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Cover Art for Issue #1 by Jeff Kuipers

Click on the small cover above to view full size colour cover. (161K jpeg)

Michael G. Coney's dark, futuristic fantasy "The Bucca",
David Nickle's pedal-to-the-metal science fiction horror story, "The Dummy Ward",
Edward Willett's wonderful space opera "Lost in Translation",
Gordon Menzies' touching "The Man Who Gathered Birds at Dawn",
Sean Stewart's "Puss at Play" and
scary "The Viruses of Quiet Desperation" by D.G. Valdron.

"The Bucca", "The Dummy Ward", and "The Viruses of Quiet Desperation" were all selected for honourable mention in Year's Best Fantasy & Horror .

The issue's centrepiece is a long pastoral poem - written and illustrated by one of the world's premiere fantasy writers, Charles de Lint.

The cover is by Jeff Kuipers - whose covers for two Tesseracts collections and a number of other Canadian SF books have made him one of our country's best known illustrators of the fantastic.

The issue also contains poems by Nancy Bennett, Barry Hammond, John Grey, steve sneyd, karen verba, William P. Robertson and Elizabeth K. Campbell...plus illustrations by Cathy Buburuz, Randy Nakoneshy, Marge Simon and DLSproule.

Excerpts from Issue#1:

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Michael Coney

Since his first short story, "Sixth Sense", appeared in 1969, Michael has published eighteen novels, several non-fiction books and over forty works of short fiction. Michael is a member of The Lonely Cry, an association of B.C. science fiction and fantasy writers.

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Excerpt from "The Dummy Ward" by David Nickle:

Different smells, thought Dennis as the speckling cleared. There was a hint of ozone where the antiseptic should have been; intermingled with that, another sharp tang -- like copper, an old penny on the tongue. And where was the stink? There was not a trace of the diaper-pail stink he'd been getting used to over the past two weeks of his stay at the General Ford North-Eastern Regional Trauma Centre.

He was in another long ward -- a dim, still corridor of drawn yellow curtains, it was nothing like the trauma ward where he'd spent the lion's share of his stay. In the distance, Dennis could hear the buzzing snore of machinery that matched and amplified the capillary-drone behind his eyes. There was a chair beside the door, an old, vinyl visitor's rocking chair. Dennis lowered himself into it, and his vision speckled threateningly as he did so. But it did not darken, and in the end Dennis returned to himself.

#

"Who's there?"

The voice was tinny, as though it came from an intercom. But when Dennis looked, he didn't see a speaker anywhere nearby. Dennis cleared his throat.

"I'm sorry. I seem to have --" What? Blacked out? Wandered off? Dennis was suddenly embarrassed. "I'm Dennis Robertson," he finally managed. "I'm not really supposed to be here."

"Dennis Robertson." The voice seemed to be coming from behind the curtain opposite Dennis. Through the distortion, Dennis couldn't tell whether it was a man or a woman. "I used to be good with names, but since the crash, I have to repeat introductions back before they stick. Dennis Robertson, right?"

"Right."

"Well I'm Tom Grey. I'm not supposed to be here, either."

Dennis got up and stepped over to the drawn curtain. If there was an intercom in there, he decided he would call a nurse, get back to his ward. But what was a patient's voice doing coming out of a bedside intercom?

Tom Grey continued: "The doctors here are saying my spine's broken, and I'm not going to walk again. I think that's a lot of crap."

The curtain rattled on its runners as Dennis pulled it aside.

"Of course, maybe I'm just in denial. What do you think, Dennis?"

Dennis had no answer. He stood frozen in place, gaping.

"Denial, or old-fashioned stubbornness?"

Jesus. Dennis couldn't make the word.

Tom Grey was a simulacrum of a man. Pink latex skin stretched like a stocking-mask over the ridges and seams of his plastic face and he wore a toupee of silver-grey hair on the dome of his skull. His mouth moved up and down mechanically, like a ventriloquist dummy's. The most credible aspects of his visage were his eyes, which were a light hazel and convincingly shot with blood.

Tom Grey lifted his arm and Dennis watched, fascinated, as he flexed his fingers. Dennis thought he could hear tiny clicks -- carbon-fibre knuckles cracking arthrytically as the joints bent and straightened again.

"See?" said Tom Grey. "Strong as an ox. You should see the guy two beds down -- he can't do anything but blink."

"That's--" Dennis felt a wave of dizziness and stepped back to the rocking chair. He sat down hard. "That's too bad."

Tom Grey's realistic eyes swiveled to look at the ceiling. "Tell me about it. He's got three kids, one who's going to college next year. His wife comes in every day and she tells me this. Who knows what they'll do, now he's --" he glanced back at Dennis, and his voice dropped to a staticky hiss of a whisper "--a vegetable?"

#

He'd seen things like Tom Grey before.

Dennis was working the phones at the tele-dealership that day. The dealership was pushing its mail-order service, and the pitch was emphasizing GF's comprehensive warranty-insurance package. Dennis and the dozen or so other reps who'd pulled pit duty watched the pitch on a big wall-monitor. Dennis was paying more attention than usual -- he'd just bought the Taurus, his first GF product since joining the company, and he had lately found himself seeking affirmation for the decision. The warranty-insurance package was shaping up to be very affirmative indeed.

About fifteen minutes into the show, the host announced a special segment. He stepped off to one side as the curtains behind the half-dozen showroom cars began to part. The lights in the showroom dimmed, the host stepped out of view, and new lights lit up the glassed-in space behind.

It was a concrete-walled corridor, running parallel to the glass wall, that extended beyond the showroom in one direction and ended in a scarred cinder block terminus near the spot where the host stood.

The view cut to a remote shot of the same or a similar corridor. At its end, a burgundy GF Lance idled, waiting its turn like a bull in an abattoir.

Without warning, the unseen driver threw it into gear. The Lance lurched forward and out of the frame.

Seven point three seconds later (this according to the running digital time display at the bottom of the screen) the Lance hit the terminus in the showroom. Although it was moving at sixty-seven point one-ought-three kph when it struck (another superimposed readout confirmed this number), there were no flames. The front end accordioned even as the rear tires left the concrete floor and the car's windshields cracked and buckled. A hubcap popped off the front wheel and flew towards the showroom audience, leaving a scuff-mark where it struck the thick glass between them.

Even through the headset, the noise of the crash stabbed at Dennis' ears.

As he lowered his hands, Dennis could make out what he was sure were screams. Not from the showroom audience -- they sat in a shocked silence -- but inside the car itself, screams and weeping noises, muffled by the enormous airbag which had plastered against the fragmented safety glass. Something was moving under the airbag.