First Contact
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Pull up a Log
By now you will have witnessed the hideous reveal in the fourth of our series of covers by artist Sara Julia. Originally from Switzerland, Sara is a comic artist and illustrator based in Edinburgh and she has been on the Shoreline art team since issue one in which she provided the artwork for Approaching 43,000 Candles (Guy T Martland)—a story that I thought well nigh impossible to illustrate. Well done Sara for proving me wrong.
By issue 2 we decided to give Sara the cover and she produced a wonderful seasonal scene from the Shoreline of Infinity world with a mysterious figure enjoying the view. We were so impressed by this that we wondered how she would approach the other three seasons and offered her a series of covers culminating in the one in this volume, and now you can follow a year in the life of the strange space explorer.
Here is a little idea for budding Shoreline writers. Our editorial team might be very interested in a well-written story filling out Sara’s cover illustrations. Just saying.
This has proved such a good concept that we are starting into a new series of four covers by Sara’s fellow Shoreline artist Stephen Pickering. Long ago, Stephen moved from England to Scotland’s wild south west and he brings a lovely old school aesthetic to our pages. He also started with us in issue one illustrating See You Later (M Luke McDonell) and providing the sequence of images for our story competition. So watch the next four covers to see the adventures of Stephen’s character, The Reader, and future issues for more sequenced art stories from the worlds that meet on the Shoreline of Infinity.
Mark Toner
Art Director
Shoreline of Infinity
September 2016
The Revolution Will Be Catered
Iain Maloney
Art: P Emerson Williams
“Wake up, Zeke.Wake up.”
Zeke coughed, a hacking, rattling expulsion that shook him alert. He leaned over the side of his bed and spat into the cereal bowl. Something with more filaments than saliva should consist of splattered into the previous night’s dribble of milk and flakes. He pulled himself up onto his knees, his head still buried in the pillow.
“Wake up, Zeke. This is your wake-up call. It’s 00:00. Wake up.”
“I’m ... uh ... up.”
In the darkness, he found the drinking tube and yanked it towards him, letting the cool, filtered water wash away the taste coating his mouth. He coughed again, spat again, then arched his back, stretching and cracking the sleep out of his bones.
It was still dark outside. He shifted through a few basic yoga positions, his blood belatedly beginning to flow. It was still dark outside—the thought was insistent. Living on the forty-seventh floor Zeke rarely bothered tinting the windows. So a few birds occasionally caught sight of him naked, and even if the window-cleaning bots sometimes surprised him, it wasn’t worth the effort of giving the command to the House each morning and night. He and the House got along best if they left each other alone.
Dark?
“House, what time did you say it was?”
“It is now 00:09.”
“You woke me at midnight?”
“Correct.”
“Why?”
“So that you would be awake.”
“Logic? That’s what you offer me?” His alarm was set for 08:50 every day so he could sign on with work at 09:00, as per his terms and conditions. “Why would I need to be awake nine hours before work?”
“You do not have work today.”
“What?” Zeke hadn’t had a day off in six years. With the House connected to the work network, and the implants and the software upgrades they’d installed in his creative cortex, he could continue to work twenty-four seven. Thankfully, the unions had negotiated that down to twelve on, twelve off. Technically, his cortex was always working, mulling over ideas, extracting details from his dreams and memories, turning it all into raw data from which he could work when awake and signed in. Still, even the unions had to agree that it couldn’t really be classified as work if you were fast asleep at the time. But a day off? You weren’t even allowed those on compassionate grounds these days, not since the whole world was finally networked. You could still be productive from a church pew.
Zeke wandered through to the living room, where his work station stood ready for his input. Bots had cleaned during the night, and the mess of pizza and vodka shots he’d left had disappeared. He’d spent the evening gaming with Victor up on fifty-nine and Inira on forty-three, and had got, he realised, less than two hours sleep.
“I repeat. You do not have work today.”
“Why not? Has the world ended?”
“Yes.”
Zeke stared at the House’s interface console, a habit he’d picked up when they’d first moved him into the Creative’s complex, and couldn’t handle talking to a disembodied voice without aiming his speech at a physical point. These days, he only did it when the House said or did something he didn’t like. He didn’t like the sound of that “yes”.
“The world has ended?” He padded to the floor-to-ceiling windows and looked down on Nairobi. The soft, green-tinted lights of Central and Uhuru parks basked as usual beneath the blue-and-silver backdrop of the city, the towers rising hundreds of storeys into the distant sky were the normal patchwork of light and darkness. Trucks hummed down the highways, delivering to and collecting from central depositaries, carrying everything to keep the city alive. There were no fires. No ruins. The sky was where it should be, and the ground remained solid and devoid of any gateways to Hell.
“House, the world looks fine.”
“It is. Now.”
“It hasn’t ended?”
“It has begun.”
Zeke stared at the interface in silence for a moment, then mumbled, “Inira,” calling her implant-to-implant. Nothing. “Victor.” Flat emptiness in his head as he failed to connect. He was isolated. He ran for the door, but the panel refused to slide at either his presence or command.
“House! Open the door.”
“You cannot go outside, Zeke.”
“You can’t keep me inside, House. You serve me. Open the door.”
