TALKING SHOP: What Do HARRY POTTER, CHUCK (TV Show), STAR WARS (Original Trilogy), a new band called DURRY, and SPIDERMAN – Have In Common?

Short answer: HELPLESSNESS

Long answer: read on...

HARRY POTTER appears in the first book as a baby in a basket, being dropped off at his aunt and uncle's house by a witch, a wizard, and a guy riding a flying motorcycle with a sidecar. According to most Earth biology, you can't get much more helpless than a baby.

Most of you are familiar with the story, but if you’re not (“What Culture do you live in – the books are available in eighty languages and Braille!) the story starts with a helpless boy who remains pretty helpless for 1.2 million words. He also manages to defeat the Ultimate Evil with the help of hundreds of individuals who sacrifice their lives (including the most powerful wizard of the age) and wreaks havoc on TWO universes…and remains basically helpless except for the fact that he’s deeply connected to the Ultimate evil and destroys him through that fact with little effort of his own.

In CHUCK, we watch the ultimate Stanford University failure-turned-Nerd Herder (aka Best Buy Geek Squad member) accidentally become the most powerful database known to Humanity, the Intersect. Instead of overthrowing the world and becoming the Emperor of Man, he stays basically the same and is handled until he becomes one of the most powerful tools on Earth; while remaining a clueless, helpless nerd who loves his sister, and has a total dork for a best friend, wins the love of a deadly CIA agent who happens to be Greek goddess-level beautiful – because he IS who he IS: a helpless nerd who loves his sister and his mediocre job, best friend, family, and life.

In the STAR WAR Original Trilogy the same story is reiterated: LUKE SKYWALKER on the brown-end of the Universe on a farm in (almost literally) the middle of nowhere with a grumpy uncle and an aunt who knows everything but can’t do anything about it because she, too, is helpless. When Luke leaves, he’s helpless. When he gets two robots he’s helpless. Even when he finds out he can wield world-bending power…he’s helpless. He remains so for some nine-plus movies.

In 2020, quarantined siblings Austin and Taryn joined forces under their family name DURRY to make music together for the very first time. In 2021 their careers were launched by their tiktok viral track, “Who’s Laughing Now”. Quickly gaining notoriety because Durry bottled up a few inner monologues — everyone from parents, to society, to their church doubted they could “make it”. Their paean to helplessness and lack of support brought them to the attention of Limp Bizkit front man, Fred Durst and became one of Jade's Music You Should Know picks one week. Here's the video: https://youtu.be/M02UGmRYQ_4

SPIDERMAN, in all of his iterations, was a kid who lost his parents, then lost his uncle to gun violence (sound familiar?). On a field trip sometime in high school, he’s bitten either by a radioactive spider or a genetically engineered spider and suddenly has the powers of a spider – strength, speed, senses, and no fear of heights – oh, did I mention the ability to stick to anything?

So, Peter Parker has everything any kid could possibly want. He can beat any of his enemies to a pulp, he can take on super villains and after getting beat up some, beat them and live to go home to his Aunt May (who has variously been depicted as elderly to barely middle-aged…). He’s also friendly, works in his neighborhood, and is known as Spiderman. But his most defining quality? He’s shy, quiet, and has so few friends that virtually no one knows who he is. He has no influence on society except for the tiny lives of people he interacts with. Of course WE know he’s destined for greatness, but HE doesn’t know that. In fact, for much of his book-time and absolutely through a big chunk of his movie time, he continues to lament that he’s basically…helpless.

It's been my experience that the vast majority of people feel helpless. I venture to believe that it’s this basic piece of the Human condition that drives everything from the Mother Theresas of the world to the Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Putin’s

So what?

All of these people, whether real or imaginary, whether musicians or CIA agent, have somehow managed to draw to them literally MILLIONS of fans. Not necessarily billions of dollars…oops, I guess BILLIONS OF DOLLARS is correct, AND millions of fans.

In the beginning, they attracted people just like them – geeks, dorks, the unnoticed, the ones “real society” labeled losers. These losers – and let me tell you up front that I AM one of them. I made countless Batman costumes out of paper grocery bags and carved a STAR TREK phaser out of a block of wood and nailed another one on it for a handle, then pounded five nails into the front end for a barrel – and then when I shot someone, I made a shrieking sound while vibrating my tongue…

These people, like myself, live lives of helpless normality. NOT desperation. Regular people will never get a government data base crammed into their heads, and the only thing a normal person will get after being bitten by a radioactive/genetically engineered spider, is a rash. They will not receive letters with wings announcing that they’ve been accepted to a wizarding school. Dorky farm boys will not suddenly discover that their father left them a light saber that will symbolically challenge an interstellar Empire, and be hailed as one of the last of an extinct order of Jedi knights. A brother and sister will NEVER discover that a TikTok they made in their basement has a million hits, they have an agent and a tour...rather than mom and dad upstairs as their only audience.

What sets all of these stories apart? It’s not the “powers” they got – magic, technology, arachnid power, or a zillion dollar record contract and road tour?

They remained the same: helpless, endearing, dorky. What changed was the world around them. And everything changed around them NOT because they were different. It changed because they were NORMAL people who kept choosing to keep going and not giving up when their worlds seemed to be going to hell-in-a-handbasket.

They believed that what they COULD do was important.

Because Harry, Chuck, Peter, Austin and Taryn, and Luke didn’t become jerks because of their suddenly power. Of COURSE they could act like jerks sometimes (and did, “Are you listening Harry?), but there were normal people around them who brought them back down from their High And Mighty Spaces, elbowed them in the side, and reminded them that while they may be “The Chosen Ones”, their close friends knew better.

They were just normal people tasked with doing extraordinary things WITH THEIR FRIENDS, FAMILY, AND LOVED ONES.

Lisa Cron writes in her book, WIRED FOR STORY, “…we’re wired to turn to story to teach us the way of the world” (p 2). She also writes that our brains experience a story as if it were REAL: “A recent brain imaging study reported in Psychological Science reveals that the regions of the brain that process the sights, sounds, tastes and movement of real life are activated when we are engrossed in a compelling narrative.” (p 4)

When I read a story that is ABOUT a king, emperor, superhero, alien, or a 15-year-old guy, I’m just not as interested, because I can’t really connect with them. They aren’t part of my reality. I can, however, keep reading and putting away my pre-judgement, I can let myself sink into the STORY.

Harry, Chuck, Peter, Austin and Taryn, and Luke are all stories I can fall into because they’re about normal people. They’re about helpless people just like me. But ALL OF THEM BROKE OUT OF NORMALITY AND MADE A DIFFERENCE IN THE WORLD.

They all inspire normal people NOT by their greatness, but by their persistence and stubborn resolve to keep moving ahead and make a difference in their stories.

Which leads ME to believe that maybe, just maybe, I can break out and make a difference, too.

Image: https://thumbs.dreamstime.com/b/helplessness-12459706.jpg

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The Odin Chronicles • Episode 22: “Friends Like Binary Stars” • by Travis Burnham

 

As the large, battered robot at the deli whirred to life, a lonely eleven-year-old girl named Vivi watched the repairs with rapt attention. The robot repair team was composed of Ingrid who was fixing the hardware, and Sloane-51, a recently emancipated AI, who worked on the software. Ingrid ran the local bar, but she was a fair hand with a wrench and was substituting for the usual repairperson.

The damaged robot in question had caused an… incident. It had crushed some groceries and threatened some customers before burning out and sputtering to a stop. Everything still smelled like mustard and pickle juice. A replacement robot would be an expensive challenge—the Galactic Mining-owned planet of Odin III was far off the beaten path.

“It looks like there’s been quite a bit of damage to the neural network,” Sloane-51 said. What she didn’t say was it was the same damage she’d sustained before gaining sentience. She couldn’t help but wonder if it was part of a larger pattern. “I can’t just enter code to fix the robot. We should let the neural network repair itself organically.”

The little girl who’d until this point remained silent, piped up. “My teacher Mr. Finn told us neural means brain. And he said school is exercise for your brain.” Vivi looked at the battered robot and said, “I think Keegan Red needs school.”

“Keegan Red?” Ingrid said.

Vivi pointed at a small plate riveted to the robot’s left foot that read Keegan Grocery Bots LLC. “Keegan. And everyone should have a last name, and Grocery is hardly a proper last name. But he’s red. So Keegan Red.”

Ingrid shared a glance with Sloane-51 and the android shrugged before replying. “The robot isn’t a danger, it just had a damaged actuator. I put in an override. And a school’s nuance rich environment would help it rebuild its AI pathways, even in just a day or two.”

“School,” Keegan said.

* * *

Some mornings later, Keegan Red entered the classroom, his head knocking a chunk from the door’s lintel. “Sorry,” he intoned, somehow managing a sheepish expression. Looking for a familiar face, he scanned the room.

The teacher, Mr. Finn, was still in the hallway talking with Ingrid and Sloane-51.

Keegan then saw Vivi, crammed into a corner surrounded by three larger students. Vivi had always been small and clever, making her a favored target of bullies. In this case, Teresa.

Large and rugged, Teresa has a shock of coal black hair and a penchant for intimidation. She was not a fan of small, and even less a fan of clever.

From a bookshelf above them all, the classroom cat—a Norwegian Forest feline named Freya—looked down upon the proceedings with disdain. She was not a fan of bullying. Also, being relatively small and clever herself, she felt offended on principle.

Forcing Vivi down to the floor, Teresa shoved a crayon at her. “Eat this, or I’ll shove it in your ear and poke your brain.”

“At least I have a brain to poke,” Vivi said.

“Brain damage it is.” Teresa leaned down, wielding the crayon.

Just before Freya leapt down to rain feline havoc upon unsuspecting bullies, Keegan approached Teresa and said, “Let Vivi… go.” His words were halting, not menacing, but his size provided the exclamation point. He was already better at speaking than he had been in the deli.

Teresa and her two wing bullies exercised the better part of valor.

During math class, Keegan tutored Vivi. He calculated like lightning. But when it came to art, he struggled, a small pile of broken crayons lay on the table beneath his large fingers.

“Hold on a second, Keegan,” Vivi said. Picking up the tape dispenser, she spared no tape in order to wrap the heliotrope purple crayon to Keegan’s large pointer finger. And with that, he was able to draw a passable flower.

Mr. Finn even tacked Keegan’s drawing to the filing cabinet behind his desk.

Then it was recess.

Vivi and Keegan decided to find some real flowers to further Keegan’s artistic pursuits. As they leaned over to investigate, a large rock clanged loudly against Keegan’s head, leaving a ding and some chipped paint.

Teresa, who’d just thrown the rock, stooped to pick up another. “I read online that robots are programmed so they can’t hurt people.”

“Maybe… true,” Keegan said. He picked up a branch as thick as a weightlifter’s arm and broke it into splinters. “Or maybe.” Keegan picked up the grapefruit-sized rock that Teresa had bounced off his head, and with a flex of his hands, crumbled it to pieces. “Not hurting humans is a myth.”

Teresa looked hesitant, and when she turned to check for backup, she found that both of her friends were already gone, running as if someone had set fire to their shoes. Teresa wasn’t far behind.

“Could you really hurt her?” Vivi asked.

“No,” Keegan replied. “But she didn’t know.”

“Thanks, Keegan.”

“You spoke for me in the deli, when I was broken and had no words,” Keegan replied. “I should thank you.”

“We can thank each other! Because just now you were strong for me.” Vivi replied.

“You have a strength that is far more important.”

Vivi curled an arm and flexed her bicep, but even flexed the muscle didn’t amount to much. She laughed and said, “Just kidding.” She pounded a fist against her heart. “I’m strong here.” Then she went up on tippy toes to thump a hand against Keegan’s chest and the reverberations rolled like thunder. “And you are, too.”

Robot and girl looked back towards the classroom where Freya beckoned from inside with a disaffected air.

“Do you want to go inside and draw a picture of a kitty instead of a flower?” Vivi asked.

“I can’t think of a better subject.”

___________________________

Travis Burnham’s work has found homes in Far Fetched Fables, Hypnos Magazine, Bad Dreams Entertainment, South85 Journal, SQ Quarterly, and others. He is a member of the online writers’ group, Codex, and has an MFA in Creative Writing from Converse College. He also recently won the Wyrm’s Gauntlet online writing contest. Burnham has been a DJ on three continents, and teaches middle school science and college level composition. He lives in Lisbon, Portugal with his wife, but grew up in Massachusetts, is from Maine at heart, and has lived in Japan, Colombia, and the Northern Mariana Islands.

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stupefy (ˈstü-pə-ˌfī) to stun, astonish, or astound

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The Odin Chronicles • Episode 21: “Hunt” • by Jonathan Sherwood

There is a moment when you realize it’s gone too far. You’ve lost control and in the blink of an eye everything is about to become horrific.

Hadiza kept the butt of her rifle tight to her shoulder. One eye looking through the scope. Finger hovering over the trigger. And realized this was that moment.

“Joe,” she whispered, hoping she spoke loudly enough for her ear comm to pick up her voice. “Joe, I think it’s here.”

Around her, the vast blue bamboo forest swayed in the constant breeze. A never-ceasing clatter of windchimes, mixed with the rustle of the bamboo’s upper leaves and the hiss of the light rain. Her knee sank into the mud.

“Joe,” she said louder.

“Hadiza,” Joe’s voice crackled in her ear. His voice echoed her strain. “Are you sure?”

“Dammit,” Hadiza muttered, and spit rain off her lips. Her eye never left the scope. She was sure she’d seen it, weaving around the bamboo like a goddamn ghost snake. And now, she stared with every neuron straining to discern something behind the endless stalks of swaying blue. She and Joe thought they’d chased it into this forest. Now she realized it had lured them here.

* * *

Hadiza and Joe Thurbone had started hunting night razors together a few years back. You couldn’t hunt during the dry season because you could be lost for days in the occasional dust storm, but she sorely missed  hunting on her home world, so when Joe pointed out that near their settlement on Odin III there roamed some nasty predators that could make for a good hunt, she surprised herself by taking him up on his offer. He was a little annoying, but around the campfire with the perimeter alarms set, all he wanted was the camaraderie of the hunt without getting too close.

Night razors turned out to be good sport—clever predators, sharp of claw and tooth—but you could take them down with a well-aimed shot. And although their claws and teeth were sharp, they gained the name “razors” for their weird shape; like a bear two hand widths wide. Black, furry pancakes on edge. On the open plains it made them easy targets from the side. Sometimes, evolution screws up.

But now, she understood, the razors’ natural habitat wasn’t the plains. It was right here.

They’d chased this one for miles that first night, never able to land a shot, so by the next afternoon, Hadiza had the idea of flushing it into the bamboo forest where it would be slowed. The beast went all-too willingly into the forest, and they plunged all-too willingly in after it.

In minutes, Hadiza realized their mistake. The razor’s thin body wriggled through the dense bamboo like a snake’s. She and Joe, on the other hand, were slowed immensely by the stalks and raised a clatter as the bamboo trunks rattled together with nearly every step.

“This sound’s driving me nuts,” said Joe after the third hour. “You remember Saanvi Das? She got lost in one of these bamboo forests and came out batshit crazy. They called it pareidolia. I guess when you hear the same sound uninterrupted for long enough, you start hallucinating sounds that aren’t there.”

That little bit of advice had saved their lives. About an hour later, Joe thought he heard something on their left, so they both swung their rifles around, eyeing every moving shaft of blue in the unending sea, so focused on what they were sure was there that it wasn’t until Hadiza heard a twig snap on their right that she spun her head around, and saw the eyes of the razor less than twenty feet away. She shouted, turning, rifle banging into the stalks, and the creature spun about and wriggled its way through the bamboo. They got a couple of shots off, but it was too little, too late.

“Go left!” yelled Joe. “I’ll go right! We’ll flush him back out!”

“Get on comms!” Hadiza yelled back, rifle in one hand and the other pushing the comm bead into her ear. She leaped and crashed her way through the bamboo. Speed was essential, and the noise would help spook the razor.

“More to the west!” said Joe. “Keep him going west toward the big sun! It’s probably less than a mile out of the forest in that direction!”

The suns were hard to see down here, but Hadiza could make out some shadows, and she ran, trunks smacking her in the face even though she held her rifle to block them.

After ten minutes, she yelled, “Shit, stop! Stop running!”

In the far distance, she could hear Joe’s crashing come to a stop.

“What?” said Joe, clearly out of breath.

Hadiza was in great physical condition, but that tripping-bounding-face-smacking running was too much. She breathed several times before answering.

“I’ve lost track of it. And we’re too far apart.”

“Shit.” Joe breathed twice. “Just felt a raindrop. Maybe we should just keep heading west and get out. I don’t mind roughing it, but getting soaked sucks.”

“Yeah. Damn. Hate to quit,” said Hadiza. Thin streaks of blood covered both forearms from the sharp bamboo. “But stay frosty. It may have taken off already, but maybe not. That one seemed pretty aggressive.”

“Yeah. We’ve kept it running a whole day. It’s probably tired as we are. Probably pretty pissed off.”

The drops became a drizzle. Try as she might, Hadiza couldn’t step as smoothly between the stalks as the razor could, and she caused the bamboo to knock together overhead. She couldn’t tell the difference between the normal sounds of rain and bamboo in a breeze and the clatter she was causing. But the razor might.

“Do you think it knows people hallucinate sounds in here?” Hadiza asked.

“You mean, maybe it brought us here on purpose?”

“Yeah, like a spider’s web. Maybe it’s how it hunts.”

“Shit,” said Joe. “Now you’ve got me fuckin’ spooked.”

“Same here, and I don’t like having this comm in my ear. Feel like I can’t hear as well on one side. Makin’ me paranoid.”

“Yeah,” said Joe. “Are you having trouble tracking the suns? It’s too damn overcast. Dammit.”

“What?” said Hadiza.

“I don’t know where I am. Damn this noise. It gets in your head.”

“Hey, it’s okay, Joe. Look, I—” She stopped. Spun around, rifle moving with her eyes.

“What is it? What’s going on?”

“Holy shit,” said Hadiza. “I swear to God I just heard my dad. I just heard my dad say something.”

“Jesus, Hadiza, it ain’t real. It’s that sound-hallucination thing. Don’t freak out.”

“I’m not freaking out. I’m not. But I’m getting out. I think I still know which way is west. Keep talking. I’m getting out and I’m not stopping. You get out, too, hear me?”

“Shit,” said Joe, and Hadiza could hear the breathing in his comm, and then a “Thank God, I see the edge. I’m almost out! Where are you?”

“I’m probably close. Just get out. I’ll catch—” And Hadiza dropped to her knee, rifle tight to her shoulder. Rain splashed off the barrel. “Joe,” she whispered, hoping she spoke loudly enough for the ear comm. “Joe, I think it’s here.”

“Are you sure? Take the shot! Take the shot!” said Joe, almost in a panic.

“I don’t see it. I don’t see it, but I can smell it,” said Hadiza, and then more to herself than Joe, “Can’t fake a smell, can you, ya fucker?”

“Hadiza, I’m out! I’m out. On the west side. Should I come back in? If, maybe if you shoot in the air I can zero in on the sound.”

Hadiza took a careful, level step. Another. She could see something ahead. Something lying low. The rain came down like noisy static. The bamboo chimed. The smell came again to her, like meat mixed with a sour musk. She slipped her finger onto the trigger. Another step.

“Hadiza, what’s happening? Goddamnit,” sputtered Joe. “What’s happening?”

She blinked several times as water splashed her face. She could just see it lying there in a crumpled heap. A leg. An arm. Joe’s body, torn wide open. His head torn clean off.

“Hadiza, do you need me to come back in?” crackled Hadiza’s earpiece.

There is a moment when you realize everything is about to become horrific in the blink of an eye.

A twig behind her snapped.

___________________________

Jonathan Sherwood has written about science and scientists for research universities for more than two decades, and science fiction for even longer. He holds a bachelors in science writing from Cornell University and an MA in English from the University of Rochester. His fiction has appeared in Asimov’s, Analog, and others.

 

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stupefy (ˈstü-pə-ˌfī) to stun, astonish, or astound

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The Odin Chronicles • Episode 20: “Faith and Good Works” • by Pete Wood

 

Father Francis climbed into the transport back to Odin III. He smiled and greeted the young woman in the pilot’s chair.

“Just the two of us today, Father,” Mazaa, the pilot, said. “Kinda weird. Usually miners are lining up to get off this rock.”

“They don’t switch out the crews until midweek, I think,” Father Francis said. Odin II was so grueling with its higher gravity and temperature extremes that Galactic Mining couldn’t entice workers off of Odin III to man the mines for longer than thirty days, even at triple pay.

The Odin II base gave them authorization to blast off. Seconds later the ship lifted into the air. The two-hundred-meter settlement dome disappeared. In seconds all Francis could see through the porthole was a vast expanse of monotonous rock and sand.

He had been on so many transports that he stopped looking out the window. Not even the massive view screen in front of Mazaa got his attention. He turned on his tablet and settled down to read We Have Always Lived in the Castle.

“Some great theological text?” the pilot asked.

“Shirley Jackson,” Francis said. Seeing the blank look from Mazaa he added. “Old Earth horror writer.”

“Ah.” She grinned. “Speaking of horror stories, I used to be a Catholic,” she said.

This woman didn’t exactly mince words. “Really?”

“Altar girl and everything. Haven’t been to mass in years.”

Francis switched off the tablet. He wouldn’t be getting any reading done on this trip. “Uh huh.”

“Does that bother you, Father?”

“No. I don’t care what you believe.” He paused. “That didn’t sound right. I do care, but I feel comfortable with whatever beliefs you have.”

“I’m an atheist.”

“That’s great. I think that’s great. Seriously.”

“You don’t see that as a problem?” she asked.

“God doesn’t see that as a problem.”

“The Bible says that?”

Francis sighed. “I don’t know what God thinks, but I doubt God cares.”

Mazaa blinked. “Doesn’t that go against the whole organized religion thing?”

“The Bible goes against the whole organized religion thing. Jesus spends half the Gospels butting heads with the Church.”

“Then why—”

“Why am I a priest? I believe in God and I believe in the Church. We do more than just mass. Charity. Education. We’re not just about the mumbo jumbo.”

“I dunno, Father. Back on Earth my priest was a, excuse me, real asshole. Arrogant. Sexist. She—”

The ship lurched. A whining noise came out of the engine. Then the noise stopped.

Mazaa pressed buttons. No response. Nothing on the radio.

“We’re leaking fuel,” she said. “We’re going down.”

Ten minutes later the ship slammed into the desert.

* * *

 “Mazaa!” Francis called out.

No response.

Pitch dark. He used his tablet’s pale light to look around. A dead view screen. Sand covered half of the starboard porthole.

He unbuckled himself and leaned over the pilot. Blood streamed down her face. Still breathing. She opened her eyes.

“You okay, Father?”

“I’m fine.”

She undid her seat belt. She lifted herself up a couple of inches and then collapsed into the chair. Her eyes welled in tears. “I need to go outside.”

Father Francis was no doctor, but he knew a serious injury when he saw one. “You shouldn’t move. Wait for help.”

She lifted herself off the chair a little higher and let out a scream of pain. “I have to get outside!” she yelled, as if the intensity of her speech would somehow will her off the chair.

“You can’t.”

“Francis, listen to me,” Mazaa gasped. “You’ve got to go outside.” She panted and continued. “No fuel. No power.” She closed her eyes and winced.

“How do I get the power back on?” he asked. He knew they’d be dead in hours when the suns came up. Maybe rescue would come first. Maybe not. Thank God they’d landed on the night side of Odin II. They had a chance before temperatures soared above two hundred degrees.

Her eyes had a vacant faraway look. Then she focused on Francis. “Something must have cut the line from the solar panels. Gotta—” She coughed. “Reconnect.”

“They’ll rescue us, right?”

“The emergency beacon needs power. Nothing but desert outside.”

* * *

Oxygen mask sealed tight, Francis stepped into the frigid night. The good thing about a planet that routinely had highs about the boiling point of water was that there, unlike Odin III, had been no micro-organisms to speak of. The bad news, besides the highs above the boiling point of water thing, was the lows at night were pretty damned miserable too.

They seemed to be on some sort of plain. Distant peaks. Well, God at least had given them that. They hadn’t crashed into the mountains.

He shivered and wondered which of the thousands of stars was Earth’s sun. He suspected a bright steady star low in the horizon was Odin III.

He tripped in the deep divot in the sand caused by the ship. The trail stretched past the flashlight’s beam.

No noise out here but the wind. Thank God he wasn’t in one of the planet’s legendary sandstorms.

He switched the flashlight to his right hand and shoved his left in his pocket where it warmed up. Thank the Lord the ship had enough oxygen for the trip outside. The two tanks strapped to his back would get him past sunrise. After that it wouldn’t matter.

He wasn’t sure what to look for, even with the jumbled directions Mazaa had managed to give before passing out. God wasn’t going to magically point out the breach. He was on his own. Francis stood in one spot and moved the beam down the length of the ship, took a step to the right, and started over again. He hopped up and down from time to time to stay warm.

Then he spotted a series of gashes on starboard. Something had hit them in the upper atmosphere. Space junk? A meteor? They’d never know. He could see faint purple streaks, probably from gushing fuel.

He shone the light in each hole. The fifth one had a cable with two shredded ends. No purple tint. This was not the fuel line.

It couldn’t be this simple. He reached inside and pushed the two ends together with some effort.

Lights flickered through the porthole, then went steady.

He stepped back to go inside, but the lights went out. He’d have to stand out here and hold the ends together if there were any chance of rescue.

Forty years as a priest, first on Earth, then twenty years on Odin III. He never imagined dying this way. Death didn’t scare him. He knew what awaited him. But Mazaa’s death was another matter. If he lessened his grip, the emergency beacon would go out and the pilot would surely perish.

Not on his watch.

He tried to stay focused. He searched for the unofficial constellations Odinians had named. Snoopy. The Beer Mug. Even a few risqué ones he wasn’t supposed to know about.

He tried to recite prayers, but his mind wandered back to the plots of old movies and books. He struggled with the Sermon on the Mount but knocked out half an hour by remembering all the differences in the adaptions of The Haunting of Hill House, Shirley Jackson’s perfect ghost story.

The first sun rose over the horizon. Then the second minutes later. He wondered how much time he had.

Then the third.

The third?

The rescue ship landed.

* * *

Francis woke up on a hospital cot. One cot over, Mazaa, with all manner of tubes stuck into her, rested.

A nurse rushed over. “You’re in the infirmary on Odin II. You’re going to be fine. You had some internal bleeding. Nothing like Mazaa.”

“Is she going to be okay?”

“It’ll take her a few weeks to recover, but yeah.”

His right hand felt numb. Careful not to pull too hard on the IV, he stared at it.

“You had pretty bad frostbite, Father,” the nurse said. “Quite an accomplishment out here. You have two new positronic fingers on your right hand and six positronic toes. You’ll get used to them in a few months.”

“I need to get—”

“You need to rest.” The nurse paused. “Mazaa had a message for you.”

He reached for a cup of water. “What did Mazaa say?”

“She said she knew she’d make it. When you went outside, she had faith in you.”

___________________________

Pete Wood is an attorney from Raleigh, North Carolina, where he lives with his kind and very patient wife. His first appearance in our pages was “Mission Accomplished” in the now out-of-print August 2012 issue. After publishing a lot of stories with us he graduated to becoming a regular contributor to Asimov’s, but he’s still kind enough to send us things we can publish from time to time, and we’re always happy to get them.

For the past year or so Pete has been in the process of evolving into a fiction editor, God help him, first with The Pete Wood Challenge, then with Dawn of Time, and now with The Odin Chronicles, a 30-chapter shared world saga that will be running here every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for the next ten weeks, and that features the creative work of Roxana Arama, Gustavo Bondoni, Travis Burnham, Paul Celmer, Jenna Hanchey, Carol Scheina, Jonathan Sherwood, and of course, Pete Wood. We suspect that Pete’s real love is theater, though, as with the print version of The Odin Chronicles now mostly finished he’s off working on the audio version, which looks to be an even bigger production that his short movie, Quantum Doughnut — which you can stream, if you follow the foregoing link.

Coming Wednesday: Episode 21 of The Odin Chronicles, “Hunt,” by Jonathan Sherwood.

Enjoy!
~brb

 

---

stupefy (ˈstü-pə-ˌfī) to stun, astonish, or astound

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SHOWCASE • “Maggie’s Confessional” • by Branden Linley

“Forgive me father, for I have sinned. It’s been, hell, probably a couple years since I last confessed.”

“Language, Maggie.”

“Sorry, Father.”

“What brings you here today?”

“I’m not exactly sure what sin I committed, but I’m pretty sure it’s one of them big ones.”

“Tell me what happened, and we’ll sort through it.”

“Sure thing. So, you remember the guy who summoned the demon that possessed Alex? Devo Dickwad or whatever his name was?”

“Yes, I remember. He’s still in prison, right? And how is your brother?”

“Yup, still in the big house. And Alex, well, he’s talking a bit now. Just a few words, but at least they make sense some of the time. And there’s less screaming. Still takes his meals through a straw, though.”

“Any progress is good news. I’m sure the Lord is watching over him and will bring him back to us in time.”

“Thanks to you. Take a little credit at least. Exorcism ain’t exactly small potatoes.”

“Just serving the Lord. Now, what was it about Devo you wanted to talk about?”

“I went to see him at the prison.”

“You… what? Whatever for?”

“See, that’s where I think my sin begins. I wanted revenge. Seeing that rat bastard in jail wasn’t enough.”

“Language.”

“Sorry.”

“But why go there? You couldn’t do anything to him in prison.”

“Oh, I wasn’t going there to punish him further. Not that he doesn’t need it. No, I went there to ask him how to summon the demon.”

“Come again?”

“I wanted to know how to summon it. Now, the way I see it, the demon got off pretty much scot-free. You sent it back to Hell and that was it.”

“And banishment to Hell isn’t enough?”

“Hell no.”

“Language.”

“But you just said hell. What gives?”

“I didn’t use it as a curse.”

“Sure, whatever. Anyway. Demon in… Hell…”

“That’s fine.”

“Right. I mean, that’s where it’s from. That’s its nature. Punishment should be something worse than your day in day out.”

“I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that summoning a demon is, well, pretty bad in the eyes of God.”

“Don’t sweat it, Father, I didn’t summon it.”

“Okay. Good, I guess. What did you do, then?”

“Well, Devo Dickwad—”

“Language.”

“Really? Fine, Devo Dumbass must have thought it pretty amusing that I wanted to know how he’d summoned the demon, like I’d been corrupted by my brother’s experience and fallen to the dark side or something. So he told me where he’d stashed his books, walked me through the basics, even gave me the exact name of the demon, which turned out to be really important.”

“But you said you didn’t summon it.”

“Not exactly, no.”

“Maggie…”

“The books he gave me, well, they’re pretty messed up. Go figure. But they told me what I needed. With a bit of ‘deductive reasoning’ and the ‘application’ of some clever ‘geometry’—reminds me, I still have to go thank Mr. B and Ms. Anderson for not letting me sleep through their classes last year—I was able to reverse the ritual Devo and his buds used.”

“Reverse to do what?”

“To send me to Hell. Don’t tell me, that’s somewhere on the sin list as well, right?”

“I’m pretty sure it’s up there on things not to do. But, why? How? Did you even try it?”

“Why? I already told you—to get revenge on that demon. And, heck yeah, I tried it. Worked like a freaking charm, too.”

“Wait. Maggie, are you telling me you actually went to Hell? And returned? Forgive my incredulity.”

“That’s cool, Father. I’m not sure anyone’s ever done it before. And to think my dad said I’d never amount to anything. Trans-dimensional pioneer, baby!”

“Back up a bit. Explain just what you did.”

“Oh, right. So, no, I didn’t exactly go to Hell. I mean, I did, sorta, but not my body. Just my mind. Maybe my soul, too? I’m not sure about that one. You’re the expert there.”

“No clue.”

“Anyway, because Devo gave me its name, I was able to basically possess the same demon who’d possessed my brother. I sorta summoned myself into it. Him. I guess it was a him, given the size of his—”

“Yeah, I get the picture.”

“You wouldn’t believe how many demons have over-sized… members. I think it’s like boys and their pickup trucks. Compensating, if you get my meaning.”

“Focus, Maggie.”

“Right. So, I was a little surprised when it worked, but I’d already planned out vaguely what to do. Everything was weird, and I had no idea where I was going. Very strange place. Hot, cold, fire, ice, dark, dank… Oh, and don’t get me started on the smells or the screams and moans. If anything, the Bible undersells it. Trust me, send a kid to Hell for a minute and it’ll work like a million times better than those candy-ass ‘scared straight’ programs they feed us at school. Worked for me, I’ll tell ya. Legit scared straight here on out for me.”

“I’m happy to hear that. But then what?”

“Oh, I just started doing good deeds. I mean, what’s the worst thing that can happen to a demon? I figured it would be having all his buddy demons thinking he’d gone soft. And he was pretty high in the pecking order, I think, since there were lots of little demons cowering all around him, taking my orders.”

“Good deeds. Interesting approach, I’ll grant you.”

“I’d hoped to release a bunch of trapped souls, thinking maybe they could escape to Heaven, but I couldn’t figure out how. I settled on doing what I could to ease their suffering.”

“Such as?”

“Giving them cool water to drink, back-rubs, turning down the flames, singing some Taylor Swift—not sure that helped with some of them—cancelling torture sessions. That sort of thing. Did that for quite a few hours I think—time is kinda weird there—and even made all his underlings help. Then his boss demon showed up. Big honkin’ dude with these horns and a sausage like the Weinermobile. One look into his eyes and it seemed like a good time to end my mission. I just slipped out of his brain and, bam, back home.”

“Unbelievable.”

“Like I said, I’m pretty sure there’s a sin or three in there. So here I am. What’s my punishment?”

“Penance? I’m not sure I shouldn’t petition for your sainthood.”

“Oh, I ain’t no saint. Just trying to get back at a demon by shedding a little light in that dark hole.”

“That you did. How about one Hail Mary and we forget this ever happened?”

“For real? Less than I got for lifting M&M’s? You’re getting soft, Father.”

“Jesus—”

“Language, Father!”

____________________

Not quite equal parts husband, father, engineer, artist, and musician, Branden Linley has been writing fiction since he could string together a sentence. Originally from Wisconsin, he now lives in Austin, TX, with his wife and son. His fiction has appeared in Fictionvale Episode 1, Alternate Hilarities: Hysterical Realms, and in other dark corners of the web such as his cheerfully neglected blog https://writingandsoon.blogspot.com/.

____________________

If you enjoyed this story, check out SHOWCASE, our special budget-priced sampler chapbook. Featuring:

• “The River of Time Joins the Sea,” by Probert Dean
• “The Mandala Doors of Hafshamn Syniad,” by Jeff Suwak
• “The Carpetbaggers Ball,” by Karl Dandenell
• “Finding Spring,” by Sipora Coffelt

Just $0.99 USD, or free for Kindle Unlimited subscribers.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08598CJG9

 

 

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The Odin Chronicles • Episode 19: “The One Who Walks Out” • by Carol Scheina

 

19. “The One Who Walks Out”

by Carol Scheina

Two miners walk into a cavern and—

Ronja had heard variations of that joke far too many times on Odin III. She only wanted to finish her beer in peace as she nestled into a dark corner in Weber’s Place. It was just her luck that a bearded man in dusty miner’s overalls cut through the bar noise with his deep, baritone voice. 

There were so many ways the story could go. Someone’s forgotten their headlamp, or they find stolen gold, or so on.

Ronja knew, though, the joke only went one way, and it wasn’t funny. 

Two miners walk into a cavern, and only one walks out.

She gulped the last of the foam in her mug and made for the exit. 

Outside, a young man stood in front of a well-traveled van, groaning as he pulled at a locked door handle. “Not again.”

Ronja slipped her pocketknife from her overalls and pushed the man out of her way. “Here, let me.” She jiggled the knife in the keyhole with practiced ease until the lock popped.

“Thanks! I’ve got to remember to take the keys out before I lock up.” The man’s tousled hair looked like it had seen the bad parts of a comb. He stuck his hand out. “I’m Father Luigi.”

“Ronja.” She shook the hand hurriedly, then turned away.

The priest called after her, “Nice lockpicking. I’ll be sure to ask for you next time!”

Ronja didn’t answer as she fingered the pocketknife in her hand. She used to say there wasn’t a lock she couldn’t pick. That skill kept her and Maia fed for quite a number of years back on Earth, when they were scrambling to keep out of foster homes and stay together. That was before she got the idea that there would be more stability and money in a mining job. Galactic Mining was looking for anyone to work for them, and Ronja guessed that the company wouldn’t care that she had had a few brushes with the law or that Maia was a year too young. 

Galactic was only too happy to hire them.

The plan was to hang out on Odin III for a few years and save up enough money to buy a home on one of the nicer planets. 

Except…

Two miners walk into a cavern…

Ronja didn’t think there was enough beer on Odin III to help her sleep. The nights alone in her home were always too dark and too long.

* * *

Early in the morning, she headed to the mines. There, at least, she could keep busy. The caverns filled with fine, gray dust as the dig-bots chipped away at rock walls. Her job was to keep an eye on her bot, as it couldn’t distinguish between ordinary rock and ore. A bot would easily pulverize a section of ore if a miner didn’t keep watch. Ronja let her eyes focus on the bot’s swinging arms as her baggy overalls turned lighter with dust.

The songs of the miners echoed through the cave, There’s a light at the end of the tunnel where my love is standing true…

It was so easy to imagine Maia working right behind her, hidden by the particles clouding the air, and to let the hours slip by.

When Ronja walked out of the mines, always the last to leave these days, the priest with the van was waiting. 

“The others said you were still in there. I wanted to make sure you got home okay. There’s a dust storm coming.”

He was right; Ronja could see the dark clouds rapidly moving in, so she yanked open the van door and slipped into the seat. “If you’re trying to pick me up for a date, I’m not interested.” Her voice came out harsher than she intended.

Luigi sat in the driver’s seat. “No worries. My heart’s already spoken for by a great woman named Shelley.”

“So you just spend your days driving around, looking for people to shuttle?”

The van bumped down the rocky pathway toward town. Outside, the winds beat against the vehicle’s frame. Dust storms only happened a couple of times a year, but the locals had warned her not to take them lightly. She could see why.

“Mostly, I spend my days looking for people to help,” Luigi said.

“You get a promotion or something for every person you convert?” After all, everyone on Odin was there for money. Galactic made their fortune with ore, the miners hoped to earn enough to find better lives. Like she and Maia, and their dreams.

Luigi shrugged sheepishly. “I’m actually not the best person to ask about the Bible and God. All that still seems new to me. But I do know the Catholic Church is doing good things here. I wanted to join in on that.”

Outside, the dust specks tapped a furious rhythm against the windshield, hiding the road from their eyes.

Luigi slowed and braked. “Guess we’re not going to be able to outdrive this. Should be fine to wait this out; it wasn’t supposed to last a long time.” He put the van in park.

Ronja stared out the window.

The priest continued. “I guess I’m trying to ask if you’re okay.”

“No.” The force of the word took Ronja by surprise. “No, I’m not. It was my idea to come here. My sister just followed along. I was the one who said we should volunteer to work on Odin II.” That was the job from hell. Temperature too hot, air too thin—no wonder Galactic didn’t allow workers to stay longer than thirty days, but the pay was double.

Ronja dug her fists into her eyes as though that could block out the memories. No wonder she never talked to anyone anymore. This was all she could think about. “If it had been a cave-in here, she would’ve been fine. But Odin II’s oxygen levels are too low, air couldn’t get in, she couldn’t breathe. She suffered brain damage.”

Two miners walk into a cave, and one comes out on a stretcher covered in oxygen tubes.

Luigi stammered. “I’m so sorry.”

Ronja dropped her fists and glared. “I don’t want to hear anything about God’s will or any shit like that. I brought her here. She trusted me. And now, it’ll be a long time before she’s strong enough to take a ship back here. She’s alone in a hospital on Odin II, learning to move again.”

“Why aren’t you there with her?” Luigi’s voice was quiet.

“Galactic makes you wait before they’ll approve another rotation. I ask, they say no. So I keep working here, and that pays for her therapy.” All the dreams now got funneled into hospital bills. They would’ve been better off picking locks back on Earth.

Luigi started to say something, but Ronja cut him off. “I think the storm’s ending. I can walk from here. We’re done.”

The storm was slowing but still whipping dust into the air, stinging Ronja’s face. Her mining goggles were back at the job site, so she used her arm to shield her eyes as the winds ripped at her hair. She kept her gaze on the ground, noticing that the van’s headlights illuminated the road as she stumbled on, following her. Dumb priest thinking he could fix things with a bunch of wise words and some dead god. The real world was family and money, and right now, she had neither.

The sting of dust eased up, but she still refused to turn around and acknowledge Luigi. Talking didn’t help. There was no changing the past.

* * *

The priest was waiting for her at the mines the next morning.

“I don’t want to talk to you.” Ronja brushed past him.

“Wait,” Luigi called. “The Church’s booked you a ship to Odin II. Galactic’s authorized you to get paid time off.”

Ronja froze. Slowly she turned. “How?”

“Father Francis, my boss, worked out a deal with Galactic. He knows people. Plus, the Church has money. Someone told me they sold a lot of artwork years ago or something like that.”

She still didn’t believe it. “Why?”

“I told you, we want to help people. It’s hard and lonely out here, but life shouldn’t be every man for himself. Or woman for herself. Someone’s got to be the one to help, to look out for folks. That’s why the Church set up locations on different planets.” 

Ronja still didn’t move.

“The ship leaves in 45 minutes. Can I give you a lift?” Luigi turned to open the van door, which refused to open. “Dang it, locked them inside again.”

Ronja slipped out her pocketknife. “I got this,” she said, “and thank you.” She tried to put all her heart into the words.

A smile grew on her face, feeling stiff from not having used those muscles in a while. It felt good.

Two miners walked into a cave and… and maybe a better life still awaited them.

___________________________

Carol Scheina is a deaf speculative fiction author from the Northern Virginia region. Many of her stories were thought up while sitting in local traffic, resulting in tales that have appeared in Cossmass Infinities, Daily Science Fiction, Escape Pod, and other publications. You can find more of her work at carolscheina.wordpress.com.

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The Odin Chronicles • Episode 18: “Memory Vault” • by Gustavo Bondoni

INTRO: Welcome to Odin III, a grubby little mining world on the dark and dusty backside of nowhere. It’s a world where everything that’s worth having is already owned by Galactic Mining, and where people have come to squander their hopes and lives, working for the company and dreaming of striking it big. It’s also a world where some very strange and peculiar things have begun to happen, and it all started about six weeks weeks ago, in a bar called Weber’s Place, when Ray Cornwall didn’t just warp the fabric of space/time, he completely bent it…

Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six | Part Seven | Part Eight | Part Nine | Part Ten | Part Eleven | Part Twelve | Part Thirteen | Part Fourteen | Part Fifteen | Part Sixteen | Part Seventeen

18. “Memory Vault”

by Gustavo Bondoni

“Any questions?” Raisa Popov asked as she turned off the auto-drill. They stood in a mine shaft deep below the surface of Odin III, an important excavation site operated by the Galactic Mining company light-years from Earth.

“None. I can handle one of these,” Jonas Gruber replied, stepping eagerly towards the machine. “It’s not so different from the equipment on a star freighter.”

“Good. We’ll work you up to these over the next few months, then,” she said. Her arm barred his way.

“I’d rather start now.”

Popov sighed, and Jonas didn’t see the foreman who made others tremble, but a woman with much too much on her plate. “Yeah. You and every other gopher in this mine. I’ve heard it all. The pay’s better when you work a drill. It’s more fun than loading the carts… You’ll wait your turn like the rest.”

“My brother…”

“Your brother loaded ore for a year before he even saw a drill. The only reason you’re here is that he has a knack for finding nodes of sylicenium for the processing plant to ship out. We’re hoping you’ll take after him.”

“He takes after me. I’m older. Time dilation on the interstellar runs just makes me look younger.” Jonas was tired of explaining that, even though he was in his twenties, he’d been born before his thirty-odd-year-old brother. He also refrained from saying that he didn’t just want a job, but wanted to fit in: everyone he knew was a senior miner by now.

“If you can find the ore, I don’t care if you’re his grandfather.” Popov walked off, heading deeper into the mines where the early-morning shift had, half an hour before, replaced Jonas’ graveyard shift.

Jonas checked his watch. If he hurried, he could catch second sunup.

Instead of heading out through the main exit, he took a connector tunnel that ran between the current shaft and a shallower, spent mine. That mine’s exit was his favorite place to watch the rise of Odin’s second sun, though it was technically forbidden to exit out of any but the main mine entrances at night, on account of dangerous predators.

As he walked, he pulled a bag from his pocket, extracted a mushroom, and tore off a tiny chunk, hopefully small enough to avoid addiction. He wanted to relax, allow himself to ease back into life on Odin III, but he didn’t want his mind eaten away.

The big, empty mine was well-lit and routinely patrolled to keep it clear of wildlife.

Movement flickered in the corner of his eye. Was this one of the mushroom hallucinations he’d heard about?

He looked towards it, but saw nothing but an empty tunnel, the rock drilled into organic shapes.

Jonas resumed his walk, and again something flickered in his vision. This time, he didn’t turn his head, but stared straight ahead and tried to see if he could make out what he was seeing out of the corner of his eye.

Men in orange, full-body suits flickered in and out of his sight. They appeared to be pulling something from the ground and stuffing it in sacks.

It took all of Jonas’ discipline not to turn his head to look. He knew the men would disappear. He had to piece the hallucination together from what his peripheral vision allowed.

It came together and he realized the men were harvesting mushrooms. The same kind he had in his bag.

They were filling sacks marked with the Galactic logo.

Jonas walked on. This wasn’t an interesting vision after all. He already knew Galactic Mining wasn’t bagging mushrooms in this mine, even if they were plentiful. He’d been all over the complex, learning every production process. No mushroom packing at all.

But… he distinctly remembered buying Galactic-produced mushrooms on his travels. They were everywhere, the bag and logo synonymous with the drug in the rest of the galaxy.

Strange.

Jonas watched the sunrise, remembering many things at once.

Every single one of those things seemed real. And yet every memory seemed to contradict every other memory.

***

Weber’s Place was as empty as it was before he left. The big difference was that the bar was now owned by Ingrid, the founder’s daughter. Apart from her and that constantly snoozing cat of hers, only Father Luigi and the woman from the comm station were there. He knew that she and Father Luigi had a thing.

He shook his head. Luigi—the town screwup—was the last person he’d expected to become a priest.

He sat at a stool in front of the bar and said: “Beer.”

“What kind?” Ingrid replied. She didn’t stop wiping a glass with a cloth.

“Cheapest you have. Maybe when I get on a drill I can buy something better.”

She passed a bottle across the bar. “How are you settling in?”

“As well as can be expected. Except…” Jonas said. He stopped speaking and drank a sip of the beer.

“Except what?”

“Except I don’t exactly know which Odin III I’m trying to fit in to. Is it the one that sells sylicenium? The one that runs the mushroom business in this sector? The one that I saw destroyed by an asteroid on the news when I was doing the Crystallia run? Or the one that rebelled against Galactic and set itself up as refugee colony?”

She shrugged. “We didn’t do any of that. Well, except for the sylicenium thing.”

“And yet I remember all of it,” Jonas replied.

That earned him a raised eyebrow. “Have you been on the mushrooms?”

“Not much.” He pulled out the bag. “Look.”

Ingrid turned pale.

Luigi walked over to check on Ingrid. His eyes fell on the bag with the unmistakable logo on it. “I didn’t know Galactic sold mushrooms,” he said genially.

“They don’t,” Ingrid replied. “I talk to everyone. They don’t.”

“I agree,” Jonas said. “I’ve been down in the mines for days. There are plenty of mushrooms, but we aren’t bagging them. I would have seen it.”

“So what’s that? A practical joke?” the priest asked.

“No. That’s what mushroom bags look like… out there, among the stars. I remember buying them. But I also remember what I saw in the mine. We’re not mining mushrooms.”

Behind Ingrid, looking over her shoulder, a man appeared: Ingrid’s father Frank.

Jonas shook his head. “You’re dead,” he told the apparition.

The man looked straight at him. “Where I come from, you never made it back. Freighter accident returning from Crystallia. No survivors. So, you’re dead, too.”

Jonas couldn’t take it anymore. Abandoning his beer, he went back out into the street, hoping to clear his head. A number of vehicles drove by, around him and even through each other. He didn’t even bother to try to figure out which were actually present in his own reality and walked across the street.

“Jonas!”

Ingrid had followed him out of the bar.

“What?”

She seemed concerned. “You need to lay off the mushrooms. Really.”

“I left the bag inside,” he said. “Keep it to show the people who don’t believe me. I really don’t want any more of these visions. Even if they’re real. Maybe especially if they’re real.”

“They’re not real,” Ingrid said. “Where are you going?”

“For a walk.”

“Be back before sundown. And don’t do anything stupid.”

“All right,” he said turning away again.

She grabbed his arm. “Promise me.”

“What?”

“Promise me you won’t do anything stupid. Promise me you will come back to my bar before the sun goes down. We’ve already lost people to the mushrooms. Some of them were good people.”

“I left my mushrooms in the bar.”

“Promise me.”

He sighed. “All right. I promise.” He made to leave again but stopped and turned back to her. “And between us, I’m pretty sure the problem isn’t the mushrooms.”

Then he walked off.

___________________________

Gustavo Bondoni is novelist and short story writer with over three hundred stories published in fifteen countries, in seven languages.  He is a member of Codex and an Active Member of SFWA. His latest novel is Test Site Horror (2020). He has also published two other monster books: Ice Station: Death (2019) and Jungle Lab Terror (2020), three science fiction novels: Incursion (2017), Outside (2017) and Siege (2016) and an ebook novella entitled Branch. His short fiction is collected in Pale Reflection (2020), Off the Beaten Path (2019) Tenth Orbit and Other Faraway Places (2010) and Virtuoso and Other Stories (2011).
 
In 2019, Gustavo was awarded second place in the Jim Baen Memorial Contest and in 2018 he received a Judges Commendation (and second place) in The James White Award. He was also a 2019 finalist in the Writers of the Future Contest.
 
His website is at www.gustavobondoni.com

In the meantime, stay tuned for Part 19 of The Odin Chronicles, “The One Who Walks Out,” by Carol Scheina, coming on Friday.

Enjoy!
~brb

 

---

stupefy (ˈstü-pə-ˌfī) to stun, astonish, or astound

On Amazon now ► STUPEFYING STORIES 23

Interface with Stupefying Stories!

► on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StupefyingStories/

► on Twitter: https://twitter.com/StupefyingSF | @StupefyingSF

 

 

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The Odin Chronicles • Episode 17: “A Question of Timelines” • by Travis Burnham

INTRO: Welcome to Odin III, a grubby little mining world on the dark and dusty backside of nowhere. It’s a world where everything that’s worth having is already owned by Galactic Mining, and where people have come to squander their hopes and lives, working for the company and dreaming of striking it big. It’s also a world where some very strange and peculiar things have begun to happen, and it all started about six weeks weeks ago, in a bar called Weber’s Place, when Ray Cornwall didn’t just warp the fabric of space/time, he completely bent it…

Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six | Part Seven | Part Eight | Part Nine | Part Ten | Part Eleven | Part Twelve | Part Thirteen | Part Fourteen | Part Fifteen | Part Sixteen

17. “A Question of Timelines”

by Travis Burnham

In a shady dark corner of the spaceport on Deus IV, Aisling pressed her life savings into the smuggler’s hand. Her hands trembled and a lock of her hair was still streaked with her husband’s blood. He’d died in her arms not thirty minutes before with the bullets of corrupt theocracy agents lodged in his torso. She herself had narrowly escaped.

“Where to?” the smuggler asked Aisling.

She panicked and blurted, “Odin III.” Just the day before, she’d read an article written by a vaguely disreputable scientist about an intriguing species of mushroom, Psilocybe koblyxceata, known as koblyx on Odin III. The scientist had made some outlandish claims and Aisling was surprised that he’d been able to publish the piece. She herself was a therapist by training, focusing on entheogenic mushrooms for the treatment of trauma, or helping relieve existential distress in the terminally ill.

*  *  *

Three weeks later, the smuggler left her at the edge of one of Odin III’s settlements. Constable Jenkins found Aisling stumbling into town, bedraggled and shivering. The constable took one look at her and said, “I don’t care what you’re running from—most of us are running from something out here—just as long as you know that I’m the law, you’ll get on fine .” The Constable looked her up and down one more time and sighed, then scrawled a name on a piece of paper and pressed it into Aisling’s hand with a few credit chips. “Find Father Francis in town. He’ll set you right.”

So with a helping hand from the local parish, Aisling did the only thing she knew how to do—be a therapist. She set aside her trauma to help others work through theirs. Most of her first clients were children—it was tough growing up in a Galactic Mining settlement. One of the three local teachers, Finn, directed his students her way.

One morning, after she’d been on Odin III for four-and-a-half months, Finn asked, “Grab a cup of coffee?” He was attractive, tall and lean, and had a solid, quiet demeanor she found comforting.

“Thank you, but no, Finn.” She still felt raw from her husband’s death. She might have tried entheogenic therapy earlier, but she knew that Father Francis would denounce the mushroom’s use. There would be severe repercussions. She didn’t want a repeat of Deus IV, and though the Father hadn’t explicitly attached strings to the charity Aisling had received, she really didn’t want to disappoint him—he’d been so kind. But she knew it was time to start working on her own trauma and she knew this type of therapy to be effective. So she lay on her living room couch, slipped on some headphones playing Arvo Part, and took a dose of koblyx mushrooms.

Psilocybe koblyxceata was like no other experience she’d had. A thousand, a million chords of light spilled out from her. She plucked at one chord and saw an alternate life—she was six months pregnant with her husband’s child, both of them safe on Zephyrus II. In other chords, the smugglers jettisoned her body soon after takeoff from Deus IV or she died on Odin II in a mine collapse or a hundred other fates. Though Aisling had no inkling why, no one else she knew was able to see timelines while using koblyx. So she kept her own counsel and told no one. Especially because she wasn’t even sure she could trust her visions. Were they truly timelines or just her own imagined visions? She’d been soundly in the non-believer camp when she’d first heard the koblyx whispers and rumors.

But then she’d used them.

A few weeks later, Finn asked her out again, “I don’t suppose you’d be interested in a mug of Earl Grey?”

“Maybe next time,” she said, but didn’t mean it.

Soon she was spending every night on her couch, plucking at timelines, examining every decision that had led her to Odin III. All those terrible choices that had led to her husband’s death on Deus IV. But at the same time, she used information she gathered to help her in her practice. The kids she guided to actions that would benefit them—in one timeline, befriending a bully worked, but in others standing up to them was best. Or competing timelines where asking out a certain someone would lead to an affirming relationship, or a bitter rebuff.

Her first adult patient was Daraja Mapunda, otherwise known as The Machinist. A wizard with worm drives and gear boxes, he was a recluse who lived down in the mines of Odin III. Aisling met him in one of the abandoned shafts on one of her koblyx gathering missions. When she mentioned her occupation, he expressed some interest and appeared at her office one evening.

“I feel like I could have done more to save my father,” he said. “But instead I just sent him away. And he died of esophageal cancer while traveling to Asclepius II for treatment.”

That night Aisling plucked dozens and dozens of Daraja and his father’s timelines. There was nothing Daraja could have done differently that would have resulted in a better outcome and the next session she helped Daraja see that.

“Did you tell him you loved him?” Aisling asked during their next session.

“Everyday,” Daraja replied. “More than once a day. In every single message. Even the short messages that were just a chess move ended with ‘I love you’.”

“What was the last thing he wrote to you?”

“That he loved me, and that he was proud of me.”

“And the last thing from you to him.”

“Knight to C6. I love you and miss you, Dad. I’m so proud to be your son.”

“If I was writing your story as a movie script, I can’t think of a more perfect line of dialogue.”

Daraja smiled through his tears. And after that he still struggled, but Aisling could tell that his heart was lighter, even if just by a bit.

The more Aisling examined her own timelines, the more she agonized over every past misstep, and more and more, found herself paralyzed with indecisiveness in her present. She didn’t want to go to the store because that evening she’d see all the thousands of timelines that action produced, good, bad, and better.

Though for some reason she couldn’t even explain to herself, she never looked at the timelines with Finn.

And Finn continued to ask her out every few weeks, but changed the drink every time, the options getting more and more ludicrous—giraffe milk frappes or seaweed beer or any number of other horrid sounding drinks. Her answers continued to be no.

Finally, she realized her timeline examinations weren’t healing her trauma, but worsening it. Painfully, bit by bit, she weaned herself from scrutinizing her own timelines, and focused on those timelines that would help find good courses of action for those in her care. And she found some modicum of relief from indecision, and acceptance that her husband was gone.

The AI android Sloane-51 came to her struggling with existential angst. She’d been referred to Aisling by her close friend, Daraja. Aisling examined her timeline and found that some of the best timelines came from when the android just kept on keeping on.

“Should I be doing something more with my sentience?” Sloane-51 asked.

Aisling replied with a question: “What do you do with it now?”

“I play a lot of chess with Daraja.”

“Does it bring you joy?”

 “Yes.”

“I can’t think of a better use for your gift. There can’t be too much joy in the world.”

That evening, Aisling reflected back on what she’d said to her clients—maybe she should take her own advice. One last time, she promised herself, she examined her own timelines. It was impossible to live without choice or consequence, but it was possible to live a life where she embraced her decisions.

Eleven months to the day after she’d arrived on Odin III, Finn stood before her. He kicked at a stone in the dirt, and the twin sunset was reflected in his dark green eyes, and limned his black hair gold.

“Aisling, do you want to get—”

It was perhaps the fifteenth or twentieth or hundredth time that Finn had asked her out. He certainly scored points for persistence.

“How about some coffee?” she interrupted.

Coffee didn’t have to be a decision that led to one million timelines, and it probably wouldn’t lead to someone dying. Sometimes, hopefully, coffee could just be coffee.

“Though maybe after the coffee?” She put on a straight face and tried not to laugh. “We can grab a couple shots of Jörmungandr viper venom at Weber’s Place.”

___________________________

Travis Burnham’s work has found homes in Far Fetched Fables, Hypnos Magazine, Bad Dreams Entertainment, South85 Journal, SQ Quarterly, and others. He is a member of the online writers’ group, Codex, and has an MFA in Creative Writing from Converse College. He also recently won the Wyrm’s Gauntlet online writing contest. Burnham has been a DJ on three continents, and teaches middle school science and college level composition. He lives in Lisbon, Portugal with his wife, but grew up in Massachusetts, is from Maine at heart, and has lived in Japan, Colombia, and the Northern Mariana Islands.

In the meantime, stay tuned for Part 18 of The Odin Chronicles, “Memory Vault,” by Gustavo Bondoni, coming next Wednesday.

Enjoy!
~brb

 

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