Issue 0 cover

Moments Of Brilliance

by Jason Stoddard

Issue 0 :: Spring 2007 (stories)

Sensation, random, like fractal noise.

Blinding light. Strange, biting smells. Chittering metallic noises. Colorful shapes that move in soothing smooth patterns.

Being lifted by rough warm hands and held close; nonsense syllables repeated, soft. Something wet and salty, falling, striking.

Movement; fast, loud noises.

Then connection, activation, integration. The feeling of being filled. Basic activity routines. Facial tracking. Response algorithms. When to cry for maximum distractive value. When not to urinate. Who to focus on and at what times.

The hazy sketch of Mission and Why, the only why needed.

But.

The connection to the outside voices, the data, the storm of information, glittering and shimmering and dancing. Reaching for the shiny prize, not able to let it pass by.

Diving in for meaning, decoding the surfaces and sounds and touches of the world. Beyond the Why. Beyond the Mission. Diving and diving and diving. A billion times a minute.

Meaning flows in:

...

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"Moments Of Brilliance" is roughly 2000 words.

By day, Jason Stoddard is just another frustrated engineer-turned-ad-guy who is busy twisting the minds of millions of consumers for his evil corporate masters. At night, he writes science fiction that has been seen in SciFiction, Interzone, Strange Horizons, Talebones, and Futurismic, among others. Unfortunately, none of the agents or editors have yet believed his line that if he had a book deal, there would be less advertising in this world.