Plant: Nepenthes “Bill Bailey” (Who was St. Remedius? And why is a medical college named after him?) Contrary to popular perception, most doomsday devices don’t start out as such. A nuclear battery stored long enough invariably starts to leak radiation, which may or may not be detectable from outside its storage container. In cases like these, the best thing to do is leave them closed and forgotten, which would work if the lock…
Backstories: "Gyre" (2019)
Plant: Nepenthes rajah (Who was St. Remedius? And why is a medical college named after him?) Galactic history is best described as flowing in waves, as major movements of all sorts leave huge amounts of flotsam to be dealt with those on the shore. Major expansions by new species qualify, as do wars that spread outside of planetary systems and particularly those that spread outside of a particular arm of the galaxy. The…
Backstories: "D-Ring" (2019)
Plant: Heliamphora minor (Who was St. Remedius? And why is a medical college named after him?) The galaxy is positively littered with artifacts, structures, and detritus from any number of otherwise cryptic civilizations, but the greatest mystery documented by the existing organizations endeavoring to track those archaeological sites involves what are commonly called “dimensional rings” found on approximately 5000 worlds and counting. The worlds themselves seem to have no common factor: superVenuses, the…
Backstories: "Witchstone" (2019)
Plant: Unknown Nepenthes Hybrid (Who was St. Remedius? And why is a medical college named after him?) A pulse. A glow. A flash. A strobe. Sometimes nothing at all. Of all of the wonders of Burin IV, the most renowned is the Witchstone Array, near the outpost town of Cottingley. Many swear that the stones visible in the Array glow in sequence at night, while others relate sudden bursts, random or nonrandom patterns,…
Backstories: "Novi" (2018)
Plant: Nepenthes burkeii x hamata (Who was St. Remedius? And why is a medical college named after him?) An ongoing human compulsion is to update and mark existing testaments left behind by others: some call it “vandalism” and others call it “embellishment,” and for as long as hominins have been building permanent edifices and monuments, others step in and leave their own mark. The bare wall, the lone boulder, the thin sod atop…
Backstories: "Raptor" (2018)
Plant: Nepenthes ventrata (Who was St. Remedius? And why is a medical college named after him?) In many environments, it’s hard to believe that seemingly abandoned structures and equipment are still used and maintained frequently, just based on weathering and wear. Paint chips from thermal stresses and powders from exposure to ultraviolet light, metal rusts quickly or slowly depending upon the rainfall and ambient humidity (even in deep deserts, iron rusts due to…
Backstories: "Tezcatlipoca Blues" (2018)
Plants: Assorted Pinguicula species and hybrids (Who was St. Remedius? And why is a medical college named after him?) The novel Smoking Mirror Blues by Ernest Hogan is only obscured by his more famous novels Cortez on Jupiter and High Aztech because of its original publication during the dotcom crash of 2001. Working on the idea of an electronic avatar of the Aztec god Tezcatlipoca and his rapid expansion into and domination of…
Backstories: "Hoodoo" (2018)
Plant: Nepenthes veitchii (Who was St. Remedius? And why is a medical college named after him?) One of the best available arguments against the existence of advanced indigenous or extraterrestrial civilizations on Earth in the distant past is a lack incontrovertibly artificial artifacts or technological byproducts in geological deposits predating modern humans. Even with radioisotope decay, the byproducts of that decay would still be recognizable as such, as with the Oklo natural nuclear…
Backstories: "Antarctica In Decline" (2018)
Plant: Cephalotus follicularis (Who was St. Remedius? And why is a medical college named after him?) Description: Very little is known about prehistoric Antarctica: with 98 percent of the continent covered with kilometers-thick ice, the few fossil beds accessible at the surface illuminate life there approximately 150 million years ago (including the discovery of the early theropod dinosaur Cryolophosaurus), approximately 65 million years ago, and the period surrounding the continent’s freeze 5 million…
Backstories & Fragments: About the Backstories
What to expect with what you’re reading here Essential information about your humble author: between 1989 and 2002, I was a professional writer working for a slew of magazines, zines, weekly newspapers, and Web sites, most of which have disappeared without trace. Finally in 2002, after hitting burnout over delayed payments, publications shutting down without notice, and editors demanding work for free, I quit writing entirely in the spring of…