Author: Hari Navarro, Staff Writer An escape pod drifts. Radioactive crystals cling as hair to its skin and a man’s voice pleads out and into the void. A voice where an automated signal would suffice. Futility borne of desperation. “... fuck. Shit. Fuck” “You’ve ...

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer The young man is wearing a vantablack bodysuit that leaves only his face discernible. Matching cloak, gloves and boots are stacked next to the log he sits on. A sensor-laden facemask lies in his hand as he starts speaking. “You wanted ...

Author: Alzo David-West Contrary to the anticipations of the ancients, the problem had not been solved after eighteen-thousand years. It was still impossible for a bioform to travel far forward into and back from distant time. Observer Jon-Rey contemplated as he studied ...

Author: Richard M. O'Donnell, Sr. The toddler unclipped his seatbelt and floated away, gurgling and laughing as he drifted toward the… The what, Lady Maggie Durante wondered. There was no ceiling in the Vista–View space lounge. Just a sphere of glass and a grand view of the ...

Author: Ken Carlson The pain in his side was a steady series of jabs. Alone it wasn’t enough to knock him down; no, the bill from the hospital was good for that. Six months of security work on this mining colony might just cover it if Murphy didn’t worry about food or ...

Author: Thomas Desrochers Basil had never imagined he’d be a bureaucrat, but The Tower housed eighty million bureaucrats servicing a legal machine a thousand years in the making – it was inevitable. His job was simple: audit the legal codex. An automated program could do ...

Author: David Henson I go to the woman at the check-in of the Identity Bureau and touch the space where my right eye used to be. “I’m Roger Sanders and —” “Look at the scanner to verify.” I clear my throat and swirl my finger around in my empty eye socket. The ...

Author: Hari Navarro, Staff Writer The man awakens and he is sitting in a tavern. His fingers trace the time beaten patina of the hard wood upon which he rests and his eyes trace the exposed beams that dance and flicker at the ceiling. The woman who sits across from him is ...

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer It’s easy to spot strangers round here. They’re the ones who call the grass-banked sewer on my right a canal. “And in those days of tribulation, the faithful called unto Old Peace, but his thing was endurance without fighting, so he ...

Author: Mark Joseph Kevlock "They all came to see me: the man who could age — or de-age — at will. They all thought it was a trick. When you reach one hundred years of age, the body becomes elastic, the flesh conforms to the soul. If I thought myself a ten-year-old, I ...

Author: J. H. Malone "Happy Valentine's Day!" "Oh, Honey, for me? How sweet!" "Open it. Then I'll take you out to dinner." "Ok, just let me... What could it be?... Wow!... A CRISPR valentine..." "I taped the pills to the back. Let's take them now and in a month, ...

Author: DJ Lunan Earth’s first extra-terrestrial visitor for 500 years is a peace offering and a miscalculation. Intended for a swift twenty-year journey through its own solar system in the Monfix Galaxy, the visitor that breached Earth’s atmosphere had voyaged for ...

Author: David C. Nutt “Wally, do remember what they used to call us back in fourth grade?” Wally bobbed his head up and down “Uh-huh, sure do. You were Adrian the alien and I was Wally the werewolf.” Adrian chuckled. “I was a bit strange back then, before I learned to fit ...

Author: Malcolm Carvalho The algorithm has just been published. I move my fingers over the cylinder in the centre of the room. A tube runs into it. I verify the cylinder’s valve can easily control the flow and pressure of the hydrogen atom stream coming into the ...

Author: DJ Lunan Tung carefully poured the molten metallic liquid into the stone mould. Almost three litres heated to 650 degrees. The orange liquid sizzled in contact with the colder, crystal marble of his signature insignia cast into a double shield reminiscent of a ...

Author: Hari Navarro, Staff Writer Beneath a stark winter hue that washes but never cleans a young woman lays naked, the cold winds filthy besom scratching as it dusts her with crystals that flurry as ash. A security camera gazes down blind and useless. The upward ...

Author: Brooks C. Mendell Day jobbers think offices clean themselves. They show up in the morning at their desks, put down their gourmet coffee on coasters their kids made, flick the mouse and check the Inbox without wondering who swept the floors or removed the lettuce ...

Author: Ken Carlson “This a good trade, Tommy; a good trade.” “Yes, Mister President.” “It’s the kind of deal that’s good for America. Maybe it’s my greatest trade ever.” “Yes, Mister President, right this way, sir.” The President and Thomas Lee Jarvis, a junior ...