Fiction Vortex - June 2013 Read online

  I knew then what the faeries had done to her, what they were still doing. Her worst fear. I closed my eyes and reached a hand behind me. I almost felt her clutching at it, clutching at wisps of sticky mist.

  "Dana, listen to me. You're real. You're with me, and I can hear you and see you and feel you." Those were lies. "Take my hand and don't let go. We're leaving here together." That was the truth.

  I opened my eyes and walked past Ted to the brilliant blue pool. I kept my hand stretched back into the mist. Ted just watched me. His whole body was shaking.

  "Dana and I are leaving," I told Ted. "Do you still want to find Marlene?"

  He nodded. His eyes were wide and sad.

  "She's out there." I didn't look back. "With them."

  "How do I find her?" Ted whispered.

  "Think of her worst fear." I stepped into the pool with my hand still behind me. "Fix it."

  The pool sucked us in, invading our mouths, our eyes, our lungs. We felt ourselves drown. When it finally ended, Dana and I were standing in Willow Grove, the real Willow Grove, and she was sobbing. I hugged her tight.

  The whole way back to the house Dana kept making me tell her she was real, and I kept telling her she was. I didn't even realize I'd left my backpack and flashlight in Willow Grove until we got back home.

  We didn't try the window. We knocked on the door. It opened and then our parents were yelling at us, Mom and Dad both, crying and hugging as tight as they could.

  I don't remember much after that. I fell asleep sometime after, snuggled up against Dana and sandwiched in between Mom and Dad. It was days before we went to school again, and months before Mom would let either of us out of her sight. None of that mattered. We were together again, Dana and Mom and Dad and me, and that was better than all the ice cream cake in the world.

  I never did find out what happened to Ted. I don't know if he ever found Marlene. But I do know that almost three years after that, on my sixteenth birthday, someone left my flashlight and backpack right outside my window.

  I like to think Ted found my flashlight in Willow Grove. I like to think he found Marlene, brought her back, but I don't know what Marlene's worst fear was or if Ted remembered it. All I can tell you is that Dana and I never went to Willow Grove ever again.

  T. Eric Bakutis is an author and game designer living in Maryland, and one of the lead developers for the Elder Scrolls Online. His short fiction will soon appear in the “Fairly Wicked Tales” anthology from Angelic Knight Press. His debut fantasy novel, Glyphbinder, will be released by McBryde Publishing in summer 2013. You can find out more about Glyphbinder’s story, characters, and world at tebakutis.com

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  A Misleading Dance

  by Catherine Evleshin; published June 18, 2013

  "Deliver by Friday, or forfeit your contract," growls the CEO of Rent-a-Bot. "And don't tell me again that the programs for the lead salsabots are ten times more complex than for the follow bots."

  "More like fifty."

  "By the end of the week, Jason." His face disappears from the screen. Six months of work in jeopardy, and Rico, my research assistant, hasn't seen a dime in weeks. From my inbox, I open a final eviction notice sent by Building Management and a message from my wife to call before we lose Internet service.

  The three alluring follow bots that I delivered four months ago are so popular that they have been requested weeks ahead. My advance long spent, the contract stipulates no further payment until I produce at least one dashing male partner to squire women desiring companionship and a surrogate willing to take orders like a pet poodle. Even in these times, it seems that women remain squeamish about paid human escorts.

  I look over at Max standing by the door of my office — suave, dark-eyed, and not a living cell in his body. "Let's give it another try," he says in his sultry, computer-generated voice.

  I rely on a human prototype to model Latino dances. Ten minutes on the phone to convince fast-talking Rico, my soon-to-be-unemployed assistant, to blow off his job search and grab the subway to my ninth-floor lab on 57th Street. "I've hit a wall," I tell him. "And I won't send out Max until our ladies show more enthusiasm for him."

  I'd soon discovered that, unlike male test subjects who never mentioned their follow bot's body temperature, the women are hypersensitive to Max's setting. Deviate more than a degree and they complain that he feels like a feverish child or cold as a corpse.

  But for the chance to practice with one of the best flesh-and-blood salseros in Manhattan, a dozen female trial subjects endure grueling sessions with Max imitating Rico's style. Afterward, we interpret their feedback.

  Last month's complaints — "the lead's too soft" or "the lead's too hard" — made it sound like I was designing sexbots, until Rico slipped his arm around my waist, muttered "Soft," and tried to move me with limp fingers. Then, without warning, he gripped my hand in a turn that threw me a good meter. "Hard." It took me a week to resolve that issue.

  The women often find it difficult to articulate their discontent. They groused that he didn't smell like a man until pheromones were added. I had to tease out of them that Max's breathing simulator failed to signal mounting excitement. Nonetheless, after I had programmed him to ease his hand to the small of his partner's back and pull her close, one subject quit the trials and took up Zumba.

  Rico sweeps through the office door, the bot's identical twin except for a faint sheen of sweat below his hairline, and a scar on his forehead that hints at menace. He points down to the street level. "Some dude's hangin' around the door asking about you. I know a bill collector when I see one. Told him I'd never heard of you."

  Rico helps himself to the last slice of congealed pizza that Max fetched two hours earlier for my lunch, then sits on the corner of my desk and props his loafered foot on the empty box. "Jason, I been thinkin'. The ladies beef that Max is too predictable, even when he nails my best moves."

  "So what are you saying?"

  "I tune in on my partners more than I realize, you know, give and take." He arches his neck like a fighting cock. "True, I'm the one callin' the shots. But my job is to make us both look good, to be on top of what she's gonna do, even when she's about to screw up."

  His foot plunks onto the floor. "I change my movements as I go along — adapt, as you'd say. Like musicians jammin' away and find themselves headin' for a train wreck. How they save their asses just might turn out to be the best part."

  "Can't the dancers, like musicians, find their way back on track?"

  Rico's manicured hand carves a flourish with the pizza crust. "Change one thing, and the whole dance can go off in a different direction."

  Something clicks in my brain. Dynamic determinism, like a squirrel escaping up an unfamiliar tree. He will reach safety, but makes a choice at each forked branch, so the path and destination are variable. "My friend, you have just given me an elegant example of chaos theory."

  The scar on Rico's forehead turns magenta. "This ain't no chaos, man. That's a no-dancin' fool trying to dominate the floor, or a couple fumbling with steps they learned in class." A lightning shimmy passes through his shoulders. "Salsa unfolds moment to moment, with seamless invention. When I'm on, my body feels it. That's when it comes alive."

  "Kudos to you, Rico, not just for your unparalleled skill, but also for your intellect."

  Rico looks like he might ask if kudos are something like back pay. "I don't know about all that. If I'm thinkin' anything, it's how to get someone into bed before the night's over."

  I see with blinding clarity that Max, who has been digesting all this from his corner, may never be a compelling escort for Rent-a-Bot clients. Adequate, perhaps. I'll refine the bot's programs like a meteorologist plots algorithms to predict a hurricane.

  I show Rico the eviction notice. "I'll need at least three weeks to complete the modifications. If we don't make this chunk of plastic more desirable by the weekend, we'll all be out on the street." Max bleeps, and I hur
ry to apologize. We have an understanding that I won't insult him.

  Rico looks at me long. In a spot-on imitation of the bot's measured speech, he says, "I could fill in for Max, until you figure out how to make him more of a man."

  My armpits ooze while I contemplate what my wife would say about this scheme. One slipup, and there goes my reputation as the first engineer to design a successful salsabot. And perhaps my marriage. With luck, I'll get Max up to task before Rico forgets and sips a drink or escapes to the restroom while on assignment.

  I glance at Max, but he offers no opinion, and I warn Rico, "You know how the women might treat a bot."

  "You think I never had to bite my tongue 'cause someone was payin' me?"

  "I hope you're not referring to me."

  "You ain't paid me this month, boss, so you don't qualify."

  I call Rent-a-Bot and leave a message to expect one lead dancer by Friday. Three nail-biting weeks lie ahead, and then my lab will fall empty and silent. No Rico, unpredictable as a stallion, no steadfast Max, and no women who can't decide what they really want in a man.

  ~~~~~

  Wall Street Insider: Rent-a-Bot (RABT), the startup that went public last month, gained fifteen percent today on the NASDAQ trading desks. The significant price move reflects market confidence in RABT's line of dancing robots. Customer demand for Max, the lead salsabot, soared in the first two weeks of its release six months ago. Four replicas have been dispatched to ease the waiting list, with another hundred scheduled to arrive in major cities in the United States, Europe, and Japan.

  Breathtaking in its lifelike appearance and behavior, the first Max out of the gate displayed a pronounced forehead defect. After its repair, female clients remarked that the flaw had rendered the bot more intriguing. Each iteration of Max now comes with this distinct facial scar.

  Isabel Molino, popular Brooklyn dance instructor, reports that she rents one of the salsabots to serve as her teaching assistant. To test Max's competence, she feigned inappropriate moves and discovered that the bot could lead her back to the correct form without missing a step. "I've never seen anything like it," she claims. "He, or should I say 'it,' is as good as the best salseros in the borough."

  With scores of women eager to meet Max's human model, Federico Suárez now offers private lessons on 57th Street in the lab where Max learned to dance. Software designer Jason Phillips is unavailable for comment, rumored to be on vacation in the Caribbean with his wife.

  Catherine Evleshin is a professor of dance and Caribbean culture. Her writing appears in WordsApart Magazine, Mused - the BellaOnline Literary Review, and Caribbean and African Diaspora Dance: Igniting Citizenship by Yvonne Daniel.

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  Bogged Down

  by Jason Norton; published June 21, 2013

  Third Place Award, June 2013 Fiction Contest

  What had begun as a wretch of a week for Preston Alstodt was turning out most glorious. His elation would have invariably been lost on the casual observer who did not share his passion for botany. But knee-deep in the brackish muck of the Everglades — leeches, gators, and fist-sized mosquitoes aside — he was reborn.

  Originally, he'd planned to stay on campus and work through Spring Break. That was before the kitchen pipes burst and the alternator in his 2007 Toyota Corolla died. On Thursday, two of his fellow biology professors were notified that Harvard did not require their talents in the upcoming year. With untold semesters to go before he could even hope for the security of tenure, Preston took their dismissal as a threat. He needed to publish or at least contribute to some credible research soon to bolster his credentials — or his resume.

  It was all too much at once. He had to get away. Harvard was just too damned cold in March — especially this March.

  On Friday afternoon, he called his contractor, worked out where to leave the key, and taxied to the airport. Five hours later, he was on a red-eye to Florida.

  It was supposed to have been a casual getaway, not an expedition. But Preston never really allowed himself such respite.

  His field team, sixteen strong, remained in Boston. Janie would've made seventeen but she was still in Ithaca. She'd refused to accompany him on the last leg of his doctoral pursuit. She'd seen the writing on the wall in his sophomore year at Cornell and realized she would always be his second most-loved carbon-based life form. They still talked, at least once per month by phone. E-mails were intermittent. They hadn't been face to face or body to body in over six years. Her choice.

  He was married to his work, but he made no apologies. Human relationships had always been too difficult. Plants were easy. They lived and died. In the interim they waged a silent war for survival; fighting and scratching and doing their damnedest to choke out competitive species for territorial dominance. Win some, lose some. Not too far removed from humanity.

  But with plants, emotions were never involved. There was no need for conversation or compromise. They were content to be alone.

  Janie was still with him, in his mind, as his plane taxied the tarmac. Six years hadn't helped him forget; not surprisingly, three gin and tonics hadn't either. He would keep trying. He had six days.

  Saturday morning, he took full advantage of the hotel's pastry-laden continental breakfast and swiped a cardboard four-cup carrier to smuggle a proper morning's worth of coffee back to his room. He showered and slathered on sunscreen. Grabbing a folder full of yet-to-be-graded mid-terms and the complimentary Miami Herald left outside his door, he headed to the beach that fronted his corner room.

  It was already hot — no surprise there — but the beach was suspiciously devoid of sunbathers. Preston then remembered he was on Spring Break in Miami, it was only a little after 9 a.m. and he was nearly 30. The college tourists that had bombarded the city still had at least six to eight hours before they would depart, zombie-like, from their hotels.

  He took nearly 30 minutes to trudge through three mid-terms. It was difficult to focus. It was practically impossible. Peeling himself from his chair, he waded into the blue-green Atlantic.

  He dove under the waves, making his way past the breakers. Lifting his feet, he allowed the tide to buoy him as he lay backward. He closed his eyes and floated, embracing the respite as waves lapped against his face. He began to mentally rifle through rare orchid species. It was a form of cognitive yoga he'd first utilized when writing his thesis, as a way to calm and clear his head.

  Cymbidium sinense: indigenous to India, Taiwan and Thailand. Found in cool climates. Requires ample light with lower temperatures. Thrives in an ideal humidity between 40 and 60 percent.

  Cattleya schilleriana: Brazil. Grows in cool to hot temperatures on cliff faces and in rivers anywhere from sea level to 800 meters above. Often used to create hybrids in attempts to breed "super orchids."

  Dendrophylax lindenii: first found in Cuba in 1844, discovered in south Florida 50 years later. Commonly known as the Ghost Orchid due to its billowy white appearance. Two thousand known to be in existence in Florida; their location mostly kept secret by researchers and horticulturalists. Considered the most sought after orchid in the U.S. and possibly the world.

  He opened his eyes at the realization, losing the poise of his float posture.

  South Florida. He was in South Florida. Within forty minutes he could be in the heart of Big Cypress Swamp, smack dab in the middle of Ghost Orchid Central. He couldn't believe he hadn't thought of it sooner. He could find a Ghost Orchid. Bringing one back would be tantamount to sacrilege, but if he got the chance to study one in the wild — hell, to even see one — he was sure it would spark inspiration for his next project.

  He returned to his chair, toweled his hands and dug his cell phone from his bag. Dialing information, he asked for airboat companies. He stopped the operator at the third listing: Fan-Dango Airboat Tours. She connected him directly.

  "Fan-Dango Airboat Tours; best gator-gazing getaway in the 'Glades," the gravelly voice on the other end said, more la
ckadaisically than one would expect, considering such a reputation.

  "Moe speaking; may I help you?" the voice followed, no more enthusiastically.

  "Do you have tours going out today?"

  "Sure do," Moe replied.

  Preston waited expectantly. "What time?" he asked, realizing Moe wasn't volunteering additional information.

  "Time you wanna leave?" Moe said, after an audible sip and swallow.

  "Aaahh, how about around noon?" Preston suggested, caught off-guard at the man's nonchalance. He wondered if all the natives were as casual.

  "Nah, noon's no good. Too damn hot. How about let's say four? Sun'll be lower," Moe countered.

  "Four it is," Preston said. "Listen, is there any chance this could be a private tour?"

  Moe took another drink. "Hell, they'll all be private today. Spring breakers don't care about airboatin'. Ain't no sex or booze in it." He paused. "Well, no sex anyway, 'less a couple of them co-eds show up and play their cards right."

  ~~~~~

  Preston arrived at Fan-Dango fifteen minutes early. There wasn't much to the place. The tiny shack had an attached pavilion that barely covered two picnic tables. An 80's-era cash register sat atop a weathered L-shaped bar. Two t-shirts — one red, one black — hung on coat hangers dangling from the eight-foot-high rafters. The sun-bleached shirts proudly displayed the white Fan-Dango logo — an airboat driven by an over-sized bespectacled alligator, Ray-Ban sunglasses resting on his snout.

  A graying, rotund man wearing a trucker's cap with the same logo emerged from the shack. His name was embroidered on his black Polo. Moe.

  "Howdy, friend. You must be my four o'clock. Mr. ..."

  "Alstodt," Preston reminded him. "Doctor Preston Alstodt."

  "My apologies," Moe said, extending his hand. "M.D.?"

  "Professor. Botanical Sciences. Harvard," Preston said, shaking the larger man's hand.

  "An Ivy-League plant man. Funny," Moe said.

  "I suppose so," Preston agreed, surprised he'd never made the same connection.