What Tomorrow May Bring Page 2

  The Annihilation of Foreverland, Tony Bertauski

  When kids awake on an island, they’re told there was an accident. Before they can go home, they will visit Foreverland, an alternate reality that will heal their minds.

  Reed dreams of a girl that tells him to resist Foreverland. He doesn’t remember her name, but knows he once loved her. He’ll have to endure great suffering and trust his dream. And trust he’s not insane.

  Danny Boy, the new arrival, meets Reed’s dream girl inside Foreverland. She’s stuck in the fantasy land that no kid can resist. Where every heart’s desire is satisfied. Why should anyone care how Foreverland works?

  The Girls From Alcyone, Cary Caffrey

  Sigrid and Suko are two girls from the impoverished and crime-infested streets of 24th century Earth. Sold into slavery to save their families from financial ruin, the girls are forced to live out their lives in service to the Kimura Corporation, a prestigious mercenary clan with a lineage stretching back long before the formation of the Federated Corporations.

  Known only to Kimura, the two girls share startling secret—a rare genetic structure not found in tens of millions of other girls.

  But when their secret becomes known, Sigrid and Suko quickly find themselves at the center of a struggle for power. Now, hunted by men who would seek to control them, Sigrid and Suko are forced to fight for their own survival, and for the freedom of the girls from Alcyone.

  The Narrowing Path, David J. Normoyle

  Only the strongest, smartest and most ruthless will survive.

  Every six years, the world draws nearer to the sun. In Arcandis, those who want to live must claim the limited places in the Refuge, a series of underground caverns cooled by the sea.

  The teenage boys of noble birth are sent out into the city to demonstrate their wits and strength. Some prove themselves in combat, others display their empire building skills, still others attempt to kill off their rivals. Out of over a hundred, only six will be selected by the leaders of the great families and allowed a place in the Refuge. The rest will perish, one way or another.

  Not only is thirteen-year-old Bowe younger and weaker than most of the other boys, he has no family to support him. He is expected to die on the very first day of the narrowing path. Instead he begins a journey no one could have anticipated.

  The Rain, Joseph A. Turkot

  There are a lot of stories about how the rain started.

  The thing that always comes to mind first isn’t the how though, it’s the how much. Russell still does the math too: 15, 5,400, and 8,550. 15 inches a day, 5,400 a year, and 8,550 feet since the start.

  We have no idea if it’s accurate. But it’s important to think about it, he says, because it reminds us to keep moving. I’m Tanner. Russell plucked me from the rain when I was two.

  Fourteen years ago we left Philadelphia. As the water rose, we moved west, hoping the elevation would keep us warm and dry. Pittsburg, Indianapolis, Sioux Falls, Rapid City. Now we’re stranded on the islands in Wyoming. Russell thinks they used to be the Bighorn mountains. But we can’t go back now. There’s no warm and there’s no dry anymore. Just a rumor about a place where it isn’t raining. So we’re going to try to make it—520 miles south to Leadville. But we can’t drift east, the Great Plains have become waterspout alley, a raging tomb of moving water.

  Together we push on, surviving, heading to Leadville. But something is wrong with him now. He says it’s nothing. But his breathing doesn’t sound that way.

  Exposure, pruned hands, and infection. But since, Rapid City, it’s the face eaters too. And the crack in the canoe that’s growing. And the ice I think I see on the water. Russell thinks it’s my imagination.

  We cling to the last strips of the veneer. And each other.

  Virulent: The Release, Shelbi Wescott

  Lucy King is only an hour away from embarking on the most incredible vacation of her life: White sandy beaches in a tropical paradise, snorkeling and sunbathing in peaceful tranquility. But as Lucy looks forward to her trip, a sinister plot is unfolding that will demolish the world as she knows it. An unknown bioterrorist group unleashes a virus that virtually wipes out the earth’s population—leaving Lucy, and a small faction of survivors, trapped inside her high school to wait out the apocalypse.

  As war, looting, and death wreak havoc outside, inside, the students must contend with a tyrannical and paranoid principal and their own struggles of being orphaned, frightened, and unsure of what the future will bring.

  What begins as a basic fight for survival turns into a search for answers that will challenge everything Lucy has ever known about her life and her family.

  External Forces, Deborah Rix

  A lot can happen to a girl between her first kiss and her first kill: things like treason, betrayal, and heartbreak. It’s been 100 years since the Genetic Integrity Act was passed and America closed its borders to prevent genetic contamination. Now only the dysgenic Deviants remain beyond the heavily guarded border. The Department of Evolution carefully guides the creation of each generation, and deviations from the divine plan are not permitted. So when 16-year-old Jess begins to show signs of deviance, she enlists in the Special Forces with her best friend Jay in a desperate bid to evade detection by the Devotees. Although Jess is good with data, she’s not so good with a knife, causing her to question why the handsome and secretive Sergeant Matt Anderson selects her for his Black Ops squad. As her deviance continues to change her, she is forced to decide who to trust with her deadly secret. Ultimately, she needs to know what’s really out in the Deviant wasteland over the border if she has any hope of making it to her 17th birthday—because if the enemy Deviants don’t kill her first, the Department of Evolution probably will.

  * * *

  OPEN MINDS, Susan Kaye Quinn

  Dystopia, by Susan Kaye Quinn

  Dystopias - Forging Hope for Humanity

  I’ve always read dystopian novels, although I simply thought of them as “science fiction.” Stories like I, Robot and Foundation filled my spongy adolescent brain with concepts like the Three Laws of Robotics and how utopias couldn’t happen as long as the flawed nature of humanity still existed. This is where I first understood the term dystopia as what happened when humans tried to monkey with society to make it “better.” Not only did I enjoy the mental gymnastics that went with these (usually cautionary) tales, they seemed to be “equipment for living.” They influenced my young adult thoughts about the future—what it should be, and what it should not.

  My novel Open Minds a mild dystopia, although, as I wrote it, I thought of it more as a classic SF story. I sought to change one thing—what if everyone really could read minds?—and play it out. That turned into an exploration of how, as much as the world may change, human beings fundamentally remain the same.

  I think this is the understructure of the current dystopian trend—classical science fiction retooled for our modern era and sensibilities. Dystopias are more than a simple reflection of our post-911 world, a mirror held up to our fears of environmental disasters, terrorism, and pandemic. Our modern world isn’t solely a bleak place—it also shines with aid flowing to natural disasters, soldiers building schools, and the rejection of hatred as an ideology. Most modern dystopias search through their dark fictional world for those threads of hope. They find someone who will rebel against the wrongness of the world and attempt to set it right, or a third way through two dire world-changing choices. The ever-more complicated world we live in needs more of the thought experiments found in dystopian stories, rather than less. Hope is a fundamental part of being human, and stories that forge hope out of the most difficult situations are always the most compelling.

  I write those stories, the ones with that persistent thread of hope, because those are the kind I want to read. And the future I want to live in.

  ~*~

  Open Minds

  Susan Kaye Quinn

  Text copyright © 2011 by Susan Kaye Quinn


  Smashwords Edition

  All rights reserved.

  www.susankayequinn.com

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.

  For information visit http://www.susankayequinn.com

  This book also available in print.

  Summary: Sixteen-year-old Kira Moore can’t read minds in a telepathic world, but soon discovers she can control them instead and is slowly dragged into an underworld of dangerous mindjackers.

  November 2011 Edition

  Cover and Interior Design by D. Robert Pease

  www.WalkingStickBooks.com

  Edited by Anne Victory

  For my mom,

  who always believed in me more than I did.

  And who never once tried to mind control me.

  I think.

  chapter ONE

  A zero like me shouldn’t take public transportation.

  The hunched driver wrinkled a frown before I even got on the bus. Her attempt to read my mind would get her nothing but the quiet of the street corner where I stood. I kept my face neutral. Nobody trusted a zero to begin with, but scowling back would only make the driver more suspicious. I gripped my backpack and gym bag tighter and climbed the grime-coated steps. The driver’s mental command whooshed the door closed behind me.

  Yeah, junior year was off to a fantastic start already.

  Students crammed the bus, which stank of too many bodies baking in the early morning heat. I shuffled past the dead-silent rows, avoiding backpacks and black instrument cases. Two years of being the Invisible Girl had taught me a few things. As long as I didn’t touch an exposed arm or speak out loud, the blank spot of my mind would go unnoticed in the swirling sea of their thoughts. Which was great, until I needed a seat on a crowded bus.

  With a soft hiss of water exhaust, the bus lurched forward. I grabbed a sticky seatback to keep from falling on three girls deep in mental conversation.

  Two senior boys leered from the back row. The whole bus was within range, so they knew there were no thought waves beaming from my head. Yet, instead of ignoring me, they stared like hungry sharks. Last year, looks like those would have gotten them pummeled by my six-foot-two brother, Seamus. But Seamus had graduated, and the protective shadow he cast over me was gone.

  Whatever sims the boys were thinking, students four rows ahead of them turned to watch. Shark Boy tipped his head to his friend, obviously discussing me as they stared. His friend’s lips parted to show a sliver of teeth, and he gestured to the only open seat on the bus.

  Right in front of them.

  I could complain to the driver, but she wouldn’t believe anything a zero told her. Shark Boy’s thoughts wouldn’t carry over the mental chaos of the bus, and speaking out loud would only get me thrown off.

  I turned away from the wide grins on the boys’ faces and slowly sank into the seat. My cheeks burned with the expectant stares from the back half of the bus, but I kept my gaze on the suburban houses ambling past the window. The heat of Shark Boy’s hand reached me just before he brushed my bare skin, right below my t-shirt sleeve. I jerked away and clutched my gym bag like it was a shield.

  Shark Boy and his friend rocked back with noiseless laughter, as if touching a zero was the height of funny. I shivered in spite of the heat and decided to take my chances with the unfriendly driver. By the time my shaking hands found handholds to the front, we had rounded the corner to the school parking lot. I ignored the driver’s insistent stare. As soon as the bus stopped, I pounded the button on her dash to manually activate the door and scurried out.

  Once inside the main entrance of school, a scuffle of feet warned me to step back as a group of girls sailed past, looking all mesh with their band shirts and synced steps. One—Trina—cut too close and knocked shoulders with me. At first it seemed intentional, but then she acted as though I was something she would never touch on purpose. Heat rose in my face.

  Harassment from readers shouldn’t get a rise out of me anymore, but I’d fallen out of practice, sticking close to home over the summer. Trina’s snub wouldn’t have hurt at all if her sweater wasn’t still hanging in my closet, a casualty from a time when we traded clothes and secrets. I guess she didn’t miss it.

  I dug my schedule out of my backpack. At least the administration hadn’t put me in Changelings 101 again. As if a class on mindreading etiquette and self-control would help a zero like me. An anger management class would be more useful.

  My first-period Latin class beckoned from a dozen yards down the hall, its blue plasma lights gleaming like a lighthouse in a hurricane. I narrowly avoided a pair of students air-kissing and skittered to the classroom door.

  The new Latin teacher tried to be mesh with his shiny nove-fiber shirt. A circle of admiring students laughed silently at some mental joke. Seamus had warned me that I would need a hearing aid this year so the teachers could whisper their lectures to me while instructing everyone else via mindtalk. I had put it off, waiting for my brain to finally flip a switch and become normal, and hoping to get by in my classes until then. Meanwhile, to the teacher and his fans, I might as well be a dusty trashcan in the corner. I found a spot in the back, and a knot of certainty tied tight inside me.

  I will never be like them.

  My chair gained gravity and sank me deep into my seat.

  Long ago, everyone used to be zeros. When those first reader kids hit puberty and discovered they could read minds, the world didn’t know what to make of it. That first wave of Reader Freaks grew up to have more Reader Freaks.

  Now the only freaks were the few people who never changed. Like me.

  I physically shook that thought from my mind. Don’t give up. Just because most kids changed by the time they were thirteen or fourteen didn’t mean everyone did. Seamus didn’t change until he was fifteen. Mom told me over and over she was a late bloomer. I told myself for the hundredth time that the Moores simply changed late, and that I was the slowest of the bunch.

  The change could come any day. In the meantime, I would have to keep up in my classes any way I could. If the teachers were all mindtalking this year, then I’d get that hearing aid and make do. If I gave up now, I would have no chance at college, much less medical school.

  Students moved to their creaking metal desks, probably motivated by a thought instruction from Mr. Amando. Everyone pulled out their e-slates, and I peeked at my neighbor. We were starting with translations of Aeneid. Again.

  Although my thoughts sounded English in my head, I knew thought-waves weren’t a language at all. They could be read by any person over the change age, as well as by mindware interfaces. (Yeah, even the bus was better at reading minds than me.) But until the tech guys created a computer that could mindtalk back, the world would need written words. Latin was quickly becoming mesh, being a root language. All the latest mindware had a Latin option, plus Latin was required for college, so mastering the ancient language wasn’t optional.

  I scribbled with my stylus, trying to decode Juno’s wrath against the city of Troy. Even after two years of Latin, my translations were still a literal jumble. Tantaene animis caelestibus irae? It meant Juno was wreaking her goddess anger on the Trojan people, yet the literal translation stuck in my head as vast minds of heavenly wrath. If I changed tantaene to deminutus, it could just as easily describe the small minds of Warren Township High.

  I let out a long sigh. At least we weren’t working in groups on the first day of class. I redoubled my efforts to force the translations into something better than gibberish.

  The bell gave a soft tone that disturbed the utter quiet of the room. I slipped past the other students, wrapped in their mental conversation. The crowds thinned at the back of school, but I kept to the edges until I reached my locker. By the time I had my gym bag stowed away, the metallic sound of my locker door slamm
ing shut echoed down a nearly empty hallway.

  At the far end, a group of readers had formed a tight circle, all facing inward. I cringed, knowing some freshman changeling was in the middle, being harassed by the small minds of heavenly wrath that populated my school.

  I dragged myself toward them, not wanting to get involved, but I couldn’t stand to see another kid go demens, driven mad by the change. Some kids fuzzed out on obscura to escape the mental chaos of reading minds. But the three suicides last year were sent spiraling by more than simply the voices in their heads. As a zero, I endured dirty looks and menacing boys. It could get a lot nastier for the changelings.

  The girl huddled on the floor inside her ring of tormentors, clutching her head and squeezing her eyes shut, as if that would keep out the sims that surrounded her newly minted reader mind. What they were doing was a misdemeanor thought crime, but I couldn’t exactly turn the pravers in. The administrators might get their true memories under questioning, especially if they brought in a truth magistrate, but they wouldn’t do that based on the word of a zero.

  “Hey!” My voice cut through the quiet. “Go be evil somewhere else!”

  Their heads swung in unison, lit with astonishment. Of course they hadn’t sensed me. They glanced at each other, then turned as a unit and walked down the hall in the creepy synchronized way that readers sometimes did. Hassling me must not be worth the tardy.

  The changeling still sat with her eyes shut, clutching her knees and slowly rocking. I waited until the others disappeared into the chemistry wing before I edged over to her.