From the December 2023 issue of Birdy Magazine, inspired by art by Roman Makarenko. This is a follow-up to the previous month’s story, “Jailbreak”, following a young Japanese woman who is completely paralyzed (shut-in) following a helicopter accident that killed her parents. With her body immobile, she relies on an AI simulation for interaction, accessed via a neuroport, leading to severe doubts about the nature of reality. (Astute readers will note similarities with my earlier story “Prism and Prison.”)
A swarm of writhing tentacles, obsidian, irregular, saw-edged, exploded out of the fabricator’s shielding, tearing it apart. The tentacles stabbed toward the spiders, which fought, but hopelessly. Whatever they shattered reformed anew, the nanobots magnetically reforming before they each touched the ground to attack anew. It was like fighting a storm of black dust, if dust was stronger than spinning saw blades. There was a reason nanotech fabricators were kept under such close guard.
THE FELL AND THE FAE 