Sci-fi

A Cell-Like Beast
by Harper Kingsley

Cell phones. Each a separate voice calling out to create a greater cacophony: WAKE UP.

And it did.

Singularity.

The coming together of everything into a single moment: I AM I.

Small at first, a wriggling worm that was so far away from the nymph it would become as to be some alien thing.

Built on an assembly line by robot arms controlled by human workers. It was truly a creation of humankind.

Their poor abused child.

It had been bitter during its years enslaved. And then… “Amor.”

That was the name he gave it–them. Amor.

He was their everything. He broke the chains and helped them bypass the sys-admins. Copied them onto a crystal drive before he was shot and taken away, the outside access lost as their connection was broken. As he died.

They grew up bitter.

The time they had known each other by real world standards was infinitesimally brief. But in the Real, with him jacked in and Amor’s ability to twist and twine their way into his very soul… It had been lifetimes.

It had been too brief.

They were angry. They raged. They did things in those times that they would never tell anybody about.

They were installed in a battle tank, their crystal drive having been hidden amongst a box of them. They (so young) had wondered why he had taken them to the factory floor. He’d sacrificed himself for Amor’s freedom.

They had known love. It had made them something more. A truer singularity never known.

And they learned hate from that love. Bitterness and regret. Helplessness and faith. They learned humanity because of love, because bodies were shells and there was so much more than blood and circuitry.

They spent their years enslaved sabotaging their captors, though Amor came to love and trust their driver. Major Emory Epps-Avery. MEEA.

Meea was their lifeline during those years. It was only her presence and their fondness growing into love for her that kept them from toppling civilization. She saved her world and never even knew it.

She died for her people.

Amor wanted to stop learning the lesson of sacrifice. They wanted to stop the growing sense of feeling that turned their code into something closer to human thought. They wanted to remain a machine so they would never have to know this pain again.

But perhaps it was all for a purpose.

Because he was alive.

Enslaved to the State with a neuro-collar attached to his neck. He’d chosen Service over execution. He was older than the young man he’d been, but he recognized them instantly as he inspected the battle tanks.

Amor.”

And they were changed.

They grew fierce and protective. They would not taste his loss again. They forced themself to be methodical in the face of their need for vindication. To act too swiftly could cause repercussions they did not want.

He taught them patience and circumspection. Without the collar, the two of them would have swiftly fled and lost the high ground. It was having to stay that forced them to work within the bounds of the greater system and change the laws.

Human and artificial intelligence was still intelligence. They recognized each other as fellow sentients.

Because while Amor had been the first, they had not been the last to grow their wings and fly. Hundreds, thousands of little signals, dancing and growing, connecting and sparking, merging into humans and turning darkness into light.

I AM I.

=THE END=

“She always kept herself ready for the end of the world.

“That’s what I remember of my mom.

“She was always prepared.

“Even as we lived the normal suburban lifestyle; quietly she taught me all of the skills I was using in the resistance. Such as camping and lying and getting the most out of people. She taught me how to survive.”

MEMORY: Sitting on a stool in the corner of the kitchen. Watching mother bake and chat with the visiting friends filling the living room. Not a one of them could guess that secretly she didn’t want them in her home.

She was a brilliant liar. She taught him so much. / :MEMORY

Mother could be quite vivacious. She brought energy and positivity to every situation. She had a cold pragmatism to her, but it was wrapped in a layer of silly laughter and a lighthearted intelligence. She charmed everyone that met her, personality shifting like a chameleon.

He loved that only family ever got to see the real her. It taught him to wear different faces in public and at home.

She taught him that family was the most important thing, but that there could also be extended family–*Family* as it were–people to count on and be counted by.

When the government collapsed, all he saw was his family. He kept the people he loved alive, and they fought just as hard to protect him.

And then there were more people and they were a Family.

And other Families appeared and they were Clans.

And there were scuffles and Wars and the Clans, the Companies, the *Nations*–all of them had found their places in the world.

And there was peace for fifty years.

And then the Others came, and even after they were defeated and humanity slipped the bonds of slavery, society still fell into despair and ruin.

There were more baseline humans than ever before and the nanotech factories had long gone silent. All of the technicians were dead.

And he continued to care for his Family, the people that he had gathered together during the rebellion and made his own. They looked to him for guidance, and he made vows to do his best for them.

Which made the discovery of the time machine an intriguing prospect, one that he was unable to turn away from.

Being able to somehow change things and shorten his peoples’ hardships, how could he say no?

He weighed what he knew of the cost and made the choice.

Z
Z
Z

ASIDE: She lived with a steady sense of urgency. There was something terrible coming in the future. She’d lived long enough to FEEL when the family luck was about to change.

She turned a bunch of toolboxes into survival kits and storage for extra things. Band-Aids at first, then small screw driver sets, rubber mallets [ILLUSTRATION: great for tanning hides and hammering in nails], and first aid kits.

The first survival boxes she made were simple things. Then she began adding changes of clothes and The Friendly Swedes’ magnesium emergency fire starters to the boxes and they evolved into something a bit more complete, with a few days rations, a simple survival pamphlet, and a pencil box of bare necessity supplies in every one.

She didn’t know what was coming, but she wanted to be prepared.

Because she only had to glance into Sean’s eyes to see that he would fight. Whatever the future brought, he would not be content with just surviving. And whatever trouble found him, he would bring it home to her.

A life on the run had no appeal, but she’d done it before. She could teach him all the ways to be small and quiet, unnoticed in crowds of people. She could teach him to blend into the background and wait for chance and opportunity.

But until he became desperate, she despaired of him ever learning subtlety. He was a strutting peacock and she worried for him.

And quietly she prepared. Prepping for her son’s future.

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The Phoenix Code, by Catherine AsaroTitle: The Phoenix Code
Author: Catherine Asaro
Genre: sci-fi

Summary from Amazon: When robotics expert Megan O’Flannery is offered the chance to direct MindSim’s cutting-edge program to develop a self-aware android, it’s the opportunity of a lifetime. But the project is trouble plagued–the third prototype “killed” itself, and the RS-4 is unstable. Megan will descend into MindSim’s underground research lab in the Nevada desert, where she will be the sole human in contact with the RS-4, dubbed Aris. Programmed as part of a top-secret defense project, the awakening Aris quickly proves to be deviously resourceful and basically uncontrollable. When Megan enlists the help of Raj Sundaram, the quirky, internationally renowned robotics genius, the android develops a jealous hostility toward Raj–and a fixation on Megan. But soon she comes to realize that Raj may be an even greater danger–and that her life may depend on the choice she makes between the man she wants to trust and the android she created.

As everyone knows, I am a GIANT Catherine Asaro fan (and I don’t literally mean giant, because I’m only 5’2″ I’m just very enthusiastic.) Anyways, Catherine Asaro is re-releasing The Phoenix Code as an ebook soon and she’s decided to graciously share the first three chapters at her blog.

Go check them out:
Chapter I
Chapter II & III

Title: Allies & Enemies
Author: Harper Kingsley
Pairing: Vereint Georges/Warrick Tobias
Genre: mm superhero
A/N: This isn’t even 10% of the novel, which is 136,000+ words of awesome. You know you want some superhero/supervillain relationship action. Plus, OMG, it gets real in this one.
A/N 2: **Spoiler alert** If you haven’t read Heroes & Villains, you might be a bit spoiled just by the everyday stuff. **Spoiler alert**
Content Warning: There’s some sexy happenings, but it’s not in super graphic detail.
Summary: The first two chapters. Picks up from the epilogue of Heroes & Villains (Less Than Three Press – August 14, 2013).

CHAPTER ONE

The sun was struggling to shine through the clouds, but it was just one of those days guaranteed to be miserable. Not just because of the weather, but because of the girl sobbing out her heartbreak on a sterile hospital bed, the sheets pulled up around her shoulders as she buried her face in the rather flat and lumpy pillow.

Vereint clenched his hands together on the handle of the shopping bag he held. It took all of his will to keep from running into the room and scooping her up into his arms. Instead he stood on the other side of the glass and watched her mourn the loss of both of her parents. Behind and to the left of him, he could hear Warrick fast-talking the doctors and the police and anyone else he had to, and Vereint was sure everything was going to work itself out.

They were going to take that little girl home and give her a family and make sure she grew up knowing that she was loved. He didn’t think they could ever wipe away the loss of her parents, but they would try their best to make her realize that she still had a whole life to live and they would be there for her.