An Aspie Tells Tales
By Bob Kite
Copyright 2012 Carrie Simmons
Cover Art By Bob Kite
CONTENTS:
Food Chain
- Science Fiction, We like to believe humans are the top of the food chain, but we are just the big fish in our very small pond. 2200 words
Newly Dead Newlywed
- Supernatural Horror, The origins of a restless spirit, and how she leaves her comfort zone. 4000 words
Family Tree
- Post-apocalyptic Fairy Tale, An oak sprite experiences a thousand years of future human history. 5500 words
Felinus Supernus
- Science Fiction/Experimental, A post-humanity evolved cat struggles against authority and doctrine to discover true history, as told through various archival sources. 1900 words
Svengolly
- Fantasy, A somewhat normal beginning that quickly becomes something of a mind trip, but resolves at the end. 3000 words
Faerie Glen
- Fantasy, Beware achieving your deepest desire, then again maybe just go for it. One person's hell is another's heaven. 500 words
Domino
- Fantasy, A gritty story of a super-hero fallen on hard times following a personal tragedy. 6700 words
Emergency Evacuation
- Science Fiction, A flash story for which I should be ashamed, if such a concept were in my nature. 327 words
Keeping To The Shadows
- Fantasy, Something of a social commentary, with a view of life from within the mind of a survivor. 1175 words
Crimson King
- Fantasy, The story of a simple country boy and his journey from the fields of his father's magic farm to the Court of the Queen of the Three Realms, and beyond. Caution: a couple of scenes are a bit on the dark side, but that's the nature of evil, as evil seldom appreciates being depicted as wishy-washy. 16000 words
Afterword
An introduction to me, my conditions, and my motivations for producing this book. 1200 words
Chapter 1: Food Chain
Bzzzzzz bzzzzzz bzzzzzz! The alarm echoed around the seemingly unoccupied pink marble bathroom, the early-morning sunlight seeping through the Taffeta curtains to brighten the start of the day. The penthouse glowed as the resident gloating in that cheerful light well before the lesser beings lower down the Manhattan social structure enjoyed a few moments of the same luxury.
The surface calm of the sunken Roman tub rippled as a few small bubbles appeared. The alarm clock took no notice, methodically sounding off every six minutes as if in irritation. A pinkish gray knob suddenly broke the surface of the water, engorged to unfurl in a disquietingly erotic manner, and smashed the alarm against the wall. The appendage deflated and retreated beneath the surface. A few moments later it reluctantly slipped out and over the side of the tub followed by the rest of the alien being.
The body was boneless, and resembled an octopus’ head-sack, but further physiology allowed no further comparison to earthly life. The formless mass squelched into the walk-in shower, spread the buttocks apart on a hanging human-suit, and entered by the anal opening. The body jerked a few times, then reached up to an overhead bar to lift itself off blunt hooks. It walked out the door, stopping a moment at the expansive bathroom window to admire the view of a small corner of Central Park and continued across the sunken living room into the glittering modern kitchen.
The alien opened the refrigerator to choose amongst a dozen pre-packaged meals, chose one, and plopped it into the microwave. It sat on a designer saddle-stool at the green-veined marble counter to shuffle through some notes for the morning’s meeting. The appliance dinged to indicate the contents had reached ninety-eight-degrees. The alien placed the package into the nickel-plated sink, removed the plastic cover, then turned around and bent over to allow a tubular feeding tube to exit the body and siphon the pinkish slurry.
It went to the bedroom after cleaning the kitchen and chose a charcoal Armani ensemble, then rode the penthouse elevator to the lobby. The concierge immediately came to attention as the private elevator door opened with a pleasant b-flat chime.
"Good morning, Mr. Smith! Shall I alert your driver to bring your car?"
"No thanks Rochester; it's a lovely day for a walk. I think I'll enjoy the sights."
The February morning was brisk, the temperature still in the teens, but the sky was clear after two days of light snow flurries. The sparkling white cover masked both the famous New York smells and the accumulation of commuter-debris. "Mr. Smith" walked down 6th Avenue, heading for his employer's corporate offices in the mid-forties block. As always, the scurrying yellow cabs utilized six lanes where the markings suggested four. The early shifts were just coming on duty and tempers were still only on a mild boil, moderating the noise to a dull clamor.
Despite a reputation to the contrary, the majority of pedestrians made an effort to avoid contact, leaving room to walk without a jostled elbow as long as one kept up an aerobic pace. The early-morning cold also minimized the number of panhandlers and doorway loiterers through which to slalom, although that would change as the temperature rose.
During the twenty-minute walk, Mr. Smith hungrily eyed the unsuspecting cattle that surrounded him, made even more delectable as puffy coats and jackets enhanced the outline of their portly frames. At his salary, he was only able to afford reconstituted people-pap, and the consequences for unauthorized hunting were severe enough to prohibit any thought of poaching. The first truly fresh meal he had ever enjoyed was during the recruiting party where he signed up for this field assignment. It seemed such a waste to allow all this ready bounty to go to waste, but upper management was very clear on this point. Nothing must ever allow the natives to become aware of their presence, even by inference.
With a mental sigh, Mr. Smith nodded towards the savory, rotund doorman and entered the gilt-framed doors of his destination. He walked across the vast lobby, presented himself to a rent-a-cop standing guard at a side hallway and navigated two turns to end in front of a door marked "Maintenance Personnel Only." A hidden device scanned him and automatically opened the reinforced door with a loud snick. He entered a small elevator, which descended several for minutes before it opened into the boardroom.
The oval table in the center of the room was encircled by twelve chairs, all but one occupied. Mr. Smith's walk had made him the last to arrive, but he was still ten minutes early. The floor, walls, and ceiling, all covered in polished concrete, hid intricate circuitry designed both to inhibit electronic eavesdropping and to facilitate intergalactic communications. The table was a single plank of waxed mahogany, plain except for a milky, round globe inset at the center. The only other items were the occasional electronic notepad or PDA. As Mr. Smith settled, the chairman cleared his throat and started the meeting.
"Let's get right to it. Overall, divisional headquarters is pleased with market trends and commends us on the saturation of the native food supply with cornstarch, corn syrup, and estrogen additives. Mr. Jones, report please."
"The recent danger from national health department inquiries has been quietly neutralized by the planned economic disruptions. Affordability, bulk, and convenience have stabilized as evidenced by sales and population weight gains. Add to that Ms. White's successful promotion of inactivity via video games, reliance on the internet, and affordable giant screen technology, the average American is now spending what, seven hours a day...?
"Actually, an average of nine for Americans, seven for other developed nations."
"Thank you, nine hours a day in sedentary activity."
"Great! Now, Mr. Smith, how are we handling the juvenile problem?"
"Although test markets sh
ow a small contingent of loyal customers prefer diabetic flavored children, the teen year's hormonal fluctuations are distasteful in the majority of the test markets. Wholesalers are reluctant to stock fresh supplies, and special orders don't have the profit margin to make them worthwhile. Our attempts at forcing puberty at an earlier age show promise, but we're not quite on goal yet."
"So do you recommend we drop the line entirely, or continue research?
"I'm leaning towards dropping, but in favor of developing a line of snacks by harvesting from third-world countries. Under U.N. nutrition programs, units aged less than six months are tasty, nutritious, and readily available in war-torn regions. Our profit per unit is smaller, but the cost is low, and we can more than make up the difference in volume."
"O.K., work up a white paper, and I'll send it upstairs for approval. Next, I'd like to move the recruiting bullet point up the agenda..."
The poly-dimensional communication globe in the center of the table interrupted the chairman. The milky translucence cleared into a burst of brilliant white light, giving way to a miniature scene of chaos. The viewpoint overlooked an office floor of endless cubicles, bulbous aliens moving around in disarray and evident distress while a cacophonous depth of noise filled the space. A harried head appeared, eclipsing half of the view field and gibbered in a flurry of words.
"Chairman Brown! I only have a few minutes before services cut off. We are ruined! Our competitors have discovered a new food animal inhabiting several hundred worlds . They have the exact same flavor, flesh, and fluids of humans but are non-intelligent, highly reproductive product. No one knows how this came about, but the result is total bankruptcy for our company. Our wholesalers are actually dumping their stocks of humans, and our creditors are calling in all notes and are preparing to sell us off piecemeal. There will be no further transport services available although I will try to convince the government to send a charity junket your way. We both know that will take decades at the least. My recommendation..."
The globe turned milky, then a deep ebony as the carrier signal was lost. The shocked department heads looked in silence to the chairman, hoping for and expecting him to take leadership and comfort their overwhelming fears.
Although they controlled vast wealth in earthly terms, the aliens were wholly dependent on H.Q. for off-world transportation and communication. Chairman Brown quickly reviewed and accepted the situation, for he was a talented leader, and moved to do what was possible.
He pressed a side button on his priority line, sat down, and gave an order.
"Security! Send Mrs. Fortelli into the boardroom."
A small nasal voice impertinently responded, "I'm sorry Chairman; protocol prohibits junior staff from entry..."
"Captain O'Donnal, you are henceforth terminated. Who else is on duty?"
After a minute of silence, another voice answered, "This is Lieutenant Charlotte Kingsly, Chairman. How may I..."
"Kingsly, you are my new head of security. Mrs. Fortelli, boardroom, NOW!"
"Yes sir, Mr. Chairman. Two minutes tops sir!"
Mrs. Fortelli was the chairman's long-time executive assistant. As the boardroom door opened, Chairman Brown smiled, stood up to gesture invitingly, and said, "Mrs. Fortelli, won't you please join us for lunch!"
Mrs. Fortelli maintained a stoically professional face despite her inner confusion as the executives began enthusiastically undressing. She finally broke into a shriek as pinkish gray tentacles began descending from the deflating flesh suits and placed her prone on the table.
An extruded appendage pierced the spine near the base of her neck, paralyzing muscles while allowing her fully conscious brain to produce delicious quantities of adrenaline. The chairman exclaimed, in a voice she neither understood nor long heard, how fresh meat tasted especially scrumptious when basted in strong emotions.
~o0o~
On the other side of a thin, non-Euclidian membrane, a smug amorphous Uber-Entity watched in satisfaction. The unseen shape lowered and twisted a barbed appendage, hooking into the accumulated ectoplasmic-temporal essence that constituted the chairman's soul. The Uber-Entity had been the agent responsible for designing and seeding worlds with genetically engineered human substitutes. The Entity was typically a scavenger of souls lost between the corporal world and the after-life. Although this provided for its continued existence, the Entity found them stale and tasteless.
For a while, it had effectively hunted and consumed live aliens until their science advanced to a point that they could defend themselves en masse. The Uber-entity had succeeded not only in isolating this specific group from their defenses but also provided the race as a whole with their own ecstasy-inducing food source.
As the Uber-Entity rolled the flavorful, screaming soul around its sensoria, it marveled at the freshness and vitality. It could consume all of them all at once, but mustered a great deal of self-discipline and decided to savor them one by one, willing to sacrifice instant gratification for long-term satisfaction. It sighed contentedly as only those at the top of the food chain can.
~o0o~
The made a The trans-dimensional Ancients admired the fine main course centerpiece for the Feast of Transition. As the elder Ancients gave themselves up to the alluring pull of black holes, their unending memories full of wisdom and experiences, they were weary and ready for the next step into the unknown. The parentho-genetic buds of the Younger generation ate their first meal of fattened Uber-Entity, and asked their parents what happens within the singularity.
"No one truly knows, but I believe that time eventually slows to nothing, offering eternal rest. Others, like the Cult of Cukukachoo, tell of a myth where the singularities were purposely designed by an omniscient being to reward elder Ancients for their good deeds in life.
~o0o~
The Grazer Cukukachoo tenuously spread across the vast entropic center of creation. felt cohesion of its constituent parts nearing the breaking point as the universe continued to expand outward, which mad it feel hungry. It reached into a few singularities, pulled a cluster of Ancients, and sent them on the slow journey towards its bowels. The Grazer felt satisfaction as it slowly stripped off and incorporated their essence into its own. Once in a very long while, Cukukachoo squeezed the dense, concentrated remains of indigestible matter and dark energy out of existence, the only form of pleasure Cukukachoo enjoyed besides the act of eating. The waste was forced into a non-region of pre-existence and exploded to form a nascent universe.
The Grazer moved either extremely quickly or glacially slowly, depending upon the observer’s perspective. It took a vast amount of time to eat a universe, but given the Grazer’s immense size, they were consumed like popcorn. Eventually, on a time scale so large as to be immeasurable, the Grazer's limited intelligence noticed a shiny something appear in the middle of the next universe over.
The something engaged Cukukachoo’s interest and awoke long-dormant instincts and feelings it did not know where pre-programmed. The Grazer left the current universe half eaten and veered towards the something. The something tasted exquisite as the Grazer slowly enveloped it. Suddenly (or at least it seemed sudden to the Grazer), the something extruded spiky ridges into several dimensions and embedded in the Grazer's gut. Cukukachoo felt betrayed as it was pulled it out of the familiar matrix it had always known. The last feeling the Grazer experienced before it expired was the strangeness of flopping alongside a string of other Grazers. It had always assumed it was the only one.
~o0o~
"Let's head back to shore, Junior, before this string of Grazers begins to rot. It has been a long day, and I'm starving!"
~end~
Chapter 2: Newly Dead Newlywed
Mary squealed as her husband of two hours carried her over the threshold. That feat was slightly more impressive given she was not as slim at twenty-five (it also happened to be her birthday) as in her youth, plus she was eight and a half months pregnant. William made a manly three steps onto the marble
floor of the cavernous entry and set her gently on her feet just before his trembling legs gave out.
Mary was the last of an ancient bloodline. Although most of the money was gone she was the heiress to several original blocks of old San Francisco properties, including the hundred and fifty-year-old Victorian four-story, she had just entered for the first time. Along with the remainder of the family fortune, she also inherited the quirky conditions placed on the trust fund. She would gain full receivership upon reaching her twenty-fifth birthday, as long as she remained unmarried and childless. Technically, she just met those requirements.
William was a newly minted dot-com millionaire who worked out of Silicon Valley to the south. The two fell deeply and compatibly in love at a Forty-Niners' corporate box playoff event nearly a year previous, a love so strong it almost cost Mary her inheritance.
" Yaarghh!” Mary exaggerated a yawn with a twinkle in her eyes. "I'm exhausted, think I'll go find the honeymoon suite and hit the hay. I'll race you up. Winner gets the choice of bedside!"
William glanced down at her very pregnant belly, clever enough not to verbalize his question but communicated his point with a raised eyebrow."
Of course," She drawled, "It's your job as the man of the house to take up the luggage."
As William stood and wondered how best to respond to her blatant sexism, Mary started up the grand staircase at full waddle.
~o0o~
After a passionate but carefully considerate "official" consummation, William started for the master bath and stripped off what remained of his tux in preparation of a much-needed bath.
"Oh, by the way." William said as he veered off to rummage through a large Louise Vuitton, "I wanted to make something extra special for your wedding-birthday-majority gift. The Board chose my department to test the pre-release home version of our new three-D printer. The modeling software integrated like a dream."