The Anomaly Volume One The Battle for the Known UnknownChapter 17
- 3 years ago
- 21
- 0
Judgement - 3754 A.D.
Although the previous three years of military training had been hard and unrelenting, Isaac would have gladly exchanged the year-long flight in the overcrowded troop carrier Judgment for many more years in the space colony of Paradise. There was little relief and a great deal more discomfort in the space ship. The only distraction to the many hours of enforced rest on a five-level bunk bed in the dormitory was regular military practise.
The chapel and mess room were the only other places where there was any reprieve from his third level bunk where sleep was his only and most elusive pleasure. His guilt for enjoying such fleeting relaxation was assuaged by the words of the Lord in The Book of Psalms Chapter Four Verse Eight: "I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep: for thou, LORD, only makest me dwell in safety".
Isaac needed the comfort of the Lord's words ever more as he increasingly yearned for the security of Holy Trinity, the company of his children and, most of all, the love of his wife, Rebecca. This last brought him the most anguish. He'd always been very proper with his wife. Their snatched moments of intimacy had always been with the intention and that alone of bringing more children to the world to serve the Lord. It troubled him that Jesus Christ said in Chapter Twenty Verse Thirty-five of The Gospel According to Saint Luke "But they which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage." It troubled Isaac also to know that it was said in Chapter Two Verse Sixteen of The First Epistle General of John: "For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world." But he also knew that the Lord implored the descendants of Noah in Chapter Nine Verse Seven of The First Book of Moses Called Genesis to "be ye fruitful, and multiply; bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein."
Surely Isaac was committing no sin by his desire to be by his wife's side.
He was also bothered by the persistent erection that accompanied his sleepless sojourns whenever he contemplated his wife. He was forbidden from touching his penis to relieve himself, but resisting such temptation was a daily struggle which even the well-memorised words of Holy Scripture couldn't entirely banish.
Every day, the Chaplain selected quotations from scripture that he and the other Soldiers of Christ had to read and reflect upon. These mostly came from the Book of Revelations and were no less obscure and confusing now than they had ever been, although Isaac was sure that these verses were selected to steel his resolve to thwart the evil of the Anomaly.
Just what did Saint John the Divine mean in Chapter Seventeen Verses Four and Five: "And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication: And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH."
And just how was this Anomaly associated with the numerical mysticism of Chapter Thirteen Verse Eighteen where it was said: "Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six."
His slumbers were not made any easier by the fact that there was no artificial gravity on the Judgement and that his fellow crusaders had to strap him to his bunk bed so that he wouldn't float away.
The only times that Isaac experienced anything like standard gravity was in the cramped and sweaty exercise chambers where the military exercises were unrelenting and fatiguing. They were principally designed to keep the crusaders fit and to prevent their muscles from atrophying. As there wasn't enough space on the space ship, the physical exercise was within specially designed virtual environments. This was Isaac's first exposure to virtual space. Because it was considered a sinful distraction, it wasn't accessible on Holy Trinity but was nevertheless reluctantly permitted on the Judgement. The virtual world was even less pleasant than real life. In fact, the most realistic element by far was the pain simulation. The setting was of a series of combat situations in which his virtual enemies were attired in the dress of the infidels and heretics he'd got to know as his fellow crusaders. It might be satisfying to immolate a Muslim infidel or to squeeze out the eyes of a Hindu devil, but the enemy he would soon confront wouldn't be such an infidel. In fact, they would be his reluctant allies. And their common foe would be atheists and maybe even aliens. Still, it was a salutary reminder to Isaac that there would be the unfinished business of cleansing the Solar System of heathens after the Anomaly was annihilated.
The Judgement was an ancient seven hundred year old craft that lacked almost every modern comfort. Its life support system was pared down to the bare minimum even though it carried three times as many soldiers as it was designed for. The atmosphere was thin, the rations were meagre and, worst of all, the quantity of fuel it carried was only just sufficient to take the craft to its destination. Only if the crusaders succeeded in their mission and took control of the atheist craft was there any possibility of returning home. And this would only be after the threat from the Anomaly had been eliminated.
There were hundreds of other space craft similar to the Judgement that had been brought back into full service after centuries of neglect. They were all hidden from the prying eyes of the Interplanetary Union by cloaking devices generated by the only modern space ship that was accompanying the mission. This was the relatively sophisticated battleship Enlightenment, whose name was sufficiently neutral to accommodate the range of competing faiths that for the first time in history were united on this one mission. The Enlightenment was the only space ship with enough antimatter fuel to make the return journey. It also carried all the senior military officers and the many senior clerics, priests, imams and rabbis.
Every day was noted by a countdown of the number of days remaining until the fleet would rendezvous with its target. Isaac privately cheered, as did all his fellows, when the count was at last reduced to double digits. But when the count became a relentlessly dwindling single digit, his joy was overshadowed by anxiety. All too soon he would be risking sudden death when his military training was put to practical use. And were the atheists as truly as evil as they were portrayed: if his death wasn't sudden then it would be after protracted and agonising torture. That, after all, was the punishment planned for the atheists. It was unlikely that unbelievers should be any more compassionate than the crusaders, jihadists and other holy warriors.
On the morning of the penultimate day, when the countdown was just two more days, the lesson provided from the Book of Revelations Chapter Twenty-two Verses Thirteen to Fifteen read: "I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city. For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie."
This was followed the next day by a lesson from the final five verses of the Holy Scripture, which culminated in the Lord's promise that: "The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen."
"Amen," repeated Isaac, as he shuffled in a long line with his fellow crusaders into the small landing craft that would take him and twenty others to the atheist craft which, with the blessing of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, they would soon seize control.
Isaac had never been inside the invasion pod before. These vehicles were considerably more modern than the Judgement and, except for a glimpse of the Enlightenment, represented the most modern space craft Isaac had ever seen. Although many corners had been cut to feed and quarter the crusaders, there was no such parsimony with regards to the military hardware. The landing pods, like the cloaking devices employed by the Enlightenment, were of the most modern design. They had to be if there was to be any possibility of the mission succeeding.
Although Isaac was crammed shoulder to shoulder into a pod designed for fewer than half the number of occupants, everything else about the craft was of superior quality. The empty space outside was displayed to the crew by high definition holographic graphics. It also broadcast a voice message from the Archdeacon who implored his congregation not to dishonour their faith and to be prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice.
The panoramic spacescape captivated Isaac. He'd never before seen space so clearly and vividly. Images were forbidden on Holy Trinity for it was said in Chapter Forty-two Verse Seventeen of The Book of the Prophet Isaiah: "They shall be turned back, they shall be greatly ashamed, that trust in graven images." Indeed, before Isaac participated in virtual training he'd never seen a holographic, let alone a graven, image. Space was much more awe-inspiring and disquieting than Isaac ever imagined. It extended in all directions as did the light from the billions of stars that could be seen in a space unmediated by atmosphere. There was no evidence of the hundreds of ships in the crusader fleet. These would remain invisible until the stealth devices were compromised by the launch of thousands of landing pods towards the enemy vessel.
Of the many bright spots in the sky, one was only slightly larger than the others but shone much more brightly. This was the Sun that in Mercury orbit was so huge and so fearsome that it would immediately blind anyone who gazed upon it.
The most awe-inspiring sight to meet Isaac's eyes was not so much the bleak emptiness of space and the distant Sun, but the enemy space ship that was glistening in the starlight. It was a featureless cylindrical cone that must have measured several kilometres in length. Its computer systems were as yet still unaware of the military force gathered outside. The crew and passengers were smugly oblivious to the fact that the atheist space ship wasn't the only manmade object this far out in space from the Solar System's ecliptic plane.
The countdown began. There were a whole three hundred seconds of waiting until the simultaneous launch of what was hoped to be an overwhelming invasion force would burst out from the cloak of invisibility that had been maintained around it for over a year.
These three hundred seconds passed painfully slowly at first but appeared to pass more rapidly as the launch came inexorably closer. Sixty seconds. Fifty seconds. And then all too soon the countdown ticked off one single digit after another towards the inevitable zero. There was then an abrupt thrust upwards at a rate of acceleration that was at least as great as any Isaac had endured in the gravity simulators on Paradise. His body and head were pinned back against the seat into which he was strapped as the pod broke free and accelerated towards the atheist space ship.
Despite the intense agony that the effort cost him, Isaac kept his eyes open in the long seconds that followed. The previously calm holographic spacescape erupted into sudden brilliance as thousands of landing pods and hundreds of space ships burst into view. The cloaking device could no longer function now its surface had been so spectacularly breached. Isaac proudly, if briefly, surveyed the valiant crusading fleet. And at its heart was the sleek and impressive battle cruiser from which the senior clerics were coordinating the invasion fleet.
Intrepid - 3754 C.E. If she were ever asked, Nadezhda Kerensky would describe herself as an essentially monogamous woman. She didn't have the desire or ambition to take on more than one lover. Surely that was all she ever needed. Nadezhda was a romantic soul. She continued to believe that one day there would be an occasion where she'd meet the one woman who'd be her partner for the rest of her life. She once thought that her ex-wife, Veronika, was to be that one woman but she no longer...
Intrepid - 3754 C.E. Ever since he'd got married to Beatrice, Paul had tried to resist the temptation to visit Nudeworld. It no longer had quite the same attraction as before. It wasn't that Paul didn't visit cyberspace any more. He still enjoyed going to places and meeting people that could only ever be encountered in virtual reality, but he mostly avoided sexual encounters. He preferred to be free from even virtual guilt when he and Beatrice made love. But the truth was that he was more...
Intrepid - 3754 C.E. Beatrice licked her fingers lasciviously as she savoured the sour taste of Captain Kerensky's vaginal juices and smiled seductively at her lover. The captain gasped. Her eyes shone bright. She shuddered with a final orgasmic spasm from the frenzied sex she was enjoying with Paul's wife. Beatrice's tongue was still moist from the lovers' commingled saliva and the juicy evidence of passion dripped from her vagina. Nadezhda had made love with many women in her hundred...
Mars - 3752 C.E. The gust of wind that blew over the red soil picked up a fistful of red dust and brushed it against Colonel Vashti's visor. Through the scattered grains, she was able to admire a landscape that was both splendidly barren and untidily littered with the detritus of war. A tank that had sunk inside a crater was weathered by wind rather than rusted by oxygen, even though it was many centuries since it had been attacked. The burnt out hulks of space craft were scattered about...
Godwin - 3749 C.E. "Frankly," said the consultant as he hovered cross-legged in the air beside Paul, "you're not doing especially well for a man of your age." "What do you mean?" Paul asked nervously. The doctor consulted the holo-manual at eye level by his side. "You're nearly eighty years old, aren't you? That's an age that might once have been considered relatively old. We would normally expect someone of your age to be perhaps thirty to forty percent bio-plastic. But you are...
Intrepid - 3754 C.E. There is almost no incident more serious than when the space ship of which you are captain has been attacked and boarded. And as captain of the Space Ship Intrepid, Nadezhda Kerensky knew that what was required was an emergency meeting for everyone aboard. It wouldn't be enough to simply broadcast a statement. There had to be a full and proper discussion of everything that had happened. But this was also something that the captain had never had to do before. It was...
It was no surprise at all to Vashti that taking control of the space ship Intrepid had been so effortless. Humans were such simple animals. All she had to do was take control of the command structure and the crew and passengers were easily persuaded to follow orders. The few cases of dissent were regrettable and only to be expected, but they were easy to identify and deal with. Human history showed time after time that command structures of sometimes appalling stupidity and gross cruelty had...
The small craft of which Colonel Vashti was the pilot weaved in and out of the relentless barrage of hostile laser fire that streamed towards her from the approaching fighter jets. The moment she failed to avoid being hit would be the moment when her craft would be no more and her mission terminated. Although her firepower was outmatched by the weaponry set against it, she made sure that each one of the laser-propelled missiles she launched hit its target. All around and ahead was the...
Paul had never shown much interest in the other passengers and crew of the Intrepid in all the months since he first boarded the space ship. He didn't feel comfortable in the company of soldiers, he didn't need to see the crew very often, and there were no other computer archaeologists amongst the scientists. He was more than happy in his own company and, of course, that of Beatrice. What more did he ever need? Not a lot, Paul mostly believed, but lately Beatrice had been spending rather...
Intrepid - 3756 C.E. Despite her being imprisoned within an impenetrable force field, Beatrice was still able to monitor the Intrepid's steady progress towards the Anomaly. Because she had an entire Proxima Centauri space fleet at her disposal, she could do this rather more comprehensively than anyone else on the space ship with the obvious exception of Colonel Vashti. There was a long time in which Beatrice could prepare for the expected time of arrival at the Anomaly. There wasn't much...
Intrepid - 3754 A.D. Naked and hairless. The shame of it. Isaac had never been so since he was a baby. The humiliation was torment in itself. But Isaac could comfort himself that he wasn't the only one so demeaned. All around him and equally immobilised on the grassy lawns of this strange Elysian but Godless world were others like him: defeated, dishonoured and similarly paralysed. He could move his eyes. He could breathe. But he couldn't move his limbs and he could mouth words with only...
Chomsky - 3750 C.E. "Marriage," repeated Comrade Doctorow incredulously. "Are you telling me you've never heard of the institution of marriage?" "Well, yes," said Paul. "I've heard of it. There's no way I couldn't have heard of it after having studied so much about the third millennium. It's just not something practised on Godwin." "You know nothing about matrimony between two people who love one another?" wondered Comrade Leopold Doctorow. "You know nothing about husbands...
Hygiea - 3751 C.E. Paul and Beatrice were no longer welcome on board the Ulysses after the explosion had wrecked so much of the space ship. As soon as the captain was made aware that the target of the explosion was his two Kuiper Belt passengers he could no longer tolerate their continued presence on his ship. They were evidently a security risk of the first magnitude to not only themselves but everyone else besides. Furthermore, as fully a quarter of the ship was now deemed unsuitable for...
When Captain Kerensky was offered the opportunity to be captain of an Interplanetary Space Ship, she welcomed it full-heartedly. It was exactly the distraction she needed so soon after the messy fallout accompanying her divorce from Veronika. The heartache and acrimony that accompanied their separation had driven Nadezhda to the psychotherapist's couch for the first time in her life. She'd been anxious whether this admission of human frailty might lessen her eligibility for such a...
Paradise - 3751 C.E. The space station may have been christened Paradise, although it hadn't always been known by that name, but even Isaac knew that the real paradise to which he expected to ascend would never be like this. This eight hundred year old space colony in the war-torn Meteorite Belt could never deserve such a name. But for Isaac and the several thousand other would-be martyrs from all corners of the Solar System it would be home for the year or so it would take them to prepare...
The Moon - 3751 C.E. The Moon was the most substantial celestial body Paul had ever trodden on in all his eighty years of life in the Solar System. When Paul stepped out of the Milton's shuttle and onto the Moon's surface, his body was directly subject to a gravitational force that was just one sixth to what he was used to. Nevertheless, walking on the Moon was hardly effortless. Ungainly was the best description of Paul's forward locomotion when he tumbled face downwards onto the...
Ecstasy - 3750 C.E. The flight from Godwin to the colony of Ecstasy in Neptune orbit marked the first time that Paul had ever left the comforts of his cylindrical world. And this first stage of his journey to Earth alone would take over three months. Although such a voyage was something he'd always dreamed of, it really wasn't especially enjoyable. The lengthy and incapacitating process of the skeletal refit prescribed by his doctor confined him to his room for the first half of the flight...
Holy Trinity - 3750 A.D. It was Wednesday on Holy Trinity. This was one of the two days of the week—the other, of course, being Sunday—that was designated an Energy Saving Day. Despite being in Mercury orbit and well bathed in sunlight from the nearby presence of the Sun, the Archdeacon and the Chief Pastors had deemed that the energy expenditure of the colony's burgeoning population couldn't be squandered on more than five days of daylight each week. Isaac was tending the small garden...
Ulysses - 3751 C.E. It only when the space ship Ulysses had travelled far enough from the Schmidt Republic that it appeared as nothing more than a tiny dot in the distance that Paul and Beatrice received a visit from Lieutenant Korolyov. He introduced himself as the Interplanetary Union military officer whose assignment was to ensure that the couple would arrive safely on Earth. He was a Saturnian, as were most Interplanetary Union officers in this part of the Solar System, and in common...
Intrepid - 3754 C.E. "It's beautiful here, isn't it!" exclaimed Beatrice who squeezed Paul's hand in hers as they walked through a park not far from their home on the Intrepid's outermost level. Paul squeezed her hand in return. He gazed lovingly into her eyes. What he wanted to say was that the park was nothing like as beautiful as she was, but although she was his wife and they made love so often together he still didn't find it easy to say such things to a real woman. This was odd...
When Colonel Vashti strolled into the living room where Beatrice was sitting, it was no surprise to her at all to see the android staring ahead of her with an expression of intense concentration. Beatrice turned her head round to face the colonel. "Would you mind telling me what has just happened?" she asked. Colonel Vashti smiled. "You don't know, do you?" "One moment there was nothing out of the usual. The next moment there were strong indications of the presence of a Sirius space...
Milton - 3751 C.E. It was the couple's good fortune that the only space ship Lieutenant Korolyov could provide for Paul and Beatrice at short notice for their journey onto Earth was the Ambassadorial Cruise Ship, SS Milton. The luxury space ship was diverted from its journey from Jupiter orbit to the Asteroid Belt to carry the diplomatic baggage that was considered too great a risk for any commercial ship that travelled across the Solar System. The few diplomats and ambassadors aboard the...
Intrepid - 3754 C.E. "Isaac, isn't it?" the Special Operations Officer asked the naked man sitting on a chair opposite him and who was gently restrained by a low intensity force field. "And where do you come from exactly?" The Holy Crusader might have been defeated but he retained his pride and dignity, despite the humiliation of his continued nudity. "Why should I tell you that?" he responded defiantly. "A fair question," said Emmanuel reasonably. "There's no penalty for...
The Moon - 3751 C.E. "It's just not fair," said the overweight man who was hovering above the ground beside Paul. "I've lived on the Moon all my life. Every year for well over a century, I've applied for a visa to visit Earth. I've entered competitions. I've applied for special permits. I've offered an obscene amount of money. And then someone like you—who comes from the fucking Kuiper Belt, from an anarchist colony no one's ever heard of—gets to go to Earth after no more than a...
Schmidt - 3750 C.E. "Schmidt?" Paul wondered. "Why are we stopping at Schmidt? And why is the colony called that anyway. Was there ever a famous Schmidt?" "I'm sure there was," said the captain of the space cruiser. "And I'm sure there are many Schmidts who are worthy to have a colony named after them. This colony, however, is named after Ronald Schmidt, the current hereditary president of the colony." "Hereditary president?" Beatrice wondered. "Isn't that exactly the same as...
Intrepid - 3754 C.E. Captain Kerensky had good reason to feel satisfied. The Interplanetary Space Ship Intrepid was safe and secure. Every surviving crusader and jihadist of the Holy Coalition had been apprehended, interrogated and processed. The Intrepid was continuing on its voyage to the furthest reaches of the Solar System as originally scheduled. The space ship had taken a battering, but there had been an almost total recovery. The Holy Coalition space pods attached like acne boils to...
Intrepid - 3756 C.E. "Why are you so anxious?" Beatrice gently asked Paul while he lay beside her. "Are we really going to enter the Anomaly?" her husband asked. "If that's what Captain Kerensky said then I can only believe that's exactly what the Intrepid, and us in it as well, will do." "I thought that was something we would never do," said Paul. "I thought that it would be suicide to enter the Anomaly." "I'm sure neither Mission Control nor Captain Kerensky would ever...
Although Captain Kerensky thought otherwise, the one person on the Intrepid who more than any other was a mere spectator since the Intrepid entered the Anomaly was Beatrice. And she was also imprisoned within an invisible force field where she was unable to communicate with either human or robot. Beatrice witnessed the same Apparitions as everyone else, but they meant little to her. A charging buffalo stormed towards the villa churning up the lawn as it did so. And then it vanished. A small...
As if things weren't already weird enough for Paul, they were about to get a whole lot worse. He was already fairly sure that it hadn't been such a great idea that the Intrepid should enter the Anomaly, however much Beatrice argued that it must be worthwhile if Mission Control had authorised it and Captain Kerensky had let it happen. All those senior officers, especially the Chief Science Officer, couldn't all be mistaken, could they? As Paul rarely spoke to anyone other than Beatrice he...
It was now over a month since the Intrepid plunged into the Anomaly and Paul was no more relaxed about it than he was before despite Beatrice's constant reassurances. What troubled him most wasn't just what was going to happen to him now that he was inside the Anomaly but whether he'd ever return to the universe he came from. "I look at the bulletin boards every day and read each and every the scientific report," Paul told Beatrice who was sitting beside him, "and I've still seen...
Zhou - 3756 C.E. Peripheral Operations Co-ordinator Zhou and the space craft in which it travelled were in actual fact a single individual. The whole entity might be relatively small and mostly consisted of engine, but the central processing unit made no distinction between its independently autonomous components and that part of the machine dedicated exclusively to space travel. This enabled the entire entity to operate at maximum efficiency whether it was travelling through space or...
Anger. Frustration. Humiliation. These were just a few of the emotions Nadezhda was feeling as she reviewed her helpless situation. Her command of the space ship Intrepid had been stolen from her by an alien. She was confined to a villa on the outermost level. She was unable to communicate with anyone other than Beatrice: the android who was both her captor and lover. And every day when she accessed the Intrepid's information systems, she was humiliated to see an android masquerading as...
Serenity – Year 27.32.15 The thick mane of blue and gold feathers tingled along the back of Gwark's sinuous neck. What was that noise? Were the eggs in the incubator hatching ahead of time? Gwark wasn't sure he was quite ready to be a father again so soon. He turned his head away from the screen of runic characters he'd been reading and focused his huge eyes on the corner of the room where the incubator stood just by the connubial bed he shared with Duwinki, his wife of many decades....
There was much that was currently troubling Emmanuel. The essential nature of the mission that he signed up for had changed dramatically now that the space ship Intrepid had steered itself into the Anomaly. He had no recollection of ever having committed himself to a mission from which there was absolutely no chance of return. Just how had this happened? How had his memory been so faulty? The evidence of the Intrepid's records was unambiguous. The space ship had indeed all along been...
Intrepid - 3755 C.E. Almost the only real pleasure remaining to Captain Kerensky was the sex she still enjoyed with Beatrice. And this despite the fact that it was the android who was the author of her extraordinary confinement. Beatrice wasn't going to deny herself the pleasure of making love with the captain. And the captain had few other pleasures. She'd lost her appetite for mixing and mingling with the ship's crew and passengers. It just wasn't worth having to avoid the excruciating...
It had been a long time since Captain Kerensky last had to squeeze into a space suit. It wasn't really what a captain of a space ship, especially one as large as the Intrepid, was ever expected to do. Why would a captain ever need to go anywhere that wasn't climate-controlled? The last time Nadezhda had put on a space suit was many decades earlier when she held a very junior rank on a much smaller space ship. On that occasion, she was assigned to go outside the space ship to examine the...
"I need to speak to you privately," said Oxana Petrovna Korolyov. Brigadier Svenssen was understandably alarmed. What could this woman possibly want? Why would a Mission Control scientist need to talk to him? His immediate anxiety was that it might be her way of suggesting that they have sex. There were colonies in the Solar System whose citizens were unnervingly frank about their intentions, but he reflected that it was very unlikely in this case. Oxana came from Saturn. She was slim,...
"I'd almost forgotten why we were here," admitted Paul when the holographic message arrived for him at the hotel in the heart of the Amazon Jungle where he'd been staying with Beatrice. "It's been such a long time since we heard anything about the mission." Professor Wasilewski's image flickered against the window through which could be seen a torrential downpour and lofty trees from which monkeys were howling at each other. The professor wasn't especially amused by Paul's...
Beatrice wandered contemplatively across the freshly grown lawns on the outermost level of the Intrepid. The space ship's restoration systems had at last made the level habitable although not everything had quite returned to the condition it had been before. New trees had been planted but were modest in comparison to those uprooted by the explosion. New villas had been constructed to replace those that had been destroyed. Animals had been relocated to replace those that had perished. The...
Intrepid - 3756 C.E. The first thing Captain Kerensky was aware of when she finally woke up was that she was lying naked on an unfamiliar bed. The next was that not only was the bed unfamiliar but so too was the entire bedroom. She had no memory of having been transported here and her first resolve was to return to her quarters. The captain was a busy woman and there was much she should be getting on with. However, every attempt to return to a more normal state of affairs was frustrated....
The Intrepid's computer system had been tampered with. Sheila Nkomo knew this for sure. She could use most of the system, but she had no access at all to any part of it that could tell her what was happening on the space ship. Ever since Captain Kerensky and the military officers had arrested and detained her in the villa, she had been as much blind as she was naked. She had no access to the Intrepid's information systems. She couldn't monitor the bridge. She had no means of communicating...
Paolo Mauritz carefully examined the calendar. Although it was very nearly the 218th anniversary of the Glorious Revolution, no celebrations were being prepared on the Space Ship Intrepido. Nor were they on the other interplanetary battleships in the space fleet speeding onwards in diminished numbers towards the Anomaly. This was one year Post Revolution whose anniversary many heroic comrades of the Twenty Fifth Reich were no longer able to celebrate. If Paolo was honest to himself, which...
The several thousand passengers and crew of a colossal space ship that was travelling through the most distant reaches of space all shared the misconception that the Interplanetary Space Ship Intrepid was on a mission directed from the Moon and that Nadezhda Kerensky was the captain. However, only one human on the space ship knew the truth. And that person was, of course, Captain Kerensky. But what use was this knowledge when the captain couldn't share it with anyone? Hers was a very...
Paul held Beatrice to his chest. Well, not all of her of course: just the head and shoulders. The rest of her was scattered in fragments across the living room, now so evidently the dismembered remains of an android rather than a human. It wasn't blood but a strangely viscous black liquid that seeped out of her mouth, from the stumps of her arms and from a torso that was sliced apart just below her bosom, or at least the single breast that remained intact. It was obvious now. Colonel Vashti...
The Colton Park Anomaly I was the epicenter and, in some ways, the cause of the Colton Park anomaly We aren't really supposed to talk about it to the mainstream press. But they said that telling our stories on the TG boards was OK, especially if we use a fig leaf of fiction. The anomaly happened on a regular Thursday afternoon. I was washing dishes and it was more than an hour until time to pick up the kids from school. I knew a fair bit of magic, even before the anomaly ...
This story takes place in my Burke's Virus universe The Anomaly By Morpheus "I want to die," Jordan Morse grimaced as he staggered into the bathroom, grabbing the wall for support. Every fiber of his body ached and hurt beyond belief and he'd already emptied his stomach three times since waking up a few hours earlier. "Just kill me now and be done with it..." Jordan splashed cold water on his face and looked into the mirror. He looked nearly as bad as he felt, though he...
Anomaly Seven - "Reality Edits" By Emma Smith All characters and organisations in this story are fictitious. No reference to any real people or events is intended or should be inferred. Cast Richard / Ruth Slater Schoolchild, Norfolk David Slater Parent of Richard Rebecca Slater Parent of Richard Fred Styles Friend of Richard Jane / Jack Styles Friend of Richard Colonel Brian Jones UK Army, SSID Commander Captain Roy Blake UK Army, SSID Sergeant Tom Williams UK...
Intrepid - 3755 C.E. As a woman outnumbered by men in the Intrepid's senior staff, Second Officer Sheila Nkomo made a special effort to befriend her fellow female officers. She wasn't in a position to get to know Captain Kerensky particularly well. This was partly a consequence of relative rank, but also because her captain was a lesbian. It wasn't that Sheila held any prejudices against homosexuals, but she did feel nervous given that the captain was so obviously attracted to...
The Sahara Desert - 3723 C.E. There was much about the Solar System that was new to Vashti. She'd already made several significant accidental errors since she'd penetrated interdimensional spacetime and materialised in the continuum in which the Anomaly's presence was most concentrated. Her primary error, of course, had been not to understand sexuality and gender. The blueprints on which she'd based her physical form were an unfortunate mix of both male and female characteristics. It...
Vashti stumbled through the open lawns of the penultimate level where Beatrice had so recently been imprisoned. She reasoned that the android perhaps had an idea of what was happening. How was it possible for a nanobot community to be compromised in such a strange and unprecedented manner? There was nothing in Vashti's vast repository of data and experience that could explain it. It was definitely humbling for a being who naturally presumed that she was superior over both biological and...
Heads turned as Beatrice strode along corridors in the space ship Intrepid that were normally reserved for military personnel. It was unusual enough for a passenger to be seen in this part of the ship although there was no security restriction as such, but Beatrice in motion was an unusually compelling sight even in a Solar System where everyone's body was artificially beautified as a matter of routine. There was a very literal sense that she was attractive: her affect on the libido was...
The lawn surrounding the villa that Isaac and his five surviving comrades had secured was littered with the bodies of the recently slaughtered. One corpse belonged to Jacob who'd suffered a martyr's death in the struggle to secure the villa for true believers. Two belonged to the accursed heretical Baptists who'd obstinately fought to defend the villa. But to no avail. One of the heretics had died at Isaac's hands. Isaac's had jumped on top of the man, tugged him forcefully by the beard...
There were two pleasures that Archdeacon James XXVI enjoyed more than any other. One was to have his anus penetrated by a monstrous cock, preferably one belonging to a black man. The other was to penetrate the anus of another man: preferably a youth who'd never been so violated before. These refined pleasures, like many others the Archdeacon enjoyed, he'd discovered through the example of his father, Archdeacon James XXV. He still loved his father, but he'd loved him most when he squeezed...
Although it had been quiet for several weeks now, Laurent still experienced some trepidation as he walked into the Emergency Rescue station. It had been quiet for too long. When would this spell of relative peace come to an end? The long history of unfortunate incidents in the South West section of Ishtar Terra suggested that this would be very soon. The extreme heat and oppressive air pressure on the surface of Venus along with the tempestuous atmospheric storms ensured that life as a...
The lights that illuminated the bar shimmered and flashed to the thunderous rhythm of the electronic music that accompanied the nude dancing on the podium. A serving android with a voluptuous bosom and a prominent arse was collecting the empty glasses left behind on the counter. There weren't very many customers and these consisted mostly of prostitutes, which was the occupation most often adopted by female refugees from the war-torn Asteroid Belt or the more impoverished colonies in...
Almond Grove - 3750 C.E. It was not without a little trepidation that Ellis followed the woman who'd greeted him when his private space ship docked at Almond Grove. Partly, this was because he'd always wanted to see for himself the private residence of the second wealthiest man in the Solar System and this was the reason he used to justify to himself the expense and trouble of travelling for very nearly a month from Venus to Earth orbit. The main reason, of course, was that a summons from...
The scorching wind that blew sluggishly across the Venusian plain made progress difficult enough for Beatrice, but much worse for Laurent and the others in his team. Although she could have taken the lead, Beatrice tactfully trailed the rest of her crew as they struggled with immense effort in their thick-shelled space suits across fifty metres of dimly lit superheated soil to the crumpled wreckage of the crashed shuttle. It had fallen victim to weather conditions dramatically worse than...
It was over in all of seven seconds, but for Paul it wasn't until the final fraction of the seventh second that he was conscious that anything had happened at all. And what he was aware of was more disorientating than calamitous. It had started with a sudden jolt that shuddered through the room and in particular the bed on which he'd been dozing. He'd been awake for over half an hour but it was his habit to drift in and out of the last few moments of sleep before eventually sliding his...