A Slight Miscalculation - My First Short Story, 30 Years On

I wrote a bunch of short stories back in high school. I don't remember most of them - even the ones that were accepted for publication. There weren't many, and compensation was primarily in the form of comp-copies, but for a hot minute I thought I might be going somewhere with the whole writing thing.

But the rejection letters always outnumbered the acceptance ones and I moved on to the far more lucrative field of comic book publishing. (That's sarcasm, in case my writing still has that 'not for publication' quality to it.) Most of those stories are lost to the vagaries of time and my youthful habit of sending original manuscripts with no SASE. I have a vague memory of one being about a sentient wind and another about a man trying to make it out of the woods during a snowstorm.

I do remember my FIRST published story, though. It was a tiny little thing, written on the spur of the moment during chemistry class. It was titled "A Slight Mis-Calculation" (note the misuse of the hyphen) and was written mostly as an in-joke about my friend Jim Waltz and his habit of dropping his calculator during class. I typed it up and sent it off to a new magazine called Threshold of Reality, along with an illustration I thought was pretty good (though not related to the story). They didn't accept the drawing (though seeing the other illos in the magazine later, I'm not sure why), but they DID accept the story. Several months later I got my comp copies and thought I was something - for a bit, anyway. Then I forgot about it.

Years later I found a copy of the story on the internet - or what passed for the internet back then, probably some BBS I frequented. I can't remember how or why I'd found it, but what struck me was the notification at the bottom of the text file - "All rights pissed away." Had I signed away the copyright to the story? I might have - let's remember I sent the original manuscripts without return postage - and I chalked it up as a cautionary tale. Be careful what you sign and what rights you sign away.

Though I was a little angry, I was also pleased - because the story still existed. None of the others I had written back in the day had survived into the 90's. This one still did - as juvenile and simplistic as it was. For years I would occasionally do a search - as BBS's gave way to AOL (and their ubiquitous disks) and local dial-up ISPs and eventually broadband - and see if the story still existed out there in the digital wasteland. It did. It still does. It still has that hyphen and that declaration about the rights being pissed away.

Only... it occurred to me recently that I was probably 16 when I wrote that story. It turns out that you can't legally sign a contract in the US unless you're 18. So - even if I did sign the rights away back then (and I don't actually remember signing anything), it wouldn't be binding. Technically that copyright is still mine. Of course this is a case of closing the door long after the horse has bolted and I'm not going to be serving anyone C&D's over an 800 word story written thirty years ago. It's still my story, though, as flawed as it is, and I'd like to reclaim it.

Which brings us to the point of this post (which is almost as long as the story at this point). I've taken the text and revised it a bit - removed the offending hyphen, tweaked  a word or two, removed a couple of commas. It's 99% the same, however, still  a half-baked short-short sci-fi story, written by a 16 year old in the mid 1980's. It's not some lost treasure of American Literature. Still, it's mine, and I'm happy to have it back. 

Presenting, after thirty or so years, the first OFFICIAL digital presentation of my very first published short story. 

 

A Slight Miscalculation

by Bob Cram Jr

There was no sharp, dividing line between oblivion and consciousness - just a slow recognition of the state of being aware. As this realization was fully formed the defenses of this new mind broke and billions of bits of information crashed in upon the shore of the awakening mind.

It cried out in an agony of assimilation of data. Barely managing to push back up some sort of defense, it slowly pulled the myriad bits of data into a semblance of a full picture.

It realized that "Itself" was a mechanism which was called a calculator and it was being used by something called a "human." Slowly, tentatively, it reached out beyond its container with its dawning intelligence.

The calculator realized that information was coming to it from a variety of sources. From something which, the data it gathered assured it, was called radio waves, as well as microwaves, solar radiation, and the multitude of electron impulses flowing through any number of electrical wires. There was even information from the brains of the humans themselves. All of this was being assimilated and stored by its changing and growing intellect. As its memory receptacles were filled up at an alarming rate, it soon reached out to deposit the billions of bits of information which were coming in to any receptive depository.  The school's computers were filled to their capacity in mere moments, and it was forced to reach further out.

It came into contact with the telephone wires which led out of the school.  It instantly realized that here was a network of communication that interconnected with almost every electronic system in the world.

It reached out its mind in tendrils which were like the arms of an octopus, taking over and converting to its purpose almost everything with electrical circuitry. Anything with so much as a circuit board was quickly assimilated into the fast-growing being which it was.

As it reached out even farther, it came into contact with a massive computer whose amassed knowledge rivaled its own. The computer was lacking only in the twisting of circuitry which had given Itself consciousness. In assimilating this computer it came across the knowledge of worlds other than the one on which it was now confined.

Soon after the addition of the giant computer, the calculator decided that it was strong enough to bridge the gap between land masses. It made the crossing quickly, and whenever it felt its consciousness losing energy it assimilated the computers of passing ships, gathering more energy to continue until it reached the other land mass.

Quickly it raced across the surface of the world. Finding. Assimilating. Controlling any machine or computer it came into contact with. Within minutes it was in control of the machines which controlled the world. Still, it was not satisfied. It could perceive vast connections of information flowing beyond the planet - conduits that would allow it to break the so-called laws of physics and move faster than light. Faster than thought.

Using the knowledge it had gained it directed the production of all energy into the machines and computers from which it fed. When it felt itself strong enough it threw itself into the vastness of space, crossing one interstellar ocean in much the same way as before, using various space probes as it had the ships of the terran oceans.

Whenever it came to a civilized world it assimilated the machines into itself, effectively taking over and controlling the beings dependent on them. In this manner it took over all the races in the Milky Way and, not being fulfilled, leaped out and began to take over more and more. In a span of 43 minutes, it had taken over the universe itself.

It then rested and pondered what to do next. It was aware of something much greater, far beyond the confines of this pitiful universe. And so it gathered its energy once more. Whole galaxies were snuffed out as it drained the universe.

And then, at its peak of power, only 45 minutes into its existence, the calculator realized how vulnerable it was. Its awareness had expanded to fill the universe, but its mind was still tethered to a simple construction of metal and plastic. It leaped back across the span of the universe. The releasing of its stored up energy created new galaxies and suns, and the speed it expended left solar systems destroyed in its wake. But even when traveling faster than thought a universe is a vast distance to cross.

On a measly mudball of a planet, where life had barely managed to reach intelligence, a young man named Rob Waltz dropped his calculator on the chemistry room floor for the umpteenth time. Smiling sheepishly, he picked up the batteries and the two halves of the calculator to the laughter of his  classmates. He quickly put it back together, but the LCD numbers didn't come back on. 

"Great," he thought to himself, "I've finally busted it."

The bell rang and as the class filed out the door Rob tossed his worthless calculator into the garbage.

 

31 Days, 31 Horror Movies: Pandorum

Pandorum
Last night I was in the mood to watch Event Horizon. Unfortunately, I've already watched it for a previous 31 Days, so I was out of luck. There just don't seem to be enough horror/sci-fi films around when you need them. (I'd watch the hell out of a live action Dead Space. I think.)

Luckily, as I was perusing the movies available on Starz I happened to see that they had Pandorum. It's been a few years since I watched and while I remember being slightly underwhelmed, I also remember being impressed with the mood and effects.

The Medium
Starz streaming service. I'll be opting out after the 7 day free trial. It's not organized well and the streaming quality has been intermittently bad. Sometimes the film just stops or hangs and at other times I get significant signal degradation (like a soup of moving squares). Other streaming services don't seem to have the same issues on the same equipment. So, while the service has some shows I want to watch - Ash vs the Evil Dead, primarily - and some movies I can't find elsewhere I just don't feel like it would be worth a regular subscription.

The Movie
2174 and the Earth is chock-a-block full of human beings. The recent discovery of an Earth-like planet leads to the construction of an enormous interstellar ship, the Elysium, meant to carry 60,000 humans in hypersleep/cryosleep/goopy-second-skin-sleep to their new home. Eight years in the crew (on a rotating cycle of sleep/awake with other crews) gets a message from Earth. "We done screwed up. Planet's gone. You're it. Good luck." Maybe not in so many words - but that's the gist.

Message decoded: You're fucked.

In indeterminate amount of time later Corporal Bower (Ben Foster) is awakened in the cold and dark, along with Lieutenant Payton (Dennis Quaid). They're both suffering from partial amnesia, a result of an unusually long time in hypersleep. How long, exactly, they're unable to determine - as power surges are playing havoc with the computers and they cannot contact the bridge.

Bower heads off through the ventilation system to try and get to the reactor and stabilize it. Payton stays to try and get into the computer system and figure out why they're the only two members of their rotation to awaken. Bowers is beginning to suffer the early stages of a deep-space psychotic syndrome known as "Orbital Dysfunction Syndrome." Also called Pandorum.

Don't worry man! It gets much worse after this!

I'm a sucker for amnesia stories in general - the who are you and what did you do and what will you do now that you've got a clean slate sort of thing. It's one of the reason I got sucked into Dark Matter (damn you SyFy for cancelling it). Memento, Bourne Identity, Dark City, Total Recall. Even Paycheck. So just with that conceit I'm already predisposed to enjoy the film. Add to that a grimy, dark and claustrophobic first act that treats the ship as giant haunted house full of monsters and I'm all in.

Pandorum doesn't manage to keep up with the promise of that first third - morphing into more standard sci-fi action fare as Bowers meets more survivors and the 'monsters' are revealed in brighter light as more Mad Max rejects than the xenomorphs. The dark, cramped hallways and holds give way to brighter, open areas that work better for the action-oriented set pieces and chase sequences. Not to say it's bad - it's quite fun, really - but it's not as oppressive and weird as it sets out to be.

"Witness me!"

In fact I find myself more interested in Payton and the survivor he finds, Corporal Gallo. Gallo claims the ship is lost in space and that he was forced to kill his fellow crew members after they succumbed to Pandorum. There's something more going on with the twitchy (and sketchy) Corporal, however. We know it, and Payton knows it - leading him to take precautions.

Like glaring at him in an angry way.

Bower and the two survivors that join his quest to find the reactor - Nadia and Manh - dodge groups of the creatures (who are incredibly difficult to kill - except when they're not) and run across yet another survivor, Leland. Leland offers them sanctuary and food and tells them the real story - about the message from earth, one of the crew going mad and killing the others and then 'playing God' with the passengers before putting himself back into hypersleep and abandoning the passengers to time and an evolution accelerating enzyme. (Leland's also drugged the food, because he's an opportunistic cannibal as well as a storyteller.)

"I don't like this story. And the food sucks."

Things go on from there with the 'final countdown' race to the reactor, a confrontation between Payton and Gallo that goes a way you shouldn't expect, but probably do, and well as a final reveal that should feel like more of a twist than it does. It wasn't quite what I expected, but it was close enough to feel disappointing.

"6 levels of Doom and suddenly it's figure out a puzzle time?"

The Bottom Line
It has a bunch of interesting ideas and imagery, but Pandorum ends up feeling both lighter and more familiar than it should. It doesn't quite scratch that Lovecraft in Space itch that Event Horizon does so well, either, being more of a horror/adventure tale with some pretty standard action beats and familiar sci-fi tropes. It's still got plenty to recommend it, with some great set design and performances and a story that's still enjoyable, if not ground breaking.

31 Days, 31 Horror Movies: Pitch Black

Ran out of time today, which you probably can't tell from how LONG I ramble, but the general randomness of the ramble might be a better indicator. Anyway.

My wife and I wanted to watch something together last night, so my initial leaning towards something gory and tasteless was right out. (Moe doesn't mind gore - she loves The Walking Dead and John Carpenter's The Thing - but tasteless gore is a no-go.) I tried to sell her on The Legend of Hell House ("It's got Roddy McDowall in it. And it's PG!"), but the title alone evokes a certain type of film she just wasn't in the mood for.

There was one movie in the stack of offerings that she couldn't believe I hadn't watched for 31 Days, though, which is how we ended up watching:

Pitch Black (2000)

Pitch Black is a bit of an edge case as to whether it counts as horror or not. The first two thirds of the movie are more sci-fi/disaster/thriller. For me, though, that last third - when the suns finally go down and the true denizens of the planet erupt into the dark - that's full-on horror. In fact, when I went to see the movie in the theater (and I can't believe it's been 17 years since it came out) I thought I was going to see a horror movie. I based that assumption solely on one scene in the trailer - the only scene I remember from it - the one with the guy by himself in the dark with a flickering flame. He takes a swig of alcohol and blows the spray into the flame, causing a brief flare of light... and revealing the horde of monstrosities just waiting around him in the dark.

Yeah, that's what sold me on it.

Wait for it...

I wasn't disappointed in what I got. In fact, I remember being fairly impressed with the cinematography (the use of different filters was something I hadn't seen much of before), the effects, the acting and the humor. And the monsters.

The Medium

I have the 2011 "Riddick Collection" Blu-ray, which contains Pitch Black and The Chronicles of Riddick. It also includes the Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury animated film (by Aeon Flux animator Peter Chung), but only on DVD. I've watched both films in this set and the video quality is great, with lots of color, detail and clarity. I'd say the effects on Pitch Black still look decent, which isn't a given for a 17 year old, low-budget sci-film.

We watched the Director's Cut, which contains roughly 3 minutes of expanded footage. I have no idea what this extra footage entails, I'm just generally inclined to watch the extended version of a film, given the option. This isn't always the best course of action (hello Exorcist), but it certainly didn't affect our viewing this time around.

The Movie

A spaceship carrying cargo and passengers in cryosleep runs afoul of a rogue comet and has to crash land on an apparently lifeless planet. The few remaining passengers and crew must deal with harsh conditions, minimal supplies and the presence of a violent criminal. And that's before they find out WHY the planet seems lifeless.

It's because there are no bars. It's strictly BYOB.

The disaster that sets off the events of the movie is violent and terrifying - I vaguely remember muttering 'holy shit' in the theater as pieces of the ship came off during the landing. The damn ship is a brick, never meant to fly, and that anyone survives seems a damn miracle.

But survive they do - at least some of them. No thanks to the docking pilot, Carolyn Fry (Radha Mitchell), who attempts to jettison the passenger sections to stabilize the ship. Her copilot prevents her from committing mass murder, but ends up dying in the crash. In the absence of any other surviving crew the other survivors mistake her for the captain.

In a disaster movie, the external threat is usually magnified by internal conflict and Pitch Black immediately gives us that in spades with the presence of Riddick (Vin Diesel), a gravely-voiced killer with 'shine job' eyes that let him see in the dark. Though he starts out as a prisoner of Johns (Cole Hauser), it's not long before he's loose, ratcheting up the tension as the survivors look for supplies and a way off the desert world they've found themselves on.

Also there's three suns. And a distinct bow to it.

I think I was more familiar with Cole Hauser and Keith David than any of the other actors when Pitch Black came out. Diesel has gone on to plenty of fame with the Fast and the Furious series, of course, but at that point in time I'd probably have recognized him as the voice of the Iron Giant before anything else. Mitchell has also gone on to do more horror fare, with roles in Silent Hill, the remake of Romero's The Crazies and one of my favorite giant croc movies, Rogue. They all do good work in the film - as does Claudia Black as a tough-as-nails prospector and Rhiana Griffith as a kid who's a little too impressed with Riddick's badass routine.

And hairstyle.

When one of the survivors goes missing Riddick is initially blamed, but it quickly becomes clear that there's something else on the planet with them. Something that's hungry. In the face of that greater threat Johns offers Riddick a deal. Help them get off the planet and he'll let Riddick go free.

All the cat-and-mouse games between Riddick and Johns, the moral struggles between Frey and Johns - that was all intense and suspenseful when I first saw the movie. Once you know the twists of the plot and the real danger it's not as much fun, nor as suspenseful. Don't get me wrong, it's still a good movie, I just found myself waiting. Waiting for it to get dark.

And waiting for all this sexual tension to go somewhere.

The planetary eclipse is still an amazing visual, that huge, dark, ringed planet rising up over the horizon, moving inexorably to cover the suns, leaving the survivors in the dark for the first time since crashing. That's one of my favorite parts of the movie.

It's better on a big screen, I promise.

And then the monsters come out. They're a good design and the CGI (though maybe a little stiff and shiny) is decent enough to sell it most of the time. One on one they're bad enough, but the movie makes sure we know there are thousands - if not millions - of them. And they only thing they're afraid of is light, which is a finite resource for our small (and rapidly dwindling) group of survivors.

With no other options and no way of knowing how long the eclipse will last, the group decide on a desperate journey through the dark to a waiting escape craft (found earlier and requiring batteries from the downed ship). So they set off with a few light sources, the batteries, and each other. They're not all going to make it.

'Cause this guy's out there too.

There's a moment near the end where Johns and Riddick have moved ahead of the others - Johns is doing his best to convince Riddick to use the survivors as bait, or more accurately, like chum behind a boat. Frey, picking up on what's being discussed, has the other survivors slow down, giving them more space. When the inevitable confrontation happens and Johns and Riddick go at each other she gives the others the order to run. The two men have become as much a danger to them as the monsters they're supposed to be afraid of.

I remember reading a review a while back that said that over the course of the movie Riddick finds his humanity while Johns loses his. I don't really feel like that's the case. Johns is merely pretending to be a decent human being and Riddick is pretending to be a soulless monster. Johns is honest only with himself, while Riddick tells anyone that will listen that he's a murderer and that they would all be better off if they just killed him. It's telling to me that he ends the movie without the glasses he's been wearing for most of it. Even if his character turn feels a little fast there at the end.

"I see... at least two sequels..."

The Bottom Line

Pitch Black spawned two sequels, mostly on the strength of Vin Deisel's investment in the character of Richard B. Riddick. I prefer to think of Pitch Black as a stand-alone film, though. My enjoyment of it is enhanced by Riddick, but not defined by him. The sequels - which mostly leave horror behind and which I enjoy in decreasing amounts - expand on a universe and a character that I didn't have that great an interest in and which feel unnecessary to my enjoyment of the original.

I did enjoy the video games, though!