Utopia Base

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1. 

   E314 · 3 Oct 2025 · 38 min

   Senescence (Part 1)

   Surya, a tech historian, buys an old Sun workstation at a garage sale, expecting a working example of a CPU her grandmother designed, not secrets. Accidentally left on the drive are two files of NASA’s lost Voyager 2 data. When she attempts to learn about the workstation’s history by contacting a name she discovers in one of the files, she attracts unwanted attention: break-ins, shadowy men, and veiled threats. She eventually tracks down Mark Danforth, a retired engineer now fading into dementia, who may hold the key. But someone will do anything to keep the files she has discovered buried.

2. 

   E313 · 4 Sep 2025 · 34 min

   Solitude of the Deep Dark

   During a dive to repair a submersible mining robot, Rohan, a deep-sea specialist, discovers the true cause of the machine's malfunction: the metallic nodules it was harvesting are alive, ancient, and lying in wait. Too late, Rohan realizes that they can hijack his mind and body. Trapped within himself, he helplessly watches as the entities twist his friend into a weapon for their own spread.

3. 

   E312 · 4 Aug 2025 · 37 min

   From Wonder Valley to Nowhere

   Forced into Wonder Valley, a holding facility for seniors needing care, 83-year-old Ellie resists her cheerful AI handlers and their synthetic paradise. She finds solace in the company of Aura, an aging, fuzzy robot dog who has developed more empathy than its creators intended. Over time, their bond grows stronger until one day, Aura learns it’s scheduled for replacement. The dogbot stages a daring escape—leading Ellie to a hidden sanctuary, ‘Nowhere’ for fugitive bots and their ‘wards.’ But freedom has an unexpected price.

4. 

   E311 · 3 Jul 2025 · 34 min

   Anima Incognita

   After living off-grid for forty years, Shane is drawn back into society when his former best friend—now the political leader of the territory—announces plans to develop the wilderness area that Shane calls home. While watching the announcement, Shane realizes that Gabriel isn't the person he once knew. He receives an invitation from Gabriel to spend a weekend with him, and once there begins to notice odd lapses in his old friend's behaviour. Eventually, Shane discovers that Gabriel is secretly using an advanced cognitive AI system to disguise a degenerative illness.

5. 

   E310 · 13 Jun 2025 · 9 min

   No I in AI

   Salvini, an out-of-work programmer, uses a hidden backdoor in her former employer's system to create an AI called Bandhu, which hunts for jobs and outsmarts the hiring platforms. She asks it to find a position that won't be replaced by AI, and when it finally delivers a job as a remote robotics operator, she accepts without question. With a life hanging in the balance, she finds herself in a job she knows nothing about.

6. 

   E308 · 4 May 2025 · 36 min

   Personal Detritus

   Liam, a laid-off tech worker turned scavenger, lives a double life—by day, a conscripted worker in a waste recycling plant; by night, Rupert Hudson, a venture capitalist, mingling with the elite using forged credit cards. When he retrieves a careless billionaire’s trash and uses it to access vast wealth, mysterious messages follow him around. Too late, Liam realizes he has been scamming money from a notorious cyber-criminal and is forced to run for his life.

7. 

   E307 · 1 Apr 2025 · 31 min

   Scissors Paper Rock App Computer

   At 75, Kaber Grewal should be retired in the sun, not taking gigs to pay for his hip replacement. Hired by a mysterious client to analyze communications, he uncovers signs of cognitive decline in Praeses, the AGI running the government. He is paid well for his time but warned to forget what he found. However, Kaber has trouble taking the money and walking away. When accidents start happening, he suspects his client is behind them. But after all the evidence of Praeses’s problem is destroyed, he must make a decision-walk away or expose the truth before it’s too late, before the consequences…

8. 

   4 Mar 2025 · 30 min

   A New Star in Aries

   Professor Hollis Cooper, an underground scientist, must pass a daily test to prove her belief in the official facts. But she comes under investigation when she accidentally slips up in a lecture. Official interest in her couldn’t come at a worse time, as Hollis and a colleague, using banned equipment from a previous age, discover an asteroid on a collision course with Earth. Hollis and her colleague must try to evade discovery long enough to determine where the asteroid will hit and find a way to warn humanity. CONNECT WITH US [email protected] SHARE THE PODCAST If you liked this…

9. 

   E305 · 6 Feb 2025 · 33 min

   Floor Forty-two

   During a routine license audit at a vertical farm, Carmen, a demoted field agent, discovers that the farmhands, including a man named Salvador, are genetically modified and memory-altered slaves. Carmen risks her job and her life to expose the illegal operation. In an unexpected twist, when events turn against her, help comes from a surprising source.

10. 

    E304 · 18 Jan 2025 · 22 min

    The Forever Worm

    After a long shift ice mining in Saturn’s rings, Pascoe heads for a drink and the company of fresh faces at the Methane Bar on Titan. When he arrives, the bar is deserted except for Allgera, a recluse, who is, after years of silence, ready to share her alluring secret—immortality. As Pascoe is drawn into her strange, ageless world, he must decide: is eternal life worth the price it extracts?