U

Mayhem

By Stephen R. Smith | October 9, 2014
Author : Steve Smith, Staff Writer I found Gaze at the Drake right where I expected him to be; in the furthest corner from the entrance in a booth which no doubt had the cleanest sight-lines in the club. Between the wire-head and I lounged a crowd of slack-jawed men and ...
Read More

Buoy

By submission | October 8, 2014
Author : Roger Dale Trexler We dropped out of warp near the wreckage. Navigator Needham did a fine job and I intended to recommend him for a commendation—if we came back from the assignment. I walked to the view screen and looked out. Ahead of us, less than a parsec away, I saw ...
Read More

Drawing Hands

By submission | October 6, 2014
Author : Aaron Koelker The Mind was thrown into turmoil the day we created our creators. Some saw it as a Babel-esque misstep. Others thought it was akin to slitting our own lines and oiling out. All saw it leading to ruin. The Boy was called just that. Grown in a tank ...
Read More

Perchance

By submission | October 5, 2014
Author : Leslie Bohem Kevin, in his early thirties, upwardly mobile, does not look like he belongs in this dank alley. He started coming down about six months ago. At first, maybe once every couple of weeks, then once a week, then every couple of days. Now, he comes every day. He ...
Read More

AutoKnowMe

By submission | October 4, 2014
Author : Kevlin Henney Not sure what to do now. No, that's not true. I know precisely what to do, but I don't really feel like doing it. Sense of awareness is, as always, the first thing to come online. >>> Initializing sense of awareness... Done It's at that point you become, well, ...
Read More

Returns Policy

By submission | October 3, 2014
Author : Rosalie Kempthorne The creature was hideous. It was lopsided for one thing, and where its left arm should be there was only a stump. To say nothing of the slimy green tentacles that hung off its shoulder where a right arm was meant to go. Its misshapen face had one good – ...
Read More

Empire

By submission | October 2, 2014
Author : Bob Newbell "Your hot coffee, sir," says the Inteeri waiter as he places the beverage on the table in front of me. "Thanks. Here's--" The short alien that looks vaguely like an anthropomorphic armadillo shuffles away before I can offer him a tip. At no time while serving me ...
Read More

I Am Battalion

By Julian Miles | October 1, 2014
Author : Julian Miles, Staff Writer The terrain is ideal for them, and they will take every advantage of the variegated cover: tiered platforms that scatter this little roomscape. Plus they have the advantage of looking like the indigenes. It is a good thing that I was tasked to ...
Read More

The Irony of Science

By Stephen R. Smith | September 30, 2014
Author : Steve Smith, Staff Writer Time. I joked once with her that it was simply the thing that stopped everything from happening at once. When she asked me for space I laughed, and said "Of course you can have space, if you didn't, everything would be happening right ...
Read More

The Sentinel

By submission | September 29, 2014
Author : Roger Dale Trexler THE SENTINEL They found it. They found the edge of the universe. And they found the sentinel there. EARLIER Harrison knew this was it. Beyond, there were no stars, just utter blackness. “My God,” he said. “I didn’t think we’d ever find it.” Ramsey ...
Read More

Skimmers and Soap Bubbles

By submission | September 28, 2014
Author : Alicia Cole "Watch out for that kid!" Tanya swerves, kicking the drive gear into second. Our hover skimmer chugs left, close cropping a row of season's end corn. She nudges the engine to a full stop and settles in the field. Trash spills out of the can the kid was ...
Read More

Stepping Stones

By submission | September 27, 2014
Author : Bob Newbell It's rotating. It doesn't look like it, but instruments show that it is. Right now it takes around 24 hours to complete one rotation. Since it's just over two miles in diameter at its center, the amount of centrifugal "gravity" being generated right now is ...
Read More

The Hero of Time

By submission | September 26, 2014
Author : Glenn Leung He was the Hero of time, that was all we knew. For millenia, long before he was born and long after he had died, he had been saving the world. An alien invasion two hundred years in the future, a genocidal plague three hundred years in the past, had all been ...
Read More

Diplomacy

By submission | September 25, 2014
Author : Bob Newbell "Please be careful getting up, Mr. Turner," says the tinny, sing-song voice of the robotic surgeon. "Some dizziness and disorientation are to be expected." Other medical automata extend thin mechanical arms to help me to my feet. I still can't believe I went ...
Read More

Orbit

By submission | September 24, 2014
Author : William Tham I screamed. Green spots of oxidation on silver-lined instruments. The porthole encased in fire, through which I vaguely saw the curvature of the earth, the Scandinavian peninsula hurtling below me, followed swiftly by the frozen wastes of the North Pole under ...
Read More

Hard Day's Night

By submission | September 23, 2014
Author : Suzanne Borchers “Good evening, Susan.” The desktop robot’s eye blinked as the gender-neutral voice greeted her. Susan had arrived home from an 18 hour shift of nursing casualties at the local pub/hospital. She slammed the front door behind her. “I have to remain cheerful, ...
Read More

Polystars

By Julian Miles | September 22, 2014
Author : Julian Miles, Staff Writer “Why are we all the way out here? If we had taken the Rigel mission, I could have been home for mid-winter revel.” Chapni sighed. That was the problem with the Urulaunk; they had this thing about partying. Preferably with as many like-minded ...
Read More

Shedding

By submission | September 21, 2014
Author : Kieron Walquist As of this moment, I am a ten-year-old Eskimo, lying on the beach in the frigid rain, stone-cold and lifeless. However, that could all change in an instant. My father, for now, is a humpback whale, circling the shallow waters that lap upon the shore, crying ...
Read More

Random Story :

  • Deep in the Archives

    Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer [Translation (from original German) of key …
Today’s Story