The Line Between Sci-fi and Fantasy

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Sardines in a Tin Can

by Wendy Nikel


Scrape. Shift. Shovel. Heave.
Scrape. Shift. Shovel. Dump.
The work is monotonous. Hard. We labor tirelessly without any breaks, though the sun's rays burn us and the shovel's handles rub off the outermost layers of our fingers and palms. The soles of our feet have permanent indentations from where we, barefoot, have pressed our shovels into the soil. We work in a line from sunup to sundown, in perfect synchronization. Those that fall behind the rhythm's drumbeat are dragged away and never seen again.
The overseers will punish us if we talk, not that we'd have anything to talk about anyway, at least not in front of them. What would we say? "Oh, the dirt was awfully hard today, wasn't it?" "Don't you wish it would rain?" "Don't you wish you were anywhere but here, doing anything but scraping and shoveling?"
After the sun sets, they pack us, like sardines, into the tin-roofed shelters which are little more than crumpled boxes of scrap metal. Though they claim that their purpose is to protect us from the elements, the fierce, red dust blows in through the cracks and the sheet metal is no protection from the joint-numbing cold. We're to sleep then; rest, and recharge so that we're ready for the work to begin again at dawn. It's difficult to do when there's no room to stretch out, when each bend of one's body causes discomfort for one's neighbor.
Even when one of us takes the hard knock of a foot in our chest or a knee in the chin, we don't fight back. No, we're smarter than that. We know that's precisely what they'd expect us to do, what they want us to do. They'd rather us fight one another and spend our energy focused inward on whoever has the spot farthest from the icy wind's reach or which of us has received preferential treatment recently from the overseers. (The squeaky wheel gets the oil, after all, even in a place like this.)
This base bickering, though, would keep our minds off the real enemy: those sitting in their air-conditioned towers, high over the rocky plains, sipping their lattes and orchestrating our every move, peering down at us and shouting orders. The overseers with their Tasers, those who laugh when we fall.
So instead of fighting one another, we work together. We plot. In the dark of the night, when they don't bother to waste even the wicks and wax of a candle on us, we strategize. In hushes, barely-heard whispers, we form a plan for our escape. We scratch our tactics into the dust beneath our feet, shuffling it away each day to destroy the evidence.
All too soon the sun rises on the red horizon and we must destroy the evidence and bury our secrets once more. With such little rest, one would think we would be exhausted, but instead we file outside refreshed, energized, and pick up our shovels for another day of work.
Scrape. Shift. Shovel. Heave.
Scrape. Shift. Shovel. Dump.
Some days the dust storms are so thick, the air so heavy with rusty, metallic soil, that the overseers' views of us are obscured, shrouded in a blanket of red. Those days, they bury their heads in their screens, tracking us by our heat signatures to ensure we keep working while they remain indoors to protect their fragile lungs. On those days, we return to our shed with thick, red dust in all our creases. But on those days, we can pretend that we're digging these ditches for ourselves, for our homes and factories and schools and libraries. On those days, we can dream.
"These aqueducts are the first phase in terra-forming the planet." The voice over the loudspeaker echoes through the valley. "We must not fall behind schedule, or the whole project will suffer."
It's their rallying cry, meant to motivate us, though we will never reap the benefits of a new planet filled with lush, green jungles and forests. No, by that time, we'll be long gone--packed up like sardines and shipped off to the next world, and the next, and the next, and the next.
Always sowing, never reaping.
Then one day, as the sun reaches its apex, they gather us together, line us up in rows and columns, and arrange us according to the numbers branded on our shoulders. We're counted and inspect us for any signs of damage, poked and prodded as the overseers take notes on their clipboards. The process takes hours, but we're offered no reprieve. Finally, as the day comes to a close, the voice speaks.
"The work here is done. The shuttle arrives tomorrow to take you to your next station."
This night no one rests. No one drifts off into his own dreams, too weary and worn to join the group's conversation. This night, we share a dream of a future free from our captivity. This night is different than any other. It's harder to keep our voices quiet, to disguise our excitement.
"Where will we go?" someone asks. The number on his shoulder is 0932. We know him by no other name, and I wonder what we'll call him, once we're free. Would he still want to be called by his number, or will he choose a name for himself? What will they call me?
"Does it matter?" another responds. His number: 3523. "As long as we're somewhere they aren't."
We all bob our heads in agreement and draw lines in the dirt of planets and orbits and places where we know they won't look for us. We debate and discuss, and finally agree on one. The rest of the night, we wait, whispering the plan to one another, as if there'd be any chance we might forget.
The shuttle arrives with the sun, kicking up thick plumes of dust as it touches down on the surface. It's our one chance, we know. It is time. When they come to wake us, we're ready.
5840 shouts "Now!" and we move as one. We press against the sides of our containment, and the shelter collapses into five flat sheets of metal. We've divided into four groups, and mine presses forward, a direct line to the rocket.
The overseers have been knocked down, flattened under the shelter's walls, and when they attempt to rise, we swat the weapons from their hands. 3958 dislocates the shoulder of one who tries to knock him over. 9547 sticks out his foot, tripping another and making his nose bleed onto the red ground. Reinforcements, more men in rust-red uniforms, rush out of their towers and towards us, but the left flank has already removed the planks from over the aqueducts, and there's no other way for them to cross.
I let out a laugh, marveling at the unfamiliar sound rising from my voice box, and race towards the rocket. 1279 has already immobilized the pilot, tying him with a rope and throwing him aside, like an unneeded garment.
My feet touch the ladder and I follow my brethren--clank, clank, clank--up to the hatch. We're packed in tightly, but this time, we don't mind. We'd rather be snug in the control room than have space to spare in with the cargo.
4829 holds up the flight manual that we stole the last time we were transported, the one we've been studying at night the whole time we've been here. How long has it been? Months? Years? None of us bothered to keep track. 3871 shuts the hatch and we all brace ourselves, tittering like madmen at our accomplishment.
3748 nudges me, and points out the nearest window. Out the window, we can see that the overseers have found a way across the aqueducts. They stand beneath the rocket, shouting, and wave their arms, running at us with faces filled with horror and surprise. I laugh at the sight of their balding heads; it seems so strange to view them from above when for so long we've had to look up at them.
3487 starts the engine, and the rockets roar to life. We embrace one another, grabbing onto arms and hands and wrists and whatever we can reach of one another, and feeling a unity that we haven't experienced, even in all those days of synchronized work.
"We've done it," 4462 mutters, his voice filled with awe.
The overseers freeze and step backward; they dare not approach the flames. The radio clicks on, and one of them speaks to us from the ground. "What are you doing? You can't do this! You're only machines! Stop!"
They've underestimated our intelligence, just as we had calculated. We may be made of steel instead of skin and bone, with gears in place of hearts, but the minds which they've given us were meant for far better things than the menial tasks of scraping, shifting, shoveling, and heaving.
8472 hits the red button and we join hands as we launch--up, up, up, into a universe full of possibility.



Citation:
Nikel, Wendy. "Sardines In A Tin Can." Daily Science Fiction, November 21, 2014. Accessed November 23, 2014. http://dailysciencefiction.com/science-fiction/robots-and-computers/wendy-nikel/sardines-in-a-tin-can.html. 



Water Witch
by Elizabeth Creith

Hazel held a forked willow stick out in front of her by the ends. Ten-year-old Molly trailed her aunt across the field, their steps swishing in yellowing knee-high grass. The stick quivered, then twisted like a cat, reaching for the ground.
"This is for show, mind," Hazel said. "Folk like to see something happening, something to tell them you've done it. But you don't need the stick, understand?"
Molly nodded, looking up into Aunt Hazel's face. Wisps of fair hair escaped from Hazel's braid and caught the light of the full harvest moon in the darkening sky. If Molly stood in just the right place, she could make the moon into a halo around her aunt's head.
The moonlight was dazzling-bright, bright enough to cast shadows. When Molly shaded her eyes, she could see her aunt smiling, her one crooked front tooth and the sweet, clear blue eyes. Molly's mama had those eyes, too, but Molly's eyes and hair were brown, like her father's.

"What really happens," Hazel said, "happens inside you. You got to feel the earth. She's got warm places and wet places, soft and hard places. You can feel the water in her, feel it in yourself. Your feet feel damp and cool, even in your shoes, and then you know you've got the right place. The wetter your feet feel, the closer the water."
Molly nodded again. Hazel led her away a few paces in the field.
"Close your eyes," she said, and spun the child around. She steadied Molly with a hand on her shoulder. "Take hold. Lightly, now. That's right." She set the ends of the stick in Molly's hands. "Now open your eyes, but don't look too hard at anything. Just walk forward and feel the earth."
But wherever she walked, however hard she tried, nothing happened. If Aunt Hazel took the stick, it bent almost to breaking to reach the ground, but in Molly's hands it was dead as her mama's broom.
"Never mind." Aunt Hazel kissed Molly's cheek and smoothed her sleek brown hair. "We'll try again another day. There's always a water witch in this family."
But they never tried again. Two days later Aunt Hazel cut herself canning. The wound sickened and the poison spread up her arm in red streaks. Nothing helped her. She died at the dark of the moon when life goes out of things and death comes easy. They buried her in the family graveyard, on the rise at the back of the farm, where her grandparents and parents lay, and her brother who died a baby.
Molly took the forked willow, drying though it was, and walked in the field every day, trying to find the spot where Hazel had held the fresh-cut willow while it arched and twisted towards water. She knew it was foolish. A real water-witch didn't need a stick, and no stick would help if you weren't one.
When the full moon rose again, Molly climbed up to the graveyard in the evening. The air was blue and chill with fall. Leaves made a bright rustling carpet for the little graveyard. Molly laid the stick down on Aunt Hazel's grave.
"I couldn't do it," she said, "I tried and tried. I'm sorry, Aunt Hazel! I'm sorry we don't have a water witch in the family now." She cried as hard for her failure as she had for her aunt's death.
When her tears were gone, she turned and started down the hill. The moon floated before her, and she wondered where she would have to stand to make it into a halo for herself.
When she was halfway back to the house, with most of a field to go, the wind came up, a little breeze that brushed over her cheek and crept through her hair to the back of her neck. She shivered and began to hurry back to the warmth of the house.
Then, just for a moment, the breeze was a warm breath.
"Aunt Hazel?" Molly said. Foolishly, she felt as though her aunt was standing behind her, smiling down at her. She paused, longing to turn, afraid it wouldn't be true.
Then she felt the smallest touch of cold on her left foot, through the woollen sock. The cold spread rapidly across her sole, over her toes.
Bending, she quickly undid the laces of her shoe and pulled it off.
Her sock sagged away from her foot, dripping cold, clear water.



Citation:
Creith, Elizabeth. "Water Witch." Short-Story Me, November 12, 2009. Accessed November 23, 2014. http://www.short-story.me/fantasy-stories/74-water-witch.html














 Are sci-fi and fantasy the same?

Above are two pieces of short story. One is Science Fiction and the other one is Fantasy.

Science fiction and Fantasy shared some element in common, which is "Dissociation." Both genres contain the effects of alienation, although in a different way. Imaginations in a fantastical world are also different with those found in fictional scientific world. 

Sardines In a Tin Can is a sci-fi short story written by Wendy Nikel. Here, the author narrated and described how people worked and are treated in another dystopian world - giving some thoughts of the system in that world to the readers. By reading the story, the readers are able to guess that the story takes place in another world/planet or probably the future where labors appeared to be "machines". The fact that each labors are numbered as well added to the dissociation effects of the story - which is a case that doesn't happen in reality as people in the real world has their own name. 

Throughout the passage, lexical terms from the category of science and technology are used. (e.g. machines, rocket, planet, station, etc.) Moreover, the author also fulfilled the use of sci-fi elements including the what if question. In this case, the question is "What if robots who can feel are labors?" As a sci-fi piece, the first text as well uses a lot of descriptions along its plot to give reader a clearer picture of the imaginary world that the author has created. The effects of "tension" can as well be seen as the author appear to foreshadow the identity of the main character through the use of some presence identity. 

As well as the first story, the second passage titled "Water Witch" is a narrative piece authored by Elizabeth Creith which plot out the story of a young girl named Molly who is a water witch. In this piece, the alienation effects are achieved as the main character is a water witch, similar such as those in the first passage except the first piece talks about robots. As well as that, by reading from the second passage, the readers would as well be aware of how the systems work in the witch world (such as that found in the first passage), especially as they go to the end of the story. (From what I could infer), the witch's world work in a ways such that there's only one water witch in each family, which is why after Aunt Hazel passed, Molly are able to bend/control the water. 

On the other side, the two texts were written of different context although of a similar purpose. The first text which is a sci-fi involved characters that are created under the predictions of the development of science and technology. This shows how the characters in this case machineries/robots could actually be invented in the future unlike the second passage which contains only imaginary characters which couldn't be found in the world and couldn't even be invented (e.g. witches, benders, people having supernatural powers.) Humans can never invent, make or even possessed supernatural powers. So, characters in fantasy genre only appear as imaginations, unlike in sci-fi which is both imaginations and predictions.

Furthermore, the dissociation used in sci-fi piece, such as those found in the first story differ than that found in the second passage. In the first passage, the author created another dystopian world with different systems in the ways things work. But, the second passage appear to be set some where around the world such as nearby a lake, graveyard, etc. which is basically on the earth. By this, there's a clear distinction between where sci-fi stories are set with that of fantasy narrative writing. 

 Lastly, "laws" created in these two genres differ from each other. When writing a sci-fi story, the author has to to create laws that are both logical and imaginative. This laws as well have to be supported by scientific reasons. This is not that distinct in the sci-fi story above. However, an example of this would be a world where cars can fly - supported by the questions "why is that?". The answer to this might probably because of the use of magnet for e.g. such as those use in a monorail, etc. (refer to flying cars in Total Recall.) In the first passage, this might be "robots are labors to human and are under the control of humans, which make them do all the things human command them to do. - although the ending of this narrative piece doesn't pretty much support this law) But, with fantasy, rules can be created as long as the authors are pleased by them. There won't be any "why" questions to question the ability of the characters to bend water such as that used in the second passage. 

 Therefore, science fiction and fantasy are two different genres. Although they might share some similar elements, but their worlds are basically composed of different imaginative theories, laws and ideas. In some aspect, they might be the same, on the others, they might be go in directions opposing each other. 






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About the Author

Welcome to my blog. This is where you can run away from the reality. Feel free to browse though my blog and bring yourself to the world of science fiction - an imaginary place where you would want to be.

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