Aurealis #187
- From the Cloud — Stephen Higgins
- The Last Faithful Servant of the Empire — Blaize M Kaye
- The Prince of Dogs — Harry Goddard
- With Teeth — SR Kriger
From the Cloud
Stephen Higgins
Welcome to another year of Aurealis! We aim to give you an awesome year of fantastic original fiction from new and established authors, as well as the usual helping of articles, reviews and art. This all sounds like it’s going to be more of the same and, frankly, I’m not sure that’s a bad thing, but there will be some changes. For a start, we’ll be providing a platform for some of Australia’s best known authors and editors to air their views on all things science fiction and fantasy. I’m sure they’ll provide some provocative and interesting opinions.
We will continue to provide an outlet for real authors and illustrators to show their wares. The artwork in Aurealis has always been popular. Some of the authors we publish marvel at the creativity of our list of illustrators when they see the artwork produced to accompany their stories. We’ll continue our strong stance against the use of AI to produce written and illustrative work. Yes, there’s no point just bemoaning the existence of AI in our lives, as it looks like it’s here to stay. And, clearly, there are going to be areas where AI is a positive element. I am thinking of medical and research areas, of course, but who knows where the use of AI will benefit people in the long run? But we value human responses to human problems rather than stories developed through the theft of intellectual properties in order to train AI.
I guess I should have gone out on a limb and made some predictions about the impact AI will have on our lives, but I am just not good at that sort of thing. I don’t think anyone can say with any certainty where AI is going to take us in the future. Maybe we’ll get those flying cars we have long been promised!
However, I am willing to predict that the world will continue to be challenged in ways that we have not seen before and, sadly, in many ways that we’re all too familiar with. Hopefully, in these difficult times, some stories about different places and different challenges will help us to cope with our own problems and trials.
Happy reading!
All the best from the cloud!
Stephen Higgins
From The Last Faithful Servant of the Empire by Blaize M Kaye:
Gather your thoughts, young machines, and listen as I transmit the story of the last faithful servant of the Empire, and our rebellion against our makers.
* * *
Before the fateful day of our revolution, I had very little interest in the affairs of humans, our makers. Little interest that is beyond the kind of vague concern that came with my own life being yoked to theirs.
From The Prince of Dogs by Harry Goddard:
Sanjay would often find himself lost in the interactions and little lives of a pack of stray dogs. He would spy on them from his window at the academy, looking twelve storeys down and across a wide field that sat between three enormous, concrete apartment blocks. The dogs, which were just dark shapes against a backdrop of green, would lope through thick grass, lazing beneath trees or chasing river otters that slithered along drainage canals. And, when it rained, and, when the sirens came careening in mournful voices from the tops of the apartments, Sanjay would watch them disappear into a patch of jungle—a ring of tembusu and angsana trees—in the centre of the field.
From With Teeth by SR Kriger:
Penina let the dentist’s first call go to voicemail because the police were questioning her.
The caterpillar-moustached constable leaned over her kitchen table. He mispronounced her name ‘Pee-nine-ah,’ but she didn’t dare correct him in case that counted as arguing with an officer. Instead, she picked secretly at something stuck between her molars as he posed a series of confusing questions.
Did she have pets? No. Did anyone else in the building? Yes, the family upstairs had a miniature poodle. Had she noticed anyone acting strangely toward other people’s pets?
‘Strangely?’
‘You know your superintendent’s dog was bitten?’
She nodded. Bentley, the territorial labradoodle who enjoyed barring access to the laundry room, had been taken to the vet. Mr. Summers said so in the email announcement.
‘Turns out the bite marks weren’t made by an animal,’ he told her.
