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You know, a lot of Photoshop users spend a lot of time making great designs. Picking every color,layer, and tool. We use our brain and creativity to come up with stunning visual treats for all to look at.
There are little hot-keys and shortcuts around Photoshop, all to make navigation easier. I'm going to show a basic but very useful palette in Photoshop called styles. Do you take notice when go and shop for your favorite clothes the verity thatrsquo;s available? Sure you do! Thatrsquo;s in a nut shell what styles are. Check out the rest @ http://www.blog.ewebsitegraphicdesign.com/
Don't know if ya'll heard about the Brotha Felipe Smith first brother to get his manga published in Japan. He's black y'all and he got his joint put in a magazine dominated by japanese creators
"I'm going to commit suicide..." she said. "What?" was the murmur from the assembled crowd.
She began to tremble.
"I can't do it anymore. I.....don't know ANYTHING! I don't know how I got here...wherever here is. I just....was..."
"Come on now honey..." the one closest to her started. "Stop that nonsense."
The trembling became more of a sway...back and forth.
tick.....tock....
"I just feel like....I have to go. I HAVE to leave this place.....make a sacrifice."
Just then, the sky opened. The beam of light shone on her.
"See......it's for me! It's my time....."
A great sigh permiated the air as she was lifted.
The sacrifice...made.
She rolled down my face....that single tear......and helped my soul to heal.
Be careful what you wish for...
Allandra set her dials for landing. “This is the one
Leonardo! I can feel it! Just like the readings indicated!”
“Humph!” her partner retorted, but with a smile in his voice. “ITS says that
every mission. We've never find anything but plants – not even an
animal. And I had my heart set on a pet, space monkey... Why don't
you give it up, babe?”
She laughed throatily. “Now you know I can't do that.” Besides
this time they're right.
The young astronaut couldn't see Leonardo. But she knew he was there,
traveling parallel to her descent. They'd been in space for a week and
both were ready for some R&R, even it was on the surface of an unexplored
planet. Moving through the crusty, mist-filled atmosphere, Allandra reduced
her speed: coasting the tiny ship in.
Her heart sank.
From a distance the dust that surrounded the atmosphere had given off a
shimmering, mauve glow – hence the name: Red Stone. But up close, it was an
ugly, crater-filled rock covered in red dust.
Intergalactic Space Travel's (IST) readings had been wrong.
The astronaut spotted a plateau between two boulder, a small valley, and
headed for it. She easily maneuvered the ship into a smooth landing.
She was operating a probe: a craft roughly the same size as the small, private
planes so popular during the 21thcentury. Yet probes had the weapons capacity
and power of the much larger phoenix crafts. Allandra scanned the surface. With
the naked eye, it appeared to be mid-day.
Or whatever passes for mid-day on this desolate rock.
She pressed the blue button on her console, activating a test of the
atmosphere.
“No readings of intelligent life species, no readings of other animal
species,” a mechanized voice intoned. “Oxygen levels too low to sustain
human life. Analysis indicates acceptable levels of toxicity.”
That means it's safe for us to get out.
She activated her ship log, and began speaking. “This is Lieutenant
Allandra Rex, commander of Probe 12. It is 2600 hours Earth Time, Day
seven of the Probe mission. Lieutenant Leonardo Cash and I have
landed on Planet Red Stone. There is no sign of life.”
But we could still find something – oh, I hope so!
“Preliminary analysis of the planet indicates that there's not enough
oxygen to sustain human life...” Keep it simple and straightforward.
She'd learned this the first year in the space academy.
* * *
She clicked on her helmet communicator. “How you doing
over there?”
“Copathestic baby,” Leonardo's bass voice responded.
“What about you?”
“Just making the rounds.” She pushed another button on her suit and
Coltrane began to softly play.
Allandra was a curvaceous, yet petite young woman with cafe au lait skin
gray eyes, and shoulder-length, black hair. Many of ITS astronauts
thought her beautiful. Leonardo was no exception. But she had no
interest in romance, unless it was casual.
She' d had her heart broken her first year at ITS Academy by Professor
Sidney Barnes, her mentor. Sidney was a slender, lithe man, ten years
her senior, with piercing blue eyes. He'd easily seduced the
wide-eyed young cadet, who hung on his every word. Even now Allandra
could remember his touch [censored].
Professor Barnes was exquisite in bed and brilliant. He was also married
with four children – something he managed to keep from her until he'd
had her over and over, in every imaginable position.
Just the thought of him still hurts.
After Professor Barnes Allandra kept her eyes on the stars and the planets
beyond them. They would would give her what she yearned for.
And they would never leave her.
Allandra was born in 2065: 50 years after Planet Earth's decline. The same
year IST began building the probes: lightweight spacecrafts that
could humans could live in for years, if needs be; and that moved
fast enough to break the sound barrier – traveling millions of
miles within weeks.
In 2065, global warning had accelerated. The final stage in Earth's
destruction had begun. Temperatures of 150 degrees scorched the
planet. Tidal waves, monsoons and cyclones tore it apart.
Those who could afford it moved underground. Food became the
world's most valued resource. The rest were herded under domes.
Scientists scurried to genetically reproduce fruits and vegetables –
with horrible side effects.
Money still ruled the world. But money was becoming worthless. That's when
the government saw the writing on the wall and created IST... and the probes:
spacecrafts designed for one purpose, to seek out planets capable of
sustaining human life.
Copyright 2011 Valjeanne Jeffers all rights reserved
In celebration of black history, in celebration of black people proactively continuing to make ourstory, my little humble offering is to discount my book Hypknowlogy for the duration of October by 15% bringing the price down from £27 to £22.95! Now there are a few things you might be interested to know:
- Hypknowlogy is actually a compliation of all three of by books in one. That's right, the whole trilogy in one book.
- At the end of the book it has a Q&A section where all the questions were those sent in by fans/readers etc.
- This book is currently only available online and even then only available for purchase through my personal online bookstore.
- At this reduced price the purchase of Hypknowlogy is the equivalent to getting one book absolutely FREE.
So what are you waiting for?
(click image to purchase)
View book trailer:
tell me what you think
They wanted water
Bought it by the spaceship load
Now we have none left
Diabetic blood
Vampire bites and wonders
Why is it so sweet?
Lyons and Grant Multimedia LLC, a newly formed Black owned and operated New York based book publishing company, is now opened for business. Our mission is to give new writers of color the chance to publish and distribute their work when the big publishing house will not.
We are looking for talented Black writers who want to get their stories published and onto the shelves of national bookstores. If you already have a completed manuscript and would like us to evaluate it please contact us at info@lgmmedia.net. If it is already edited we have a distribution network already lined up and can go to print within a month or two. Your book will also be converted into an ebook for distribution to both the iPad and Kindle markets.
We are looking for all genres even short stories. We are also interested in illustrators for cover designs as well as interior graphics.
If you are a writer with a story please forward us the following information:
Your full name
Mailing address
Phone number
Email address
Brief author bio
Synopsis of story
A representative will contact you promptly.
We are NOT a vanity publishing company. So not everyone’s work will be selected and there are no costs involved. All authors maintain all rights to their work.
Well, it's been an interesting ride this summer writing the Priestess Saga. Doing the initial drafts on my cell phone was also interesting but not my cup of tea. The main thing was to prove it could be done. In the meantime, I think a well woven storyline in the tradition of ancient stories and myths was produced. I do believe those of you who have followed the story all summer will be pleased with the end. As for what's next for the Priestess? Not sure. But, I'm not ruling out anymore stories, just right now I'm going to concentrate on other stuff. Anyway, thanks to those of you who kept up with it all summer and for those of you who discover the Priestess for the first time.
All Hail the Priestess!
I listen to people. It's just what I do. Pay attention to the words, but even more important, I pay close attention to the tone of the voice......the inflection.....the cadence.....Very subtle clues that mean everything. .
The words on my door tell the story...”Lead Jeneice Roberts, Audio Succor”. Not a whole lot to it.....I help people based on the things they decide to share. The only issues arise when my....clients....omit important parts of their “stories”.
My unofficial office is situated on the 8th floor of the Wilmount building on the northeast side of Linherst, in the great sub-common of Thorson on this ball we call Teeren Prime. I've been here most of my life......since my gens came to help make Teeren Prime habitable. To hear them tell the story, TP was a great wasteland, full of deafening nothing, save for the one water cache just south of the last land mass. At one time, there was great debate over re-organizing the entire planet......allowing the most wealthy first access to whichever acreage they wanted, and leaving the rest of my people to luck and chance. Finally, the planet decided for them....
In 2971, the seven Lower Zone islands suddenly shifted and moved further south. When they were completely out of view of the main mass, a scout drone was sent to investigate. All of the data retrieved indicated that the seven never existed. Imagine that.......the seven prime pieces of real estate....vanished.
No matter what they tried, the Orchestrates could not convince the 6 Primes to reconsider and purchase land on the Main. And the 10 years of construction began.....
Today, Linherst is the cardinal post of TP, housing mostly states and their kindred. On the outskirts, most Ares Elite reside.
Then you have me.
As a genaive, my genfem noticed I had a “talent” for deciphering if someone was lying. She reported this information to the Ares Elite Proper, who suggested intensive testing. It was soon decided that I would be trained to be an Ares Elite Civ, one who works for, but is not part of AE.
The one thing that could jeapordize my position is the one thing I've never shared with anyone. What they call a talent, I call “cast”. It's almost like a faint picture in my head...a scent that no one else can smell.....or just a certain feeling. I've been “casting” for so long, it's truly second nature to me.
Second nature.....
Second chances....
Upon completion of my training, I was given my first appointment as Audio Succor for the AE civ reserves and proceeded to examine ,my first case.
The wife of Grand Marshall Levins had gone missing.
And he lied from the very beginning.
I sequestered him for just under 2 hours. All the while he remained calm and fixated on getting just the right words out.
His last sentence sealed it..... “She was the love of my life....she was my everything....”
I typed on my infopad. “Hmmm.....” just audibly escaped my lips. Grand Marshall Levins sat up straighter in the well appointed young finox leather chair. His sudden movement caused the material to lightly squeal beneath him.
“What is it?” His voice was firm. “Oh......” I placed the pad on my desk. “It's nothing GM Levins....” He interrupted....”Please, call me Aldin.” “O.K. Aldin.....” I stood and crossed to the front of my desk, purposely obscuring his possible view of the infopad. 'Lady Levins has been missing for just over a week. The AEP have looked into every possible explanation....situation.....route......but nothing has turned up. Her family on Rolant has not heard from her, and she has not been recorded as taking a transport off of Teeren Prime. And speaking to you.....to be honest......” I shifted my gaze to meet his. “Well, it poses more questions than it answers.”
His facial expression shifted from a look of absolution to slight confusion.
“Such as?” he demanded. “What question? What questions?” His body language intensified; changed....became more guarded. I felt my pulse rate increase.......heat began to build in my ears.
“Well....Aldin.....” I rested back on my desk. “It took you three days to admit her as missing.....”
“Yes...” he interrupted. “See, Larise has this habit of going off on her own sometimes. I didn't think anything of it until I hadn't heard anything from her....”
“O.K. So you just now deem it important to share this information?”
He turned his face slowly to the side. “I......It should be in the initial report.....”
“I studied the report before this meeting, and there is absolutely no mention of her solo sojourns....”
“Look civ....” his demeanor seemed a touch hostile. “You need to process this information and find my wife!”
“Find your wife? We both know where your wife is.....Aldin.....”
I pressed the indented area on the call unit to summon the in house cap/core team.
He rose from his seated position and smoothed his hand through his thinning hair. His back looked tense, revealing the fight or flight response. I hoped he made the right decision.
“How.......My life......Over......”
The partitian glowed the emergency red for a split second before retreating to allow cap/core access.
“GM Levins.....” The civ attired agent spoke with absolute authority. “Your duty is forefit.”
I averted my gaze, yet I knew what was to come.....
The agent closed the gap between himself and GM Levins. He positioned his dominant hand at the base of Aldin's neck and performed the gene extraction through a small pinprick. Through the same entry point, the injection flowed.
It took a matter of seconds for GM Levins to fall to the floor in a hump of flesh that would never again know a normal life.
One of the Cap/core agents knelt beside him and secured the thin strap around his neck, making sure the command node was situated on the injection site. The light flickered a barely visible yellow prompting GM Levins to stand. “Protocol Delta Prime 4....” The agent spoke aloud. “Follow...” And with that, GM Aldin Levins proceeded behind the agent through the partitian.
“Lead Roberts.....” the remaining agent began. “Please.....
I interrupted....”I know........report.....” I slumped in my chair. “ As soon as Vid forwards the encoded pod recording to me......” He seemed to sense my irritation. “Yes ma'am...” I was happy to see him leave. The vapor at the entrance swirled and settled into the solid closure. It was still clear so I spoke “mute” and the opening became more opaque.
Even after all the times during my intern I had witnessed the agents perform this task, it still seemed to suck the energy from me. My entire being felt listless and wasted. But, as usual, protocol demanded it.
I took a deep breath in an effort to compose myself....while in the back of my mind, a vivid show of what awaited GM Levins haphazardly rolled on like a feature film.
“Jeneice.....” The call unit glowed a faint green. I waved my finger down the right side to respond. “Daylyn.....What is it?” “Just wanted to know if you cared to do a late lunch......”
LYONS & GRANT MULTIMEDIA LLC (LGM), is ready to release their first novel "Supernature" penned by H.V.Lyons. They are looking for reviewers who are interested in reading and writing a review on this upcoming science fiction adventure novel.
The story was inspired by song writer Jean-Marc Cerrone's 1977 smash hit song by the same name, Supernature is a story about genetic engineering gone awry. After a series of strange incidents in the Arizona desert along with unexplained disappearances on a California beach an unlikely team of investigators and scientists join together to unravel a mystery of global proportions. Something is causing animals around the world to mutate, evolve and breed at an accelerated rate endangering the lives of thousands. All of the evidence points to a substance created by a suspected eco-terrorist working for the world’s largest biotechnology company. It becomes a race against time to find a solution to halt the spread of the mass mutations. If they fail it could mean the end of man kind.
So far the reviews have been positive. Here are a few:
This is a great science fiction read. - Barbara Hightower
The story goes full speed ahead. - Ami Blackwelder
This book gave me the creeps, but held my interest. - Brenda M. Lisbon
If you enjoy a suspenseful sci-fi thriller, then Supernature is an excellent choice. - Roger Wilson
Contact us NOW info@lgmmedia.net
From the ansible memoires of Exalted Scout, Glendale Mokoto, Hero of the Exodus Wars and the Fall of Earth. These are an amalgam of the earliest recordings before he was presumed lost one hundred years ago.
Two hundred years ago, I was nothing special. I had no extraordinary abilities or talents. I was not blessed with superhuman strength like members of the New Order, genetically manipulated to be the perfect human specimens, trained and bred to be the ultimate warrior protectors of the human race.
I did not augment my mind with sentient mechanical intelligence like the Cognoseti, who became human predictors of the future of man. It was their wisdom that discovered the Earth's greatest hidden secret; that we were not the first creatures on Earth to evolve into sentience. These human machine hybrids would later house the first true machine-descended intelligences in human history.
I did not mingle my DNA with those of animal species to garner advantages lost by the development of our bigger brains. The Transformed, whose malleable DNA allows them to absorb genetic traits of other species, would lead our Humanity in the exploration of new worlds after we lost our home in the Sol System.
You see, I was just a baseline human, good genes, nice teeth, good skin, and until it fell out in my fiftieth year, a nice head of hair. Two hundred years ago, I was also the most celebrated hero; indeed, I was the last hero of the Exodus of Man. They named a starship after me, they named a continent after me, they named thousands of children after me. And to me that is a strange thing, seeing how I did not actually survive the experience.
To ponder this, and to explain why you are now able to know any of this, you have to know a bit more about Old Earth.
I remember the stink of the war. It got up into your nose and never left. You could smell the burning flesh, the expended rounds, the fear, exhilaration, the bloodlust, the sheer terror of the Henrenki boiling up out of the ground in every major city on the planet.
I remember the fighting, the endless fighting, the bravery of those young men, their ceaseless dying, wheat before the scythe. When we retreated, the Henrenkai came, wave after wave, like the ocean filling in the beach of our dead. I remember them swarming over our positions, and even with machine guns blazing, bullets tearing into their nacreous, resilient flesh, they kept coming.
Things looked hopeless until the New Men appeared, with their mysterious talk about the Art of War, talk of the brush strokes of their weapons, their mastery of the battle-dance. In those days, all we knew of war was the spastic struggling of the uninitiated to battle. We had been too long at peace. Our struggles for survival, even before He came, all but absorbed our attention. But even after generations of peace, we were still a warlike species and returned reluctantly to the field of battle. Every man woman and child was armed because this was a war without quarter and without mercy.
When the Cognoseti revealed His existence, He rose from the oceans, the Ancient Enemy of all who live in our galaxy. We did not know He was legendary. We did not know what scars He and His kind had swept across the face of the galactic empire. We did not know what He wanted, only that He destroyed all that we had, with malice and forethought. We did learn one thing: when He rose from the Pacific Ocean, we realized the nature of our enemy, He had the might of an entire world, buried within our own.
Mechanically-sentient, He created weapons like the Henrenkai from His very flesh, the organo-mechanical body in which He fell to Earth billions of years ago and hid in the iron core of our planet. He hid because He was pursued by the greatest species our galaxy had ever spawned. He hid and waited until they passed away or forgot; we are not sure which. When He arose again, He had been all but forgotten by everyone in the galaxy. How could they not; nearly three billion of our years had passed while he slumbered.
So we were forced to fight Him on our own, tiny simians against a god-like machine who had tried to enslave an entire galaxy. He fought us on land, sea, air, and even in space. What could we do against an enemy so incredibly powerful? He destroyed a third of the human race and had barely awakened. We lost all hope.
Then we received a signal from space. It appeared on every communication band, every wavelength, every technology, all at once. If you were watching anything, listening to anything, it appeared and told you to be ready. A prophecy had sent them back to us, and it was now time to leave our world. They told us to gather as much of our world as we could carry. We did not understand, but we gathered our resources, every animal, every plant, every insect we thought we could find and catalog. We even set aside entire islands, marked with force fields to make them stand out.
We had no idea of what the Sjurani were capable back then. We did not know what to expect, but their message gave us hope, so we fought on.
I remember the first time I saw their ships. They blotted out the sun. We fought a retreating battle to their designated pick up points, and they gathered us up with tractor beams, entire cities, whole islands. It was rumored they took the entire African continent. They landed in their reptilian regalia and fought alongside us, as terrifying as the Henranki in their own way. Garishly colored in silks and metal, reptilian, festooned with gem-encrusted scales, loud, large, and boisterous; think of Old Earth fraternity boys armed with plasma cannons and rocket launchers and you will know something of the Rex, a warrior-breed of the Sjurani. They helped us hold the line against the Ancient Enemy while we fled. They claimed they were dinosaurs who had been born on Earth millions of years in the past. We were too desperate to care. And too foolish to realize why that was more important than we knew at the time.
Evacuation took two weeks, and I and my battle-brothers stayed and fought until the very last ships were leaving the planet. Hundreds of millions were moved to ships every day, each scarred with the loss of someone or something precious.
The Sjurani told us He was soon to waken. Once that happened, we would stand no chance at all. The Ancient Enemy had only one agenda, and that was leaving the Earth. And we could never allow that. Our planet's gravity well was the only thing that prevented Him from opening a gateway to another Universe.
But we could take the fight to Him: A suicide mission. We fought to reach the Ancient Enemy and infiltrated Him with the help of Sjurani technology. We carried into Him an antimatter weapon, created by the Sjurani, with the force of a billion Hiroshima bombs. A weapon far more powerful than anything Humanity could ever create. His arrogance in being shielded from outside, made him believe he was invulnerable. Once inside His armored shell, we could use short range teleportation to penetrate deep into His neural network. Three groups entered the alien machine. Even if all three were successful, they told us our weapons would not kill Him. But we could wound Him, perhaps even lobotomize Him, for a time.
This would allow the two hundred million humans who agreed to stay behind to cover the final retreat. The West Coast of North America was destroyed in this final battle. The Rocky Mountains are all that remain of that coastline. One billion humans left the Earth in that two week period with some of the most terrifying fighting ever seen in any war, any conflict.
Once the antimatter was placed, I, the last survivor of three dozen of the finest warriors of two races, made my way to the surface, killing everything in my path. I waited. The never-ending supply of Henrenkai continued to boil forth from the Ancient enemy. In that last moment before detonation, I lay down my exhausted weapon and the Henrenkai stopped, confused by the act.
With seconds remaining, I assumed the battle occurring in space had interrupted my teleport, and I resolved myself to dying, free of anger and the corruption of war. I vowed never to wage war again. My death would keep my promise.
I opened my arms and the battle-enraged Henrenkai charged me, their razor sharp talons poised to shred flesh from bones. In those final seconds, time slowed as I watched them. Close to me, I studied them in a way I had never before. Their anatomy was a marvel: Bones of carbon fullerenes, talons sharper than the sharpest steel. Wide, predator-set eyes, excellent for determining the distance to me, their prey. I could smell their hot breath, a cinnamon overtone, and I closed my eyes, ready for death. No fighting, no resistance. I felt the antimatter as it detonated. A shockwave swept through me. I could feel it in my very atoms.
Suddenly, I could see the blast wave of energy and could feel my atoms snatched away protectively within the teleport sheath. I felt my body dying as the waves of antimatter, converted to gamma rays and cosmic radiation, were transformed into the most powerful kind of destruction in our universe, in the perfect release, the ultimate annihilation of matter. No man can ever say he sat in the heart of a star and lived to tell others of it. Neither could I. It would have been breathtaking if I had a breath to take.
In that eternal second, I violated causality and was in two places at one time. I was trapped in the containment field, experiencing a quantum reality, existing in two places and in neither. I was onboard the ship in a viewing chamber teleported, so they thought, to allow me, with the remnants of my species, to see the death of my world. Such a weapon would destroy the Earth as we knew it. I watched, both detached at a distance and intimately aware of the death throes of my home planet.
For a moment, as I violated causality, I could be anywhere and any when; I moved through time and space, and I could see the Ancient Enemy's arrival on Earth three billion years ago, fleeing, He crashed into a small planet in an unidentified star system with a small yellow star. I could feel His terror, I could feel His near dissolution, His flesh, burned with a fire like a solar flare, tearing His substance apart. He submerged Himself into our planet, and the rocky surface extinguished those flames and His terror subsided. He sank into our world, and His screams grew quieter, until after an eon, He slept and forgot.
As I stood there in the middle of the greatest energy release since His arrival, I realized He would not die. He would survive just as He did before. Our work was almost in vain. His massive, nearly indestructible bulk would provide one benefit. Those who remained behind would not be wiped out from the weapon. They would be stranded on a world still trying to kill them. The thought was terrible, and the last thing I remembered.
I was the last human to leave the Earth two hundred years ago, an unwitting and unwilling hero of a war we all but lost.
I woke several years later on our way to Toranor, a system of Gaian super-worlds created by a race of highly-advanced beings called The Precursors. No other race in the galaxy has ever come close to their level of technological capability. They were as far beyond even our Sjurani benefactors as we were beyond ants.
The Toranor star system had trillions of sentients living in harmony in what was called the jewel of the Corvan Empire. Now homeless, Humanity and the Sjurani were offered a place on one of their lesser worlds. I knew I would never call this place home. I had seen too much, done too much. There would be nothing for me here.
All that I valued died with Earth.
I asked what a single man could do in an Empire of sentients with magnificent technologies, making our human achievements, even in the year of our Lord 2475, seem like children's toys? How could I distinguish myself?
By providing the one thing all Empires need: New boundaries. I became a Scout. I was told the role of a Scout was a solitary one. I would be provided a robot companion if I desired. My job would be to map stars toward the center of the galaxy for planets capable of being terraformed by the Mariovel at some point in the future. I was promised the knowledge of the Empire at my fingertips and all the time of my life to read and learn it.
It was then the Sjurani revealed to me that I had died during the teleportation. They had never tried to teleport during an antimatter explosion. No one ever had. My mind was able to be reconstructed, but my body had died. They took my mind and placed it within a robotic shell that mimicked my own form so well that I was never aware of the change at any time.
I was angered at first. I walked around for almost a year, on Galtan II, our new home, knowing something was different, but not knowing what. Galtan II was like all of the worlds of Toranor, beautiful, diverse, fantastic. The knowledge that all of these worlds were created by a sentient species that was not God, boggled the imagination. Imagine a star system with twenty habitable worlds. The knowledge would turn our ideas of science and religion on their ears.
Galtan II boasted a forest that spanned the entire equatorial band of the planet, one giant forest whose myriad trees were connected by their root system into one organic supercomputer, a single hive mind which could separate segments of itself to communicate with other forms of life. One of the most amazing world-minds in this part of the empire. Yes, there were others. Since the Botani did not choose to live in the colder parts of the planet, we were offered the other two thirds of the world to live responsibly on. With the technology of the Sjurani supporting our own, we could be good neighbors.
The Sjurani told me that what they did, they did for love of my heroic sacrifice. They created an entire technology around saving my life. I learned later they held my psychic resonance in an energy field that consumed the energy of a world for years. I felt guilty once I learned what was done on my behalf.
I learned that my condition, once successful, because of my heroic stature, spurred a whole division of baseline humans to make the transition to the robotic. We were called The Transcended. They gave up their flesh to become the first robotic-human hybrids. Were there consequences? Certainly, but none of them ever considered it an unfair trade, except perhaps for me. I would have liked to have had the choice.
When I was appointed a Scout, the Corvan empire made a starship for me; since I was no longer a living organic, they made something faster than had ever been created before. I named it Hayward's Reach after a small seaside town where I lived the quiet life of a writer before the end of the world came for us all. Before activating the ship, the greatest generals, admirals, and Sjurani Rex came to see me off. They said wonderful things, heroic things about me and my sacrifices. I didn't listen.
All I could hear was the loneliness. No, the alone-ness that space offered me. I thanked them. I climbed aboard my ship and synchronized my ansible to an ansible station here on Galtan II which would relay my reports. Since an ansible could only be paired once, something about quantum entanglement, it was the most critical thing I could do unless I wanted to communicate relativistically.
My pilot was a Conscentia, a sentient intelligence housed in the mechanical body of a woman. She was the first of her kind, a mechanical version of myself. I started life as a man and became a machine. She started a machine and became a woman.
Her name was Pele. She named herself after the mythical goddess of the legendary Hawaiian Islands that are no more. When I asked her about her name, she said once she had studied human history. The tale of the Hawaiians fascinated her, and she had taken it upon herself to study all of the notes on Earth's Polynesian cultures. Our ship was equipped with a distillation of all of the knowledge of the human race. We would also have an upstream of new ideas and achievements when time and bandwidth permitted. When I asked her why she was coming with me, she said since she would never get to see Hawaii, the next best thing was to discover a place like it somewhere else.
She arranged our path through the empire and indicated we would reach the edge of the Empire in as little as three jumps and three months using their Gate system. After that, we would be on our own, moving at approximately thirty-two times the speed of light. It would take us three thousand years to cross the galaxy. We would be taking the scenic route, flying through as many star- dense systems as possible. We were the fastest things in the Empire, streaking away from all that I knew, and I was glad to be doing it. It was unlikely we would survive the journey across the galaxy. The Sjurani estimated we might live for four hundred years with careful maintenance. We promised to change our oil regularly. Pele laughed. The Sjurani just looked quizzically at me.
Sitting down, I called up a data-screen. The words were queued up from earlier in the day, waiting for me. Pele was sitting at the nav station monitoring the ebb and flow of the aether. I read out loud as would become a tradition for the two of us in the decades to come: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair..."
I had always wanted to read A Tale of Two Cities, and at that moment, it seemed appropriate. I never had the time before. Taking my companion's hand, this new season of light illuminated our souls as we fled into the core of the galaxy, to see things no man had seen before. I, once being the most ordinary of men, had transcended the human experience for something never done before. It was, indeed, the best of times.
Hayward's Reach © Thaddeus Howze, 2011, All Rights Reserved
Superior species:
Ants, bees, elephants, grass, trees…
No human beings
All of humanity was outraged and soon afterwards a committee was formed to appeal the decision from CILF. Not long after the committee was submitted the appeal, the committee disappeared and was never heard from again effectively ending all attempts at diplomatic solutions.
Saturday Morning, April
Kisanii was in her room on the floor, sitting on her legs, drawing again. Looked like a dog, or another wolf. She loved to draw, especially animals, but she could manage people pretty good, too. I smiled at my little artist, proud. I glanced around the room, at the varying posters of wolves, dogs, and pups on her walls. I walked on past the room without saying anything, thinking, leaving Kisanii to her art.
When the phone rang, I knew who it was. I didn't want to answer, because I knew what she wanted. It was the same thing she had been asking about for weeks now, and I keep putting it off, keep giving her the run around, but summer was almost here and I needed to decide...
“Hello?” I heard my husband ask. His voice was softer as he spoke, more soothing, and my suspicions were confirmed. Yes, it's her. He only talks like that with his mom. I froze, waiting.
“Let me go ask her,” I heard my husband say, and his voice was getting closer. “Hey,” he approached me, touched my arm, gently. “It's my mother. She wants to know if Kisanii can come out there this summer. I told her I would talk to you.” He lifted his eyebrows, pleading with his puppy-dog eyes.
I knew he wanted me to say yes, and I hesitated, because I wanted to say no. But I really had no reason to. Not really. He waited, then said, “I'm ok with her going out there.” I hesitated again, thinking, knowing. Deciding. He put the phone on speaker, and I took the phone from him.
“Hello,” I said into the phone.
“Well, Miss Kali! Long time no hear from! How are you?” she asked me, enthusiastically. I knew this was for my husband's benefit.
“Hey, good; how are you doing?” I felt I was forcing it in my attempt to sound light-hearted.
Don't get me wrong. I do love my Mother-in-Law, especially after eighteen years of knowing her. But until me, she hadn't been used to anyone telling her no, or going up against her. I do try to be respectful of her age and knowledge – that's how I was taught – so sometimes I give in to her. As long as it doesn't interfere with my family's needs, I was good.
It's not that she was pushy. She was just a true Alpha-female, just expected a yes out of everyone, and always had good reason why everyone should be in compliance with anything she wanted. Me, well, I just always marched to the beat of my own drum, and my hackles rose almost unconsciously whenever she and I interacted. Today was no different.
“Well, I'm alive,” she responded, and I knew she was smiling. I laughed slightly at the familiar phrase she always used. It didn't matter what was going on with her, she was always just glad to be alive. She had reason.
“I'm just trying to get something locked down for Kisanii to come out and stay with me this summer,” she continued. “What does you all's calendar look like?”
“Well,” I said, “I think we are clear, I mean, we hadn't made any definite plans,” I said, stressing the word definite.
“So, can she come out in early May? I can keep her for the whole summer. I have a lot of things going on that I know she would enjoy – some art shows, church functions – she can spend some time with her cousins – they will be out here in June...” She quickly listed several things, several activities that she was sure my daughter would want to participate in, giving me no real reason I could say out loud, to reject the plan.
“Oh, ok,” I said, which was all she allowed before going on, providing more reason for me to say yes. I slowly walked into our bedroom as she continued. My husband followed, a hand on my shoulder, the back of my royal blue silk blouse.
“I figured we could meet you all in Atlanta and get her from there, so you all wouldn't have to come all the way here – and then just do the same at the end of the summer,” she said, everything figured out, as usual. “When does school end?”
“The second week in May. We can bring her the following week.” I curled on my bed, laying the phone down, and stroked the coils behind my ears.
“Ok, good! I'm looking forward to seeing her. I know she has grown six inches since I last saw her.” Her voice sounded amazed, amused, proud her granddaughter would probably be as tall as she was, at 6 feet even.
“Yes, I think so. She's at my height now.”
“Wow, Kali. What are you gonna do with her?” My Mother-in-Law laughed, an unspoken understanding of her double meaning between us. I sighed, “I do not know. She's not my baby anymore, I guess.”
“Not anymore,” my Mother-in-Law said. Neither of us spoke for a second. My husband knelt by me at the side of the bed, continued the conversation, oblivious to the tension. I was lost in thought. What was I gonna do with Kisanii? She would be an official teenager soon.
“Alright,” my Mother-in-Law said, “I'll let you all go. I just wanted to go ahead and get a plan together -” like she didn't already have one “- and get her out here, before the summer was over.” She chuckled.
“Ok, then,” I said, looking at my husband, wishing he could help. “I need to get these kids outside for a little while, anyway. Take them to the park or something. It's a nice day today; I'd hate to waste it indoors. I'll talk to you later.”
“Alright,” she said. We all said our goodbyes, and I hung up, torn.
Three months later
In Kennesaw, we met my in-Laws at Laredo's off Barrett Parkway. When Kisanii got out of her Grandfather's car, her younger sisters and brother all ran to her, hugging her and keeping her from walking properly. They'd missed her. I took a minute to take in my child as she and I walked toward one another.
Kisanii was carrying a new medium sized, black bag with a picture of a gray wolf in a wood, turning its head toward a glowing moon. I glanced at my Mother-in-Law, who just watched me, triumphant.
Kisanii looked like a different person. Her jet black, springy curls had been straightened out, and was in a long ponytail down her back. I clenched my teeth but was not surprised, since every time my daughters visited their Grandmother for an extended length of time, their hair was always hot-comb straightened, no matter how much I objected. What was different was her face. Kisanii always had the slanty deep brown eyes that reminded me of mine, but now there was something about them, something...knowing, that had been there only barely, before she left in May. As she looked at me, after enduring the pawing of her siblings, I had to catch my breath at my daughter's apparent maturity. What happened to my daughter?
Kisanii gave me a wide, warm smile, and I suddenly felt choked up. She doesn't resent me, she's still my girl, I said to myself. When I reached her, wrapped my arms around her, and she held me with a power and confidence I knew was from her summer of activity, I felt my eyes burn a bit, my body betraying me in its sentimentality. She is my girl, but not my girl, and now she knows it. The only relief I felt is that she didn't seem to mind. Apparently her Grandmother hadn't attempted to turn her against me, which I was grateful for.
Even if I was not happy she had gone against my wishes with Kisanii.
Her Grandmother and I exchanged another look, and I detected a challenge in her eyes. I challenged right back - Don't test me - but for the sake of the family, neither of us said anything as we all entered the restaurant to eat. There would be words later.
That night, back at home and after everyone was in bed, I went downstairs and called my Mother-in-Law. She answered almost as soon as the phone rang.
“Kali,” she said by way of greeting, all business.
“Rita,” I said. “I take it you know why I'm calling.”
“Yes; I figured you would,” she said, unconcerned, “and you're probably not happy.”
“No,” I said. “I really didn't want this now. We talked about it before, and I thought we had agreed...”
“She was ready. It was my duty to take advantage of that,” she told me, matter of fact. “You can't keep the child from being who she is.”
I remained calm. Why did grandparents think they could do whatever they wanted? “Rita,” I said, keeping an ear open for my husband, or the kids. “I know you mean well, but 'Sanii is only a kid. This would be a lot on her.”
“She'll be thirteen in three months. She may as well go on and start now. That's the best way for her to get used to it, get proficient at it.”
“Yes, maybe so, but I really wanted her to wait until she was older.” I was getting agitated. I sighed, knowing the real reason was I didn't want my daughter to be any more than she appeared to be – a typical tween girl, with typical tween girl problems. “Being a Wolf Warrior is a lot for a thirteen year old girl,” I said almost to myself.
“And you know that how?” I bristled at her words. “She should have started training a year ago, Kali. That's how it goes with us. Hell, I started at nine, and I turned out fine. You Cats don't seem to understand, for some reason, how important it is to start Alphas out as soon as you see the signs. Being one yourself you should know.”
I took a deep breath, let it out, slowly. She said the word 'Cats' like it was a bad thing. This 'Dog' was testing me, but I would not respond to that. Insults and rudeness were beneath me, just as she was.
We didn't speak for a minute. I guess what was done was done, what had to be, had to be, but I didn't like it, didn't like her attitude. Who was she to judge when it was right to begin the training, I thought. But I knew that when tweens started showing an increased interest in particular animals or activities, when the dreams began, when the body became stronger and full of unreleased energy, it was time. No motherly over-protectiveness could change that.
“You straightened her hair.” I said this because what I was thinking would not be polite.
She scoffed. “When was the last time you saw a curly-haired wolf?”
I stiffened at her sarcasm. My Mother-in-Law went on, quickly. “She'll need to be training with us, on a regular basis. She'll need to study with her own kind -” her tone was snotty as she said this, then quickly added, “- so she doesn't get rusty. You may want to consider letting her stay with us.” She paused. “Unless you want to find a pack there for her to live with.”
She knew I would not do that. They would not treat me as “kindly” as my Mother-in-Law would, because I was an enemy, one of the Cat People. My status as Queen Warrior would just barely be respected, if at all. Even she only tolerated me because of her son and our children. Another pack may not accept my daughter, not until she had proven herself as one of them, and they wouldn't make it easy.
I decided to be cool. Rita was right, in a way. If I wanted to look out for my daughter, prepare her for the double life she would have to live because of her heritage, it needed to start now, should have started earlier. I guess I just wanted her to be a normal kid for as long as possible, in a world that only understood and accepted what it believed to be normal. Even if none of us really were.
“I know you really don't understand my point of view, Kali,” she assumed. “But Kisanii knows who she is, and has decided to accept it. She began her training, and it was her decision to begin. She took it well. I think you need to let go. It could be worse, don't you think?”
That better not be some kind of dig at my feline heritage, I thought, knowing Rita was familiar with the rough training my kind had to endure, worse than hers had been. Rita was being disrespectful, and I began stroking the curls at the back of my neck, calming myself. She must have forgotten. She was just an Alpha. I was Queen, and stronger. If we were face to face, I could destroy her.
I just said, “Yes. It was going to happen at some point. I know.” I was sad, but she didn't need to know that. “I will talk to my husband. But I don't think he'll understand this.”
“No. I've tried to talk to him about us, but once he got older, he didn't believe. Thinks I just like telling stories about our family line to make us appear more than human." She laughed bitterly. "It skipped him, anyway. And...you've never told him about you, have you?”
“No.” I waited, thought. “I will let her live with you. Give me a chance to talk to him. I'll make him believe.”
I hung up, before she could object that I could do what she had failed at for years.
I didn't want to let my baby go live with her Grandparents, but I couldn't teach her what she needed to know, not about that part of her. I made my way up the stairs, and thought about what I would say to the man I married about our little girl growing up.
The total number of ISEA 2011 Istanbul participants was around 1,350 people between local and international participants. I was one of the international ones and here's what I presented:
This research is becoming a basis for my cognitive science work this semester... and I had a blast in Istanbul!
HYDE
Portrait of a Modern Monster
The Doctor is In
"Mr. Hyde I presume?"
A quiet and subtle voice, barely heard above the howling wind outside the hundred and second floor of Grayson Tower, the tallest building in the center of Hub City. "I suppose I will have to have those claw marks buffed out of the front of my building." The speaker has his back to the window, sitting down, hunched over a desk. "You know, we do have an elevator."
A thick cane leaned against the desk with a large black stone on its tip. He was writing something slowly. Once done, he folded the letter meticulously and placed it into an envelope. Slowly he rose, gripped his cane and turned around to face the window and the towering form of Hyde.
He wore a grey suit and over it a white lab coat. His suit, obviously expensive and his cufflinks flash in the brightly lit room. His face was brown like a burlap sack and his age was indeterminate. His eyes, black as coal, peek out from underneath wide and bushy eyebrows. He is bald but his face bears a well-manicured goatee. His full lips are peeled back in a predatory and menacing smile. His eyes however, do not share the smile. He leans back onto the desk. "Do you mind if I smoke?"
The man is calm, I'll give him that. "Enjoy. It will be your last." Hyde's voice is gruff, coarser than usual. He was just finished healing from the beat down, he received two months earlier from the super-soldier commandos. The only thing that made that drubbing worthwhile was watching them turn into smoking, cancer-ridden piles of rotting meat. Whatever technology they were using was not ready for prime-time. It had taken two months of hunting, limb-breaking and old-fashioned detective work. The trail led him here. It was time for some payback.
Hyde turned his head to take in the room and saw an extensive laboratory filled with a variety of computers, autoclaves, other machines, some familiar, others not. A flash of memory sweeps over him and he remembers a biometric monitoring system across the room. He is not sure why he recognized it, but the memory was strong. Whoever this doctor was, he had money to spare. Not just anyone could afford this setup. Another mystery.
"You like my lab? It is only one of many. I will take you on a tour tomorrow, if you like." The man uses his cane to point around the room.
Hyde snorts, "What makes you think you'll be alive tomorrow? I plan to rip you limb from limb."
"Really? Before you get the answers you have been searching for? Or should I say, Carlucci is searching for? That would be so anticlimactic."
"Spare me the small talk. I think I will prefer the answers you will give me when I am ripping open your chest. People lie less when I am eating their ribs before their eyes."Something's wrong.
"Spare me the posturing, Mr. Hyde. I know who you are. I know what you are. In a way, I helped to create you." He stood up from leaning on his desk and squared his shoulders. Though not quite as tall as Hyde, he was nearly six feet tall himself. "Now we can have this conversation, the easy way or the hard way. Your choice."
Hyde clenches his hands and his knuckles crack with a rhythmic precision. He turns his head and his neck bones crack as well. A hot, metallic smell starts to rise from his person and his ragged jumpsuit begins to smoke. "You know what, let's do this the hard way. I am sure I won't break a nail on that nice Armani, you're wearing. What do your friends call you? I want to know who to mail your head to."
"In Japanese tradition, it is considered polite to give your name to your enemy. You have chosen the nom de guerre, Hyde. I will be Doctor Jekyll to you, sir, after all, I did help create you. And like the good Doctor, I too have a dark side." Stepping out of his shoes, and taking off his lab coat, he throws it over the chair. "Anytime you're ready, sir."
Hyde needed no more prelude than that and leapt across the room arms outstretched, his carbon-hardened claws, extended, fangs opened in a bestial roar. In a movement Hyde can barely see, Jekyll steps to the side and grabs Hyde's arm and whirling him around he slams him across the room into a bookcase. The bookcase crumples under Hyde's massive weight. The two hundred pound teak bookcase crumpled like tissue. Hyde laughed, knocking books and wood off of his back. "Nice throw, Doctor. I hope your plan does not include Aikido to save you. It's not nearly going to be enough."
"Not at all Mr. Hyde. I am not counting on Aikido to save the day. I was simply giving you the chance to see you were out-classed and offering you one more opportunity to see reason before I have to actually hurt you." While Hyde was climbing out of the bookcase, the doctor had taken off his suit and laid it upon his desk. He was wearing a skintight undergarment that covered him from neck to the ends of his extremities. Only his hands and feet were naked. "I await your pleasure."
Hyde turned to the doctor again, trying to figure out what his senses were telling him. The smell was not one of fear, it was one of excitement, and something else, something chemical. It reminded him of the metallic scent of his own transformation. But the doctor looked completely unchanged.
Hyde exploded across the room, books flew from under foot as Hyde moving as fast as a train, reached out with a clawed hand directly pointed at the doctor's face. And again, with only a minimum of movement the doctor spun and avoided Hyde's hand. Completing his spin he kicked Hyde right out of the window. The doctor stopped to grab his cane and looking out the window, leapt after Hyde to the nearby rooftop where Hyde would land, hard.
Hyde crashed into a concrete stairway rising onto the roof. Tearing through it, he lay stunned. As he tried to get up, Jekyll land squarely onto his chest, driving Hyde into the reinforced roof of the building. Jekyll bounces away lightly and lands nearby. Hyde's response was immediate. He swept rubble with both of his arms toward the Doctor and bounded to his feet, while the doctor used his cane to deflect the rubble, Hyde began attempting to close the distance between the two.
Despite the fact, he had just jumped thirty stories out of a building, the doctor didn't even appear to be winded or surprised. Hyde kept up his assault his clawed hands lashing out as fast a cheetah's killing blow and with as much power. The doctor used his cane to block Hyde's strikes but did not attack. This only seemed to infuriate Hyde further. Their exchanges were faster than the eye could see and the doctor retreated the entire time. Hyde pushed the doctor back to the edge of the rooftop. Leaping over Hyde, he landed twenty feet away.
Hyde pushed his body further, and felt his arms growing longer, muscles changing in texture and tone, hyper-oxygenating them, exchanging strength for speed. Hyde rushed the doctor and his clawed arms slashing out, striking the doctor on the belly and shoulder. The strange undergarment acting as an armor, the blows drew no blood. But Hyde was testing its strength and knew he could overcome it. His nails sharpened into needle-like points. The doctor withdrew outside of Hyde's assault. He held his cane in two hands. Twisting the head, it transformed into a sword cane and armored sheath.
The two of them clashed together, a blur of motion, both landing strikes and taking blows, the sound of claws on steel range around the glass canyon as the two titans struggled for dominance. The doctor began to give ground as Hyde blows landed and one even tore his left arm's armor away revealing muscular flesh beneath and the lacerations of Hyde's diamond-tipped claws. The doctor, using his sheath, smashed Hyde in the mouth and knocked him across the roof.
Hyde shook his head, wiping away blood, "Nice. You've survived a lot longer than I expected. But this fight is just about over." Hyde's jumpsuit was bloodstained and nearly completely destroyed. Carlucci bought them in bulk since their arrangement. He was crouched and studying Jekyll for any sign of weakness. He didn't see one. Palming a piece of rubble, an idea formed.
"I was trying to show you the pointlessness of this exercise and how we could work together. With my genius and your brawn, we could rule Hub City and remove the criminal scum that infests her."
"You care about Hub City? I don't think so." Hyde stood gauging the distance between the two of them.
"But you do. Once we clear away Hub City's vermin, I will show you things that will make Hub City worst criminals look like Girl Scouts."
"You do realize I am an unreasonable person, right?" Hyde began to breathe faster and deeper. His muscles and bone density began to multiply. The scar on his chest began to heat up and his overall temperature rose.
Doctor Jekyll's eyebrow rose in surprise. He is altering his nervous system, attempting to increase his reaction time and attack speed. He is reducing his mass to increase his speed. This was unexpected and exciting to learn. What is the source of his transformation energy?
Cupped in his hand, Hyde threw the piece of rubble with supersonic speed. As his deadly projectile crossed the distance between he and his target, his mighty legs were already propelling him right behind it.
Jekyll, momentarily stunned by the speed and ferocity of this improvised attack was struck by the deadly projectile in the left shoulder and dropped his sword. The missile exploded into dust.
"So you can be surprised." Hyde landed his punch squarely across the jaw of the doctor and the doctor's head snapped to the right with the force of the blow. With a reflexive backhand the doctor knocked Hyde sailing across the roof.
Hyde rolled with the blow and landed on his feet sliding across the rooftop. What the hell was that? How did he do that? I thought he was on the ropes. What did I miss? I need to buy some time. "The commandos, they were yours, weren't they? They move like you do, fight like you do, mixing martial arts with superhuman strength and speed. But they turned into piles of rotting meat. But you don't appear to be about to turn into a pile of organ-bursting goo. Why is that?"
"Nice strategy, make me talk while you look for my weaknesses." Doctor Jekyll smiled. He rubbed his jaw. "That was a surprise. I didn't know you could do that. I see why you refuse to use a weapon; its visceral, primal, savage. You see, there is so much we can learn from each other. But I think our time is done. I have learned all that I think I can today." Dropping his sheath, he turned toward Hyde, dusting himself off. "You, for instance, will learn..." He disappeared from where he was on the roof and reappeared in front of Hyde. Hyde never saw him move. He punctuated every word with a powerful strike from his fists, driving Hyde's face into the rooftop with each blow. "I." Boom. "Don't." Boom."Have." Boom. "Any." Boom. "Weaknesses." Boom. And then Hyde lay still. Smoke rose from the hole in the rooftop. A light rain started to fall.
"I know you are teetering on the edge of consciousness, Mr. Hyde. I trust I have made my point. I will have need of you at some time in the future. When I do I will call for you. And you will come. Otherwise I will destroy everything you hold dear, Mr. Carlucci."
Doctor Jekyll walked to the edge of the rooftop. He stopped to pick up his sword cane and sheath. Locking them together he leapt away into the night.
Hyde sank into unconsciousness.
Hyde © Thaddeus Howze 2011. All Rights Reserved [@ebonstorm]
