All the excitement and enthusiasm could be summed up with Ukraine’s Sergey Poyarkov’s winning the top prize of $5,000 in a display of emotion and thanks that was quite profound. Later, Sergey would also be asked to be a judge for the Contest.
Judges have come and gone as well. My friend and mentor Frank Kelly Freas passed away in 2005, a great loss not just to myself and his friends and family but to the science fiction community. Others have passed on too: Frank Frazetta and Jack Kirby. Fortunately, I had the great honor of meeting both icons via the Illustrators of the Future ceremonies, and my good friend Paul Lehr who was a total inspiration to anyone he spoke to. We remember the passing of Wil Eisner, Alex Schomburg, H.R. Van Dongen, Edd Cartier, and Leo Dillon who have also gone onto the “great studio in the sky” as it were.
Others have joined us over the years, including amazing legendary artists Vincent Di Fate, Stephen Hickman, Cliff Nielsen and Stephen Youll. As a judge from the beginning, I have become part of the original “legacy” artists, along with Val and Ron Lindahn. In fact, I would say as an illustrator I have grown with the contest, my own work winning awards such as the Hugo award—a lineage of this award I share with not only Kelly Freas, but Vincent Di Fate, Edd Cartier, Leo and Diane Dillon, Stephen Hickman and Stephan Martiniere.
Over the years we’ve had events in Los Angeles, Washington D.C., Cape Kennedy, and Seattle at the Science Fiction Museum. In Florida at Cape Kennedy in 1997, I got to meet judge and icon, Frank Frazetta for the first time, when he stopped by to say hi after we all watched the launch of a space shuttle. After the launch, the heavens opened and poured rain in a never-ending torrent. Amusingly, the fact I had a rental car nearby suddenly made me five new best friends. There was a lot of laughter trying to squeeze everyone into that car. This is how the best memories are made.
My, where did twenty-five years go?
In addition to the awards ceremony, the Contest winners are treated to a week-long intensive workshop on illustration with Contest judges and top professionals in the field who stop in.
Many winners of the Contest have gone on to create terrific illustrations and art for many forms of media—not just books and magazine illustrations, but also films, game designs, et cetera.
Times have changed since the Contest was initiated and so have the outlets and exposure for this kind of work. I have gone from seeing entries done purely as line art and pencil drawings to fully-rendered computer-generated color images or “paintings.” As we entered the new millennium, I have seen the word “illustrator” redefined.
The Internet has broadened the scope of entries coming from all parts of the world to the Illustrators of the Future Contest. It’s fairly amazing to see the diversity of artists and ways of seeing things through their art. It brings a wider world view of new vision and creativity, and a freshness to the genre.
Illustrators and artists will always be needed in one way or another. Anything you see in our society that we use carries an image that was designed by an illustrator at some point—be it at the creative beginning or the packaged ending. Whether it’s for something in the media or something used on an everyday basis, it was designed to have a finished “look” by an artist. Books, no matter what anyone tells you, will always be read, so they will need to be “packaged.” That means cover art and/or interior illustrations. Art helps identify a thing, no matter what it is.
All in all, the Illustrators of the Future Contest is a way of investing in the future. We need new generations of creative thinkers, artists, illustrators, simply to create a visual culture for years to come. The future is a mystery, and what it brings is uncertain, but pictures have been made by Man for all his history for one reason or another. The future needs vision, and for that, the future needs art. Forward!
The Graver
written by
Amy M. Hughes
illustrated by
TAYLOR PAYTON
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Amy M. Hughes was born in Provo, Utah, the first American child of a Canadian family. She was raised in Alberta, Canada, surrounded by prairie while dreaming of mountains and trees. Too many forested fantasy novels may have had some part in that.
She learned to read early and moved from The Hardy Boys in the first grade to Tolkien by the fourth. She developed a deep love of reading that has sporadically spilled into a need to write, on and off for many years. In 2008, at the insistence of her husband, Amy attended Orson Scott Card’s Literary Boot Camp. She learned more in one week about how to tell a good story than she had in the first two years of her English degree.
Amy has been a factory line worker, a veterinary technician, a missionary, an herbalist, a landscape designer, and a stay-at-home mom. She has also eaten fire, jumped off a third-story balcony, and crashed in a hot air balloon. More than anything, she wants to be a writer. She hopes it doesn’t have to involve growing up.
“The Graver” is Amy’s first submission to the Writers of the Future Contest.
ABOUT THE ILLUSTRATOR
Taylor Payton was born in 1990 and spent many of his early years as an adventurous and wily youth in the bustling suburbs of Minneapolis, Minnesota.
During his grade school adventures, he and other classmates would spend many hours drawing characters from their favorite games and anime.
For as long as he can recall, he was rather fond of doodling, but he didn’t make the solidified decision to become an illustrator until the age of twenty-one. The calling hit Taylor in the midst of his collegiate major of media arts and animation. He soon put down the animation paper for digital paintbrushes, but still finished up his degree.
Taylor went on to win “Best in Show” at his graduate portfolio ceremony and has since worked on a plethora of private and commercial jobs. He aims to further his arts education at a local atelier while he develops his worlds, characters, and professional career. Taylor’s art verges on the fantastic, but he’s cultivated a deep connection to the novelties of abstraction and surrealism.
The Graver
There’s damage from the storm all over the farm, but the twisted casing of the fence’s reactor is what worries me the most. The wind tears at my hair and my clothes, not entirely settled yet.
“It looks pretty bad, Daniel.” Isaac’s translucent form passes through the pile of debris and leans closer to the wreckage, craning to get a better look. His image crackles with static in the wind. “I were you, I’d be praying hard nothing notices this is down.”
I deliberately ignore the suggestion of prayer. “Yeah, see here? The main shaft’s busted,” I answer. I use the edge of the reactor to balance myself as I clear away the leaves and mud that have snarled along the main panel. “And here,” I point, “the circuits are shorting out.”
Isaac leans in, clicking his tongue as he studies the circuit panel. In the distance, something I don’t recognize howls into the returning storm. I’m running out of time to fix this. I turn and look down the line where the fence should have been. The energy field, from the top of the old cattle pasture down to the cottonwoods along the road, is gone. Below the cottonwoods, I can just make out the pale iridescent line of the fence continuing around the south end of the property.
“Daniel, this leaves you pretty open,” Isaac says. “I can send you the part for the main shaft, but not until tomorrow. It’ll take a few days to get to you. I don’t like that you’re out here. This whole setup is pretty primitive to begin with.”
“Yeah.” I straighten. I glance at the sky, hoping for more hours than I know I have, but the light is fading fast.
Isaac’s image flickers with static for a moment.
“Is there any way to rig things so it seems the fence is still up? At least from the outside?” he asks. I shake my head. Isaac sighs. “You should never have left Denver, Daniel. I know things were hard for you here, but the walls don’t short out when a tree falls on ’em
. There’s a reason people don’t choose to live outside the gates.”
“We’ll be fine.” I struggle to keep my voice calm. “Storm’s been building all day, and it’s going to be a bad one. Raiders don’t raid in weather like this.”
“I don’t like it. I hear the stories. Gravers outside ranging in packs, taking who they want. I mean, after what happened with Angela, I get it, but … you need to see this.…” His voice is uncharacteristically firm. Before I realize what he’s planning, he’s replaced his own image with news footage. It takes me a moment to recognize the smoldering remains of a burning farm. Photographs of the gravers responsible for the carnage flash across the screen—three average-looking men I might have passed on the street without noticing, except that their eyes are glowing. They’ve killed nine people and devoured their souls—no, their brain patterns, I correct myself—and now the light of their victims shines from the gravers’ eyes.
I squeeze my eyes shut against the image, but the sight of the gravers has already triggered images of swirling energy being absorbed from Angela’s lifeless body. It leaves me feeling as if there’s a vise around my chest. My hands are suddenly shaking. I push the thoughts away as firmly as I can.
“That’s enough, Isaac. Turn it off,” I snap. The news footage disappears, replaced by Isaac’s translucent image. “I’m here now. I’m not coming back. We’re going to get the fence back up before anyone knows it’s down.”
Isaac nods stiffly. “And if you don’t? That happened last night and less than twenty miles from where you are right now. I’m sorry, Daniel, but think about Emma. She’s nearly an adult, and you won’t be able to keep her at home with you much longer no matter where you are.” He sighs. “I’ll send your part tomorrow.”
I open my mouth to yell at him. But before I can speak, Isaac’s image disappears into the port, leaving me alone with only the persistent whine and tug of the wind for company. The port’s iridescent dome remains quiet. I snatch it up and shove it into my pack. I’m standing ankle-deep in mud.
“I am thinking about Emma,” I mutter to myself. Keeping her safe is all I have left.
I spend the next hour clearing debris and shoring up the side of the reactor that had sunk. I cut away any other branches that might succumb to the wind and cause more damage. Angela’d say I should pray the storm would pass. But I gave up prayer the day she died.
When it’s finally too dark to tell branch from wire, I gather my tools and stumble through the wind toward the house. The dark seems to have given the storm new life, and I’m leaning heavily into the wind by the time I climb the front steps. The body scanner by the door blinks into life, then flashes green.
“Welcome home, Daniel,” says the front door as it swings open. I leave my tools and my muddy boots on the bench just inside. I hesitate at Angela’s picture on the wall. There’s a smudge on the glass above her cheek, and I catch myself. I pull my hand back from tracing the line of her face again. It never does me any good. All that’s ever there is cold, smooth, lifeless glass.
“Emma? You home?” I call.
“Emma is in the kitchen,” the house replies. “Shall I tell her you are home?”
“No need.” I turn myself away from the photograph. As an afterthought, I add, “I want immediate notification of any security risks in the area until the fence is repaired. Everything within, say, twenty miles or so.”
“Of course, Daniel.” I can at least count on the house not to talk back.
I walk toward the kitchen, trying to find something to say to my seventeen-year-old daughter that won’t end in another fight. I stop short of the door when I hear her talking.
“No. Of course not. How long you gonna be?” Emma pauses, and a gust of wind rattles the windows. There’s a voice answering. A boy’s voice, I think, but static obscures the words. “Yeah, seriously. I have to go. I heard my dad come in a few minutes ago. Yeah. Can’t wait.”
I push open the door. Emma starts and puts her back between me and the image. She sweeps her hand across the port and the image blinks out. It’s replaced by a rotating three-dimensional model of an atom before I can see who it might have been. The display lights up her face, and her profile looks so much like her mother’s that my heart constricts in my chest.
“You smell like rocket fuel,” she says from over her shoulder.
“How’s your homework?” I ask. Part of me hopes she’ll tell me the truth. Most of me knows better. I grab the soap and turn on the kitchen sink. I brace myself, then plunge my arms into the frigid water and scrub away the dirt and oil of the day’s work. But I can’t scrub away my worry about the fence. The images of the burning farmhouse won’t just wash away. But I’m not ready to admit that Isaac may have been right.
“How’s the water?” Emma asks.
“Hot water’s next on my list. I promise.”
“We had hot water at home.” So many things I’d like to say to that, but I keep my mouth shut. Angela told me once that I had to be the grownup. But it is so hard with Emma sometimes. I turn off the faucet and rub my arms with the towel. My arms are red with the cold, and my fingers are like ice.
“You were supposed to start dinner,” I say.
“We had takeout at home too,” she says. “And we had neighbors that didn’t need to be kept out with some stupid killer electric fence and—”
“Enough, Emma.” I slam my hand down onto the old wooden table and immediately regret it as Emma flinches away from me. I take a breath. “There’s nothing left for us there.” I manage to sound much calmer than I am.
Emma stands up. She’s tall enough now she almost meets me at eye level. “And whose fault is that?”
“Don’t you blame me for your mother’s death.” My voice sounds thin to me.
“I don’t,” she says. “I blame you for letting them kill her the second time.” A violent gust of wind rattles the windows in their casings.
“There’s no such thing as a soul, Emma. It was just energy. Impulses and memory. Mental programming. And it put the man who killed her in jail for a very long time. Your mother was already gone.” No matter how many times I say the words, they come out sounding hollow.
“That’s not what she would have wanted, and you know it,” she says.
“Enough!” I yell. I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to calm myself, but I can’t seem to shake my rattled nerves. Not tonight. The images of Isaac’s news feeds just won’t be pushed away.
“There is an unknown vehicle approaching,” the house says calmly. Emma turns and waves the port off, then slips it into her pocket.
“Doesn’t matter,” she says. “I’m out of here anyway.”
She turns and sprints toward her room. All I can think is that the fence is down. Three gravers. Nine bodies.
“What do you mean unknown?” I ask the house.
“It is comprised of an amalgamation of several different vehicle types. It predates transponders and is not registered with local authorities,” the house answers. The gravers on Isaac’s news footage drove unregistered salvage too. I reach into the space between the fridge and the wall and pull out my grandfather’s shotgun. Stunners are legal, but shotguns are scary.
I reach the front entry just as Emma darts out the door with a bag slung over her shoulder. I follow her out, shotgun in hand.
“Emma!” I call. Emma skips down the steps toward the drive. The tree line along the ridge of the valley appears black and ragged against the fading light of day. There’s a car running at the end of the drive, its doors open and its headlights illuminating a golden path across the road and into the trees. Everything is quiet. The world nearly vibrates with the pressure of the storm about to break.
I manage to grab Emma’s arm at the bottom of the stairs.
“Let go of me.” She tries to pull away, but I hold her firm.
“What is this?” I ask.
/> “What do you think?” she says. There’s a boy Emma’s age coming up the drive.
“You told him the fence was down?”
“Get over it, Dad. I’m done being a prisoner in this stupid house.”
She fights her arm free and tries to run. I just manage to grab hold of her jacket, and I don’t let go. “You’re not a prisoner. It’s my job to keep you safe.”
“Right. Prisoners get hot water and visitation.” Emma sulks.
The boy steps into the light at the base of the stairs. “You alright, Emma?” he asks. He squares his shoulders as if he’s going to fight me for her if he has to. All hundred and thirty pounds of him.
“Go home, kid. Emma’s not going anywhere.” I lean the shotgun against the porch, relieved that I’m not going to need to use it. It’s been twenty years since I’ve shot it, and I’m not in a hurry to do it again.
“Dad, come on. Three more months and I’ll be old enough to leave here anyway.”
“Then you can wait three months,” I say.
“I got my cousin in the car,” the boy tells Emma. “Do I need to call him up?”
“He older than you?” I ask. Three fat drops of rain splatter on my face.
“Yeah.” He answers hesitantly.
“Good.” I tell him. “Then I can have him arrested for attempting to kidnap a minor. Now get out of here before I call the authorities.”
“Not how it works out here,” says a man coming up the drive. Behind him, the light from the headlights flickers with the shadows of the trees in the wind. He looks a lot like the boy, only ten years older and a hundred pounds heavier. “Ain’t that right, Nina?” he says over his shoulder. He comes to a stop next to the boy, just at the base of the stairs, only a few steps out of my reach and far too close for comfort.
Behind him comes a woman, lean and wiry. She’s got glowing tattoos that wrap up her leg before disappearing beneath a too-short skirt. They fade from blue to red and back again. She’s fiddling with a flip-top lighter in her hand. Flip, spark. Flip, spark. “Sure thing,” Nina says. The flame catches for a moment and is blown out by the wind.