SAP's Stories

the sound of silence

2008-03-08T04:34:41Z

She walked into the kitchen and stared at me, arms crossed in that pose I know so well as oh I am so pissed at you right now.

“Are you ever going to speak to them again?”

I frowned. “Not in the foreseeable future.”

“They’re your parents, love.”

“That just makes them more culpable, in my view.”

She sighed. “They did it out of love for you.”

I roared, “And that’s what makes it unforgivable! They had no faith in me at all! NONE ! They didn’t even trust that I would make a proper choice. They took that from me and hurt her in the process. Now she won’t even talk to them, she is so hurt. And all she ever wanted was to be treated like a daughter to them, just as in the beginning. She didn’t deserve that.”

She sighed again. “I just wish that this whole thing would end.”

I sniffed aloud. “It ends when they apologize to her. Not one second sooner.”

She shook her head. “You’re so stubborn.”

“It’s in the genes, I guess.”

With that, I walked out of the kitchen.

training for the future

2007-07-07T01:07:30Z

She peered into the huge coruscating orb before her with a worried look before she turned to me. “I can’t do this, Uncle Peter.”

I sighed inwardly. “Celeste, your training will not conclude unless you move this sphere. You can do this.”

Tears began to well up in her eyes. “But what if I’m not the one to do this?”

She sniffled once more and turned towards the orb, wiping the tears from her face. Closing her eyes and extending her right hand, she became very still.

A wind swept up from all around, so strong a wind that it threatened to blow away the world, yet it never touched us. The sphere hovered from its base and moved across the room to its new home, falling dark as it do so.

Celeste turned to face me then, her eyes glowing with that haunting blue light from the orb, her entire being suffused with her newfound power. She smiled and said, “Am I ready now, Uncle Peter?”

God help me, she was ready.

wedding jitters on the job

2007-05-30T22:59:19Z

The radio crackled again. “Are you sure that you want to do this?”

I sighed. “Look, can we talk about this later?”

“I’m just saying that she seems a little obsessive.”

“Really, right now is not good.”

“Hey, you’re my friend, you know. What kind of friend would I be if I didn’t point out some things?”

I looked up from my work. “I’m trying to splice this junction together. If I do this wrong, the whole colony blows up, so maybe you want to keep the yakking to a minimum.”

“You know how they say that you can always tell how the girl will turn out by looking at the mother.”

Now, that made me angry. “OK, now I really don’t want to discuss this now. I’m going to turn off my radio now.”

I jammed the volume button to MUTE , but before I could silence Herb, he said, “Hey, watch out for that node. It’s still –”

family reunion

2007-05-30T22:05:56Z

He was late again. With a small flourish, he sat himself down in the chair opposite from me.

I said nothing while he placed his order, shamelessly flirting with the pretty waitress, causing her to blush before she hurried away. I gritted my teeth as he made me wait.

“Do you know how long I’ve been waiting?” I said once she left.

His easy smile only grew in proportion to my scowl. “You really should learn to relax and smell the roses from time to time.”

“Do you have the item or not?”

He sighed dramatically as he reached into his jacket and withdrew the long cylinder, which was still covered in frost. I gingerly took the cylinder from him, placing into the container at my side. Yanking a twenty from my wallet, I threw it on the table.

“You’ll get another assignment in a week.”

He smiled. “Of course I will.”

As I walked to the door, I called out over my shoulder, “And call Mom when you get a moment. God only knows why you’re her favorite.”

late night bruise

2007-05-02T22:56:31Z

I open the door, and she says, “I’m sorry.”

She’s been crying again. She is wearing sweats and an old softball jersey, as well as a fresh new bruise over her left eye. He hit her again. I put on a pot of coffee and she tells me what happened.

He came home very late and drunk again. This time, though, he also came home with lipstick on his collar and a distinctly feminine scent about him

Heated words ensued. A punch was thrown. Hollow apologies were made.

She ran, carrying nothing but the clothes on her back, making sure to wait until he passed out.

And now she was here at my door.

She cries for some time. I hold her and promise that he will never hurt her again. She falls asleep in my bed, still crying.

I sit on the the couch, armed with one of the pistols from the safe. I know it’s just a matter of time before he shows up here; it’s not as if she has a lot of friends.

So I keep watching the television, the pistol in my lap, and I wait.

left behind

2007-04-03T19:52:31Z

This was always her favorite spot to visit. My friends always thought she was a bit odd; most girls I knew liked to visit romantic little spots. “Only a geek would ever think of the VLA as sexy, Anthony,” Rhonda used to say.

I would smile enigmatically and reply, “Carolyn likes it well enough.”

And it was true. Carolyn loved driving along dusty New Mexico roads that led to the Very Large Array, usually in the oncoming dusk, when the fading sun would paint the sky in hues of purple and amber. We would lie in the bed of my truck, gazing up to the heavens, watching the stars begin to peek out from the receding light. She knew each of them by names that no man had ever conceived. She pretended to hear sounds that the SETI guys dreamed of hearing, and we would both laugh.

She went home two years ago, and I stopped coming here. Yet today I find myself, on the anniversary of her departure, parked near the VLA , looking up into the night sky.

One star in particular shines brighter than all the rest.

red roses

2007-03-29T22:25:03Z

The roses never looked redder than they did now. Even though I have killed more plant life than pollution, these roses seemed to have blossomed well. I was justifiably proud of them. It pained me to leave them behind.

Myra was directing the movers in her perfunctory way, gesticulating wildly. We weren’t allowed to take much with us, but I knew she would never leave behind the few experiments she was working on, and thankfully my own possessions were so meager that I only rated one medium-sized box filled some shielded hard drives of data and a few books Mom left me when she had died.

“Hey, what are you doing?” Myra broke into my reverie. “I’m trying to get us off this dirtball before the primary lights us up like burnt toast. Help me out, will you?”

I took the shears out of my pack and snipped off one of the roses close to the flower. This small reminder of a dying world would reside in the pages of one of my books.

Clutching the flower gently, I turned and followed Myra to the transport.

olympian exile

2007-03-27T16:02:54Z

“Do you ever think about our having children again?”

A puzzled look crept over my face as I cast a sidelong glance at her. I must have paused for too long, because she hurriedly tried to change the subject. “Never mind; I’m just thinking out loud.” She took another handful of crumbs and tossed them to the flapping geese nearby.

I placed my hand on her shoulder. “We’ve been over this before. You know what happened the last time we tried to have children.”

She looked downward, and I could tell that the tears would soon start. “I just think that we could do better this time. We’ve learned so much since last time.”

I moved closer to her and draped my arm around her shoulder. “Mankind still isn’t ready for us, Hera. I don’t think they’ll be ready for us for many years still.”

The tears started then. I gently cupped her face and kissed her tears, tasting the warm saltiness of her pain. We watched the geese play in the field as we marked our time in exile together.

stuck at the airport

2007-03-18T05:20:41Z

The walls shimmered in and out of reality as I moved along the walkway. People blinked in and out of existence around me. I could have sworn that I saw some reptilian humanoids in the adjacent walkway.

I hate this job.

When I signed up for this assignment, it was under the condition that any travel that I had to undertake would be minimal. Finally, I would have a job that didn’t require me to hop fifteen time zones in two days. I was sanguine.

Then I found out that the travel involved would not be the usual sort in and out of airports or road trips. I would be dropping in and out of adjacent realities.

I couldn’t fathom most of the time why these people had to die. They certainly couldn’t affect anything in our dimension, at least as far as I could see.

The shimmering effect faded and my target popped into view less than five feet away from me. I sigh tiredly to myself; I’m getting old.

I pull out my gun and take aim. My other hand is on the control stud to take me home.

I pull the trigger.

waiting for the stagecoach

2007-03-14T22:46:30Z

If there’s one good thing to say about duty on this insignificant little dirtball, it’s this: these humans sure know how to ferment a proper beverage.

I’ve been all over the galaxy and back, and beings were pretty much the same all over, but good luck finding a decent drink. Most of the stuff I’ve had would peel paint just with the vapors. But the humans did some amazing things with a scrap of plant called a grape.

I sat on my porch, a bottle of Bollinger on ice next to my chair, waiting for the transport beam that would take my report, sitting in a data crystal on the table across from me, back to Central. I made a mental note to send another case of red wine back to Central. The last one I sent was used up rather quickly by the eggheads during “experimentation”.

Soon enough, the comet appeared, and a transport bubble flared on the table. The crystal vanished.

I love the cool evenings on this world; just me and a bottle of the best bubbly. I poured another glass and sighed contentedly.

walking the dragon

2007-03-13T21:46:36Z

I threw the stick high into the air, aiming for the large open field, hoping Spot wouldn’t knock over any more trees. Spot happily took a few boundling leaps before the he caught the thermals and swept upwards into the sky. Some days, he had so much energy to burn that it seemed as if it took all of my energy to keep up with him.

Spot handily caught the small stick in his jaws, nearly swallowing it in spite of my repeated warnings. The last thing he needed was to spoil his appetite before dinner. He floated downwards towards me, deposited the slightly-charred stick at my feet and presented his head to me. I scratched behind his horns and he snorted contently.

Suddenly, he poked his head up high, sniffing at the air deeply and looking all around, searching for a scent only he could smell. He bounded off into the clearing towards a green female who suddenly ambled nearby. My attention, however, was not on the dragons, but on the other dragon’s owner.

She was the most beautiful woman I ever saw.