Escape Pod Flash: The Sincerest Form

Rated PG for low intensity inter-species conflict

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 8:07 — 5.6MB)

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The Sincerest Form

By W.G. Hopkins

Bars of light crossed my desk, carved from the sun by the open window. The
scent of hot asphalt rose from the path that led to the capitol buildings.

Beside me, Dr. Singh motioned for the guards to bring in Dr. Norman Terriault. He looked pale. I motioned for him to sit.

The guards stood on either side. The officer saluted.

I closed the window. A faint buzzing hovered in the air.

“Why me?” Terriault asked.

“You must be familiar with the work of the Imitant Office,” Singh consulted his tablet, “Dr. Terriault.”

“I’m just like both of you.” Terriault leaned forward, the guards pulled him back.

“Apparently,” I said.

Escape Pod 194: Exhalation

First appeared in Eclipse 2, ed. Jonathan Strahan.

Rated PG. Contains entropy, eschatology, and empirical evisceration.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 51:24 — 35.3MB)

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Show Notes

2009 Hugo Nominee Winner!


Narration first appeared at and produced by Starship Sofa. Special thanks to Tony Smith and Ray Sizemore for their kind permission to resyndicate this award nominee.

Exhalation

by Ted Chiang

But in the normal course of life, our need for air is far from our thoughts, and indeed many would say that satisfying that need is the least important part of going to the filling stations. For the filling stations are the primary venue for social conversation, the places from which we draw emotional sustenance as well as physical. We all keep spare sets of full lungs in our homes, but when one is alone, the act of opening one’s chest and replacing one’s lungs can seem little better than a chore. In the company of others, however, it becomes a communal activity, a shared pleasure.

Escape Pod Flash: Grandpa?

Rated PG for paradoxical violence.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 5:43 — 3.9MB)

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Show Notes

Be sure to check out Mr. Lerner’s new book, FOOLS’ EXPERIMENTS.

Grandpa?

By Edward M Lerner

The lecture hall was pleasantly warm. Behind Prof. Thaddeus Fitch, busily writing on the chalkboard, pencils scratched earnestly in spiral notebooks, fluorescent lights hummed, feet shuffled. A Beach Boys tune wafted in through open windows from the quad.

“And so,” he continued, “travel backwards in time would violate causality, and hence appears to be impossible.” He turned to face the class. “The problem is most commonly illustrated with the ‘Grandfather Paradox.’

Escape Pod 193: Article of Faith

First appeared in Baen’s Universe, October 2008.

Rated PG. Contains religious themes and some violence.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 41:41 — 28.6MB)

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Article of Faith

By Mike Resnick

“I’m sure,” I said. “Somehow, lunch seems pretty trivial after you’ve been thinking about God all morning.”

“God, sir?”

“The Creator of all things,” I explained.

“My creator is Stanley Kalinovsky, sir,” said Jackson. “I was not aware that he created everything in the world, nor that his preferred name was God.”

I couldn’t repress a smile.

Escape Pod Flash: A Preference for Silence

Rated R. Contains sexual situations and noisy people.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 6:01 — 4.1MB)

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A Preference for Silence

By Lucy A. Snyder

Veronica was a spaceworthy lass with a definite preference for silence and a sensitivity to detail. She’d never lost her tea in zero gee and had always been the first to note when the coffee maker needed cleaning or when the fluorescent lights would flick-flicker in signal of the bulbs’ impending death.

Escape Pod 192: Sumo21

First appeared in Abyss & Apex, 2005

Rated PG. Contains death, betrayal, hauntings, and a challenging amount of Japanese.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 53:00 — 36.4MB)

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Sumo21

By Daniel Braum

“Oh great Emperor,” the gyoji said, continuing the ritual. “These two honorable warriors can not agree who will step aside, and who will join the sacred battle to return you to us. We would gladly send all our sons, but the Council of Infinite Japans says there may be only twenty-one. So now they must fight to decide.”

“May the best warrior join the fight,” the crowd answered in unison with the gyoji.

The gyoji stepped back. Asashoryu stared into Takanasuro’s expressionless brown eyes. The match would begin upon a tacit agreement between them. He kept Takanasuro’s mid section in his field of vision while focusing on keeping his own face blank. He knew the beginner’s lesson as if it were part of him; faces deceive and betray, but all movement starts at the hips.

Escape Pod Flash: Beachcomber

First appeared in Baen’s Universe, October 2008.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 9:05 — 8.3MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG. Contains hopes that will never be fulfilled.

Beachcomber

By Mike Resnick

Arlo didn’t look much like a man. (Not all robots do, you know.) The problem was that he didn’t act all that much like a robot.

Genres:

Escape Pod 191: This Is How It Feels

First appeared in Asimov’s, March 2008

Rated PG. Contains themes of death and child endangerment.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 37:38 — 25.9MB)

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This Is How It Feels

By Ian Creasey

Nathan’s eyes stung as he remembered how Jenny used to do just that: the same jump down the stairs, the same windmilling of her arms as she landed…. The grief swept over him like a palpable wave, making him stagger backward.

“Dad?” Christopher kicked his backpack down the hall to the door. “You all right?”

“It’s nothing,” said Nathan. He rubbed the implant-port behind his right ear. It’s nothing. It’s not real.

But it felt real.

Escape Pod Flash: It Was Death By a Bullet, But I Was Killed By a Woman

Rated R. Contains sex and violence.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 4:37 — 4.2MB)

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It Was Death By a Bullet, But I Was Killed By a Woman

By Michael Bekemeyer

I have a special skill. I am a part of a small group of people on this planet that can do special things with their minds. You have your mind readers, your empaths — and you have people like me who can control things through telekinesis. I have always been able to move things, just by thinking about it. It always came in helpful when playing golf.

Escape Pod 190: Origin Story

Escape Pod 190: Origin Story is an Escape Pod original.

Rated PG. Contains sibling rivalry and comic book deconstruction.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 33:58 — 23.3MB)

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Show Notes

Special closing music: “Skullcrusher Mountain” by Jonathan Coulton.

Origin Story

By Tim Pratt

He didn’t call himself The Aerialist at first. The newspapers came up with that later. He called himself Kid Kangaroo of all things, because of the jumping from rooftop to rooftop, even though I made fun of him, called him “Joey,” made jokes about dingoes. Nobody knows his secret identity but me, and I only found out because I snuck into the treehouse one night to smoke a cigarette and found him changing out of his leotard and tights and domino mask. He was only fifteen. I still remember what he said: “Don’t tell anyone — if my identity is discovered, you and mom and dad could be used against me.”