Dystopian Med Volume 1: Dystopian Med, #1

By Nicholas Stillman

Dystopian science fiction writer Nicholas Stillman brings you five dark experiments in medical fiction:

"I Live Under Two Rocks"
A disgruntled, one-time assassin enters a living laboratory to stop a secret experiment that exploits a beautiful woman.

"Jackpack City"
A vengeful modern-day necromancer could ruin a dystopian city already overflowing with wandering patients.

"Keeping Things Fair"
During a nuclear winter, the last diver on Earth forages to keep degenerate submariners, the remainder of humanity, alive.

"The Harp of Heaven"
In a future city of luxury, a reluctant burglar risks everything to end the suffering of bizarre, ornamental pets.

"The Pull"
While escaping a dystopian city, two documentary filmmakers must save each other from the call of an irresistible desert siren.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Stillman Sci-Fi
• Release date: Nov 25, 2015
• ISBN: 9781519926272

Nicholas Stillman

Nicholas Stillman writes dark but entertaining science fiction. His weekly short stories and collections aim for variety and novelty with fun and thought-provoking twists. They often branch into dystopia, crime, horror, medical fiction, black comedy, romance, adventure, adult, and the completely new. Some of Stillman’s themes include civilizational collapse, addictions of the future, medicine in space, dark psychology, and the terrifying fate of our healthcare. Stillman offers monthly free short stories at StillmanSciFi.com. Get yourself free, easily accessible short stories for life--the perfect way for any science fiction fan to spend time on commutes or at home.

Book preview

I Live Under Two Rocks

THE PERFECT WOMAN LEFT the apartment and walked three blocks away. When she turned right and disappeared, Nathan took the key to her door out of his pocket, a key no one should have owned. In seconds, he entered the tidy one-bedroom of hers and strode an efficient line to the underwear drawer.

He had done it before. Nathan worked as a security guard but found better part-time work online eight months ago. It paid triple minimum wage and required making these shady intrusions. The job made him feel like a private investigator at first, one who got into the trade too easily. But now, after dozens of trips to the same woman’s underwear drawer, the excitement turned to excrement.

This time, Nathan tried to work even faster. The drawer slid open with its regular ease and refreshing sound. He gripped the knobs with the sides of his fingers to avoid leaving fingerprints, in case it ever mattered. It probably wouldn’t, given the fortune that Nathan’s mysterious nutcase employer spent on this operation. Other security guys worked for him too, guys who could use a higher wage.

Guys like Nathan.

Those guys got to follow the woman with the superhuman curves. They made phone calls whenever she entered a clothing store or did laundry. Nathan inevitably got a phone call too, a key in the mail once, and another key that time she moved out. Nathan’s job seemed much easier in comparison, but riskier. Hoping her roommate or landlord wouldn’t barge in, he grabbed and pocketed the new pair of white panties.

Nathan whisked identical panties from his coat pocket and meticulously stuffed them in the space he just created. They fit naturally between the other folded underthings. He patted the replacement panties here and there, so everything looked undisturbed. The replacements, including every pair in the drawer thanks to Nathan’s work, had paper-thin technology inside. Cam panties, the voice on the phone had called them. They contained tiny cameras, a light source which activated at body temperature, a long-lasting battery looping within the waistband, motion detectors to turn everything on, and a transmitter. Apart from the battery strip, it all fit between two layers of cloth posing as one―the cloth that sat just under the groin. All flexible. All undetectable. The woman had her genitals surveilled all day.

And until some sick-fuck developers could make it all waterproof, Nathan had to sneak in and replace the cam panties every time the woman washed them. The employer didn’t care. He had millions in discretionary income, and a full tech crew on this. And Nathan’s sighs grew angrier whenever more cam panties appeared in his mailbox.

He didn’t know why his boss liked the woman’s vagina so much. She had an ass made of heroin. Nathan saw five and a half feet of raw pleasure prior to every intrusion. And not even her worst ancestors deserved this violation. But Nathan’s other jobs had him confronting shoplifters with addiction problems. Sometimes they had weapons.

Here, though, someone paid him to avoid confrontations. And that meant in and out fast. Nathan glanced at his work once more. It looked neat, organized. It looked like a drawer of folded panties. He pushed the drawer closed with both wrists.

He left, as usual, with one hand in his coat pocket―and not the one with the stolen panties. This pocket contained a snub-nose White Rhino revolver, a model that practically concealed itself. If someone barged in, Nathan planned to draw and point only. He’d pose as a burglar who hadn’t yet taken anything. If the woman entered, she would only get a draw. She’d see some idiot with a toylike gun, and that scenario could cause problems too.

A week ago, Nathan almost did get busted. He had just left the apartment after a regular trip to her underwear drawer. Just another day after laundry day. His head, lowered in regret, nearly bumped into the superwoman’s breasts. It happened two meters off the property. The woman backed out of the way and smiled ravishingly. They sidestepped each other. She had sugar and charm and wore a thin dress few on Earth could manage. The goddamn silkworms probably had curves. Most days, she’d wear sexy-as-possible pants.

Oh, sorry. Sorry, Nathan had said.

The woman smiled all the way to the apartment steps, filling up the outdoors with some sort of chorale. She gave no indication of spotting Nathan exiting her place just moments before. Nathan’s large bulbous nose elicited a lifetime of such smiles, and only this one time did he like it.

Nathan knew little about women besides that. They disappeared into cars and asked landlords 18 question before rejecting a new apartment. Girls vacated and vacationed frequently and often larkily. The fat ones thought a vest could hide all sins. The skinny ones wore wretched expressions on their mouths, permanently. All of them thought shoes made a difference, though no truly straight man had ever seen women’s shoes. In all of history, straight men never looked below the ankles.

Mostly, he knew the attractive ones saw him and ran away. They ran for their lives, before his nose got them. But this woman hadn’t. And she deserved to keep her non-electric panties, made by sweatshop workers and not tampered with by tycoons.

Once, he followed the superwoman. She had the shape of a literal bombshell. That day, she wore loose-fitting pants that didn’t show off everything she had. But still...perfect build, ten million percent. The girl knew where to store it all. Nathan had spotted the day shift guy following her for profit and approached him. They had developed a brief friendship. That other worker gave out the address of their employer. When you have a fucking weirdo for a boss, word gets around.

And today, Nathan would pay that asshole employer a visit. He would put a bullet in his employer’s face and move to another city. For what could the woman do upon discovering this defilement? What would confronting her and confessing to all those break-ins accomplish? She lacked the criminal connections for real justice. Moving out clearly did jack. And the police needed fucking Crime Stoppers to get any evidence. They needed other criminals to snitch on their friends. The boss had money, and guys, and more guys who needed money even more.

So after today’s entry and switch, Nathan rode the bus to the part of town with flowery yards and open curtains. The middle seats smelled like barbecued feces that seniors produced in the days before death. The seats still stank from the same diaper blasts yesterday. Someone’s bowels had exploded like a rusty pipe, or rusty pipe bomb, leaving dead epithelial cells in the aerial mix. That stench, from the inside of a dying colon, hung around Nathan’s personal space. His ears couldn’t escape either. Through the drone of the bus engine, he heard the rumble of traffic. It sounded like moping rain on a clear day. Cars surrounded him, moving like boluses through intestines.

Numerous blobs rode to work, tanks of animal products and processed food. Nathan glanced back and saw lips built solely for TV dinners. Leaning to see around that, he saw acne. Beyond the face with three days worth of oil hovered more faces greasy enough to blur vision. Many pregnant-looking men sat with their earphones. Some had conical breasts. Their mothers had never told them how baloney gets made or why they shouldn’t eat it forever.

The ride finally ended after an hour of puttering to every bus stop, some just meters apart. Relived to get off, Nathan still had to walk and sweat a while. He had one day left in this city with all its pathetic jobs. But this final job belonged to him. It would mean something.

On the walk to his employer’s house, a crow flew by and hailed him with a squawk. The city birds had to eat litter stamped onto the pavement, but they got to fly. Similarly, Nathan could just move out at whim. He had a bare apartment, two suitcases in it, a train ticket under one of their handles, and a hotel reservation held in cyberspace. He’d have this one little adventure, save the woman without her knowledge or involvement, and earn that one point for himself in the sky.

Hello crow, he said. I’ll see you dickheads one province over.

The employer’s house finally showed itself through the shrubs and fences. The numbers sparkled in sunny brass. Other lawn luxuries, like the table set and concrete birdbath, fought for attention despite their skinniness. Nathan barely studied the house exterior. If the police ever questioned him, his denials would work best if he could hardly remember the details. Of course, getting paid under the table for break-ins meant he’d probably never get questioned. The cops tracked suspects through legitimate payroll files.

Upon reaching the front of the one-story home, Nathan stuck to the streets and circled the premises. A ten-minute casing would do. The wind blew around the house to punch him for it. Such bullshit always happened, though, for not owning a car. He saw an empty driveway, no garage, and no one’s shadow through all the windows. In these afternoon hours, most of the upper class enjoyed their ideal work schedule or went out for fancy steam. After high-end dinners, they had vacations, SUV, cottage, house in the south, and a boat in that order. But the man who lived here had live pornography to get back to. He’d return before evening. Anyone could guess that by the shape of the woman.

But in case the boss worked from home and hated cars, Nathan knocked on the front door. When no one answered the