Echo: A Dystopian Science Fiction Novel

You know, raising a family isn’t that bad.  As a younger man, I railed against the nine to five life, the 2.5 kids, the white picket fence…but here I am, a grown-ass man of fifty-three years, making it work.  I never thought I’d marry, much less settle down.  All I used to do was work out, write stupid stories, and fly high on magic mushrooms.  I mean come on—what kind of life is that?  We need to make the most of the time we have left.  There’s a lot of cool furniture I still want to get; a lot of cool chotchkes that just became available at Pier One Imports.  Sure, the office can get a little monotonous, but everyone needs to eventually grow up.

Speaking of growing up, I gotta check on my twelve-year-old son:  Cole.  Yeah, I know I said  I would never pick a frat-boy name for one of my kids–that I’d end up naming them something cool like Falkor or Scorponok or Death Race 5000–but I guess that’s just another silly fantasy that I have to lay to rest.  Cole’s my pride and joy.  My shining light.

I can’t help but smile as I walk up the stairs and slide my hand along the railing (just put a fresh coat of varnish on this, and I am dee-LIGHTED with how it turned out).  My boy’s room is down the hall from the master bedroom, where Irma and I occasionally engage in a measured round of missionary sex.  No anal or oral for me—not anymore.  That stuff is just too darn complicated.

Cole’s a good boy—I’m pretty sure he’s studying for school or working on his next merit badge.  Man, he makes me so proud; when I was his age, I was so much less mature than he is now.  It’s more than a pleasure; it’s an HONOR to have a son like him.

As I turn the knob, I say, “Cole?  Time for your—”

And as the door swings wide, I lock eyes with my masturbating son.  His wet, gleaming dick is quivering and twitching in his lotion-slick hand.

“Dad?  NO!”  His face twists in abject horror.

“OH GOD!”  I barf and shit myself at the same time.  The world begins spinning; I don’t know which way is up or down, left or right.  I stagger back through the hall, slapping the wall with numb hands, trying desperately to keep my balance, then stumble into my room and bang the door, crying and wailing like a dying hyena.  My vision tinges red; the trauma of what I just saw is making me cry tears of blood.

“Seppuku,” I moan.  “SEPPUKU!”  It’s the only thing I can think of—the only thing that can end my pain.

As I fumble blindly around for a makeshift knife—anything with a blade will do—I accidentally open my eReader to Echo, activating its reality distortion powers.  Magic flash.

Reality bubbles inward, then everything swirls together into a technicolor haze, and I’m sucked up into an existential whirl of time-space deconstruction.

HOLY FUUUUUUUUU—

SHLOOP!

I drop into my ergonomic office chair, staring dumbly at my MacBook’s screen.  The cursor on the word doc is blinking steadily.

Wait—what?

I look around, and realize I’m in my San Francisco studio, the one I moved out of twenty years ago.

But that can’t be right.  I got married, settled down…

And then I look down at my ripped body, and my giant wiener hanging by my ankles.

Holy shit, I guess I didn’t…

I guess I fucking didn’t.

😀

Have you been suckered into an apple-pie dreamscape, only to have it torn apart because you walked in on your beloved progeny’s tawdry jerk-sesh?  Never fear!  Get Echo Vol. 1 on Kindle here:  Vol. 1 on Kindle.  Vol. 2 on Kindle here:  Vol.2 on Kindle  Vol. 3 on Kindle here:  Vol. 3 on Kindle  Vol.4 on Kindle here:  Vol. 4 on Kindle  Echo Omnibus here:  Echo Omnibus  Echo Vol. 1 & 2 Combined Edition here:  Combined Edition  Musings, Volume 1 is available here:  Musings, Volume 1  If you wanna hear me babble on about anything and everything, and strain my FREAKIN’ BRAIN, then here’s a link to my podcast:  Strained Brains!  It is on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, and Google Play!  Please give it a listen and a five-star review!  Here’s the miscellaneous gear that I use to try and become an uber-human:  Optimization, and last but not least, my buddy Jumar Balacy has made a supercool microsite at kentwaynebrain.com!  Go check out his computer-based wizardry  🙂 🙂 😀

Hold on!  I just got approved to be an Amazon affiliate!  If you’re going to buy ANY product from Amazon, and you’d like to support my efforts for absolutely free, then simply click on one of the Echo links I’ve provided—they’ll send you to Echo’s Amazon page—and THEN buy whatever product you wish.  Amazon gives me a small referral fee each time this happens!  In this manner you can support my books, musings, podcast, zany ads, or my adventures along the noble path known as The Way of The Man Child WITHOUT spending any more money than you were already going to!  Should you do this, I vow to send you a silent blessing, causing your genitals to adopt the optimum size, shape, smell, and death-ray attachment of choice that paralyzes your enemies with fear and envy!  Entire worlds will bow before your nether parts!  😲💪 😜