Domains of Opposition
Day One—Minus One
The Riven
What The Watcher Saw
Tall wooden walls, stark white and unadorned, mark out a simple quadrangle under an open-beam ceiling. Late morning sun leaks into the space through narrow horizontal windows set high up in the eaves. Lower down, a couple panes of …
Guardian
Brin is awake without perceptible transition, lying on a stone shelf with Narregan behind her, one arm draped, sheltering her in his sleep. His breath stirs the small hairs on her neck. She shrugs his arm and pushes herself …
The Bones of It
Her nav signals its disconnect from the trac pattern and glides the vehicle onto a well-maintained surface road. She resumes manual and squints into the middle distance ahead for a glimpse of something she’s never actually seen before. It’s …
Crows Come Around
Cast your gaze down here, if you will, and see the lone figure whose trail leads him through forested hillsides. He remembers the smell of this damp earth. He’s been in this country before, at least two lifetimes ago. …
Small Worlds Collide
Recumbent in the van’s open side panel, a cushion between her back and the door post, Ruby is content to wait for the next scene in the unfolding mystery story her life has become. To go out seeking pieces …
A Warrior’s Perspective
When first I am awakened from that dreamless torpor to which we had abandoned ourselves, I sense time has passed, but not how much of it, and that beyond the stony vault sheltering us, the world has changed. It …
Tradition & Obligation
Jonas watches the uniformed man return to his sleek, metallic buggy. Its odd, wing-like doors close with a hushed solidity and the conveyance moves away under its own queer, whirring power. The dogs complete a couple exuberant revolutions around …
Pojade
The images displayed are as sharp and clear as the best law enforcement recorders can generate under the circumstances and the burly brown bear peering over the shoulder of a somber technician is experiencing an unaccustomed level of anxiety. …
Remert’s Perspective
The door to Remert’s private office snaps back into the pocket behind the armoire and the Director’s hurried exit is blocked. The Deputy Director is an unwelcome obstacle to egress. “I have business elsewhere,” Remert says. …
Adventures in the Non-local Quantum Hologram
Komila Chandra
The Bean Counter’s atmosphere is bright without glare and just crowded enough at any time to suggest the site’s quiet popularity. Komila is seated, as is her custom most days, alone at a small high-top near a street-side window, cup in one hand, foldie in the other, scanning headlines without much interest. …
Taquo
The ocean, temperamental, pacific in name only, reaches to meet a hazy, gray horizon. Wind has churned the surface into white-capped folds marching without cadence across an open expanse. Braced against a force that cannot touch him, Denny stands within the encircling transparency of the greatroom watching breakers expend themselves against the …
The Veep
Located on the White House premises, just across West Executive Avenue from the West Wing, is an imposing structure, a grandiose architectural monstrosity Mark Twain once referred to as “the ugliest building in America”. Situated within the Eisenhower Executive Office Building among a host of other executive branch agencies and staff is …
Dash9’s Interview
Rain pelts in muted fury against the clearwall nearest him as Denny reenters what many still refer to as “the Real world”. Euphemisms abound. “We’re ready whenever you are, Denny,” Eric says. “What?” “The interview with Benn and young Mr. Crippen. Did you still wish to participate?” “Oh, right. Have they initiated …
Day One
LocUS
Pruitt’s Enlightenment
The limousine whispers in low and slow over the terrace garden treetops and hovers in defiance of its streamlined mass. Landing pins extrude and, with a lazy pirouette, it settles onto the pad without recoil. Inside …