by Matt Krizan This year, when Santa crept down the chimney, Caroline was waiting. She hid behind the tree, delighted to see Santa go straight for the milk and cookies she’d left. As he munched away, Caroline tip-toed up behind him, quiet as a mouse… …and smacked him across the head with a baseball […]
by Sheri White My parents own a business, so we get a lot of Christmas cards with family photos on the front. You know, everyone in matching pyjamas, even the dog (okay, the dog’s cute). I hate them. Several years ago, I noticed a distorted face on a card. I thought nothing of it, […]
by Angela Zimmerman The change happened quickly. Monday, Mother started screaming the last word of her sentences. By Wednesday, Caleb found Mother standing in the kitchen with a knife pressed against the puppy’s throat. Even though Mother received the latest updates, Caleb could see that Mother’s biometrics were failing. Failing biometrics resulted in unstable […]
by Kimberly Rei The light, lithe figure moved through the crime scene quietly, without disturbing evidence. Her team watched her. She didn’t fit in. She looked too human. Or not human enough. She made them nervous and they hated her for it. She crouched, eyes flickering to take in the body. She reached for […]
by Jessica Brook Johnson Penny was checking her phone’s texts as her smart car cruised along the highway. There was a high-pitched ding followed by a message from HotBoi752. “I’m tired of being ignored. I deserve better.” She rolled her eyes. “AI dating? What was I thinking?” The car began to accelerate. “What the […]
by Andrew Kurtz “I wish people were born with wings, so they could soar in the sky,” Sid told his android butler as they stood on the two-hundred-foot mountain peak after a rigorous climb. “Have you completed your flying lessons yet? You have been taking a lot of them,” the android stated. “Yesterday was […]
by Pauline Yates Eager to try the new AI Book Writer app, I download the program and enable the wireless imagination transfer function. “Welcome to Book Writer,” a computer simulated voice says. “Please imagine scenes for text conversion and click upload.” I imagine the scenes in “Murder By Moonlight”, the crime novel I started […]
by Scott O’Neill I get the others to stop whimpering so I can hear my smartwatch. “sAIveME free expert system downloaded. Please summarise your crisis.” “Class-Nine shuttlecraft. Drive damaged by hostile lifeforms. Pilot and engineer eaten by same. Nontechnical crew to repair drive for escape.” “Acknowledged. Scan damage and available resources.” I show my […]
by Liam Hogan “Ship! Seal doors against the zombies!” A relaxed, artificial voice queried: <Define zombies?> As far as our ship’s mega-intelligent AI was concerned, there wasn’t any difference between us and them. Whenever one of the infected approached any of the doors, whether to sickbay or the bridge, it opened with a polite […]
by Samantha Arthurs They told me that smart cars were the way of the future. I wish now that I had never listened. I’m trapped inside; my own coffin on wheels. The automatic door locks are no longer responding to my fingerprints. My voice commands go unheard. I’m not sure where we are going. […]