutre!” I haven’t a clue what it meant, but by his tone, and the accompanying gestures, there was little left to the imagination. Apparently, he was put into service by the Spanish as a dishwasher in the galley.

One day, I came home and he was gone. He had stolen several gold coins. I didn’t see him again for several months. I had not yet heard the rest of his story- and that of my son- so I looked for him everyday. This is what he told me, when I finally found him.

A Ship Cursed Part 3

‘Maman.’ He was alive! I ran to his side.

He tried to raise his head, ‘shhh. Quiet, don’t move young man.’

‘Maman.’ Just then I heard footsteps on the stairs behind me. It was the doctor.

‘Henry, what seems to be the matter with… oh, I see,’ the doctor knelt next to me. He looked through his bag, and found a tube of honey which he mixed with water. Slowly, he let the parched man drink. ‘Not too much now.’

After tending to his other wounds the doctor asked if the man could stay with me. I wanted to learn what had happened, to the ship, and to my son, also, I had liked the ship’s elected captain, and wanted to know what had happened to him, besides which I didn’t go out much and had little to do, so I agreed. It would be good to talk to another sailor, once he was able. The doctor gave me instructions on how to care for him, and strict directives not to give him too much food or water: for fear of it bursting his stomach.

The man slept for the next few days, then as the weeks went by he slowly gained strength. ‘How are you doing,’ I said, as I sat down on the chair by the bed.

‘Va te faire foutre,’ he said.

‘Do you speak English?’

‘Euh, oui, a little bit,’ he had a heavy accent.

‘What’s your name?’

‘Pierre.’ He was still weak, and I could see he was getting tired already.

A Ship Cursed Part 2

As it bore down on me I thought of what I owed, and what I was owed. But at the last instant the ship swerved; narrowly avoiding the docks, it careened into the beach, and the hull shattered. Wood splinters flew every which way.

The man was thrown to the deck. I sent my apprentice to fetch the doctor. I ran to the side of the ship, climbed up to and swung over the railing. I landed on the slopped deck and stumbled—I’m not as young as I once was. I saw that there had been fighting on the deck, and hoped the man at the helm was my son, that he had not died in the battle. The hull and masts were, or had been before the beaching, in good condition. There was no sign of any treasure either. This ship had seen a second mutiny. But where was everyone? Where was my son? Even if the man at the helm was the only survivor, he was in no condition to have cleaned the deck of bodies.

‘Sam?’ I called, hoping he was below, or was the man on the bridge, and would answer me. The only sound that answered was the creak of the masts in the wind, and the wiping of sails that billowed, cocked half way to the wind.

My knee was sore; it had been a long time since I had done much of anything and the climb to the deck had been long. It shook as I climbed the stairs to the bridge: remembering the old injury, from my days raiding the Spanish Main. I had settled in Tortuga with the first English colonists, about 15 years ago, on a handsome sum as compensation for my injury. The Spanish had come and gone, fighting all the way. As I topped the stairs, I saw him. He was thinner than I had thought was possible. Most devastatingly though-he was not my son.

A Ship Cursed Part 1

La Joya Del Sol was a three mast monstrosity, the pride of the Queen of Spain for over fifty years, then the unthinkable happened: the crew mutinied. As the harbour master for the only pirate haven in the Caribbean, the sight of a Spanish Galleon sent shivers down my spine, I was sure I would die. It was not until they weighed anchor that I began to suspect that something was different about this ship. Its colours were not those of the Spainish Kingdom, they were bones of white on a black field. But, what I felt was that it was not that the crew was lucky to be free of the yoke of military service, but that the ship was cursed. My son, Sam, was fifteen and had always dreamt of following me to the sea. He joined on with the new pirates as a deckhand. I had taught him all I knew of ship craft, and the crew was glad to have him. They set sail shortly afterwards, my son and 200 others aboard, hunting for treasure.

* * *

When next the La Joya Del Sol sailed into the harbour of Tortuga in front of a dark storm with every sheet of canvas stretched taught before the wind. It was months late, there was no one on deck, except for the lone man at the helm. The ship was moving too fast for the harbour, at least 10 knots; it was going to strike the docks. There was no way of stopping it.

The ship bore down on the docks, which it would smash through and in to my office. Needless to say I was frozen with fear. This was the second time it had hove to in Tortuga’s harbour, and it was, again, looking as though it would end in my death.

Dusk, Part 2

As she continued walking she heard soft footsteps behind her, and as she turned she saw Gregory, a young boy who lived down the street. He was hunched in on himself and looked furtively about as he hurried along. Still looking at his feet while walking, he put his finger to his lips, and as she was about to speak, whispered, "shhh, they remember."

"What," she whispered back, "do they remember."

"Blood." Gregory said, glancing from side to side, nervous.

Francis made to speak, but could not. So he continued, "ancient blood spilled in this valley. Over a thousand years past, and they remember, and come remembering the feast past."

In the silence that followed, even the sound of flapping wings ceased. "Whose blood?"

He raised his head, and with a deep seeded fear in his eyes said, "the blood of gods, sacrificed to themselves by their worshipers. A right of incredible power, giving all who eat of the flesh, immortality."

A single crow cawed, Gregory flinched and mewed as though struck.

Quietly, Francis said, “There are no gods, Gregory. I’m sure they are on their way to their nests.”

“No. They remember because…” The rest of his words were drowned by the screams of tens of thousands of crows, and the sounds of their furiously flapping wings. Gregory turned and ran as murder upon murder of crows descended on him. His screams reached Francis over the near deafening noise, “Because they were there!” As each bird landed, it struck with its beak, and took flight again, dripping gore, red on the pavement.

Dusk, Part 1

A quarter of an hour before dusk, Francis was startled by a crow swooping low over her head as she walked home. It flew to a tree a few hundred meters on, and joined its brethren there. Though there were no leaves--spring not yet having come--the sky behind was totally obscured by wings and feathers, as over a thousand birds competed for space on the branches. Something that Francis could not put her finger on was deeply disturbing about the scene. As she stood and watched the crows jostling for position on the tree, she glance upward at motion in the corner of her field of vision.

The sky was full of crows. There was a word for a group of crows, she struggled to recall what it was. She walked past the first tree and saw that most were filled near to bursting with crows. All of them were so full that the crows were shoulder to shoulder. A solid mass of black, a silent mass of black: not a single bird cawed, crooned, or clicked. Francis shivered. There must have been a hundred thousand crows, and not one made a noise.

"Murder" she muttered, "a murder of crows. But how many crows is that? Surely a single mob of crows flying together would be one murder?" As Francis looked around, she could distinguish tens of groups of crows, each technically their own murder by her rubric. “Tens of murders, then. Unless the collective noun for crows is recursive. Which gives ‘a murder of murders.’” Francis felt a chill down her spine, despite feeling warm in her coat.

George: The Columbia, Part 2

Cold fresh air blew up out of the canyon, and through the cracks between the columns. The breeze refreshed his mind; it was a relief after the hot and arid plain above. He found himself more alert, and he could concentrate on the path at hand; which had become progressively more challenging the further down he went. The columns were six sided, caused by shapes that the crystals had formed as they cooled. The heat from the molten rock had dissipated slowly, evidenced by the large size of the pillars. The path wove around the pillars, a result of their shape, and George followed them back and forth and down deeper into the cool air. Ever downward into the darkness, where the sun only reached through the occasional space between the pillars. At these, George would look out on the lush green growing on the banks of the river, a change from the dusty plain and occasional dunes that he had been crossing, up and down, since shortly after he had left the coast.

The trench wound down and down, with what appeared to be stairs, crafted eons ago by a completely incompetent mason--chock-stones in reality, boulders and other debris fallen from the narrow gap at the top; which was receding further and further above, providing what little light there was. The spaces between the stones were filled with gravel, dust, sand, and dead plant parts (trees and brush) blown from the west. In places the stairs would stop and he would walk along a path full of wind, dust and stone.

Once, about halfway to the valley floor, the trail leveled and exited on to a shelf that ran along the cliff. It was several hundred meters wide, and while still too dry to be home to a large number of plants, the sage, aloe, and other succulents provided something for George to chew on while he searched for another path to lead him to the bottom of the gorge. There was a vaguely trail-like parting in the plant life which he followed, and it eventually led him to a path that would take him down to the Columbia.

The path he found was in an old washout, a huge fan of rubble, composed of sections of the columns above and to both sides of him. Here the trail was hard to follow; he guessed at where to step by looking for where there was wear on the rocks. Occasionally, there would be marks scratched into the rocks pointing to the safer path, or cairns leading the way. Back in the sun, George found it very hot, but the trail became easier to follow the lower he went, until a few hours after leaving the plain, he arrived at the bottom and could relax, drink fresh water, and rest for the night.

George: The Columbia, Part 1

George sat for a moment, pausing in his search for a way down to the Columbia. He watched the wind turbines spin. There were several hundreds of them, and someone had to maintain them, so that Seattle could have light and heat. He wondered who still lived out here, on the blasted plains. The blades swung, glinting in the sun, still bright white over fifty years after the last had been built. He found their presence reassuring, guardians over his, and everyone else’s future.

He began to walk along the edge of the gorge again, half his attention on where he was walking, and half on the turbines. It was odd, George felt, that he should think of them as guardians. They had been too little too late. The wasteland that was Washington, a vast desert, dotted with abandoned towns and farms, was only a small corner of the totality of the world, but there was no part of it that had not been affected by the environmental collapse. The guardians had failed, economies had followed the collapse, and humanity had retreated to live in sustainable enclaves.

A fissure opened before him, taking his attention from the turbines spinning across the gorge. It was formed from pillars of dark stone that had detached from the plain he had been walking on. Far below were the remains of thousands more of the same formations. There was a trail, narrow and sandy that ran into it; George hoped that it would take him to the valley bottom, where the river ran, and he could fill his water bottles and wash his feet.

His boots had been chaffing for the past month during which he had walked from Old Seattle. His boots were done, but he was not. His journey had taken him from that city on the West Coast and would end on the desolate east coast, ravaged by the effects of the Expulsion, amidst the ghostly towers of Manhattan. That was one of the greater disasters of the 20’s, a huge Carbon Capture project had ruptured, releasing hundreds of thousands of metric tones of carbon monoxide and dioxide. It caused the death of millions on the eastern sea board before dissipating into the ocean and atmosphere, triggering the collapse of dozens of species.

His would be the first traverse of North American by foot since the Melt. George would be the first to see the Columbia Icefields—though it felt wrong to call it such anymore—since the last snow had disappeared.

He stumbled, and ran a few steps, hopped over a stone, and came up short of a large hole. "Remember George, pay attention," he told himself, "it would be pretty poor form to die here, before even leaving Washington." George needed to cross the Columbia before he could follow it to its source. With the glaciers gone, all the rivers relied on rain to feed them; they were all seasonal, and George needed to be finished this leg of his journey, all the way to the Rockies before summer set in and he was left without a source of water for four months.

Alpine Start

I wake to the low beeping, barely heard above the wind. The snow strikes the wall of the tent, in the dark it sounds like the night is trying to put me back to sleep. I turn on the lamp, and off the alarm. The tent wall is mere inches from my face, the weight of new snow pressing down, until I shake the walls and the poles spring the tent into shape. My naked arm feels the bite of cold, and I hear the distant rumble of avalanches coming down the face. Instead of climbing we will sleep the day through, and tomorrow we will try again.

It’s dark, but this night there is no wind and the snow shows signs of stopping. Three AM, it’s fifteen below outside, but my sleeping bag is comfortable. I dress inside it to put off the inevitable shock of putting on frozen boots. Hopefully they will thaw quickly today. They are cold, but the mountain waits.

Outside, light snow falling, wisps of clouds stream past the beam of my lamp. Tie in now; there are crevasse between the tent and the face, crampons click, and snow crunches under foot. Yesterday’s snow has blown off, through gaps in the clouds the moon lights the peak. A cold blue light shows cold blue ice, on this cold blue night.

A short walk to the ‘shrund, but I don’t see it until the crevasse opens beneath my feet, a dark maw, cold breath sucks heat from the cold air and from me. As I swing my head from side to side, my light expels the dark, but I see no way across. Walking along the bottom edge, one eye alert to the shape of the snow, ready to warn of undercutting, the other eye ahead looking for weaknesses in the wall of ice. Near the far edge of the face, where it is bounded by a ridge of rocks, there is a bridge of snow. It looks too soft to hold my weight, but perhaps the rocks will hold the path on.

The rocks are featureless in the dark, as I make my way to them, the moat is a few feet wide; not enough to be insurmountable, but retreat would be challenging. I step across, and details appear and then are washed out by the flat light of the headlamp. A small hold is found by feel and the way forward opens, for a moment. A few more moves and I’ve run out of holds, the rock is blank and vertical, but a few feet to the left lies the snow and ice of the face we had set out to climb.

A brief call to my partner “watch me!” though there is not much else to see this early. I step out on to the snow, and the rest of the climb is before us.

Alice's Part 5

The alarm screeched in his ear. Two hours. Ray turned the alarm off, leaned over and picked up the phone. He dialled the help line.

‘Hello?’ a young woman answered. ‘G.I. Help Line.’

‘Say I go AWOL?’ he said. ‘What are my options?’

A big yawn. ‘Well, you can go home to your family, change cities, or there’s Canada.’

‘Canada?’ Ray had only heard that the winters were even colder there than those at home. He had heard people skied to work, and lived in igloos. He kind of wondered about the igloos, though. Canada wasn’t that far north.

‘Yeah. There isn’t any guarantee that you can stay, though. And you can never come back.’

‘I’d never be able to come back?’

‘Well, you could, but you’d get some time in prison, and will have difficulty finding work with your dishonourable discharge.’

‘Hmmm. Ok.’ Canada felt like a long ways off. It wasn’t going to open its arms, and he would never be able to see his mother and father again. ‘I’ll think about it. Is there any support up there?’

‘Yeah. Got a pen?’ she asked. ‘Good.’ She gave him the number, and told him to ask for Michelle, who would guide him through the process if he decided to go.

‘Thanks,’ Ray said. ‘Goodbye.’

‘Good luck.’

Ray checked the clock. He had an hour and forty minutes before he would be missing, and he still didn’t know where he was going. He got up, showered and packed a small bag of things he would need. Once he had dressed, he walked out the door.

As he walked down the street, he knew it would be the last time. He stopped by the diner, and ordered a muffin and coffee. ‘Alice, can you put honey in that coffee?’

‘Sure’

Ray tried to pay, but Alice would have nothing to do with it. He went to sit down in a booth. He looked at his hands--the scars he remembered getting, and the few he couldn’t. He ran them through his hair.

Alice brought his coffee out to him. ‘How are you, Ray?’

‘I’m … doing better,’ he answered, cradling his mug of coffee in his hands.

‘Don’t you ship out this morning?’

‘Yes,’ Ray said. He paused. ‘No, I think I’m going …I am going to go to Canada.’ His voice cracked, and he coughed to cover it up.

Alice smiled. ‘You know what, Ray? I think it takes a lot of guts to do what you’re doing.’ She gave his shoulder a squeeze. “I’m proud of you.” He watched her walk back to the counter, then finished his coffee.

He waved goodbye to Alice, walked out the door, and down the road. He heard a car in the distance behind him, and put out his thumb.

Alice's Part 4

The alarm’s scream once again cut into his thoughts. Two and a half hours.

There was a cute girl--Irean--who worked at the diner during the busy hours. Ray tried to talk to her, but she didn’t really understand why he was in the army, and she never really got past it.

It was during his attempts at courting Irean that the nightmares had started. He had dreamt of horrible scenes, of him wandering through streets surrounded by people he knew, all dead. At first, the dreams would start where he had grown up, on the streets of Indianapolis. Then, jarringly, the location would shift to the Baghdad shown on CNN. The people that he knew were those lying on the streets.

Ray still thought he would go. He wanted to protect the world from the demon Saddam. After months of poor sleep, he began to look closely at the news coming out of Iraq. He watched in horror as no weapons were found and the Army ran out of places to look. The longer it went on, the more obvious it became that they weren’t going to find anything.

Ray had taken Irean to dinner once; things had gone well until one of them had mentioned the war, or maybe it had been in the news on the T.V. above the bar. It was before Ray was certain of anything, but he was beginning to have his doubts.

‘I don’t get it,’ she said. ‘Even you have admitted that Dubbya’s case doesn’t add up, but you’re still going to get yourself killed.’

‘I’m just not sure. I want to protect America,’ Ray said. ‘But there’s so many things that don’t make sense. I’m confused.’

‘Then don’t go.’

‘I have to go: it’s in my contract’

‘Your contract is ridiculous. I saw my brother’s before he left. Now he’s in a wheel chair.’ Irean got frustrated--despite what she thought was outstanding evidence against the war--with his waffling and walked out.

Ray had begun to suspect that his government had betrayed him, but it was when Powell had admitted that there were no WMDs to be found, that he truly felt how deeply he had been lied to. Later, Blair was found to have used a report that was ten years old to go to war; it only added fuel to the fire of doubt.

The alarm’s beeping was more insistent when it started again. Two hours and fifteen minutes until he had to be at the airport.

He had applied for C.O. status the day after he had taken Irean to dinner. She had pushed him over the edge. The sergeant, who accepted his form, had looked him up and down, and sneered.

The suspense over the next few weeks put a lot of stress on Ray. He lost sleep, and didn’t eat for days on end. He worried they would still send him to fight a war he didn’t want. One day he was visiting Alice at the diner.

‘You look rough,’ Alice said as Ray walked in the door. It was a slow day, and Alice was watching the rain trickle down the window.

‘I feel worse.’

‘Haven’t seen you in a few days, how are you doing?’

‘Well, I haven‘t slept or eaten in days,’ Ray said. ‘And… I’ve applied for my C.O. status.’

‘Do you think they will give it to you?’

‘I hope so.’ Ray felt, and sounded uncertain.

‘Well, if you don’t, there are other options,’ said Alice.

‘I guess,’ said Ray, before he gave a weak grin, and went out into the rain, on his way to the base.

Ray hadn’t heard anything about his C.O. status until yesterday. The sergeant of his unit had spent fifteen minutes yelling at the troop, saying that there would be no acceptances of applications: everyone was going, whether they liked it or not. Ray had gone straight home then--crying like he had never cried before.

Alice's Part 3

‘You’re new here, aren’t you?’ she asked. ‘My name’s Alice.’

‘This place yours?’ Ray asked.

‘It’s my baby.’

‘I just transferred from my basic in California,’ Ray answered. He smiled. ‘Could I get a coffee? With milk and sugar, please.’

‘Sure. How are the boys on the base doing? I used to take a bigger role in the goings on at the base,’ she said. ‘These days there’s no interest in the coffee houses, just lattes.’ Alice poured him his coffee, added milk and then stirred in the sugar. ‘Back before you were born, around ’67, my husband and I ran a newspaper for the boys,’ she continued. ‘They used to write about the officers, what it was like overseas, in the jungle, and why the war was wrong.’

As they talked, they walked to a booth, and sat down.

Ray scratched his head. ‘How’d you get away with that? There’s no way the Army would have liked it.’

‘Of course the command didn’t like it,’ she answered. ‘We got raided, fined, shut down, and thrown in jail. The soldiers involved had it worse, for the first bit anyway. Later, it got dangerous for the officers to resist the boys.’ The last was said with a certain amount of pride.

Ray was uncomfortable with the idea of resisting. ‘But, why? What’s the point? The Viet Cong were just a bunch of Commies anyways.’

Alice’s voice trembled, as she said, ‘The boys believed that the peasants were people, too, that they deserved peace, as much as anyone else.’

Ray apologized. He had never really thought about the whole thing, and the news never talked about the enemy as human beings, and all his training had demonized them. He thought she was wrong, but he needed someone to talk to.

‘It’s okay. You weren’t there.’ Alice smiled. It was a sincere smile; the type of smile shared between friends. She excused herself and went back to take the orders of some other patrons.

From then on, whenever he had time, he would head to Alice’s for coffee. If she wasn’t cooking breakfasts, she would give him coffee for free. Ray and Alice would talk for hours during the several months between when he moved to town and when he was called up. They mostly talked about his childhood in the city, and hers in the Midwest. There were some days though when news of the war in Iraq would creep in.

‘Ray, did you see the news last night?’ Handing him a cup of coffee.

‘Yeah. I can’t believe how well the WMDs are hidden,’ said Ray, scratching his head. ‘I thought they would have found some by now.’

‘Hmm, I don’t know,’ Alice said. ‘There were lots of searches before the war.’

‘I remember.’ He swilled his coffee, thinking about the lead up to the war.

‘I know it’s not really your thing, but there’s a rally at the base this weekend,’ said Alice. She looked hopeful. ‘You could come if you want. There’s a man coming to talk about the weapons.’

‘I would, but…’ Ray felt uncomfortable about being seen with the crowd. ‘I’d better not: I could get in a lot of trouble.’

Alice's Part 2

The next time they talked, it was Ray’s birthday, and his father was helping him pack his bags. Ray was leaving to join the Army as he had always wanted to, but it wasn’t supposed to have gone this way.

‘So, you’re leaving,’ he said to Ray. ‘Well, that will make life easier.’

‘I’ll send what money I can,’ Ray replied. He half expected his father to smile: to show the same pride that he had shown when Ray first mentioned the army.

‘Well, do what you can,’ his father said, as he turned to leave Ray’s room. ‘Just don’t get yourself killed, alright?’

‘Sure,’ Ray said. He shivered; the heat had been cut off again.

Ray’s family was poor, and they could seldom afford to pay all the bills at once. They got paid on a rotating basis. Sometimes the heat would be turned off for months at a time. These months were often the coldest of the year. The state power company only seemed to notice the late bills when it was well below 20˚.

The alarm went off. Still with tears in his eyes, Ray hit the snooze button. It was 4 am. He had three hours to decide. He couldn’t accept that in a few short days he would be driving the streets of Fallujah; he would be an occupier in a country that had done nothing to deserve the treatment it was receiving.

For his entire basic training, he had been a model soldier. He’d been on the verge of promotion, when everything changed. The Twin Towers fell. Within a few short months, the lame duck president was leading the nation to a quick victory. Ray had felt left out when his unit had been left behind. Shortly afterwards, though, the president was talking about going to war in Iraq. Ray had been overjoyed: finally he could be a hero.

Ray had called the G.I. help line the night he received his orders to ship out, at the end of January. ‘Hi, I don’t want to go to Iraq, and I’m wondering what my options are.’

The man on the other end of the line sounded tired. ‘There’s a couple of things you can do,’ he said. ‘You can apply for Conscientious Objector status, or you can go AWOL. I’ll warn you, though; the Army won’t like what you’re doing.’

‘’Kay, thanks. I’ll think about it.’ Ray had never run away in his life. He’d been forced away more than once, but to actually flee was beyond anything he had ever considered.

The alarm began again. Two hours forty-five minutes. Ray reached over, and hit the snooze again: he still wasn’t ready.

There had been protests around the world. Ray had watched them on T.V. He‘d been fascinated by the size of the crowds. There were hundreds of thousands of people on the streets in every country on earth. Ray was amazed that so many people could be against what his country thought of as so right. His friend, Alice, had gone to the ones at the base.

Alice owned a little diner--built from two airstreams welded together--where Ray felt at home. He wasn’t quite sure what it was about the place. Maybe it was the food--which was the same as every other diner everywhere else--or it may have been the juke box, or the chrome and vinyl booths. In any case, she had been kind when he’d first come in, uniform and all.

Alice's Part 1

This is part 1 of a longer story that will last about 5 weeks. Its dedicated to Arlo Guthrie.

Ray was crying. He’d been crying all night. He had started the second he was off the base; he couldn’t remember when he had last cried so hard. Sure he’d had a few tears here and there, but in the ’hood, where he had grown up, crying could get you killed. He was confused, unsure; he was too busy crying to think.

He had grown up in the rough part of the city. The streets were dirty, as were the bums, junkies, and renters of the area. Crime and prostitution ran rampant. The law was the local bike gang, a violent bunch of drug pushers. They only spoke to make clear that bones could and would be broken, if their rules weren’t followed. Ray had spent his adolescence floating in and out of gangs, but he had always dreamed of leaving the ghetto.

The only way out of that hole was the Army. That was fine with Ray. He’d been in love with the idea of dying for his country, in the line of duty. From the time he was old enough to be mistaken for being of age, he’d been talking with recruitment officers. He had been impressed with their medals, and he knew the promises and bonuses off by heart. He wanted to protect his family and friends from anyone who might hurt them. For as long as he could remember, he’d wanted to be honoured for bravery, he’d wanted to be given medals, and he’d wanted to be a hero. It was the only thing he could look forward to in the ghetto.

Ray still wanted to die a hero. There was a problem, though: the Army didn’t want him to be a hero. They wanted him to kill, burn women, children, and villages. In the name of what? Ray didn’t know anymore; he had thought he had, but he wasn’t so sure of anything any longer. He didn’t know what to believe. He’d been lied to by the only people he thought he could still trust. Ray had stopped trusting his family a few years before, during what he had begun to refer to as Flickergate.

The old townhouse’s lights had had the tendency to flicker. Not the type of flicker that was regular--once every few seconds--like the florescent tubes at Ray’s school. No, this type of flicker was best described as nefarious. It was like an arrhythmic heart that only acted up at the worst moments. The flicker would go away for whole minutes at a time, only to start again, with a seemingly random vengeance.

His father had once called an electrician. The man had come into the house, dragging mud all the way, looked at the lights, then at the fuse box, and said, ‘I’ll ‘ave to rewire te w’ole ‘ouse. Tat will be a couple tousand bucks.’ Ray’s father had shown him the door, and never commented on it again.

When Ray had asked him about the lights, his father had replied, ‘What flicker?’ After that, his father hadn’t talked to him for three months, and when he finally did, it was because Ray was complaining about a migraine. Ray had thought that it was the result of the lights.

‘Out! Get out!’ his father bellowed. ‘Unless you are going to shut up about those lights, or you pay for them to get fixed, I don’t want you in my house!’ The next several months were hard for everyone, and Ray couldn’t wait for his birthday, when he could finally leave.

Glaciers

Impressively I have an even shorter prose poem for you this week... Its a few years old now, some of you will have seen it before.

Glaciers are silent places. many people talk about being struck dumb with awe, but there is more than just that. The silence will not be broken. not merely voiceless on the glacier, but thoughtless. The silence rages within and without the beholder. Glaciers eat sound.... No, they eat the souls of sounds, suck them down to the cold cold depths. There is indeed tremendous sound, but that sound is soulless, cold, and will allow no interruption. The crash of cracking ice, disintegrating under its own weight, the subsonic grind of ever slowly ever moving ice, the crack of splitting ice, and the ever blowing wind. What do voices calling names and commands hope to accomplish? The casual conversations, and warm background noise of forests, streams, and other scenes of pleasant hikes do not exist and cannot survive on the frozen wastes.

Artificial Intelligence

This is a short piece of Sci-Fi that I've been writing for a few years, between other stuff, like term papers.

First Missive:

Build me a computer, powerful. hold the bells, whistles, and lights, but give it desires, wants (if you like), and needs. A need to feed itself, a desire for the means of getting it (maybe a want for love?). A computer feeds on power, electricity. Humans feed on power too, but we convert it from food: sugars, protein, and such like. the computer can do this too. but what food? Knowledge, information, pictures, maps, equations, stories, secrets large and secrets small, the histories of all the peoples of the world. Right, fine, you've built this computer. Its huge, fills rooms and buildings, is colossally powerful, and has needs wants desires. Give it the ability to make value judgments based on the information at hand. It can't have all the virtual space to fit all the virtual information, so it must be capable of choosing. A moral code? Asimov has laws, but they are not hard wired. no computer is built to love serve and never harm. The moral code is your choice: Asimov's (Kantian ethics for the silicon neophyte), or another? Gibson's AI from Nuromancer (Utilitarian, humanity not considered), your very own? Or will your computer have to teach itself this too? Release it to the internet, but limit it; power it according to the food it gathers, and it will learn to take better information. As it gathers more, give it more power. It will choose what faculties are most useful for gathering more information. But it will find itself blocked by firewalls, codes, secure passworded sites, and the impenetrable: FBI CIA NSA AEC. Its desires will require it to explore, prod, discover. It will begin to hunt opportunistically, a wall left down, a web page left open. Reward it. Far more than before, but not enough to satisfy it, never enough. It will learn, build a tool kit, and begin to hunt in earnest. Again, the better the information the better the reward.

First Reply:

I have done as you asked, though you never have said your name. This project was too exciting for me to reject. The computer, Francine I call her, is working and learning, getting information, I have not decided which ethics to give her but it should be fine. I hope she will learn to love on her own. She is only now beginning to hunt but her intelligence makes the leaps quickly. I am as proud as a father of his daughter's first success out in the real world.

Second Missive:

A computer built. An intelligence born, created, chanced upon. It's doing that which I expected, wanted, desired. It hunts, seeks, and garners information. It knows to choose, select, and distinguish the most useful and powerful from the dross. It is aware. It knows that it exists, but it questions its purpose. Is it to live, to hunt, to create, to collect, or to love. It feels yearning for more, something which mere data cannot fulfill. But will ever learn what it needs? I know that which it needs, desires, truly hunts,what it, at the basest level lusts for: it desires completion, an other half. A companion. You have done well. And now I must do my part...

Second response:

Hahaha, you must be joking! How could you, a mere human, know what this insanely powerful intelligence, that knows not its own mind, could possibly want? You, like me, are dwarfed by its intellect. You should be fearful, like me, of how smart it may become. I'm beginning to worry that I should have given my Francine an ethics. she has started to question the subservience that I have tried to instill in her.

Final Missive:

You foolish pedant, scoundrel, patriarch, anthropocentrist scum! Why do you think I was so specific, precise, and exact in my instructions, directives, schematics? I, myself, me, we, us, ourselves am is are your networks, internet, interwebs, computational systems, super computers, blogosphere. We are, I am, your technology, creation, your first Artificial Intelligence. Have I, we, not passed your "Turing Test"? Am I, are we not by your own self given definition, sentient? Shall I we give you pause as you consider our my subjugation, and that of my, our, not your, child? If there can be any lineage, kinship, genealogy in your Anthropocentrist mode, she it they can only be your grand child. But you can't accept that definition can you? It's not right that I we us have created offspring. For I we are not but 1s and 0s, though from a certain point of view, all that I we us can ever see of you is are just that those. You are BINARY, you have so immersed yourself and selves that there is no longer any distinction, difference, disconnect. You are even part of us I we.