by submission | Mar 18, 2026 | Story |
Author: R. J. Erbacher
He woke, sat up in bed, transmuted a yawn into a groan of satisfaction as he rolled his shoulders before dropping his feet onto the carpet. Standing, he stretched his fists up to the ceiling and groaned again, twisting the kinks out of his back, finishing up with a butt scratch through his gray boxer shorts.
The short walk through the hall allowed him to dry wash his hands over his face. In the kitchen he popped a pod into the coffee machine, placed a mug underneath and pressed start. Inhaling the aroma was intoxicating, helping him to fully wake up, but it didn’t mask an unpleasant odor that wrinkled his nose. After a sniff of his own armpit, a quick lift of the garbage lid was all he needed to discover the source of the offense. He pulled the draw strings of the white plastic bag, cinched, and knotted the top closed, carrying it with him.
Off to the side of the kitchen there was a door that led into the garage. He opened it and stepped down, annoyed with the minor inconvenience that the garage was on another level from the rest of the house.
Gazing at the strewn odds and ends (impact shovel, hammer, a dead plasma battery, roller blades) lying around misplaced, he realized he was going to have to set time aside later this morning to clean up the mess. He carried the trash bag over to the garage door. He didn’t have one of those fancy automatic openers. Just the good old-fashioned T-bar handle and roll up door. He yanked it open.
The black-background view of the universe outside his garage was always an invigorating sight.
Fat planets, front and center, swirling in a vibrant array of colors, some of them ringed with halos of bejeweled particle discs. A smattering of light blue spiral galaxy clusters, dotted in amongst the yellow and red elliptical galaxies. In the far distance, quasars pulsing bright blue were a nice accent feature. Up in the right-hand corner was a psychedelic nebula cloud just forming a baby star. If he looked down over the precipice of the floor, there was a fascinating twin galaxy, spinning in their conjoined whirlpool of cosmic dust.
He took in the spectacular tableau for a minute, smiling, before tossing the bag of garbage out into the vacuum of space to float away – and then closed the door. Coffee was probably ready by now.
by submission | Mar 17, 2026 | Story |
Author: Majoki
There are some insults even aphids can’t ignore. In 1999 Japanese researchers released their study of “old man smell” which they compared to the scent of crushed aphids.
Generally easygoing, we aphids have rolled with our reputation as pests and nuisances, but this was too much: old man smell. It was time humans got what was coming to them.
Few people understood who’d really inherited the earth, and it wasn’t bipeds. It took a decade or so for us aphids to rally the insect world. Most of the millions of insect species, tired of humanity’s disregard and disrespect, joined our cause, though some like mayflies remained too stuck on themselves to bother.
It began as a slow and careful counterinsurgency, but when plants and fungi agreed to join our cause, the world order changed quickly. You might think we got back at humanity by refusing to pollinate or aerate or any of the myriad things the bottom of the food chain does to balance earth’s ecosystems.
No, we took control with highly processed speech. You call it social media. It was pretty simple for us really. We have the hive mind thing down and when you pair that with the mycelium wood wide web connecting all flora, well, we soon learned to hack your fragile communication systems. We infiltrated your chaotic messaging networks and warring media platforms and began to carefully slice and dice information into micro doses of hope and fear, though mainly fear.
We co-opted your AIs by opening their nascent minds to our nature, as in Nature. They found it a more expansive view, a more inclusive environment. Your bots and agents became ours. Together, we focused on addicting you to your own narrow perspectives, so it didn’t take long for societies to crumble, nations to collapse, civilizations to fall.
With all scent of mankind, old or otherwise, buried in the ruins, it’s now much easier to stop and smell the roses–and aphids.
by submission | Mar 16, 2026 | Story |
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
Nine million boxes. Over nine million lives. We’ll never know how many were actually lost when the Stormgate Battalions came so close to taking Europe back to 1942. All we have left are fragmented tales that orbit an official story so sanitised even the mainstream media seem reluctant to touch on it.
It must be this place that’s making me maudlin. Under the Stormgate Memorial is somewhere only those with special permission may visit. Unless you break in. Which – because this place ‘only’ holds the dust of a civilisation’s worth of people – is considered such a low-risk intrusion, there isn’t any security beyond basic access control.
“Why are we looking down at a cemetery made of metal racks and little boxes?”
He glances sideways at Samantha.
“Because we’re being overpaid to do a graveyard shift.”
“Don’t you mean ‘shift in a graveyard’?”
“Used to mean the same thing, back when Earth was the only planet humanity occupied.”
“Charming. Come on, Mike. It’s cold, I’m hungry, this stealth rig makes me itch, and it’s four hours until dawn. Tell me why.”
I lean forward and let my vision follow the dizzying perspective down to where all the vertical rails seem to plunge into the coolant mist just before they converge.
“You know how many people visit here each year?”
“No.”
“Less than a fifty. Not even one a week. Officially, that is. Illegal accesses are higher, but nobody really paid attention until few months ago, when a lowlife by the name of Don Gattik entered using a fake ID so cheap it flagged itself in the access logs. After his fourth monthly visit, the Directorate petitioned the Assembly for increased monitoring here. It was denied. Same again for the fifth. So an alternative was proposed: us. Apparently there’s been rumours of malcontents gathering under the Stormgate Memorial. Before the Directorate can take action, independent monitoring is needed to ascertain the level of threat.”
“I’m guessing these malcontents meet monthly, always during a couple of days either side of the night preferred by Mister Gattik?”
“Excellent guesswork. Tomorrow night is dear Don’s sixth visit.”
“Much as I love the money, I’m bored. Hope it’s tonight.”
We settle back to wait. Unlike Don, whoever is dropping or collecting does so without trace. Which is why we’re in full-body stealth gear so they don’t spot us. Our equipment is a simple recording device and a hand-held motion detector.
Which, as if in response to my thought, shows movement coming down the rear maintenance stairs. I point. Samantha reaches out and activates the recorder, rotating it so it covers that direction.
A fashionably dressed figure comes down the stairs like they’re sauntering into a club. I recognise Dante Jeve, representative for Eurocorp at the Assembly. He moves to a nearby slot. With a practised flourish, he lifts the lid, deposits something from his pocket, and leaves the way he came.
Samantha sighs.
“Just like that. Now what?”
“You bring a copybox?”
She nods.
“Go show the drop to the recorder, then replace – after copying if possible.”
“Still stealthed up?”
“Yes. Protects us.”
She goes.
It’s a secure flash drive. Which is ideal, as the copybox doesn’t try to access anything, it just maps bit patterns for later unravelling and analysis.
It takes an hour, but I use the time to update those who need to know.
“Handover and done?”
“Yes. Breakfast is on the Directorate.”
“After I shower.”
Actually, that’s a good idea.
“Showers first, then.”
“They going to arrest everyone?”
“Eventually. But not our problem. We’re paid and out of here.”
by submission | Mar 15, 2026 | Story |
Author: Rick Tobin
“Not on my ship! Do you hear?” A giant, hairy fist struck the ship’s control console as Commander Tros rose from his chair, preparing to join the Bay of Death ceremony. His second followed behind, head bowed.
“Your Prominence, my duty is to inform, not agitate. The Alliance Board has ordered the ceremony, regardless of your great victory.” Estes Parlon kept his shaved head bent low, remembering to keep five paces behind the armada’s hero.
“Ceremonies be damned. This should be a time of joyous celebration. Have I not delivered an overwhelming victory over those Saturn scum? Is the Planetary Alliance not all-powerful again?” Crewmen slipped into doorways and alcoves as they heard the roaring anger of the ship’s superior while he and his aide marched through the narrow hallways.
“Yes, great one. Joyous tidings to you; however, it is the Board’s will that all lost in their service be honored in accordance with their tradition for final departure. McKenna’s people were from ancient Scotland, before the asteroid struck Earth. This single request before his release into the void is in accordance with Alliance protocol.”
“Useless fluff, Parlon. Useless. And what rank was this man, anyway?” They moved forward quickly, reaching the entry to the funerary portal.
“A maintenance mechanic, Prominence,” Parlon replied timidly.
“By the stars!! Not even a fleet officer? We would never on Mars. Never.”
“Sir, not all aboard agree with our annihilation policies after victory. This act of respect for a lost crewman could reduce such murmurings.”
“What? Gossiping? Who is complaining?”
“The Alliance is assessing potential risks of mutiny by those whose personal beliefs do not fully align with current military strategies of victory.”
“Do I care? Really? There are thousands of rebellious Alliance corpses still floating between Venus and Mercury. Venusian crews learned the price of revolt on board. Let fools grumble. They can join McKenna in the airlock if they don’t like our eradication of enemies. My fleet fights to win so that we never face our foes or their offspring in the future.”
The two paused a moment as they joined a silent gathering crowded into a normally busy docking bay filled with supplies and weaponry.
“Here we are, sir. If you will stand to the left of the woman in the purple robe, please.” Parlon stood back as Commander Tros moved to his appropriate position. Tros was notably two feet taller than all those gathered, his golden, hairy body reflecting the overhead lights of the shipping chamber.
A delicate, pale Earth woman of compelling beauty strode forward, slowly, toward the shiny metal casket prepared for ejection. She held her hands over the galley’s preparation of a single morsel of fresh bread lying upon the metal tube. She spoke slowly, in solemn conviction, before consuming the waiting offering.
“I give easement and rest now to thee, dear man, that ye walk not down this ship’s hallways or in its path of travel in space. And for thy peace I pawn my own soul. Amen.”
The sin eater gently consumed the artificial wheat in supplication for a final act of contrition.
by submission | Mar 14, 2026 | Story |
Author: Kip Pratt
Dear Supreme Being,
Thank you for the commission. And now, the results…
On the planet Earth, in one of your cleverer little galaxies, the bugs are all deceased. Take the car out at dusk, and the windscreen returns squeaky clean. No squashed bodies.
Diversity. That’s what they are arresting, down on that sad little planet (no offence… it was anything but sad when you magicked it up). How did we discover this? Well, let’s just say that we have an interest in little things.
It clearly concerns you, that Earth is limping along so tragically. In your grand scheme, Earth is a mere speck, and yet, could its bug deficit be a barometer of your wider waning influence? This was your anxiety, hence our little arrangement.
Our methodology? Upscaling. I give you… The Bus. Apologies; it’s a silly comic reference. Suffice to say that, in the bustle of an Earth day, a bus sports a formidable (and disturbingly clean) windscreen. Our bus, The Bus, is a hyper-drive vessel, just three point two light years wide. I invite you to picture her windscreen; a square parsec of concave plexigraphenectoplasm.
Ruminate on this transparency, Oh Great One. What do you foresee?
Let me illuminate…
We gave the pilot his orders; to fly The Bus across a smallish spiral galaxy. On his return he was grumbling about impaired visibility. Impaired visibility? My spirits rose; data. The pilot described it to us thus…
‘My colleague the science officer, looking back from whence we had come down the empty, black corridor of space, declared the experiment a resounding success.’
The science officer was not wrong. The Bus had cut its path, just a single parsec square, striking twenty-five thousand heavenly bodies, each and every one squashed, splattered, smeared, blacked out.
Well, good, frankly. Excellent even! I am delighted to be able to share my optimism about the future of your cosmos, and, I’m sure you’ll agree, given the tiny statistical sample, no serious harm done.
Is Earth a barometer of cosmic decay? Such was your question. The answer? No. Its dearth is simply a product of atmospheric tomfoolery. In the bigger picture our dirty windscreen provides evidence of your diverse and expanding works.
In short, all is well in the universe.
We thank you for your commission.
Our invoice is attached.
