Category Archives: Writing

January 21, 2008

Arthur Mengel awoke to water dripping repeatedly on his forehead, no, a moist hand, he realized as he quickly came to his senses, or at least those that worked.  The planet he was stationed on lacked the normal stimuli that most are accustomed to.  He stretched in the pitch black of what he knew as home.  A muffled skittering told him that his companion was satisfied he was awake and leaving him to ready himself.  The middle-aged anthropologist’s cubby in the network of caves again returned to absolute silence.

At first the darkness and utter quiet had unnerved him, as it would anybody.  Society had conditioned him to chaos.  It was only his sheer will to complete his job that kept him from going insane in those first few years.  Now the darkness was an old friend.  He stood and oriented himself towards where he knew the door was, an ingrained map, just as with most of the rest of the corridors that housed his community.  Slowly, he began walking.

He had been awakened for the morning ritual, or at least what he considered the morning ritual.  There was no indication of time.  He marched towards the single exit from the underground city.  For some thousandth time he traveled to the amphitheatre.  (2668 quipped a voice.  He had stopped taking notes after first his datapad died, and later his flashlight, instead committing all his information to memory.)

The stars in the clear sky above cast more than enough light for him to navigate by with his sensitized eyes.  He crested the hill to the sloped dish which seemed the center-point of his alien culture, the last of the stragglers.  Glancing about for a recognizable face Arthur quickly sat down next to a younger Salamander that he’d nicknamed Kenapocomoco (snakefish), or Ken for short.  The Salamander slowly blinked at him in recognition with exaggerated eyes then turned its gaze back to the center of the crowd.

The ceremony that had perplexed Arthur Mengel for the last seven years was about to begin again.  The race of salamander like aliens he’d been sent to study had no language that he had discovered, and yet somehow formed a coherent society with a complex social structure.  His eyes wandered back to the grotto that was the center of their community, his community.  Slowly, the five who he had decided were the leaders ambled towards the opaque orb that was the cause of it all.  The first one rose up and placed its front hands on the orb.  Each of the others followed suit.  Their glistening bodies went rigid, just before a light of growing intensity began to emanate from their shared heart.  A short while later, a mellow wave of warmth washes over Arthur.

He knew there had to be some importance to this ritual.  He felt understanding it was the one thing holding him back from truly knowing their society.  Another wave of warmth, the light oscillating in mute greys and greens and blues, there had to be something, something obvious, something missing.

Another wave of warmth washed over him, but this one not emanating from the orb, but from within himself.  The understanding washed over him.  He began crying at the realization.  Music.  It was music.  Ancient tales and strange emotions engulfed him.  Music truly was the universal language.  He lifted his head to the stars, and wondered if any other would ever experience their symphony.

I’ve been told there is a concept in the Navy called “belt buddies.” Aircraft carriers are dangerous, very busy places. When new sailors are learning the ropes on an aircraft carrier they are assigned to physically hold on to the belt of a senior sailor so they cross the deck at the right time and in the right direction. Last Shadow draws some inspiration from this.

August 20, 2009

Prompted by: Dami

They say the expected lifespan of an atmo-jumper is just thirteen minutes from jettison.  Five of that is spent in-flight, and the next fifteen minutes before extraction are the slowest hell of your life.  The truth is, most casualties are the result of novice pilots having zigged when they should have zagged.  They rarely make it past their first jump on their own.

A sane person might ask why anyone would voluntarily dive headfirst into almost certain suicide.  Most rookies ask themselves the same question in the moments leading up to launch.  Once you have made it through your first battle though, and the nerves have worn off, and you’ve had a chance to sleep, and eat, and generally distance yourself from the chaos, you start to notice it.  The box has been opened.  By subtle degrees it pushes its way from your subconscious.  One moment you will be bull-shitting with other personnel in the mess, and then just for an instant you will have a glimpse of clarity, or more a memory of clarity.  You barely catch it out of the corner of your eye, like looking through a filthy, cracked window.  You have no doubt that it is there, but you can’t quite bring things into focus.

Then it is forgotten.  You continue about your daily routine as if nothing ever happened.  It is still there of course, biding its time, chipping away at the cracks in your mind, but for the time being it is easy not to think about it.

Slowly.  Slowly it worms its way back to the surface.  Maybe only once now, but then again.  Soon it is growing in strength.  It invades your thoughts more often.  Over time it becomes a constant, nagging desire, driving you mad from the inside.  If only.  If only.  Just when you think you can’t possibly bear this cross any longer, that’s when you get the call.

“Approaching orbit.  All personnel conduct final preparations, drop scheduled at 0800 tomorrow morning universal standard time, 2570 local.  Evening prayer service will be held for those wishing…” The monotone voice of a female officer broadcasts throughout the ship.  Finally an end to the mental agony!

Readying your suit, and gear the nerves start up again.  All the want of the previous weeks makes way for basic survival instinct.  After all, what sane person would willingly put themselves in mortal danger.  Lining up for the drop tubes, the adrenaline is racing. Your muscles are shaking.  It’s not unheard of for the best of pilots to fall flat over, passed out in fear.  It takes every ounce of willpower to step into the tube when it is your turn, but all you have left to do is pray to whatever gods you believe in. And then, nothing.

The horizon of some alien planet curves out in front of you for thousands of miles just before your suit’s thrusters kick in, hurtling you towards the planet’s surface.  The stark beauty, and the knowledge that there is no turning back even if you wanted to, and the pure contrast making you realize just how small and insignificant you really are.

Time bends around you.  Your super-sonic drop to terra firma could take hours or days.  The HUD of your suit flashes irrelevant data, your only tie to reality.  When you finally reach the ground everything around you is frozen in the glare of the drop flares that are supposed to confuse enemy tracking systems.

What comes next is perfection more elegant than any civilian can dream of.  For fifteen minutes, you are more than human.  You are become death.  You are life.  You are an ancient Greek god of war, abroad a thunderous chariot.  You are love, and you do love. You love all the souls being released at your hand.  It is beautiful and vulnerable and pure, a perfect climax in your lovers embrace.

Then it is over.  The drop ships come in easy through the devastated defenses.  You climb aboard, spent.  Sometimes you cry.  Sometimes you bask in the afterglow.  The female pilots joke that the men fall asleep after a battle.  No matter what, it has been sated for now.  You can return to a normal routine for another few days.

“Final approach.  We will be over the drop sight in t-minus 3 minutes.  Prepare for launch.”

I can never tell whether a new pilot will survive a jump.  But stick close to me, I mean in my shadow, and you might stay alive long enough to receive your own blessing, or your own curse.

The bleak ice world of New Tibet is fun to visit as an author, but hard on its animal people inhabitants. I don’t usually write fan fiction, but the nature of this shared universe inspired me to torture some characters.

June 24, 2009

Prompted by: Saelio

Just a little farther.

The hare took another agonizing step.  His feet were past numb.  The tattered pads left streaks of red in his wake, sharply contrasting the perpetual white of the New Tibet landscape.  He shivered again.  Or perhaps he had never stopped.  The frigid, bleak atmosphere was friendly to no one.  Inch by inch, it ate away at you soul, assuming the Vishons or Shivers didn’t get to you first.  The thick cloud cover casting a gray mantle over the entire planet.  Night was nearly indistinguishable from day.  New Tibet’s dual moons lit up the clouds the same as the sun, although perhaps with an even more depressing shade.  It was enough to drive anyone born off-planet to madness.  Even for the natives, it was only a matter of time before their spirit left, their body slow to catch up.  It was enough to get logical people to do stupid things in the impossible hope of escape.

This is where our hare comes in.  Just like so many others, he was lured by thoughts of fortune and adventure.  He landed with the notion of catching his slice of the pie, and flying out in his own private space-liner financed by rare minerals.  With all the others, he was disappointed to find there was no fortune to be found for honest work.  No way home, no special skills, he went where the work was.  The mines were hiring.  If the surface was dreary, than the mining tunnels were the outer reaches of hell.  The average temperature in the tunnels was much warmer than surface.  This, may have seemed a blessing, but the air hovered just above freezing.  This was enough to keep liquid the never ending “drip, drip, drip” of water.  The glacial melt eventually seeped through even the thickest fur.  It combined with the dust in the air to form a muddy pelt, and a deep cough that never seemed to go away.  Long hours of bitter labor left little time to rest, and no time for play.  Such was the life of a miner.

It started small.  A Shiver pusher confronted him on an abandoned street corner.  “Hey, you look like you could use something to warm you up.”  Our hare warily noted the wild look in the foxes eyes.  A gust of cold wind pushed him forward half a step, cutting through his jacket, into his fur and brushed bare skin.  The fox eagerly reached into the pocket of his large overcoat and pulled out a foil wrapped pill, proudly displaying his wares.  Not wanting a confrontation he quickly slipped the fox several creds and hurried towards his home.  The pill remained clutched in the hare’s paw.  It’s foil wrapping seemed almost electric with danger, deep inside his coat pocket.

The fox was an oddity.  The Shivers consisted almost entirely of wolves.  There was little chance he would advance past his current position, selling synthetic super-drugs.  Still, the crazed fox likely made twice as much as a miner’s wage.  Any sense of honor had dissolved along with uncounted miles of stone at the drill-tip.  The hare’s reasons for avoiding the Shiver’s was far more primal than that. The Shivers were a dangerous bunch.  They perhaps weren’t as bad as the Vishons, barbaric polar bear brutes by comparison, but a thousand generations of evolution gave our hare an innate caution among creatures with such pointy teeth.

Inside his cookie-cutter studio apartment the hare sat at his table, the only other furnishing a worn out cushioned chair in the adjacent corner.  He stared at the pill, now unwrapped.  It seemed to glow back at him, a pale green hinting at its hidden power.  In a flash he had dropped the pill in his mouth and swallowed.  He waited a moment.  A letdown embraced the hare as the drugs failed to have the expected effect.  He stood, and began his nightly routine when a warm tingle began creeping under his fur.  He scratched at it cursing the mines and the dust and the mud, but when he realized the feeling was spreading he knew it must be the pill.  The feeling grew to envelope his whole body.  It was a warmth he hadn’t felt since arriving on this horrid planet.  Waves of euphoria hit him one after another, each bigger than the last.  It was all he could do to stumble to his cot.  It…feels like sunshine.

The next morning, our hare woke up with a dry mouth, but still the drug lingered.  He glanced at the clock on his stove and stood up with a start.  Late for work! In a panicked rush he readied and sprinted to the mine site.  An angry foreman awaited him when he grabbed his time card and turned to punch in.  He acted sorry and agreed with the over-weight badger when he was called a cadre of despicable things.  None of it mattered, all the hare could think about was the amazing feelings from the previous night, and the fox on the street corner.  He was warned not to be late again, and rushed off to the tunnel entrance.

After work he went straight to the fox dealer.  “Ah, back again.  I trust you enjoyed my services?” The hare just handed him more creds and groped for the foil wrapped ambrosia.  He didn’t even bother to get into his house before popping his next high.  It was every bit as good as the first one, if not better.  Traces of his first experience still circulated through his body.  In an instant he had gone from out of luck bunny to king of his own world.  The work in the mines no longer mattered.  He knew he would have happiness to look forward too upon his return.  It became a matter of course to stop by and patronize the pusher after work each day.  At first he was cautious, he never bought beyond his means.  He would go two, three, four days without eating just to save up enough for one high, but he always payed cash.

Then it happened.  The New Tibet Mining Corporation technically held a no drug policy.  It was rarely enforced.  Half of the companies security personal were on the payroll of one or other of the cities major gangs.  The only time it was really held to was when some corporate bigwig came in from off planet.  It was his lucky day.  Mandatory drug screenings.  Our hare blanched in fear, knowing there was no way to escape the inevitable result.  He got the paper in a surprisingly short amount of time.  A grey slip (of course) that read “20 day suspension of labor activities, and immediate dispatch from The New Tibet Mining Corp. property.”  Twenty days…how am I supposed to live without uppers for twenty days? How am I supposed to live without food for twenty days.  Dazed from the stress of the mornings events he found himself mindlessly walking the same route he always took to and form work.  Seeing him coming, the pusher stepped out to intercept him.  “You’re off work early. Did you make a big discovery and they sent you home? A bonus perhaps? I’m sure I have just what you’re looking for.”

The hare tried hard to glare at the fox, but couldn’t find the hate in his emotionally empty mind.  “No, it’s not quite like that.  I’m under temporary suspension because of your pills.  I don’t exactly have the money right now…”

The fox grinned a sly grin and consoled the hair.  “That’s okay my friend, you’ve been such a good customer, I’d be happy to let some go to you on credit.  You can pay me back in better times.  With interest of course.”

Again, the hare tried to feel something.  What could it hurt.  It’s not as if I have any more to loose.

Some days later, growing desperate for basic necessities, he decided to do something he promised he would never do.  He tracked down a Shiver controller and begged a loan.  He quickly spent it on dry food,  heat creds, and water before he had a chance to grow weak and go back for more Warmth.

He made it to day nineteen.  The withdrawal, and his returning inhibitions fought each other in a never-ending battle.  He couldn’t sleep.  He couldn’t keep down the meager nutrients he had left.  His body was killing itself.  It was in the dead of night that he left.  He took only his coat with him.  At first he thought he was walking to see the fox again, but his feet kept plodding right on by his usual haunt.  He kept walking to the outskirts of the city, then beyond.  The wide ice plains seemed endless under the moon’s glow.  Only a faint silhouette gave him any target.  Mt.  Arkon loomed in the distance.  He kept on through the night.  At times he sprinted running from his demons in the city.  Never did he stop.  To the base of Mt. Arkon he ran, and still he didn’t stop.  Upwards!  Upwards!  The morning was fast approaching.  He had to get to the peak hidden above the clouds.  No, he had to get above the clouds.  Onwards!  His mind knew his body was dying.  There was no returning to the city.  He poured every last ounce of energy into one last step.  Then somehow found the energy for one more, and one more.  “Upwards…I must…get above the clouds.”  His senses faded as life drained from his body, and still he kept climbing, blind and deaf.  Finally he could give no more.  His torn body collapsed on the icy rocks, never to move again.  The last thing he felt before his soul was released from the ice prison was sunshine on his face, guiding him home.

November 25, 2007

“Are we there yet?”

“Almost, it’s just a bit farther.”

The two teens had just broken out of the tree line.  They’d left their beat up old car at the trailhead just over an hour before.  At first the trail had been easy.  It followed one of countless creeks up into the mountains.  But it quickly turned steep as they followed its path.

“Water break,” he panted, un-shouldering his cheap nylon backpack and handing a bottle to his companion.

“Where are you taking me?” She asked for the twentieth time.

He smiled at her persistence.  “I already told you, it’s a surprise. It’ll be worth it, I promise.”

He’d promised her something special for her birthday.  He couldn’t afford anything big even if she’d wanted it, but he hoped above hope that she would like this.  “Money and things aren’t important. People always expect that their next big screen TV or new car will make them happy.  Maybe diamonds will buy them a happy relationship.  But in the end it’s not things that matter.  It’s the love and respect of your family and friends.  That’s what makes you rich.”  She could be exasperatingly wise sometimes, knowledgeable beyond her years.

They’d got a late start up the trail, and it was already beginning to get dark.  A chill breeze whispered through the trees below them.  They both shivered a bit.  “We have to hurry.” He glanced at his watch, picking up his own pace a little as he spoke. “It’s almost time.   It’s just past the next switchback, not much farther.”  The looming rock face quickly came upon them.

“Follow me, I know the way up.”  He assured her, already scrambling up the inclined surface.  She was not long to follow.  He already stood waiting for her when she got to the top.  “Oh wow…it’s beautiful.”  She said in genuine awe.  Before them seemed to lay the whole world.  An ocean of green rolled out before them.  Dozens of high-mountain lakes sparkled in the sun’s dieing light.  An incomparable lightshow played out before them as the day gave its final agonized throes.  He opened his jacket and held her close as she shivered.  Together they sat, legs dangling, sitting on the edge of the universe.  “I love you big brother.”  “I love you too Sis.”

 Dedicated to my sister, Erin.

Dog Mountain, June 2013

June 6, 2008

“He gave everything he had just to save what he thought was left of all he knew… Yet, in the end only ash was in his hands.”

Christian, that was what they’d named him when they’d taken him from his home at twelve summers age, Christian White.  A perverted attempt at making him into a reject copy of their own imbalanced society.  Invaders from a far off land, what did they know about life in this place?  They tried at taming this wilderness to make it like their own, taming its people, and ended up destroying both.

He had fought what they were doing to him, tried to run away, but he was caught every time.  Finally, he gave in, the animal spirit biding it’s time for a chance at escape, the bars gnawing at self.  There was nothing to be done.

Seeing that they had been successful, they released him, civilized.  Yet, none would take him.  He tried their way, doing as they had conditioned him to.  Every step he was cut down by prejudice and fear.  His own would not accept him.  He was no longer one of them, tainted. Not one, and not the other, a lost generation, a stolen generation.

So it was that he ended up where it all began.  An abandoned patch of barren earth he had once called home.  He crouched at the edge of the fire pit, the only sign the place had once been a human habitation.  Ashes stained his hands, and his old life blew away over the red dirt wasteland.

A lone dingo skirted the edge of the camp, drawn by the lingering scent of meat, and urine and sweat, of life.  I knowing glance passed between two beasts:  The hardship of life, the pain of hunger, the unfairness of it all.  It was a different hunger that Christian felt.  He yearned for belonging, for the balance that had once been, for right.  The dingo had something he would give anything for.

Broken, he lay down next to the last remnants of his origins.  The afternoon winds pelted his bare chest as the sun scorched the land from above.  He wished the dingo would come finish him off and eat him, at least then some part of him would be right.  As he lapsed into midday darkness, a metallic clang wakened his inner animal.  Raising her head she stared at the source of the strange noise.  One of the bars was gone.  The elements of the wilderness had rusted through the cage.  Cautiously, she stuck her head out of the new door, jaded by years of mistreatment.  Then, free.  Two dingoes trotted over the rich blood of the Australian outback.

January 16, 200

“Don’t worry, there’s nobody but us for miles.” The two had made it to camp late the night before, setting up just after dark.

“I know. I just can’t help it.  I’ve never done anything like this before.”

“Comon, it’s not like I’ve never seen you naked before.”

“That was different. That was…it was dark then.”  The blush was clearly evidenced in her voice.

“I promise you, it’s the second most fun you can have with your clothes off.” Serenity of the kind only found in unspoiled wilderness encompassed them.

“Fine, I’m coming.”  The woman stepped out of the tent, a stunning archetype of rustic beauty.  Beside her stood her smiling mate.  “But I’m keeping the towel on until we get to the lake.”

“You realize you are ridiculous.  The lake isn’t more than fifty yards away.” He walked beside her in nature’s clothing.

“…and you still love me anyways.”

They reached the edge of the lake.  She neatly folded her towel and set it on a rock. A breathtaking mountain vista looked down on them from the clear sky.  Together, leaning on each other for support, they waded into the crisp alpine waters. Playfully they splashed, water droplets sparkling in the pure morning sunlight.

“You’re beautiful.”

January 15, 2008

“NOOOO!”

Impossibly strong flannel arms bound the woman’s arms to her side.  Before her a murderous looking lot crowded her fiancé.  Snick! A glint of silver…

Jula Blades awoke to find herself tangled in her sheets on the floor next to her bed.  The head of Jared, the fiancé in question poked over the edge of the bed.  A concerned look adorned his face.

“You had the dream again didn’t you?” She just panted, trying to regain control of her breath. “Jula, that’s the third night this week! We have to figure out what’s causing this.  It can’t go on.  You’re turning into a wreck.”

“It’s nothing. It’s just a dream. That’s all.”  She shivered slightly, her body drenched in sweat.

“It’s not nothing and you know it.  I don’t know if I believe in premonitions and the like, but something is happening.  I know it is.”

Jula unsteadily stood up, putting the sheets in order.  She climbed back into bed and wordlessly fell into a restless approximation of sleep.  This scene played itself out many times over the next several weeks.  Each time Jared encouraging her to do something about it, and each time herself going back to sleep without a word.

She wasn’t afraid to seek help.  She was afraid because she knew it would come to pass.  Some feeling told her that it was real.  It was only a matter of time.  Jared was everything she ever wanted in a relationship and she refused to let it be taken away from her.  Maybe, if she just stayed alert she could keep it from happening.  She couldn’t let it happen.  She wouldn’t let it happen.

“NOOOOO!”

A familiar scene played out in her nightmarescape. She was bound, helpless.  But this time something was different.  It was all too real.  She watched the thugs kick her downed mate, his body a lifeless silhouette against the greasy backdrop.  Snippets of memory came to her panicked mind.  A restaurant, they’d been on a restaurant.  He’d insisted on walking home because “it’s good for you.”  Oh why did he have to walk home! She watched them beat him and spit on him and this time she knew what was coming.

“Nooo!  You will never do it you bastards! I won’t let you!”

She fought the invisible hands, breaking free in an amazing display of primal determination. A flash of silver, a lightning quick movement, and it was all over.  She lay bleeding beside her battered mate, a knife embedded in her chest.  She had done it. she had saved him.  She could finally rest in peace.  A smile graced her lifeless face.

“Jula…Jula…”  An ethereal voice called her from within the bright light that seemed to be from everywhere and nowhere.

“Jula…you made it.  It’s morning and you didn’t wake up once.  It’s the first time I’ve seen you so peaceful in months.”  She lay against his chest, an arm draped around her own.  His speech provided a comforting rumble as she awoke truly rested for the first time in what seemed like an eternity.  She smiled and took in the moment.

“It’s over.  You’ll be safe now.”

April 9, 2008

“GODAMMIT! IS THAT THE BEST YOU’VE GOT!”

 Noah’s scream barely penetrated the pounding rain.  In response, a large thunderclap smashed against the evergreens over-head.  “This wasn’t the way it was supposed to be. This was supposed to be the easy way out.” He cursed angrily at himself.  He’d been stupid.  He’d gotten away with shit before and got off with nothing but a handslap.  This time his rap caught up with him.  The judge gave him an option: prison, or he could enroll in this “alternative program.”  The choice seemed obvious at the time.

 He had been dropped off on the tiny remote lake.  It didn’t even have a name on the map, like so many others they had flown over.  The plan was to meet with “some crazy medicine man,” who was to act as his counselor.  “Fucking summer camp!”  It had been three days.  His food was gone.  He was soaked to the core.  And there was no fucking medicine man to be found.  For the first time in as long as he could remember, Noah fealt truely helpless.  There was noone there to take out his anger on, no scapegoat for his weakness.  He was freezing, starving, bloody fucking alone.

 Warmth.  The crackle of a fire.  It was all Noah could do to lay surrounded by the thick canvas bedroll, as his senses returned.  He suddenly realized what all this meant.  “Where the hell have you been!” he yelled to the wilderness.

 A voice behind him made him jump, to see a grey-haired balding man leaning against the trunk of a Red Cedar. “The flowers are particularly livid this year.  I hope you don’t mine that I stopped to listen.  It’s only rarely that their choir is so well rehearsed.  Breakfast?” The man said, offering a half-eaten bowl of what appeared to be oatmeal in Noah’s direction.

 “Umm…did you eat out of that?”  The stranger gave a quick nod.  “Thanks, I’ll pass.”  “Suit yourself.  It’ll be one of your last hot meals for awhile.”  The woodsman took another scoop of the mush.”  In answer to your earlier question, you said thanks.”

 “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”  Noah was convinced by this point that he’d been suckered into being flown out to the middle of fucking nowhere, to be stuck with a complete wackjob.”

 “You said thanks.  When I asked you if you wanted food, you said thanks.  Would you have even feigned polite conversation when you arrived?  I’ll be blunt.  You have the upper hand.  There is absolutely no way that I could break through the walls you have put up to protect yourself.  I needed you broken before I ever met you.”

 “So you would have just sat back and let me die!” Noah was standing by this point, falling back into his practiced threatening act.  A chill morning breeze made the hair on his boxer-clad body stand on end, slightly lessening his desired effect.

 “Of course not, it’d be somewhat difficult to train you if you went and died on me.  No, I was watching you.  It’s not as hard as you might think with all that interference you have.  Interference, it’s what I call the kind of constant gnawing anger that only humans experience.  We truly are a strange being, to hold rage inside us for no reason other than because we can.  No other creature does that you know.”

Noah just stood there frozen in his suddenly useless pose.  There was some feral aire about the guy that made him uneasy. “And what is that gibberish supposed to mean?”

 “That, is what you’re here to find out.  Now get dressed! It’s time for lesson one.  By the way, the name is Mat, Mat Windchaser.”

 “Weird fucking medicine man, I knew it.”  For some reason Noah found an inane level of amusement from this as he pulled on his pants.

June 24, 2010

Prompter: Gibbs

Shuffle-clank. Shuffle-creak.  Shuffle-clank.  Today was one of her better days.  Gert was up out of the wheelchair and walking.  The Company supplied leg braces were supposed to give her the mobility of any native terran, but damned if they weren’t noisy, and uncomfortable.  Even with the noise they fell far short of the physical aptitude regulations for full citizenship.

Painfully she crossed the short distance from her apartment to the pathetic, dirty excuse of a closet office. Her official title was “Extra-planetary advisory chair,” but really she was a glorified paperweight.  Just another one of the moon-rocks that had been so popular during the middle of the 21st century. The company ’employed’ her in an attempt to make amends for taking her from her home, for crippling her, for making her an outcast.

Many called the extra-planetary mining operation a folly, doomed from the start.  The cost of supplying a lunar outpost would be tremendous, not to mention returning the raw materials.  Still, there was no water to poison on the moon, no atmosphere to pollute.  The advantages were enough to sway several wealthy investors, and for a time it seemed there gamble had paid off.

For twenty-three years the operation thrived. The investors were fat and happy. The exotic location attracted some of the brightest to man the mostly mechanized outpost. Among them were Gert’s parents to be, although they didn’t know it yet.  For twenty-three years it looked as if life on the moon was a sure thing. Gert was seventeen when the mining company decided to pull out.  The damage had been done before she was even born, before her parents even knew she was going to be born.  The effects of low gravity on a fetus are irreversible.

Up there it hadn’t mattered. She was perfectly suited for the environment.  She was the only child of twenty doting parents.  She could hold the whole world in the palm of her hand, and did on more than one occasion in the panoramic observation platform.

The gravity of the closure of luna’s only permanent residence did not fully sink in until the last tender landed at the Space Port of Seattle.  She couldn’t see the streaks of rain on the outside of the inches thick viewport, tears of frustration streaked down her own face clouding her vision.  She couldn’t move.  Her body conspired with the cruel, cruel earth to trap her in her seat.

“No.” She shook the memory from her head, stopping just outside the entrance to the mine administration building.  She gazed upward at the fading orb in the morning sky.  Her former home called to her, or perhaps some part of her that had never left.  With only the heavens as her witness, she made a solemn vow. “No matter the odds, I will see the moon again.” With that, she shuffled inside.

May 30, 2010

Prompted by: Dami

Sam sighed to herself.  She had come here expecting to save the world, or have a mystical revelation or something.  She had been saving for this trip for three years.  Every month a small part of the meager paycheck from her part time job during college went to the Tibet fund.  Two weeks after graduation, a political science degree fresh in her possession, she boarded the plane with all the pent up ambition of her school years.

It was not to see the region as a tourist.  She wanted to see the country as a scientist.  She wanted to see it as a local might.  It was everything she could hope for.  There was a modern day resistance going on.  A silent refusal of the rule of the Big Red Government by the pacifistic local peoples.  The events of the coming years could determine the future of the world.  “Surely, a small part of southwest China couldn’t affect us,” said her friends.  She believed there was a deeper, psychological connection with Tibet than most people would realize, and certainly more than they would admit.  The people of Tibet offered a last bastion of hope.  They refused to give in, and yet they refused to resort to the violence favored by so much of the civilized world.  A victory of the people here could return hope to those in the western world, an unstoppable wave.  Somewhere in Tibet was hidden Pandora’s fragile butterfly.  She just had to find it.

She started at the university, meeting with a fellow American student who had been attending school in Lhasa.  After a week of acclimatizing to the local culture, she began her formal interviews.  First an overview of their place in the community, socio-economic position, traditions, and religious beliefs.  Then gradually she introduced a few more pointed questions regarding Chinese occupation, and the exile of the Dalai Lama.  The work was made slow due to the necessity of a translator.  The results were often too vague to be immediately useful.

At the end of her month long tenure she had interviewed dozens of people.  She had notebooks full of her field scribbles.  A pouch bulging with full audio tapes was tucked in her luggage. Despite this she had not found the secret she had been looking for.  The people were not hesitant to talk about their desire for the Chinese government to leave them to their own devices.  Yet, none of them seemed particularly distraught by this actuality.  None of them seemed frustrated by the lack of progress on the liberation front.  Couldn’t they see the situation they were in!  She was angry for them.

Stolidly, she gazed out the window of the tired taxi she sat in.  The lights of the approaching Lhasa Gonggar Airport made neon waves through the cracked, rain-streaked window of the cab.  She pulled to a stop next to a large sign written in English, Tibeten, and Chinese.  “Namaste.” She bowed to the driver and payed her fare.  A monstrous red flag fluttered at the top of a towering flag pole.  She couldn’t help but smile.  Hidden from view of the road, a small string of colorful prayer flags tied together the sign and pole.  Even here, the resistance was on.