Dreamstim

Author : Travis Gregg As I fired my gun into the Stim’s chest I wondered if he saw me as a monster or if he understood that I was only doing what he had forced me to do. His choices had brought us to this point and I was just trying to clean up the mess. My partner and I got the call ...

Symbiosis

Author : Bob Newbell The Cold War between the United Colonies of the Asteroid Belt and the Oort Cloud Alliance had been going on for almost 50 years when open warfare finally broke out. The planet Uranus proved to be such a rich source of helium-3 that neither side felt it could allow ...

The Final Assault

Author : Josie Gowler I opened my eyes. I was lying on an army bunk. My lieutenant and best friend Nick was sitting at the foot of the bed. He sat there in silence looking a cross between concerned and pissed off. With a black eye. I got up, staggered over to the toilet behind its ...

Guide To Alien Sex For Dummies

Author : Geetanjali Dighe Congratulations! You are one of the lucky few who has just won the underground bestseller “The Guide To Alien Sex For Dummies”! Trusted Industries, now in their 100th year of mining, and the sole asteroid mining company (37th asteroid mined!), are giving away ...

The Time Goblin

Author : Clint Wilson, Staff Writer Throughout the universe there are many creatures that eat other creatures. Few however match the intelligence and hunting prowess of the time goblin. His species is incredibly rare, a solitary armless biped said to have originated from an ancient ...

The Mathematics of Future Paradox

Author : joe malone "Can we watch Michelangelo work today?" my wife said, at the breakfast table. "I have to go into the future today," I said. "The future? You said that you would never go into the future. You said going into the future is like a man opening his girlfriend's mail. ...

Police Control

Author : Stefan Aeschbacher The look down the barrel of a gun was frightening; much more frightening than I ever imagined it to be. 'ID yourself citizen' the cop behind the barrel barked. I moved my left wrist, containing the ID tag, towards the reader. Much faster than I expected ...

Field Test

Author : Julian Miles, Staff Writer The moonlight is cut off by drifting clouds as I hurdle the wall and drop into the shadowed mess that comprises the unfinished foundations of what will be the Chibakan headquarters when they finally find some new backers. Behind me I hear the ...

Embargo

Author : W Hunter “Where is everybody?” Enrico Fermi, 1950 The enormous space craft slid out of the hyper-dimensional matrix in the orbit of one of the gas-giant planets. It gravitated towards the inner planets smoothly, gathering data by the millisecond. Within a short time the ...

The Man With No Name

Author : Desmond Hussey The Climber clings to the base escarpment of Olympus Mons’. Freezing zephyrs tug at his dusty, ocher robes as he scales, hand over fist, the sheer face of ruddy basalt. “What is the nameless name?” Master Su-gee asked him once, long ago. His voice soft as ...

Salary Man

Author : Ray Daley The Misthkthos had been on Earth over a year when I talked to my first one. They'd come in peace, landed in a quiet region and strolled out of their ship into the night to check out our planet. Easy enough to spot them as aliens you'd think? Then you'd be thinking ...

Fun Slows Us Down

Author : Duncan Shields, Staff Writer I’m with the XIA. The Xenomorph Intelligence Agency. I’m undercover. This is a soft war; more of an intelligence-gathering mission to discover weak points and destabilization technique hypotheses in case they’re needed. It’s the pin-striped skin ...

Past Tense

Author : Robin de Graaf Bartleby pushed open the heavy pub door. A bell jangled and a handful of pub patrons gave him a quick look-see. Realizing that they had no idea who he was, they quickly returned to their pints. Bartleby looked around, until he saw who he was looking for. He took ...

Old-Time Memory

Author : Kiel Finger He stabbed his knife into the hardpack soil. It didn’t go in very deep; in fact it barely stood upright. Maybe an inch or two into the ground, tilted to the left. Not as dramatic as he would have liked, but the meaning behind the act was clear. It was an old ...

Pageturner

Author : Joseph Pascale My ears were assaulted by a variety of sounds as I entered the 21st Century-style café. The most alarming was the grinding sound that could have come from a malfunctioning robot, but was actually emitting from large copper contraptions. I was also unaccustomed ...

The Seven Year Scream

Author : Aldous Mercer Gerrard goes down on one knee to tie Junior's shoelaces. He double, then triple-knots the things, and wonders what else she's left deliberately undone. "Did Mommy tell you why I wanted you to come today?" His voice is low. "Uh-Huh." Junior's toddler-treble is ...

Home Is Where the Heart Is

Author : Roger Hammons The Lady of the House had a mind of her own. “Christopher James Robbins!” she scolded. “Yes, ma’am! Yes, ma’am!” he replied, picking up the dirty clothes. The forceful puff of hot air from the vents made him chuckle, which seemed to annoy her even more. He ...

Junk Planet

Author : Clint Wilson, Staff Writer The piles of scrap starship parts stretched off toward the horizon in every direction. I’d lived on the junk planet for almost five years now, but my escape was imminent. I wound up here like so many others, stranded in orbit with a broken ship, ...

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  • New Currency

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