Authors: Daniel Wimberley
The Pedestal
**Kindle edition**
The Pedestal
Copyright © 2014 by Daniel Wimberley
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
Design Vault, LLC
First Edition: February 2014
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Wimberley, Daniel.
The Pedestal / by Daniel Wimberley. – 1
st
ed.
p. cm.
1. Life on other planets – Fiction. 2. Bioengineering – Fiction.
3. Apocalyptic fantasies – Fiction.
Book design by Giovanni Auriemma.
For my son, Luke.
It starts with an upset stomach. Bearable at first, soon uncomfortable enough to send the man dashing home from a poker game on a perfectly gorgeous Friday night, forfeiting twenty credits to a twitchy, red-eyed apothecarist along the way. Shuffling through his front door, the man chews a fat antacid tablet, bemoaning the unconscionable price of such bitter, antiquated medicine to his empty condominium. Later, still suffering, he downs two more to no avail. The discomfort worsens with each passing minute until it can no longer be written off as just another of middle-age’s petty tolls.
Something is undeniably wrong.
A man of proud stock, he’s powerfully resentful of his implant—technology better suited for the hopeless youth, in his opinion, who brandish their lazy constitutions like the engorged bellies of ticks—but when the heat in his gut becomes unbearable, his lifelong posturing over such things loses focus; he calls upon his NanoPrint like a prodigal son, and he’s far too despondent to feel any shame.
The implant tingles in a short burst, flooding him with merciful relief in milliseconds and drawing from him a scoff of grudging amazement. He’ll wrestle with guilt in the morning, no doubt, but for now he feels like a new man.
Minutes later, sitting in his favorite chair, he draws a glass of chilled Chablis to his lips, smiling even as he drinks. Maybe he’s misjudged the value of his implant after all.
Beneath the skin of his wrist, the tiny body of his implant begins to oscillate in steady spurts. At once, the burn of reflux resumes, this time with maddening intensity. The Chablis smolders like hot coals in his stomach. Simultaneously, the room seems to yaw, spinning around him like a broken carnival ride; he worries that he should sit down before he falls, but—of course—he’s already sitting. Sweat seeps from his pores, yet his body shivers.
What’s happening to me?
In answer, the contents of his stomach spew from his mouth like rodents fleeing a flooding burrow, toppling him off his chair and sending his drink sailing. Prostrate on the floor now, the man groans. The floor tilts in and out of kilter, gathering speed. His chest seems to compress as if a fat man is climbing aboard. It’s becoming maddeningly difficult to breathe with his lungs heaving in sporadic gulps—and for a few terrifying seconds at a time, not at all. His NanoPrint is still now, but he suspects the damage is done.
I’m dying
.
There’s no one to help, no friendly neighbor to run to his aid, no automaid resting on its charger, waiting patiently for a command. Hardly the time to entertain loneliness, yet it creeps in nevertheless. For many years, he’s lived in the shadow of death—alone, separated from the woman he loves; now, as the end is upon him, the wastefulness of fear is made plain. He wants to cry out, to scream for justice, if not for help. Even if he could summon the energy to bother, his voice would scarcely penetrate the soundproofed walls of his condo.
In desperation, he submits an emergency ticket on his NanoPrint. But he’s a pragmatic man; help will arrive too late, and he knows it.
As if to vindicate this bit of black cynicism, the emergency submission hiccups and then fails; it slips quietly into a background queue where he hopes it will idle only briefly before reprocessing. Gliding across his retinas, though, a connection error dispels even that feeble hope.
...Fatal error encountered.
...Connection failed.
...The nexus is not accessible with your current NanoPrint configuration. Please seek the immediate assistance of a nexus administrator.
Tears cloud his vision. He’s been cut off from the nexus, and thereby from everything on the planet, living or otherwise; however lonely he felt only a moment ago, he’s truly never been as alone as he is now. And still, the room spins and spins.
Oh God, why won’t it stop?
In a last-ditch effort, the man attempts to launch his MentalNotes—to document these final seconds, for whatever they’re worth—but nothing happens. A sob forms in his throat, yet he can’t catch a decent breath to send it on its way. His implant whirs to life again, and for a scant millisecond his hopes rise.
Perhaps there’s still a cha—
Crawling to his knees, the man suddenly buckles as an immense pain seizes him, goring through his chest like a giant, dull knife. Beneath the chaos, despite the pain, his thoughts race with detached clarity. His NanoPrint isn’t arbitrarily failing him, he realizes—it’s attacking him. The unthinkable—the stuff of conspiracy tales—has come to pass. He’s known for some time that his end is near; he’s spent many sleepless nights worrying over the how and when, but he never imagined that his own NanoPrint would be weaponized against him. He’s terribly afraid now. Of dying, naturally, but equally for those he’s leaving behind, the few who have made life worth living.
It’s now or never, he realizes. Everything he’s worked for—all that he’s endured to protect his loved ones—it all boils down to this moment. The realization gives him an ounce of bitter courage, and he digs into his NanoPrint process queue. Sequences cycle there at dizzying speeds, resolving too quickly to interpret in the best of circumstances, but that doesn’t matter. As the dying man issues his final command, a victorious smile rises above the agony of death.
_execute file pedestal.exe;
His implant responds instantly.
... Fatal error encountered.
... Connection failed.
The smile flickers off like a popped filament. Just like that, it’s over. He has failed. Nothing remains but to die.
Abruptly, as if cast away by a great wind, the bondage of his implant leaves him; the persistent signage, the gentle chemical prompts he’s endured every moment of his life—they’re quiet for the first time, and in their absence, the silence is sweet bliss.
Blackness engulfs him, and though he longs for the plush nothingness of that soft abyss, a lone thought gives him pause on the very precipice of death.
There’s only one hope now—but who will protect the boy?
