Sci-Fi Short Stories: Sci-Fi Shorts, #1

By Jon Griffin

A collection of short science fiction stories by Jon Griffin.

Black Space
Rockets, Space, Death

In 2061, commuters shuttle from New York to the moon as easily as people once boarded a train. With eleven daily transits, it's business as usual. This flight is special, but why?

Sergeant Desh Arld Neck is months from retirement, having served the NYPD for 20 years. He's in the middle of an AA meeting when he gets a call. It's urgent. Something has gone very wrong, and he must get back to the precinct. Now.

The moment he spots the mayor and police commissioner, he knows this is no ordinary case. Not good, and,what does Galim Jerin have to do with space?

If you love science fiction thrillers, you'll love Dark Space. A short story about manipulation, psychological scars, and the human condition.

Cloudbreak
Despair, Hope, Triumph

Stranded on a planet light-years from earth, three children run out of food. They only know the rain. 10,000 days of it and someone has to leave the pod or they all die.

Dark Horse 1954
Demons, Fear, Resignation

I used to lead a normal life… until I turned ten. Then they showed up.

That night haunts me to this day.

Now, at thirty-two years old, I leave some unknown town yet again. Then they do the unthinkable. Lucky for me I have an ally.

Or do I?

Dead Justice
Hal Steadman works for the CIA. He knows how to kill people and how to get rid of the bodies.

He failed his mission in Eastern Europe, and has to pay the price. Small town Texas is the currency. You learn a lot at The Farm, but playing a US Marshal?

They never told him what he was protecting, but an accident reveals the truth... and it isn't good.

The Ark

Phillip Carmichael hit rock-bottom. Time to get out of town. Reno sounds good.

On his way he encounters a mysterious storm that envelops him. Emerging from the storm he finds himself at the edge of deserted town, in a different time. Time travel isn't possible... is it?

Will he find what he wasn't looking for, or exactly what he needs?

A time travel short story.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mayuli Press
• Release date: Oct 15, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393928355

Jon Griffin

Born in Los Angeles Jon Griffin has lived in many places and many countries. He enjoys writing books in many genres and especially loves hanging out with his family and traveling the globe to visit old friends and make new ones.

Book preview

SCI-FI SHORTS

VOLUME 1

JON GRIFFIN

MAYULI PRESS

Copyright © 2019 by Jon Griffin

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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CONTENTS

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Black Space

Cloudbreak

Dark Horse 1954

Dead Justice

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

The Ark

Also By Jon Griffin

Acknowledgments

About the Author

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Brittany moved her pudgy legs quickly to keep up with her father's long stride. He found their seats and buckled Brittany into hers, pulling the straps tight.

Now, little princess, he whispered into her ear. See that blue sky out there? He pointed out the window beside her seat.

Brittany nodded and pulled her thumb out of her mouth.

That's gonna turn black, and you're going to feel pressed down into your seat. Once it's truly black, I want you to do me a favor, okay?

What, Daddy? What favor?

Tell me when the stars come out.

She grinned. "Daddy, you're silly. There aren't any stars. It's daytime!"

Her father patted her head and strapped himself in the next seat, then grasped his wife's hand firmly. He didn't like going to the Moon in general, but business trips weren't optional. At least he had gotten permission to take his family along this time. Now that they were safely aboard, there might be enough time to take a short nap.

Below decks, in the engine room, a mechanic dressed in overalls opened his red toolbox and took out a small, fist-sized device. Placing it carefully against the shielding surrounding the power plant, he gritted his teeth and pushed a small button on the side of the device. A red light began to blink, and a timer began counting down from thirty minutes.

He paused, staring at the device. There was still time to turn it off, to put it back in the toolbox, to walk away from the ship.

He reached out to shut it off and was horrified that his hand instead pushed the magnetically attached device into a shadowy crevice where nobody would find it.

With a large lump in his throat, but thinking about the money that would cover his mother's cancer treatment, he packed up his toolbox and climbed the ladder down to the tarmac. As he drove his maintenance cart away from the doomed ship, he glanced in the rearview mirror, mouthing a small prayer for the souls on board.

Brittany stared out the window, kicking her legs and waiting for the stars to appear. So far, nothing. She glanced over at her father, who snored gently, his head tilted back, mouth open. Her mother leaned against his shoulder, staring at the floor.

Brittany's ears popped as the cabin doors were locked and sealed. She whined and her mother handed her a bit of chewing gum.

Peppermint. Yum.

A man talked on the loudspeaker and then fell silent. The cabin lights dimmed and a gentle rumbling built into a loud roar. Brittany felt a pressure on her chest and stopped kicking her suddenly heavy legs. Her father awoke with a gasp and clutched her hand in his.

Are you okay, princess? he asked loudly over the roar of the engines.

It took all her effort to turn her head, supported by the cushiony seat, in his direction. Yes, Daddy!

He lifted a slow arm and pointed to a display mounted into the seatback in front of her. See these numbers?

She turned her head forward and saw numbers flashing on a screen under the letters ALT. They moved faster and faster and, as she watched, they clicked through 10,000.

What does it mean? she asked her father.

Watch them grow until the sky turns black outside, he said.

She looked to the left, noticing that the sky was still blue, but growing darker. She stared at the whirring numbers, and watched them climb ever higher. 70,000. 80,000. 90,000. At 123,560, there was a bright flash and a giant kick in her back.

Her father's hand was torn from hers and the loudest noise she would ever hear was suddenly cut short. A blast of icy coldness hit her and she tried to gasp, but couldn’t. There was nothing to breathe.

Above her, in the black velvet of space, millions of stars glittered. She tried to breathe again, but nothing happened.

Her seat turned slowly, and the big curve of a blue planet swung by. The cold bit into her and she shivered, hard. She turned her head easily to the right, and then to the left, searching for her parents.

They were gone.

She was all alone, hanging in the blackness.

The cold wasn’t so bad after a bit. Her eyes grew heavy as she tried one more time to take another breath.

Below her, the blue curve swung away and she could once again see the stars, outlined on their black background.

She wanted to tell her Daddy that she'd found the stars. But she was too sleepy and instead closed her eyes.

And fell.

Desh Arld Neck grimaced and threw his empty coffee cup at an overflowing garbage can outside New York City's busiest police precinct, the 17 th, just south of Central Park.

His captain couldn't have called him at a worse time. He'd been in the middle of an AA meeting when his phone had buzzed. Urgent. Emergency meeting at the precinct. Get back now.

No mention of what it was about, but a hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach said it was going to be bad.

He swatted away the news feeds that flitted around him, visible through his dataglasses, and entered the cool interior of the massive stone police headquarters that housed his desk and the desks of another two thousand people.

The elevator doors groaned slowly open and he pushed his way to the back of the car. Twelfth floor, please, he called out, and somebody up front pushed the button.

He ground his teeth, trying not to listen to the tinny voices leaking from other occupants' dataglasses in a handful of languages.

Something about the terrorist bombing of the Moon shuttle, the first ever interplanetary act of terrorism. Glowing red words scrolled by over the steadily climbing floor numbers, and as he read them his gut twisted.

NY Times exclusive: 402 souls lost after mid-air explosion; anti-expansionist group Galim Jerin claims responsibility.

Neck grimaced. Galim Jerin was a fringe group of ground-huggers, using violence to push their agenda of non-expansion. They had been founded three years ago, just after the Lunar colony had been established.

The elevator door dinged on the twelfth floor, and Neck pushed his way through the crowd of bodies and got out.

Although Galim Jerin's name came from an Israeli warship destroyed by a nuclear torpedo, they had begun as a mostly peaceful protest group. Last year, Adlai Mordecai had replaced their founder. A few months after that, people started dying.

Detective, bellowed Captain Wallace's familiar voice. Get in here!

Neck held up a single finger and stopped at the kitchenette just outside the conference room to pour another cup of coffee. He glanced quickly through the room's transparent walls at the people gathered inside.

His heart sank. Both the Police Commissioner and the Mayor were there.

Neck! his captain said through gritted teeth. You wanna hustle, maybe? We got guests. He emphasized the word guests to imply that they were the type who didn't like to be kept waiting.

Neck sighed and walked into the conference room, taking a seat as far away as possible from the Mayor's balding pate and setting his coffee down on the scarred conference table.

Mayor, this is Detective Neck. He's going to take on the case.

I am? Neck said the words before he could take them back, and winced inwardly at the heavy disdain in his voice.

Yes, Neck, you are, Wallace bristled. And Mayor, we will get to the bottom of this horrific event.

I got bodies, including American bodies, raining into the Atlantic, Captain. Make this stop. Now. The Mayor stood up and, without a glance in Neck's direction, stomped out of the room, followed by the Commissioner, who glared daggers at Neck.

The door swung shut, leaving Neck alone with his captain.

Neck scratched his arm and took a sip of coffee. Sorry, Cap. That came out more surly than I'd intended.

Fuggedaboudit. We got work to do. He waved his arm and the room darkened, the glass walls going opaque. We got the bastard that planted the bomb. Tobiah Rufus, a mechanic for Interplanetary Travel Lines. He's been with ITL for four years, kept his nose clean, never had any trouble. The union loves him, says he always pays his dues on time, never a disciplinary action. A head shot of a pinch-faced man appeared over the conference table, slowly spinning. The man in the image held a placard with numbers on it at chest level.

The Captain continued. "Rufus has admitted guilt, but clams up