Machine Sense Read online

  Copyright © 2018 by Dominic Schunker and Offworld Publishing Ltd. All rights reserved.

  This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  First Printing: 2018

  ISBN 978-1-9993471-3-0 (eBook)

  ISBN 978-1-9993471-4-7 (Paperback)

  ISBN 978-1-9993471-5-4 (Hardback)

  Offworld Publishing

  www.offworldpublishing.com

  This novel’s story and characters are fictitious. Certain long-standing institutions, agencies, and public offices are mentioned, but the characters involved are wholly imaginary.

  Contents

  1. Tomatopaccio

  2. The Preacher and the Cardinal

  3. The Fight

  4. Veto

  5. Bayside

  6. Mr. Sanchez

  7. Sacramento

  8. Sentience

  9. Flag

  10. Billings, Montana

  11. I-5

  12. Rabbu Tahumu

  13. Dover Street

  14. Carajillo

  15. Katherina

  16. Something Napoleon Said

  17. Venomous Little Cakes

  18. Raid on the Mountains

  19. Utukagaba

  20. Pipe Dreams

  21. What’s that Song Called?

  22. Family Album

  About the Author

  Subscribe

  Thanks

  Coming Soon

  Story

  Bonus

  History. Izzi didn’t want anything to do with history, especially Nazis and concentration camps. Assholes.

  Her dad was an asshole. He’d seriously pissed her off last night and here she sat in this airless, sweltering classroom that contained no-one else wanting anything to do with Nazis and concentration camps either, including Mr. Perkins.

  Why not put everyone in a class of what they want to do? Sure, in third grade the fireman and astronaut classes would be full to bursting and it would be an underwhelming lawyer class but by the time you get to thirteen like Izzi, you know if you’re going to want anything to do with Nazis and concentration camps. Even at Izzi’s age, she already thought wouldn’t it be nice if those class ratios persisted into later life.

  Izzi kept her eyes open as a courtesy to Mr. Perkins. After her dad’s weirdness yesterday, she couldn’t focus on anything else. There was something different about last night, something she’d never felt before from him. Why was he being so secretive and annoying? Izzi’s friend, Sarah reckoned it was another woman. Maybe it was time to do some detective work on him.

  And then there was that horrific dream that woke her up soaked in sweat early this morning, sat bolt upright with a wide eyed panic, trying to breathe. When the air finally came, the nightmare remained vivid and the fear still clung to her sweat. She looked round her room to recognise items of reality, things that told her it was OK. Her massive Fozzy Bear in the corner was just grinning at her. A smile flicked the nose of fear and fear was gone. Then her dream showed itself.

  She’d been drowning, so deep underwater she couldn’t even see where the surface was. All her friends were there as well and lots of people she didn’t know, all drowning, some already dead. They were all reaching out to her to help but she just couldn’t. She tried to extend her arms to grab onto them but she was incapable of any movement, trapped as a useless witness to this death scene. When the dream finally oozed back into its terrifying realm without her, she centred herself and closed her eyes to put consciousness away but her eyelid darkness kept bringing it back. She couldn’t close her eyes or get back to sleep for hours and only managed it as her room started warming to the small early light.

  Izzi seemed at peace. She had her head on the desk and was taking in the picture of outside as presented by the two large windows.

  Outside was sunny and bright, and she knew what it smelt like: jasmine and toffee apples and the sea. Perhaps, if her timing was spot on, she’d be able to avoid the performing dicks in the parking lot and get off to the boat quick smart. A tiny fragment of her dream resurfaced. The dream had made her feel scared of water. That was the most horrific thing about the dream. Sure, there were drowned floating classmates and a scene of horror but the open water was the only thing that made Izzi see the real beauty of life and escape her other life. How hideous would it be to be terrified by her only salvation?

  The problem with today, apart from the residue of her nightmare and her legs once again feeling like they belonged to an old lady getting out of a chair after six hours of TV, was her silly dad. He never had secrets from her so what was this?

  As of four days earlier, in the midst of an angst born of so much more than simply being a teenage girl, Izzi had cast aside the cute blond look. She’d put away the skip-thru-the-fields girlie dress for ripped jeans, a hoodie and navy-blue hair wrapped round her little ears like an elf.

  In keeping with that theme, and still unbeknownst to her dad, bless him, a tattoo of a disturbing looking demon coming to get you, had materialized in the middle of her back. It being summer and all, she’d be forced to fess up before long on that one. On the face of it, the elements were aligning their ethers and creating a time to remember for Izzi.

  It would all be swimming if it wasn’t for the fact that Izzi was old enough and smart enough to recognise she might be starting to lose her grip on broader reality.

  It’s like the first time you get that little twinge of pain in a tooth, you just know eventually it’s going to need something doing. And so it was with Izzi. The signs were clear to her. Something was seriously wrong. It was now a matter for her to address it or hide from it. She expected changes at her age but didn’t think this is what they meant.

  The wind had got up a bit and was tinkering with the trees, teasing them into a casual sway. The boat would be bobbing up and down, little bells and rigging would be singing its tune and the sound of the waves would join to make it just what she wanted.

  Izzi thought about heading to the harbor and getting out into the ocean just like she did pretty much every day. She had her phone countdown from the minute she arrived at school to the minute she thought she would get onto the boat. As soon as school threw them up onto the sidewalk, that’s where she was headed. When her dad finally came to get her that’s where she’d be, if he actually did come today. For all she knew it would be Sarah’s mom picking her up.

  She’d known how to sail since she was about eight years old. It seemed the first real deep breath of the day came at that time. Their little boat was a middle-aged Cole 43 with one or two teeth missing, enough downstairs to make for a cosy little party and comfy sleeping afterwards. It was all she could remember about the ocean. Her mom and dad had taken her on it when she was a baby and told her stories of almost dropping her over the side. Since then it had been her second home.

  Izzi rubbed her left leg to try and ease out the pain and closed her eyes. She thought about that day not so long ago. It was the most awesome day of her life aboard that little boat with her mom and dad. It was tinged with some great oddness though. Mom and Dad had woken up far too late for little Izzi, she was up and packed and dressed before coffee was considered. She’d even put most of their stuff in the car ready. It was the Saturday she’d been hanging off for weeks.

  Once they were all on the same page, after Izzi had thrown a few toys out of the pram, they started off with a bit of breakfast at the Harbor Cafe and she was a little more at ease. It was another glorious sunny morning in San Sebastian, the breeze would lift a sail or two and all was right and smiley with the world.

  Izzi had lived here all her life and knew it
like the back of her hand. It was a very Mexican style town, tiny side streets and whitewash and a feeling of complete peace, there were no feds scoping nasties here, there wasn’t a Microsoft or some other country-sized thing camped out nearby, it was just a school and the sea and a few buildings that were of little interest to her, apart from Flat Eric’s Burgers, of course.

  The boys on the fishing boats had finished their day and were having a few sneaky ones at the harbor bar, putting off their return to duty at home.

  Izzi’s mom ordered tomato slices with a gentle oregano sprinkle. They called it tomatopaccio and she was hoping there may be a little lemon garlic dressing going on. Izzi and her dad needed fruit and lots of it, in this case, ‘Izzi, number four, melon slices with a tickle of maple.’

  The cooling breeze slipped between the boats and washed over them, tickling their legs under the table and fluttering the light drapes behind the double doors to inside. A little scratty dog was taking a pee against the side of the nearest boat, breeze flapping his little ears back, tongue hanging fully out to one side and generally having a good time. But a shout from its owner and the owner of the boat brought this little mutt down to earth and admonishment was expected. The day was set fair to be a good one.

  Soon breakfast arrived and all three of them took possession of their melon slices and maple. Izzi’s mom thanked the waitress and picked up a slice. Mom and Dad chinked slices like a glass of bubbly and were upon their melon quicker than the wasp that had arrived around her ears.

  Izzi looked at the retreating waitress and then back at her mom and dad and then back to the waitress, who was wiggling away with apparently no drama to be had here.

  But there was drama to be had here dammit, care of Izzi. Pretty far from happy with the available human response, she picked up the menu quite venomously, making sure her nails scratched on the distressed blue pine table top, and would prove her point quickly and to the embarrassment of everyone else.

  It took her a few seconds to realise it. The menu was a completely different design and color scheme to the one she had literally just used to order her melon. And it took her a few seconds more to realise the bar was apparently called the Harbor Bistro not the Harbor Cafe.

  On further examination of the menu, she confirmed the melon slices were still pretty much top of the bill for breakfast and now even had a little gold star, but after two or three ever more careful scopes, ever decreasing circles of desperation, she couldn’t see tomatopaccio anywhere on the thing.

  Preparing to admit defeat, Izzi turned her eyes to the boats in the harbor, jingling and swaying softly in the breeze. It usually brought her a clarity but today there was only another instant departure from her recollection.

  A large yacht, tallest mast in the place, sat just four or five boats along the walkway and that bad boy had not been there when she got here a few minutes ago. They don’t just rock up and park like a little car. On this beautiful vessel was an even more beautiful woman, tall, slim, bronzed in an orange bikini and looking straight at Izzi’s confusion until Izzi spotted her. The woman calmly smiled, turned away and slid below deck. Izzi was sure she’d seen her before somewhere but couldn’t place it. She wanted to be that woman one day but returned to her present turmoil.

  She looked back over at two completely oblivious parents actually being quite annoying and friendly with each other. There was no sense to be had there or from the menu or from anything in the scene around her.

  In the absence of any sense, Izzi summoned the waitress back over with a smile. In the several seconds the waitress took to gather herself, she managed to look deflated at being called to action, primed her notepad and finally plotted her swing over to Izzi’s table.

  In these very same seconds, Izzi wondered if the acid that was meant to be in the punch last night at Dana Jolly’s party was suddenly kicking in. Did it really take that long?

  ‘I’m really sorry but I’ve got two questions,’ said Izzi. The waitress turned her flirty smile at Izzi’s dad back to Izzi and offered the slightest tilt of the head to indicate, ‘and they are …?’

  ‘First, have you re-branded and put new menus down, like in the last five minutes?’

  Without quite appreciating why a person would ask this, the waitress was confident she knew this one. ‘Nope, it’s been called Harbor Bistro for about ten years but you live here don’t you? Aren’t you Izzi?’

  Izzi was and took a moment to look above her head at the sign just under the awning. ‘Harbor Bistro.’ A menu switch for a subtle rebranding might have been possible but a six foot sign being changed above her head as she sat there, not so much.

  Disappointed by question one and deep down knowing the answer, she felt compelled to pursue question two.

  ‘And my mom actually ordered the tomatoes, not melon.’

  Her mom looked at her dad, slightly ahead of feeling the confusion, while her dad looked Izzi right in the eyes, offering little emotion. Izzi avoided that paternal gaze with all the strength she had as punishment for his indifference at all of this as it was happening. Poor skills, Dad.

  ‘I didn’t order tomato anything darling,’ said her mom. ‘Don’t be silly. Eat your melon and let’s get out on the water.’ Her mom beamed a lovely, honest, warm mom smile at Izzi but Izzi could only eye her coldly back.

  Both parents were clearly useless in this episode from The Twilight Zone and there was only one thing you can do when you find yourself here in a land where logic sits starved and imprisoned: seek a release, find that logic in this world and, more importantly, find something you can blame.

  It was Mom who ordered the tomatoes. Was this strong lovely woman she so admired frightened to make a scene or was something else afoot? Izzi had never witnessed her mom back down, yield or fail to kick off royally if something got under her skirt.

  ‘Mom, seriously you didn’t order that. For fucks sake.’

  ‘Izzi!’

  The thing was, Izzi kinda knew this wasn’t her mom’s fault. Her mom genuinely couldn’t order something off a menu that didn’t have it. Izzi rolled this through her head and she knew her game was up. Leave it, send away the waitress.

  And don’t think she didn’t still see her dad’s eyes searing into her from over there. No use, too late, that father, seriously if you’ve got something to say, say it.

  At this point, the waitress added, ‘Yes actually, she did order the melon,’ and she said it with a certain tone.

  Izzi knew this line of inquiry was going nowhere. It was now time to analyze her dad. He needed to step up. He’d know. She trusted him as the final arbiter, but he just looked back down at his melon and tucked in.

  ‘Nothing? Dad, seriously?’

  ‘Izzi!’

  This was followed by something Izzi always seemed to do when she was annoyed or upset. What she was trying to say was something along the lines of, ‘are you seriously telling me you didn’t hear her order tomatoes’ but it emerged from her as ‘Rugummum ul nisme izzakara suati?’ Sounded more Klingon than human.

  She’d been doing this pretty much as long as she could form speech and usually resulted in her mom and dad cracking up laughing, which in turn propagated the Klingon. Dad was sensible in holding back the chuckles today though.

  Izzi had a naughty joint every so often but there were other drugs that produced exactly the nonsense of this harbor morning and she’d thought about them lots. If acid was in the punch at Dana’s party and this is what all the fuss was about, they can all abandon themselves to the daft chaos of it.

  The waitress edged ever closer to a place waitresses call retreat, slipping doorwards at a slow but intended rate. Izzi recovered decorum to thank her, which officially released the girl from this oddness, and Izzi was forced into a little contemplation.

  The rest of the world was carrying on as normal, Mom and Dad behaving like this never happened and everything here at the cafe, or bistro or wherever it’s called, maybe Club du Port in the next ten minutes, was, on
the face of it, at ease with itself.

  But Izzi wasn’t at ease with shit. She knew what she saw, she knew what she heard, all this shit just happened, plain and simple.

  No-one was going to listen to her and she thought it was perfectly reasonable to fester for a while, considering toys and prams.

  Then Dad looked over when he knew her mom wasn’t looking and just gave her the shush, we’ll cover it later sign.

  In this cocky gesture, Izzi saw a serious underplaying of what she needed but she also saw a chink of light and agreed to lock eyes with her dad purely to signal, indeed yes, we will cover it later or prepare to face your doom.

  Perhaps her dad could solve this little riddle, maybe her mom wasn’t well, or was she sad or was she finally certifiably mad? She didn’t seem any of these really. Izzi would collar the old man soon enough for some proper input and give him a decent kicking for the lack of that input in the first place, leaving her in tomato-fuelled limbo.

  This confused twenty-seven minutes neared its finale. Izzi had dispatched some but by no means all of the melon and left the rest in disorderly fashion on the table to lodge a subtle if squelchy protest at parental performance not to mention that tart of a waitress wanting to jump her dad. She smeared a bit of maple on the table top to give that slutty waitress something to do.

  They were quickly on the boat and hitting open water, cruising slowly past the mystery yacht and its hidden beauty as they exited the harbor. Izzi was solo at the back, controlling the movement of this slinky cool vessel, she handled all of it. Her mom and dad continued their annoying closeness and cuddled on a bunch of cushions by the steps with a curiously early glass of something Izzi wasn’t allowed yet.