As I mentioned a while back, the latest volume of The Henlo Press’ journal, Old Bones, is out and I’m happy to say that it’s received the coveted Kalindi kiss of approval.

I’m also happy to say that it’s got a new story of mine, “OOPS Is Now In Effect.” It’s got a kind of funny background.

Some years ago, before the COVID lockdown made telework a regular feature of life, our office was required to have a plan to continue operations in case of some kind of catastrophic event made it impossible to get to our office in the courthouse. Such a contingency is not just theoretical, unfortunately. As a result, we came up with a Continuing Office Operations Plan, which was referred to as the COOP.

This amused me. Not the concept itself, but that someone had come up with the acronym COOP. It made me think of chickens, not catastrophes. And it was so close to OOPS. I mean, just move a letter around and it’s right there, right? Throw in the inherent surreality of doing table top exercises where we pretend the courthouse was destroyed or something (as if we wouldn’t have more pressing concerns) and it just all struck me as a little silly.

So I wrote down “OOPS Is Now In Effect” and a general idea about some plan for a contingency that would be a lot worse than anything that might happen to my office. The idea hung around for a while until this past year, when I finally fleshed it out for the latest volume of Old Bones.

OOPS stands for “Ontological Operations Plan: Severe,” which is the kind of thing that might come in handy if you work in the Department of Metaphysical Insight within the Ministry of Transnational Affairs. Kevlin treated the massive OOPS manual the way most folks do various office manuals, with as little attention as possible.

Of course, shit goes down, and it’s down to Kevlin and an intern named Erin, who did the reading, to try and make it out alive. Here’s a taste:

It was mid-morning. Kevlin had just finished his coffee and was starting to think about lunch when the klaxon sounded.

An alarm had gone off on Kevlin’s very first day years ago, for the annual fire drill. That one had been a low but insistent hum he felt in his guts, less an urgent warning than a polite suggestion. After the fire drill was over someone told him that it led to less panic than the traditional blaring klaxons and flashing lights. Kevlin wasn’t so sure, if there was a real fire, he didn’t want to be a little bit panicked.

This one wasn’t a polite suggestion. It was loud and brassy, like a high school trumpeter was trying to show how loud he could play. The tones were long and even.

Blaaaaattttt. Blaaaaattttt. Blaaaaattttt.

Nonetheless, he remained calm, as this wasn’t the first time a klaxon like this had gone off. Typically it would go for a minute or two and then the soothing voice of the office AI would chime in and explain that the potential emergency had passed and there was no cause for concern. One time, of all things, there’d been a bomb scare, but it was resolved quickly and Kevlin hadn’t worried.

A minute passed, then two, with no letup in the noise.

Blaaaaattttt. Blaaaaattttt. Blaaaaattttt.

There was no reassurance from the AI. Kevlin’s palms started to sweat as his mouth went dry. He wished, not for the first time, that his office actually had a window in it. At least then he could break it and jump out. Sure, he was on the fourth floor, but it was better than just sitting here. He reached for his coffee mug, but it was empty. He stood up and was about to go get a drink and see what others were up to when the AI finally spoke up.

“Employees of the Ministry of Transrational Affairs,” it began in soothing, angelic tones. “There is no cause for alarm. The building has undergone an unexpected transdimensional shift which Advanced Studies is attempting to remedy. Until the matter is resolved, please implement Ontological Operations Plan: Severe. Thank you.”

“Ontological Operations Plan,” Kevlin said, terror rising in his throat. “That means OOPS.” He bolted through his office door and headed for the lobby. “Shit!”

Kevlin thought Metaphysical Oversight must have been designed by Deadalus, with a set of windowless offices in the middle of the floor, surrounding an open space that had been filled with cubicles. With walls high as a person, you couldn’t see in and it was easy to get lost in their labyrinthine environs. Out front was Donna’s post at reception, a small triangular room that opened into the building lobby. Kevlin had worked here long enough to know the way out without giving it much thought, which was good, since his brain was screaming in his head. His only thought was to get out of here now, regardless of the cost. The high walls of the cubicles made it impossible to see whether anyone else was still there. Surely they were in reception, funneling out the front doors and to the stairs.

Blaaaaattttt. Blaaaaattttt. Blaaaaattttt.

He turned the corner and came to a stop so fast he almost fell over his feet. There was no reception. Where the desk and the doors and the chairs for visitors were supposed to be, there was nothing except inky black void. It wasn’t like space. There weren’t any stars, nothing that in any way suggested the night sky. There was no Donna. Instead it was a complete absence of light, like the event horizon of a black hole.

Kevlin backpedaled so fast that he tripped and fell onto his ass, hard, cursing at the top of his lungs.

Behind him there was a voice. “Kevlin?”

He turned. Erin was peeking around the doorframe of an office, clearly on her hands and knees. She gestured frantically. “Get over here!”

For the rest of that story, and more great stories and such, get your copy of Old Bones Volume 3 here or here or here or follow them on Facebook to see if they’ll be at a book festival near you (they almost certainly will).