Something Wicked #19 (March 2012) Read online

  www.SomethingWicked.co.za

  SCIENCE FICTION & HORROR

  ISSUE 19 – MARCH 2012

  cover art by

  Hendrik Gericke

  Editor

  Joe Vaz

  Head Fiction Editor

  Vianne Venter

  Contributing Non-Fiction Writers

  Mark Sykes

  Deon van Heerden

  Joe Vaz

  Vianne Venter

  Proofer

  Mark Sykes

  Marginals

  Genevieve Terblanche

  Design & Layout

  Joe Vaz

  Cover Art By:

  Hendrik Gericke

  Advertising

  Joe or Vianne

  [email protected]

  First Published March 2012

  by Inkless Media Publishing

  PO Box 15074, Vlaeberg, Cape Town, 8018

  www.SomethingWicked.co.za

  Copyright © 2012 Something Wicked

  Cover Art © by Hendrik Gericke

  All of the stories are copyright in the names of the individual authors as follows.

  “It Pays To Read The Safety Cards”, copyright © 2012 by R.W.W Greene.

  “Stained” copyright © 2012 by Chris Stevens

  “Ghost Love Score” copyright © 2012 by Peter Damien.

  “The Book of Love” copyright © 2012 by Nick Scorza

  All rights reserved. This eBook is licensed to the original purchaser only. Duplication or distribution to any person vie email, flash disk, network, print out, or any other means now in existence or yet to be invented is a violation of International copyright law.

  All characters within stories are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental, unless otherwise stated.

  The views expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of the publisher.

  Something Wicked Magazine

  March 2012

  Table of Contents

  Editor’s Note

  It Pays To Read The Safety Cards by R.W.W. Greene

  Writers Cornered: R.W.W. Greene

  Sixth Sense of Humour: Twisted Sinister by Mark Sykes

  Stained by Chris Stevens

  Writers Cornered: Chris Stevens

  Ghost Love Score by Peter Damien

  Writers Cornered: Peter Damien

  Book Review: 11/22/63 by Stephen King

  Feature Interview with Brandon Auret

  The Book of Love by Nick Scorza

  Writers Cornered: Nick Scorza

  Artist Profile: Hendrik Gericke

  © Something Wicked Magazine, 2012

  www.SomethingWicked.co.za

  EDITOR’S NOTE

  Mar 2012

  It’s been an exciting lead-up to our March issue, mostly to do with trying to squeeze thirty hours of work into a four-hour day. Damn physics, always getting in my way.

  I’ve also spent the last month designing and laying out our first ever anthology.

  The Anthology collects all the stories from our first six online issues (#11 through #16) in glorious paper and, if I say so myself, it’s looking beautiful.

  I’ll be posting the cover and TOC in a few days to go along with our IndieGoGo campaign (that’s Kickstarter for people without US bank accounts).

  Meanwhile, back to the issue at hand.

  Our March issue comes at you with four original stories, one SF and three horrors.

  We start off with some good advice in ‘It Pays to Read the Safety Cards’ by R.W.W. Greene on the 6th of March.

  Chris Steven’s twisted story, ‘Stained’ will be posted on the 13th of March. On the 20th of March comes Peter Damien’s ‘Ghost Love Score’, and we close off the issue with Nick Scorza’s ‘The Book of Love’.

  Our interview for March is with South African television and film actor, Brandon Auret, who has just come off the new Niell Blomkampf (District 9) film.

  Together with Mark Sykes’s Sixth Sense of Humour, this completes our issue for this month.

  If you just cannot wait to read all the stories then why not purchase the magazine now, or take out a subscription through Weightless Books?

  Thanks again, as usual, for your support and leave us your comments and thoughts on the stories, or even a review on our Amazon page.

  Till next time…

  Joe

  15:33 28th Feb 2012

  [back to contents]

  IT PAYS TO READ THE SAFETY CARDS

  by R.W.W. Greene

  A lot of people cheered when our space plane docked with the Sam Walton but I wasn’t in the mood. The ride up was terrible. First I felt squashed, then I felt like I was falling, then I just wanted to puke. The flight attendant had handed out anti-nausea gum before we took off, but people were throwing up all around me. A couple of rows back, someone missed the barf bag and vomit bubbles floated by my head. The attendant captured it with a net. Gross.

  “Ten years ago, this would've cost you half a million bucks,” my Dad said when we strapped into the plane. “We get to fly for free.”

  Mom had smiled, but I could tell she wanted to cry. She'd been tearing up off and on since we said goodbye to Grandma last week.

  Dylan kind of whimpered when we took off but went to sleep as soon as we entered free fall. I think there was more in the gum than anti-barf medicine.

  While waiting for takeoff, I read all the info and safety cards I could find in the seat pouch. I do that whenever we fly. It makes me feel like I’m doing my part to keep us from crashing. One card showed that the space plane can carry 400 passengers “safely and comfortably into orbit”. The Sam Walton is full at 50,000 colonists, which means it will take 125 flights to get us all aboard. At four flights a day, that's a little more than 30 days.

  Dad said our flight was set for the middle of the boarding schedule, giving us about 15 days before we left orbit. Fifteen days of staring at a planet that I'll never be able to touch again. Joy.

  “Hayley,” Dad said, “you're awful quiet. Are you still feeling sick?”

  I looked at him. Part of me wanted to say something mean. A smaller part wanted to say something nice.

  “I'm fine,” I said. “I'm just practicing my math.”

  Mom and Dad are both math people. He's a machinist and she's a micro programmer, which is why their colony applications were accepted. Dad could probably recreate any part on the colony ship. Mom writes code for fones, our portable data and communication devices, finding ways for them to do more with ever-smaller programs. The colony-lottery people probably drooled and crossed their fingers when my parents submitted their applications. Sucks for the colony that they got me in the deal.

  Dylan inherited their math brains. He's only eight but already knows more algebra than he should. I do OK, but it's work. I'm better at writing and art. Dad sometimes calls me a ‘right-brainer’ and kids Mom about having an affair with a milkman, whatever that is.

  As soon as we docked, the flight attendant made an announcement. “Please keep your seats until your assigned attendant escorts you to the habitat ring. You might feel a little queasy in microgravity but you'll be all set once your feet are on the ground.”

  I wanted to shout at them: You'll never have your feet on the ground again!

  It took about an hour to get everyone off the plane. Most of the colonists came aboard in family groups and that's how they were escorted off. When our turn came, the attendant showed us how to unstrap and pull ourselves along the handrail to the docking ring. It was pretty much like being in a swimming pool, but Dylan grinned like it was the best thing in the world. I wanted to hit him.

  I sn
agged my backpack on the door but the attendant helped me through. Everything I still owned was in the pack, all 15 pounds I’d been allowed. I’m small, like my Mom, and none of my friends take my size, so most of my clothes went to charity. My parents sold a lot of our other stuff at a lawn sale, while I hung out at a friend’s house. I just couldn’t stand to sit there and watch my whole life disappearing into other people’s cars.

  The flight attendant passed us off to one of the Sam Walton's crew, who introduced herself as Spaceman Apprentice Jen Dudevoir. “Call me Spaceman Jen,” she said, as she led us through a wide corridor to the habitat ring. She reminded us that the ring was set to constantly spin to approximate Earth gravity. I wanted to tell her “Spaceman Jen” sounded stupid, but it probably wasn't her fault.

  We could walk just fine in the ring, although I still felt lighter than normal. Dylan jumped around like a freak until Mom threatened to send him back to Earth. Spaceman Jen led us through boring taupe corridor after boring taupe corridor. Eventually we got to our quarters.

  They were just that, a space about one quarter the size of our house back in New Hampshire. Mom and Dad had a tiny room for themselves. There was a slightly larger family room with some chairs, a couch and a wall-sized Vid screen, and a tiny bathroom with a combined sink and toilet. Showers were “communal,” Mom said. The room Dylan and I are to share was like a closet, with bunk beds.

  “I get top,” Dylan said, practically sprinting up the ladder to the upper bunk.

  I took a deep breath but it didn't help.

  “Mom, I don't want to share a room with him.”

  “It won't be so bad when you get used to it,” Mom said. “Your bunk has a privacy screen you can use to shut us all out. There's a Vid in there, a lapdesk and some shelves for your personal stuff.” She touched my arm. “It's only until you graduate high school, and then you can move to the singles' dorms if you want.”

  “That's in four years!” I'd left all my friends behind, left Grandma, left all my stuff and now I had to share a room with my brother! “This was your idea, not mine! I didn't want to come. I could've stayed!”

  I glared through tears. Back on Earth I would have run outside or up to my room. Here, I could run out to the corridor, where anyone could see me, or to my bunk, and hope that I could figure out the privacy-screen controls before I looked stupid.

  I opted for the bathroom, and locked the door behind me.

  Dad banged on the bathroom door and yelled for a while. I could hear Mom telling him to stop shouting and that I had to come out sometime. She was right. There wasn’t much to do in there and, since it was now our only bathroom, I couldn't keep it all to myself. My brother had to pee, like, twice an hour, and I knew he hadn't gone since we left Earth.

  I came out in about 10 minutes and we silently agreed not to look at or talk to each other for a while. Dylan was already playing a game in his bunk so I dropped into mine to see what was up.

  Inside, the bunk was maybe twice as wide as me, and two feet longer than I am tall. The sleeping platform was adjustable, so I poked some buttons to get it into a reclining position and got the Vid dropped into place. I found the switch for the privacy screen and let it cut off the sounds of explosions and laser blasts from the upper bunk. Each bunk has its own ventilation system and can be sealed in an emergency, keeping the occupant alive for up to 48 hours. For now, it was just a good place to get away from my family.

  I flipped through the ship’s entertainment options until Mom pinged me and told me it was time for lunch.

  All the families in our section of the habitat ring were scheduled to meet for three cafeteria-style meals a day. We followed the directions in Dad's fone to our dining hall, where we joined the queue. We each took a tray of food and carried it back to our assigned table. Lunch was a fresh green salad with a soy curry and a brownie for dessert.

  “Enjoy the fresh water while you can, kiddo,” Dad said. “It might not be so tasty once it's been circulated a few thousand times.

  Yuck. I looked at the squeeze bottle of clear water on my tray and wondered what color it would be in 50 years, after everyone onboard the Sam Walton had drunk it and then peed it out over and over again.

  The families around us, all recent arrivals, pretty much kept to themselves. There were a few tables of singles, men and women who came on board alone, but most people accepted as colonists are part of “stable family units,” whatever that means.

  About midway through the meal, one of the ship's officers approached the lectern at the front of the room. He introduced himself as Lt. William Quinn and welcomed us aboard.

  “Over the next five days you will spend a lot of time learning about the Sam Walton and its systems. Then you will have two days off, just like back on Earth.” A lot of people laughed at the lame joke; I crossed my arms and glared. “Then on Monday, it's back to work for all of you. The kids will go to school, the adults will report to their job sites. Business as usual. You'll work hard, go back to your quarters and then kick back and relax. In 16 days, the Sam Walton will leave Earth’s orbit and then our journey really begins.”

  My mind wandered back to the video Mom had shown us when she broke “the news”. Our destination was Proxima Centuri, a star system about four light years from Earth. The plan was to use an ion drive to get the Sam Walton to Jupiter, where it could pick up some speed with a gravitational slingshot maneuver. Then, in two years when we left the solar system, the Walton would use its nuclear-pulse engines to accelerate to cruising speed. If all went well — and we didn't blow up, run out of air or freeze to death — we'd rendezvous with Proxima Centauri in a little more than 85 years. Mom and Dad would be dead and I'd be pushing 100.

  “It took us less than 200 years to damage our first space ship, Earth, beyond repair,” Lt. Quinn said. “The one we're on now is a lot more fragile. The air you breathe, the water you drink, the food you eat is all part of a carefully balanced system. Follow the rules, watch out for each other. We’re all in this together.”

  There was applause and some crying after that. Mom made us all hold hands around the table for a few minutes of silence. I peeked once and saw that Dylan was looking all around with a big grin on his face. I scowled at him and he grinned even harder.

  “We're in space,” he mouthed.

  Tell me something I don't know, I thought.

  The rest of the day was full of meetings and tours. The officers said they didn't expect us to remember much our first day, which was why the whole of the next week was scheduled for orientation. After dinner we went back to our quarters and I told Mom and Dad I was turning in early. I wasn't tired, really, just … full. In the space of 24 hours I'd left Earth for the last time and boarded a ship that I would spend the rest of my life on.

  I washed up a little in the bathroom and headed to my bunk. I changed into pj's and engaged the privacy screen.

  Then I cried.

  It wasn't fair. My family was practically religious about recycling and power conservation. Mom and Dad both biked to work and the bus we took to get around town was electric. Problem was, Mom said, all that came too late to help and too many things sped up the problem. That big oil spill in 2010, the nuclear meltdown in Kansas in 2015, the meteorite strike in California the year I was born … Scientists said we'd vaulted over the so-called tipping point and there was nothing we could do about it. Most of the life on Earth was dying and humanity, as we knew it, wouldn’t be far behind.

  Part of me cared but part of me didn't. I missed Earth. I hadn't seen any of my friends since my family entered quarantine six weeks before launch. Sure, there were Vid calls and e-messages but fewer and fewer of them as the days passed. Only six kids bothered to wish me good luck on launch day and Ben’s message called me a “deserter”. I knew he was only half joking.

  I dried my eyes on my sheet and went to sleep.

  School on the Walton was different than it was on Earth. For one thing, we attended class in person instead of logging in
from the study carrels in our bedrooms. We also ate lunch together, which meant we could talk about other people in person, not just in e-chat.

  My new friend Amanda’s news made me forget to chew my sandwich. “Megan is dating one of the crew? I can't believe it!”

  “Believe it,” Amanda said. “I saw them making out on the observation deck.”

  “She's going to get her heart broken,” said Brenda, another one of our lunch crowd. “You know what they say about the crew.”