It happens once every year. A massive festival spanning an entire month, climaxing at the legendary Running of the Bulls. The small, pleasant city of Pamplona, Spain, becomes a hybrid of arena and racetrack, as thousands of people dash across the city with hundreds of charging bulls behind them. The Running, as it is known across the world, is one of the biggest events of the year.
And now, in the year 2060, it is time once again for the Running.
* * * * *
Mars Hammond stepped off the Zero-G hover train outside of Pamplona. A small black bag was slung over his right shoulder, contrasting against his solid white jersey and bright red shorts. He walked off the train, and slowed to a stop as his light blue eyes panned the massive rush of people. After some time, Hammond found who he was looking for: a short man dressed in a three-piece suit. His eyes caught Hammond, and he quickly walked through the crowd to him. Mars grinned at the little fedora hat approaching him, the body beneath it lost in the crowd.
The little man finally reached Hammond. "Zero-G is going to be the death of us all!" he exclaimed. "If you’re going to fly, fly, if you’re going to ride on the ground, ride on the ground. Why HOVER?"
Hammond smirked. He began walking through the crowd slowly, his eyes now scanning the train station for the exit.
"Mars, you want to explain to me again why the hell you’re here? Where could you even find a place to stay on such short notice?" the little man asked.
"Clyde, I appreciate your concern, but there’s nothing to discuss," Mars was approaching the exit to the train station. "The contract’s settled, I’ll be playing…well, sitting…for Chicago for the next three years. The season’s over, we won, now I’m going to enjoy the off-season. And don’t worry about a place to stay…it’s only going to be for a night." Hammond looked down briefly at the shining gold ring on his finger as he exited the train station.
Mars Hammond’s agent, Clyde, still followed him out of the station. "And you think running in front of bulls is a good way to enjoy the off-season?"
Hammond was about to respond until his eyes took on the arduous task of observing downtown Pamplona. Long plumes of streamers were sailing across the night sky. All the lights gave the darkness near the horizon a dim red glow. People flooded the streets and the buildings, screaming and singing. There were booths everywhere, peddling everything from Spanish-English translators, to "authentic" Spanish food, to maracas. The town was virtually bathed in red and white. People ran around with red capes on. They wore lavish red jackets, bright red hats, red shoes, all against a canvas of white shirts, skirts, blouses, and pants. Hanging from buildings were immense posters of the Adidas, Snickers, and Pepsi advertisements, and of course, Bullie, the cartoon bull who’s become the mascot for this year’s Running. In the night sky, Mars could make out the gigantic silhouettes of blimps, little lights blinking on all of them.
"Look at those blimps," yelled Hammond through the noise of the crowd to his agent. "That’s got to be a hell of a view. The only thing better than paying $25,000 to be down here is to pay $50,000 to be up there."
"That’d be because it’s safer," yelled back Clyde. "You know, I would’ve been all for you bookin’ a blimp ticket, but NO, you had to come down here."
Mars continued to take in the end of the month-long party that went constant before the Running itself. He said softer, not caring if Clyde heard him, "I watched action all season. Now I want to be a part of it."
"Is that what this is all about?" asked Clyde. A small, floating camera came around a corner and came to a halt in front of them. The size of a melon, it was a black, floating sphere with a lens coming out of it, zooming in and out, adjusting it’s focus. A logo, with the words "Sony Cameraman" was on either side of it. Despite the noise of the crowd, Mars could hear the all-too familiar clicking noise of it taking hundreds of shots of him in a second. Clyde brushed away the camera drone with a wave of his hand. The camera seemed to write-off Mars and Clyde as unimportant, and continued to float around the downtown area.
Hammond was slowly navigating the crowd, making his way towards one of the buildings. "The NBA Finals lasted seven game this year," he said, "seven games times 48 minutes…336 minutes, Clyde. I spent 17 of them on the floor. It has a way of making you a little restless."
"We’ve gone over this before," said Clyde, "you want more minutes…"
"No!" Mars suddenly stopped his journey through the crowd, turned to face Clyde.
Clyde’s small chest heaved slowly. Hear it comes again, Mars thought. "You’re good, Mars. Damn good. You know it and I know it. 50 or 60 years ago that would’ve been enough to make you the hottest name on the court. Now…"
"I know the speech," Mars cut in quickly, "I’m too normal, I’m too plain, I’m too nice, and I’m too white."
Clyde made an affirmative motion with his hand to Hammond. "You understand that. And all you have to do is get yourself a gimmick, like everyone else in the league. You ever think of doing something with your hair, dying it green, maybe an afro?"
Mars defensively ran his hand through his crew-cut dark brown hair. "No, I haven’t." He continued to move towards the building.
"How about a dance? Everybody loves a good shuffle after a dunk. I gave you the name of that choreographer…"
"No dancing." Finally making it through the sea of people, Mars entered the alley near the building he was approaching. "It’s enough you gave me this stupid name."
"Mars, the God of War!" exclaimed Clyde, an affirmative thrust of his fist to go with his words. "It’s perfect, if you’d just argue with the ref every once and awhile."
Mars slung his bag off his shoulder and placed it against the wall in the alley. The alley was deserted, amazingly. Taking one last look up and down the back street, Mars sank down against the wall of a building into a sitting position in the alley. A grin on his face, he looked up at Clyde.
"Ohhhh no…" began Hammond’s agent, "you’re not sleeping here…"
"This place has been booked up for this probably since last year’s Running. This is probably the comfiest bed I can find on such short notice." Mars patted the ground beside him, "More comfy than the benches in Chicago."
Clyde, his hands up in resignation, finally surrendered. "Alright, this is what you want to do? This is how you’re going to spend your time? Fantastic. One of these bulls is going to run you down, and instead of the bench, you’ll spend the season in a hospital bed…or worse, a coffin. And if that happens, I wouldn’t expect your number to be retired."
"My number already is retired." Mars grumbled. He unzipped his bag, took out a small gray box.
"You have my number. Call me if you need anything…a ticket home, some money, a will drawn up…"
"I’ll do that. Goodnight, Clyde."
Clyde waved good-bye, eyebrows raised in a confused mix of exasperation and despair. Leaving the alley, it didn’t take him long to disappear into the crowd. Hammond rested his head briefly against the hard wall of the building. Smiling, he opened the gray box.
* * * * *
"Santiago, can you hear me down there?"
"Just barely, Julio! The crowd here is ENORMOUS!"
Mars watched with intense interest the Spanish Media Network’s coverage of the 2060 Running of the Bulls. Santiago D’Angelo was the on-the-scene reporter…Mars had seen him down the street, in fact, complete with a small fleet of camera drones following him. Julio Marcus, the anchorman, was asking him questions about the big event. Mars watched all of this from his Intel laptop terminal, a little message at the very bottom of the screen saying in small print ENGLISH TRANSLATION ENABLED. The camera was now live at the scene of downtown Pamplona, only a few blocks from the alley Mars Hammond was calling home for the night.
"What’s this year’s Running going to be like?" asked Julio off screen.
"I gotta tell you, Julio, this year’s Running is going to be the most fantastic, most exciting, high-octane ride EVER!" The crowd roared its approval to Santiago’s assessment. "The world’s brightest bio-engineers have been working all year to make the bulls of this year’s Running the biggest, meanest monsters on the known planet!"
"I heard that the latest developments in bio-engineering have altered the intelligence of the bulls. Is that true, Santiago?"
"Oh, yeah!" exclaimed the reporter. "Long gone are the days of being herded through streets and following steers in packs. These bulls can, and will, break away from the herd to chase the people of Pamplona down alleys and back streets, they’ll anticipate turns, and they’ll even use their strength to break through barricades! And, for an added fear factor, red lenses have been implanted into the bulls’ eyes, giving them a frightening red glare!"
Mars smiled inwardly. Without bioengineering, bulls are easily three times the size of a human, and probably five times as heavy. Between that and the enhancements of bioengineering, do you really need to give them red eyes to make them scary?
"Santiago, is anyone there in Pamplona scared of potential fatalities?"
"Not really, Julio…over the past few years, there have been a handful of deaths from being gored by the bulls, but it’s nothing to really get excited about. The blimps above me have crews of dropships attached to them, and a fleet of camera drones will be hovering through the city throughout the Running. If any problems develop, the dropships will arrive in moments, armed with taser harpoons to stun the bulls long enough for an emergency pick-up of victims."
"Now, I here this year there’s going to be an award for the first person out of the city?"
"You heard right, Julio! For the first time in the history of the Running of the Bulls, a huge gold trophy will be given to the first person who can cross the finish line at the end of the city!"
Mars turned off the broadcast, muting the excited chorus of cheers, and put the laptop terminal back into his bag. He had a big day ahead of him tomorrow, and he needed his sleep. Using his bag as a
pillow, Mars laid down in the alley and began to drown out the sounds of the everlasting party around him. It wasn’t difficult for him, no harder than sleeping on the high-altitude jets while the rest of his team was celebrating a win.
* * * * *
There were still many things that had to be done before the Running could truly begin. The thousands of people in attendance were a confused mass in the center of Pamplona, waiting for the event to begin and wondering exactly how things would work out. A few booths were still open, selling t-shirts, hats, and posters, but most of the vendors had left. As Mars Hammond jogged through the streets, he noticed many holes in the sides of buildings and cracked pavement.
That damage, Mars thought, is from last year’s Running.
Mars had hidden his bag in the alley he had spent the night sleeping in. He wasn’t concerned if it was stolen; it had few precious possessions in it, nothing Hammond couldn’t get again if he needed them. He was sure to start his morning with a rigorous stretching routine, almost an hour and a half of warm-ups and exercises. He was also jogging around the city, and using the opportunity to take in a few more sites.
The streets were wide open in many spaces. Much of the garbage had been gathered into narrow alleys and gutters. Hammond overheard a conversation earlier that morning stating this was on purpose: runners could try and out-run the bulls in open spaces, and when they got tired or couldn’t outrun them, they could leap into an alley and take cover. Mars also noticed the doors to many buildings were open. A few blocks ahead of the starting point of the Running, Mars saw a spacious four-way intersection. A bus had been parked in the middle of the intersection, probably to serve as a barrier to slow down the bulls.
Mars finally ended his jog in the center of the city, where the entire population of Pamplona had gathered. Hammond had heard another rumor that citizens of Pamplona were required to participate in the Running. Many were virtually forced to invite strangers to spend the night in their homes, and help educate them in the rituals of the festivities. Indeed, Mars had seen no one, a soul, in the blocks outside the center of the city.
Hammond looked up, and he could clearly count six blimps. They all seemed to be turning slowly in the gentle breeze of the gray afternoon sky. Looks like rain, he thought. Bringing his gaze to the ground, he saw the same shower of red and white fabrics adorning each and every person present. Mars looked at himself, and saw that the white jersey he wore was looking a little dirty from sleeping in the alley.
In the air, Mars could hear a soft whirling sound. Looking up, he saw one of the blimp’s dropships hovering in the air above the crowd, the whirling sound belonging to its Zero-G generator. The ship looked like a helicopter without a propeller; a small, sleek craft, with a pair of wide, glowing blue panels running lengthwise across the dropship’s belly.
The ship’s pilot began to speak through the dropship’s attached loudspeaker: "EVERYBODY, EVERYBODY, CAN I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION?" The throng of people began to quiet. Another dropship descended from the sky, its loudspeaker speaking the same message.
"REMEMBER THAT OBJECTS OF ANY KIND ARE STRICTLY PROHIBITED. WEAPONS OF ANY KIND ARE STRICTLY PROHIBITED." This is it, Mars thought. His hands shook with excitement...the last time he was this excited, he could remember, was his first professional
basketball game, four years ago.
"IF YOU ENCOUNTER A BULL, DO NOT PANIC; BE CALM. A DROPSHIP WILL COME TO YOUR LOCATION AND TRANQUILIZE THE BULL, AND YOU WILL BE AIRLIFTED TO SAFETY. RUN IN AN ORDERLY FASHION, AND DO NOT PUSH, SHOVE, OR ATTACK
FELLOW RUNNERS."
The crowd was getting anxious. They all knew it was time. Many were talking about the size of the gold trophy the winner got; others spoke in nervous tones about the number of fatalities there have been in Runnings of the past. Mars remained absolutely silent.
The dropship relayed its final message; "PERSONNEL ARE CORDONING OFF THE AREA AT THE CORNERS OF VALEJO AND DARENGA STREETS ALONG QUADERNO WAY. ALL RUNNERS ARE REQUIRED TO STAY IN THIS AREA UNTIL THE COUNTDOWN ENDS, FROM
WHICH YOU WILL RUN NORTH TOWARDS THE CITY LIMITS. THE BULLS ARE SECURED IN THE SOUTHERN END OF THE CITY. BOTH PARTIES WILL BE RELEASED AT THE SAME TIME." The crowd cheered at the mention of the bulls. Some cheered as if mere mention of the bulls was like a movie star to be seen in person. Others cheered in knowing that the bulls were half a city away. Mars smiled as he observed the huge, cheering crowd.
"ENJOY THE RUNNING OF THE BULLS, AND RUN SWIFTLY!" The first dropship floated into the sky, back to the blimp that it came from. The second dropship floated above and in front of the crowd, in the center of the gathering. In front of the ship was a giant timer, its glowing
red numbers reading "1:10…1:09…. 1:08…"
Mars seemed to be able to watch himself from outside his own self as he prepared to run. He could see his body moving slowly, deliberately. He did not push and shove to get to the front of the crowd. He did not exchange tension-relieving pleasantries with the strangers surrounding him. His eyes were focused straight ahead, past the people in front of him, past the blocks that stretched beyond. He looked northward.
: 30:29:28…
The doors on the side of the dropship opened. Thirty camera drones floated out, dashed through the sky, panning the crowd. Bullie the Running mascot leaned out of the open dropship and waved. The crowd roared in excitement.
: 12:11:10…
Two more dropships flew past the crowd, their frames adorned with various advertisers. Clouds of confetti and plumes of streamers fired from them, arcing through the sky in strips of red and white. The sounds of maracas, whistles, bells, flutes, could be heard everywhere, at a steeply rising crescendo, a climax within a climax, as the thousands in attendance, in a single unified voice, counted off the last three numbers.
: 03:02:01…
A loud horn blew. A tremendous cheer erupted from the accelerating crowd.
And Mars Hammond began running for his life.
* * * * *
For those first few moments, the crowd needed nothing. Their built-up adrenaline, their total excitement, could drive the entire run on its own; no beasts of any kind needed to be behind them. They ran down the streets hollering and screaming, arms flailing, boasting about out-running the bulls. Mars Hammond simply ran.
When the moments stretched to minutes, adrenaline gave way to endurance. Many people began going into the obstacle-laden alleys to rest, while others slowed to jogs, or even walks. Mars Hammond simply ran.
And then, in that moment, that moment where the crowd’s collective patience would have dropped another notch, the bulls were on their way. The ground was suddenly unstable, vibrating and thudding. Beyond the muted noises of the crowd, new noises could be heard, snorting, violent noises, the angry clack of hoof on pavement. Three waves, heartbeats apart, rippled through the crowd: recognition, excitement, and fear.
Mars Hammond simply ran.
Behind him, there were screams. A cloud of dust, or dirt, or maybe just that ever-present haze when something horrible was near, surrounded Mars. Looking ahead, he could see he was approaching the vast intersection he jogged through earlier this morning. Mars slanted his straight run, heading towards one of the buildings.
The building Mars headed to was a small one, a restaurant, perhaps. A canopy raised above the walkway in front of the entrance. Accelerating to a full sprint, Mars dashed to the entrance. He leaped through the air and grabbed the edge of the canopy. Catching the end of the canopy,
Mars vaulted onto the top of it in one swift move. He slipped precariously on the glossy, bright red plastic of his impromptu perch, but eventually got his balance. A voice in his head said slowly and constantly "This is wrong. This is stupid. Don’t do this." But Mars had to. He had to see what he was up against. Mars turned around, and looked south.
People who Mars had passed down the blocks were now running for their lives. And from the cloud, the bio-engineered bulls emerged. Hammond’s first thought was that the Spanish Media Network hadn’t done the bulls justice. They were even larger and more menacing here, in the streets of Pamplona, then they ever were in the media’s graphics and clips of previous Runnings. Their huge, bulky bodies moved with strength and speed, a deadly kind of grace that threatened to kill you if you sat and watched it for too long, such as Hammond was doing now, atop the canopy. They stampeded from the southern end of the city, running with a determination and rage none of the thousands of people had. Mars followed their run through the intersection with his eyes. At the far end of the intersection, one bull clipped another bull. The clipped bull’s left shoulder slammed into a nearby building, causing the side corner of the building to collapse like a sandcastle that was just kicked. In the middle of the intersection, two bulls struck either side of the bus parked in the middle of the intersection, and a third bull ran headfirst into the middle. The bus exploded and tore in half, like a molded log struck by a sledgehammer, and the bulls ran straight through it. Countless camera drones buzzed the explosion, circling the raging bulls. The central bull, which tore through the bus, was on fire. It didn’t seem to mind.
Mars had seen all he needed to see of the bulls’ fury. He’s seen his opponent, now he needed to beat them. Looking through the intersection bustling with bulls and a few unfortunate runners, Mars desperately looked for an escape route. He found one, an alley branching off to the northwest of the intersection. It looked like it joined into a side road. Mars thought, from there, he might be able to run in a tight arc through the streets, never in the larger roads where the bulls would be, but not far enough away to seriously hurt the time it’d take him to leave the city. Looking carefully in the area beneath the canopy, Mars waited for an opportunity when no bulls were nearby to gore him. Picking the right moment, Mars leapt off the canopy and landed onto the ground. He sprinted for the alley.
This particular alley, like all the others in Pamplona, was covered in trash picked up from the streets and hoarded here. Moving swiftly but carefully, Hammond made his way through the alley and into the side street. From there, Mars broke into a full run. The blocks flew past him as he ran through the streets to the end of the city. All around him, he could hear the frantic sounds of the runners trying to evade the cloned bulls with varying levels of success. And like some kind of soundtrack to Hammond’s mad dash was the sound of the bulls, the snorting, the rumble of their hooves against the streets, the crashing and stomping crescendo that surrounded Mars, enveloped him. It was like Mars Hammond was about to be buried in disaster, and was running out of it.
Mars couldn’t possibly tell how long he had run through the streets of Pamplona, with the thrilling disaster behind and around him. He had never had to move this fast or run this hard in the NBA, not on the most essential fastbreak, and not on the most vigorous workout. His body had never given him the signals it was giving him now, signals of fatigue mixed with this incredible level of excitement. This might be how it feels to be a starting guard, thought Mars. But probably not, he concluded.
Turning a corner at almost full-speed, Mars could see his final destination in the distance. Checkpoints were set up around the northern border of the city. Beyond them was a stairway leading down to the subway. That was probably where the commencement ceremony took place, while the bulls were being taken care of, Mars thought. And I’m almost there.
Behind him, Mars could sense many others like him: determined runners, driven by instincts of survival, success, or even pure adrenaline, who hadn’t been afraid to run with the bulls. It was hard to tell in the chaos surrounding him, but Mars figured the closest people were at least several feet behind him. That’d put him in first place. He knew this, but the thought didn’t register in his mind. Something else was taking all his concentration. Behind him, close by, Mars heard screaming. Not frantic, excited screaming, but the screaming of panic, the screaming of someone in serious trouble. Behind the noise of the screaming, Mars made out the snorting breath of a bull. Though there were hoof beats everywhere, Mars could hear these hoof beats were out of synch; they didn’t make the haunting rhythmic CLACK-CLACK, CLACK-CLACK of the other hoof beats. Someone was being gored.
Mars, his brain hollering against him to do otherwise, slowed to a jog, then stopped and turned around. In an alley a half a block behind him, Mars saw an overweight man collapsed onto the ground. A bull was above him, stomping down on him with his two front hooves, and butting him with his horned head. The rotund man was bleeding profusely from his temples, his nose, and his large belly. Two camera drones were trained on the slaughter. The man was screaming, crying. It was a horrible sound. It was the sound of a man who had made a horrible mistake.
Mars Hammond swiftly moved towards the attack. Approaching him was a man in a red cape running wildly, his arms flailing. He was yelling something in Spanish at the attacking bull as he passed. The bull looked up. The man ran past the bull, and the bull continued his business with the squirming victim beneath him. The man’s eyes met even with Hammond’s, and he said something else in Spanish. In one swift move, looking almost like it was rehearsed; Mars shoved the man out of his way with one hand and seized his bright red cape in the other. The man stumbled, said something else in Spanish that didn’t sound so festive, and continued running.
Mars draped the crimson cape over his left arm and approached the bull. He didn’t exactly know what he was going to do, but he was going to do something. He got closer to the bull, closer, an arm’s length now, and Mars Hammond did the unthinkable.
He slapped the bull’s head.
The bull looked up again, and Mars stepped swiftly backwards. They definitely don’t need the red eyes, thought Mars morbidly to himself. Its eyes could be neon pink, and I still think that I’d be more scared now than I’ve ever been in my life. Now that I’ve got his attention, what the hell do I do? His mind grasping for ideas, Mars suddenly remembered the NBA Playoffs. Though they only happened two months ago, it seemed like it happened in another lifetime. "Slammin" Sean Slade, Chicago’s starting guard, always did this ridiculous dance when he was announced in the starting line-up. It was the most annoying thing someone could ever do, and it made Mars just want to slap him and say "would you just PLAY, for Christ’s sake!?!?!?"
Mars thought it was as good an idea as any. He wrapped the red cape around his lower body, like wearing a towel after a shower. His hands were out and up, two L-shapes on either side of his body. Taking a deep breath, Mars Hammond then did the infamous Slade Shuffle: twisting his wrists, his hips a wild flurry of activity, the red cape flowing through the air. There was also this little noise Sean made when he did it, but Mars didn’t think it was necessary.
The bull pawed the ground near his incapacitated victim menacingly. My God, Mars thought, it’s working. He exaggerated the dance more, sent his arms flailing to the heavens, his hips in spastic gyrations, his legs kicking beneath him. Had Mars not been so scared, he would’ve noticed the assembled camera drones and probably have slowed down a little bit.
The next moment could be measured in heartbeats. To Mars, the distance between him and the bull seemed not like four meters, but four kilometers. The bull charged, it’s head lowered, it’s horns poised to strike, it’s eyes never leaving it’s dancing target. Mars stopped the dance and undid the cape around his waist in one snap of the wrist. Jumping to the side as the bull came, Mars threw the cape over the bull’s head and dove to the ground to the right and behind the bull.
Mars was fast, but the bull was faster. The bull’s eyes, even with the cape thrown over them, had read Hammond’s maneuver, and the bull slanted right. The bull’s left horn tore into Hammond’s hip as he dove. Mars hit the ground in agony, and the bull ran past him.
Hammond struggled to get up, his bloodied, tortured hip in a world of pain. Hammond turned to face the bull again. The bull had thrown off the cape, and given itself plenty of room for another charge. But this time, Mars wasn’t certain if he had another spin move left in him. Not with hip in the shape it’s in, not with a cape to blind the bull, and not with the bull’s undivided attention on him.
The bull charged. Hammond stared into those red lens eyes, as if the answer to his prayers could be found in them.
But they weren’t found in those eyes. They were found in the dropship behind the bull.
The bull got closer, closer…it’s head was lined up perfectly with Hammond’s chest… and suddenly a short spear impaled itself in the bull’s back. The bull stopped, howling in pain. Bolts of miniature lightning surged through the cable between the taser harpoon and the dropship, into the bull’s body. The bull’s legs gave out beneath it, and it slid on the ground inches to Hammond’s left. Mars limped out of the way, so as not to get shocked. Three men in white jumpsuits leaped out of the dropship and ran to the overweight man on the ground. One approached Hammond. Before he could say anything, Mars waved him off with his hand.
Mars limped, then walked, then jogged, north. Then he ran. Then he crossed the checkpoint, went down the stairs into the subway station, and collapsed in a heap on the nearest bench.
* * * * *
Mars Hammond was the 31st man to finish the 2060 Running of the Bulls. Everyone saw his encounter with the bull, which was recorded from nine different angles by the camera drones, across the globe. Mars Hammond was a hero to all…except Sean Slade, who was angry that his dance was used without his express permission. Hammond’s heroics would be seen in countless "best of the Running" videos for years to come. Mars spent the entire month following the Running doing interviews for talk shows of all kinds. It was a full-time job. Nike shoes offered him an advertisement contract for the Nike Skywalker Zero-G athletic sneakers.
Four months passed, and the season was ready to begin again. Mars Hammond was greeted with a standing ovation. Much to Sean Slade’s anger, Mars Hammond started for most of the first month of the regular season.
Chicago once again made it to the playoffs, where they lost to Houston in six games. Six games times 48 minutes a game…that’s 288 minutes. Mars Hammond spent 14 of them on the floor.
Bio: "I am a 2nd year college student at Northern Michigan University in Marquette, Michigan. I am a writing major. This will be the very first story of mine that's ever been published for anything. Though I've written a few fantasy stories before, this is my first official foray into science fiction. I am a Capricorn who enjoys Italian food, long walks on the beach, and moonlit dances. I am also an avid basketball fan."
E-mail: kadoogan@hotmail.com
Visit Aphelion's Lettercolumn and voice your opinion of this story. Both the writer and I would love to read your feedback.
Return to the Aphelion main page.