Hello, Starshine. The Earth says hello. And welcome to the Lightspeed Magazine Story Podcast. I'm your host, Janina Edwards. In this episode, you'll be listening to Talk, The Siren Song of the Otherworld Goggles by Dominica Fedeplice and The Other River by John Lasser. Both pieces will be narrated by Alison Bell Buse. First up is our short shot, Talk, The Siren Song of the Otherworld Goggles by Dominica Fetaplace. In just a teeny little moment.
DC High Volume, Batman. The Dark Knight's definitive DC comic stories. Adapted directly for audio for the very first time. Fear. I have to make them afraid. He's got a motorcycle. Get after him or I'll have you shot. You mean blow up the building. From this moment on, none of you are safe. New episodes every Wednesday, wherever you get your podcasts. can you change your personality how does peer pressure work Should you ever really trust your gut?
These are just a few of the topics we've recently tackled on my podcast, Something You Should Know. It's a podcast where leading experts give you valuable intel that you can use in your life today. I'm the host, Mike Carruthers, and with over 1,000 episodes and over 4,000 mostly 5-star reviews, I invite you to check out Something You Should Know, wherever you listen. Welcome back. And now, Talk, The Siren Song of the Otherworld Goggles.
Talk, The Siren Song of the Otherworld Goggles by Dominica Fedepli. Talk, The Siren Song of the Otherworld Goggles by Tandi Rivera. Salon B, 30 minutes. Thanks everyone for coming. My name is Tandi. I'm here to talk about how I used my Otherworld goggles to become a better version of myself. But first, here is a partial list of questions I will not be answering tonight.
What is consciousness? Is reality real? Does the AR I see in my otherworld goggles represent an actual parallel universe that exists, or is it just a computer simulator? Why are we merely passive observers when we use the otherworld goggles? Why can't we interact with the AR displays? Wow, a lot of you are leaving. Okay, sorry to disappoint. Wait, before you go, here is a question I will be answering. Are we trapped in a simulation? Oh yeah, that got your attention.
The answer is yes. We are trapped in a simulation. And that simulation is called the human brain. We're constantly hallucinating here in our own little skulls, but it's not something we're necessarily aware of because each of us hallucinates in a manner more or less consistent with the people around us. We don't have access to reality. Everything we experience is filtered through our own consciousness.
and we don't have access to anyone's consciousness but our own. Our so-called agreed-upon reality is basically just all of us dreaming the same dream, more or less. There is a theory of human development that speculates that the purpose of childhood is to train your own neural network to sync up with those around you so that you can properly join the shared hallucination we call a society.
That's why it takes so long to grow up. This theory was actually created by an alternate version of myself I observed using my goggles. That version of me is a professor of cognitive science. Makes me wish I hadn't dropped out of grad school. A different version of me, a version who went to med school, is a psychiatrist. She speculates that people with mental illnesses are failing to sync their hallucinations with the hallucinations of other people.
Hey, don't boo me. It's not my theory. Boo her, if you can find her. Not that she'd be able to hear you. There was some hope in the early part of this century that advances in quantum computing could also lead to insights into consciousness and the human brain. The thinking was, we'll build lots of powerful artificial brains, and those brains would teach us about our own wetware. Well, here we are at the end of the century, and we haven't learned as much as we'd like.
Sure, people have built some powerful AIs that do lots of important work, life-saving stuff. But we're not quite sure how these AIs work, only that they do. Fortunately, you don't have to know how something works in order to use it. And so, yeah, no one really knows how the other world goggles work or even why they show us the things they do. I think of the goggles as an artificial brain whose dreams are visible to us.
Quick show of hands. How many of you in here feel like you overuse your goggles? That's a lot of pain. I've observed many other Tandys who are hooked on their goggles. Those are the most boring versions of myself to visit. I'm just there watching them wandering the world with their goggles on. I assume they're observing other versions of ourselves, but there's no way to verify. I don't stay in those worlds too long. I ask my goggles to take me elsewhere.
Another of me translates ancient Greek texts. I spent way too long observing her, but I was fascinated by the way she was translating Homer's Odyssey. You know the siren song? The song that is so addictive it dooms men to their death? In Other Tandy's translation, the Siren Song is just a description of step alternate versions of you are doing in parallel universes. This Tandy, translator Tandy, does not use goggles.
She's a recovering addict, I think. She made me wonder, am I addicted too? Should I quit? Then, and I'm not proud to say this, but I became resentful of her. This happens more than I care to admit. I see all the versions of me that are doing cool things, like astronaut Tandy or paleontologist Tandy, and I feel so inadequate. I was starting to resent translator Tandy as well, but instead of exiting that universe, I stayed and kept reading her version of The Odyssey.
Odysseus is totally hooked on the siren song, same as everyone who hears it. But he figures out a way to moderate his enjoyment of the song, essentially by letting other people control his dope. From that point on in Other Tandy's retelling, Odysseus becomes a much more powerful hero. He's able to incorporate the experiences of his other selves to ascend to a new type of hero. He had essentially made himself into a collage of all his favorite Odysseus.
What if I tried to make myself into a collage of all my favorite selves? Would I transform into a super tandy? And that's what I've been trying to do. I've been trying stuff out. Stuff like this, standing up in front of, like, dozens of skeptical-looking people. Is this talk going badly? So what if it is? I'm going to keep working on it and keep delivering it until it is good.
Being up here is scary, but I don't want to let my fears get in the way of my true purpose, which is helping others. I know that's my purpose because I've seen so many other versions of myself do it. Just as we're invisible to the people in alternate universes we visit in our goggles, I think there are lots of invisible other selves observing me. Like I'm picturing them in the room right now.
Some of them are clapping, I hope. Others are taking notes. The ones who are taking notes are probably going to give totally amazing versions of this talk in their own universe. Me doing badly right now is teaching them how to do better. Alternate versions of you audience members are going to enjoy it so much, I bet. So I'm fine if I suck, now that I know my suckage has a higher purpose. This is why I try to find a moderate approach to goggles usage.
I use them enough so that I can learn from my other selves, but I also take them off and do stuff so that others can learn from me. Think about it. If the Buddha had goggles, this is how he would have used them, right? Anyway, as all of you in the audience have probably guessed by now, this talk isn't even for you. It's for the invisible versions of me that I can't see, but I'm pretty sure are watching me right now.
Thank you for coming. I hope you learned something. You can go ahead and clap now if you want. I can't hear you, but don't worry. I know the silence between universes seems unbridgeable, and perhaps it is, but despite all that, I'm listening for that inaudible applause. Thank you, thank you, thank you for showing up. That was Talk, The Siren Song of the Otherworld Goggles by Dominique Afetaplase, narrated by Alison Bellevue.
Dominika Feta Place writes fiction and poetry. Her work has appeared in Zizova, Asimov's, Analog, F&SF, Clark's World, Uncanny, and Reactor. Her honors include two Pushcart Prizes, a Rona Jaffe Award, a Barbara Deming Award, and fellowships from IPARC, Jirasi, and the McDowell Colony. She is a graduate of UC Berkeley and the Clarion West Writers' Workshop. Next, we have The Other River by John Lasser. Coming right up.
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Driving alone through the Sahara blew Sarah Beth's mind. She woke up in the back of the Jeep, smoked a joint, popped a Black Beauty, and revved her engine, full of thoughts and plans. She'd imagined driving with her head empty, like she thought the desert would be, but everything was full. Palm trees, all sorts of scrub brush she couldn't identify. Not the sea dunes, she'd imagined. Something different and far more alive. like she was, even under the eyeball-blistering sun.
The first tire went flat 100 miles out of Algiers. She busted out the jack, put on the janky-looking spare, and threw the useless old tube to the side of the road before driving on. just like life with Emmy. Even when the wheels came off, they'd kept going. Even when it was a bad idea, like driving alone through the desert, the weed and speed had kept them trucking. The only way out is through. That's what Emmy always said.
Quoting someone, Sarah Beth never asked who, but Emmy said it with such conviction that she'd made it her own. Nobody could stand up to her when she was like that. 800 miles later, only 100 miles short of Tam and Rasset, the spare blue. Sarah Beth heard the pop, the slow hiss of air. The car shimmied as she pounded the brake, but there wasn't much to hit. She felt everything, and she had it all under control. She'd felt that way with Emmy, too. Look where that had gotten them.
On her own, Sarah Beth couldn't even boost a car. If they'd had the fight right away, she'd never have left Spain, except maybe to go back home. Her parents didn't approve. They might buy the ticket if she'd promised they'd never see Emmy again, that Sarah Beth would go back to school. Right now, she was okay with that. It had never gotten physical before Casablanca. She couldn't remember who'd taken the first swing. It might have been her. It didn't matter.
Sarah Beth took inventory. Low on water, hot as hell, all alone. Nobody likely to drive by, no payphones, haha. Whichever way was out, it didn't involve the Jeep. Just beyond a stand of palms, Sarah Beth saw something. black and glittering in the endless sunlight, some obelisk left in the desert by some long-forgotten civilization, like something out of one of those terrible poems Emmy made her read.
Wasn't much to do but go and take a look. Not unless she could walk a hundred miles without water or someone should just happen to drive by. Lot of luck with that. Might as well check it out. Probably just the drugs, but you never knew. Maybe there was a payphone she could use. Maybe there was some fellow with a, what was it, a souk? Who could sell her water and snacks and maybe even a camel to get her out of here. A regular Taurus trap. Could be.
It wasn't as close as it looked, not just over the next bump or the one after that. The black granite monolith grew and grew as she approached. Was that writing on its face? Carvings glittering under the midday sun? Or just a trick of the light? The air crackled, and all Sarah Beth's hair stood tingling on end. She didn't see any canvas or silks yet, indicating market stalls, but perhaps they were still concealed by the undulating sand.
She felt drawn to the obelisk, the way she'd been to Emmy the first time she'd seen her. Sarah Beth had never been into girls, not like that. But one glance of Emmy, silk scarf tied around her neck as she picked away at that guitar, and she was hooked but good. Her throat cracked. Sarah Beth tasted blood. Her skin blistered. If she died here, Emmy would feel like hell, at least until she popped her next pill. But no, Emmy would never find out. Nobody would.
They'd find an abandoned Jeep by the side of the road, stolen in her race six weeks prior. No identifying information. If they found her body, they'd have her passport. But why would they search so far away? No, Emmy would never know. Everything Emmy touched turned to dust, but it never really touched her. Everything Sarah Beth touched turned to shit. And with her hand still stuck in it, she couldn't help but smell the stain.
By the time she reached the obelisk, Sarah Beth wasn't sweating anymore. Heat stroke. No doubt the handful of pills she'd dried swallowed hadn't helped, but she couldn't have made it without a little help from her friends. The obelisk stood alone. No market, no tourist booth. No water, no food, no camel, and certainly no tires. She was fucked. Well and truly fucked.
So close to the road, hard to believe nobody had set up shop here. So many tourists going by to squeeze a quick buck out of. Sarah Beth turned her head and peered toward the silent road. It did not appear to be black granite, as she'd believed. Maybe it was just the drugs, but it seemed to be made from some kind of dark energy. It had form, yet she could stick her hand straight into it like it wasn't even there.
She'd always felt as though she'd never been quite real to Emmy. And now she wasn't any more real to this massive tombstone in the desert. Her hand inside it felt cool, like dipping a finger into a stream, but it came out dry. At the corner, she could stick her hand through and watch it come out unchanged on the other side. It was too hot. She was overcome with the certainty she couldn't make it another hour out here. What if she stepped on in?
Sarah Beth hadn't ever been a coward. Cowards didn't quit college to run off with women or make love to them. Cowards didn't live on the ragged edge, popping pills and stealing cars. Still, the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end, and she got goose pimples all up and down her arms when she thought about stepping inside that cool, strange obelisk. Dying out here under the sun felt safer.
Even now, Sarah Beth couldn't resist. Even if she wasn't here to deliver the message herself, Emmy was right. There wasn't any water. Even if she could find her jeep, make it back. Then what? Pray to God that someone else drove by, stopped, gave her water, or fixed her car? He'd never answered her prayers before, and she didn't imagine he'd start now. There wasn't any other way out. The risk of death had never stopped her before, not since she'd hooked up with Emmy.
Staying out here under the white, hot, searing sun wasn't risk of death. It was the certainty of it. That fucking monolith could be death itself, but not any more than 110 degrees and no shade or water. Through. She whispered the word and felt her heart jump. Too many pills. The only way out was through death. Not dying, punching right through to the other side, whatever was there.
Something waited for her, not across the river in the Land of the Dead, if there was one, but on the far side of that country, the other river. There had to be one. When the dead died, where did they go? Maybe that's where Sarah Beth was headed. Maybe not. But wherever she was going, it was somewhere death couldn't hold her. That wasn't the drugs talking. Her body trembled, but her mind was clear. Break on through, like in the song, The Only Way Out.
She put her hand in again, held it till her arm shook. It ached to swallow. Sunstroke or terror, did it matter? It didn't. The only way out was in. One foot, then the other. They tingled in the cold. She kept her head out till the last, like she was at a party trying out the limbo. But she couldn't keep it out forever. The cool air felt delicious as it crawled across her legs and up her trunk. She closed her eyes and pulled her head forward until everything was cold and electric.
Cold pricked her scalp like winter raindrops. Sarah Beth strained to see, but all inside the obelisk was dark. She stood, waiting for her eyes to adjust, then sat, then lay down to rest. She closed her eyes, though it wasn't any darker that way. She hadn't meant to fall asleep. It was the pills that did it. The comedown was brutal. What she wouldn't have given for a bottle of red wine. Half a bottle. A glass. She hadn't stashed any in the Jeep, and it was too late to go back there anyway.
Coming off of those beauties, she'd often crashed for a day, a day and a half. This felt like it might have been longer than that. Though in the continuing darkness, it was hard to say. What Sarah Beth needed now was another pill to get her going again. She dug the pill bottle out of her pocket and shook it. Empty.
She'd taken the small bottle because it fit in the stupid pockets of her jeans. Should have worn men's jeans, like Emmy, that could fit a grown-up-sized pill bottle in them. Fuck women's jeans, fuck empty pill bottles, and fuck Emmy. The darkness seemed splotchier now, like maybe there was a little bit of light. Or maybe that was her eyes going crazy from the lack of stimulation. Maybe she was hallucinating.
Once she'd seen a friend of Emmy's, a real pill head named Woody something, Woody Hollis, come down from an eight-day jag. It had almost been enough to scare her off the pills, but not quite. Sarah Beth didn't believe in God, who had never answered her prayers, not even once. But if this was anything like Woody, she'd be praying to him before everything was out. Praying? Shit, she'd be seeing him face to face, probably cussing him out.
Stop it, chickadee. Emmy's voice, clear as if she was standing behind her, one hand on her shoulder. Be here now. Stop worrying about all that shit you can't control. Breathe. Where are you? Was she a memory? A hallucination? A dream? In the dark and silent cenotaph, it was hard to tell the difference. Whatever it was, psychic contact from across the Sahara, a psychological model come to life, Sarah Beth was thankful. Her heart slowed. Her finger stilled. She could make it through the hangover.
She still had a chance to get out of here alive, only maybe she was dead already. Was this what death was like? Shit. Her heart banged against her chest again and again like a sparrow trapped within her ribcage. You're doing it again, chickadee. So what if you're dead? You're still kicking. Break on through, like you said you would. Stand up. There, you can do it. What's that feel like? Like you're dead?
How would I know? Sarah Beth said aloud. I've never been dead before. Neither had I until now. You're... It made sense if this obelisk was death. What had happened to Emmy when they'd left? It was all Sarah Beth's fault. She sobbed, no more in control of her tears than anything else in her life. Hush, Chickadee. You never know who's listening. Wouldn't want them to think you were high. You've got to maintain.
Sarah Beth nodded. Her core was still wound tight, so tight she might snap. No sense in talking to herself. There wasn't anything to do but on with it, whatever it was. The only way out is through. She wasn't sure whether that was Emmy's voice or her own. Sarah Beth shuffled one foot forward. When it encountered no obstacles, she shuffled the other one up to meet it. She slid the first foot forward again, and the second, her hands up before her face.
Where was she headed? It had never mattered before. Why should it matter now? Because now she was in deep. This wasn't dropping out of school and taking a job in the typing pool. This was life and death. So what? Should she freak out? Throw a tantrum on the floor? What good would that do? Emmy was dead and speaking to her? Or she'd lost her mind. And all that crying wouldn't bring Emmy or her sanity back. She wiped her eyes and a blanket of calm settled on her.
Maybe death kept her calm. You didn't see corpses losing their shit in graveyards. That privilege was reserved for the living. Her fingers touched stone, smooth as patent leather, cold and firm. She turned the backs of her hands to the wall and pressed them down as she dragged her hands back and forth. No crevices, no joints between blocks. She slid left and felt again for seams.
Still nothing to see, nothing to hear. Her mouth felt too dry to taste anything. What did she smell? Stone and dust. Ozone, like lightning had struck. She slid left again. Twice more, and she reached the corner. She ran her fingers up and down the narrowest crevice, but still didn't feel where or how the blocks were joined. They had to be, didn't they?
Three more walls, three more corners, 20 paces between them. She went around a second time, feeling up and down more this time. No buttons, no levers that she could find. She crumpled to the ground and wiped away a solitary tear. She was still thirsty, no water to waste on crying. She wasn't hungry yet, though that had to be coming. She had to conserve energy. at least if she wasn't dead. Her laugh echoed off the walls and filled the space between.
Maybe that was it. Maybe there was a lever or a switch or, well, anything at all worth knowing somewhere in the middle of the room. She walked it, shuffling her feet in a narrow back-and-forth pattern, but she came to the other end of the room and had found nothing. Sarah Beth flashed back to when she put her hand through the wall and into the room. It couldn't be a one-way door, could it? Everyone thought death was a one-way door, but you just needed to know the way out, the way through.
She shivered. The cold, earlier a respite from the desert, now chilled her through. Her fingers trembled, not with amphetamine certitude, but with hunger, thirst, all the needs of her body. She curled up on the floor, knees to her chest. Maybe there was another pill, one she'd forgotten in her jeans pocket. If only she could reach it. If only her hands were. She cried out, though nobody else was there to hear. What if the way out from death was another death? Was this that? What should she do?
What would Emmy say? Sarah Beth strained to listen, but Emmy had fallen silent. She closed her eyes and wept, not for dying a second time, but for losing Emmy again. Sarah Beth opened her eyes. When had she stopped crying? When had she fallen asleep? Once might have been the pills, but twice? Well, people slept when they didn't have a choice or any more beauties. This was normal people life, a lot of sleeping and crying and shuffling around in the dark. No wonder she'd traded it away.
The cold had settled in all over. It couldn't be as cold as she felt, bones and flesh alike. She'd be dead. Maybe she was. Best not to think about it. Hello, she called. Her voice faded, echo-less. More proof the walls weren't real, or at least not the stone they felt like beneath her fingers. Hello? Something brushed against her hand. Silk. Loose, like a scarf. Emmy? Sarabeth whispered. Something warm nearby. She reached out.
Emmy took her hand. Sarah Beth choked back a sob and closed her eyes, even though it was still dark, trying to smell Emmy. The only scent was that whisper of lightning and rainstorms. If she'd even been here, Emmy was gone again. It had been a dream, hadn't it? Everything was cold. Everything hurt. Clearly, though. Everything hurt clearly. Last time she'd been high or getting clean or something. Messed up one way or another.
Now she was clean, clear. She was going to die if she wasn't dead already. If she was, the walls of this cenotaph couldn't hold her. Could they? She put both hands in front of her and shuffled forward, daring the wall to stop her. All at once, she was outside again. The sand beneath her feet warmed Sarabeth, even through the soles of her sandals. But was it the same sand? The sun, not right above her but nearly so, felt like balm upon her skin. But was it the same sun?
Soon, its caresses would turn to slaps or worse. But right now, it meant that she wouldn't be cold forever. There was something beyond that cold of death, and she had found it. She glanced behind her, but the monolith was gone, as though it had never been there, been only a dream of death. It had been real. Emmy had been there. She hadn't visited Sarah Beth. Sarah Beth had visited her. She was not dead. Not Sarah Beth. Not yet, anyway.
It was strange, wasn't it, to go to the land of death and learn nothing? Well, death was a big nothing. There weren't secrets to be had. No sucker except the memory of loved ones. Just darkness and cold. There had been the touch, hadn't there? That was behind her for now. Her stomach growled. She was hungry. Back home or on the other shore, her needs were unchanged. Shelter, food, and water.
There on the horizon, water, a pond, what was it called? An oasis in the shimmering heat, glimmering as if unreal. one sandal in front of another, Sarah Beth trudged toward it. That was The Other River by John Lasser, narrated by Alison Belbuse. John Lasser was born in New York City. He lives and writes in Seattle, Washington. His stories have appeared, or are forthcoming, in Interzone, Analog, Underland Arcana, and elsewhere.
He is a graduate of the Clarion West Writers' Workshop, class of 2016. When not writing or working in the tech industry, John watches birds, cooks with his wife, plays pinball with his children, and programs his Apple II. He looks forward to scuba diving again soon, too. Find him on the web at twoideas.org and on Mastodon as at disappearingjohn at wandering.shop.
Today's narrator was Allison Belbuse, Skyboat's publishing and production coordinator, as well as a director of over 150 adamant podcasts and over 50 audiobooks. including her Earphones Award-winning compilation, Egyptian Nights and Other Tales of Imagination and Romance by Alexander Pushkin, and the Audi-nominated The Quest of the Silver Fleece by W.E.B. Du Bois.
She wrote and narrated the introductions for four original audiobook compilations, including Best Cases of the Continental Op and The Best of Catherine Mansfield. Aside from direction and production, Allison co-hosts Adamant's Lightspeed and Nightmare Short Shot podcast.
and has also begun narrating stories as well. Allison was the outstanding graduating senior of the English department at San Diego State University, where she minored in French and in interdisciplinary studies through the Weber Honors College. Outside of Skyboat, she is also the lead singer, rhythm guitarist, pianist, and co-songwriter for Meteor Street, a four-piece literary rock band based in Los Angeles.
The Warning Woods has haunting horror stories that are sure to linger with you long after listening. I'm Miles Treidel, writer and narrator of The Warning Woods. Each week, I write an original scary story and share it with you on The Warning Woods. I've written two novels and nearly 200 short stories spanning the horror genre. If you're into scary stories, you need to check out The Warning Woods.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Just search for The Warning Woods and click play at your own risk. I don't have much time. I am being transported by the Ecclesiast vessel Markava to stand trial for heresy of the highest order. But I will not renounce my work. And to my last breath, I will speak the truth of this plague-ridden world, that ours is not a loving God, and we...
are not its favored children. The Heresies of Red Elf Bandwine. Chapter 2. Coming right first. When Dad Wandered Off I was so frightened what would happen. When we found him, he had no idea where he was or how he had gotten there. I'm so glad he's got an angel inside. Angel is a subdermal implant tag used to track via a small GPS transmitter embedded in a chip about the size of a grain of rock.
The chip is implanted in the arm and uses residual biokinetic energy to keep an indefinite charge. It requires no maintenance or modifications to the chip itself. Because walking home alone at night doesn't mean you have to be afraid. I'm glad to have an angel inside. In your life and the lives of those you love are on the line. Isn't it good to know there's an angel inside? Recursion and the Realm Podcast Network. Listen before they silence the signal.
Lightspeed Magazine is edited by John Joseph Adams and published by Adamant Press. The podcast is co-produced by Stefan Wagnicki and Alison Bell-Bews at Skyboat Media. And the stories and podcasts are copyrighted. 2025. Post-production was by Alex Barton at Phase Shift. and our music was composed and performed by Jack Kincaid. Thanks for listening, Starshine. This is your host, Janina Edwards. It's fine if I suck, now that I know my suckage has a higher purpose. For now.