Summary: by Victorya Chase narrated by Serah Eley with guest host Charity Helton Welcome to the 2nd Annual Artemis Rising a celebration of women and non-binary authors This story has not been previously published. Discuss on our forums. For a list of all Escape Pod stories, authors and narrators, visit our sortable Wikipedia page Thank you for visiting us on Facebook and Twitter about the author… I’m a writer. I’m a teacher. I have taught doctors how to write poetry. I have taught fiction classes to university students. I have taught adults how to write about themselves. I love creative writing research and have published in that realm. I’ve also presented at conferences across the country, both academic and in the speculative realm. Life is forever intriguing. Come explore it with me. narrator Serah Eley about the narrator… Serah Eley is a software developer and former podcaster who once produced a weekly science fiction podcast called Escape Pod; you can find it at escapepod.org. It’s since gone on to become somewhat successful. She strangely mispronounced her name as Steve Eley at the time; she’s since realized that life is much more fun as a woman, and came out as transgender last year. Serah lives in Atlanta, Georgia with her two wives, Alison and Cat. So if there were ever any betting pools on what happened to Steve: changed sex, joined a committed lesbian love triangle is the dark horse winner. She is, obviously, still Having Fun. Bioluminescent Memory By Victorya Chase “Riley’s a Godsend, isn’t she?” Lily asked. We were standing in the doorway of our daughter, Absidee’s, bedroom watching her sleep. She started to stir, face contorting in the fear of a nightmare surfacing, when Riley put a glowing paw up and patted her on the cheek. Her face immediately softened. I sighed. How was it that Riley could do what I couldn’t? Four years ago I gave birth to our daughter, a blessing and symbol of our blessing. Absidee was a fairy tale in each and every laugh and gurgle. But, a child who had nightmares so terrible she’d wake us up with her screaming even when she was too young to talk. We kept her in our bed, and still she couldn’t sleep. Absidee shouldn’t have been aware of anything terrible, not in the overprotective home of two first-time mothers. When Absidee turned three her pediatrician warned us about the long term effects of helicopter parenting, especially with both of us hovering like news copters at a crash. Since birth she had slept with us, the crib at the end of our bed empty most nights, her screams waking me and her little body lashing out in night terrors. We conceded to her own room. This only meant that her yells echoed down the halls. At four she was lingual and no longer spoke in just the gurgling speech of babies. I heard her murmur the name from her dreams and realized my trauma was transferred through the womb; the umbilical cord a pump of memories into her tiny growing body. I had never even told Lily the name of my abuser no matter how many times we spoke in hushed tones about the experiences I somehow survived. And suddenly it was on the lips of Absidee. # Bioluminescence started as a way to track FIV in the feral cat community. Cats were captured, tagged, given the glowing gene, and then set free. Ultimately, this created a new breed of cat. Sleek-furred glowworm green and blue animals ran all over town. Shelters teamed with these radioactive felines. Lily brought up the idea of getting Riley first, not that Riley was Riley then. She was a stray among a number of strays in cages lining the walls of a shelter. As much as humanity could grow in science, conscience was much harder. Absidee had just spent her first week in her room, a painful experience for us all. Lily held her while we walked from cage to cage, examining the animals. Many paws reached out to us, but Absidee only reached back for R[...]
