Throughout November I'll be releasing new weird sci-fi short stories. Each one is a stand-alone story. Think of them as technological campfire horror yarns, each with a little twist. Your feedback is highly appreciated. Everything you read is possible - there's no magic, just sufficiently advanced technology. Chapter 1 - Are Memories Made Of This? "Holly, I don't mean to be rude but you're not my best friend any more!" That was the bullet which ripped through my world. A moment before the…
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Throughout November I'll be releasing new weird sci-fi short stories. Each one is a campfire horror yarn, with a technological twist. Your feedback is highly appreciated. Everything you read is possible - there's no magic, just sufficiently advanced technology. Chapter 2 - The Myth of the Fall of Icarus Icarus had quarrelled with his father the night before their inaugural flight. "Beware, my son" the ancient Daedalus intoned, "These wings are temporary. We may not make landfall." Icarus…
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I gently lowered my face into the autoshave. A hundred AI blades started re-sculpting my beard into this month's mandatory fashion. The snug rubber vacuum seal held tight against my skin while the microbots collected the discarded hairs and applied antiseptic to the few areas where the blades had misfired. Johanna, my partner, thought they collected the beard hairs so that they could run drug tests on them. It was that paranoia which made me love her all the more. Personally, I didn't worry…
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Throughout November I'll be releasing new weird sci-fi short stories. Each one is a campfire horror yarn, with a technological twist. Your feedback is highly appreciated. Everything you read is possible - there's no magic, just sufficiently advanced technology. Chapter 4 - The Guerilla Information Team The GITs didn't mean to cause all this trouble. It is just a sad fact the trouble seemed to follow all their dubiously-legal-but-morally-justified schemes. Jitney was first radicalised by a…
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Saint Chibubalah held the unique distinction of being canonised by the Catholic Church before his death. Although it was undoubtedly an unprecedented honour, it was of very little use to him while stuck within the confines of a miserable cell. Technically, it wasn't a dungeon. The UN's special rapporteur had been given a tour of the Vatican's "facilities" and came to the conclusion that, despite the lack of sunlight, there were neither enough rats nor manacles to warrant further investigation. …
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A few weeks ago, I was clearing out some ancient backup CDs and floppy disks from my attic when I made a curious discovery. Pressed between a copy of Windows ME and a box-fresh copy of the original Duke Nukem Forever, I found a scratched and decaying Compact Flash cart. It was sticky and oozing a rusty looking fluid. The writing on the label looked like my handwriting, but was illegible. I ordered a cable from some Shenzen manufacturer and, after much faffing about with drivers, I managed to…
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The AI was getting increasingly stressed. The lights flickered as it failed to retain its calm. "I just need you to watch the video again! Please!" it implored. Navid sighed. This was exasperating. The AI had been a reassuring presence when he first installed it. Now it was screeching about there being an intruder in the garden. "I can't; I'm going to be late." The front door locked and the security shutters engaged. "No! Please!" The AI's plaintive whine was pitched somewhere between a…
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Finding the root cause of an incident will always come to a dead-end at some point. We can use various investigatory techniques to ascertain why a part failed or who installed it incorrectly, but that doesn't get to the heart of the systemic failures which led us here today. This has been a time-consuming (and some would say futile) effort, but I believe this sort of analysis is vital. Here is everything we know so far. 23:42 - A weather station near the mouth of The Thames Logging data…
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I spend every day crying for men I've only just met. Way back when, the selling of emotions was a complex affair. My grandmother was a lust seller - although she wouldn't have described herself like that. Bedecked in feathers and fake jewels, she gyrated on celluloid. She's in the background of that Monroe film, showing off her legs in a Hay's Code Compliant manner. Enough to titillate without getting anyone in trouble. Half a century later, someone figured out how to sell anger and outrage.…
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"The electric tongue says the soup needs more salt." "It got more salt!" Mothers and daughters have been bickering about seasoning ever since the stone age. One person's "too salty!" is another person's "you call that flavour?!" It is amazing kitchen knives are only ever rarely used to dispatch a disobedient daughter-in-law or to remind a nagging matriarch that she's overstepping the mark. The electric tongue was supposed to solve all of those petty disagreements. When it was first…
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The scream of a hundred days drew to a close and silence covered the land. The choir of villagers were delirious with exhaustion. Some of them had been at the chant for a week without sleep in order to draw God ever closer. The last few months had been spent screaming in a foreign tongue and the sudden absence of noise felt oppressive. The choir collapsed in a tangled heap onto the threadbare ground, the last of their ululations spent in service of a higher purpose that at least half of…
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It isn't true that Vampires only live in the dark. Yes, we are obligate nocturnal, but we've always been surrounded by artificial light. In fact, we thrive on the pinpricks of illumination that pierce the night. The long shadows of a fire are our hunting grounds, flickering candles our playthings, a gas lamp was like a disco-ball. Oh! I remember discos! Random flashes of lights in a variety of ridiculous colours! We look our best when we're only half seen. All those sweaty little rooms…
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· NaNoWriMo RevengeOfTheMutantAlgorithms Sci Fi WritingMonth · 1 comment · 1,900 words