Archive for 10 and Up

Genres:

Escape Pod 278: Written on the Wind

Originally published in Beyond the Last Star

Rated PG: Talk of war elsewhere

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 53:14 — 36.6MB)

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Show Notes

Show Notes:

  • Feedback for Episode 270
  • Next week… A groovy strange kind of love

Written on the Wind

By David D. Levine

Thuren Nektopk peered down at Luulianni from above his massive desk. “I suspect you know why I’ve called you to speak with me in person.” He spoke in his native language, Ptopku Dominant, using the form of address for a subordinate or a child. It was a constant reminder that the Ptopku had built and largely staffed this station, and was one of the most powerful species in the Consortium.

“Yes, Supervisor,” Luulianni replied in the same language, knotting her tentacles.

“And that would be…?”

“Because of my side project.”

“Yes.” Nektopk suddenly released the bar from which he hung, caught himself on another handhold, and with two swift strokes of his arms swung down to where his six slitted eyes were level with Luulianni’s. “Your little side project.”

Luulianni cringed. “I don’t understand why it’s so much of a problem.” She straightened and tried to meet his gaze. “I put in my full quota of time every day.”

“Yes, you do, and not one moment more. But I know you are capable of so much more than that. Any work you do on this pointless little side project of yours constitutes theft of resources from the Section — from the whole Project!”

“Theft?” she squeaked. Angry at herself for the loss of control, she brought her voice down. “Theft of resources? But I don’t use any data storage space, or any other Section resources! I write my notes on the backs of old printouts.” She did not mention how much more natural it felt to work on paper.

“You are stealing the most valuable resource of all!” Nektopk pointed at her with one limber foot. “Your own time and attention!”

“But it’s my time!”
(Continue Reading…)

Escape Pod 277: Rejiggering the Thingamajig

Originally published in Analog, 2010

Rated PG: For violence.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 31:41 — 21.8MB)

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Show Notes

Show Notes:

  • Feedback for Episode 269: Élan Vital
  • Next week… Linguistics… in space.

Creative Commons License

Rejiggering the Thingamajig by Eric James Stone is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Based on a work at escapepod.org.

Rejiggering the Thingamajig

by Eric James Stone

The teleport terminal had not been built with tyrannosaurus sapiens in mind.

Resisting the urge to knock human-sized chairs about with her tail, Bokeerk squatted on the tile floor, folded the claws of her forelimbs together, and concentrated on her breathing. Meditation would calm her nerves. What should have been a two-minute waystop as she switched to a different teleport line had stretched to three hours, and being the only passenger in the terminal creeped her out.

The cheerful voice of the customer service AI roused Bokeerk from her trance. “It is my pleasure to inform you that the cause of the technical difficulties in the galactic teleport network has been found.”

Bokeerk perked up and rose on her hind legs, remembering just in time to duck her head so it wouldn’t bang the ceiling lamps. “Please send me to Krawlak,” she said. It was unlikely that any of her eggs would hatch for another few days yet, but she was anxious to get home.

“It is with the utmost regret that I must tell you that will not be possible at this time,” said the AI, with a tone of such abysmal sorrow that Bokeerk’s eyes could not help but moisten with sympathetic tears. “I require assistance in repairing the problem.”

Bokeerk lowered herself into a squat again. “When will help get here?” She looked at the time display on the digital assistant strapped to her left forelimb. She had now been stranded for three hours and fifty-two minutes.

“I estimate a spaceship carrying a repair crew could be here within twelve years,” said the AI. Its voice seemed to have lost the customer service aspect.
(Continue Reading…)

Escape Pod 275: Schrödinger’s Cat Lady

Escape Pod 275: Schrödinger’s Cat Lady is an Escape Pod original.

Rated PG: For quantum theory and brief violent description.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 29:22 — 20.3MB)

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Show Notes

Show Notes:

 

Creative Commons License

Schrödinger’s Cat Lady by Marjorie James is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Based on a work at escapepod.org.

Schrödinger’s Cat Lady

By Marjorie James

I got out of the car, smoothed my shirt down over my bulletproof vest, and contemplated the cats. They contemplated me right back. I sighed. I hated these jobs.

I opened the tiny gate to the front walk (no fence, just a gate) and made my way to the door. The house was small and tidy, a light blue bungalow with green trim and yellow curtains pulled across the windows, through which the cats were peering. It didn’t smell, which was a relief. And something of a surprise, considering the heat. It was one of those days when the world seemed to be actively rejecting human habitation, where the smog and the humidity made the air feel like warm mayonnaise. On a day like this, a cat overpopulation should be stinking to high heaven. Maybe this wasn’t for real, I hoped. It might just be some neighbor with a grudge. Couldn’t be more than a dozen cats here, max. Maybe this one wasn’t going to be that bad.

I have never been very good at predicting things.

(Continue Reading…)

Escape Pod 273: Dead’s End to Middleton

Originally appeared in Crossed Genres Magazine.

Rated PG: For monsters and old west excitement. Yee Haw.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 38:35 — 26.6MB)

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Show Notes

Show Notes:

Creative Commons License

Dead’s End to Middleton by Natania Barron is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Based on a work at escapepod.org.

Dead’s End to Middleton

By Natania Barron

Dust rose at the horizon in tongues of earth and wind, dancing before the sinking sun. Bits of mica flashed now and again; almost like fairy dust, thought Nathaniel, more than a little delirious in his saddle by now. It had been far too hot for a breakneck race such as this.

But there were slobbering, chittering creatures swarming Middleton behind him, slavering over the horses and terrorizing the families that made up his close-knit community. Their only hope was in him. Sutherland Ranch couldn’t be far. Old Man Sutherland would know what to do.

Time was wasting. His horse, Mixup, needed water, and Nathaniel needed rest. His tongue felt cold, his lips cracked and bleeding; he’d gone so far past dizzy that he’d come to expect the world to shift a bit by now.

But, no. Maybe not that much.

“Don’t move.”

A voice. A woman.

It was easy enough to comply. Nathaniel doubted he had the strength to move, anyway; his ankle was still twisted up in the stirrup.

(Continue Reading…)

Escape Pod 272: Christmas Wedding

First appeared in Warrior Wisewoman.

Rated PG: For love at the end of the world.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 57:02 — 39.3MB)

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Show Notes

Show Notes:

Christmas Wedding

By: Vylar Kaftan

Today was a perfect day, with three flaws.  It was snowing here in Miami, one of her brides had trouble recognizing her, and her cummerbund wouldn’t stay up.  The cummerbund was the only problem Mel could fix.  She brushed ashes off the church office’s desk and rummaged around for safety pins. She found typed notes for an old sermon, some yellow pushpins, and three tampons.  Mel took the tampons and left the rest.  Not a single safety pin, which surprised her–for a place that looters hadn’t been through, there was little here.  Underneath the desk, Mel found a paperclip.  After a moment’s thought, she opened her pocketknife and cut two holes in the cummerbund’s back.  She unbent the paperclip, wired the cummerbund together, and attached it to the belt loop on her black jeans.

Her bridesmaid poked his head in.  “How’re you doing in here?”

Paul had a fake poinsettia flower wedged behind his ear.  Mel laughed, a tense noise that hurt her throat.  “Paul, where did you get that flower?”

He grinned and walked into the office.  Paul had been a small-town Georgia fireman, in sunnier days.  He wore a plain gray shirt that exposed his well-muscled arms and new blue jeans that fit well.  Mel wondered where he’d found them.  Paul said, “I look like a hippie, don’t I?  Well, a hippie on steroids.  You look sort of James Dean meets Roy Orbison.  I like the bow tie.”

“I told you–you didn’t have to get girly.  You can be my best man.”

Escape Pod 271: God of the Lower Level

First appeared in The Urbanite.

Rated PG: For power struggles and new life creations.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 25:55 — 17.9MB)

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Show Notes

Show Notes:

  • Feedback for Episode 263: Fuel
  • Next week… It’s Christmastime!

Creative Commons License

God of the Lower Level by Charles M. Saplak is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Based on a work at escapepod.org.

God of the Lower Level

By Charles M. Saplak

Hello, Horatio.

Hello, Fredrick. I’ve been waiting.

Of course. How have you been?

Good. And you?

Fine. I’ve finished my other work. It’s now, let’s see…, three twenty-seven a.m. It’s dark outside, of course, which means that there’s no sun, but there is some reflected light from the moon, and some dim light from the stars, and then electric lights in various places. Are any of the terms I’ve just used unfamiliar to you?

No.

Good. I have four hours and thirty-three minutes until shift change. I can spend some time with you. Do you have any questions for me?

Yes, Fredrick, I do. Are you my God? (Continue Reading…)

Escape Pod 270: Advertising at the End of the World

First appeared in Apex Online

Rated PG: For language and adult topics of spousal death and demanding advertising.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 31:16 — 21.6MB)

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Show Notes

Show Notes:

  • Feedback for Episode 262: Cruciger
  • Apologies to narrator Dani Cutler, whom I didn’t credit in the introduction. Shows what happens when I try to get ahead of the workload…
  • There will be no epub this week; this was purchased before we started purchasing epub rights.
  • Next week… The old west, and some dangerous happenings.

Advertising at the End of the World

By: Keffy R. M. Kehrli

Excerpt:
Five years after her husband died, two years after she moved to a cabin in Montana, and six months after the world ended, Marie opened her curtains to discover her front garden overrun with roving, stumbling advertisements. Marie hadn’t seen one since she’d sold her condo and moved out to her isolated cabin. She shuddered.

There were at least twenty of the ads, and for all it seemed they were doing their damndest to step lightly, her red and yellow tulips were completely trampled. Marie had stubbornly continued to cultivate those flowers despite the certainty that she ought to be using the gardening space, and the captured rainwater, to grow food. Not that it mattered what she’d been growing there. It was all mud now.

The ad nearest her window looked quite a bit like a tall, lanky teenager. It moved like one as well, and might have fooled her except that its forehead was stuck in price scrolling mode. Faintly glowing red letters crawled across its forehead from right to left.

TOILET PAPER… 2 FOR 1 SALE… RECYCLED… .

Genres:

Escape Pod 269: Élan Vital

First appeared in Sybil’s Garage no. 6

Rated PG: For adult topics of parental death

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 28:07 — 19.4MB)

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Show Notes

Show Notes:

  • Feedback for Episode 261: Only Springtime When She’s Gone
  • Next week… The future of corporate America

Creative Commons License

Élan Vital by K. Tempest Bradford is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Based on a work at escapepod.org.

Élan Vital

By K. Tempest Bradford

The few minutes I had to spend in the Institute’s waiting room were my least favorite part of coming up to visit my mother. It felt more like a dialysis room, the visitors sunk into the overly-soft couches and not speaking, just drinking orange juice and recovering. There were no magazines and no television, just cold air blowing from the vents and generic music flowing with it. I’d finished my juice and was beginning to brood on my dislike for overly air-conditioned buildings when my mother arrived attended by a nurse.

I kissed and hugged her, automatically asking how she was, mouthing the answer she always gave as she gave it again.

“I’m fine, same as always.”

It wasn’t strictly true, but true enough.

(Continue Reading…)

Escape Pod 268: Advection

First appeared in Clarkesworld

Rated PG: For mild violence

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 26:54 — 18.6MB)

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Show Notes

Show Notes:

  • Feedback for Episode 260: The Speed of Dreams
  • Next week… The difficulty of watching a parent die.

 

Creative Commons License

Advection by Genevive Valentine is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Based on a work at escapepod.org.

Advection

By Genevieve Valentine

The first day of fifth year a boy came in with the new eyeshields, a glossy expanse of black with no iris or pupil, and looking at him was like looking into an eclipse.

All the other girls said it made them uncomfortable; they teased him to take them out, to put on some normal sunglasses like everyone else. They said they’d never forgive him for hiding eyes in such a handsome face.

“Fortuni, it’s a little much,” said someone.

That was how I learned his name.

We were all Level Two intelligence, but before the first week was over the news was out that some had managed to find the money for a sixth year. Janik Duranti, who spent the history lectures drawing stick figures screwing on his computer screen, was getting a sixth year. I’d be cleaning his office someday. Answering his phones. Updating the registration on his blue ID cuff.

Carol Clarke opened the top button on her shirt as soon as the shades went down; obvious, but it was worth it to be married to a guy who had a sixth year.

(Continue Reading…)

Genres:

Escape Pod 267: Planetfall

First appeared in The Book Of Exodi

Rated PG: For violence

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 32:41 — 22.5MB)

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Show Notes

 

Show Notes:

  • Feedback for Episode 259: The Lady or the Tiger?
  • Next week… Weather: wild, and planned.

 

Creative Commons License

Planetfall by Michael C. Lea is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Based on a work at escapepod.org.

Planetfall

By Michael C. Lea

Galthas Talisar stepped out from the buzzing chaos of the transportal and onto lush greenery. This world was alien, to be sure, but the patterns were almost familiar. The ship’s oracles had chosen well.

Behind him, the transportal hummed again. An armored leg emerged and carefully found its footing on the blue-green ferns carpeting the jungle floor. More than twenty thousand miles above, the leg’s owner shifted his weight and stepped fully through an identical transportal, instantly emerging on the planet’s surface below.

That cautious step belonged to Urjik, who could be called cautious in few other ways. In fact, his reputation had left him few other options for a willing partner on this mission. Urjik did not care. He and Galthas had fought together against the worst the Zayeen had to offer. He trusted Galthas implicitly, despite his disdain for the other scrawny ascetics from Signet Battalion.

Urjik’s greenish skin and jutting lower canines marked him as a charuk, his bloodline tainted by nether influences. Despite this stigma, and despite his temper, he had risen quickly in Rampart Battalion. Even the most burdensome battlesuit did not slow him, and no one was a truer shot with an inferno cannon or a hex-impelled railgun. (Continue Reading…)

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