Up and Coming: Stories by the 2016 Campbell-Eligible Authors

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Up and Coming: Stories by the 2016 Campbell-Eligible Authors Page 264

by Anthology


  He stopped and peeked around the wall to see if there were any other uninvited guests waiting for them. There weren’t. Their way to the door was clear.

  Nate turned back to the three, tilted his head to the entrance, and mouthed, “Let’s go.”

  His head wasn’t fully back forward when, from the corner of his eye, he saw Raj drop his shiny waxed apple. Nate’s face must’ve been telltale because he saw his horror reflected in Terry’s. She spun in time for both to see Henry’s fingers lunging, clutching for Raj’s pack as the out of sorts man bent toward the desk for the rolling apple.

  And then Raj bumped the desk.

  The response of the tentacle was immediate.

  Henry spun left and dropped down to avoid the recoil of the three meters of whip bearing toward him, the butcher knife blocking his face.

  Raj was too late to react. By the time he screamed he was thrashed above Nate and Terry and slammed in between the ceiling above and desks below. The scream ceased on impact.

  In the instant the beast had sprung to life Nate had pushed his back into the wall. What had been Raj was a pasted jelly. Nate’s eyes darted the length of the tentacle. The root of the arm near the vent undulated in a short arc. If he acted, he could get close. If he didn’t, they were next.

  With one liquid motion he launched himself from the end of the wall and thrust his paper cutter blade down through the crimson flesh of the beast.

  A thunderous shriek echoed up through the floor as both ends of cut tentacle began to spout fountains of blood.

  The tentacle was cut but there were four meters of length to the vent. Nate began hacking wildly, working to move closer to the source.

  From the vent the tip of another tentacle began to creep through. Nate wanted to get closer but his fight with the wounded limb kept him at bay.

  Then to his left flew a chair, and then another. He looked over to see Terry franticly throwing whatever furniture she could lift. They were on the offensive.

  Invigorated, he swung the blade down harder, hitting his mark and hacking two feet off at a time, making his way toward the second tentacle.

  Then he saw Henry.

  Using a flat panel monitor as a shield, he rolled up to the vent and with one slash, severed the two limbs clean at the grate.

  Nate rushed over to help Henry flip a table upside down on the vent. Then they slid the nearby copy machine to the table and pushed the heavy box on its side.

  His arms, shirt, and Men’s Wearhouse khakis were coated in blood. And so were Henry’s. Terry somehow escaped the worst of the fount.

  “What now?” Terry asked.

  “Well,” Nate said, “we’ll find a floor with running water. Clean up.”

  She nodded and brought the back of her hand across the bridge of her nose. “That’ll be good.”

  “First though, I think we should eat. I haven’t had meat in weeks.”

  Henry grinned. “I’ll get the Sterno.”

  ***

  It took another week to find a floor with running water. It was, of course, one of the floors where physics didn’t matter. The floor had an executive gym, which meant showers, and showers with enough force to propel water down, so even with objects floating and suspended the three of them reveled in properly cleaning themselves and their clothes.

  Nate finished and dressed before the others. The changing area reminded him of places he’d only seen in movies. The lockers were hardwood, not metal, and mosaic tile covered the walls. It was a comforting place and he decided he’d rather wait there than out on the odd floor. He sat at the end of the dark lacquered wooden bench with his back to the wall, one arm on his knees, one hand playing with a suspending piece of glass, twirling the jagged shard midair. On a bench next to him was a Sony Walkman, not an iPod or an mp3 player or even a Discman, but an old Walkman, plugged into a wall charger. He grinned and picked up the old tape player to examine it, but the cord wasn’t long enough to pull over so he reached to unplug it. That’s when he saw that the green light of the charger was on.

  He looked up at the nonfunctioning lights and began to question how the outlet could work and then remembered that objects floated here. This was an odd floor.

  He slid the old headphones onto his head and hit the eject button to spy the cassette—a no brand mixed tape. He slapped the tape back in, pushed play, and watched it through the small plastic window. The tape began to turn on its spindle. At first there was only the fizzy sound of static and he thought the antique was a piece a junk. Then, with a breath of new life, the ostinato of Zeppelin’s Kashmir burst into his brain. A grin crept across his face as he stood and clipped the silver plastic box to his waist. With a swagger, he set out to patrol the echoing halls of suspended glass, rolling his shoulders to the beat, the two-foot paper cutter blade tapping the side of his leg as he walked.

  As he exited the gym a thirty-foot tentacle struck out of the mist with lighting ferocity.

  Instinctively, so did he.

  ***

  Hugh Howey Lives(Novella excerpt)

  by Daniel Arthur Smith

  Originally published by Holt Smith ltd

  FOUR

  When Sebastian led them into the second floor dining room, Tia was immediately taken with the dark mahogany paneling. Even with her rare access to the most exclusive resorts, she had never seen a structure so flamboyantly resourced, for so few. Full wooden structures such as the pine log lodges of Aspen were rare. Wood paneling was a flex of wealth of the type that her father and his friends frowned upon. Her family was fortunate to have survived times when wealth was dangerous. It was better to be subtle. That was one of the reasons her father loved the sailboat, “An excuse to be surrounded by wood,” he said, “without flaunting.”

  But the paneling was not the only thing special in the room. The far wall to her right, and the arched ceiling above, were paned with the same durable glass-like transparency as the greenhouse walls of the university’s botanical garden. The thickness of the panes and the darkness of the night hid the weather beyond in a black void. If not for the heavy rivulets running down the frames and the remote flash of electric cyan that filled the sky when they entered, she would have thought the storm had passed. Wide palm fronds sprung from tall corner vases and were positioned high in such a way that they appeared to hold up the ceiling. The centerpiece of the room was the dining table. Though not unique, it was impressive, a long table, mahogany like the paneling, surrounded by a dozen brown high back leather chairs, and in them, their waiting hosts.

  Kay leaned into Tia’s ear. “It’s The Dining Room.”

  “What?”

  “The Dining Room,” she repeated. “It’s from another story.”

  “No, no. I know what—”

  “I present Miss Tia and Miss Kay,” Sebastian said.

  Four men and six women rose from their seats at the table to face the two women. Bill was standing across the table, in the middle. Only he and the silver-haired woman at the far head of the table to the right offered anything close to a smile. The others held expressions that ranged from inquisitive to objectively observant to downright bothered.

  A gaunt, grey-haired man raised a cloth napkin to his mouth in a poor attempt to hide his whispers to the younger woman next to him. The woman wore an aubergine hijab over her head. She was one of the group peering at the two girls with a bothered stare. Tia was sure the comment was about her and Kay’s appearance. Everyone at the table was dressed for dinner. Tia and Kay were in light blouses and capris. Except for a long-sleeved thermal and some undergarments, that’s all they’d bothered to pack. Tia slid her right foot behind her left. She wanted to drop her gaze toward the floor. Etiquette stopped her.

  The silver-haired woman at the head of the table must have sensed her discomfort. “Please, come sit next to me,” she said, gesturing to the two empty chairs to her left. “You have to excuse us. It’s been so long since we’ve had visitors.” The woman’s dark eyes darted a silent scolding to
the others at the table, and then went pleasantly back to Tia and Kay.

  The message made clear, the others began to smile and nod.

  The woman gestured for Kay to take the seat to her left.

  “Thank you,” Kay said.

  Tia nodded as well. She waited behind the second chair for the others to retake their seats. Bill stood next to the woman across from her, and when her eyes met his, she caught his subtle wink and nod, a signal to go ahead and sit. When Tia lowered herself into the chair, the others sat and resumed their conversations. The waft of humanity allowed Tia to breathe a bit easier. She was accustomed to formal dinners, but felt uncomfortable because she and Kay essentially forced their invitation by what her mother would have called ‘dropping in unannounced.’ In the back of her mind, her mother and a long list of nannies were making that face between a frown and a smile.

  At least Kay was by her side.

  Tia may have been raised at these tables, but Kay was far more at ease. After they were seated, Kay placed her right hand onto the hand of the silver-haired woman. “Thank you so much for the hospitality,” she said in a calm, soothing tone. “Your house is so beautiful.”

  “Oh, the—” the woman began to say, obviously taken by Kay.

  “The room is wonderful,” Kay said, “the bath is wonderful.”

  The woman appeared, not surprised, but curious, and elated at once. Kay could do that to people, Tia thought. Put them under a spell.

  Kay continued, “And we’re especially grateful that you let us in without knowing us.”

  Tia placed her hand on Kay’s thigh.

  Kay’s head pivoted around to catch Tia’s waiting smile. “Thank you for helping us,” Kay finished softly.

  Tia thought the woman’s dark eyes were about to tear. The woman was had clearly been handsome in her youth, and though the hair that must have once been raven black was now silver, her elegance remained. She gazed at Kay for a long moment and then smiled again, slid her hand out from under, and then patted the top of Kay’s. “You’re quite welcome,” she said. “My name is Allegra. Allegra Acardi. To my right is Connie Cortez, Susan Chan. You’ve met Bill. Next to him are Monica Wynn, and at the end of the table is Hector Vazquez. Across from him is Quentin Mills, Zaynah Ahmad, Walter Cain—”

  “Doctor Cain, if you please,” the gaunt, grey-haired man abruptly said.

  The woman next to Tia leaned into her and, in a tone mocking Doctor Cain said, “We’re all doctors here. I am Doctor Fukai, but please,” she smiled widely, “call me Emma.”

  “Doctor Cain stands on tradition,” added Bill, “and we give him that. The rest of us are a bit more casual. Imagine how monotonous it would be if we all greeted each other on this small island as Doctor.” His eyes darted to Allegra. “Would you agree, Doctor?”

  Kay let free a giggle, infecting the others around Tia—Connie, Susan, and Emma. Allegra kept decorum, and Tia and Kay composed themselves to follow their host’s lead.

  “You’re all doctors,” Tia said. “So this is not a resort?”

  “Oh, no,” Allegra said. “This is a research station, and as I said before, we don’t receive that many visitors.”

  “I apologize that we came unannounced.” There, Tia said it, though Kay already thanked them, the weight was heavy.

  “Almost met you with a missile,” Doctor Cain said.

  “Oh.” Tia was unable to hide the alarm on her face.

  Allegra frowned. “We’ve been monitoring your transponder since early this morning. We thought you might be coming to investigate the issues we’ve been having with one of the turbines.”

  “We saw one of the turbines was stalled when we arrived, but we didn’t see them on the geocom.”

  “You wouldn’t have seen them. We keep the turbines masked from the geocom to avoid attracting scavengers, and only a few restricted Elleron systems monitor their performance.”

  “And ours was not one of those,” Kay said.

  “Yet you were in an Elleron craft. Caught us off guard. Initially we were confused as to why a repair craft wasn’t announced, or a shuttle flown in, and then when we saw your speed and realized that you weren’t a repair corvette, we thought you might be—” Allegra raised her brow.

  “A scavenger corsair,” Tia said. “Yes, I apologize. I do see the confusion now. You see, we didn’t realize you were even here.”

  Kay shook her head. “I don’t understand the confusion. You thought we were a repair ship because of our transponder?”

  “Our boat’s transponder and our geocom are in the company’s name,” explained Tia. “We appear on geocom as an Elleron craft. Scavengers use sailing corsairs to go undetected in open water and often use stolen transponders to get near an occupied area.”

  “You’re lucky our defense system didn’t kick in,” Doctor Cain muttered, “you shouldn’t be out so far.”

  “Again, we’re sorry,” Tia said. “Thank you for your hospitality.”

  Allegra peered bitterly toward Doctor Cain, and then said kindly, “To have you and your friend here, even by happenstance, Miss Elleron, is a treat for us all.”

  Bill raised his glass of wine. “Hear, hear. To new friends.”

  The others raised their glasses, waited for Tia and Kay to do the same, and then a cascade of “Cheers” rounded the table.

  “This is lovely,” Tia said, and sipped more red wine from her glass.

  “Thank you,” Hector said from the end of the table. “I grow the grapes myself, on the south slope.”

  Kay added, “It’s different than any wine I’ve ever tasted. The aromas are lovely. The bouquet is fascinating.”

  “Be careful,” Connie said. “If you encourage him, he will be forced to tell you that it’s the soil carried on the wind from Africa.” She moved her right hand slowly across her plate, fluttering her fingers.

  Kay lifted her glass to see into the wine. “That’s what adds that dirt pie aftertaste.” And Tia was certain she meant it.

  Susan held her forearm at forty-five degrees. “If you ask, he’ll tell you it’s the angle of the south slope that adds the hint of fruit.”

  Tia sipped from her glass again. She tasted the soil she did not notice before. She was raised around fine wine yet only could tell the difference by color. Her Kay was a self-taught connoisseur, an autodidact in all things.

  “I think it’s great you make your own wine,” Kay said. “You’d be challenged to find any real wine at the university. We only have cheap sake at best.”

  Hector shrugged. “We are rather self-sufficient here. My colleagues are right, though, I know everything about Connie’s kumquats, and she in turn knows the secrets of my vines.”

  “Well, I still think this is nice.”

  “Then you won’t be disappointed here,” Doctor Cain said. “Perhaps Miss Elleron can tell us what she and her friend are doing so far out. With the current weather, this is a two-day sail from New Miami. Not a very safe distance with scavengers about, and the storm.”

  “A pleasure cruise, really,” Tia said. “The storm was supposed to be going out, and I didn’t think about scavengers.”

  Three syns, Model Seven servers, smaller and more petite in design than Sebastian, entered from the side of the dining room. They each carried a covered serving tray. In unison, they placed the trays on the table, removed the lids, and began to serve.

  “Though we still take the necessary precautions, scavengers haven’t been seen in these parts in years,” Allegra said. “But the storm is a real concern. I’m afraid you’ll be our guests for the next few days.”

  “Really,” Kay said. “That long?”

  “Your boat will be safe in the lagoon. You won’t want to go out on the open water though. You can contact your family to let them know you’ll be all right. Apart from that, I’m afraid we don’t connect to the outside, unless there is a true emergency.”

  Kay frowned.

  “It’s because of our research,” added Allegra. “You
understand, of course.”

  “Believe me,” Kay said. “This is a great place to be holed up, it’s just that…”

  “Just what, dear?”

  “Kay’s tablet fell victim to the rain,” Tia said, “and she was hoping to access her backup in the Archive.”

  “No problem,” Bill said. “We have access to the Archive. You’re free to use one of our tablets in the library.”

  “You have a library?” Kay asked.

  “Certainly,” Bill said, “actually, that’s the kind of research we do in the Calypso Project. We work in publishing.”

  “I knew it,” Kay said.

  “Knew what, dear?” Allegra asked.

  Tia smiled. “Kay has this crazy idea that Hugh Howey lives out here, and is still writing books. Can you imagine that, Hugh Howey alive, writing books?”

  Conversation at the table stopped. Allegra’s face became stern, her peering eyes fixed toward, almost through her, in an intense glare. Tia realized she said something terribly wrong.

  “You said you didn’t realize we were even here,” Allegra finally said.

  “No,” Tia said. “We didn’t.”

  “She didn’t believe me,” Kay said. “I found the clues.”

  “The clues?” Allegra asked.

  A syn placed a bowl of vegetable soup on Tia’s plate. “Thank you,” she said. “Kay has this idea that this author, Hugh Howey, has left bread crumbs in his books, leading to this island.”

  Quentin, the round-faced portly man at the end of the table, chuckled aloud and then simply said, “Clues in books.”

  Allegra looked long at Quentin, nodded slowly, and then returned to her kind demeanor. “Young people,” she said. “You are the future. Let’s eat our dinner. Shall we?”

  FIVE

  Tia didn’t remember walking up to the top of the mountain, but there they were, her and Kay, fingers interlocked, hands swaying forward and back, laughing as they did on their strolls along the New Miami Boardwalk. They weren’t on the boardwalk. They weren’t in New Miami at all. They’d hiked up beyond the manor, to the top of the island. The mountaintop was lit up by small fires that spat from openings in the rocks around them. The night sky was starless, a blanket of void. Kay was giggling. Tia said something funny. She could not remember what she said. She could not remember saying anything.

 

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