The Outpost

"The Outpost"

a short story

Gary Baker, August 2013

Ship Captain: Farah, to the bridge,” came the light, airy female voice over intercom speakers. “Attention Vassals: would Captain Farah please return to the bridge?”

It wasn’t a question; but then again it never was. Not with her.

With a heavy sigh, Ship Captain Julian Farah thrust himself the rest of the way up the corridor ladder and into a long, open passageway. He stood there for a moment with his hands on his hips, letting the gritty scales of the powersuit bore holes in his palms while basking in the blue-green glow of ever-present LED lighting.

“Ship Captain: Farah, to the bridge.”

First Contact, the conclusion

"First Contact"

a short story

Gary Baker, June 2013

(the conclusive end to a 2 part sci-fi)

Acier arrived on the floor of the Tear bridge with a soft shush. His feet first hit the smooth metal alloy meant to feel more like the ground cover foliage back home. The sensation was as pleasing as reaching his home world once again with the intent to stay.

It would never happen, he knew, especially since his kind had long since expired in this desolate universe. Only the ability to preserve their remnants had saved the entirety of Acier’s race as such individuals had been slingshotted themselves into deep space using the large gravitational pull of the nearing sun. Acier had been awoken years ago, by the queen herself, sole survivor of the Elders, a lone soul in the universe dedicating the rest of her existence to seeking out others like her; others with the physical inability to expire without some severe exorbitant force that could push them from this realm.

First Contact, part 1

"First Contact"

a short story

Gary Baker, March/April 2013

(part 1 of 2)

Acier watched as the alien craft drew near like a god landing from the heavens to visit what it was that had been created long ago. The ship was almost virtually a polygonal tear: half-octagonal in the rear where the engines, though currently off, glimmered with a resplendent turquoise glow, with the front section slowly tapering to a spear-like point.

Just below the tip of the nose rest the ring of thick metallic glass to the main command center, appearing quite like a band of oil with innumerous colors shimmering in the rays of the Earthen sun. By design, this very ring indicated a clear sense of interstellar physics that humanity still had yet to understand.

Acier, a nonhuman living on what the Eartheans called “the Ring”, knew all there was to know of this very science and technology. He knew that the craft was built more like a skyscraper than any ship the humans had devised, that the force of generated gravity caused by such tremendous acceleration needed to propel such a mammoth creation would necessitate floors perpendicular to the course trajectory. He knew that at high velocity the heads of the beings running the craft would be closest to the nose, and that this not only made things easier overall for energy saving uses but also of more quickly-gained “space legs”.

But the Earthean Ring was enormously more peculiar than the creations of Acier's own kind.

Made up of a similarly mammoth number of “crate”-like modules, the Ring encompassed the

Understanding

"Understanding"

part 11 of many

Gary Baker, April 2013

(from the Corporal Roi excerpts)

Corporal Roi Anxo knelt in complete darkness, awaiting the next move. He felt his hands on a solid-yet-invisible flooring beside his left leg beneath his chin, like a runner lunging, ready to begin the race.

But where was the gunshot to indicate a start?

He reached his awareness outward like a cloud, trying to get a grip on his surroundings. No sound came to him, nothing reflecting from surrounding objects so he knew he wasn’t in a room of some kind, yet no echoes of wind came to reveal his being outdoors.

Whispers in the Darkness, part 2

"Whispers in the Darkness"

part 2 of 3

Gary Baker, February 2013

The screen flicked on. A scratchy scene glazed in apple green.

Along the back wall a bed hung by chains, holding a woman with a swollen abdomen breathing in heavy gasps and pants. Her legs had been propped up and to the sides where a bald man with dark skin knelt between as though looking into a television screen.

"Look, Kara," the man paced with his words while he wiped his forehead with the back of his wrist, "I need you to keep breathing and stay calm until the contractions start."

A woman with her blonde hair a mess stood from the pregnant woman's side and stepped to the counter top.

Whispers in the Darkness

"Whispers in the Darkness"

part 1 of 3

Gary Baker, February 2013

The screen flicked on. A scratchy scene glazed in apple green.

At first all that was visible was a blank wall to one side, the slate grey tones lost to the discoloration of the video feed. Midway along the wall stood a sturdy colorless lampshade without cords, though light emanated from it like any other. Along the back wall, just beyond the lamplight, hung a common unfurnished bed held to the wall by bolts with taught chains that kept the outer edge from falling.

People huddled together on the mattress pad like fear-struck pests lost in a catacomb of burrows. The farmer had the plow running, now the inevitable loomed before them as the blades picked up their whir.

The Comet

"The Comet"

a short story

Gary Baker, January 2013

It was one of those moments when you had to look twice, with the afterglow of an explosive burst making rivulets in the wake of the event. The stars dimmed under tinted glass as Krio looked north along the blue lines of the programmed airway.

Ships moved along the X-axis parallel to the planetary orbit, the cargo freight along the Y-axis lifting people, foodstuffs, and debris up and out of the shrinking rock in space. It shone like a pearlescent green ball, held aloft in the oblivion of endless surreality as though tinged with an inner lighting mechanism generated by the far-distant sun.