Fiction Vortex: June 2013

By Fiction Vortex

We have conclusive proof in this issue that the May issue was more than just a fluke because we have yet another month's worth of fantastic science fiction and fantasy stories to deliver. This issue has some great surprises, too. While some seem to fit into traditional genres, such as alien invasion, fairy grove visitation, and haunting ghosts, there are also a few that defy description. For instance, what genre covers a botanist who finds more than he bargains for while searching for Ghost Orchids? There's a story that seems to be a general dystopia until you realize it's dealing with the most dystopic medium of all: reality television. And of course, how do you classify a story where the language changes as the story progresses?

Now perhaps you can see why we're so proud of these stories.

Of course, being the narcissistic sociopaths (say that ten times while drunk) that we are, we couldn't just let the fiction writers have all the fun, so you'll also see a few writing tips from me and the Editor-in Chief, Mike Cluff, near the end of this issue. They involve vehicular manslaughter and malicious fairy hit squads, so at least they should be interesting.

Fiction Vortex publishes science fiction and fantasy short stories from writers around the world. All stories in this issue appeared on the FictionVortex.com site during the month of June 2013.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Fiction Vortex
• Release date: Jun 21, 2013

Fiction Vortex

A fiction vortex is a tornado of stories that pick you up and hurl you through a barn to find enlightenment on the other side. It’s a whirlpool of fascinating tales so compelling that they suck you in, drag you down to the bottom of your mind and drown you with incessant waves of glorious imagery and believable characters. Nope. Not that either. But we’re getting closer. A fiction vortex is an online speculative fiction magazine focused on publishing great science fiction and fantasy, and is run by incredibly attractive and intelligent people with great taste in literature and formidable writing prowess.

Book preview

Fiction Vortex

A Speculative Fiction Typhoon

June 2013

Volume 1, Issue 2

Edited by Dan Hope

Copyright 2013 Fiction Vortex

Cover image courtesy of NASA

Smashwords Edition

Website: FictionVortex.com

Twitter: @FictionVortex

Facebook: FictionVortex

Table of Contents

Letter from the Editor

Short Stories

Losses Beyond the Kill Point — by Marilyn K. Martin (1st Place)

Freckles, Stan, and Peconic Joe — by John Byrne

A Feeble Gleam of Stars — by R.W.W. Greene (2nd Place)

Willow Grove — by T. Eric Bakutis

A Misleading Dance — by Catherine Evleshin

Bogged Down — by Jason Norton (3rd Place)

Lyfe — by Tyrone Long

In the Rain — by Lisa Lutwyche

Writing Tips

The Bus Test: A Simple and Merciless Method for Improving Characters — by Mike Cluff

The Sins of Short Story Submissions — by Dan Hope

About Fiction Vortex

Letter from the Editor

Did someone alter the temporal dampening settings on the time dilation cognetization initiator? It seems like we've been doing this for longer than two months. But here we are, celebrating our second issue of Fiction Vortex.

Let's set aside the specifics of time perception and talk about what's really important: the stories. We have conclusive proof in this issue that the May issue was more than just a fluke because we have yet another month's worth of fantastic stories to deliver. This issue has some great surprises, too. While some seem to fit into traditional genres, such as alien invasion, fairy grove visitation, and haunting ghosts, there are also a few that defy description. For instance, what genre covers a botanist who finds more than he bargains for while searching for Ghost Orchids? There's a story that seems to be a general dystopia until you realize it's dealing with the most dystopic medium of all: reality television. And of course, how do you classify a story where the language changes as the story progresses?

Now perhaps you can see why we're so proud of these stories.

Of course, being the narcissistic sociopaths (say that ten times while drunk) that we are, we couldn't just let the fiction writers have all the fun, so you'll also see a few writing tips from me and the Editor-in Chief, Mike Cluff, near the end of this issue. They involve vehicular manslaughter and malicious fairy hit squads, so at least they should be interesting.

Thank you for your support of the site, and we hope you continue to enjoy great speculative fiction from Fiction Vortex. Look for more every week on FictionVortex.com, now complete with NSA wiretapping so the government knows how cultured and widely read you are.

Vortexical Wishes and Cyclonic Dreams,

Dan Hope

Managing Editor, Voice of Reason

Fiction Vortex

(Back to Table of Contents)

Short Stories

Losses Beyond the Kill Point — by Marilyn K. Martin (1st Place)

Freckles, Stan, and Peconic Joe — by John Byrne

A Feeble Gleam of Stars — by R.W.W. Greene (2nd Place)

Willow Grove — by T. Eric Bakutis

A Misleading Dance — by Catherine Evleshin

Bogged Down — by Jason Norton (3rd Place)

Lyfe — by Tyrone Long

In the Rain — by Lisa Lutwyche

(Back to Main Table of Contents)

Losses Beyond the Kill Point

by Marilyn K. Martin; published June 4, 2013

First Place Award, June 2013 Fiction Contest

The pig was green that morning. A bad green. Darker than the grass. The color of a laser-tank in the forest. Bad! Grunting and gobbling in its morning trough, the pig was a green mini-blimp, darker green stripes rippling the length of its back. Its stubby green legs were distorted, as usual. One floating out sideways, another one arcing over its back.

OUCH!  His stomach-alarm had gone off. No, No, No! he said, a fist pounding on the small device permanently locked around his waist. Bab, Bad, Bad!  Blinking dazedly, he turned to look up at the large one-story circular building wavering above him in the near distance, like a mirage. His legs started stumbling toward it, even as his fogged brain was deciding what to do.

He entered the circular building through the huge blue doorway, since he was wearing scrubs the same shade of blue. His feet seemed to know where to go, as he lumbered toward the medication dispensing desk.

That one! That one! That one! His finger pounded the counter beside a pink pill, amid an array of thirty pills of all different sizes and colors. The pills were always spread out on the counter, for the patient to first approve them.

Okay, that one, said the Dispenser in monotone behind the counter. Any reason you don't want to take that one?

Bad pink! the patient said, finger still jabbing the counter beside the pink pill. It's dead!  Dead pink! Pink people dead!

Alright, fine. Sign here, intoned the Dispenser with a sigh, and placed the electronic signature pad on the counter before the patient.

The bald patient picked up the stylus and scribbled madly, then started jabbing the screen with the stylus. Lines are fences. Can't escape. Bad! he hollered at the pad. He blinked away sudden memories of street barricades, and no easy escape as the enemies' tanks approached. Meanwhile, the small screen's crisscrossing protective grid appeared underneath his signature. Then there was a tiny flash, and his thumbnail photo appeared in the upper right corner above his signature, to properly ID him as the scribbler.

Okay, here are the rest of your morning pills, the Dispenser announced, after scooping up the remaining pills into six small swallow-size cups. A large glass of juice was set on the counter for him.

As the patient downed one cup of pills after the other, amid gulps of juice that dribbled down his chin, the Dispenser uploaded the patient's signature to the mainframe. Then the pad was noisily thrown back underneath the counter. The bad pill sat off to the side of the counter, to be logged in and then discarded.

The patient spent the rest of the day down the slope at the farm, checking to make sure all the animals were their proper color. The purple chickens clucked and scattered from him. The green-striped pig grunted and ignored him. But the aqua-colored horse just stared at him, as it solemnly chewed its alfalfa. He listened carefully, but something was wrong.

~~~~~

That one! That one! That one! the patient insisted that evening, a finger jabbing the counter beside an aqua capsule.

Okay, any reason? asked the bored Dispenser, moving the offending capsule aside.

Horse color. Didn't talk to me, muttered the blinking, crazed patient, as the signature-pad was slid in front of him. Bad horse! Bad! he continued, as he scribbled lines and circles for his signature.  Another small flash, and then he shoved the pad back toward the Dispenser.

As he downed his six tiny cups of pills with juice, the Dispenser uploaded his signature, and added a few notations: Refused one pill each, morning and evening med dispensing. Reports horse didn't talk to him after morning meds. Did not jab signature pad for evening meds, and was the first time he pushed signature pad toward me when finished.

~~~~~

For the next few days, the patient randomly picked out one pill to be removed at both morning and evening med dispensings. Then, at the farm one morning, he noticed something strange. The chickens were all white. Not one was purple. But the pig was still green.

Bad pig! he hollered from the other side of the gleaming metal fence. But the pig continued to snort and snuffle, as it gobbled its breakfast from the trough. Don't eat all of it! shouted the patient at the pig. Some of it is bad!  Bad pills! Bad pig!

He was petting the nose of the non-talking aqua horse later that same afternoon, inside the horse stable. Suddenly he heard many footsteps and looked around. He spied an Official in a white lab coat, leading a small knot of nervous people through the stables. Since this happened fairly regularly, the patient had never paid any attention before. This time, however, he surprisingly seemed to understand most of the conversation. When the Official stopped and turned, to answer a question from the group, the patient jerkily turned to listen too.

Actually, this kind of therapy started by accident, the Official was saying to the knot of people, whose distorted faces stretched and twisted. It had been a very controversial theory before the war, that someone's Soul or Spirit could guide a person's body and mind back to health, the Official was explaining. "Our psychiatric hospitals had just started to experiment with that theory, and even had some promising results. Then the war broke out.

After the war, with so many insane and so few trained medical personnel who had survived, it suddenly became our Theory of Necessity, the Official continued. The patient had lost track of the conversation by this point, and stood blinking, unsure what to do next.

In order to help all these hundreds of thousands of psychotic people, driven insane by the war, we gathered them up into safe environments. Like this fenced-in compound, which used to be a military base, the Official gestured. "We watch them, protect them and medicate them, mainly to keep them calm but mobile.

The medications range from tranquilizers to mild hallucinogenics to herbal restoratives, the Official explained. "And the patients must see and approve all the pills before taking them. They are allowed to stop taking one pill per dispensing session, if they wish. Interestingly, the patients who are ready to heal usually refuse the hallucinogenics first.

Other patients, more damaged, choose to stay in a distorted hallucinogenic world longer, the Official sighed. "Based on