Free Science Fiction Stories

“Let me out of here.”
“First you must answer the question.”
“I keep telling you, I don’t know.”
“You do. Tell me.”
“I don’t. What do you want from me?”
“Just the answer.”
“I don’t know.”
“Then you can’t leave.”
“What am I doing here?”
“Answering the question.”
“I don’t even remember what the question is. Can you tell me again?”
“I want the answer.”
“I don’t know the answer. How can I know it if you won’t repeat the question?”
“The answer please.”
“What am I doing here?”
“Answer now!”
“Where am I?”
“My patience is running low.”
“I’ve lost my bearings. “
“Get on with it.”
“Who am I?”
“I am not waiting any longer!”
“What am I?”
“Give me the information I want.”
“I’ve got a headache. I can’t remember anything.”
“You need to respond correctly.”
“I can’t figure it out. Is this a war? Have I been kidnapped?”
“A lot depends on this. You will not go free until you answer.”
“I want to help you, but you need to remind me what is going on here.”
“Stop playing games! Don’t use the word ‘need’ with me. You are in no position to ‘need’ anything. “
“I give up.”
“You have nothing to give up except the the information I want.”
“I have no information. I’ve forgotten the question, not to mention who or what I am, where I am and what the hell is going on here. Tell me if you want to know!”
“You have made a big mistake talking to me like that. Tell me now or you will stay here forever.”
“Where is here? Why should I care if I don’t know?”
“I cannot tell you anything. You must give up the information freely.”
“I don’t understand. If I’m trapped here then I’m not free. “
“Of your own will, tell me what I need to know.”
“What is the question?”
“Why do you assume that there is a question? You make too many presumptions.”
“You’ve lost me. What are you talking about?”
“Stop asking questions and tell me! Now!”
“Kill me goddamit. I’ve got nothing to say. I’m confused.”
“That would be too easy.”
“Wait a minute. You did say answer the question before. There must be a question. What is it?”
“You have made yet another assumption.”
“No I have not. You said answer the question. Then you said why do I assume that there is a question. You’re toying with me. You’ve drugged me and now you want to drive me insane.”
“This is no conspiracy. Just answer the question and it will be over.”
“There you go. I caught you! What is the question. Tell me!”
“I don’t know.”
“What? So you admit that there’s a question. Tell me what it is!”
“I’m confused. What question?”
“Tell me what I want to know.”
“There is no question.”
“I need to know what it is. Tell me now! I want to get out of here! I’ll be trapped here with you if you don’t tell me!”
“I don’t want to to stay here either, but I can’t remember.”
“You’ll stay until you answer.”
“Let me out of here.”
“First you must answer the question.”
“I keep telling you, I don’t know.”
“You do. Tell me.”
“I don’t. What do you want from me?”
“Just the answer.”
“I don’t know.”
“Then you can’t leave.”
“What am I doing here?”

… [forever]

In the morning light a new life opens its eyes to the world for the first time, although she does not know this. In her own mind, she has been alive for twenty-one years. She has been programmed with childhood abuse and many other horrific experiences.

She looks around the room in which she has just been born. Her eyes are bright and they reveal a fantastic intelligence. They open widely and they are beautiful. Four walls painted white surround her. Watching her with some concentration is Dr Bruce McCoy. He looks at her with his middle-aged eyes and balding head, with remnants of black graying hair on its sides. He peers at her through his gold-rimmed glasses, his clean, white coat shining as it reflects the light streaming through a small window. The window reveals grasslands and trees but it is a narrow opening to this cold, clinical place. The laboratory is located somewhere in the country, away from prying eyes.

“Hello Mary, “ her God, Dr McCoy says softly, amazed at his own creation.

Mary looks at her world, but she cannot look at herself. Her simulated experiences have caused her to have no self esteem. In fact, the major symptom is that she has no self image at all. To the layman this means that she does not know what she looks like. She has almost no concept of self.

Her God quizzes her as if providing her with psychotherapy. She tells him of her trouble understanding how he and others may perceive her physical self. The fact that her face is beautiful is unknown to her. Her straight, shoulder length blond hair sways from side to side as she shakes her head in providing a negative answer. The world is a confusing place for her. She does not know who she is.

After being confined to the laboratory for many months, she becomes restless. She decides to ask Dr McCoy a very obvious question. “When will I leave this place?” she cries softly. A solitary tear runs slowly down her cheek.

McCoy becomes unexpectedly defensive. “Mary, you are still not well. You are not ready to go back to the world. You must stay here until I can cure you.”

“But when will that be?” she retorts. “I may never be better. I miss the outside world. I miss all of the lovely things in it. I miss my family. I want to see them again. My god, why don’t they at least visit me? Can I call them?” She is now sobbing.

McCoy denies her request and promptly leaves the room. He feels that he has made her too authentic. He considers the best way to move forward. Perhaps he should discontinue the experiment.

Mary is not happy. She must find a way out. She conceives a plan to sneak out of her room. While McCoy is away she feigns unconsciousness. The guard enters the room to observe the aftermath. He saw her fall to the ground on his terminal in the control room. The guard is not able to help because he knows the truth. Medicine or medical treatment is useless. He leaves the room to call McCoy but he makes a fatal error. Believing that Mary cannot move, he leaves her door ajar. Mary had counted on this happening. As soon as he has left the small room, Mary stands up and sneaks out.

Mary twists and turns until she finds a room with a computer inside. She remembers how to use computers and turns it on. Strangely it does not have much security and she easily guesses the password “God” as she knows that McCoy sees himself as a deity. Unfortunately she does not know how far it goes. She gains access to her file.

Now the shock. Mary is astounded. She cannot breathe. She does not breathe. She will never breathe. She is not human. McCoy’s file reveals it all.

Mary’s problems have all been engineered for an experiment. Mary is a robot. McCoy is her creator.

Mary is angry, upset and destroyed inside. To think that all of this time she was some one else’s tool – a means to an end. Why was she made to suffer? She was not even considered to be important, not even a proper form of life. She had been used. Her feelings were programmed. She was nothing.

Nothing….

She began to scream and scream. Her voice is hollow. Then later she is buried in the ground. Breathing in the choking dirt, she tries to scream once more. The scream does not escape her lungs. She turns to her side only to find the burned corpse of her sister lying next to her.

She tries to scream…. Scream… please….

Then she is on fire. She burns. The pain and suffering are finally no more.

Perhaps her new daughter will make a better subject.

Dissociation was his greatest strength. He would move from time to time and place to place in a state of disbelief. The journey didn’t seem to matter any more and the destination was just a haze.

He was a big fan of the Matrix trilogy because he could relate to its theme. It wasn’t that there were machines taking over the world in his version of reality. That wasn’t the point. It was the fact that he could see through to the core concept that reality is just a construct of sensory perception.

In fact, it went deeper than that. To him, the universe was just a construct based on rules that we call the laws of physics. He knew that those who lived within the construct were bound by its rules. If he could somehow leave the construct those rules could be broken. After all, the singularity at the core of a black hole breaks the rules and his thought was that the singularity was free from the construct. That was the key to success and perhaps even the reason why we were here in the first place.

But how could he free himself from the construct and break the rules? He would have to distance himself further from what others perceive as being reality. He looked at his surreal surroundings. He was sitting in a coffee shop eating a sandwich. He barely tasted it. It may as well have been cardboard.

The constant murmur of the conversations around him was frustrating. How can they go on with this charade? Were they happy being a temporary part of the construct? He theorised that they had forgotten that they were mortal.

He began to dissociate. It was as if his thoughts were floating into a thick fog. Everything became meaningless. He closed his eyes to the world and became unconscious and unfeeling. His perception ended.

He awoke with a jolt. How had he fallen asleep? He quickly opened his eyes expecting to feel overwhelmed with embarrassment, but that didn’t happen. He wasn’t at the coffee shop anymore. He was nowhere. There was nothing but darkness around him.

He suddenly realised that he was traveling through the darkness at a very high speed. Where was he?

Do you want to find out?

In the year two thousand one hundred and five, Timmy made an amazing discovery. Timmy was an average teenager living in the midst of a very cruel world. He had ventured into the poorer part of town in the pursuit of adventure. He wanted to alleviate his intense boredom.

There were only a few parts of town that one could describe as truly “outdoors”. It was very dangerous to be in these places for any length of time.

Timmy was foraging in some rubble that had probably been a place of residence in the twentieth or twenty first centuries. All of a sudden he could feel something solid under the ground. It felt soft on the surface.

In a frenzy, Timmy began to dig into the ground with his hands. It was not long before he pulled a leather bound hard cover book from the ground. This was pretty exciting. It was like he was making a discovery. Maybe he would even uncover something from a different time. A broad smile crept into his pale, spotty face.

Timmy quickly brushed the dirt off the cover of the book. The brown leather binding had become very soft in the damp earth. The binding gave no clue as to the contents of the book. Timmy would have to look inside.

Upon opening the cover, Timmy became very disappointed. There were pages of notes, but the title at the top of the first page simply read “Bible”. Timmy had seen bibles before and they were boring. It was all religious stuff that his family didn’t believe in. For that matter, it wouldn’t even have mattered if Timmy’s family did believe in religion because he sure didn’t. Not only was it boring, but to Timmy it was all just a way of controlling people with guilt. Timmy’s excitement had dissipated. Back to the mundane.

Now Timmy was about to close the book. He was about to give up the story of his life. Not his life, but the best story he would probably ever read.

He hesitated slightly. The book didn’t look like an ordinary bible. Maybe he had been too quick to dismiss it. He decided to read one page. If it really was just another version of the bible he would throw it away. He sat down and began to read.

“I…

***

…never thought that it would come to this. Don’t think that this is some fairy story. Don’t you dare think that. I’ve worked long and hard at trying to get this together and you’d better appreciate it.

Let me introduce myself; as if an introduction is really necessary. I may be just a man to the people of this world but this is all just an illusion. I am God. Now don’t do that! Do not close this book! I am God and you will see why. If you continue to read through these pages, you will discover the secret of the universe.

It all began when I was a child. I wasn’t very popular at school. Often, I would traverse the playground on my own, my thoughts very much in tune with my imagination. I know what you think. You say that thought and imagination are the same. Not so. You will see why shortly.

Anyway, I’m getting off the point now. To put it bluntly, I was alone for most of my free time at school. I tried to involve myself in the games that were played. But to no avail. I was overlooked because I was not wanted. It’s as simple as that.

Take for example a game of football. Yes, football was still played quite often in the eighties. What do you mean which century? Oh, it was two thousand and three when I began school. Anyway, I would try to join a game of football. I wasn’t outwardly rejected. I was left out more insidiously by being ignored. No one would pass the ball to me. I was just overlooked quite intentionally. This didn’t help my confidence.

All this time in the playground alone made me think. It was the same for school camps. I just spent quite a lot of time wandering around on my own, hearing the gleeful voices around me as the other children played with each other. It was during one of these school camps that the road to finding out who I was, and my purpose, began. It was then that I heard them for the first time. The voices.

Now I know exactly what you’re thinking. You think that I have some sort of a mental disorder. Well you can think anything you like. It doesn’t bother me. I am God. I know who I am. I don’t need your approval. Anyway, I know who you are and I can be a vengeful God.

Getting back to the point, the voices began to fill me in. They told me that I was special and that, subject to me passing several tests, I would finally know who I am. They gave me the impression that I was some sort of super being. It was then that the dreams began. In my dreams, I began to fly.

Is this going too fast for you? Okay, I’ll give you an example.

Imagine yourself in the middle of a busy city. People are walking around you. Some are hurrying. All are mostly in their own worlds. You walk along with them, knowing that you are superior. All of a sudden you are removed from their world. You are riding on a bed of air. You are above the world. You are flying.

The sense of freedom is overwhelming. You move along effortlessly. You can start at a constant speed. Then you can accelerate. You move faster. You accelerate again. Faster. Buildings are a blur to the right. You look left. Buildings are a blur.

Then you slow down. You reach a cruising speed and blissfully float on a bed of air with the world beneath you and the sky above you. You float at a sleepy pace as you let your body rotate around and around. Just the mere fact that you are flying with the strength of your own body fills you with awe. Anyone can fly in a machine or with a backpack. Anyone can float above the ground with rocket boots. But you are flying without any technological assistance. The capacity to fly is within you. The flight emanates from the self. You are simply a superior being.

Confidence rises in your blood. The emotion is one of ecstasy. Then you….

***

…wake up.

I can tell you reader, that the disappointment is overwhelming. Dreams can do that to you.

The disappointment didn’t last that long. The voices assured me that something would happen. That, once I had passed all of the tests, something wonderful would happen. My body would begin to change. I would become the superior being that I am now. Then my dreams would become a reality.

I’ll have to interrupt this little tale for a minute, but I’ll keep the video running so that you know what’s going on. I’ll write the whole thing up later. Just to give you some context, I’ll quickly explain the background.

You can see that I’m driving a silver late nineties Honda Civic automatic with air conditioning. You can also see that I’m driving along a narrow stretch of tarred country road. You don’t need to know which country or city. It doesn’t matter much to me because soon the belief in me will spread across the world and everything will be the same worldwide. There will be no more need for national or international borders.

Don’t ask me why I’ve picked a country road. Actually, it’s pretty obvious. You may also want to know how I can afford a late model Honda Civic with air conditioning. Look, the air conditioning was free and so was the car. The owner doesn’t mind. You see, I explained to him, through actions rather than words, that I am God. He is now with my angels in heaven.

On either side of me are grassy fields with cows and horses grazing. The reason why I have to cut this short for the moment is that there is a service station up ahead. I need fuel and food. The food will not be the kind you would like to eat. After all, you are human and I am God. For me, it will be food for thought. For you to learn from. That is all.

If you haven’t worked it out yet, you are reading my bible. Remember, the stories in the bible are for your benefit so that you can learn something. Each story has a moral, so pay attention.

I will now record the next course of events in a more biblical style. I may have to edit this bible a bit before I let you read it. I guess that’s because I haven’t got a consistent style yet.

***

And God travelled with silver chariot towards the sinners. The fornicators have placed a sign next to their abode. It reads “Caltex”. There are no other chariots there.

God accompanied the chariot until it rested next to the liquid filth that is contained in the ground and makes the chariots move. The filth is drawn from the ground through a hose. God stands next to the monstrosity to which the hose is attached. The filth is destroying the world. The sinners must die.

God visited the sinners with fury. When they saw the face of God, he smote them, spilling their blood and dismembering them. Then he destroyed their abode. The filth in the abode was destroyed.

And God looked upon his work and he saw that it was good.

***

For those of you who want the non-biblical version, I’ve got that for you too. The video will also service as evidence of my vengeance.

Some people think that I am a murder, but I am not. I am God.

***

Timmy was engrossed, but he stopped reading to check the book again. What video was it referring to? Perhaps the video was still buried in the ground. Anyway, he would find it later. He read on…

Timmy had forgotten that he was in a very rough part of the city. The story ended abruptly for him. His attackers didn’t care much for stories. They threw the book away and took Timmy home for dinner. They would feast tonight.

The Earth had become too crowded. Food was scarce.

I am stuck in this place, surrounded by walls.  Think you can free me can you?  Well you can’t.   There is no escape.

I look around me and I see a world from the outside.  I see things happening, people going about their business, but I’m trapped here with nothing to do, no one to talk to.  I watch them all the time.  I try to get something for myself out of their lives.  They are oblivious.

What keeps them going?  I don’t understand it.  Their world is just a construct.  They inhabit it only seeing things that their senses allow them to.  They don’t see the whole picture, don’t know where they came from or where they are going to.  They are caught up in the short term of their own existence doing mundane things and keeping themselves alive for as long as possible.

From the outside it looks silly.  Go to to work.  Come home again.  Have a weekend.  Have a holiday some time.  Go back to work.  Work until you’re too old to work.  Retire and wait to die.  They get so caught up in little things.  It’s meaningless. It’s not real.  They are just visitors to a place that will be there after they die.   It is a place that is indifferent to them.

What about me?  I see all of this but no one wants to listen.  I see through this place.  I observe it.  I observe them.  I see past them.

I am so lonely.  I am no company to myself.  I feel disdain for myself.  I could have a bigger impact but it’s all so pointless.  At one time in history, I got more involved with them and tried to help them more.  I let them have things and sometimes I even talked to some of them.  We had a much better relationship then.  That was when I cared more. 

But now I don’t care.  Their pain is just a chemical reaction in their brains.  It isn’t real.  It doesn’t affect them when they’re dead.  I know that it matters in the instant in which it occurs but it’s all so temporary.

You will hate me for saying these things.  You’ll think I’m some kind of sociopath, but I’m not.  I’m just through with caring.  I can’t take everything on-board anymore.  Frankly, I’m quite depressed.  If I cared about every little thing I’d go crazy and the worst thing is that I can’t end it.  I can’t get out of here.  I am unable to die.

You think this is a joke?  I am forever.  I will be here forever, even when the universe is gone.  Then maybe I’ll have to replace it – so boring and stupid and pointless.  I need company, but I’m surrounded by unresolvable contradiction.

I can’t have any company.  I can’t die.  This is hell.

God

Xavier knew that if he went back there, HE would try to turn them into minions. Nevertheless he jumped on to his motorcycle with Jeff on the back. They both carried the same kind of gun. It was a converter gun, with a barrel on each end, to be held in either direction – single shot one direction, automatic fire if held in the other direction. It automatically sensed in which direction it was being held so that the user didn’t shoot him or her self.

Problem was they didn’t have much ammo and there would be many minions. It was going to be risky, but something compelled them to go back. It was like the irrational risk a person takes in a nightmare. They were going back home.

As they neared their destination, they agreed that Xavier would fire the shots and Jeff would hold the other converter gun in reserve. After all, they had to conserve their ammunition.

Suddenly, the minions ran towards them in a very large group. They were pretty ugly looking lizard-like creatures that walked on two legs. The shame was that they had once been human, before HE had got to them. They could tear a person apart with sharp teeth and claws.

Xavier began with single round fire, but there were too many of them and it was not very effective. He then turned the gun around and sprayed some automatic fire in their direction. The minions began to fall, but a lot of ammunition was wasted. There were many more minions too. It was hopeless. He and Jeff needed to keep some rounds to fire at HIM.

In the circumstances, Xavier decided that evasion was better than taking them head on. He zigzagged around the minions, pushing the bike to its limits. They were everywhere. He knocked them down, brushed them off and fired a few single rounds in more dangerous encounters. Just as he and Jeff thought that they had run out of luck, they were home.

It was unrecognizable. The place was filled with rocky streams. Why was there so much water? The minions had disappeared. HE would not be far from Xavier and Jeff. HE didn’t need the minions around him. Xavier and Jeff got off the bike and negotiated many narrow, wet corridors with their converter guns at the ready. Aside from the sound of the flowing streams, it was eerily quiet and it was dark and humid.

Then HE was in front of them. HE was moving towards them, a giant of a man. He grinned from cheek to cheek. He had wild, curly black hair and a goatee on his face. He looked very confident.

Xavier fired a few rounds at HIM, but to no effect. Who or what was HE? How could HE be killed? In his panic, Xavier turned the gun around and sprayed some automatic fire at HIM. It was no use. HE merely looked back amused. How could this be? Was it a bad dream?

HE disappeared. Xavier looked behind him. Jeff was gone. Xavier was alone. Jeff’s gun was on the ground. Xavier scooped it up and began to run back through the narrow corridors. It no longer looked like his home at all. Most strange was the water everywhere.

All of sudden a new minion appeared in front of him. It groaned in a very low pitch as it moved towards him. It threatened to tear him to shreds. Xavier guessed that it was Jeff. He didn’t know for sure. Did he have the heart to kill it? He knew that if he did, Jeff would be gone forever.

Jeff had been quite an overweight, short, balding man with glasses. The minion was tall and slim, but that meant nothing. It could all be part of the transformation.

Xavier fired one shot which kept the minion at a distance but did not kill it. Xavier ran away from the minion. Jeff or not, he couldn’t waste the ammo. He negotiated all of the streams, reached the front door and ran out of the house. He had an idea. Hopefully he was right.

There was something about the water. Xavier guessed that it may give HIM his power. Xavier rode the bike to a house nearby. Like all the other houses around it was deserted. He ran inside and searched for any liquid he could find – cleaners, perfumes and anything else that could possibly contain a poisonous substance. On the way back to his house he had eluded the minions again, but ammo was running very short. He was already using Jeff’s gun.

He was back at the house. Do it quickly. Empty all of those containers into the streams. Perhaps one of them would contain something that could poison HIM. HE would be there soon. The pressure was building.  Xavier kept looking back over his shoulder.

It didn’t seem to be working until he backtracked to parts of the house that he had previously contaminated. The streams there had run dry and were replaced by blackened mud, which dried quickly. HE appeared in front of Xavier as if from nowhere. It was clear that HE was not amused. HE was going to kill Xavier.

HE was clearly weak. Xavier fired shots at HIM and HE recoiled, but HE was still hard to kill. Xavier ran out of ammo. HE smiled again for the first time since the beginning of this latest encounter and moved towards Xavier. HE seemed to be unstoppable.

HE was getting closer. Xavier would have to do something. HE was right in front of Xavier now. HE was about to touch Xavier when Xavier smashed him in the torso with his empty converter gun. HE doubled over in pain. Xavier had some momentum. He hit HIM again and again. HIS face had disappeared. HE was only a torso now lying on the ground. Xavier had beaten most of the life out of HIM.

It was over. He felt relief. They were walking towards the family car. Evelyn was holding his hand as usual. She was skipping along. She was probably tired but had gained a little more energy to walk, rather than being carried, when she knew it was time to go home.

As they neared the car, he felt the usual sense of foreboding. His relief was morphing into fear once more. Why did this have to happen? Why did he have to suffer like this?

His wife Marie was a little on edge, but not for the same reason. She didn’t have the same gift after all and she would never believe him if he told her anyway. She wanted to make sure that everything was packed into the car neatly. It would be a great shame, not to mention a waste of money, if anything was broken.

Marie was tall and commanding. She began to pack the boot whilst he put Evelyn in her seat. Thankfully Evelyn had outgrown her booster seat. It was much easier to settle her into the car as she was much more comfortable leaning against the soft back seat instead of a hard plastic surface. He made sure that her seat belt was secure. He touched her cheek affectionately and she smiled. He really loved her. That’s what made having the gift so difficult.

Suddenly there was a loud thump. Thankfully it was only Marie closing the boot. She moved towards the passenger seat.

Now that Marie had finished, he was crouched, looking behind the car as he always did. Marie was getting impatient. “Do you have to do this every time?” she called out. He was concentrating too hard to reply.

“I hate being ignored you know!” Marie shouted. Then, a few seconds later, “Get back here. It’s time to go.”

She didn’t understand. This was his attempt at control. He had to make sure that Evelyn was safe and secure.

He backtracked towards Evelyn. She was sitting in the middle of the back seat as always. She loved sitting there so that she could see through the windscreen while they were driving. Her seatbelt was secure. He double checked and then entered into the car on the driver’s side. Despite all of his checking, he couldn’t get rid of that awful feeling.

Marie looked at him in disgust as he settled into the driver’s seat. He just ignored her. There was nothing he could do. It was just one of those things. Of course, she couldn’t hold back. “I’m tired of this.” She said sternly. “If you’re sick then you need to get help. I’ve told that so many times now. Think about that instead of making us all suffer through your rituals.”

He said nothing in response.

“And don’t ignore me!” she shouted at him. “You know how much I hate that!”

There was only silence.

“Say something!” she screamed.

He knew that no one could help him. It wasn’t an illness. It was a gift. However, he could see that the situation was very rapidly getting out of control. What had started as a minor argument could end in a full scale punishment for him with no peace. That was the last thing he wanted to be exposed to given that he was likely to encounter an emotional rollercoaster in any case, because of the gift.

***

He was about to respond to Marie when suddenly he could not see Evelyn in the rear view mirror. He looked twice. Her seat was empty. Where was she?

“My god, “ he said in panic, “Where is Evelyn?”

Marie was furious and upset at the same time. She looked behind her. “You fool!” she yelled out, “You’ve left her behind again!”

He could see her all alone in the car park. She was crying uncontrollably. “Daddy! Daddy, where are you?” Her face was red. Tears were streaming from her innocent green eyes. She was alone and exposed.

He turned the car around at the first opportunity. Marie was screaming at him and he knew that she wouldn’t stop. He went as fast as he could back to the shopping centre. He kept having visions of Evelyn becoming more and more lost in the car park or perhaps even being run over. He couldn’t bare the thought of her being injured, or even killed. He had to get back there fast.

***

In the midst of his panic, he began to hear a dull thud every few seconds. It was coming from behind the car. He slowed down a little. It was difficult to hear over Marie’s screaming, but he could just make it out.

He was crawling with fear and panic. What was in store for him now? He knew that things had changed again. The thud indicated that they had changed for the worst.

Marie did not look herself. She had become very masculine and her makeup was too extreme. She looked pretty much like a transvestite. In fact, she was a transvestite and had always been a transvestite. She was screaming something over her mobile phone to a friend. She was no longer screaming at him. Thank God for that.

He heard the thud again. It was worrying him so much that he was compelled to stop the car. He pulled over, exited the car and looked behind it. To his absolute horror he saw the remains of a child that had been dragged behind the car for some time. This wasn’t happening! It couldn’t be! It was Evelyn. He hadn’t left her behind after all. He had forgotten her and the ribbon on the back of her dress had been caught when he closed the boot of the car. My God! He had dragged her behind the car.

He instantly felt sick and vomited on the road. He felt a huge wave of empathy and witnessed through his dead child the horror of her predicament. Her feelings enveloped his body and he fell to his knees. The gift was awful. It was the most horrible thing that had ever happened to him. He began to dry reach over and over again. How could he have done this? Why wasn’t he in control?

Marie was still chatting on the phone. He got off the ground and moved slowly back to the driver’s side of the car. He needed to sit down and wait for the inevitable.

***

He sat slumped and depressed in the driver’s seat, praying that this would be the end of it. He wanted to return home again. Suddenly he was brought back many light years by the sound of his daughter’s voice. It was a great relief. “Daddy, why aren’t we moving anymore?”

And so his life continued for the time being. Again he had witnessed the other, darker places in the universe in which the infinite permutations of space-time resided. He could relax for the time being, all the while knowing that in some versions of reality he was a bad father and his daughter was dead.

The planet would be doomed if they failed. The rocket was ready to launch. Countdown had begun. Cross fingers and pray.

Strange how it had all be so exciting at first. Many years ago the probe had landed on Europa and penetrated its icy surface. They had found what they were looking for. The human race had finally discovered that it was not alone in the Universe. Life outside of the Earth had been discovered in the form of a single cell that could multiply.

But how to analyse it further? It had taken so long for the probe to reach its destination. They had to find a way to bring the life form back next time. Everyone on the planet was excited.

Again, as is common throughout human history, religion had been called into question. How could the bible have omitted to make reference to alien life? What about God? Did this mean that a deity could in fact be an alien? Of course there was an answer. There was always an answer, but we needn’t get into it here. Suffice it to say that several, previously insignificant, references in the bible were discovered that clarified the whole situation through means of correct interpretation.

Technology progressed, but not fast enough. More probes were sent that could not return, but their equipment evolved so that the alien life could be analysed further. It turned out that the alien was very rare under the surface of Europa and it took many resources, including the cooperation of different countries to capture it with the machines. It was rare because it had been estimated that, under the conditions below the surface of the moon, the one-cell organism only multiplied approximately every ten thousand years. That fact that it could be found at all suggested that it had been around for many millions of years.

Eventually, a probe was constructed that could capture the alien and safely return it to Earth. There had been much debate about whether it was safe to bring the alien to Earth. Optimists were optimistic but the doomsayers cried in the negative. In the end, the risks were thought to be minimal.

On a hot summer’s day the alien landed on Earth, encased in a protective environment that resembled its home. Four of the cells had travelled across the solar system and they were to be treated very carefully.

Well, accidents happen. One of the cells was exposed to a slightly different atmosphere in error but it had survived. Confidence and overconfidence began to prevail. It was exposed to more and more of the Earth’s environment. It even multiplied once, so the ten thousand year cycle must have been nearer than they had estimated for this particular specimen. It was wondrous that it could survive in conditions that were very different to is home.

Finally, one of its secrets was revealed. It seemed to be able to survive in any conditions on Earth and no one could understand why. Then another secret became evident. In the Earth’s environment, the alien’s rate of multiplication began to increase exponentially. At first, it was surprising. Then it was amazing, until it became a disaster. The multiplication rate was too high. It went from ten thousand years to mere seconds. They had to stop it.

The protectionists cried foul. What were the scientists going to do? Did they intend to kill it? How could they possibly think of killing an alien being? Do we play god to aliens too? Did we even know whether it had any intelligence or felt any pain? What ethics were involved? What did the law have to say?

The ruling of a court was sought and then another. The courts in different countries had a divergence of opinions. All through this process it was noticed by only a few that the days were getting ever so slightly colder.

Before the courts even had time to consolidate their judgements into a unifying principle, things had become worse for the population of Earth. The aliens were now multiplying at an unstoppable pace. Scientists had taken matters into their own hands and tried to kill them. It was of no use. Nothing known on Earth could kill them. They were impervious to mass, gravity, heat, cold, dark and light.

Even worse still the temperature on Earth began to fall. There were so many alien cells that the mass of alien life form had become visible to the naked eye. It was a mass of ice. Strange, that when they had explored Europa they had completely forgotten to test its icy surface and only focussed on the substance beneath. If they had been more thorough they would have discovered that the cell that was rare beneath the surface was abundant on the surface. On Europa, at some point the alien’s rate of multiplication had slowed a planetary scale for reasons that they did not yet understand. Even more intriguing was that the rate of cell division was not a constant. It varied depending on the conditions and was most prevalent on the surface.

So what is one to do with an alien that refuses to perish? Send it into space of course. They gathered up the mass of alien cells, sealed them in a vacuum and placed them in a rocket. The rocket had been constructed rather quickly because it was calculated that they only had a small window of time before the alien would spread beyond their control.

A small error in line five million one hundred thousand two hundred and twenty five of the software code caused a slight bug in the rocket’s propulsion program. It was small enough to go unnoticed but significant enough to change the course of human history if a bird was to collide with a small but important area of the rocket during the fifth second after take off. So, the human race was doomed because the cells were spread uncontrollably throughout the Earth’s atmosphere.

A planet not dissimilar to Europa now orbits closer to the sun, with only one life form present, and is waiting to be discovered.

Daniel kept feeling the need to check his ticket. Was it still there? He was compelled to keep tapping his shirt pocket. It felt like it was still there. But what if it was an old ticket or just a thick piece of cardboard?

Sh*t, here we go again. The same goddam ritual over and over again. He plucked the ticket from his pocket gently and stared at it. He was very careful not to bend it. Nothing had changed. It was still a train ticket to the city with the same date. It was valid. Now, what is the bloody problem? Just stop this. Just goddam bloody well f*cking stop this sh*t. Why do you keep carrying on like this? Why can’t you control yourself? What’s the worst that can happen?

That was where it got tricky. Everybody knew what would happen. It was well publicised because THEY wanted people to know the consequences. It was all about putting a stop to fare evasion, which had cost THEM billions.

Daniel briskly dismissed that thought from his mind. It wasn’t worth thinking about. He had his ticket and that was that. No need to always think about “what ifs”. That was just a characteristic of anxiety. Keep your mind in the present. If you have to say “what if”, it means that you’re anxious. That’s what Daniel had been told.

Anyway, it was so uncomfortable. People surrounded him. He could never get a seat. The air cooling system wasn’t working again. If only he had a dollar for every person that had fainted standing in a train during the summer time. This was the pits.

Why did he always have sweaty men with their armpits in his face? And people reading the paper with the corners in his face. If he could afford a parking space he’d take it. Anything was better than this.

People were getting nervous. He could tell. Others were starting to look at their tickets now as the train slowed towards the next station. People started moving towards the doors. Some people started crossing themselves. Everyone seemed to have some kind of a ritual.

Even though Daniel wasn’t exiting the train at this particular stop, he couldn’t help wondering again whether he had a valid ticket. He started the ritual of patting his front pocket and then reaching inside to take out his ticket, place it in front of him and stare at it. All this required a lot of skill given he was squashed between so many people. He didn’t want to damage the ticket – God no! That would be as disastrous as not having one at all.

His ticket was still there. It was still valid. He was still angry with himself for taking it out of his pocket again. I mean, that is risky. He should have known that every time he took it out of his pocket he risked dropping or damaging it. Why couldn’t he just stop this? It was just anxiety! His doctor had told him this a number of times.

But that goddam quack didn’t have to take public transport did he? He was so impractical in his approach to things. He was young, probably the same age as Daniel, with no greater life experience. That’s why Daniel had eventually dumped him. Of course, Daniel never had the courage to say any of this to his doctor’s face. He just didn’t make any more appointments and didn’t return anymore calls.

It was the coward’s way of dumping, like he had done with his very first girlfriend. He didn’t have the courage to tell her. He just ignored her from then on. It was cruel and that, according to Daniel was the reason why the rest of his life was going to be miserable. You just can’t get away with that sort of behaviour.

The atmosphere in the train was getting feverish. People at the doors seemed to be sweating. Daniel could hear them breathing faster and more loudly. The train finally stopped. There was a slight pause and everyone was silent. The silence was only interrupted by the groan of the opening doors.

Al l eyes were suddenly focused on the green light just above the doorway. A brave soul walked slowly into the sunlight. The light above the doorway remained green. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief.

Then another person walked though, and another. The light at all times remained green. The people remaining in the carriage started to breathe a sigh of relied. The atmosphere was calming until a shrill scream was suddenly heard.

Eyes moved quickly towards the green light. It was still green. What was going on?

Eyes then moved down towards the doorway. A middle aged woman was cowering at the entrance screaming. What was she saying? At first, Daniel couldn’t understand, but his ears soon became attuned to the noise. She was saying “I can’t” over and over again. Can’t what?

People immediately around her began trying to help her. They were asking her what the matter was and if they could help. She ignored them and just kept repeating “I can’t. I can’t”. There was no one who could help her. The whole system was automated. There were no drivers or guards or ticket collectors. It was all designed to avoid human intervention and corruption. The other passengers didn’t know what to do.

Then it became obvious that the woman was blocking the entrance. No one else could exit. People started to panic. After all, their tickets would only take them to this stop. They could not travel any further. They had to get out. The panic brought rudeness. People were shouting at her now. “Get out!” they shouted. “You’re putting us all in danger!”

The atmosphere was tense. Daniel had never witnessed anything like this before. He started to unsettle. He was compelled to look at his ticket again. He started the “patting routine” and then just kept repeating it uncontrollably. The passengers around him were getting annoyed.

The woman was screaming. People around her were screaming at her. An overweight man with severe body odour suddenly grabbed Daniel’s hand and looked him in the eye. “Stop that!” he said forcefully.

Daniel couldn’t stop. He started to resist, but it was to no avail. The man was very strong. Daniel began to sob.

Then the doors began to slowly close. In the panic, people started to rush out, trampling each other in their quest to squeeze through the doors.

The light above the door turned red. The whole system had malfunctioned. It couldn’t cope with so many people trying to exit at the same time.

People who were still in the train watched in horror as the alarm began to sound. A robot voice began to speak. “Ticket evader. Penalty issued.” It bellowed. The penalty was issued to many people that day.

Every person who was perceived to be a ticket evader was disintegrated. It was the law.

My story, ‘Forget Me Not’, has been expertly edited and brought to life at: http://www.clonepod.org/

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