I chew the gum cautiously, wincing at the bitter taste seeping through the mint overtones. The engineers assured me there is no risk of it exploding without the chemical stimulus of the detonator, but they've been wrong before. I curse the rules that say we can only use appropriate tech for the parallel we are active in. If it's not nanotech the engineers seem to treat it like some kind of game, an academic experiment in antiquity. As soon as the gum turns sweet I extract it from my mouth and push it gently into the lock. I take the packet of cigarettes from my pocket and pull one out, checking it to make sure it is one of the ones that I need. I lick the paper wrapper and gently break it apart. I tease out the dark, thin thread hidden within it and push it into the gum. Next I take off my watch and wrap the thread around the diver's face which I twist ninety degrees. A push of the wind-up knob sets the timer going and I quickly run around the oversize desk and duck behind it.
Unseen by me there is a fizzing and a sharp crack. I wince. I'm hoping the sound of the party below will cover up the noise of my break-in but there are plenty of guards patrolling around, keeping an eye out for people like me. I lift my head over the desk. The safe door is open, a small wisp of smoke caught in the moonlight crack of the curtain. Running back to the safe I start to explore its contents, pocketing the jewelry, putting the folders with documents to one side. The theft of the trinkets will help to provide a cover for my real reason for the burglary as well as inject some much needed local cash into the project's coffers. I spread the documents on the desk and begin to quickly identify those that might be of use. Plans for rockets, buildings and other assorted hardware, signatures on deals and contracts. I quickly photograph them all and then scatter them around the safe to give the impression that the have been discarded and thrown to the side. It won't fool the Professor, but there won't be enough evidence to prove we were here, either.
I clip the camera back onto my belt buckle, rearrange my bow tie and brush down the tuxedo jacket. I check the hallway outside. Still no-one. I need to get back to the party unnoticed and get out of here before the robbery is noticed. Always the fun part. A door opens and my hand slides to my gun. Agent Kowalski steps out of a side room, messing her hair a little. I take her arm and, turning the corner we begin to stagger down the hall with our best drunken walks. It's all going well until we reach the stairs to almost walk straight in to the guards forming a wall blocking our path. Behind us the Professors gentle voice speaks.
"Kill them."
Kowalski and I both launch ourselves at the guards, drawing our guns, but we are too slow to get off a shot and, deafened by the sound of shots, we fall. The pain and blood mix into my senses into a single flailing cry of annoyance.
Back at the base Kowalski, now back in her normal body, is cursing. Staggering around the office space as she paces through the adjustment exercises. I watch her, waiting for the hangover kick of the transmission to peel away before I start my own exercises.
"Not only did we not get anything, he also knows we are here. He's going to find the bloody camera and know it was us."
I shrug.
"We can still pull the images from my mind. Won't be as good, but it's something. And the Professor would have known anyway. It's not stupid."
Jung, the blue brain consciousness currently in charge of us, watches from his screen silently. He's a patient one, and he already has a plan in place, I can tell from looking at him.
Showing posts with label extract. Show all posts
Showing posts with label extract. Show all posts
Sunday, 28 February 2010
Sunday, 13 July 2008
photomancy
I look through the album looking at the photos in my collection. It has been painstakingly built up over years, the images pressed lightly against th gum of the page, protected by a thin film of plastic, and carefully catalogued into the correct sections. Some of them are whole while others are missing corners, or have holes cut into them to remove key elements; a particular pattern of wood or stone, a person's head, the paw of a cat. Many of the photos I have taken and developed with my own hands but others I've sought out and purchased, occasionaly at great expense, in order to extend my collection.
They have to be real photos, developed from the original negative, or polaroids work well. Maybe even better, with little inhibition caused by the repetition of the original event. Digital does not really work at all. Some think that this is because of the resolution of the camera and some still try to use the latest cameras in an effort to experiment and free themselves from the purity, and difficulties, of film. I do not believe this can be done. The capture of a digital image is too transitory, the mechanism for absorbing the image is diluted by all the other images that have passed through it. Maybe the first photo a digital camera takes has power but after that there is nothing left. No essence, no magic.
They have to be real photos, developed from the original negative, or polaroids work well. Maybe even better, with little inhibition caused by the repetition of the original event. Digital does not really work at all. Some think that this is because of the resolution of the camera and some still try to use the latest cameras in an effort to experiment and free themselves from the purity, and difficulties, of film. I do not believe this can be done. The capture of a digital image is too transitory, the mechanism for absorbing the image is diluted by all the other images that have passed through it. Maybe the first photo a digital camera takes has power but after that there is nothing left. No essence, no magic.
Sunday, 23 March 2008
training
The bus stops at a gaudy sign with a painted picture of a monkey. The Chinese students get off excitedly, their cameras blinking to record everything they see. A line of deep red mountains, barren and scored with hideous black scratches, forms a line along the edge of the road, stretching off towards the west. Sam looks out, interested to see what has got everyone else so excited. The other foreign students look tired and bored, eyes blurred from trying to focus on pocket games or study manuals in the jagged motion of the bus.
“What is it?” Devers asks Sam.
Sam shrugs and gets up, dropping through the doorway into the chill air outside. The driver is already stood there, watching with a casual insolence as he smokes a cigarette.
“Shi shenme difang? Youming ma?” Sam asks.
“Shi.” The driver replies. These are the fire mountains. The place where the Monkey King had one of his trials. Sam remembers the story and looks around. The range seems strangely small compared to how he had imagined it. It does not seem to inspire the fear and awe described in the story of Tripitaka's thirst. Sam is struck by a strange sense of deja vu in the realisation that he is tracing the steps of the novel even if only part-way. Now the Earth seems tamer than it ever has been, ground down under the spreading of human life and its desire to make itself at ease where it can. He shudders and tells himself it is the cold.
The bus shines in the brilliant light when they get on it again. Past the mountains the bus drives on for hours, through the next night and day, until they begin the slow ascent to Tibet. The bus is a copy of the ones used to ferry workers around on Mars and so it is also a part of the training. It is a long, jointed snake of metal, divided into three compartments. Two are living quarters, one of the men and one for the women. The one on the end carried their equipment and scientific instruments. They have to learn to think of it as their refuge.
Half a day into the climb up the winding road they stop at a gully. Instructor Xia blows his whistle and they assemble in a line outside the bus. He speaks first in Chinese and then Sam translates it into English for the others.
“We are now at 1000 metres. Still not so high that you will be feeling the effects of altitude sickness but it is essential that I remind you – if you feel ill effects you must tell me or one of the other masters. More than likely it will be nothing, but we have to be sure. Even people who have been up here many times before can still succumb to altitude sickness. Remember to take your meds, those little machines will keep your lungs working for you. For tonight I want you to rest and enjoy your last beer. There will be no drinking once we are on the top. Anyone found drinking, or even with a stash of alcohol smuggled away somewhere will be immediately expelled. There are no exceptions.”
The serious expression on his face suddenly breaks open into a smile. He reaches into a pocket to pull out a small bottle of baijiu and cracks it open.
“Good luck to all of us.”
He tips a little on the ground and takes a good swig. The students laugh and break up into our natural groups, a few eager ones jumping back on board to get out the supplies they had been hoarding, the rest just taking the chance to stretch their legs.
The next day the bus sets off early. Everyone feeling sore and hungover, headaches grow worse through the day as the altitude increases and all retreat into silence to avoid petty arguments. The bus creaks along a road that is so old its self-repairing nanite cover has been stripped from its pitted surface. Dark patches of concrete are scattered either side where the nanites accumulate in small hollows and against rock. Another day of driving. Eventually they arrive at the training camp.
The camp is situated in the middle of nowhere. There is only the faint dark smear of mountains on the horizon to offer any indication that the world is other than flat, grey and featureless. There is a stench of ozone and acids leaking into the air from rusted and battered equipment. The temperature hovers around zero degrees. If it were not for him being able to breath the air unaided then this is what Mars must be like, he thinks. Silent apart from the sound of the land itself, the sussuration of the wind and the sand sharing ancient secrets.
“What is it?” Devers asks Sam.
Sam shrugs and gets up, dropping through the doorway into the chill air outside. The driver is already stood there, watching with a casual insolence as he smokes a cigarette.
“Shi shenme difang? Youming ma?” Sam asks.
“Shi.” The driver replies. These are the fire mountains. The place where the Monkey King had one of his trials. Sam remembers the story and looks around. The range seems strangely small compared to how he had imagined it. It does not seem to inspire the fear and awe described in the story of Tripitaka's thirst. Sam is struck by a strange sense of deja vu in the realisation that he is tracing the steps of the novel even if only part-way. Now the Earth seems tamer than it ever has been, ground down under the spreading of human life and its desire to make itself at ease where it can. He shudders and tells himself it is the cold.
The bus shines in the brilliant light when they get on it again. Past the mountains the bus drives on for hours, through the next night and day, until they begin the slow ascent to Tibet. The bus is a copy of the ones used to ferry workers around on Mars and so it is also a part of the training. It is a long, jointed snake of metal, divided into three compartments. Two are living quarters, one of the men and one for the women. The one on the end carried their equipment and scientific instruments. They have to learn to think of it as their refuge.
Half a day into the climb up the winding road they stop at a gully. Instructor Xia blows his whistle and they assemble in a line outside the bus. He speaks first in Chinese and then Sam translates it into English for the others.
“We are now at 1000 metres. Still not so high that you will be feeling the effects of altitude sickness but it is essential that I remind you – if you feel ill effects you must tell me or one of the other masters. More than likely it will be nothing, but we have to be sure. Even people who have been up here many times before can still succumb to altitude sickness. Remember to take your meds, those little machines will keep your lungs working for you. For tonight I want you to rest and enjoy your last beer. There will be no drinking once we are on the top. Anyone found drinking, or even with a stash of alcohol smuggled away somewhere will be immediately expelled. There are no exceptions.”
The serious expression on his face suddenly breaks open into a smile. He reaches into a pocket to pull out a small bottle of baijiu and cracks it open.
“Good luck to all of us.”
He tips a little on the ground and takes a good swig. The students laugh and break up into our natural groups, a few eager ones jumping back on board to get out the supplies they had been hoarding, the rest just taking the chance to stretch their legs.
The next day the bus sets off early. Everyone feeling sore and hungover, headaches grow worse through the day as the altitude increases and all retreat into silence to avoid petty arguments. The bus creaks along a road that is so old its self-repairing nanite cover has been stripped from its pitted surface. Dark patches of concrete are scattered either side where the nanites accumulate in small hollows and against rock. Another day of driving. Eventually they arrive at the training camp.
The camp is situated in the middle of nowhere. There is only the faint dark smear of mountains on the horizon to offer any indication that the world is other than flat, grey and featureless. There is a stench of ozone and acids leaking into the air from rusted and battered equipment. The temperature hovers around zero degrees. If it were not for him being able to breath the air unaided then this is what Mars must be like, he thinks. Silent apart from the sound of the land itself, the sussuration of the wind and the sand sharing ancient secrets.
Sunday, 6 January 2008
China Taxi
Taxi rides always fill him with a mixture of awe and fear. They seem to sum up everything that is different about China from home. Over the quiet hum of of a million electric motors is a cacophony of downloaded kareoke horns; videos flickering along the side of taxis flashing advertising; teenagers scooters decorated in strange holos of their favourite pop sites, images of divas from Shanghai, Hong Kong and Taiwan smearing in the air around them competing with rappers and rock bands depending on dress and inclination. Sam is only 24 but the Chinese youth make him feel old and slow with their devotion to fashion, colours and gadgets.
The taxi ascends on to the freeway and the computers take over from the driver with a short warning beep and a scripted message in Chinese, Hindi and English informing them of the additional insurance charge and their rights in the case of an accident. The messages are barely audible under the thud of the driver's Taoist Tech beats. The driver still has a limited say in the direction of the vehicle but primary control now rests with the computers of the central traffic control. The movement on the freeway, though, is not the steady calm grace of motorways back home, but an acceleration into speeds nearing 150 kph amid a chaos of shifting lanes and variable speeds. Lines marking the road's natural channels become mere indicators as 5 lanes of traffic shift in the space seemingly made for only four. The traffic constantly weaves in and out amongst each other with only inches to spare, determined by complex flocking algorithms that European and American governments would never have the courage to trust.
After a short ride they spiral back down to street level again, the adrenaline of the trip metallic in Sam's mouth, and the driver dumps him with a disinterested grunt of thanks onto the edge of the pedestrianised shopping area.
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