Posts Tagged ‘space’

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Cast of Wonders 248: Binaries

Originally published in Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 73 (June 2016)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 13:28 — 12.5MB)

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Show Notes

Theme music is “Appeal to Heavens” by Alexye Nov, available at MusicAlley.com.

Binaries

by S.B. Divya

Year 1: I come into the world wet and squalling and ordinary, born of heterosexual bio-parents.

***

Year 2: A flat photo shows me on my first birthday with a shock of red hair, wide green eyes, and an expression of distaste at the sticky white frosting on my fingers. My mother stands on one side looking not at all Jewish; my Goan, lapsed-Catholic father stands on the other.

***

Year 4: Shaya is born. I am a match to my mother’s complexion, but my baby sister takes after our father. No one thinks we’re siblings unless they see the fierce, protective scowl on my face when I’m allowed to hold her.

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Cast of Wonders 238: The Absolute Temperature of Outer Space (Artemis Rising 3)

Cast of Wonders 238: The Absolute Temperature of Outer Space (Artemis Rising 3) is a Cast of Wonders original.

Content Warning: Grief

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 22:08 — 24.2MB)

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Show Notes

Illustration by Mat Weller. Artemis Rising logo designed by Scott Pond.

Theme music is “Appeal to Heavens” by Alexye Nov, available from Promo DJ or his Facebook page.

The Absolute Temperature of Outer Space

by Xander M. Odell

Dwanda watches her dad bound across the lunar landscape and shivers inside her jacket.  The Moon lifts him higher than anyone on Earth could jump and sets him gently down again, a kangaroo in a space suit.  Sunlight flashes bright white across his helmet.  She chooses not to notice the ragged tear down the right side of his bulky suit, or the way she can see through him to the gray, airless expanse beyond.

The shuttleport crowd paces around the clear observation dome to make room for their excitement and boredom.  They talk softly amongst themselves or watch the swarm of service bots making a final safety check on the shuttle Io.  A few browse the souvenir stands for last minute gifts or keepsakes from their lunar vacation.

Her mom settles beside Dwanda on the couch.  “Brought you some cocoa.”
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Cast of Wonders 224: Welcome to Willoughby’s

Cast of Wonders 224: Welcome to Willoughby’s is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 42:58 — 39.6MB)

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Welcome to Willoughby’s

by Michael Reid

You ever been to Upsilon Orionis? As far as asteroid belts go, that one’s pretty weird. Someone dragged every last asteroid in that system right up close to the star then built a temple to a different sun god on each one. How about Beta Pictoris? That solar system isn’t even properly formed yet and there’s already a golf course in its asteroid belt. It has fairways and sand traps and everything, with each and every hole on a different rock. So you could say I’ve seen a lot of weird stuff in asteroid belts. But the taxidermist was definitely the weirdest of them all.

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Cast of Wonders 210: Little Wonders 8 – Embracing Change

Cast of Wonders 210: Little Wonders 8 – Embracing Change is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 21:15 — 19.7MB)

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The There-It-Is Store

By Adam Gaylord

The bell over the door jingled and Claire hastily tucked her book under the counter. It was one of her favorites and she’d just gotten to the best part. She didn’t want a customer to come in and claim it.

An older man, probably twice Claire’s age, entered the store. Actually, he really more danced his way in. The man turned this way and that, his eyes trained on the ground, all the while patting his pants, alternating front pockets and then back. Claire suppressed a giggle at the sight of his search dance – as it was fittingly known in the trade. The man gave up the floor and scanned the shelves by the door, muttering to himself while patting his breast pockets. “I swear I just had ’em. I was walking out the door…” He passed over boxes of buttons, jars full of jewelry, several large sacks stuffed with socks, and a pail packed with pocket watches before stopping in front of a particularly large crate nearly overflowing with keys. He gave a low whistle, eyeing the huge box with trepidation.

“Good morning Mr. Crowhurst,” Clair interrupted his search.

“Hm? Oh, yes. Hello.” Mr. Crowhurst wandered up to the counter, still patting. “I really hope you can help me. Do you happen to know where…” He trailed off, his eyes drifting to the shelves behind her. Claire felt the tingle of the there-it-is magic and the man’s patting finally stopped, his face lighting up. “There they are!”

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Cast of Wonders 171: Pluto

Originally published in Lightning Cake, November 2014

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 7:10 — 6.7MB)

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PLUTO

by C. E. Hyun

On Pluto, there were pterodactyls that flew in V-flock formations. Sarah had never seen pterodactyls that flew in V-flock formations.

This was not demoted-to-dwarf-planet Pluto. This was a lush and fantastic Pluto, which Sarah and her companions discovered while returning from their discouraging voyage to the system of Poseidon. (Perks and promotions had been promised on their finding the fabled god’s trident. Alas, all they’d found were dusty moon rocks, and there were plenty of those next door to home.)

On Pluto, fresh fruit dangled from the trees. They camped by the beach, where the sand was pink and pale. It was a welcome respite, and no one was eager to hurry back home. Here, the weather was lovely. Curious creatures populated the land. Silver otters and sapphire hummingbirds. Tiny compsognathus that scampered in the beach grass.

It was Tony, their systems engineer, who discovered them. “I’m good with animals. Look, I’ve got this guy eating out of the palm of my hand!” he said.

“Maybe it’s him that’s good with you,” Sarah said. The compsognathus crushed Tony’s walnut like a marshmallow.
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Cast of Wonders 166: Hard Passage

Originally published by Perihelion SF (2014).

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 35:17 — 32.3MB)

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Show Notes

Juliet Mushens’ book Get Started in Writing Young Adult Fiction is available now in the UK, and forthcoming in the US. You can find her on Twitter.

Hard Passage

by Holly Schofield

Daylan hurried along the edge of the crowd. He would violate the Heartcreed if he was late again.

As he approached the main wormhole gate, a new wave of arrivals washed over him. There should have been a few minutes grace. I’ve got the schedules wrong again, he thought, flicking his grimy pad into begging mode with an aching thumb.

“Help a poor orphan boy save for a ticket home,” Daylan called out to the kindliest-looking ones as he forged upstream, against the hectic flow of passengers, hunching to make himself shorter. He waved his pad, the large zero indicating his lack of credits. Most arrivees let their eyes pass over his ragged clothes and unblemished forehead, the lack of a visible brain implant labeling him idios.

Endless multitudes streamed by, a cacophony of colour and shapes: tall, elegant Naiphs; stocky Rassakits; right-sized Terrans. Humankind and the two known extraterrestrial species surged in a constant flux; arriving and departing ships determining the tidal ebb and flow of the spaceport.
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Cast of Wonders 118: Perihelion

Cast of Wonders 118: Perihelion is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 5:03 — 4.6MB)

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Show Notes

Today we present Vajra Chandrasekera’s story, Perihelion.

You may know that we usually pay our authors using PayPal. We were amazed to discover that it is not possible to receive PayPal payments in Sri Lanka! There are many individuals and small businesses that provide online services like web development, graphic designing and more in Sri Lanka. But Sri Lanka not supporting PayPal has become a barrier for them to continue and progress in their careers. If you’d like more information about this and to help support creative people like this week’s author, please go to https://sites.google.com/site/ppforsrilanka/enable-receiving-money-to-sri-lanka-through-paypal.

Perihelion

by Vajra Chandrasekera

Hold on tight, we’re coming around again.

This thing crumbles a little every time we hit perihelion. Almost lost my footing again. You okay? Good. We’ve got a moment to catch our breath, except we don’t breathe any more. Words stick in language like vestigial tails in the womb. Not that we have either of those any more, either.

We still have eggs, though. And if you’re ready to leave yours behind, now would be a good time. We’re about as far from the sun as we’re going to get.

No? It’s okay, it’s okay. Take your time. You’re all right, I got you. Don’t worry, all right? If you can’t bring yourself to make the jump, I’ll carry you. I just think you’ll like to look back later and remember your first time flying.

We’re all afraid the first time.
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Cast of Wonders 114: Now Cydonia (Staff Pick 2013)

Originally published in Orb Speculative Fiction Volume 7 (2007).

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 30:19 — 27.9MB)

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Show Notes

Now Cydonia ran as Episode 71 back in March of last year. One reason I’m personally so proud of our win is the story’s author, Rick Kennett. Although I’ve never met him, he’s from my home town of Melbourne, Australia and I love that a fellow countryman writes such kick-arse stuff. I narrated one of his ghost stories for Pseudopod, the immensely creepy The Dark and What It Said which is flat-out the best evocation of how spooky and lonely the Australian bush can be. Rick is a talented writer and I’m always happy to hear his stories when they appear in the pod-o-sphere.

Now Cydonia

by Rick Kennett

Cadet Cy De Gerch bounced forward into the desert darkness, raised her arms in a defensive posture and, as best as a fourteen year could, barked, “Halt! Who goes there!”

There was no one there. There never was.

Cy jumped back, a slow leap in the low gravity, to her original position on the perimeter, her vacsuit moving easy like a second skin, to watch and wait and break the boredom as best she could until relieved. Out there was the desert she had trekked the past two years with her section of Martian Star Corps cadets. Out there was the countryside of Mars – cold and red and a billion years dead, littered with rocks, pocked with craters, filled with myths and ghost stories, most of which Cy didn’t really believe. Sergeant Kreeng – Old Get-It-Right – had known what he was doing when he’d set them perimeter guard duty consisting mostly of doing nothing. It was, she knew, a discipline of the mind.

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Cast of Wonders 89: The Carmel B Crazies

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:00 — 24.8MB)

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The Carmel B Crazies

by Rick Kennet

On the day she turned seventeen Cy De Gerch peered through a window into rusty red desert and saw her future squatting darkly in its launch cradle.

She’d been discharged from hospital an hour before and had made her quick way to Styx City Starport. Standing now at the window into Launch Cradle 3, her bag slung over the shoulder of her new Martian Star Corps tunic, she gazed through the glass like a kid outside a toy store. Utopia Plain, her new toy, smooth, black, ellipsoid, seemed to squat in its cradle amid a patch of the red desert of Mars. Recently repaired after a battle with Xenoid warships at Rigel, the starship’s liquid lines were unbroken but for the pressure tunnel extruded from her forward hatch. A thing of space, it seemed to sit impatient to lift into the pink-brown sky and the void beyond.

All her fears and excitements came flooding back – a feeling of elation at this new beginning aboard her first ship; a scary feeling too of coming adrift, separated from her family on Phobos and the surrogate family of her space cadet section, training days ended.

Inspecting herself in the window’s reflection, Cy adjusted her tunic sporting its new lieutenant’s bars and ran a hand through her short dark hair, wondering if she’d surprise her new captain with her age. She thought that she might. She was the first of her breed – a product of the Gartino genetics experiment – to qualify for active service. It all depended on what Captain Ralph Brown was like. Would he understand and appreciate her as a purpose-built person, trained and schooled seventeen years for this purpose? Or would there be suspicion and mistrust?
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