Black and White

“ No matter where you go, everyone’s connected. ”

– Lain Iwakura, Serial Experiments: Lain

Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace, photographed by QT Luong

The silent world around him was a dull, cloudy grey. Whatever colour had been present during the initial recording of it had been filtered out. It was hard to focus on any single detail, the inkwelled scene made to be poignant, but not studied too closely. Individuals were no longer blurred, to aid in his assignment, but their blood remained censored, as it was in the media. 

Bragging Rights

Screenshot via Star Citizen

“Okay, listen up,” says a voice in your ear. “As of thirty seconds ago you are the last remaining Bouncer pilot in this system. Reroute on vector 4.96 and await further instructions.”

Creation

The Robotic Hermit

Surreal Digital Art from Rolan Gonzalez, see more of his work here!

Now sit here my love and watch, just watch. Watch as I stand apart but steady, arms wide open in invitation as our new world forms before us.

Feel the breeze across the skin of your cheek and know that I am conjuring a place so sublime you’ll shed tears for me once more. Listen to the sounds of a Universe all our own gasping into existence. Smell the new grass beneath and the fresh leaves above and know that never again will we be denied. Taste the clear waters that clash around us, that flow and bend and rain.

This place, this bright open space where no single man is yet King, is mine to mold and yours to protect. For we are done with smite and folly, done with jealousy and malice. We rise higher…

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The Dark Room

Nobody Behind the Door by Nicolas Gouny

You know exactly what they look like; black and shimmering, with big long jaws full of bright white teeth. They stretch their arms out, but never come closer than you allow them to.

You stand there and wait, using the light beyond the door to study every shiny scale. They growl and sniff and howl, restless in the dim.

You think they’re the reason you’re still here, that you can’t leave until they are gone. They know better.

Our New Pet

A little mushroom alien by Zeldacw

Flangiprop n. a small, “mushroom-like” carnivorous mammal found native to a cave network on DK-233. Appears to possess an acute sense of smell, not unlike an Earth dog. Communicates in high-pitched squeaks.

“It’s a stupid word,” he told her, staring into the cage.

“Well, I think it suits him,” she replied, tapping at the glass.

A series of low, happy sounding chirps echoed around the small container as the… Flangiprop sat down and blinked up at them. One of it’s his short little arms made a sort of waving motion. He watched her coo at it out of the corner of his eye. “I can’t believe they let you keep it.”

Her smile was like something out of an old holograph, bright and stunning and a tiny bit irritating. “I know, right!?”

The little brown and red thing let out a long, cheerful squeak in response. He was gonna have to run a neuroscan on the damn thing later, make sure there wasn’t some sort of telepathic link going on. He leaned back against the hull of the carrier, watching the techs load up the rest of their equipment. She was too busy making weird ass baby noises at the thing to pay any attention to them tipping her core samples the wrong way up.

“That thing is messing with your mind,” he said, crossing his arms.

He thought she was ignoring him until –

“I think I’m gonna name him Henry!”

He sighed. It was gonna be one hell of a long ride back to base.

Ouroboros

Corporate Shadows by Badbrushart

Bit of an odd feeling, staring into the slime and seeing a version of you who doesn’t know who they are yet. Only four left now though, drifting in the ooze until someone pulls ’em out and tops ’em up.

There’s so much green and blue in here the red bar on my tablet looks a bit garish, the little coded lines sweeping across the screen as my replacement soaks up all my knowledge like a sponge. Wonder what she’ll do with all. Go after the Organisation, probably. Maybe stop by Breakers and drink a little first though, I got some good memories of that place.

Slumland Symphony

Under a Rock, by Jonone (click-through for full size!)

Garrett watched the sunrise from behind an old beaten up carrier that had been gutted decades ago. All that was left was the shell, a blistered, broken mass of metal that once knew how to fly. Sad, he thought, tipping back his hat and squinting into the wind. Time was he’d have maybe been a pilot himself. Sat behind a board full of pretty blinking lights and taken off, broken atmo with a smile and a purpose and money in the bank.

There was a creak followed by a muffled snap, distant and quiet, off to his left. Someone was trying to get closer. Garrett sniffed the air, and settled his hat back firmly on his head, down over his eyes. His back was aching, pressing into the ship’s old carcass, heating up with the sun as it rose.

Another creak, light footfalls skittering over the ruins of the graveyard. Woman maybe, or a boy. Young either way, starving like the weeds that sprouted up from between the cracked dirt just to wither. Whoever they were, they were getting closer and moving faster. Figured him for an easy mark, sleeping under the sky, miles from anyone who might give a fig about justice or the proper way of settling things…

Fooling the Trickster

Dark Deeds in London, by kirillart.

I could feel it, seeping out and soaking the green cotton of my dress. Sticking the cloth to my skin as it spread. I imagined the contrast as warmth blossomed across my chest and my heart began pounding. I wondered, bizarrely, if he was smiling.