SFS1 - Science Fiction Short Stories

by Mani, Krishna kumar

It could have been my mystery man. But why was he following me if he had my number. Besides, United Publishing was one of the most prestigious publishing companies in the country. They wouldn't talk someone.

  “We would like you to publish your next book with us. When can we sit down and discuss this?”

  “Tomorrow around 11 AM works for me.” “Okay sure. Do you know where our head office is?”

  “Yes, I know,” I lied. I vaguely knew where it was. I'd look it up on the internet later. I'm excited by this opportunity. As a writer I'm familiar with this publisher's work. A lot of the top writers in the past decade have published their novels through them. Needless to say, it's a high honor for them to be calling me. I forget about the no account note-taking man and start to think about tomorrow's meeting. Maybe I should pretend I've got other offers for my next book. Would that help or hurt my chances?

  I got up so early it was still dark out. It didn't matter, I had hardly slept the night before anyways. Generally publishing companies negotiate in royalties so I decided to take the print-out of my previous book's royalties. Would that make me seem like an amateur? Would they laugh at how little I'd earned while they were making money hand over fist? As I start the car, an old song plays on the radio. I don't know the words but I hum along to it until it ends. It's soothing and before I realize it, I'm waiting at a signal across from the United's head office building. Now, every second seems like ten minutes. I look around outside. Oh god. Somehow the same guy with the notes has followed me here and is parked parallel to my car a few rows over. He's watching me and jotting down something. I am clueless as to who he is. I guess maybe they did hire him to follow me? Either way, I'm shocked to see him still around. I want to catch him and shake him and ask him what in the seven seas he wants, but I have a big meeting so I control myself. But I keep an eye on him until I walk into the front of the building. He doesn't seem to be following me inside thankfully.

  I meet James in a conference room and he comes to the point directly:

  “Congratulations, you are going to write your next book for us, the time for completion is only four months, but I believe you can handle that? We want to have a new holiday release and we think you're just the author to provide us with it.”

  I am surprised at this offer to say the least. “4 months?”

  “Yes, you're comfortable with that, right?” I sit back in my chair and think for a moment. I wouldn't have to search for a new concept. I could use any one of the ideas that I already have. If I did that, I could deliver on time. “Sure.,” I answered.“Check the agreement, these are usual terms given to writers. We're going to give you a 20% advance for living expenses. We will pay you right now with a check. 10% will be paid after we finalize the outline as a little reward. 30% will be remitted after the first draft, and the final 40% after you deliver the final copy of the novel. I'll give you some time to look over it I'm sure it's a lot to take in. I'll be waiting in my office. All you need to do is sign it and then you can come collect the advance.”

  When he had left the room, I'd noticed that he hadn't even mentioned the amount. I checked the document and searched for the payment section. Once I saw the amount “one million,” I couldn't not believe it. I shouted to myself “one million!” Suddenly I was afraid. This is a dream. It has to be a dream. People do not give you a million dollars for writing a book. That's just crazy. But I check if it's a dream. I can't fly, pinching hurts and I'm not in my underwear. Everything seems to check out. I can't control myself. I expected to be paid a lot less than one million dollars. That wasn't even in my best case scenario. I hurriedly read through the agreement and signed as fast as I could. Now I am a millionaire. Well, once I complete the book. But wasn't that the easy part? I walked like a king to James' office. He looks like he's having a meeting in his office so I just decide to wait outside. I look around the visitor's area. There's a few chairs and a fish tank, but I don't think there's any fish in it. And in the corner of the room, there's a man. And he's taking notes. This time I lose control. I walk over to him and glare at him.

  “Who are you?” I ask.

  He doesn't even acknowledge my presence. He's too busy with his notes.

  “I asked, who are you? I know you are following me, tell me!” I shout.

  Now he smiles to himself and notes something else on the page. But he still doesn't even look at my face.

  I shouted again. “Who are you?...”

  He doesn't respond. Maybe he's deaf? Who cares. He's following me and I'm going to make him stop. Suddenly I grab his notes and look at that what he is writing down. Oh my god, he's written down everything about me. He even knows about the million dollar check. He is spying on me.

  I start tearing the papers and finally get a response from him:

  “Don’t do that. I'm the writer of the story. You are the character and you've just destroyed your own story.”

  Note:

  Sorry for the incongruities, I sculpted a writer character for the story, but the character believes he's the real writer. He argued with me and likely has destroyed the story. He thinks he's in control, but I am the real writer of the story.

  10 Teleport 2.0

  These machines are my boss' invention. While he's an excellent scientist, the world has never seen him. He doesn't want fame or glory. Doing research and invention is his passion. I've worked with him for the last three years as an assistant and in this time, he's invented three things but he never discloses his inventions to the world. Every time he invents something new, I tell him that he should let people know about it. But he just dismisses my advice by saying something like 'this can be misused' or 'maybe one day, but the timing isn't right.’ I can't accept that. There's so much good that can be done for the world, and I need more and more money. So I stole his machines last week while he was busy with some new research. I don't know the science behind it. But I've operated the machines many times and I know if other scientists can get their hands on the machines that they can reverse-engineer them. I can't live like a monk like my boss can. I want money and I want my hard work to be acknowledged, even if I'm just an assistant.

  Teleportation is only a concept to most people. For me, it's a daily reality. I can't count the number of times I've teleported within the lab. That's what I stole. I can disappear from one machine and appear in the other in a fraction of a second. And I'm going to sell it to the world.

  To monetize it, I prepared a demonstration. At the same day and the same time, I booked two auditoriums. One was in New York and one was in San Francisco. Yes, I am going to have my demonstration in two places that are on two different sides of the North American continent. At first, no one believed me. When I took out ads in the newspaper, people finally started listening. My boss never read the newspaper so I wasn't afraid he'd catch on. I've been contacted by some nut jobs, but for every one of those, I've had ten venture capitalists, reporters, industrial leaders and even government authorities who want to get their hands on this new technology. I've told them all the same thing: wait for the demo.

  Now I'm on stage in New York, behind me there is a teleportation machine and on the other side of the stage there are two screens. One shows the San Francisco stage, and the other shows its audience. The same setup exists in San Francisco, except of course, their screens show the New York stage and audience. Along with this, everything is being live streamed to the internet. .

  I show my hand to audience and start to talk. “Science fiction concept becomes reality. This is my invention, the teleportation machine!”

  The audience looks at the teleportation machine. It looks like a glass wardrobe with two cables connected into the back of it. I begin to explain what teleportation is to the audience, but most of them are familiar with the concept.

  “Of course you already know what teleportation is!” I say. “Well then, let's proceed to the demonstration. I'll be going to San Francisco by teleportation, please watch me arrive on the screen.”

  Onc
e again I wave to the audience and enter into the New York teleportation machine and exit in San Francisco in a fraction of second. I welcome the San Francisco audience and am met with a resounding cheer. The New York audience is clapping from there as well. Some are taking out their phones and calling people, others are hurriedly talking to the audience members next to them.

  To impress the both audiences I tell them from San Francisco stage: “I left my water bottle in New York, I'll be back in just a second.”

  I interrupt my speech and enter into the San Francisco teleportation device and exit in New York after I take the water bottle, I see the San Francisco audience by screen and smile. Once again I go back to San Francisco.

  I start my speech. “You can’t believe this right?”

  Most of the people clap, a few members of press replied.

  “Yes. We're not going to believe it unless we can see it for ourselves. Maybe it's just an elaborate magic trick. You have one twin here, one twin there. Let us prove it for ourselves.”

  I'm not shocked by the reply. Some Hollywood movies have shown how this trick would work with twins.

  “Alright then! Any one of you, please come with me to New York! I will teleport you there and get you back here safely. No transport charges! Choose a representative to go, I'll be waiting.”

  After some discussion, they decided to send the CNN reporter. First I sent him by pressing the destination terminal as T01 using the keyboard. The audience and myself see him appear on the screen in New York When he got there, he looked out into the audience and began to talk with them. He asked them if he was really in New York, took some photos and then walked outside the auditorium. After that, we couldn't see him any longer on the screen.

  After a few minutes, one of the reporters suddenly came to the stage and told me that the CNN reporter was on video call on his iPad. We hooked it up so that we could show it on the screen.

  “I went outside and checked to make sure that I was in New York,” he began. “I also I checked the current location in Google maps and saw that the city it said I was in was New York. But I can’t believe this, seems to be a dream.”

  The audience clapped, they still could not believe what is happening.

  “Alright, now I will go to New York and send a different reporter from there to here.”

  I sent Francisco, Francisco surrounded me and took photos and started to interview me.

  Press: “How does it work?”

  Me: “It's much too technical and complicated to explain in a brief press meeting. I'll simply say it converts an object from one form to another form after successful transmission and then regenerates the original object at the other end.”

  Press: “What is required to operate this machine, is any fuel required?’

  Me: “Only electricity to power it and an internet connection to transfer the data. It couldn't be simpler.”

  Press: ”What is the use of the internet connection?”

  Me: “It could be LAN, WAN or the Internet. the NY Times reporter to San and I appeared again in San right after him. Everybody A connection is required to transport the data like I said. The teleport terminal will convert the object as digital data and transfer it over internet to the receiving terminal. Then the receiving end regenerates the object. After a successful regeneration, the digital data will be automatically erased in both terminals as to prevent copying.”

  Press: “Then you mean, a human can be cloned using this?”

  Me: ”It could be, but that's really not the functionality of this invention.”

  Press: “is it safe?”

  Me: “100% , it uses lossless conversion. If there's an internet connection problem, the data is here so it will either resend it again or regenerate again in the same sending terminal.”

  Press: “How can this invention be used?“

  Me:”In the future we'll have no more airports or railways stations, only teleportation stations. People will come to the teleportation station and then can go where ever they want.”

  Press: ”Can even go to other countries?”

  Me: ”All the teleportation machines will be linked, they can go to any terminal by entering the terminal number. It can be in any country. It might not even have to be on Earth.”

  Press: “Space travel? Other countries? Won't this be a security risk?”

  Me: “Absolutely not. Just like at airport, teleportation will be overseen by the government and everyone will still have to follow the visa and security checks of course.”

  One of the press reporters told me that this would be the headline tomorrow and for days to come. They started immediately publishing the news on the internet and I thanked them for their kind words. I sent and received back the reporters. Now I am at New York.

  The venture capitalists were eager to meet me. In truth, they're the ones I wanted to meet with all along.

  “Wait a just moment,” I told them. “I will say goodbye to the San Francisco audience and be back in a couple of minutes.”

  It took me fifteen minutes to dismiss the meeting and enter into the San Francisco teleportation device after which I reappeared in San Francisco. Business people were waiting for me in New York. Already it was a longer delay than I would have liked I urgently pressed T03 and I exited in New York. No... it was not New York. It was my lab. And my stupid boss was standing front of me. Now I understood. I wrongly pressed the lab's teleport ID T03. During my work day I tested this machine hundreds of times. I pressed the wrong teleport number by habit and accidentally teleported here. My boss is looking at me angrily and I cannot look him in the eyes. My plan is to run again to the teleportation terminal before my audience wonders where I've gone.

  “I was busy with my newest research and, in fact, had just completed it when I saw you on the television,” he began. “I hadn't even noticed my missing teleport machines until I saw the CNN live report and understood what was going on.”

  I was silent, just waiting to get out of there. He continued, “You don’t know anything about how the teleportation machines work and still you stole them.”

  I run to the teleportation machine and enter the New York teleport ID correctly. Luckily the device is working. I exit and open the door. Again my boss is standing right in front of me.

  He pointed his finger at something to my left. That's when I saw it, the San Francisco teleportation terminal. Now, three teleportation machines were in the room. I'm shocked and I ask him how this is possible.

  “This is teleport 2.0,” he said with a smile. “It's my extension to my teleportation invention. Now I'm able to teleport objects remotely and I can even teleport a teleportation device itself just as I've done with the two teleportation machines you thought you could steal.

  “Get me back to the audience. The world deserves these machines. Science isn't for the benefit of only one man,” I yell.

  He stood there silently. I lost control ran to him and tried to hit him. But he just dodged and I though better of it. I ran to the store room and fell down in misery. Before I tried to attack him again, He locked the door. I shouted for a long time but got no response.

  After 8 hours, He opened the door. I was very tired and gave up trying to attack him. I requested that he allow me to go back with the teleportation machines. I was sure someone was still waiting for me to come back.

  He motions over to his computer screen. “Look at that news website.”

  The website reads: ‘Black-magic man cheats press media, suddenly disappears from hotel, hotel management complain to police regarding balance of settlement for auditorium rent.’

  I pulled up more pages and saw the same article on every one of them. It was even being posted on websites that didn't even usually post about the news. Nobody believed it was real because the teleportation devices and I disappeared from there. They all thought it was some elaborate hoax.

  My boss looked at me for a long time before he spoke. “Get out of here. Never come back.” ABOUT THE AUTHOR
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  Krishna Kumar resides in India and is a new author who writes mainly in the science fiction genre. He is currently working on a novella and above everything else puts his readers first when writing stories.

  He is a techie with twelve years of experience in the IT industry and currently works for an IT product startup as their Senior Technology Architect. Writing is his passion and he's been writing since he was ten years old. This is his first publication. He is thankful for the time he's been able to spend on this book as his education, family, job and other commitments take up a lot of time. He was waiting for the right time to publish, and He hopes you've enjoyed reading his work.

  Reach him at www.writerkrish.com Facebook www.facebook.com/writerkrish Twitter @ writerkrish