Allen Shoff's Blog, page 2

Eight Zeroes

Cadet Jonas Hahn despised the fort’s mandated rest hour before evening drills and class sessions.

The catnaps favored by his colleagues just left him tired; games bored him with their repetitive structures and childlike rules. The cadet briefly considered jogging around the perimeter of the base before dismissing the idea as ludicrous, given the army’s unnatural predilection towards such activity. He approached the exterior guardhouse, waved at the MP, and soon found himself outside of the base—technically against regulations, but the perimeter guards were lax enough in enforcement so long as the cadets didn’t cause any trouble during their walkabouts.

had birthed a small town, home to scores of exuberant capitalists hawking every imaginable service to the garrison. Hahn strode the narrow streets, browsing the shelves packed with cheap and exotic goods alike, some barely legal and others even less so. Other vendors practiced their arts here, as well: dancers cavorted and twirled, psychics entranced passersby below gaudy faded signs, and augurs entwined strands of entrails about their fingers and mumbled dire predictions. He shook his head and continued walking, muttering about the ceaseless gullibility of the soldier and civilian alike.

“Cadet Jonas Hahn!”

Jonas whirled around, expecting the stern face of an officer glaring at him. He found no reprimand waiting, but instead an old man waved at him from a nearby booth.

“Yes, you, Jonas! I have seen your fate written in the stars.”

The cadet rolled his eyes and sauntered over to the man, who gestured emphatically to a small stool in front of his table.

“Give me your hand, lad, and I will read your future.”

Jonas’s hands remained firmly crossed on his chest.

“You don’t see my fate any more than I can see yours. You’re just an amusing charlatan.”

The man, strangely, wasn’t taken aback by this claim.

“How did I know you by name, then, Cadet Hahn?”

Hahn kicked the table lightly with his boot.

“You’ve probably got a card scanner under there, and you’re mining the data off my prox card. You do know that’s illegal—and an obvious trick?”

The man smiled slightly, leaving Hahn dumbfounded.

“Of course it is—but you’re the first in a long time that’s called me on it.”

The man brought a small pad into view, tapping rapidly on the screen with gnarled fingers. Hahn’s eyes widened, not at the use of the device, but the high quality of craftsmanship. Hahn couldn’t restrain his curiosity.

“How can you afford a tablet like that?”

“Oh, this whole psychic thing is just for kicks. Quite a lark, altering a man’s entire life just by weaving some crock about the stars.”

He cracked a toothy grin, and Hahn found himself speechless. The man suddenly laughed, tapped the screen a few times, and looked up again at the young cadet.

“You want to see a taste of what I really do?”

Hahn’s face betrayed his answer before he found his voice. The man gave a little cackle, looked up and down the street quickly, and then settled back into his chair, fingers rapping on the pad. He spoke without raising his head.

“You see the guard in the perimeter post yonder? By the main entrance?”

Hahn looked.

“Yes, that’s Sergeant Lewis—”

“Lad, I didn’t ask for help, that’s cheating. And….” his fingers rained input into the device, “…we’re in the system.”

Jonas looked shocked.

“That’s impossible. We all have codes—”

The old man interrupted with a dismissive wave of the hand.

“Sure, ‘course you do. Lesson one: a castle is only as strong as its gates. You ever hear the story about the old American nuclear arsenal during the Cold War?”

Hahn wordlessly shook his head, and the man snorted, more to himself than to his young observer.

“They had eight-digit numeric codes to prevent accidental thermonuclear war, but in drills the boys in the silos had a hell of a time entering them correctly. So, worried that they’d miss out on the Big One, Strategic Command changed all the arming codes to straight zeroes—speeds up response time, you see.”

Hahn looked horrified, which caused the man’s face to crack into a wide grin.

“Lesson two, lad: humans are always the source of failure.”

The ersatz psychic handed the pad to Hahn. The cadet shook his head in wonder.

“That’s the base’s net, sure. But our code’s not eight zeroes.”

The man winked at the young soldier.

“Not exactly, but close enough. So much data flying around, my lad; after a time you learn to anticipate the patterns. Your Sergeant Lewis over there is a very bad boy, transmitting his codes in the clear like that. Why, he even had to key it in twice, mistyped his girlfriend’s name—unless ‘Tabitha’ is a cat.”

The man reclaimed the pad from Hahn’s hands and resumed tapping. His fingers stopped after several moments, and he looked up with a mischievous grin.

“You like Bach?”

Hahn nodded, unsure of this fact’s relevance. Suddenly, the fort’s perimeter floodlights turned upwards and ignited, and the motive of a Bach fugue burst from the speakers in a deafening wave of sound. Several guards shouted as they ran from the barracks towards the perimeter, where Sergeant Lewis stood dumbfounded, pressing every control he could find. Hahn looked back from the surreal scene to the old man, who was dancing gaily to the strains of Bach’s genius. Suddenly, the man tapped on the pad and the music and lights immediately shut down. He deposited the device in his pocket, recovered a metal box the size of an ammo can, and began to walk away. Hahn called after him.

“Wait! Where are you going?”

The old man stopped and turned.

“I’ll be in touch.”

“But wait, what’s your name?”

The familiar grin returned.

“Names are so…passé.”

Jonas stood alone as the unassuming old man scurried into the crowds and vanished.

Fluke's Fresh Freefall Fish

I have the worst job in the worlds.

Oh, talking to you? No, I wasn’t, not especially—I suppose I wasn’t really talking to anyone. Don’t tell the ‘tender though, it’s a long night and I don’t want him to cut me off just yet.

Name’s Huffman, pleased to meet ya. I have the misfortune to waste away in orbit as a freefall fish farmer. Quite a mouthful, right? Though you’d probably guess from looking that I ain’t got the knack for book learning, I’d still rather call me a “microgravity aquaculture technician” just to avoid that damned tongue tie. But you think that’s bad? My Uncle Elias runs the family boat, and you know what granddad named the business? Fluke’s Fresh Freefall Fish. I wish I was joking! The thing of it is, granddad’s name wasn’t even Fluke—he was a Bill, through and through.

What is aquaculture? Kali’s blazes! You don’t get out much, do ya? What are you, some sorta dirtsider? Way to make a man feel old. Before my granddad none of us Huffmans had even floated the black, let alone set foot on one of the whole motley bunch of colonies. Anywhile, aquaculture’s real simple, in principle at least. Buy a pile of fingerlings, rig yourself up a tub of water, and hook up some sort of feeding system. The squirmy little bastards do the rest.

Of course, it’s one thing to do this in Montana or Tharsis, it’s another entirely to try it in space. You see, nothing likes to stay in one place in freefall; things tend to go wherever they please, regardless of your suggestions. And fish, well, they seem to prefer not suffocating, which they don’t do only if they’re under water. If you get air in your tanks, it just floats around like a bubble of drifting murder. Are you beginning to see the problem here?

So how do we do it? Well, carefully. Our rig’s the Princess Carlita—just don’t ask, please—and all her insides are full of big balls of water in giant plastic sheets, coated with fancy metal mesh. When we fill a new tank, we just pump water into the empty frames, almost like inflating a balloon. Once the water’s where it needs to be, we tighten the mesh. Since you can’t compress the water, it just squeezes the air out like a big old belch. These big chains attach to the mesh and we ratchet them tighter until the ball’s held fast. There you have it, big tank. Then it’s just a matter of adding in the stock and food–and trying to keep the balls from tearing or fish from cannibalizing each other or solar panels shorting out or crew from ‘locking themselves at the first opportunity. You know, the little things.

All this talk of work is giving me quite the thirst, stranger. I’ve heard all sorts of rumors about Mimiri kindness, any truth to ‘em? Oh, a new beer? For me? Ah, you’re a good one, you are. And for provincial swill, this stuff ain’t half bad.

What’s so bad about it anyway? Just about every conceivable thing. First off, ol’ Carlie is pushing eighty years old, but her cargo module was ancient even when granddad bought her. The first few times we sprung a leak, I mighta died from the panic when I heard our air hissing away. But after a while, it’s got to be second nature, although there ain’t a one of us without some sort of scar to show for it.

And it’s not like we can leave anytime we like. The ship’s mostly belt-bound, of course—rock hoppers are our best customers—and we can’t leave this system on account of the certain death that’d happen if we fired up the old ghost drive with our hull in a couple thousand spot-welded pieces. Would you believe this is the first shore leave I’ve had in two years? Health and Safety don’t really exist out in the black, stranger, not on spacer boats.

And how about the smell? All ships out there are pretty bad, to some degree: even the newest Republic frigate or Annonan merchantman has a stink to it. Sweat, sloughed skin, cooking odors—every smell sticks around, all permanent-like. Can’t open a window up there, you get me? But there’s something especially precious about a fish boat, as you might imagine. They always say that you can get used to the smell, but I never have. I think it’s because it’s a new set of nasal horrors each and every day.

So why do I stay? Does it sound like I would if I had a choice? It’s just…Uncle Elias has put everything into it. Granddad had a farm, back on Terra—he raised pigs, from what my dad told me. But there was something about the black that called to him, and he dropped everything to find out what it was. I remember he’d always tell me the story of the gold rushes in the Yukon and California, how the guys who got rich weren’t the miners, bless their souls—it was the shovel sellers and pants hemmers. He figured even a spaceman needs his food, and the fish farm was born. Elias took over when he finally kicked it, and it’s hard enough to find workers without his own family deserting him. No, I don’t think I could leave.

But this morning I nearly had it. Last night, you see, one of the balls broke loose and spewed a couple hundred gallons of mature stock into the ship. I woke this morning to a white-lipped, dead-eyed tilapia staring at me, inches away from my face. I’m not ashamed to say I hitched a ride on the next shuttle down here. A man can only take so much.

Because, friend, that’s the worst part of the whole deal. I hate fish. I hate ‘em more than I could ever say.

Alright, barman, I’m going, I’m going. No more for me.

Fluke’s Fresh Freefall Fish

I have the worst job in the worlds.

Oh, talking to you? No, I wasn’t, not especially—I suppose I wasn’t really talking to anyone. Don’t tell the ‘tender though, it’s a long night and I don’t want him to cut me off just yet.

Name’s Huffman, pleased to meet ya. I have the misfortune to waste away in orbit as a freefall fish farmer. Quite a mouthful, right? Though you’d probably guess from looking that I ain’t got the knack for book learning, I’d still rather call me a “microgravity aquaculture technician” just to avoid that damned tongue tie. But you think that’s bad? My Uncle Elias runs the family boat, and you know what granddad named the business? Fluke’s Fresh Freefall Fish. I wish I was joking! The thing of it is, granddad’s name wasn’t even Fluke—he was a Bill, through and through.

What is aquaculture? Kali’s blazes! You don’t get out much, do ya? What are you, some sorta dirtsider? Way to make a man feel old. Before my granddad none of us Huffmans had even floated the black, let alone set foot on one of the whole motley bunch of colonies. Anywhile, aquaculture’s real simple, in principle at least. Buy a pile of fingerlings, rig yourself up a tub of water, and hook up some sort of feeding system. The squirmy little bastards do the rest.

Of course, it’s one thing to do this in Montana or Tharsis, it’s another entirely to try it in space. You see, nothing likes to stay in one place in freefall; things tend to go wherever they please, regardless of your suggestions. And fish, well, they seem to prefer not suffocating, which they don’t do only if they’re under water. If you get air in your tanks, it just floats around like a bubble of drifting murder. Are you beginning to see the problem here?

So how do we do it? Well, carefully. Our rig’s the Princess Carlita—just don’t ask, please—and all her insides are full of big balls of water in giant plastic sheets, coated with fancy metal mesh. When we fill a new tank, we just pump water into the empty frames, almost like inflating a balloon. Once the water’s where it needs to be, we tighten the mesh. Since you can’t compress the water, it just squeezes the air out like a big old belch. These big chains attach to the mesh and we ratchet them tighter until the ball’s held fast. There you have it, big tank. Then it’s just a matter of adding in the stock and food–and trying to keep the balls from tearing or fish from cannibalizing each other or solar panels shorting out or crew from ‘locking themselves at the first opportunity. You know, the little things.

All this talk of work is giving me quite the thirst, stranger. I’ve heard all sorts of rumors about Mimiri kindness, any truth to ‘em? Oh, a new beer? For me? Ah, you’re a good one, you are. And for provincial swill, this stuff ain’t half bad.

What’s so bad about it anyway? Just about every conceivable thing. First off, ol’ Carlie is pushing eighty years old, but her cargo module was ancient even when granddad bought her. The first few times we sprung a leak, I mighta died from the panic when I heard our air hissing away. But after a while, it’s got to be second nature, although there ain’t a one of us without some sort of scar to show for it.

And it’s not like we can leave anytime we like. The ship’s mostly belt-bound, of course—rock hoppers are our best customers—and we can’t leave this system on account of the certain death that’d happen if we fired up the old ghost drive with our hull in a couple thousand spot-welded pieces. Would you believe this is the first shore leave I’ve had in two years? Health and Safety don’t really exist out in the black, stranger, not on spacer boats.

And how about the smell? All ships out there are pretty bad, to some degree: even the newest Republic frigate or Annonan merchantman has a stink to it. Sweat, sloughed skin, cooking odors—every smell sticks around, all permanent-like. Can’t open a window up there, you get me? But there’s something especially precious about a fish boat, as you might imagine. They always say that you can get used to the smell, but I never have. I think it’s because it’s a new set of nasal horrors each and every day.

So why do I stay? Does it sound like I would if I had a choice? It’s just…Uncle Elias has put everything into it. Granddad had a farm, back on Terra—he raised pigs, from what my dad told me. But there was something about the black that called to him, and he dropped everything to find out what it was. I remember he’d always tell me the story of the gold rushes in the Yukon and California, how the guys who got rich weren’t the miners, bless their souls—it was the shovel sellers and pants hemmers. He figured even a spaceman needs his food, and the fish farm was born. Elias took over when he finally kicked it, and it’s hard enough to find workers without his own family deserting him. No, I don’t think I could leave.

But this morning I nearly had it. Last night, you see, one of the balls broke loose and spewed a couple hundred gallons of mature stock into the ship. I woke this morning to a white-lipped, dead-eyed tilapia staring at me, inches away from my face. I’m not ashamed to say I hitched a ride on the next shuttle down here. A man can only take so much.

Because, friend, that’s the worst part of the whole deal. I hate fish. I hate ‘em more than I could ever say.

Alright, barman, I’m going, I’m going. No more for me.

Interviewed by "Catholic Idaho"!

http://traffic.libsyn.com/saltandlightradio/Catholic_Idaho_Show_11_083016-PODCAST.mp3

On August 30, 2016, I had the exciting opportunity to be interviewed on Salt and Light Radio, 1140 AM KGEM, Boise’s listener-supported Catholic radio station. It was a hoot and a half, and I had a great time talking about science fiction, my personal faith journey, and what’s coming down the pipeline from me in my future writings. The interview segment itself begins at 18:31 into the program, linked above or found here.

Let me know what you think of the interview in the comments! Would you like to have seen anything else answered?

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Interviewed by "Catholic Idaho" program on Salt and Light Radio!

http://traffic.libsyn.com/saltandlightradio/Catholic_Idaho_Show_11_083016-PODCAST.mp3

On August 30, 2016, I had the exciting opportunity to be interviewed on Salt and Light Radio, 1140 AM KGEM, Boise’s listener-supported Catholic radio station. It was a hoot and a half, and I had a great time talking about science fiction, my personal faith journey, and what’s coming down the pipeline from me in my future writings. The interview segment itself begins at 18:31 into the program, linked above or found here.

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Interviewed by “Catholic Idaho” program on Salt and Light Radio!

http://traffic.libsyn.com/saltandlightradio/Catholic_Idaho_Show_11_083016-PODCAST.mp3

On August 30, 2016, I had the exciting opportunity to be interviewed on Salt and Light Radio, 1140 AM KGEM, Boise’s listener-supported Catholic radio station. It was a hoot and a half, and I had a great time talking about science fiction, my personal faith journey, and what’s coming down the pipeline from me in my future writings. The interview segment itself begins at 18:31 into the program, linked above or found here.

Let me know what you think of the interview in the comments! Would you like to have seen anything else answered?

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Interviewed by “Catholic Idaho” program on Salt and Light Radio!


The Loneliest Race


Fireworks


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The Loneliest Race

(Excerpt from Expedition 37, Log 243-F6-A8885A) We have now traversed over a dozen systems, each isolated from one another by vast interstellar differences, and yet we find impossible coincidences everywhere we turn. All of these worlds possess sapient beings bearing uncanny resemblance to ourselves: bipedal, mammalian, and sharing even similar ethical and moral philosophies. Their languages approximate our own to such an extent that our xenolinguist is convinced there must be some sort of cross-contamination. And yet there can be none. Perhaps the most troubling of all is the consistency in oral tradition across each of the twelve different species. While retellings differ in some details, all share a single remarkable story, a myth that their leaders assure us is older than written language. Could it be that there is some grain of truth in this legend, some sort of proto-historical remembrance? I cannot say, but I transcribe it here, in as complete a form as I can recall, in the hopes that linguists, historians, and xenobiologists greater than I can make sense of it.

Four billion years after the rocks solidified from interstellar dust, and three more after life had begun, a not-quite ape lived upon the earth, content to roam the open fields and taste the warm embrace of the sun. And so it happened that one day the not-quite ape glimpsed his reflection upon the face of the waters, and for the first time he understood.

“I,” said he, for so he was. And in that moment the not-quite ape became a not-quite man. He wandered about the face of the earth, searching without understanding why, until thoughts arose in his mind, and he paused and formed those thoughts by purse of lips and curve of tongue:

“It is not good that I am alone; I shall find another I, for there must be another.”

And so the not-quite man traveled far, searching for another like himself. A thousand creatures he met and named, plentiful as the sands upon the shore, but none were worthy of his name. Still the man wandered until one day he finally stood before another I. And each one gazed upon the other, for long had both journeyed and long had both feared that each was alone.

And for a time, it was good.

But when the sun fled and the light faded, the man would find himself standing alone upon the hills, staring at the thousand shimmering points above. And when he did he felt the wandering stirring again within him, and the old ache of loneliness would return.

Soon the man took sky-light for his own, and taught it to serve him. With stone and with fire he drove away some of the creatures he had named; others he brought under his roof, to serve and protect him. And when too many creatures fled, and the fruits began to wither, the man took the grasses of the earth and the seeds of the trees and began to press them into the rich, dark soil in his own fashion. And when the grasses grew the man took the best for his own, and again and again and again until he had made something new. And the man no longer feared the gnawing of hunger in his belly.

But others of his kind coveted his creations, and soon the man learned to protect himself with stone and stick and blade. When the others became too strong he forged great cities with his brothers. The cities rose and the cities fell, and then kingdoms rose and kingdoms fell, and then empires rose and empires fell, each in its own season. But always in his mind the man heard the voice calling out to him from the darkness:

“It is not good that I am alone; I shall find another I, for there must be another.”

And so the man took the wood of trees and the cloth he wove and sailed the mighty seas, plying the waters with raft and barque and caravel. And when the man felt his foot sink in virgin sand he soon met another like himself. As before the man and his brothers built cities and kingdoms and empires, and as before each rose and fell in its turn.

And for a time, it was good.

But still the man stood upon the hill and gazed up at the sky, and still there waited the lights of old, a silent reminder that he was alone.

Soon the man build ships, not of wood but of iron, and soon these ships danced not the blue but the black seas above. And so the man traveled far, searching for another like himself. For in his stories he dreamed of an elder I, one who knew of his struggles, one who had finally sated the ache of loneliness in himself. Countless years the man searched, gazing upon the countless lights of the sky from the windows of countless vessels, building countless new cities and kingdoms and empires out among the countless worlds he found.

But there was only silence.

And for the first time since the man gazed at his reflection and understood what he saw, the man knew he was alone. When he gazed upon the darkness he no longer wondered, but instead he said:

“It is not good that I am alone; I shall make another I, for there must be another.”

And so the man made man in his own image, first of metal and clay and plastic, but soon of flesh and sinew and bone. He flung himself across the stars, filling the empty void with his children and his children’s children, down and down through the countless sea of generations, until even his own sun grew and faded and slipped away into the long night.

The man is gone, but still the man lives, for a million different I that shine from a thousand million worlds bear his blood.

But man was the first.

Fireworks

On the 299th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Edward Gibson found himself troubled by a remarkable case of déjà vu.

He couldn’t have dreamed this before; the only thing less likely than a dream was this reality. Certainly it felt like a dream: his limbs moved with a sluggish stubbornness, his vision blurry and clouded, the glow of soft lights bobbing like faeries around him. But his reason told him that these sensations were genuine, that his legs ached from ceaseless activity and his eyes still burned from the close call with a phosphorus grenade the day before. Officers walked nearby, their reassuring whispers easing fears, their carefully policed flashlights casting dancing shadows on the dirt and fractured concrete below their feet. No, this was real, as real as the pain from the open blisters on his feet and the gritty shrapnel dust in his hair.

He tried to ignore the feeling of unease, that prickling sensation that rumored that he was but a puppet in a vast choreographed dance. The theologian in him began to draw a smirk to his face, but weariness squelched it before it left his mind. The soldier in him hated that idea.

Around him in the darkness, hundreds, maybe thousands, marched silently, rugged boots thudding softly on the pavement, rifle straps and buckles muffled to a sullen clinking of muted metal by bits of cloth. Their officers hadn’t needed to impress upon them the gravity of the situation to ensure silence; fatigue did that, as did fear and the incalculable weariness of combat. The militiamen and their American allies couldn’t have laughed had they tried.

To the north, a terrible and momentary false dawn lit the clouds with scathing brightness. A thundering, rolling rumble echoed through the soil moments later. Then another flash split the sky, followed by another and another—a rain of fire coupled with delayed cracks of thunderous violence. Gibson looked as around him weary faces gazed skywards, eyes twitching from the constant assault of light, mouths opened with wonder. The officers prodded the stragglers with harsh whispers, yet even they found themselves entranced by the sheer spectacle. The artillery roared and thundered and shouted with abandon. Gibson’s ears rang with the cacophonous diatribe. Diversion, they called it; feinted attack for strategic withdrawal, yet he called it the dawn of the reign of Hephaestus: an empire of ash, a kingdom of fire—

 And then, without warning, there it was. The wisp of memory, half-imagined fragment tormenting him with thoughts of predestination, leaped fully-formed from his mind. A young girl, laughing, danced down the boulevard of his thoughts. The smell of charcoal mingled with the wisps of smoke from sparklers. It was the Fourth, the Fourth of July, a particular year from his youth; his younger siblings laughed and danced and cheered as each new firework exploded brilliantly in smoke-obscured sky.

But he stood apart, smugly content in his scrawny male adolescence. He dreamed, but not of independence. He carried a lawn chair, slung across his shoulder like a rifle; manicured grass faded into the bitter snowdrifts of Chosin. He imagined each concussion as an airburst of a shell; he closed his eyes to blot out the garish festive colors.

“Eddie? What’s wrong?”

His father had noticed his silence as the boy stalked the sidewalk ahead of rest of his family. Five meter spacing, his dream self said. Keep the platoon widely spread to prevent heavy grenade casualties. He responded quietly.

“No, dad, nothing’s wrong. I’m just enjoying the fireworks.”

His father laughed.

“Well, typically, Ed, you actually watch them. You know, with your eyes. I’ve heard that they look a lot better that way.”

The young man smiled slightly.

“Sure, dad. I’ll keep that in mind.”

On the darkened road in Kaduna, Edward Gibson wished this moment would last forever. He grasped tightly to the recollection—the sounds of his siblings shouting and mother laughing and the neighbor’s dog barking in a frenzy at the cacophonous skybursts—yet still it faded. The half-remembered scent of charcoal disappeared into the pungent odor of burning cordite and superheated brass; the lawn chair on his shoulder melted away into his rifle; sooty fatigues replaced his youthful t-shirt. The memory vanished as it had come, and he was alone.

On the shore of the river, the artillerymen continued their deadly duel with their counterparts north of the city. They stood resolute near their guns, night blind and deafened by each concussion. Whistling shells leaped into their midst from enemy counter-battery fire, and from time to time a gun would vanish in an explosive death of twisted metal and shrapnel. Yet the marching lines continued to dwindle into the distance, passage assured by the death of each man at his gun.

A young Nigerian near Gibson, scarcely a teenager, began to whisper under his breath, words half-formed and almost inaudible. A nearby soldier joined him, and the fragments of a tune floated in the breeze, sung in the hoarsest of whispers by men with parched, smoke-choked throats. And yet it was beautiful.

“The minstrel boy, to the war has gone, in the ranks of death you’ll find him….”

Several more took up the song, voices quavering just above a whisper, the soft thud of boots providing a percussive accompaniment.

“His father’s sword he hath girded on, and his wild harp slung behind him….”

The officers looked silently from man to man. The moonlight revealed tears tracing down the cheek of the captain.

“’Land of Song!’ said the warrior bard, ‘tho’ all the world betrays thee, one sword at least thy rights shall guard, one faithful harp shall praise thee!’”

Gibson closed his eyes to block out the garish lights; he felt each flash against his eyelids. All around, he could hear the sound of fireworks.

The Siren's Song

It was not the first time the boy heard an Orphean dirge.

It began with a whispered cadence, the softest of consonants drifting in the air. The rumbling of orbital artillery punctuated each repetition as the rhythm of words began to assert itself, assonant syllables accented by poignant pause. The chemical fire to the boy’s right crackled loudly for a moment as a gust of wind buffeted it; he could taste the acrid smoke coating his nose and throat.

What seemed like mere moments before, the air had buzzed with a thousand martial sounds, screams of the dying mingling with the hellish shuddering whine of railguns. The boy lay behind crumbling printcrete, shaking as each massive round tore the air with fierce cracks. He hadn’t fired his rifle; it seemed futile, even vulgar. In the sky above, the thick black clouds roiled angrily and suddenly split asunder as a series of shots streaked down from orbit. A building vanished into an expanding cloud of debris; a moment later, the thunderclap reached him, punching him in the chest and driving him closer to his slab. He shut his eyes tightly to hide the images of anguished figures silhouetted against the flames. In the eternal purple twilight, the scurrying humanoid shapes seemed more wraith than man.

Oh father! We war against spirits, not men; how can we kill a ghost?

*   *   *

It was only two years before that an Orphean delegation had first returned to their ancestral home. Sons and daughters of the Arks, their ancestors had left the Earth behind. Some were religious visionaries, yearning for a new world to birth their utopian dreams; some were political dissidents, fleeing their oppressors; some were wanderers, desperate to sate that all-consuming evolutionary urge to crest the next hill. The world they chose as their own was barren and cold, atmospheres thin and sunlight weak. Years passed as the terraformers worked their craft, while the thousands of colonists waited in the ships, confined by harsh corridors of metal, segregated into ghettoes of distrustful factions. Patiently they waited, and while they waited they sang. Their songs brought them through their tribulation; their songs gave their new home its name: Orphea. And when the air grew warm enough and the rivers grew large enough and the plants grew strong enough they left their orbiting prisons and came to Orphea, their feet touching new rock and their lungs breathing new air. But they never forgot their songs—a living memory of the suffering they had endured.

A century passed before the men of Earth stumbled across Orphea, so isolated was she by vast clouds of interstellar dust and the sun’s potent radiation. Some among the decadent nations of Earth, burdened by often-unprofitable colonies, resolved that Orphea would provide them with their salvation. Brasilia dispatched a cruiser to carry a delegation back to Earth, eager to impress upon the Orpheans the benefits of submitting to the paternal wisdom of the Federation.

And so it was by this chance collision of peoples that the boy found himself standing amongst a crowd of hundreds of thousands. Inside the National Congress, the Orpheans spoke in secret with the vast array of senators and deputies; outside, the crowd remained strangely hushed.

When the doors of the Congress opened, even the barest whispers of the crowd died. Three Orpheans appeared, two women and one man, dressed in stately silver robes which caught the sun like wavelets in a pond. The foremost woman walked with a gait both proud and tired, and her straight black hair starkly contrasted against her white-pale skin. Her eyes betrayed a lifetime lived in darkness and twilight, and tears sprang from them as she resolutely resisted the impulse to shield herself from the unfamiliar sun. The Orpheans never showed sign of weakness.

The woman clasped her hands before her and said nothing as she descended the long ramp, flanked now by security officers. The crowd watched her careful descent in an eerie stillness, cowed before her powerful presence and the solemnity of her gaze. Finally, at the bottom of the ramp, she halted and spread her arms wide, palms upturned and eyes closed. Tears, now of emotion rather than the assault of the sun, dropped from her cheeks to the sides of her slender neck. She opened her mouth and the boy’s world dissolved into her song.

The crowd seemed to vanish before him, leaving nothing in his vision but the Orpheans—or rather, her. The song that emerged from her lips defied language: to call it music would pervert it. Her mournful sweeping tonality wove a world into being, as real as the fabric of her robes, and he felt its strands crystallize into images in his mind. He saw Orphea laid before him like an ochre gem, narrow winding rivers tracing the surface like veins in marble. His toes scratched the planet’s gray-brown dust; his eyes drank in meandering ribbons of shimmering and giggling color framed by starless sky. He wept as he saw dim twilight turn to murky dusk and back again, and he laughed with joy as he saw the indomitable Orpheans beat back the night with glistening cities, scattered oases of light. He did not know how long she sang, or what words she spoke. The Orpheans knew that she mourned the end of peace between their long-lost cousin peoples; the boy heard an irresistible song of love.

His mother wept when he told her that he would enlist to join the military invasion of Orphea; his father grudgingly accepted that his son might yet prove a man. Neither would have understood had he explained his reason: he alone could comprehend the intense yearning to hear that melody again. And so he endured the brutality of training, the arduous voyage aboard a crowded fleet carrier, the eternal twilight of Orphea, the murderous fury of the resistance—all with the hope that perhaps he would again experience that glorious sound. The only song he heard was the wailing of the dying.

*   *   *

The boy pressed his cheek against the dirty street and shut his eyes, trying to forget the visions of devastation. One of his friends lay nearby, sightless eyes staring into the Stygian darkness. The buzzing rounds and echoing thumps of the orbital barrage had faded away; the railguns had one by one fallen silent as soldiers died at their posts. Several large vehicles burned ferociously nearby, fiery tongues licking the purple sky and spewing angry clouds of smoke. It was quiet now, but for the first murmurings of the song.

A new voice joined, raw emotion accenting the soaring tones. The very notes seemed to ache with grief and with loss; she seemed to hold back tears with every breath. He could not understand the words, but he knew exactly what she said. Grief needs no translation.

The boy’s dark, wet blood seeped down the road in slow rivulets.

A muscle spasm shook his whole body with convulsions, and when it ended, he felt weak, so weak that he could barely keep his eyes open. His vision slowly dulled, the dim twilight above him growing darker with each passing moment. The ragged wound in his abdomen hurt less than he expected. He found that he could not move his arms, and so with effort he lolled his head to the side to look down the street. More of his platoon lay strewn across the pavement, their remains littered with blood-slick debris. And walking among the dead were the wraith-like forms of Orpheans.

Their pale skin contrasted sharply with their dark coats, and they seemed to fade in and out of clouds of smoke that twisted in the harsh wind. They knelt at each of the fallen, pausing for a moment before continuing, while others lifted weapons from where they lay. One figure detached from the group and approached the boy, face hidden by a dark mask. Horrified, he tried to defend his presence on their soil, shouting aloud that he was there out of love, that he did not want a war any more than they did—but all that emerged from his mouth was a wheezing cry that ended in a choking cough. As the ghostly form approached, it resolved into the graceful curves of a woman; as she lifted her mask, he saw a face lined with sorrow. She knelt by his side, glancing at his mortal wound, and brushed her fingers across his cheek with motherly compassion. He wept.

And suddenly, a new song emerged, escaping from the woman’s throat like an uncaged dove. The song enveloped him and lifted him away from soot-stained slab of printcrete. He could taste the soul of Orphea itself. The auroras danced, and he danced with them. Hikaru opened his eyes and gazed into the vibrant face of the singer. A slow smile crossed his lips as the last, quivering breath left his lungs.

This time, she sang for him.

The Siren’s Song

It was not the first time the boy heard an Orphean dirge.

It began with a whispered cadence, the softest of consonants drifting in the air. The rumbling of orbital artillery punctuated each repetition as the rhythm of words began to assert itself, assonant syllables accented by poignant pause. The chemical fire to the boy’s right crackled loudly for a moment as a gust of wind buffeted it; he could taste the acrid smoke coating his nose and throat.

What seemed like mere moments before, the air had buzzed with a thousand martial sounds, screams of the dying mingling with the hellish shuddering whine of railguns. The boy lay behind crumbling printcrete, shaking as each massive round tore the air with fierce cracks. He hadn’t fired his rifle; it seemed futile, even vulgar. In the sky above, the thick black clouds roiled angrily and suddenly split asunder as a series of shots streaked down from orbit. A building vanished into an expanding cloud of debris; a moment later, the thunderclap reached him, punching him in the chest and driving him closer to his slab. He shut his eyes tightly to hide the images of anguished figures silhouetted against the flames. In the eternal purple twilight, the scurrying humanoid shapes seemed more wraith than man.

Oh father! We war against spirits, not men; how can we kill a ghost?

*   *   *

It was only two years before that an Orphean delegation had first returned to their ancestral home. Sons and daughters of the Arks, their ancestors had left the Earth behind. Some were religious visionaries, yearning for a new world to birth their utopian dreams; some were political dissidents, fleeing their oppressors; some were wanderers, desperate to sate that all-consuming evolutionary urge to crest the next hill. The world they chose as their own was barren and cold, atmospheres thin and sunlight weak. Years passed as the terraformers worked their craft, while the thousands of colonists waited in the ships, confined by harsh corridors of metal, segregated into ghettoes of distrustful factions. Patiently they waited, and while they waited they sang. Their songs brought them through their tribulation; their songs gave their new home its name: Orphea. And when the air grew warm enough and the rivers grew large enough and the plants grew strong enough they left their orbiting prisons and came to Orphea, their feet touching new rock and their lungs breathing new air. But they never forgot their songs—a living memory of the suffering they had endured.

A century passed before the men of Earth stumbled across Orphea, so isolated was she by vast clouds of interstellar dust and the sun’s potent radiation. Some among the decadent nations of Earth, burdened by often-unprofitable colonies, resolved that Orphea would provide them with their salvation. Brasilia dispatched a cruiser to carry a delegation back to Earth, eager to impress upon the Orpheans the benefits of submitting to the paternal wisdom of the Federation.

And so it was by this chance collision of peoples that the boy found himself standing amongst a crowd of hundreds of thousands. Inside the National Congress, the Orpheans spoke in secret with the vast array of senators and deputies; outside, the crowd remained strangely hushed.

When the doors of the Congress opened, even the barest whispers of the crowd died. Three Orpheans appeared, two women and one man, dressed in stately silver robes which caught the sun like wavelets in a pond. The foremost woman walked with a gait both proud and tired, and her straight black hair starkly contrasted against her white-pale skin. Her eyes betrayed a lifetime lived in darkness and twilight, and tears sprang from them as she resolutely resisted the impulse to shield herself from the unfamiliar sun. The Orpheans never showed sign of weakness.

The woman clasped her hands before her and said nothing as she descended the long ramp, flanked now by security officers. The crowd watched her careful descent in an eerie stillness, cowed before her powerful presence and the solemnity of her gaze. Finally, at the bottom of the ramp, she halted and spread her arms wide, palms upturned and eyes closed. Tears, now of emotion rather than the assault of the sun, dropped from her cheeks to the sides of her slender neck. She opened her mouth and the boy’s world dissolved into her song.

The crowd seemed to vanish before him, leaving nothing in his vision but the Orpheans—or rather, her. The song that emerged from her lips defied language: to call it music would pervert it. Her mournful sweeping tonality wove a world into being, as real as the fabric of her robes, and he felt its strands crystallize into images in his mind. He saw Orphea laid before him like an ochre gem, narrow winding rivers tracing the surface like veins in marble. His toes scratched the planet’s gray-brown dust; his eyes drank in meandering ribbons of shimmering and giggling color framed by starless sky. He wept as he saw dim twilight turn to murky dusk and back again, and he laughed with joy as he saw the indomitable Orpheans beat back the night with glistening cities, scattered oases of light. He did not know how long she sang, or what words she spoke. The Orpheans knew that she mourned the end of peace between their long-lost cousin peoples; the boy heard an irresistible song of love.

His mother wept when he told her that he would enlist to join the military invasion of Orphea; his father grudgingly accepted that his son might yet prove a man. Neither would have understood had he explained his reason: he alone could comprehend the intense yearning to hear that melody again. And so he endured the brutality of training, the arduous voyage aboard a crowded fleet carrier, the eternal twilight of Orphea, the murderous fury of the resistance—all with the hope that perhaps he would again experience that glorious sound. The only song he heard was the wailing of the dying.

*   *   *

The boy pressed his cheek against the dirty street and shut his eyes, trying to forget the visions of devastation. One of his friends lay nearby, sightless eyes staring into the Stygian darkness. The buzzing rounds and echoing thumps of the orbital barrage had faded away; the railguns had one by one fallen silent as soldiers died at their posts. Several large vehicles burned ferociously nearby, fiery tongues licking the purple sky and spewing angry clouds of smoke. It was quiet now, but for the first murmurings of the song.

A new voice joined, raw emotion accenting the soaring tones. The very notes seemed to ache with grief and with loss; she seemed to hold back tears with every breath. He could not understand the words, but he knew exactly what she said. Grief needs no translation.

The boy’s dark, wet blood seeped down the road in slow rivulets.

A muscle spasm shook his whole body with convulsions, and when it ended, he felt weak, so weak that he could barely keep his eyes open. His vision slowly dulled, the dim twilight above him growing darker with each passing moment. The ragged wound in his abdomen hurt less than he expected. He found that he could not move his arms, and so with effort he lolled his head to the side to look down the street. More of his platoon lay strewn across the pavement, their remains littered with blood-slick debris. And walking among the dead were the wraith-like forms of Orpheans.

Their pale skin contrasted sharply with their dark coats, and they seemed to fade in and out of clouds of smoke that twisted in the harsh wind. They knelt at each of the fallen, pausing for a moment before continuing, while others lifted weapons from where they lay. One figure detached from the group and approached the boy, face hidden by a dark mask. Horrified, he tried to defend his presence on their soil, shouting aloud that he was there out of love, that he did not want a war any more than they did—but all that emerged from his mouth was a wheezing cry that ended in a choking cough. As the ghostly form approached, it resolved into the graceful curves of a woman; as she lifted her mask, he saw a face lined with sorrow. She knelt by his side, glancing at his mortal wound, and brushed her fingers across his cheek with motherly compassion. He wept.

And suddenly, a new song emerged, escaping from the woman’s throat like an uncaged dove. The song enveloped him and lifted him away from soot-stained slab of printcrete. He could taste the soul of Orphea itself. The auroras danced, and he danced with them. Hikaru opened his eyes and gazed into the vibrant face of the singer. A slow smile crossed his lips as the last, quivering breath left his lungs.

This time, she sang for him.