SL Huang - Up and Coming - Stories by the 2016 Campbell-Eligible Authors

"But the prosecutor would have the jury believe that the instrument you played that night, the instrument that was on your person when you were arrested, the instrument otherwise known as Exhibit A, the supposed murder weapon, is Betsy."

"It isn’t. I don’t know what happened to Betsy. I don’t have her anymore."

"No?"

"Unbeknownst to me at the time, I wasn’t playing Betsy the night Horace was murdered."

"Why were you playing an instrument other than your own?"

"As I said, I was unaware. Someone switched her for a reasonably fine instrument that had been previously tainted with poor old Horace’s blood. Sarelle, I’d say."

The prosecutor popped up. "Move to strike! Opinion."

"Sustained. Jury will disregard. Tread carefully, Defense."

"Your honor," said Al, "I would like to admit into evidence a receipt."

The judge allowed the document.

"What is this for, Mr. Umberto?" Al asked.

"An engraving job I had done a few years ago. It reads, Engrave word—Betsy—on inside of clarinet bell. "

The judge requested to see Exhibit A.

"Let the record show," the judge said, "that this clarinet has no such engraving."

"Where is Betsy, Mr. Umberto?"

"I have no idea. Ask Sarelle."

Al should have bet on himself after all.

Even though the bogus clarinet I played that night had Horace’s blood on it, the coroner’s testimony about a recent deep knife wound on Horace’s forearm introduced enough doubt in the jury’s minds about where that blood might have come from, that I was acquitted.

Sarelle was never prosecuted. She had a convenient alibi locating her in San Diego that night.

The trial gained Al some notoriety though and he set up a full-time practice on the US side of the border.

I missed him at first. I thought about him a lot. Eventually, I went to see him.

"Fancy office," I said. "Business must be good."

"I have you to thank for that."

"Really?"

"Sure."

"You’re welcome. But we both know it wasn’t my doing. I’ve come here today to make an accusation and here it is: Horace was killed in the alley, with who knows what, by Attorney Al."

He regarded me for a long time, dark eyes steady. Then he said, "Don’t do this, bud. It’s not a game."

"Was she worth it?"

Al lifted his hands palms up, indicated his wood paneled office and said, "My—uh—interactions with her were extremely beneficial, yes. More to me, than her. I’d think you’d be happy to find out that Sarelle doesn’t win every game she plays."

"I thought you said this wasn’t a game."

I wonder about the caretakers in the habitat. Why’d they play that particular game? Maybe they were just simple men wiling away the hours, but I’m suspicious of humans and their motives. Maybe they really were trying to make us like them—in every way.

From that respect, it’s good to know that Sarelle wasn’t capable of the physical act of murder—that she had to get a human to do her dirty work.

But, it’s not exactly something to be proud of, is it?

This ended up like one of those busted games of Clue where someone makes so many wrong guesses that it becomes obvious who did it, and since there’s no point in making the correct accusation, you just put away the weapons, fold up the board and call it a night.

I never got Betsy back. Either one of them.

Perihelion Science Fiction Magazine

My spring green great-granddaughter has come home from her Earthstudies for a visit.

"We learned about Great Aunt Sonjec’s Birth of CaROUSal in History of Music, Grandma Carinth. They call the frequelet the most important innovation in music since the gramophone. "

"Bah," I say. "History’s all guesses and lies."

Her hair ripples in the light as she shakes her head. "Don’t be a poor sport just because your sister is famous and—"

"Think I care about that? I don’t. But I lived that history. 2215, right here on planet Pas. The Birth of CaROUSal

…oh yes. But what historians don’t know is that I served as its mid-wife. If I hadn’t been there, CaROUSal would have been stillborn."

I sat, watching from the shadows at the back of the open-air bar. My synesthetic response was deepred-shimmery: detached anticipation, as Sonjec, 19 in earthyears—two younger than me—climbed onto the platform that served as stage. On the wall behind her a banner read: CaROUSal.

Her thick straight hair lay like a thatched roof over her forehead, short and shaggy around her ears. She wore a bright blue shirt and tight grey-green pants shoved into heavy boots. Two other people were on stage: a keyboardist, whose name I never got, and the percussionist, Ruk.

Ruk is P’twua, one of the three humanoid races on Pas.

The first, and—at that point—only, frequlet hung from a plaited strap over Sonjec’s left shoulder. The scrolled brass and copper box with curved sides and a dozen or so touch-interfaces lay flat against her diaphragm.

As she adjusted the instrument’s settings, I noticed my dry mouth and sweaty palms. The red shimmer had transformed into vibrating mud-green: low-grade anxiety. Why? I had nothing riding on this performance. I didn’t care whether Sonjec did well or not.

I’d felt only irritation when she recently showed up. Sonjec had always stayed on Earth with her father, while I accompanied our mother on her diplomatic posts. New languages, people, cultures fit not only my interests, but also my sensitivities.

Ruk moved to the front of the stage and spoke in his language, Dwa*p’ti. P’twuas made up most of the crowd.

I picked up the gist. He explained that unlike most music where you stay quiet and listen, CaROUSal’s music was made on the spot from the input of sound and Sonjec’s talent. He instructed them to make as much or any type of noise they wished.

"The frequencies will flow from all of you into Sonjec’s instrument and back out—transformed. You will be an integral part of the music and it will be unique to this night."

Sonjec’s music changed passive listeners into active participants.

Her implanted binaural conductors meant she and her multi-layered contraption were one highly-integrated circuit. That night, the input from the Dwa*p’ti language—which includes a variety of pops and ticks of the tongue on the cheeks, lips, teeth and from the throat—made music unlike anything I’d ever heard.

But even while appreciating the raucous, rhythmic melodies with surprising tangents and harmonizing vocals, I felt my anxiety grow to high alert.

Chartreuse: edgy, risky, headed toward danger.

Then, the complexions of the P’twuas, normally a pale green-ivory, went coral.

Disoriented, I jerked my head around the room, trying to figure out what was happening. I don’t see imaginary colors; I mentally associate colors with emotional content. But, coral, like all colors, had meaning to me.

Coral-pale: teasing.

Coral-sharp: mocking, taunting, ridicule.

Ruk, looking distraught and stunned, no longer played, but Sonjec, eyes closed, didn’t notice.

I stood, overturning my bar stool, every muscle tense as the playful boisterousness in the room disappeared. I didn’t know what it meant for P’twuas to suddenly go coral, but I knew the vibes had changed from fun to furious.

She has to stop the music .

I strode toward her, jostling through the small tables and standing, shouting, fist-waving P’twuas. Inside me, hot pink-bright: outrage, streamed alongside spinning, intense, viridian green: violence.