A. C. Ellis Science Fiction Mini-Collection #1 Read online

  A. C. Ellis Science Fiction Mini-Collection #1

  Three Short Science Fiction Stories

  by

  A. C. Ellis

  More Kindle eBooks by A. C. Ellis

  A. C. Ellis Science Fiction Mini-Collection #1

  Copyright 2012 by A. C. Ellis

  This edition published for the Kindle by A. C. Ellis

  For Janet

  Contents

  Holes — 3,600 words — first published in Vertex Magazine, Volume 3 Number 3, July 1975

  Bronson had his duty, and he also had a desire to remain sane. This was fine, until the two came into conflict.

  Happy Three Hundredth — 1,280 words — first published in The Periodical Lungfish, #7, Summer 1985

  Patrick O'Brien was certainly old enough. He just wasn't sure he could handle the reality of it.

  Termination Orbit — 1,500 words — first published in Vertex Magazine, Volume 3 Number 2, June 1975

  To Rayne, communication was life, his only link with reality, and he knew that without it he would die.

  ***

  Welcome!

  This mini-collection contains three short science fiction stories from my collection of sf and mystery/suspense shorts, Spaceships & Brass Knuckles. More short stories can be found in that publication, and my novels are listed at the end of this publication.

  Enjoy!

  Holes

  Edward Bronson stood on the bank of a too perfect stream, allowing the pine-scented breeze to caress his tanned and naked body and permitting it to play through his long black hair. His arms slipped around Gwen's waist, and she stepped closer. Her nude side pressed lightly against his, sending a flush of pleasure coursing through him.

  Paradise was beautiful.

  The air was clean and clear, its crystal purity allowing everything to stand out sharp and separate. The edges of leaves and individual blades of grass, even the soft curves of the distant mountains were defined with unbelievable clarity. Each element of the scene before Bronson was totally of itself. Together, they formed a landscape of graceful symmetry.

  The colors were calm yet vigorous: the azure sky, the brown earth, the green forest, the violet mountains. No color was harsh. Nothing drew attention because of its color or hue. Yet every element in the scene commanded attention.

  Bronson gazed into the stream, watching several large trout swim lazily against the current. The world was fresh and clean around him. It filled him with a mysterious emotion, a primeval love. It felt good.

  Gwen led Bronson to the large oak in the center of the clearing. A crude bow and quiver of arrows leaned against the trunk beside a primitive fishing pole. Nearby a fire-pit smoldered, its thin tongue of smoke licking at the sky.

  Bronson stretched out in the grass, pulled Gwen down, kissed her. Her small breasts pressed lightly against his chest, their nipples hard and erect with anticipation.

  He placed his lips to her ear, breathed in the mild but intoxicating woman-smell of her. "I love you," he whispered.

  "And I love you." Gwen raised herself slightly, flipped brown hair out of her eyes with a toss of her head. She ran her fingers through the coarse hair on Bronson's chest, tracing invisible patterns.

  I wonder how long we will have this time? Bronson thought. Not long enough. Never long enough.

  He knew this was paradise only because it was his concept of what paradise should be. It was what he wanted. It could just as easily have been a crowded metropolis or a luxury-filled palace. Bronson did not want those things.

  One thing that could never change, as long as this was his paradise, was Gwen. For someone else, Gwen would not exist. She would be different for each individual in Bronson's place. He was sure in some instances she would not even be female. But there would always be someone like her—someone to insure the caretaker made the checks.

  Bronson programmed Gwen from minute to minute with his every action, word and thought. If he wanted a hunting companion she became a skilled tracker and expert marksman. If he felt dominant she was meek and pliable. If he wished to make love, as he did now, she was eager and versatile.

  But always she was Gwen. That—more than anything else—was what Bronson wanted, what he needed.

  An insistent buzzing filled his head. He looked up into Gwen's eyes, imagined hurt and disappointment in their blue depths.

  "Damn! There it is. I won't answer it this time." He clutched her tighter to him.

  "You must," Gwen said over the buzz. Her voice pleaded softly. "You know you must."

  "Yes, I know. The training. But what would happen if I didn't go?"

  "Maybe nothing, but you can't take that chance. I won't let you."

  Gwen pulled away as the buzzing suddenly became louder. Fear widened her eyes, tightening her face muscles. Her lower lip began to quiver and she bit it hard.

  "Yes," Bronson said, "I'm coming." He sat up and shook his head forcefully.

  * * *

  A sudden puff of antiseptic air assaulted Bronson, fogging his mind. The rich earth-smells were gone. In their place were artificial chemical scents. He was strapped securely into a contoured chair, facing a computer console. With a violent thrust of his hand he slapped the alarm off. Then he sat and watched the flashing lights, the changing numbers, trying to clear his head.

  The light pressure of his clothing made him uneasy and his thoughts drifted to Gwen—his Gwen, his wife—so many years ago. Quiet nights on the beach making love on the sand beneath the stars, making plans to journey together to those same stars.

  They volunteered for the colonization program.

  Then pain. Gwen in the hospital, dying slowly from the insideof a hyatidiform mole, a tumor of the placenta. To Bronson she was being devoured by a child who would never be born. And her last constricted words: "Please, remember me as I was, strong and healthy."

  Bronson pushed the thought from his mind and unstrapped himself with shaking hands. He removed the feeder tube from the plastic vein shunt at his wrist—a tube that not only supplied nutrients to his body, but also special chemicals to prevent tissue atrophy during his periods in paradise.

  He ran a hand down his pain-lined face. The checks always hurt. They tore him away from Gwen in paradise, brought memories of the real Gwen he could not face.

  But he knew the checks had to be made.

  He got up unsteadily, walked to the basin on the far side of the cabin, splashed cold water over his face. He tired to will himself to want to make the checks, but he could not. He dreaded them.

  Leaving the cabin, Bronson stumbled down the short corridor toward the vault. He thought again of Gwen as he worked the hatch open. Her long slender form, her clear blue eyes. The clean earthy smell of her always waiting when he returned, but always insisting he go—making him face a reality that continually tore at him from inside his skull.

  A chill sliced through Bronson's light clothing as he swung the heavy hatch back and entered the vault. Goosebumps rose on his skin. But the chill was more than a purely physical sensation. This place was a tomb.

  Row upon row of steel coffins stood on end in their racks, each labeled with the name of its frozen occupant, each studded with dials and gauges. Three hundred twenty in all. Near the top of every coffin was a small glass window. Faces peered out in blank stares.

  The faces were grotesque nightmares—too white and immobile, lacking emotion. They reminded Bronson of Gwen's face, in the hospital on Earth, blank with drugs ineffective against the pain. They brought back the unwanted memories. Again Gwen whispered her choked plea.

  These colonists could not talk. They were incapable of caring. Every molecule of water in th
eir bodies was gone, replaced with a liquid fluorocarbon. They were cold, frozen—4.2 degrees above absolute zero—xenon hydrate protecting against freezing damage.

  For Bronson, they were dead.

  Sometimes he imagined himself as Charon, eternally ferrying the dead across the black river Cocytus. His situation was similar. More often he cast himself in the role of Aeneas, descending on a regular schedule into the infernal regions. But he was denied his Sibyl.

  Bronson knew he should care about the colonists. They could not care, so someone had to. But he could not. The only reason he made the checks was because of the training—and Gwen.

  He checked the dials methodically, made changes where necessary. The training was still effective, hours of computer regulated hypnosis. But when he came to the livestock vault, he gave its instruments only a cursory glance. Everything seemed all right there, so everything was all right. He had to get back to Gwen.

  Bronson returned to the cabin and sat in his chair. He strapped himself in, reconnected the feeder tube. Closing his eyes, he felt the mental snap as the micro-circuit embedded in his brain clicked closed.

  Depression fell away.

  * * *

  Gwen sat beneath the oak, her back to Bronson, her knees drawn up to her chin. Bronson sat down beside her. The cool grass felt good beneath his buttocks. But there was a slight chill in the breeze as it blew off the mountains, and it was stronger than usual, gustier.

  He put an arm around Gwen's shoulders. She stiffened under his touch, and her skin felt cold and waxy.

  "What's wrong, kitten?"

  She turned toward him, a pouting, brooding expression shadowing her features. Her eyes were a dull blue-gray, lacking their usual brightness. "You know what's wrong," she said.

  "No, I don't. Not unless you tell me."

  "The livestock vault." She turned away.

  "Christ, Gwen. They're just animals."

  "Just animals!" she snapped. "How can you say that? They are important animals. They could mean the lives of those people after the ship lands. People, Ed. Real flesh-and-blood people."

  Bronson cupped her chin in his hand, turned her face toward him. "What is this?" he asked, noticing that still more color had bleached from her eyes. "Just what are you trying to do?"

  "It isn't what I am doing. It's what you are doing. Look." She pointed toward the mountains, where a small black spot hung in the sky. It was scarcely visible, yet its irregular shape filled Bronson with fear. It looked threateningly out of place in its surroundings. Bronson had never seen anything like it in paradise—or anywhere else.

  "What is it?"

  "It's what you just did. It's your lack of caring." Gwen brought her arms down and hugged her knees tighter against the chill. "It's your training beginning to break down."

  "But what is it?" Bronson asked again.

  "A hole." She stared out at the black spot above the mountains.

  "A hole," Bronson repeated. "I did that?" Gwen nodded without looking at him. "Can it be fixed? Can I repair it?"

  "Go back and check the livestock vault thoroughly." Gwen's voice, too, held a chill.

  "That will fix it?"

  "Yes, this time. But I'd like to know it won't happen again. Can I be sure of that?"

  "You know I can't answer that." Bronson shook his head violently.

  * * *

  And woke in the cabin. He unstrapped and disconnected, stumbled out of the cabin. He entered the vault and the iciness hit him like a fist, sending shivers up his back. He marched past the coffins, to the livestock vault. Carefully, he checked it, double checked each gauge reading and dial setting. Everything was in order.

  "Damn!" he said aloud, en route back to the cabin. A dream had told him what to do. But that dream meant everything to him. He had been living the dream for five years—and would continue to live it for another thirty-three years, until the ship landed. That other world was now more real to him than the steel and electro-fluidics of the ship.

  The circuit in his head, that was what had warned the computer. Not only did it make Gwen and his life in paradise possible, it also gave the computer complete access to his conscious thoughts. In effect, Gwen had read his mind. From another world, from paradise.

  The term paradise had originated as a joke among the technicians on Earth, something to humorously describe the electro-fluidic mind tricks they were attempting to create. But after its first test the name lost its humorous connotation. The ingenious computer program did, in fact, create an individual paradise—a highly addictive one. The name stuck.

  After Gwen's death, Bronson was still in the colonization program. The program director came to him and asked him to volunteer for the caretaker position. They explained he needed the position and the program needed him in it.

  Bronson took the job. He had no one waiting at the end of the journey, and nothing to remain on Earth for.

  And now, he again had Gwen.

  He reached the cabin, strapped himself in, inserted the feeder tube. Then he closed his eyes and felt the snap.

  * * *

  The chill was gone from the air, the black spot no longer in the sky. He thought he saw a slight discoloring above the mountains where the hole had been. Or was he imagining it, seeing what he expected to see?

  Gwen stood and smiled as he approached her.

  "I checked it. Everything was fine there. And here?"

  "Fine now." She nestled into his arms, kissed him. Her eyes were bright again, but not quite as bright as they had been before. Somehow, he knew they would never regain all their luster.

  "Will it happen again, Ed?"

  "No."

  "Are you sure?" She looked into his eyes, searching for truth. "Can you fight the memories?"

  "Yes, I'm sure. I can't go through that again. I love you too much."

  "Good. I have a surprise for you."

  Bronson looked down at her, puzzled.

  "I thought I'd wait until it showed, but I can't. Not now."

  "You're pregnant?" There was the hint of horror in Bronson's voice. The image of Gwen, pale and thin in a hospital bed, flashed through his mind.

  Gwen nodded, smiled. "It's all right, Ed. Nothing bad can happen. Not here. I promise you."

  "But...."

  "You just start thinking of a name, I'll do the rest."

  Bronson hugged her tighter to him so she could not see his face. It was a tortured mask of pain. "When?"

  "Not for some time yet. My program is based on reality."

  "This is positive reinforcement, isn't it? A reward for going back to check the vault."

  He felt Gwen's nod against his shoulder and cheek. "That's part of it. Do you mind?"

  "No," he said in a steady voice, "not at all."

  His stomach was tied in knots of fear.

  * * *

  Twelve months passed in paradise. Bronson watched in dread as Gwen became large with child and her breasts heavy with milk. Apprehensive, he helped her through morning sickness and labor pains. Gwen was programmed to be soothed by his small attentions, and gradually his fear dissipated. Often, Bronson placed his hand against her stomach, felt the child kicking. And finally he helped with delivery.

  They named their son Jason.

  Bronson was careful to assure his shipboard duties did not suffer during the year. He checked everything more methodically than ever, and did not complain when the ship called. He feared upsetting Gwen during her pregnancy, and he could not shatter their immense joy after the birth.

  The memories and depression did not return. He blocked them from his mind with thoughts of Gwen and Jason in paradise while making the checks. And paradise itself acted as a block while he was there.

  But a few months after Jason's birth, Bronson began again to resent the call of the ship. The ship seemed to always call at the most enjoyable times—those intimate moments a family should share. He went back to his old hurried checks. They were thorough, but he took shortcuts whenever possible. The memor
ies returned despite his efforts to block them.

  * * *

  Bronson stretched out on his back in the grass, his hands behind his head, looking up into the fleecy cloud-patterns. He moved as little as possible; his son was curled up on his chest, asleep.

  He raised his head slightly, looked at Gwen. She sat beside him, her back against the trunk of the oak, watching them.

  "Isn't it about time you got us some dinner?"

  "Not until after you feed Jason."

  "You enjoy watching that, don't you?"

  "Yes," Bronson said.

  "I'll feed him now, if you like. Were you going hunting this afternoon?"

  "No," he said, lifting the child and handing him to Gwen. Jason came awake in his arms and began crying softly. "I don't want to go far. I'll catch a few trout from the stream."

  Suddenly, the buzz started in his ears.

  "Damn!" Bronson pounded the earth with his fist.

  "Please, Ed, don't start that. You know it has to be done. So much depends on it."

  "I know. But why now?"

  Gwen took a deep breath, let it out slowly. "No matter when the ship calls, it will interrupt something. You have to learn to live with that."

  Bronson got slowly to his feet.

  "It's the memories—they're back, aren't they?"

  "Yes, they're back. But I can handle them."

  "You're sure?"

  "I said I could."

  "Ed, Jason can wait until you get back." Gwen's eyes pleaded softly, tears forming a wet outline around them.

  "No," Bronson said over the buzz, almost a scream. "Go ahead and feed him."

  * * *

  Bronson made the checks quickly. And again the memories crep into his mind, weaving their web of depression.

  He fought them, tried to push them aside with thoughts of Gwen and Jason waiting in paradise. But it did no good. The mental picture of the real Gwen's pale, pain-ddistorted face superimpose itself on the window of each cryogenic coffin. The child they never had blossomed in his mind, like a fungoid growth, a deformed caricature of Jason. The memories and nightmare fantasies became harsher, clearer. They branded themselves deep into his mind.