New York City, sometime in the near future. Humanity has finally gotten its act together and is working as a single species with a common purpose. Their first project after defeating climate change: The Lens. A telescope poised at the edge of the solar system that is designed to look for life elsewhere in the universe. It worked. But what humanity eventually discovers tells more about themselves than any otherworldly civilization.
In the water mines of a desolate landscape one man dreams of winning the monthly competition to haul as much water as possible. His new teammate, young and unsure of himself, slows his progress. Falling out of the lead because of the luck of another team, his team races to catch up. When tragedy strikes the man realizes he can make up for lost time. His chosen method, unethical and possibly immoral, is all that he can do to win the prize. The catch is, if he’s caught he will lose all his time and his only reason for living.
A young man feels as if his entire universe weighs on his shoulders. If he doesn’t get the family up and going for the day, everyone will be in trouble. His single mother, who works constantly to keep them alive, needs all the help she can get. His brother, belligerent and lazy, adds to the list of things he needs to take care of. Adult responsibilities for a child of nine. Yet he doesn’t complain and does his best until one day when an unlikely visitor from another dimension shows him a way out. To be free, he needs to take an extreme action that will tear his family apart and turn him into the monster he so fears.
Where do you draw the line of what is acceptable in a relationship? How far do you want to see into the soul of your companion, and at what point do they cross the line into the unforgivable? For Ambassador Quinlin, what started as a harmless affair with a mysterious woman progresses into a twisting relationship full of intrigue, passion, longing, and death.
These and other thought-provoking stories and vignettes sample a range of science fiction sub-genres: first-contact, cyberpunk, post-industrial, post-apocalyptic, science fantasy, and many others. Inspired by the author’s love of New York City, his continuing obsession with AI, or ripped out of his nightmares, “Dreams of a Freezing Ocean, Volume II: Dark Oceans” is an epic collection filled with short stories for short attention spans.
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