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    Diary of One Who Disappeared
    Diary of One Who Disappeared
    Diary of One Who Disappeared
    Ebook167 pages1 hour

    Diary of One Who Disappeared

    By Jason Erik Lundberg

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    The year is 2040 and an envoy of the North American Union finds himself a fugitive in the Southeast Asian nation of Tinhau.

    Lucas Lehrer is tasked with travelling from the North American Union to the island-nation of Tinhau to extend the offer of political partnership. When negotiations break down, Lucas decides to request asylum, and he soon encounters an odd series of coincidences in which his deep-seated desires start coming true. Among the backdrop of societal instability and growing nativism, he befriends a young woman who is not what she seems, and who may not be from our universe at all.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherEpigram Books
    Release dateApr 6, 2019
    ISBN9789814785631

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      Book preview

      Diary of One Who Disappeared - Jason Erik Lundberg

      Diary of One Who Disappeared : A Novella

      Jason Erik Lundberg

      ISBN: 978-981-47-8563-1

      First Edition, April 2019

      © 2019 by Jason Erik Lundberg

      Author photo by Mindy Tan. Used with permission.

      Cover art by Victoria Lee, inspired by the artwork of João Lauro Fonte.

      Design by Victoria Lee.

      Published in Singapore by Epigram Books

      www.epigrambooks.sg

      All rights reserved

      This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

      Table of Contents

      OCTOBER

      NOVEMBER

      DECEMBER

      FEBRUARY

      MARCH

      Acknowledgements

      About the Author

      A Project Supported by the Creation Grant

      Advance Praise for Diary of One Who Disappeared

      A richly-detailed and satisfying story of dissolution and discovery, set in a near-future reality where the question of what makes us human is paramount. Against larger political concerns, a smaller and more searing narrative unfolds, about a man who is lost and found in places that are found and lost. Within the pages of this book are insights on the human heart, serene and devastating in its truth-telling.

      Dean Francis Alfar, Palanca grand prize-winning author of

      Salamanca and The Field Guide to the Roads of Manila

      "A fascinating journey of adventure and ideas, capturing

      many of the political and geopolitical issues of today.

      Evocative and effective."

      Jeffrey Ford, World Fantasy Award-wining author of Ahab’s Return

      A story of interpersonal and international politics, a haunting exploration of how one defines and redefines oneself, a thriller and a human tale of personal growth. If you are looking for intelligent, thought-provoking speculative fiction, board the airship from the repressive North American Union to cosmopolitan Tinhau. Readers of thoughtful, humane fiction are in for a treat.

      John Kessel, Nebula Award-winning author of The Moon and the Other

      A fantastic tale of the possibility of revolution—both personal and political—inherent in every moment.

      Ken Liu, Hugo Award-winning author of

      The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories

      "Diary of One Who Disappeared is a riveting, poignant account of a man’s world falling apart and the new one he creates for himself. As much a dark reflection of our own world today, it’s also a cautionary tale of the possible futures we can yet avoid. Surprising and thought-provoking, Lundberg’s striking milieu and engaging characters will linger with readers long after they turn the last page."

      E. C. Myers, Andre Norton Award-winning author of

      Fair Coin, Quantum Coin and The Silence of Six

      A striking new way of seeing Singapore, the USA and the emigrant experience in an age of renewed bigotry and environmental disaster.

      Ng Yi-Sheng, Singapore Literature Prize-winning author of Lion City

      "A wildly inventive epistolary narrative that’s equal parts

      1984, The Twilight Zone, The Adventures of Luther Arkwright and Claremont-era X-Men. Lose yourself in a world where digital technology collides with airships, phlogiston cannons, pirates and tesseracts; and where love or loss may be just an alternate universe away."

      Victor Fernando R. Ocampo, Romeo Forbes award-winning author of

      The Infinite Library and Other Stories

      "Set in a not-so distant future, the book offers a reflection of global politics today and provokes questions of what it means to be human. Through diary entries and letters we witness hope, grief and disappointment amidst the persistence and failure of imperialism. We are reminded of the political potentials of speculative fiction, but most of all, Diary of One Who Disappeared is about a journey. It is a story of travel and transformation, a contemplation of encounters and roads not taken."

      Intan Paramaditha, PEN Translates award-winning author of Apple and Knife

      Through communiqués, missives and the common email, relationships unfold and splinter within a futuristic world ruled by religiosity and prejudice, mirroring our present-day political climate in terrifying but revelatory ways. The narrative also convincingly offers a morality tale about how the ramifications of our actions and thoughts, even our unconscious desires, extend beyond the realm of our known universe.

      Cyril Wong, Singapore Literature Prize-winning author of

      Ten Things My Father Never Taught Me

      Lundberg’s world-building is constructed from the inside out, ideas wrapped around an underlying architecture of emotion. A smart, engaging voice.

      Charles Yu, celebrated author of

      How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe

      Also by Jason Erik Lundberg

      Fiction

      Most Excellent and Lamentable (2019)

      Strange Mammals (2013)

      Embracing the Strange (2013)

      The Alchemy of Happiness (2012)

      Red Dot Irreal (2011, 2012)

      The Time Traveler’s Son (2008)

      Four Seasons in One Day (2003)

      The Curragh of Kildaire (2001, 2012)

      Picture Books

      Carol the Coral (2016)

      A Curious Bundle for Bo Bo and Cha Cha (2015)

      Bo Bo and Cha Cha and the Lost Child (2015)

      Bo Bo and Cha Cha Cook Up a Storm (2014)

      Bo Bo and Cha Cha and the New Year Gift (2014)

      Bo Bo and Cha Cha’s Big Day Out (2013)

      A New Home for Bo Bo and Cha Cha (2012)

      As Editor

      Best Singaporean Short Stories 1 (2019, UK)

      The Epigram Books Collection of Best New Singaporean Short Stories:

      Volume One (2013), Two (2015), Three (2017) and Four (2019)

      LONTAR #1–10 (2013–2018)

      Fish Eats Lion (2012, 2014)

      A Field Guide to Surreal Botany (2008)

      Scattered, Covered, Smothered (2004)

      For John Kessel and every mentor

      who has given me the priceless gift of their expertise

      OCTOBER

      ENCRYPTED DISPATCH

      #A4FEB6946B8AD5C444890F6CB2

      Sent: Mon, 01 Oct, 3.37pm

      Rick,

      I’ve just returned by train from the indef camp in Orlando with the rest of the DESD contingent, and things are worse than we suspected. The camp warden, a squat red-faced man named Duke, put on a good show, presenting a Potemkin tent-city full of their best behaved swees, all smiles, everything clean and proper and in its place, not an untoward word against their prison guards. No complaints about the ability-blocking kara bracelets they’re all forced to wear. Each tent decked out with books and magazines and even the odd tablet or æ-reader, like a fun camping trip instead of indefinite detention. Aside from the canvas of the tents, all of the administration and support buildings were grey concrete. The smell of bleach was strong.

      Halfway through the tour, Warden Duke decided that we all needed a demonstration of the karas’ effectiveness; one of the model swees was brought before us, a young Hispanic man with arabesqued tattoos on his arms. One of the guards aimed a hand-held device with wires all over it at the swee’s bracelet; the metal kara glowed briefly, and then the warden handed the young man a cup of water. But instead of taking a sip, the swee waved his other hand over the top of the cup, and the water rose out of it! Of course, I’ve read the documentation on hydromancers, but to see it in person is a totally different experience.

      With his outstretched hand, the swee pulled the water upward into a long tail and then manipulated the stream into different shapes in the air. The cup had dropped to the ground. One of my DESD colleagues (I think his name is Herman? He works in financial analysis) involuntarily clapped and let out a cry of delight, and then immediately checked his actions at the severe expression on the warden’s face. But then the warden’s mouth turned into an O as the swee lengthened the water into a thin tube and whipped it quickly in the direction of the warden’s head. It could only have been providence that collapsed Warden Duke’s knees at that moment, saving him from concussion or a lost eye or some worse injury.

      The guards tackled the water-manipulating swee to the ground, even as the water whip struck them on their backs and arms; with the wired box they reactivated the kara, which glowed again, and then the tube of water lost coherence and came apart in a splash that dampened all of them. The swee was again contained, so the guards marched him off to one of the support buildings. The warden stood back up and tried to laugh off the incident, bad apples and all that, but he was clearly rattled that the demonstration had not gone according to plan.

      I slipped away on the excuse of needing the toilet, and was able to meet up with our contact Blair in a service corridor inside the administration building. She handed over a sealed envelope, which I secreted underneath my shirt. Once the camp tour was concluded and I was back in my hotel room, I scanned the enclosed documents and photos, and then burned the originals; the digital files are attached to this dispatch.

      It’s clear that the tent-city was a ruse, because all the swees in the concentration camp are actually housed deep underground in fenced-off areas. The kara bracelets are not even necessary there because the walls are lined with a mesh that acts like an enormous Faraday cage, and blocks their superhuman abilities en masse, no matter what kind; they’ve solved the problem of having to engineer each kara to work specifically with a given swee’s ability. However, the effect is that the environment looks like a maximum security prison. The electricity of the camp is powered by solar panels, but the swees themselves are denied sunlight.

      The technology itself is remarkable, far more advanced than I’d have thought we’re currently capable of. Just imagine where we’d be if the Range, that apocalyptic weapon, hadn’t devastated our infrastructure for so long. It’s appalling that these advances come at the expense of freedom and dignity.

      And the children. Rick, they’re keeping the children in overpopulated pens, segregated from the adults. Since they’ve got the swee-testing age now down to eight years old, there are kids there without their parents, without any adult supervision or care, having to cope on their own. Thank the Lord that, by law, we’re unable to test any younger. Can you imagine the evil cruelty that would come with putting babies in cages?

      That this site is on the former Disney

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