Category: Short Stories

Shorter-form fiction

Short Story: No Choice in the Matter

~ S.M. Nolan ~ 4 Comments

His heart pumped fire, a war-charge. His feet thumped damp Earth, beat a near supersonic rhythm jet-fueled by adrenaline. He’d have panted terror if it weren’t for fear that it might slow him down. Instead, he took half breaths, held them. His temples pounded. Brain half-suffocated brain. He didn’t care. Higher-brain functions weren’t important now. So long’s his heart kept his blood moving, his legs would keep working.

He slid down a hill, pivoted, sprang across a ditch. He landed, still running. Blood-hounds barked and howled over grumbling ATVs and whining dirt-bikes. Moonshine and gunpowder pierced the air, inflicted by the clothing of his pursuers. He wasn’t even sure how he’d escaped. It didn’t matter. Nothing but running did.

They’d tied him up days ago, had been starved and tortured him since. Mason wasn’t sure who, but knew they represented the less-enlightened sect of populous in these parts. They were almost fanatically devoted to eradicating those unworthy of their antiquated, myopic lifestyle. Mason knew what his crime was. They’d bludgeoned it into him. “Choosing” to love a man was the highest disrespect to them. Never mind the fact he hadn’t chosen a damned thing.

The assholes would’ve never been part of his thoughts. They weren’t either. Not until they started attacking him, anyway. He knew well enough they were a part of a local order of hicks– most-likely the Smith or Flynn clan. A few others like them inhabited the area, but none were so brazen as to kidnap and torture a man.

Mason and his husband arrive home one day to find a giant swastika scorched into their front yard. A giant, brown and white “FAG” burned beneath it. It was hardly clever. In the end, all it did was anger his neighbors. Even the less, “liberally-minded” cites of the American South would’ve cared so much. Saying that would’ve missed the point that current era was hardly any of the 1900’s. Even the more conservative folk– most elderly– didn’t care. He’d changed more than a couple minds on “his type” himself alone.

The his was even simpler than the why. It was all freedom, openness; most folk judged a man’s worth by the sweat on his brow. The rest didn’t care to know anyhow: It wasn’t their place to broach such uncouth topics. Changing minds became about how the sweat poured from the couple’s brows. If there was anything to either of them, it was hard-work. From the trades of carpentry and auto-maintenance, to their home renovation hobbies, to landscaping “FAG” from their yard with new sod, both men earned their respect.

Yet here he was: sprinting through back-assward woods. The snow-ball’s chance in hell of escape was as likely as his becoming another hate-statistic.

Engines revved. Dogs howled. Powder and booze-smells grew stronger. His heart readied to give out, accept death. His mind readied to watch on-high as his blackened and bruised body crumpled. The spatter of bloody knife-cuts across him were even less a choice than anything. He hadn’t chosen a damned thing. Never. The fucks behind him didn’t care in the least.

But he had to find Ben, had to reach him. He’d been working late, hoping for extra cash for their trip when Mason went missing. The hicks feared him. Ben was twice the size of even the largest captors, but all muscle. He could’ve punched a fist any one of ‘em Terminator-style. He tended toward pacifism though. All the same, had he been there, Mason would’ve never been caught off-guard. Never frozen. Never been jumped from behind and knocked unconscious to be tied up. It wouldn’t have happened. Mason’s state would’ve enraged Ben’s rare but fierce temper.

Mason wouldn’t go back, couldn’t. He wouldn’t lie down. Wouldn’t die. He’d never submit to another torture session. He’d kill himself before those bastards carved anything else into him. “Fag” was the least of it. The first cuts were quick, easy. Eventually, all of them were made with dull blades.

A passing gleam appeared through the trees. It curved away. Distant engines mingled with dogs and shouts. Mason’s heart nearly stopped. The rural highway to town appeared. He scrambled up-hill, more determined than ever. He bobbed and weaved through trees met asphalt. An old Bronco screeched to a stop, nearly hit him before the blue and red lights appeared. The deputy was out, gun in-hand before he realized the man’s sordid state.

The ATVs rumbled nearer. The dogs howled over Mason’s hysterical pleas. The cop ordered him into his truck, peeled out as the first pursuers appeared at the tree-line. He raised his rifle to fire, saw the lights, then grit his teeth and lowered his weapon. The Bronco raced to town and the hospital. The officer took Mason’s statement as he was tended to by a nurse. Ben appeared, face pale but with fiery eyes held at-bay by concern.

Ben hugged Mason carefully, parted only when the nurse insisted she finish stitching and bandaging him. The officer left a guard on the hospital room over night. He returned the next morning alerted the couple that all of the men Mason had reported were being arrested.

Justice was swift, as near to complete as it could be. Mason’s testimony was given via teleconference from his hospital bed. His injuries were too severe to allow him to leave. Nonetheless, his story went public. Debates of hate-speech, freedom, and crime were sparked locally and nationally. Most sided in the couple’s favor.

Mason, on the other hand, was merely glad to be alive. He was wheeled into his house, at Ben’s insistence, to find a giant banner welcoming him home. Beneath it, stood all of the couple’s friends and neighbors. If nothing else, Mason was who he was, and most were grateful for that. No matter what others felt for a moment Mason knew, if given a choice, he’d have chosen to be himself– if only to selfishly retain the love that welcomed him home.

Short Story: Immortalized

~ S.M. Nolan ~ 2 Comments

She didn’t know how to say it. Writing it was easier, but speaking it was difficult. A few days ago, she couldn’t have even done that. Thinking of it was still painful, but before– in the first moments following it– even thoughts had failed her. Now, here she sat, staring at the log-in screen of her own computer, in her own gaming chair. Beside her, his empty chair and blank screen inflected a terrible grief on her heart. It choked her up, what needed to be done, but she had to do it.

It was like that old adage of “the show must go on.” Only it wasn’t a show. For her, it was life. Life had to go on. Most people found comfort in that, solace in the idea that it’d one day end. They held vain hopes of reunions. She didn’t. She had only the grim reality of the lonely present. They’d met through a screen, just like the one she watched now. The character had been different then; blue-gray skin in place of the pasty white. Black hair where it was now bright red. The bright palettes of high-level armor had adorned the elf-body though, as it did now. She remembered the first time she ever saw him, in-game. Love at first sight didn’t exist for her. It wasn’t going to either. Through avatars of druid bulls, archer-orks, or anything else the game manifested, it simply couldn’t.

His words, those were real. His actions, by proxy at first, were real too. The twelve years of love, happiness, and marriage since were even more real.

All of it had come from a raid night. she’d been invited to join his guild for the chance of epic loot and hordes of XP, in exchange for healing magic. No-one had any idea what they’d started. Before long, she was up all night with him, playing after the rest of the Guild had retired. She’d always been his support, his crutch. Even after things had gone from game-life to real-life. His upbringing had left him with more emotional baggage, but he managed it with a rogue-like agility that defied the tank-builds he played.

She understood that paradox better than anyone: He’d always thrown himself into the thick of things to save others. The scars on his face and back said so. They were small, subtle, but there. She remembered them as well as the earthen hair and eyes she’d caress and stare into. Most of all, she remembered how he’d gotten them, a story he’d only told once. It was all the times she’d needed.

He’d been quiet, voice softer than a mouse’s. He’d come home from work one night as a teen, later than usual. His father had decided to take out his pink-slip on his sister. He fought back for the first time that night. His sister cowered, bloody and bruised in a corner, as he was beaten almost to death that night. His parents told the paramedics he’d fallen down the stairs. They’d hid the little sister in her room. Everyone knew the lie, but Martin kept quiet for his mother’s sake. The belt marks were too distinct. The scars from the buckle obvious. It had gouged skin like a garden rake to chaff.

A friend of his informed the police soon after. They raced over and caught Martin’s father in the act. As far as she knew, he still hadn’t shown his face. More than two decades had passed. But Martin held no grudges, especially at the end. That he was gone now was unbearable.

She took a deep breath, swallowed hard, and keyed in her password. A prompt flashed for a secondary authentication, and she typed in a pass-code sent to her phone via text. The loading screen with its mini-game about cute elves went untouched. It dissolved to the field where she’d last logged out beside him. They’d played for hours and hours together, expecting an end. Yet somehow, they both knew when it was the last time. They’d returned to the field where they’d first met, where she’d first joined the guild to raid, and stood beside one another to watch the animated landscape.

There was a resignation in Martin then. He just held her hand, in game and out, and stared into the distance. It was as if things had come full circle. Only Martin could say what or how. Even now, her eyes leaked to think of that sad despair in his ailing grip.

She wiped an eye, keyed in a command to pull up the guild-chat menu. All but a couple of the regulars were on. It didn’t surprise her. It was prime farming time. After-work hours were guaranteed to find the full-Guild in voice chat. The couple that weren’t there were still friends. She had to wait. It was only a few minutes before they appeared, almost in tandem. She cleared her throat, wiped away a few more tears, and slipped on her headset. She sent invites to join a party, at her location, to everyone. Another few minutes passed before the twenty-odd people had assembled before her in-game.

Like Martin before, she felt something had come full-circle. She stood in the same field where she and Martin had first met. Where she and everyone had first met. The assembly armored creatures stood in two lines before her, sensing what was to be said. They felt no need to rush her, nor could have for anything in the world.

Her breath shook. Her voice warbled and wobbled. “You are mine and Martin’s best friends. He loved you. As I do. Like f-family.” She involuntarily sucked air through her teeth. It rip the hearts from every guild member. “That is why, I feel it my duty to…”

She sucked air again. No one moved. The avatars merely watched, awaiting the inevitable words. Not even they wished to sully the moment with idly animated movement. It was obvious the group was as heart-sick and grieving as she was.

“I feel it my duty to… tell you Martin’s battle with cancer ended this week.” A near-imperceptible slump of shoulders appeared from the assembled creatures– or the players’ grief was so thick in the air, it felt that way. “He w-wanted me to th-thank you for everything you’ve done. If it were not for your kindness, the last few months would’ve been unbearable. I f-feel the same. You’re the family neither of us has had but wished for. I can only thank you for that, for me and for Martin.”

The field sank once more into silence. It lasted a long moment before a character suddenly materialized from thin air. Judging by the rare, exclusive armor, and the lone markings of “GM” and a single name, it was one of the game’s admins– the big wigs that worked on it, and whose power in this place exceeded a God’s.

He looked to the assembled characters. “Forgive my interruption. I understand this is a time of great pain, but my presence was requested by Mr.Fluffers.” He said as a random guild-member bowed amid the assembly. “You’ve lost a member of your guild. I understand the depth of that bond. So in your friend’s honor, I give you this.”

With a flashing spell-cast, a statue in the place where Martin would have stood beside her– where he had stood, time and time again. Cast in bronze, and identical to his character, his name was inscribed on its base– the ultimate honor any player could ever hope for. The GM turned to eye Martin’s wife and friends.

“I didn’t know him, but seeing his friends– his family– here today, I know he was a good man that kept good company. I am truly sorry for your loss. I dedicate this field in his honor, to be known as Martin’s field. It cannot remove your loss, but it can assure you he will be forever remembered.”

With that, the GM knelt, and placed a glowing, golden flower at the base of Martin’s statue. The rest shuffled over to do the same. She cried openly on the voice chat, more from gratitude than grief. She knew some bonds could not be broken. Death only made them stronger. But so too, it seemed, some people transcended death itself. Their spirit was so powerful a force as to become immortalized in ways man could never have imagined. For her part, she was just glad to have known him. To have loved him. Even if their time together was shorter than she’d have liked.

Short Story: Triggermen

~ S.M. Nolan ~ Leave a comment

Spotlights threw their beams and heat across two-rows of computers, situated back-to-back before pinstriped Racer chairs. The high-power LAN was accented by LED peripherals that inflected slight hints of color over the otherwise bright white. Beyond them, along the three sides of the arena, the crowd roared in, riled by the convention taking place outside. They sat in their seats as restless and bloodthirsty as any crowd could be. Cube-like displays of flat-screen televisions hanged scatter-shot from the ceiling, ensuring no-one missed a second of the mayhem about to commence.

Slideshow of teams about to enter the arena with short bios and photographs flickered past. Digital banners ceremoniously proclaimed, “Triggermen World-Champion Clan Match: Icewind [ICWND] vs Phantom Cobra [PCBRA].” Triggermen, arguably the greatest E-Sports title ever created, had grown from a few groups of fanatical fans to millions of players, and countless clans, in only a few short years. The first Triggermen championships forever changed competitive gaming.

Mechanically, the game was nothing special; simple team or free-for-all game modes, and a few others more cult-favorites than competitive. The real prize was the immersion. Triggermen managed to suck a player in, as if they were really there, fighting for base-rights, hostages, or bombs. Either from the expertly crafted-atmosphere, the absorbing environments, or the pitch-perfect sound effects, there was something about Triggermen that had captured every player and transported them to a new world.

The two teams filed in. Cheers nearly staggered them. Some players waved or made vague gestures of gratitude or love. Others remained straight-faced, unaffected, too focus to let the crowd gain purchase in their minds. They took their seats, fitted their headsets, and keyed in their credentials. With their profiles loaded, each player chose their load-out and prepped for game-play. The start counter began at 10, prompted hands to make their last, minute adjustments.

Among the teams was Brandon Dodgson, also known as BurntVenom, or just Venom. It was only luck that his gamer-tag had slotted him a place on a team where Venom actually made sense, though he hated the first part of the ages-old gamertag. None of that fronted Venom’s mind though. Like always, Triggermen had completely taken over. He sat amid the rest of Phantom Cobra, taunted by into a rabid fury by a downward tick of a digital clock; “3” coursed fresh adrenaline through Cobra. “2” readied them for bloody gun battles, flowing improv-strategy, and hostage rescue. “1” poised them forward, ready to beat Icewind to their hostages and back to base first.

The teams found themselves at opposite sides of a large map, lined up like their seats in the long dissolved area. “0” flashed as boots hit dirt and beat a cloud of dust with headlong-sprints, Venom among them. He knew the map well, better than most; three, main paths were laid out between the two bases. Cobra’s hostages were sequestered inside the opposing base, just behind Icewind’s spawn. A few shortcuts here and there cut diagonal paths between main through-ways to give players ambushing options– or ambushee options.

Venom knew the cuts well, but he wasn’t about to start the shit-storm of close-quarters fighting. He kept his sights forward, broke into pairs to assault the three, main paths. Slicer was with him; the only girl on the team, and more ballsy than most of the other guys. She insisted on being called a tomboy, wearing the label as something of an achievement. When Slicer’d joined Cobra, Venom cared less about her genitals than if she’d be an asset. A few matches later, she’d smoked the rest of Cobra in 1-vs-1s– Venom hadn’t let anyone else cover him since. She was always at his side, he at hers, and this championship wasn’t going to be any different.

They sprinted through the foliage of the first path, followed its decline, and slowed near its mid-point. They vaulted over a fallen tree, dropped into cover between it another, knowing the play. They’d run it more times than they cared to count. Venom covered slicer with his rifle as she slipped over the tree beside him, shouldered her way along a ruin’s to the short-cut’s opening. She crouched at the passage’s mouth jutting from the jungle around them, and slapped down a proximity explosive.

The first sounds of gunfire erupted in the distance. Slicer hopped back into place beside Venom. Someone on Cobra radioed “C” was breached.” Venom ignored it, B-route was his. So long as they did their job, everyone else would do theirs. He vaulted over the tree as Slicer had, repeated her actions at the mouth of the passage’s opposite side, then knelt to cover Slicer’s advance.

She sprinted past the passages, Venom on her tail. The sloping ground continued for a quarter Klick, leveled out in a low brook gurgling with a shallow current. A few tall stones and toppled trees scattered around the area provided cover. Venom dropped into a crouch behind a stone, angled sideways to see the path forward. Slicer threw herself to her belly, crawled for the cover of tall reeds along the brook’s far-edge.

Rifle fire chattered over the low booms of explosives and shotguns. “A” was being fought for, hard, “B” seemed desolate. There was no way to be certain I-W wasn’t lying in wait, or worse, causing a distraction to extract their hostages. Venom and Slicer could only wait so long before forced to advance on I-W’s base, and their own hostages. When that time passed, they knew of only one way to play it.

Venom was out of cover in his crouch, weaving a random zig-zag to keep anyone watching from predicting his movements or hitting him with gunfire. When he reached the far-side of the brook’s clearing, Slicer jumped up and sprinted for his side. She crouched again beside him, followed in-step to begin the forward advance toward IW’s base.

The ground sloped up, a perfect place for an ambushing sniper to wait for them to appear. Slicer dropped prone, inched upward along the left side of the trail. Venom mirrored the movements at the opposite side of the path. Slicer’s head peeked over the rise. A distant rifle barked. Debris dusted the air a few feet forward. Slicer inched back down, heart racing. Venom knew what to do: it had to be him. The only way to force the sniper to shift his aim would be for him to run– without that split second misdirection, Slicer couldn’t get a shot off.

“On three,” she whispered. “One.”

“Two.”

“Three!”

Venom was sprinting in his zig-zag. Erratic barks traced his path forward. He bobbed and weaved in the open, no cover in sight. A lone shot rang out and the sniper-fire went quiet. A kill fed over the reel of player names above an audible rise in the crowd’s roar. The pair regrouped, went in guns blazing. Muzzle flashes lit darkened corners of I-W’s bunker-base. The crowd’s din rose with each animated spray of blood or sound effect of death. The pair littered a pair of bodies with lead, and with a quick command, the hostages ran for Cobra’s base.

Venom slapped in a new mag as someone spawned before him. His pistol out, murdered the guy before he could react. Sweat beaded on Venom’s brow as he sprinted after the hostages, pulled ahead to clear the path. They made for C, trampling over bodies of both sides for the narrow short-cut back to B. Slicer ran Vanguard, Venom one-shotting an I-W rifleman with his back turned. The darkened passage gleamed at both ends from the daylight scattered over the jungle and its ruins.

“They’re on our tail,” Slicer said, hustling out onto B route.

A burst of fire swallowed her words. She dropped prone, rolled sideways. Venom wanted to stop, knew he couldn’t. He led the hostages nearer toward Cobra’s base– almost there. Slicer was up, rocketing after him. The first proximity explosive went off. A pair of names popped up on the kill-feed. Slicer swiveled, laid suppressing fire on the path’s center. Another pair of I-W troops appeared. Their fire whizzed past Slicer, aimed at Venom’s hostages. She growled, tossed a grenade.

Venom stopped at the doorway to their base, heart pounding. Slicer back-stepped toward him, firing. The first hostage hit the rescue threshold and the first I-W soldier appeared. Venom splattered his digital blood across foliage. The second hostage hit the rescue zone, Venom forced to reload. Slicer kept her eyes forward, blasted the last I-W that tried to take advantage of Venom’s state.

The last hostage hit the rescue zone and the screen popped up with “Mission complete.” Cobra were instantly on their feet, headsets off. The crowd roared, “Co-bra! Co-bra!” Slicer and Venom leapt, hugged. She kissed his cheek with a giddy laugh, and hugged another team-mate. Cobra shook random hands with I-W between monitors, now world champions with more than a few grand to remember the win by. Venom didn’t care so much for the money or the title, he was in it for the game– though he wasn’t sure he’d ever wash his cheek again.

Short Story: The Well

~ S.M. Nolan ~ Leave a comment

A series of long, rectangular modules interconnecting domes stole the rusted horizon. They rose from the dirt, dust-covered red and brown from high-winds and a oxygen-starved atmosphere. The city, Uruk, had originally been a lone, dome-rectangle module built to house a small team of astronauts. Their mission had been to make the Red Planet habitable. A few decades after having succeeded, Mars was thriving.

Uruk, named for the first, modern city in human history, had become Mars’ premiere settlement, and thus, the largest settlement outside Earth-orbit. Countless orbital stations contrived artificial gravity and took residence there still, but none compared to the masterpiece of human ingenuity, perseverance, and sheer will of Uruk. In merely three decades, Mars had gone from a settlement of five to over ten-thousand. Likewise, the astronauts’ lone module had grown to upwards of 5,000, not including the various modules required for vital systems, manufacturing, agriculture and the like.

Amid the glorious madness of it all was Commander Jenna Thomason; pushing fifty without looking a day past thirty-eight, eternally fit, and dark eyed with marbled steel and onyx hair. Contrary to expectations, no-one on Mars had aged prematurely from colony living. In fact, aside from a few, minor colds and pre-exisiting conditions, people were in pristine health.

Over the years, Jenna had become something of an icon; she’d been one of first, true residents, having arrived on the last, scientific deployment to Mars. She and four others were to complete the final preparations before the arrival of the colony ship en-route. Jenna had no reason to return to Earth afterward, and like the others, had elected to stay to ease the colonists’ transition.

Unofficially, she was looked at as Uruk’s leader; a Mayor of sorts, despite the position belonging to another woman (who often deferred to her.) Presently, the two were strolling through a series of modules in the “city quarter,” where most business and civil services were conducted. The dome-modules there were roughly a kilometer wide, multi-leveled, and arranged in such a way as to hide their curvature.

Their connecting hallways were another story; thick, with rubber-sealed windows offering views of neighboring stacked, steel modules, imposing edges and rises of domes, or if at the edges of the settlement, endless rusty expanses the faded into browns further along the horizon. It was beside one of these windows Jenna and Mayor Cline found themselves. Jenna stopped to talk, watching dust tossed about in a wind that whistled on the deceptive tundra beneath the sunlight.

“I’ve instructed maintenance to halt all other operations and begin repairs,” Cline said.

Jenna nodded, “And you’re hoping I have a solution. I don’t. I’ve been in this city longer than anyone, and we’ve always known it was only a matter of time. I’ve made weekly inquiries with Earth for twenty years, but no-one’s done a thing about it.”

“There must be something,” Cline urged.

“It’s been done, Sarah,” Jenna replied firmly. “We’ve deployed dew-collectors, and water reclamation systems, but the fact is Mars’ water-supply resides at the poles in its ice. We knew that when we arrived. Finding the subsurface glacier was luck, it was never meant to last.”

Cline’s face sank, “You’re saying you won’t help?”

Jenna palmed her forehead, “There’s nothing to help. Uruk is out of water. We lose too much to evaporation and agriculture to keep up. It’s always been a system of diminishing returns.”

“Are you trying to say “I told you so?”

Jenna leaned forward against a window sill, braced herself with a deep breath, “I would never be that spiteful, Sarah, let alone about this. Ten-thousand people is a lot of water. What we need to do is begin rationing. Put people on water budgets. But we need an accurate measurement of our current resources, and projections for measures to be emplaced.”

Cline’s frown cut deep curves into her cheeks and brow, “There’s going to be a lot of backlash, and it’s only prolonging the inevitable, not fixing it.”

“Backlash is better than death by dehydration,” Jenna reminded. Cline winced. “Put maintenance on stand-by. I’ll lead a team to survey the Well. Meanwhile, someone’s going to need to be review our current water usage to examine our options. I’ll look at them when I’m back. I suggest overseeing the process until then.”

Cline was less than satisfied, but recognized her authority, “I’ll see you soon, then.”

The two parted ways, and Jenna immediately set to gathering a team, exosuits, and supplies. Her group of four met in a module outside Uruk’s water-treatment plant. There, an airlock lead to a catwalk, and in turn, to Mars’ bowels and the small, glacial reservoir contained beneath it. For nearly thirty years, “The Well” had been relied on as Uruk’s main water-source. Unfortunately, ait was never meant to last, nor even to be relied upon in the first place. The ice-caps were, but given the nearby reservoir, all plans for a connecting line had been put on hold for more urgent matters at the time. In Uruk, urgent matters always abounded– such was the nature of planetary colonization. Thus, the pipe-line was never completed.

The team’s survey concluded enough water for three months remained. On proper rationing, Jenna estimated the time could be doubled. Two to Three days after that sixth month, people would begin dying of dehydration without either a solution, or the first of several, unlikely shipments from Earth. Mars and its people could rely on Earth’s hospitality, however.

That left one, worthwhile solution; several thousand kilometers of pipeline between Uruk and Mars’ North pole need be erected. Even if the project could finished in time, and there were considerable doubts, it would take almost every person in Uruk working nearly ’round the clock. The projections weren’t promising.

Sara Cline, elected and esteemed Mayor of Uruk, called a conferences. Every person in the city was required to attend, or view the broadcast piped across all channels of the city’s televisions. Cline stood before thousands of people, muster all the confidence she could, and with Jenna at her side for morale began to speak.

“It is with dire need that I come to you, Uruk. It has been brought to my attention that our water is running low. To preserve our stores, we must– regrettably– impose a ration limiting families to a thousand liters per week.” She waited for the griping to wane, then continued, “I know it will be difficult, but other matters demand our more immediate attention.” She glanced back at Jenna for courage. The public icon did her best to impart what she could. The crowd noticed, quieted. “We require every last body working to rectify the problem so we may never again be troubled by such matters.”

Jenna stepped up, ready to speak professionally on the plan’s logistics, but saw the concerned faces and sighed, “I’m not going to lie to you. Things aren’t looking good: In less than six months, we must begin and complete a pipeline spanning the distance between Uruk and the North Pole.” There was an audible murmur from the assembled few thousand people. “In order to do that, it will require every one of us working double-shifts.”

The crowd went silent again, but Jenna sensed their collective ire and anger. She did her best to rouse their passion in the proper manner. “One hundred years ago, people said we’d never reach the moon. Forty-five years ago, people said we could never survive on Mars. Today, I am saying we can, but only if we work together. This task should not be seen as insurmountable, but rather difficult, a challenge to be overcome. Our species has time and again proven its innate ability to not only survive, but to thrive. We overcome the difficult, make possible the impossible, all by virtue of our existence. Knowing that we must now turn our sights to the Pole and begin work should hone our focus. I, for one, set my sights there voluntarily, to toil as others will. I ask only that you join me.”

She went quiet, the room dead silent until applause began to rise to a crescendo. Whistles and hoots came with it. Someone said something about loving Jenna while tears formed in her eyes.

Six months to the day later, she and a team of tired, stinking workers stood in the newly constructed module of “Polar pump station-1.” The flick of a switch prompted the start of a water-flow. Minutes later, a radio echoed a confirmation of positive pressure at Uruk. The room exploded in cheers. Jenna smiled; such was the power of Humanity in the face of adversity.