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Long Days (1075 hits)

Category: UberMadness!

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Submitted by UberMadness! (View user info) at 2006-11-06 18:40:24 EST

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Entry 1

On maps of ancient Earth there were blank spaces, unexplored territories. These areas were often filled in by superstition and fear, cryptic warnings about terrible beasts inhabiting those places. The notion that many ancient maps contained the phrase 'here be dragons' is a myth. There are very few actual maps bearing those words, but there are many warnings about beasts just as curious or frightening to sailors and explorers of a young Earth.

We came to this distant star seeking a new home, an Eden.

We found dragons.

~

We found them on the great plain above the rift. They had been moving west like a herd of cattle, and now they stood silently, covered in dust.

It was night, and we were exploring above the rift in the beams thrown by our wrist and helmet lights. Mosquito-like bugs filled the air, searching our suits for exposed skin, attracted by our heat. We called them buggers. Their non-toxic bites stung and itched. Down in the rift buggers were seldom seen, and we could walk around in zip-up cottons. Up here we wore our patrol suits, and just as well, otherwise we would have been eaten alive.

Small jetbirds perched on unmoving horned heads and scaled backs while sucking in breaths that would be released with a loud razzing sound as the little things took to the night air on leathery wings. Jetbirds ate buggers like a kid ate popped corn. That made jetbirds our friends.

We had set down weeks ago, three days ago by the rotation of this new world, which was one and a half-times the size of Earth. The planet turned on its axis slower than we would be accustomed to as we had maintained Earth's day-night cycle aboard ship, and each day and night lasted three Earth days. They were long days and long nights.

While others continued settling into the calm depths of the rift, we were exploring. We had gone fifty kilometers up and down the rift, and this was our first climb up to the vast plains we had seen briefly as we had made our descent from space. We took pictures and bagged small plants and scooped up soil in plastic jars.

Greenfield raised a gloved hand and rapped on the head of one of the beasts.

"Solid as rock," he said, shouldering his rifle and pulling on the two long horns on the snout of the leading beast. "These things look like they are a thousand years old. Probably petrified."

There were thirty-six of the creatures in this group. Most were hunkered down, heads tucked in. The creature in the lead had its head cocked upward.

They were big. As big as horses, with rounded humps on their backs.

There appeared to be several other groups of the creatures on the plain, but further away it was hard to discern them from jumbles of rock and mounds of earth as everything was covered in fine gray dust.

With the heel of one boot I dug at the soil nurturing foot-high grassy blades. The blades danced and as the dust fell away I saw that they were a vivid green. They looked tough, almost leathery. I angled my wrist light down. In a few seconds I had a hole ten centimeters deep.

"The dirt is soft," I said.

Greenfield gave me a sneer. "So? What's your point, little girl?"

"The point is this," Burgundy said, "Wouldn't these things have sunk into this soft earth if they were standing here for any period of time?"

"Oh sure," Greenfield said. "These things just arrived yesterday. You fuck—"

"Enough," Ballisteros said. His voice was like the rumble of an engine. "We've done our sweep. There's nothing up here. Back to the ship."

Burgundy looked from me to Ballisteros. "With all due respect sir, I don't think a short radar sweep is a guarantee that there isn't any indigenous—"

"That's an order, Burgundy. We head back down now. You and Shiina can cover the rear in case anything tries to sneak up on us."

"Yeah, Lefty," Greenfield laughed. "With you shooting one-handed and Shiina trying to shoot straight without getting her tits in the way the two of you just might hit a moving target. Or you could just call for help."

I took a deep breath and stood tall, my breasts clearly outlined by my impact suit, which could be as hard as steel upon impact but was now as supple as latex.

"Don't worry, Greenfield. I'll be sure to keep these out of your way."

Greenfield raised his rifle and fired between Burgundy and me. The depleted uranium shell hit the left horn on the snout of the leading creature. The horn shattered.

"Knock it off," Ballisteros roared.

"Dead as shit," Greenfield muttered.

As our eight-man squad headed back to the trail leading down into the rift, I picked up a fragment of shattered horn and tucked it into one flap pocket.

~

We named this new world Bliss. Actually, the Turners named this world. The Far Corps squad laughed and jeered when it was announced ship-wide.

The Turners had been the single largest religious denomination back on Earth for over a hundred years when there was a backlash against them. Most of them were genuinely good people, but as their movement grew, so did their power base and socio-political influence. It was inevitable that they would be hated instead of admired. It's human nature.

The backlash happened in the time of my grandmother. By the time I was born, the Turners had put three ships in Earth orbit. They were looking for places to start over, free of religious persecution. Places where they didn't have to defend themselves. They were looking for Edens.

The Turners followed selective teachings of Jesus Christ. Their core belief was simple. When faced with antagonism and violence, turn the other cheek. That made for a peaceful and admirable society, but it set them apart from the rest of humanity.

And while they were peaceful, they weren't stupid. Back on Earth they took their beatings with a stoicism some admired and some condemned as crazy. When the Turner ships set off in search of new worlds, they took along mercenaries, most of whom where selected from the Far Corps, soldiers who had fought in the Lunar Civil War and had been in skirmishes on Io station and darkside Mercury.

The Turners did not fight. Nothing in their religion prohibited others from defending them, however. The mercenaries were along for the ride just in case they were needed. They were all grateful to be doing something productive.

I was born aboard the Hopeful, four years into the three-decade journey. I was schooled with Turners, who ran out the doors when the end bell rang and went home to chores or worked in the gardens or laboratories. I went home to chores as well. Cleaning rifles. Throwing knives. Hands-on combat.

"Turners can be sweet and good," my teacher said. "But sweet and good doesn't last long alone. They need muscle and steel and a heart that can be as cold as ice when the need arises."

Teacher taught me well. She had been drummed out of the Far Corps because she had restraint issues. When all hell broke lose, she was the one you wanted nearby, but in times of peace she might break your spine over one knee for some innocent comment taken the wrong way. Teacher knew the Turners were giving her one last chance.

She fractured one of my legs twice, broke a total of seven bones in both arms, broke my nose and my cheek, and gave me the thin white scar that bisected my left nipple.

When teacher was fifty years old she caught a cancer and died. She was buried in space with full Far Corps honors and sent on her way to the voices of a Turner choir. When the ceremony ended and I was alone in the quarters I shared with her, I was able to mourn my teacher as my mother.

~

Bliss was one of five Earth-like planets circling a distant star almost identical to our sun.

During our journey to Bliss, forty-five Turners died and thirty-eight were born. Three mercenaries died. I was the only replacement.

Turner scientists did all the scans they could from space, but that only told us so much. The day-night cycle on Bliss would take a lot of getting used to if we decided to stay, but the gravity was just slightly less that of Earth, and the atmosphere was a perfect match, if not cleaner. As we watched from orbit we saw that there were hellacious dust storms that kicked up at dusk, and cleansing rains at dawn, but there were deeps rifts in the great plains of the northern hemisphere that seemed to be sheltered from the storms and held deciduous forests, which would hopefully support anything we wanted to grow there. After studying the temperatures in the southern hemisphere we realized that winters would be mild on this world.

The air and soil could have been full of deadly microbes, or there could be savage primitives down there. The only way to know for sure was to set down and explore. That's why Far Corps mercenaries like me were on board. Just in case.

A shuttle went down and collected samples. The samples indicated that this world could support us.

The Turners decided to set down in one of the rifts for a single day-night cycle. The Corps would stand alert and go on recons while Turners sampled everything they could. After that, we would know if this world would welcome us.

After the Hopeful entered the atmosphere she switched from her fusion drive to jet engines, and extended her massive wings.

The sun was setting beyond the rift we were headed for, and the clouds around the ship were pink and gold.

I was looking forward to the smell of a wood fire.

A flock of wayward birds made this world our home, for better or worse. The birds were the size of condors. One moment we were dropping down through cloud cover at twelve thousand meters, and then the ship was jolted as five of eight engine intakes were filled with bird carcasses. Three engines exploded, two stalled, and the Hopeful dropped toward the rift like a stone fitted with wings.

It all happened so fast there was no ship-wide alarm raised, no time for warnings.

Our pilots were very good. We lost part of a wing and our communications tower to one jagged side of the rift, and hit and bounced and hit and tore a trench in the ground.

Of two hundred and six Turners and thirty Far Corpsmen, there were only nineteen deaths.

After realizing that the Hopeful would never again be airborne, we spent three day and night cycles exploring the rift we were in. We were lucky. The rift was hundreds of kilometers long and fifty klicks across. There was a river running along the bottom of the rift, perhaps the remainder of the flow that had carved this rift into the rock of millions of years.

The high ground above the river was forest, with small open plots where we could one day plant gardens. The Turners had livestock, but they weren't meat eaters. They ate milk and eggs and cheese, but no flesh. Along with breeding livestock and hundreds of frozen embryos they had seeds and transplantable gardens in the ship that could one day become orchards and fields providing all the food they needed.

Which is why my squad of Corpsmen went up onto the plains after many Earth days of staying by the safety of the ship. Damage assessments had been made and what little dust that filtered down from the twilight storms above had been cleaned away. With the coming of another long night the Turners had finally decided to send us out on a short exploratory recon, to observe and photograph and collect soil and plant samples. If we were lucky we could plant hardy crops that could survive the dust and rainstorm cycles that occurred on what we were already calling topside.

~

We had been away from the Hopeful for two Earth days of continuous night. Once back down in the rift we left our samples with the science division in the ship and then went to our quarters outside. The Corps had tents not far from the squat ruin of the Hopeful. It was cool at night, but it felt good to breathe fresh air and bathe in the river.

I went to the tent I shared with Burgundy and changed into layered cotton zips. He acted busy, but I knew he was watching by the bluish light of our lamps. It was a cool, clear night. I in turn watched Burgundy change clothes with one arm and admired his skill. Even though he was nearly twice my age he was a handsome, capable man. He had lost a limb in the battle of Venus Station. He must have been just a boy then.

All of the Far Corps mercenaries hired by the Turners were unfit for Corps service but still had a lot to offer. Sergeant Ballisteros was missing an eye. Greenfield had gotten his cock and balls sheared off by a laser at some time in the past. I assumed that was why he treated women like trash. Members of our squad had prosthetic legs and strap-on kidneys and titanium skulls.

We could still point and shoot better than any Turner, though.

I was intact, and I was here because I was an accident. Or so my teacher told me. I like to think she lied, and my mother really wanted me.

It was impossible to avoid seeing Burgundy's erect penis as he stripped down. I often looked in the mirror and wondered what it was about me that made that made me arouse most of the men and one or two women in the squad.

He saw me looking down at that jutting horn of flesh and gave me a 'what are you gonna do?' shrug.

I hadn't realized how awful recycled water tasted until I drank from a river for the very first time. I gave Burgundy sex, and asked him if he wouldn't mind filling up our big plastic water jugs at the river. Mother had always told me I was pretty, and as my teacher she said there was nothing wrong with giving sex for favors from time to time. When he left the tent I remembered the horn fragment in the flap pocket of my suit.

I found the fragment and returned to the Hopeful, looking up at the stars and realizing the night cycle would be ending soon. Up on the plain the first light of dawn was probably visible on the horizon, and the scudding clouds carrying the rainstorms that came with it.

A younger Turner scientist named Orem was overseeing work on many of the biological specimens collected, bugs and birds and the only mammal found so far, a ferocious little marsupial that looked like a tiny grizzly bear.

Orem was looking into a microscope when I entered his lab. He stood and gave me a little bow, a courtesy reserved for ladies, not mercenaries. Orem had a soft prettiness that made him the mockery of men like no-balls Greenfield, but the scientist had a gentle way about him, and an inquisitive nature I found appealing. Mercenaries asked very few questions before they started shooting. When I had returned from my first upriver recon in the rift me had asked me a hundred questions, his eyes glowing with fascination as I described the rift valley beyond the ship. He had complained that the Turner elders had declared him too valuable to set foot outside the Hopeful until we knew it was safe.

"Nao," he said. "I welcome you."

"Got something here," I said. I held up the dusty gray horn fragment.

He took it and examined it closely, turning it over and over.

"Incredible," he said. "Is it bone?"

I told him what we had found up on the plain.

"Even though they looked long dead," I said, "This one with the shattered horn bothered me. He was looking at the sky, but he didn't look like a dumb animal. He looked more like a cat than a mouse. There was something bird-like about his eyes. Like a hawk I saw in a library film about Earth animals. Like a hunter."

Orem washed the fragment with a bottle of sterile solution. Under the layer of dust the horn was blue-black, like the steel of an old handgun in a museum.

The tip was very sharp.

I took a seat and watched Orem. He was my age, maybe a year older. He turned the fragment this way and that, examined it under a light, poked inside the shattered end, and frowned the whole while.

I must have dozed off while he was looking at some of the pictures of soft, dusty shapes we had downloaded from our helmet cameras, something I never did on patrol, and then Orem gave me a gentle shake.

I nearly laughed when he asked, "Are you sure this was dead?"

"Greenfield shot that horn off of the creature's head," I said. "It didn't move at all."

Orem thought about that a moment, then said, "Come with me."

He led me outside the ship. As we stepped outside I saw him glance around nervously, clutching the horn fragment in one fist.

"It's perfectly safe," I said. "I'll protect you."

Orem scowled at that, and I imagined his masculine nature was butting up against his Turner disciplines.

Upriver we could see the glow of Far Corps lamps inside of tents, and campfires outside of them.

I saw a line of figures moving up the path to the plain above.

"Another patrol?"

Orem nodded. "The elders want more samples."

"I should be with them."

Orem looked almost embarrassed when he said, "I told the elders you were assisting me."

When he saw the look on my face he took a step back. "You were sleeping."

I looked again. I thought one of the tiny figures was missing an arm.

"Some of my squad are going out again?"

"As far as I know this recon is volunteer. That one armed fellow is going, yes."

Just as light began to brighten the sky over the rift, it grew dark very fast.

"Squall," I said, shoving Orem under the cover of a rent in the Hopeful's hull.

Water poured down. The air was so humid it was like breathing through a wet cloth. The river turned white and the earth looked at if it were being struck by invisible bullets.

After a few minutes the rain moved on. Now we were in for three days of sunny autumnal skies.

Rills of brownish water streamed into the rift.

"That dust in the rainwater is actually soil," Orem said. "It washes off of the plains and flows down here, where it accumulates and creates fertile soil. That's why we have such lush forests along the river, and why the plains are almost barren. I bet parts of those ledges on the edge of the rift are holding thousands of kilos of old dust."

I stepped outside and turned my face to the sun. It felt good after such a long night. I saw Corpsmen squatting and brewing coffee rations over campfires. Fresh brewed river water coffee was the best. Further up the rift wall I saw the distant recon patrol moving up and out of sight.

Gravel crunched behind me and I turned to see Orem holding up one hand, shielding his pale face from the sun. I laughed, and then felt alarmed.

"You cut your hand on that damned horn."

"There's no need for such vulgar language," he said with a smile, gently mocking the strict morality of Turner elders. He lowered his hand and inspected it closely. After a moment he said, "My hands are fine."

He was much paler now, and his eyes were wide, confused and a little scared.

"Well where is the blood coming from?" I asked.

Orem held up the horn fragment.

The shattered end looked like a broken bone, moist and red inside. A ruby-red drop of blood fell to the ground.

"Come with me," he said, his face now dark and stern.

He grabbed my hand and moved quickly, almost dragging me down the corridor. I found this rough handling unexpected, and appealing.

Back in Orem's laboratory he fiddled with a hand-held light source while a machine analyzed a drop of blood.

"I'm going to mimic the light of our new sun," he said.

He had set the fragment on the table. Under the standard ship lighting it looked dead and dry.

Orem moved the filtered light over the fragment, and it seemed to come alive.

"Its biophotonic," he said. He looked at a monitor and read the results of the blood analysis. "Carnivorous reptilian."

"What does that mean?"

"This horn contains cells that absorb light and..." he shrugged. "Convert it to energy, I suppose. And if the creature it came from had those cells all over its body, it could conceivably be dormant during the long nights and during the long days..."

"What?"

"I imagine it would awaken quite hungry."

~

I ran down corridors painted a soothing gray, running hunched over along the wall of one segment that had been twisted and crumpled during the crash. Alongside the shuttle docking bay and a line of storage bays was the Far Corps com room. Our old quarters were here as well, segregated from the general population during the flight. It made sense. We could be a rough bunch.

I thought of the creature I had taken the horn fragment from. I had begun thinking of it as Shatterhorn in my mind. Teacher taught me that. Name your enemies even in the heat of battle, and you won't loose track of them. A dozen faceless men were harder to account for than Fat Man and Bleeding Shoulder and Cracked Faceplate.

I thought of Shatterhorn. There had been something so unsettling about the way his head was cocked at the end of that long neck, those avian eyes turned up to the sky. Shatterhorn was no dumb animal. He had known what was coming.

Fifteen Far Corpsmen were standing in the orange glow of central com. I hadn't seen these men and women ever look this tense, not even when we came in for a crash landing. Twenty-three of us had survived the crash.

"What's happening?"

Most of them looked at me and looked away, since many of them saw me as a child. I had been born when they were in their prime, and now they were well into middle age.

Ballisteros was sitting at the com. He wasn't wearing his prosthetic lens. He said it gave him headaches. In the harsh orange glow of the com his missing eye was a ragged crater of scar tissue in a face twisted with frustrated rage. He looked like he could go mano-a-mano with the Turner's all-powerful God.

I edged closer. "Sergeant?"

He was holding an earpiece to one ear. With his free hand he held a finger to his lips, shushing me. Until then, I never would have imagined him capable of such a gentle gesture.

I looked up at the single large monitor on one wall. It was divided into eight segments, some of them already dark. Other feeds from the helmet cams topside showed flashes of sunlight and arms and legs and blue steel blurs.

Another picture went dark. The cameras were cheap things, and usually the first thing to go in a patrol suit.

Ballisteros closed his one good eye and lowered his head. Then he reached up and yanked the earpiece jack out of the com console. The speakers set high on each wall erupted with noise.

There was a mixed roar that was high-pitched and rumbling.

"Fuck!" somebody said.

"What was that?"

"Sounds like a lion trying to imitate a pig."

Ballisteros released a rumble of his own. "Quiet, people."

We Far Corpsmen shut our mouths.

And listened to what came out of the speakers.

"...falling back, falling back..."

A jumble of voices were fading in and out. Shouts, mutters, screams, and roars.

"We're falling back, Sarge." That was Burgundy. The picture from his cam was rolling and distorted. He sounded like he was still in control, but when he wasn't speaking his breath came very fast, faster than when he had been on top of me, not so long ago.

I could hear the quick put-put-put of rifles firing on semi-auto. It was such a little sound, I thought, knowing the devastation those depleted uranium shells could cause.

"Falling back, falling— Ruvier! Your back!"

There was another squeal and rumble and a man screamed.

"Muthafucka muthafucka muthafucka!" That was Barone. Each curse was punctuated by a gunshot. Barone had lost most of his digestive system to an acid grenade. When the rest of us were in the mess hall eating chow, he stayed in his bunk, injecting a thick, nutritious paste into a metal fitting on his scarred abdomen.

There was a lull, and then Barone whispered. "Three shots, corporal. Three shots, Burg. Two in the chest and one in the head. Don't these fuckin things have hearts or brain—"

There was a squealing roar and a thud and a cacophony of shots. For some reason I suddenly thought that this horror should be happening in the dark of night, not of a fresh and sunny morning.

Finally, Burgundy spoke again. His voice was choppy. He was running. "Men down... Barone, Ruvier, Sheih, and Long River. Tippins is in bad shape. I don't know what happened to Shennelwort. These things are everywhere, Sarge. We only killed four of them. Four! Tippins and I are heading for the path down into the rift."

His camera transmitted images of a jumping landscape.

For the first time, Ballisteros spoke. "You can't do that, son."

The speakers emitted white noise, broken by harsh breathing and nearby squealing roars.

"—the fuck? Fuck that shit man, I say fuck that fuckin—"

That was Tippins. Everybody called her Black Diamond because she was unbreakable. She was in full-blown panic now. Her helmet cam was dead, but her voice was coming through loud and clear.

Burgundy cleared his throat. "Sarge?" Burgundy knew. I could tell by his voice that the Corpsman part of him knew what the Sergeant was saying, but the part of him that wanted to live had to ask. "Can you repeat that?"

Ballisteros spoke softly, his voice rumbling like an engine on the other side of a steel wall. "Whatever those things are, you can't lead them back here, Burgundy. Lots of women and children down here, son."

There was a long silence. Huddled in the safety of the Hopeful very one of us wished we were topside right now. We could hear ragged breathing, and those roars that sounded so much like sounds of rage, drawing closer.

"Tippens, turn off your com."

"No, Burg, fuck that, FUCK THAT!"

"Tippens."

"Okay," Tippens said. "Sarge, don't let this be a motherfuckin waste now. You circle the wagons and get ready, cause if these things find you, you got a hell of a fight comin." There was a tiny click.

Now we could only hear Burgundy breathing. "Hey, Nao," he whispered. "Thanks... for before."

As he clicked off his com, everyone looked at me.

After about a minute Ballisteros opened his mouth. "All right, soldiers. We—"

With a dry snap a com clicked on and a patch on the big monitor lit up. Someone was screaming. We saw the edge of the rift, and the trail leading down.

"I'm almost there! I'm almost at the edge of the path! Get ready for me cause I'm almost—"

The speakers transmitted a crunching, choking sound and someone whispered, "Fucking Shennelwort."

Jagged white shapes filled the picture from Shennelwort's helmet cam.

Jenny Allunga pointed at the monitor. "Are... are those teeth?"

There was a buckling crunch. The monitor went black. We could all imagine Shennelwort's faceplate shattering.

Just before the sound of breaking bones filled the room and Ballisteros switched off the com, we heard snuffling, like a dog testing the wind for a scent.

~

We hustled out of the com room and went to the armory, a storage closet filled with weapons, where we grabbed battlebags and filled them with loaded magazines for our rifles. Ballisteros grabbed a four-shot rocket tube and then raised the dusty cover of a wall-mounted emergency alarm and slammed his fist against the flat button. For the first time the ship was filled with rise and fall of the alarm.

As we went down the corridor to the nearest exit, Turners jumped out of our way, some of them covering their eyes when they saw our weaponry, as if we were carrying something obscene.

We filed out of the Hopeful and stood looking up at the edge of the rift. Since we had been off duty, all of us were wearing our casual zips.

"Shiina and Allunga stay with me," Ballisteros said. "The rest of you get suited up."

I kept my eyes on the ridge above us, trying not to think of the protection my suit offered. I was wearing a thin layer of cotton and rubber soled shoes.

Ballisteros set down the rocket tube and raised a rangeviewer to his good eye. "Don't worry, you two. If those fucking geckoes come down here I don't think patrol suits will make much of a difference."

"Way to reassure a girl, Sarge," I said.

Ballisteros looked at me a moment as if he wanted to say more, glanced at Jenny, and then went back to watching the ridge through the rangeviewer.

"Turner's Christ," he said. "Here they come."

I set my battlebag and rifle on the ground. Among the confusion of magazines were a burn pistol and a rangeviewer. I held the device to my eyes and scanned the ridge.

The stone-hard dusty dragons we had seen topside were now coming down the steep path in single file. They were dark blue and supple, and they moved like intelligent lizards, testing their footing as the descended. They had skin like armor plating, jaws two feet long, sharp snout horns, and strong legs that ended in thick claws.

When I turned to Ballisteros he had the rocket tube on one shoulder. He looked through the sight and said, "This is what happens when you piss off mammals."

A missile leaped away from the rocket tube on a streak of white vapor. The trail was a series of old ledges winding down into the rift. The missile struck one of the ledges. We saw rocky debris and a cloud of dirt rise up into the air and heard the concussion a moment later. Two of the dragons were blown apart. Two fell a long way, striking jumbled rock above the river.

I looked up. The long line of dragons continued to move. When they came to the damaged ledge they would pause, sniff the air, and then jump the gap.

"I count twenty," Allunga said, looking through her own rangeviewer.

I saw movement in the distance and used my viewer. One of the fallen dragons was thrashing as if it had a broken back. The other was slowly crawling across tumbled rock toward the Hopeful.

Three Corpsmen in patrol suits ran to meet it, firing their rifles. When they got closer the slow-moving dragon leaped onto one of them. Rifle shots echoed up and down the rift.

When the dragon finally stopped moving, only two Corpmen were standing.

Ballisteros looked grim. "One hundred and fifteen shots," he said. "Just to take down one of those things. An injured one."

He looked over his shoulder. Inside one of the access ports he could see Turners peering out of the shadows. He shook his head.

I looked back and thought I saw Orem in the gloom.

The suited-up Far Corpsmen assembled before Ballisteros. One of them was Greenfield. He was covered in dragon blood. He had been one of the two shooting the fallen dragon. His face was as white as snow.

The sun was still at an angle, not yet over the rift. The dragons were still making their way down the trail on the sunny side of the rift. They would be here in minutes.

If only it was night, I thought, looking back at the virtually helpless Turners peeking out from the shadows of the Hopeful. And they were the brave ones. The rest of them were probably cowering in the dark.

Ballisteros began deploying a defensive line. I saw him point at me, but I didn't hear a thing he said.

Shadows, I thought.

"They don't come into the rifts because of the shadows," I said.

Ballisteros frowned at me.

"They can't function in the dark."

"It's fuckin daytime, little girl," Greenfield said.

Peering through her rangeviewer, Allunga gasped. "There is another group of those things gathering up top."

I raised a hand, pointing at the opposite side of the rift. "Yes, but the sun is still rising. If we can—"

Ballisteros grabbed my wrist and squeezed, hard. God damn me, he was strong for an old man.

"Join the line, Shiina."

"Sarge, think about it. These things were dead in the night and—"

"And we have an enemy force approaching our position. Join the line, Corpsman!"

I turned and ran for the ship.

Ballisteros shouted, "This isn't a game!"

I looked back and saw him deploying the mercenaries in two lines of seven.

The first of the dragons had reached the bottom of the rift and was galloping toward us with frightening speed.

I ran inside the ship.

Scattershot weapons fire from outside sounded distant and weak.

~

"We've got to keep everyone inside the Hopeful," I said, after finding Orem in the relative dark of the ship interior. "Shut down all the lights. Those things out there can't operate in the dark."

Orem shook his head. "And then what, Nao? We hold out until dark and... what? Try and destroy them? Run from the rift? You said they were like stone—"

"We could use explosives to blow the fuckers to pieces."

"And if more come, what then? Cower in here until our food runs out? Try to outrun them topside? What—"

"Turners seem to be authorities on cowering and running," I said. "Are you going to eat, or be eaten, you fucking spineless—"

Orem slapped me, hard. It was so unexpected I reeled backwards, and he was already grabbing me and holding me like a mother with a child.

"I'm sorry, Nao. God forgive me, for I have sinned."

I looked him in the eye and smiled, tasting blood from a split lip.

"So you can fight after all," I said.

Orem hung his head, ashamed. "What now?"

I told Orem that all of the Turners should seal themselves behind locking doors. When he passed on that order I grabbed his hand and led him through the ship to the animal bays. When we reached the little cheese farm, I took my burn pistol from my holster and grabbed a tether. I chased down one of twenty plump goats and put the tether around its neck.

Orem gave me a look that verged on disgust. "What are you going to do to this poor creature?"

"It's time we gave your God a sacrifice," I said, leading Orem and the goat outside.

When we stepped out of the ship I kept my eyes of the shadowed side of the rift. In the corner of my eye I could see the Far Corps firing their rifles furiously at the advancing creatures, and I was proud of them. I was also certain they were all going to die.

"My God," Orem said, "Those things..."

"Shut up," I said, picking up the rocket tube and tossing it to him. "Carry this."

We ran down to the riverbank and I pointed my burn pistol at the goat's flank and fired, angling the pistol to create a wide, bleeding wound instead of a small cauterized hole.

The animal let out a bleating cry and I saw more than one dragon head turn our way.

We ran to a shallow part of the river and waded across, and then started up the gentle slope to the trees lying in shadow. I dragged the goat as it weakened, leaving a trail of blood behind.

"This is ridiculous," Orem said. "Those things probably see your fellow soldiers as fresh meat. Why would they follow us?"

"Because," I said. "I saw parts of the last attack. They killed Corpsmen, but they didn't eat them. Maybe we taste bad. They have to eat something though, and since they don't know how many goats we have I'm hoping—"

I started pulling the goat along as fast as I could. Orem looked over his shoulder and let out a squeak. I swore that if we lived through this I would tease him about making that unmanly sound until his dying day.

At least forty dragons had veered in our direction and were splashing across the river.

We ran across loamy soil and entered the trees. The forest growth was a thick band of vegetation only a few hundred meters thick, up and down the length of the rift valley.

When we were clear of the trees, we started entering an area of heavy shadows. Above us was the rift wall, jutting ledges of rock. Fifty meters away was a small hollow of rock that looked as solid as granite. Shelter.

The sun was still moving, and the shadows under this part of the rift wall were receding faster than I had expected. I was counting on them to keep the dragons at bay.

The goat was staggering and sluggish, and I let go of the tether.

From across the river I heard a Corpsman let out a horrifying scream.

I raised the rocket tube and aimed at a part of the rift wall that looked dry, untouched by runoff from the rains. I remembered what Orem had said earlier, about the ledges holding lots of old dust.

I fired the three remaining rockets up into the rift wall, pulverizing a lot of rock, but not all of it.

I turned to grab Orem and saw that he was kneeling by the dying goat.

"God damn me," I said, hearing a growing rumble above and roars and the furious snapping of branches in the trees below.

I grabbed Orem's arm and dragged him just as I had dragged the goat.

Dragons burst out of the trees and paused, looking upward with their avian eyes.

A stone hit my shoulder and another bounced off of Orem's stupid goat-loving head. I threw him into the rock hollow and rolled in after him. The world was obscured by dust and falling rock.

When the last fragment of the rift wall fell, I looked out into a gray world. The dragons were covered in dust and moving slowly.

A small group of bloody, beaten and beautiful Far Corpsmen came out of the trees and began systematically shooting the dragons with round after round until the creatures dropped dead.

I heard the gruff voice of Sergeant Ballisteros and laughed out loud.

"The hump! Shoot the hump! It's either a brain or a heart under there!"

"Who gives a donkeyshow fuck what it is!" That was Greenfield, and I was amazed at the joy I felt when I realized he was alive. "Just fill those fuckin humps with the heavy stuff!"

Orem reached out to hug me like the softie he was, when I noticed one of the dragons slinking through the trees. He dragon had only one horn rising from its snout. Shatterhorn.

The dragon wasn't trying to hide. It wasn't running away from the remaining Corpsmen. It was edging around them. It was heading for the river, over which a hanging shroud of dust moved toward the fighting dragons on the far side.

I thought of how good it felt the first time I bathed in the cool water, naked under the sun.

"Turner's Christ," I moaned, not realizing I had picked up the Sergeant's favorite epithet.

Shatterhorn was going to wash himself off in the river.

I caught up with him just as he was stumbling to the water, his great clawed feet kicking up sprays of water. I realized I was only carrying my burn pistol.

I didn't want to do this.

My teacher would have done this. My mother would have done this.

I jumped onto the dragon's back and fired the pistol, burning through the hump on his back. The dragon surged ahead into deep water, and then reared up. The world spun around me. I saw a long line of dragons standing motionless and watching from the trail high above the shifting cloud of dust.

Shatterhorn fell to one side. I was swept off of him by the water and felt a tearing pain in one shoulder. After that, all was darkness, until I woke up inside the ship, in the infirmary.

~

I learned later that Shatterhorn had swiped me with his claws just before the water carried me away.

Half of the Far Corps were dead or mortally wounded. Those still living converged on Shatterhorn and shot him down.

Ballisteros told me the dragon had reared up one last time and let out a roar directed up at the others on the trail leading down into the rift. After that, the creatures on the trail had turned around and gone back the way they had come.

Greenfield had jumped into the river and pulled me out, even though he was a mass of injuries. He even gave me mouth to mouth, the bastard.

I spent a month in a bed inside the Hopeful, healing. Orem visited from time to time, wary of me. He would babble excitedly about the dissections he planned for the dragons, but wouldn't come too close.

"Don't dissect Shatterhorn," I said. "Just bury him. You have enough other carcasses to play with."

When he asked my why I would make such a bizarre request, my answer was simple.

"The beast fought well," I said. I knew the Far Corps would understand.

When I was well enough, I went to the library. I could have asked Orem or Ballisteros to look for what I needed, but I didn't want to alarm anyone. I had to be sure.

After some searching I found the video archive of images caught by the hull cameras as the Hopeful had been coming in for her crash landing. There were pink and gold clouds all around the ship. Then the Hopeful shuddered, and began a fast descent toward the rift we now called home.

I waited for the moment just before the ship entered the rift. I froze the image from one particular hull camera and enlarged it. The picture on the monitor showed the western plain from a height of a few hundred meters.

On the horizon a dust storm was sweeping toward us, the storm that came before every long night. In the middle distance were fields of blue. I enhanced the image as best I could, and then simply stared. The plain was covered with thousands of dragons moving in herds, like the buffalo of old Earth.

A final count showed we had killed eighty-one of them so far. We had lost half of the Far Corps, who had either died during the fight or soon afterward from the injuries they had received. They were buried as heroes.

Sooner or later, more dragons would come for us, and there might be more of them as intelligent as the one with the shattered horn.

The Turners were going to have to learn how to fight.

There were long days ahead.

---

- VS -

---

Entry 2

Jonathan Brennan sat back in his Seattle hotel bed, wondering if he should switch on the television. "Watching hotel TV seems so depressing, even if it's porn," he thought, deciding against it.

He stretched himself out on top of the queen-size comforter and wiggled his fingers slowly above his head. He then outstretched his arms on the bed and exhaled, imagining that he and the bed were one large, sedentary creature.

He glanced at the time, a quarter to nine at night. He thought to himself, "Sam hasn't called yet."

He closed his eyes. The phone rang. In the middle of the fourth ring, he picked it up. "Hello?"

"Jon? It's Sam!"

Jonathan imagined Sam sitting at his desk in New York with two mugs of coffee and an Internet browser window open to a pornography site. "Hey Sam."

"Hey buddy!"

Jonathan pictured his business partner rubbing himself in anticipation of exploring the pornography site. He hoped that the conversation wouldn't last long.

Jonathan said, "Hey. I made it in okay and we're still on schedule for tomorrow."

Sam said, "That's great, dude!" Jonathan rolled his eyes. He wished that Sam would stop calling him "dude." It should've ended when they had graduated high school together twenty years prior.

Sam continued, "This is going to be it, man. We're going to be fucking rollin' in it. New fuckin' houses, new cars . . .shit, do you realize that we'll probably be able to buy places in that new Wilton development in Connecticut? We can be the guys that guys like us used to work for! It's gonna fuckin' rock!"

Jonathan winced, wondering again what was on his hotel's cable channels. "Yeah," he said quietly, "It'll be great."

"Hell man, you'll be able to buy Nicole any college education she wants!"

Jonathan disliked it when Sam talked about Jonathan's family, and especially his daughter Nicole. Was it Jonathan's imagination that Sam's stare always seemed to linger on the 13-year-old a little longer each time he came over to visit?

"Well," Jonathan replied, "She's sharp. She'll be fine."

"Dude, you sound tired."

Without thinking, Jonathan replied, "I'm probably jetlagged. I'll call you tomorrow after the meeting."

"Before, man! Call me before the meeting so we can go over all of our shit, okay?"

"Fine."

Sam said, "Good night, dude," but Jonathan didn't hear it. He had hung up the phone and had gone back to breathing slowly on the bed. He smelled the room. Its aroma reminded him of something long since passed. He looked to the left and sighed as his eyes caught his business presentation sitting on a small desk.

Jonathan Brennan and Sam Rotali, friends since junior high school, had started the Brentali Corporation. They programmed and sold software solutions to the food service industry. Capitalizing on the Y2K scare and an intuitive user interface, their business had enjoyed modest prosperity in the northeastern United States. They had sold software packages to numerous independent franchises, and it wasn't long before major fast food chains took an interest. When a multinational client called with a serious offer, Jonathan flew out to Seattle to discuss Brentali's offerings with its executives.

Jonathan sighed again. He tried to figure out what it was that so annoyed him about his planned business presentation. From there, he wondered what it was that so annoyed him about Sam, Nicole, and his wife, Jessica. Then, he wondered what it was that so annoyed him about himself.

"How are you?" he asked out loud.

"Crappy," he said, "I'm 38 and I'm still talking to myself. Out loud for Christ's sake."

"Oh, whatever. You're allowed. It's been a long day."

Jonathan tried imagining what a short day would be like. In three minutes of thought, he realized that he was riding the crest of 20 years' worth of long days.

"Fuck, really?" he asked himself.

"Do you remember," his voice dropped low, "The smell of Jessica's vagina?"

He chuckled to himself, allowing the memories of their first month together to pour before his eyes like a foggy paint. The college dorm. The roommate. The train. The flowers. The flowers. The flowers . . .

He looked down to find that his right hand had strayed to his crotch. He smiled and a warm wave of self-pity flowed from his gut to his groin to his forehead, which throbbed slightly.

He moved his hand away and closed his eyes. When he next opened them, it was 8AM.

He felt himself in his clothes from the day before, shifted slightly, and groaned. He was reminded of how much he hated sleeping in his clothes. The sun came through the half-open window blinds and he held up his hand to block it. He pulled himself out of bed.

Jonathan removed his clothes and stepped into the bathroom. He turned on the shower, then turned around and twisted the sink taps. Bowing before the mirror like a holy ritual gone stale, he splashed lukewarm water on his face, wiped his eyes with the back of his hands, and stared into the mirror.

Nothing looked back.

He squinted at his non-reflection. There was the sink, the towel, the shower, and the bathroom door in an otherwise empty room. For a moment, he thought, "This would make a good photo," but shoveled panic onto any further creative thoughts.

He wasn't in the mirror.

"What the fuck?" he asked out loud. He pressed his fingers to the mirror, closed his eyes, and shook his head. He opened his eyes. Nothing looked back. He looked at his hands and down at his body. Everything was clear and visible. Was it a dream? It had to be. He pinched and slapped himself, momentarily wincing not at the pain, but at the sound of hand against flesh. Still, his senses did not deceive him, and he was very much awake.

Jonathan's mind became curiously bare, as if he couldn't focus on the sudden turn of events. Should I go back to bed? Do I have a tumor? Am I dead?

He looked out of the bathroom and back at the bed, half-expecting to see his corpse resting peacefully in yesterday's clothes. The bed was bare. He looked at the window, wondering if he had jumped out of it in his sleep. He pinched his nose, he blinked hard, and he bit his tongue.

He sat down on the bed, picked up the phone, and dialed 911.

"911 operator, what's your emergency?"

Jonathan realized that he should have planned a better description for his symptoms. "I'm having some sort of weird . . .thing happening. I feel okay, but it's just that I . . . I . . ."

"Calm down sir," the operator said before Jonathan even realized that he wasn't calm, "What's the matter?"

Jonathan spoke slower. "I was in the bathroom, and now . . ." He stood up and examined himself in a small mirror on the bedroom wall. He wasn't there.

"Oh God!" he turned away and shut his eyes tightly. He felt lightheaded. Was it a tumor? "Send someone over here! Something's wrong with me!"

An ambulance and a police car arrived. Two paramedics entered Jonathan's room to find him pacing back and forth, wrapped in a white bed sheet. "Can you see me?" he asked, out of breath, "Can you see me? Can you?"

The paramedics looked at each other. The larger and darker of the two said, "Calm down, sir. We can see you just fine. What's wrong?"

"You can see me?" Jonathan asked quickly, then turned to the mirror. "Then look! There! Look in the mirror!"

The paramedics looked and the police officer entered the room.

"Holy shit," the large EMT said, "I can't see you in the mirror!"

"Me neither!" agreed his partner, a small young woman.

The police officer looked in the mirror without a word. He saw himself and the two paramedics, but no Jonathan.

"Holy shit," the cop said, "Like a fucking vampire."

Jonathan's heart beat loudly enough for him to hear. His legs wobbled and the large paramedic caught him as he fell towards the floor.

"What's wrong with me? What's wrong with me?" Jonathan wheezed.

The cop whispered some unintelligible words into his radio. He looked around the room. The paramedics sat Jonathan down on his bed and performed a short, routine physical examination.

"You seem fine . . .perfectly fine," the young paramedic said, "Is your only symptom not being able to see your reflection?"

Jonathan snapped, "That's a pretty big fucking symptom, don't you think?"

"Easy, man," the officer said, "Take it easy."

The paramedics began packing up their equipment. The short paramedic said, "Well, if there's nothing physically wrong with you then we can't do too much."

The big EMT nodded. "I'm sure it's just a temporary thing."

Jonathan protested, "But I can't see my own reflection! I'm not a vampire or anything stupid like that! What the hell is wrong with me?"

The cop had left when no one had been looking. Indeed, even the paramedics looked uncomfortable and seemed in a hurry to leave.

The smaller one said, "You'll be fine. Just so long as other people can see you, right?"

Before Jonathan knew it, they were gone.

********************************************

"Nobody likes me at school. I wish you'd just send me to Westfield Junior High. Jenna said that I'd love it there."

Jonathan switched off the television and gave his 11-year-old daughter a small smile. Nicole stood tall and beautiful at an ecotone of youth and adolescence. Her dark sapphire eyes were framed in pale red pools. She had been crying again. Jonathan had his usual thought. "I can't believe I made something that can breathe, smile, and cry."

"Sunshine," he sat back, remembering how warm she had been when she sat on his lap years ago, "I know that it's rough now. I had a really tough time in school, too. At least you've never gotten beaten up," he said, realizing that it was the wrong thing to say.

He pictured her on his lap again, wanting nothing more than to make everything better and to make her smile. "Sunshine, your mother and I want you to be happy."

"So why won't you send me to Westfield? Jenna goes there! I know I'd make a lot of friends and be happier! I hate it at Sacred Heart!"

Jonathan instantly thought of the Virgin Mary and wondered when Nicole would lose her virginity. He closed his eyes.

"Sunshine, you're getting a much better education at Sacred Heart. It'll really help you come college time."

"I don't care about college time! I care about right now! I hate it there so much, and going back there every day is making me hate it and you and Mom more and more!"

Her nostrils flared. Jonathan glanced down, hoping that she couldn't smell his shame.

"Sunshine, what do you think the kids at Sacred Heart see when they look at you?"

Nicole wrinkled her nose and said, "Some dumb loser girl who's taller than everyone else and gets yelled at by the teachers all the time."

"And what do you see? When you look at yourself? Do you see the same thing?"

Nicole rolled her eyes. "I don't want another psychologist. I want a goddamn father."

Jonathan thought for a moment. What reply would be the most loving? What would put his indescribable feelings into describable words?

Jessica, who had overheard from the kitchen, stormed in and sent Nicole to her room.

"Honestly, you just sit there and let her talk to you like that?"

********************************************

The paramedics and police were gone. Had it been a dream? Did he even call them in the first place? Of course he had. What was happening?

It was 8:45. He had to leave in fifteen minutes. He had to leave in fifteen minutes and he hadn't showered, shaved, or seen himself in the mirror at all.

Bleeding from two minor shaving cuts, he left the hotel room. While sitting in the town car that the company executives had sent for him, he thought about The Battle of the Aleutian Islands, the last military conflict between sovereign nations to be fought on American soil. He had wondered, had there not been another since then? Something about Vietnam, but the Vietnamese never landed in the U.S. That couldn't be it.

He checked himself in a small mirror in the back of the car. He still couldn't see himself. The town car arrived at its destination in downtown Seattle.

With two small (now hardened) cuts on his face, he entered the corporate offices and was ushered before a boardroom of six suits, each of which stood next to each other in size order. Jonathan was reminded of a childhood game and, for a moment, wondered if the executives had ever tried stacking each other vertically in size order.

"Have a seat, Mr. Brennan," a member of the collective offered. Jonathan sat down.

Throughout his presentation, he hoped that his physical appearance hadn't suffered as a result of his inability to use a mirror that morning. He sporadically wondered if the six-member corporate collective traveled together as a group, interlocking together to roll from place to place.

He sat down after nine minutes. They asked him to sit outside. After five more minutes, they called him back to the boardroom.

"We'll buy 600 units to start on a trial basis. If it works for us, we'll scale it up next year."

A multi-millionaire in two sentences. Sam would be so happy.

They asked, "How soon can we have it?"

"We'll ship it by week's end," Jonathan said. His face itched.

"Great. We'll phone accounting and transfer the funds to whichever account you specify."

Six handshakes, some thank-yous, and a trip to accounting later, Jonathan walked out of the building where the town car was waiting for him. He climbed in and his cell phone rang.

"What the fuck, dude? You were supposed to call me before the meeting! Before, remember? I said before!"

Jonathan said, "We sold 550 more than projected. The money's in my account, but I'll transfer your half when I get back to New York."

Sam whispered, "We sold 600? Are you shitting me?"

Jonathan waited a moment before replying, delighting in Sam's short-lived disbelief. "We sold 600."

Jonathan heard the sound of Sam throwing everything off of his desk, including his new computer. Then, the unmistakable sounds of someone dancing on a desk came over the phone.

"Fuck yeah! We did it! We've broken in! Fuck yeah!"

Jonathan held the phone away from his ear. He glanced out of the window as the car turned onto Elm Street and passed a used auto dealership. Then, he imagined Sam urinating all over the office in crazed celebration.

"We're fucking millionaires, dude! We fucking did it! We have to call everybody! The high school reunion's next month and I didn't want to go but now we can throw all this shit right in their fucking faces! Remember how we always wanted to do that?"

Jonathan thought to himself, "You always wanted to do that. I never minded going, mainly to see how the bullies had grown up."

He closed his phone while Sam was still ranting and raving about something. Was it something about Nicole? He checked his reflection again. He still wasn't there.

Once back in his hotel room, he packed his bag and checked his airline tickets. Northwest flight 534, direct to New York. 3PM. Hotel checkout time was noon. He looked at the room clock, which read 11:49AM.

Perfect. Clockwork. Everything.

He checked out and climbed into a taxi.

"Where to?"

He had planned to say, "SeaTac Airport, please."

He had wanted to say, "SeaTac Airport, please."

Sam, Jessica, and Nicole all poked his shoulder at once. "Tell the man, 'SeaTac Airport, please.'"

"Elm street, please."

"Where on Elm?"

"I don't know the address. I'll tell you when we get close."

Jonathan disembarked at the used car dealership. He went inside and a young, blonde man in a suit stood up from behind a small desk and shook his hand.

"Can I help you, sir? I'm Marcus."

Jonathan smiled at the firm handshake. "Hi Marcus. I'd like a van."

Marcus said, "Then I have what you're looking for. Right this way."

Marcus led Jonathan to a dark blue, 1995 Dodge Ram van. "This one just passed inspection. It only has about 110 on it. The last owner was a contractor who broke both of his legs on a job. He's working at a stationary store, now."

"As what? A paperweight?"

Marcus laughed, perhaps a bit too hard. "Ha ha ha! That's a good one."

"I'll take it."

I-90 east. Windows down. The iPod blasted "Jessica" by The Allman Brothers over the stereo.

Jonathan's eyes moistened. He sobbed twice, then punched his hand out of the window, up towards the overcast skies.

"Woo!" he screamed.

As he drew his arm inside, he noted in the side view mirror that he still couldn't see his reflection. An instant later, "Ramblin' Man" poured out of the speakers. He yelled the lyrics as loudly as he could, banging on the steering wheel with each beat. For the moment, any care about his reflection washed away like sand on a pacific beach. Like wind through the High Cascade Mountains.

"Hey honey," Jonathan said to his home answering machine, "The meeting went well. I'm driving back instead of flying. If there's anything you want me to pick up, let me know—"

Someone in a red Mitsubishi Eclipse cut him off on the road.

Jonathan hit the horn. "Watch it, you mother fucker!" he continued on the phone, "Give Nicole a hug for me, and call if there's anything else."

He paused. "I love you. Bye." He closed the phone.

He took a detour to visit a trucking museum just outside of Idaho. "How many people come to see this place?" he asked the woman behind the front desk.

"You're the third one this week," she said, "An elderly couple came in yesterday."

Jonathan wondered if he'd ever take Jessica to that museum.

He pulled into the Pine Dash Motor Inn in Boise, Idaho that night. The girl behind the front desk asked him, "In town for business?"

"Nope," Jonathan grinned back, "Pleasure."

The girl chuckled. "That's rare. No one comes to Boise for fun."

"Well, I work back in New York but I just wanted to see the country. Any suggestions?"

The girl thought. "Well, if you like national parks, then Lucky Peak State Park isn't too far from here. If you really want to see the country though, stay off the interstate. Everyone thinks that they're going to see America by zipping by at 90, but that's how you miss the best stuff. I think so, anyway."

Jonathan smiled. "That's good advice. What's your name?"

"Leah. I'm going to set you up in room 110. I'm just going to go see if it's ready for you."

She walked away and returned a minute later with a keycard. When Jonathan entered his room, he found an extra welcome mint on his pillow.

When he checked out the next morning, he asked the new front desk attendant, "Is Leah around?"

She replied, "Sorry sir, she does the overnight shift."

"Please make sure that she receives this." Jonathan passed her a sealed envelope that had, "Leah," written upon it. In it was a $100 bill.

With Boise behind him and America's "Ventura Highway" on the stereo, Jonathan welcomed the first sunlight he had seen in days. He thought about Leah, and realized that he would have propositioned her if he hadn't been married. Then, he started thinking about other things that he usually stopped himself from doing.

He thought, "Is it really just laws that protect society from chaos? Is it just the threat of being caught and imprisoned that stops people from stealing and killing? What if there were no police? What then?" He thought about an old political comic he saw about someone saying, "You can take my gun when you pry it out of my cold, dead fingers!" and smiled.

He followed route 20 to 26 and then 191 into Jackson, Wyoming, just south of Yellowstone National Park. He parked outside of the Alpine Junction Bar and sat inside on a stool. He ordered a beer and sat back, enjoying the smoky air and the low murmur of the bar patrons.

He closed his eyes. "If there's a Heaven, I hope that it's just like this," he thought.

"A dingy bar in Jackson?" he asked back, "Are you serious?"

A young man who couldn't have been older than 18 entered the bar and sat a few stools down from Jonathan. The bartender said, "I need to see some ID, Teddy."

Teddy smiled and leaned across the bar, patting the bartender on the back. "How's it going, Rich? Haven't seen you at the games. You'd better be there tomorrow. It's a big one."

"One of my guys left me, so I have to work here and watch the reruns on public access."

"Fuckin' A."

"The usual?"

"You know it."

Jonathan smiled, instantly taking a liking to the obviously underage man to his right. "Put it on my tab," he said.

The bartender said, "Teddy here's the star running back of the Jackson High School Jets. His are always on the house."

Jonathan turned to Teddy. "And how old are you?"

Teddy sniffed. "You a cop?"

"No. Just passing through."

"Wouldn't matter anyway." Teddy turned to his drink.

Jonathan asked, "How are you guys doing this year?"

"We're making state. No doubt." Teddy swigged down most of his beer.

"Where to after that?"

Teddy slammed his beer down on the counter. "Are you my fucking mom? I'm gonna go pro and get the fuck out of this dump. Another one, Rich. Put it on his tab," he stuck a thumb at Jonathan.

Jonathan smiled and finished his drink in silence. He left the bar and climbed back into the van. He reached a nearby turnoff for 189 north and south. North would take him up towards Montana, and he had always wanted to see Montana. South would take him closer to Denver, where he had an old college friend.

"South it is," he thought, and turned. A young girl crossing the street in front of him stopped in her tracks and stared at him through the headlights. Jonathan hit the brake and jumped out of the van.

The girl was holding her white top together, as if it had been torn. He left cheek was freshly bruised. She was shaking.

"Oh my God, are you okay?" Jonathan asked.

The girl's eyes flicked downward. "Y-yeah, I'm fine. I just have to go home."

"What happened? Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm okay. I'm just—"

"Can I give you a lift? I'll take you home."

She eyed him warily for a moment, then nodded. "I'm just so tired," she mumbled.

Once back in the van, she directed him to a small, rural neighborhood. He stopped the car outside of a white ranch-style house. He turned to her. "Will you be okay?"

"Yeah. When you're Teddy Grady's girlfriend, you don't have a choice, heh." Her eyes darted around again.

"Football team Teddy?" Jonathan asked.

"Duh. Who else? Heh."

"He did this to you?" he asked, wondering if she'd want to kiss him in exchange for his concern.

"I-I've gotta go. Thanks for the lift."

She jumped out of the van and Jonathan watched as she went into her house. He turned around and drove back to the bar. He stepped into the lot and picked up a wooden plank from a nearby discarded packing crate. He waited by the door.

When Teddy left, three friends accompanied him. Jonathan waited until they parted ways in the parking lot and Teddy walked over to his own car.

Jonathan grabbed the star player of the Jackson Jets from behind and dragged him to a shadowed area by an old fence.

"What the fuck—!" Teddy yelled.

Jonathan swung the plank with full force at Teddy's face. Teddy fell into the fence headfirst and collapsed to the ground facedown. He tried to pick himself up but Jonathan kicked at Teddy's stomach and hit his left shoulder with the plank.

Teddy convulsed and he vomited on himself as he rolled over and held his hands up, desperate to ward off another blow. Jonathan leaned over his adversary.

"If you lay a hand on your girlfriend again, I will break both of your fucking legs!"

Jonathan swung the plank onto Teddy's right thigh. The football player howled in pain.

Jonathan tossed the plank onto Teddy's quivering body and turned around. "Good luck making state, you son of a bitch!"

Jonathan jumped into the van and turned south to Colorado. Again, he punched his fist into the air and screamed triumphantly into the night.

********************************************

Inside the dorm's common room, Jessica placed the last of fifteen steaming pancakes onto a plate.

"I don't know what it is," she said, turning off the stove, "But I'm just so hungry tonight."

"I'll say," said Jonathan, sitting at the common room table, "Where are my pancakes?"

Jessica pursed her lips into a false frown. "Ha ha. You're having most of these. I won't be able to finish them."

"If I must," Jonathan looked around, "Do we have any syrup?"

"Robin has some in the fridge. We can kind of borrow it from her. It's been in there for a little while, anyway."

Jonathan stood up, slowly slid the wooden chair under the table, and sultrily approached Jessica. "Hey, baby," he whispered.

"Hey," she smiled.

He curled his arms around her waist and leaned close to her face. "Would you like to be my pancake tonight?"

Jessica raised her eyebrows and licked her lips. "Mmm. That sounds great. You might need a lot of syrup, if you're going to eat me all up."

Her breath on his lips was nearly too much to bear. He brushed her lips with his own. "Will Robin mind if we use her syrup to get all sticky and . . .roll around?" he kissed her lightly.

"Oh God," Jessica wrapped her arms tightly around Jonathan and hugged him tight. "I love you so much."

********************************************

"Jason doesn't live here anymore," a short, rotund landlady said in Denver, "He moved to Chicago."

Jonathan frowned. "Chicago? Do you have a forwarding address? He's a buddy of mine from college. We went to the University of Michigan together."

After a night in Denver and a night in Omaha, Jonathan rode into Chicago. He phoned Jason, who was working as a low-level investment banker. They met up for lunch at a café on West Roosevelt Road.

"Christ, man," Jason said, hugging his friend, "How the hell have you been?

"I'm fine. It's good to see you."

They sat down. Jason pointed to Jonathan's face. "You growing a beard? Looks good!"

"Heh. Well, it's a long story."

"What the hell are you doing out here, man? Last I heard you moved into a new house with Jessica and Nicole. How's everything going?"

"Everyone's fine. Nicole's in eighth grade and starting high school next year. Jessica's still teaching high school art. I started up a software company with a friend and we're doing all right with it. How are you?"

"That's great! I'm glad it's going well. As for me, I've been better. Work's okay, but I was just skipped over for a promotion and my mortgage rate's going up and I'm either going to have to give up eating lunches or sell the place and move even further away. Gas prices alone are enough to make me barely break even each week."

Jason paused, then smiled. "Sorry, man. Just venting. My girlfriend left me a month ago and both of my folks are in and out of hospitals. My brother's working on a nuclear submarine in California, and that leaves me with just about no one at the moment. I'm sorry. If you need a place to stay tonight then you're most welcome."

Jonathan said, "Thanks, and don't worry about venting. I'm glad I could be here for you. Hey! I know what'll cheer you up." Jonathan stood. "Follow me."

Jason gave his friend a look, then followed him to the bathroom. Half-seriously, he asked, "Uh, is this a gay thing? Because I saw your ass that one time in college, and since then I've never gotten it out of my—"

"Just shut up and get in here."

Jason looked over his shoulder and followed Jonathan into the one-person bathroom. Jonathan stood near the toilet, away from the sink. "Okay," he said, "Now look in the mirror."

Jason gave his friend a look, then gazed at himself in the mirror above the sink. Suddenly, a roll of toilet paper hovered right next to his face.

"What the fuck?" Jason yelled, jumping away, "What's going on?"

Jonathan laughed and dropped the toilet paper roll. "I'm sorry, man. I just wanted to freak you out. I don't reflect in mirrors anymore."

"What? You don't?"

"Nope." Jonathan jumped up and down, waving his arms in front of the empty mirror. "I woke up that way early this week. I feel fine, but I have no idea what the hell it is."

Jason looked in the mirror, then back at Jonathan several times. "Holy shit . . .you're like the invisible man!"

Jonathan said, "Only in mirrors, and I already considered a career in bank robbery. What's weird is that whatever I'm wearing becomes invisible, too."

Jason nodded, "Yeah, it's like some weird electromagnetic thing. How fucking bizarre." He looked at the mirror again and adjusted his hair. Then, he turned back to Jonathan. "Our waiter definitely thinks we're gay by now. Should be go back?"

After lunch, Jonathan passed on Jason's offer of staying overnight, preferring the rarity and bliss of solitude. They parted ways, exchanging promises to visit each other more often. As Jonathan walked down the crowded street, he thought, "My strange condition doesn't seem to bother anyone for long. It's almost as if they just accept it as something easily explained. The EMTs, the policeman, and even Jason . . .it's like they think it's weird, but then they just accept it and move on. I wonder what that means?"

He walked into a post office, wrote out a check for $200,000 to Jason, and mailed it.

Once back in the van, he pulled onto I-80 east. He called Jessica at home.

"Hello?" she answered, her voice strangely deep.

In his sweetest voice, Jonathan said, "Hey honey. It's me."

"Hey."

Something was wrong. "You don't sound so good. Is everything okay?"

"Not really."

Every possibility tore through Jonathan's head. "Is Nicole all right?"

"She's fine. She's at a friend's."

"Oh. What's wrong?" Jonathan felt a heavy weight steadily growing in his stomach.

"I'll tell you when you get home. When will you be here?"

"Um . . .a couple of days. Why don't you tell me now? I don't like surprises."

"I don't want to talk about it over the phone."

Jonathan raised his voice. "Then why bring it up at all? Why do I now have to spend the next two days worrying about what the hell is going on?"

"Don't yell at me, Jon. You practically disappear after a business trip and now you have the nerve to tell me—"

"I didn't disappear! I left you a message! You never called me back!"

"Whatever, Jon. We'll talk when you get back."

"Tell Nicole I—"

Jessica had hung up.

"I haven't really gotten trashed since this whole thing began," Jonathan said to himself, "Tonight, wherever I stop, I should change that."

That night, Jonathan pulled into the Oil City Hotel in Oil City, Pennsylvania. There was a small bar off of the lobby and he sat down, intent on drinking at least enough for a good buzz. After forty minutes of watching boxing on the bar television, a lone woman came downstairs and sat two stools away. She ordered a Long Island Iced Tea.

At first, Jonathan was too busy repeating the same conversation to himself over and over to notice her.

"Jessica probably cheated on you."

"No. She's probably just really hurt that you weren't more in touch with her this week."

"And cheated on you as a result."

"She wouldn't cheat on me."

"Yes she would."

"You're right."

The slightly overweight woman at the bar was staring at nothing in particular, apparently not a fan of boxing. She wore a long black skirt, long-sleeved gray blouse, and an open black, button-down sweater. Her face was pale, and her full head of shoulder-length strawberry blonde hair made her appear far younger than she probably was. "Likely a business traveler," Jonathan thought.

He glanced down at a dark red novelty cocktail napkin. In white letters, it read, "If time flies when you're having fun, then may all your days be short."

"Amen to that," the woman said. Jonathan looked up. She was looking at him. "Hi," she extended her hand, "I'm Sam."

"Sam?" Jonathan started, thinking about his business partner for the first time in days.

"Samantha," she said, and Jonathan shook her hand. "Business trip?" she asked.

"Sort of. Just traveling back to New York."

"I'm heading for Toledo. I'm a clerk for Marguilles Shipping and we just opened a satellite office there. We're based out of Baltimore."

Jonathan thought, "There's a whole 99% of the country that I haven't even seen on this trip. I'll have to do it again sometime. Maybe with a stop in Toledo, if this chance encounter leads to a torrid romance."

"Do you like your job?" Jonathan asked.

"Hate it," Samantha said, downing her drink, "I wanted to open up my own cruise line but a former friend screwed me out of a really great business deal. Now I track and ship commodities to national and international markets. Ooh!" she feigned enthusiasm. "What do you do?"

An hour of casual conversation and three drinks later, Samantha was barely able to support herself on her barstool. Jonathan paid both of their tabs.

"Can I escort you to your room?"

He helped Samantha to room 204 and paused awkwardly with her just outside. She leaned in to him, tilted her head down, and looked up at him with her eyes. "You want to come into my room."

Jonathan said nothing.

She leaned closer. "You want to fuck me."

Jonathan said nothing.

She tilted her mouth to a hair's distance from his lips. "I'm married and I have two kids."

Jonathan said nothing, and in the next moment, she was kissing him.

The next morning, he woke up in her bed. She was still asleep, her mouth barely open, her hair slightly fluttering with each breath.

He left his business card on her night table and left the hotel. Later that day, he finally arrived back home in New York. He glanced in his rearview mirror. He still wasn't there.

When he walked into his house, Jessica came up to him and he hugged her. She barely hugged him back. "What's wrong?" he asked.

They sat down in the living room and Jessica began, "Before you called me that first time, Sam called to tell me all about how much money you made in Seattle. I was so . . .hurt that you didn't tell me right afterwards . . .Sam came over with champagne and Nicole was over at a friend's house and we were drinking and he was talking about how different everything was going to be, and he was so excited and he talked about the Wilton development and, and, I, we, we just . . ."

She trailed off. Jonathan asked, "You just what?"

"Cut the crap, Jonathan! We fucked! We fucked in our bed! We fucked in Nicole's bed! We fucked in the kitchen, we fucked on the dining room table, and we fucked where you're sitting right now!" She buried her face in her hands and sobbed.

Jonathan thought about patting her leg, but he didn't. Then, he did. She took his hand and brought it to her lips, kissing it over and over, remembering the boy, the pancakes, and everything that was once wonderful.

"I'm just—oh God, Jonathan, I'm so sorry . . .you know that things haven't been going well between the two of us and I just . . .I'm just so sorry . . .I—"

Jonathan held his hand up. "Honey, it's okay. Sam was right. Things are going to be different. Things already have been different for the two of us for a while. I want you to be happy and—"

"But I don't want Sam! I don't want to marry him! You think I do?"

Jonathan looked away. "No, but I don't think that you want to be with me anymore, either. We'll make it a clean split without any fuss. For us and for Nicole. Easy, one-two-three."

He had imagined the words and the situation in his head scores of times. Still, hearing them outside of his imagination for the first time made them seem as fresh as flogging wounds. He wanted to blurt, "Why can't things go back to they way they used to be? Why can't we just have a great time together? What the hell happened to us?"

Jessica was thinking the same things.

Jonathan stood up and smiled down at Jessica. She stood up and followed him to the door. He turned around. "Well, I'll be back or I'll send for my things. We'll figure it all out."

"Yeah, we will. Oh, Jonathan—"

"What?"

"Well, there's no way to really . . .um, well, the money that you just got from the big sale, I . . .um, well, since we're getting divorced, I think I'm, you know, kind of . . .entitled to . . ."

Jonathan said, "Don't worry, honey." He caressed her face with his hand, "You'll get what's coming to you."

She smiled and hugged him. "Thank you. I want this to be clean and easy, too. You have a place to stay?"

"Yes. Don't worry about me."

That night, Jonathan set up his van as a temporary bedroom. His cell phone rang.

"Hello?"

A man's voice said, "Jonathan? Oh my God . . .I don't—" the man started crying.

"Jason?"

"W-why did you do this for me? I can't accept—you're a fucking angel on Earth! You're . . .I-I love you for doing this. It's the nicest thing that anyone . . ." he started crying again.

"It was nothing. You were always a good friend. Right now though, I need your banking and accounting expertise."

"Anything. Name it."

Someone called on Jonathan's call waiting. It was Sam. He ignored it.

"I need to empty my account completely and set up a quick trust fund for my daughter. I'm going to be living off the grid for a while."

Jonathan looked in the rear view mirror.

A smiling, bearded man looked back.

---

Entry 1:
  Bigmike
  Bubba2341
  Confuzitron
  Coyote
  darko
  domenad
  EchoBoxing
  extacy_red
  ghola
  GodChicken
  helbling
  Hirilnara
  indoninja
  intellismartness
  Jack_McCallum
  joedaddy
  JoeyG
  JonnyX
  kimmy02721
  lechuza
  Magicaddict
  NerfHerder
  nrduncan
  orph
  Pentameter
  rob_berg
  sparkle_pink
  SPECIALk
  St_Jimmy

  28 eligible votes (29 total) *

Entry 2:
  Amontillado
  august_sobriquet
  Axolotl
  Circe
  Crystle
  DrogoRoch
  FunnyAsCancer
  gravitas
  HotWillie
  Impassive-Digressive
  JMG114
  KindaNews
  MandaPanda
  Orgasmatron
  polyamorousaj
  rad1101
  ripple
  Sepsis
  Stagger_Lee
  stevie_says
  supadupapupa
  thedominator
  TheUniter

  21 eligible votes (23 total) *


* Eligible votes are those made by users who had either (A) posted 3+ messages OR (B) written 100+ [lowered from 750+] reviews as of the beginning of the UberMadness! competition.

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User Reviews

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Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-11-11 21:47:56 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

Circe
Orgasmatron
Stagger_Lee
stevie_says

******
Proof that "good" writers often fuck up...

BWAHAHAHAHHHAAAAHHAHAHAHHHAHHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!

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Submitted by Snark (user info) at 2006-11-10 13:01:40 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

Two of the best reads thus far in the contest.

I would have voted #2 but damn, they are both so frickin great.

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Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2006-11-10 11:41:26 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by joedaddy (user info) at 2006-11-10 03:19:09 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

now i feel really bad because, in my opinion, #2 was far better

have faith, the "smart" people always vote later today

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Submitted by SPECIALk (user info) at 2006-11-10 02:15:30 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

So many words...my eyes are bleeding

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Submitted by St_Jimmy (user info) at 2006-11-09 21:32:55 EST (#)
Ranking: 1

Wow, both were really long, but both were pretty good.
Had to go with 1 because I dig sci-fi.

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Submitted by kimmy02721 (user info) at 2006-11-09 12:46:36 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

No Comment

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Submitted by Pentameter (user info) at 2006-11-09 09:44:15 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

I'm voting for entry 1 because it was creative, inventive and overall, just an excellent story.

I couldn't follow entry 2 for the life of me...and what I did get didn't impress me at all.

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Submitted by helbling (user info) at 2006-11-09 07:25:59 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by rad1101 (user info) at 2006-11-09 06:39:03 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by darko (user info) at 2006-11-09 00:08:55 EST (#)
Ranking: -1

No Comment

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Submitted by DrogoRoch (user info) at 2006-11-08 10:21:57 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

I am so glad I will be going out this round. The thought of going up against either of these doesn't sit well with me.

Both were bloody superb #2 gets my vote because the thought of buggering off for a while is something I will be doing soon.

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Submitted by gravitas (user info) at 2006-11-08 09:39:34 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

Too bad I can't vote for both.

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Submitted by Hirilnara (user info) at 2006-11-08 07:57:15 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

...I really hated picking between these. The first one just had a slight edge though.
Sorry Author 2

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Submitted by thedominator (user info) at 2006-11-08 02:34:06 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by sparkle_pink (user info) at 2006-11-08 01:35:30 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

Oh yeah, my original original comment was going to be:

It took long days to read these! HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHA. I'm so witty!

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Submitted by sparkle_pink (user info) at 2006-11-08 01:33:10 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

I thought entry 1 was better written, a better story and made better use of the title.

Entry 2 was good too... but I had a difficult time 'getting it'. What was the point of not seeing his reflection? What did that have to do with anything?

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Submitted by Impassive-Digressive (user info) at 2006-11-07 19:44:58 EST (#)
Ranking: 1

As much as I love sci-fi, I just couldn't get into #1.

#2 however sucked me right in. Nice stuff.

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Submitted by nrduncan (user info) at 2006-11-07 15:55:41 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by ripple (user info) at 2006-11-07 13:48:11 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

yes.

one was too long and incomplete.

2 was good.

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Submitted by extacy_red (user info) at 2006-11-07 13:43:11 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

awesome.

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Submitted by GodChicken (user info) at 2006-11-07 11:58:20 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

Both of these were so great. Sorry that only one of you can keep going.

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Submitted by JoeyG (user info) at 2006-11-07 11:51:15 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

Both well done, and very little between the 2 pieces.

#1 by a whisker.

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Submitted by Amontillado (user info) at 2006-11-07 10:13:32 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by august_sobriquet (user info) at 2006-11-07 09:12:43 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-11-07 08:48:21 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by indoninja (user info) at 2006-11-07 08:36:14 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by JMG114 (user info) at 2006-11-07 08:17:10 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

WTF IM NOT READIN ALL THAT.

Seriously, what's next? Novel-length pieces come round five?

I enjoyed both of these.

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Submitted by intellismartness (user info) at 2006-11-07 06:44:29 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

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Submitted by Magicaddict (user info) at 2006-11-07 04:49:23 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

I am so very glad I took the time. Thak you, to both of you.

#1 by a nose.

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Submitted by Confuzitron (user info) at 2006-11-07 04:26:13 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by supadupapupa (user info) at 2006-11-07 03:59:08 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

How is #2 losing?? The flow of the story is amazing! #1 was interesting but the writing style made me want to puke in places...

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Submitted by orph (user info) at 2006-11-07 03:24:19 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

Number 1

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Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-11-07 02:41:32 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

Very nice.

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Submitted by supadupapupa (user info) at 2006-11-07 00:58:28 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

#2 was freakin awesome

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Submitted by Crystle (user info) at 2006-11-07 00:29:52 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

BUT WHY didn't he show up in the mirror?!?

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Submitted by Coyote (user info) at 2006-11-06 23:29:47 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

Tough call, in a good way for once.

Entry 1... although the weight of dead-end exposition nearly buried your story, it felt more right than Entry 2. I know I wouldn't want to have to go up against either one of you next round though.

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Submitted by gravitas (user info) at 2006-11-06 23:15:48 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

i see you both took long days literally.

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Submitted by Bigmike (user info) at 2006-11-06 23:05:31 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-11-06 22:50:22 EST (#)
Ranking: 0


There were a couple of fuckups in #1 that had me scartching my head, but I like those damn dragons.

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Submitted by Circe (user info) at 2006-11-06 22:42:20 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

Really tough choice.

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Submitted by TheUniter (user info) at 2006-11-06 22:37:53 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

Both were well written. I suspect #1 might be more popular with uber, but #2 is actually the superior work, in my opinion.

Nice job to you both.

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Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-11-06 22:09:48 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

# 1 was cool , don't be no fool, give it all your vote,
#2s a tool, it made me drool, and shit a billy goat....

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Submitted by FunnyAsCancer (user info) at 2006-11-06 21:59:35 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

Fuck the both of you.

Fuck you.

Fuck.

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Submitted by NerfHerder (user info) at 2006-11-06 21:45:13 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

Okay Steve.

I'll work on it double hard. It'll be done by noon tomorrow. Honest.

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Submitted by MandaPanda (user info) at 2006-11-06 21:35:19 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-11-06 19:55:13 (#)
Ranking: 2

Entry 1 was fairly cool.

But Entry 2 rocked and didn't stop a-rocking. Goddamn that was good.
~~~

I agree. #2 was great. It kept me interested all the way through.

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Submitted by MandaPanda (user info) at 2006-11-06 21:34:10 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by stevie_says (user info) at 2006-11-06 21:08:09 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

Quit reading and post your entry, Nerf!

I'm going INSANE OVER HERE.

Just a little.

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Submitted by NerfHerder (user info) at 2006-11-06 20:58:27 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

Entry #1. Wow. Seriously, well done.

It seems like my roommates had endless things to break my concentration when I was reading the story and every time they did I mentally whisked them out to rejoin the story. I really had a lot of fun reading it. Hell, I may even read it again.

Entry #2 was fine as well but had no real chance against dragons on another planet.

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Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-11-06 20:53:12 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by rob_berg (user info) at 2006-11-06 20:32:59 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2006-11-06 20:21:40 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

btw you guys make me sick. my entry is utter shite comparitively

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Submitted by stevie_says (user info) at 2006-11-06 20:21:18 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

Read 'em both (!) . Went for two because it just grabbed me more. I couldn't understand it and I like things I can't understand.

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Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2006-11-06 20:18:01 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

number one was good. fuck yeah dragons

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Submitted by coley (user info) at 2006-11-06 20:10:43 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

I'm going to read these both later as I am feeling quite ADD and they are quite long and I want to do them justice.

Just thought you'd all wonder where my rating was unless I explained. Didn't want you all to worry.


(joking, nerds. Joking.)

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Submitted by EchoBoxing (user info) at 2006-11-06 20:08:42 EST (#)
Ranking: -2

both were entirely too long. try again guys. this time with 10 words or less.

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Submitted by lechuza (user info) at 2006-11-06 19:57:50 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

YES

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Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-11-06 19:55:13 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

Entry 1 was fairly cool.

But Entry 2 rocked and didn't stop a-rocking. Goddamn that was good.

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Submitted by Sepsis (user info) at 2006-11-06 19:49:33 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by thorpe (user info) at 2006-11-06 19:45:25 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

Is this some sort of joke?

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Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2006-11-06 19:43:41 EST (#)
Ranking: 2

nice match-up, but I love me that sci-fi shit

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Submitted by domenad (user info) at 2006-11-06 19:41:29 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Submitted by polyamorousaj (user info) at 2006-11-06 19:36:46 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

It had a picture.

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Submitted by joedaddy (user info) at 2006-11-06 19:00:30 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

basically just to piss off author #2

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Submitted by darko (user info) at 2006-11-06 18:53:31 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

If I read these I bet I'll vote for 1 because of the filename in 2.

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Submitted by HotWillie (user info) at 2006-11-06 18:50:33 EST (#)
Ranking: 0

No Comment

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Flanders:
Homer, affordable tract housing made us neighbors, but you made us
friends.

Homer: To Ned Flanders, the richest left-handed man in town.

When Flanders Failed

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