Engines of Empathy - Prologue

Here is the full text of the initial draft of the prologue of Engines of Empathy

PROLOGUE

     As always, leaving things to the last possible minute was proving to be a bad idea. In this case, a particularly bad idea as the last possible minute included the sum total of the time remaining in his life. He always expected he would die in his bed, or someone else’s bed many years hence. Warm, comfortable and surrounded by impatient descendants with something cryptic to say as his last words. He’d given his penultimate utterance a lot of thought, “My only regret is that you never met your birth parents,” had been his personal favourite. He imagined saying it to his grown up children and watching their faces as he drifted off.

     Of course his darling wife would be deceased by then, out-living that most perfect of women would be the honourable thing to do. Fate appeared to have a different opinion as she was away visiting her parents until the baby arrived. In his opinion the installation of children was a fine thing, but taking delivery of the finished product nine months later? That he felt was better left in the hands of experienced women.

     The rain and crashing thunder outside made it difficult to hear the whine and click of his approaching assassin. The only lighting available in the large mansion was the flickering glow of candles, and there were precious few of those.

     “What-ho Mr Wibbly?” he called into the darkness. Somewhere out there a door handle rattled, and then exploded out of the frame in response. The prototype possessed remarkable strength, but very poor fine-motor skills. Dashing on stockinged feet he made for the library. Closing the door he went to the fine writing desk that took pride of place in the room. He had bought it at an auction, recognising it as living oak, the rare wood that had been a key to the discovery of the age. The discovery that was now going to get him killed.

     The letter was complete, but there would be no time to post it now. He paused, listening between the rumbles of the storm outside for approaching death. There it was. The whirr and click of clockwork gears; the slow, deliberate sound of approaching betrayal. The letter folded up into a narrow strip, with shaking hands he prised open the hidden slat in the roll-top desk’s cover. Pressing the letter inside, he winced as the office door shuddered under repeated blows.

“I’ll be right there!” he called. Sliding the slat back into place, he patted the desk fondly one more time and whispered, “That should cause someone no end of trouble.” He smiled and went to meet his death.

Old Stories: The Tower

I've been trawling through some old files and finding old stories. This one is from 2009 or earlier. Never published of course.

The Tower by Paul Mannering

The architect and reason for the tower were lost to the sea in aeons past.  Only the stones remained. Each block of black basalt curved slightly, just enough to cling to its brethren and encompass the tiniest angle of curvature in the round edifice.  The tower stood tall and phallic on the barren black cliffs above a storm grey sea and waited.

 Tomlay and Adelsa left the tower in dull morning light cast by the ancient red sun. The tide had receded uncovering the rich mudflats and the shellfish that they harvested.  Today they called each other Tomlay and Adelsa, yesterday each had created different names for the other.  One was male and the other female, and after smashing the hard calcite husks of their meal, they slurped and gnashed their teeth against the pale slime flesh nestled within.

The emptiness of their bellies satiated, Tomlay grunted at Adelsa and pushed up against her buttocks, his genitals swelling.  Adelsa, today bearing the complimentary female parts refused him and Tomlay pushed harder, grunting with increased ferocity.  The female scampered away and climbed the sea-worn stones of the cliff, pausing, crouched on a narrow ledge to throw small stones at the furious male below.

With a dismissive gesture, Tomlay turned away from her and loped off down the beach.  Hunched over, his flat pale hands slapped the hard-packed wet sand every few strides and he collected and discarded anything that caught his eye without pausing in his rush.

Adelsa’s hoots faded into the hiss and moan of the surf.  Tomlay scampered over the horizon, if Adelsa would refuse him today, then he would seek solace elsewhere.

The sun was midway between the grey sea and the highest point of the sky when Tomlay reached the next bay.  The tide was returning, sweeping back in a long pulsing flood to cover the mud and sand, refreshing the shellfish beds and maintaining the smooth palate of the long beach. Tomlay splashed through the edge of the surf until the salt stung his eyes and his translucent eyelids flexed shut and turned his view into a muted sepia shade.

Turning away from the water, he scuttled on long boned legs, up and over the dunes as barren as the tower cliffs, to the border of the marshlands beyond.  The marsh did not interest Tomlay or Adelsa, they had never found reason to penetrate its humid, rustling depths.  Passing along the soft-earthed strip of land between sand and bog Tomlay felt his lust swell anew.

At the further end of the second bay, a peninsula rose.  Twin to the rock under the tower, this outcrop made a pedestal for a statue, vast and unknowable, the smooth stone rose to a dizzying height in the air and bore a pleasing feminine shape like that which Adelsa wore today and Tomlay might wear tomorrow if Adelsa tired of it.

His hairless body glowing with exertion Tomlay bounded up the rocks, leaping and grunting he sprang and clung until he reached the top.  Here he rested, idly stroking himself as he crouched and breathed the salty air. Squinting up at the statue Tomlay considered every curve and niche.  Not wanting to waste his climax, he released his grip upon himself and hooting in delight scuttled forward to leap upon the naked toe of the figure. From there he scampered up the smooth incline of the massive carved foot and laid his hands on the cool stone of the giant ankle.

Adelsa grew bored with crouching on her ledge.  She knew where Tomlay was going, having been there herself many times. Straightening, she finished climbing to the top of the cliff and with her back to the tower; she flexed and twisted her body, catching the warmth of the morning sun on the waxen flesh of her breasts and thighs.

Tomlay became one with the embodiment of female essence.  He entered her; this vast repository for all that was female, merging his own flesh with that of the dark stone.  In the warmth of her womb, he was zygote.  Fertilized egg dividing and conscious of all existence, the seething turmoil of a billion-billion generations of DNA twisted around him.  Filtered light glowed sanguine and comforting; he remembered conception and birth throughout time.  This was the culmination of life, only the genetic memory remained. Tomlay ejaculated and cried out, his emissions floating in the warm space that both surrounded and engulfed him.

Returning to the tower Adelsa felt the shuddering connection that Tomlay made with the female, encased in the up-thrust structure. With a moaning cry to the burning sun her own form broke down and joined with his in the union of genetic replication. Together they disseminated in to the component units of genes and the chemical codex of life. 

Through out the day and the night they would gestate. In the following dawn two new forms would emerge, craft names for themselves and bask under the pale light of the red sun and experience the success of life.

Loose Lips

A complete change of pace for the collection, 'Loose Lips' is a previously unpublished bizarro story. I've been a fan of all manner of insane writing for a long time. Jeremy C. Shipp is one of my favourite bizarro authors and his writing can be somewhat mild compared to others like Cameron Pierce. Lips is a change of pace for the collection, and the first of the non-horror stories therein. It is however still a strange tale and that's why it is included.