Sample, 'Points of Reference'

“Colonel, what happened to the Naga Sentry?”       

He wouldn’t, or couldn’t look at me. He kept his eyes on the double vault of airlock doors ahead of us. There were guys in spacesuits a lot like my skinsuit, but with helmets, preparing a spacepod just for me.    

“Your parents were good people. All of the people on that ship were good people. I couldn’t stand the sight of that thing. I had orders to bring it in to port. I was commanding a brig carrying it in our cargo hold. When we passed behind the star to make  a standard orbital approach, I flushed it into Alexis’ photosphere.”             

I nodded. “Good.”       

“You’ve never talked about the seven months you spent as a Loner on that ship.”       “

Why would I want to?”          

I shut my eyes tight. Just like that a flash of memory returned, as real as when it happened. My father standing over my mother’s body, staring at his hands. His running screaming into the calesthetics ring between sleep pods until another crazy passenger shivved him.        

Me, seven years old, wheeling my parents’ bodies on their own sleep cot to the science lab freezer where we stored cellular samples for seeding on A-Seven. I secured them on their mat, spooning them together in death as they’d been in life, before this fucking voyage began. Then I shut the freezer door.      

“It’s ready,” the Colonel grunted. “How about you?”               

“Yeah. Let’s go.”

[a very short chapter for a story using my DeviantArt character Lianna]

Enjoy.

www.mike3839.deviantart.com

This Should Come as a Surprise to No One: The Female Doctor

Remember when Lenny Henry became the Doctor? He was a black man, a comedienne who for one glorious, brief, hilarious sketch became the universe’s most famous Time Lord. Nobody whined about that. Well, I suppose it might have had a little to do with the fact that he wasn’t really the Doctor. It wasn’t CANON!!! The BBC gave Colin Baker the year off, and Lenny Henry stepped up. But, he could have been, and I would have been happy with it.

             I would love to have seen him do more as the Doctor. Alas, I knew this skit only as an extra included on the Comic Relief VHS, “The Curse of Fatal Death”, which to be honest was the best Doctor Who program we were given in 20 years. Sure it was; it was written by Steven Moffat, wasn’t it? That was his first foray into the world of Who, and what a debut.

            So, sorry, Thick-Of-Skull here, not getting why y’all getting so uppity because the new Doctor is (gasp) a--A WOMAN! AAAAUUUGHHH!

            Yeh. Calm down and let ‘em regenerate.

13th Doctor Jodie Whittaker

            Why are you so surprised at this? You didn’t care when the General (Ken Bones) , the old British white guy, regenerated into T'nia Miller—a BLACK, BRITISH woman. EEEKKK! And oh man, was she relieved to be a woman again! You got down with that, but you object to the Doctor we know changing gender?

            This is not a PC plot, so you can yank that stick out from up your proper white male ass. This is not a surprise. They’ve been hinting at it for 41 years, ever since the newborn Eldrad made that throw-away line in “The Hand of Fear”: “Oh come, Doctor, you sound like Professor Watson. As a Time Lord you should be well acquainted with the process of regeneration.”

            Yeh, that was waaaay back in Tom Baker’s era. And every single time since then when it was announced that a new actor would be taking the role, the fans started clamoring for a woman Doctor. I’m excited for this. I can’t wait for 13 to get snarky with Davros, or Missy, or the Cybermen. You know what, screw all you white dudes and you PC paranoia. I’m setting my gear up for Season 11.

http://www.doctorwhonews.net/2017/07/bbc-responds-to-complaints-about-casting.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPbiGb_JVLI

"Adorable moment young girl reacts to new Doctor Who announcment"

Taking Down the Cameras (short fiction)

This was the day I’d always dreamed of, since that first afternoon I saw those spycams on their spindly rods posing over our traffic signals. Only a few appeared at first but as time moved on, they began to multiply like fleas at every traffic stop. I fumed every day, even sped past those electronic signposts screaming “Speed limit exceeded”, just to be contrary. Maybe it was cowardice not acting on our frustrations sooner, but the generations pass, new voices arise with the balls of the young, and I was proud to be invited to stand with my grandson as we tossed a tow cable around the spycam’s neck and yanked hard.

[New short short story. Enjoy. ]

Nooses? Not on my watch, sonny

Grow up, you idiots.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/05/us/nooses-hate-crimes-philadelphia-mint.html?mcubz=0

Yep, the noose is back. Across the Southern U.S. these things have been cropping up too frequently, symbolic of the bigotry that's been simmering to the surface since last November's election. One incident that made national headlines came towards the end of June, when a white male coin maker carried a noose across the factory floor at the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia to the workstation of a fellow African-American coworker.

The veneer of civilization is thin in the best of times; all it takes is a little stress to bring the Neanderthal roaring back. That's not acceptable.

No, actually, this is obscene. You're telling me in the 21st Century, white males feel privileged enough that this sort of intimidation is going to be allowed? How about NO. Fuck NO. Keep your nooses in the gutter with you, where they belong. This is not anything that I'll tolerate.