Time and Time Again

Author: Helena Pantsis I learnt in the moments I stole when I was sixteen that time piled up, folded in and on top of itself like leaves of an endless, unwilting cabbage. I took seconds from my father, gathering them like crumbs of toast on the plastic table cloth, and ...

Enigma

Author: Christopher De Pree She was funny at first, more of a party trick. You could ask her a question and she would answer in fully formed sentences. She could write stories, essays. Other versions took our pictures, selfies and wove them into fantastical scenes. Made us ...

The Gravedigger

Author: Majoki The shovel chimed lightly against a larger rock and the gravedigger paused in the hole. Sharp gusts lifted the loosened dirt, whirling it across the high plain into the reddening dawn. They would come soon. They always did. A slow procession up from the ...

Welcome Home

Author: Bryant Benson I have wandered Earth for over a century searching for another one of my father’s creations. Even those that hunted us so long ago had all disappeared. Between the relentless plagues and rising oceans that consumed their coastal cities, it didn’t take ...

Take the Hint

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer No guns down there. No swords, either. Nothing bigger than a table knife, and nothing double-edged. The humans who first founded a colony on Kenshun were an unarmed combat cult. Their teachings quickly became the laws by which this odd ...

Inevitable As Fate

Author: David Barber Hemmings made his living from hunting trips. It was his way to study clients as if they were big game themselves. Take this Fournier-Clément couple for instance. Madame had glanced into her tent, found it spartan and clean, then busied herself with ...

The Black Dog

Author: Timothy Goss 1. They've lost the Dog, it was en route to Vega station. "What happened?" Councillor Lauder drools while foam bubbles form at the corners of his mouth. His red face turns beetroot in the afternoon light. The vessel was dragged from the stream ...

Kurt’s Last Snow

Author: Jeremy Nathan Marks Why wo ee? why wo ee? an' wo ee an' wo ee? -Snow All day long, the droid kept entering and exiting the room. It opened the curtains at dawn and levitated Kurt while he slept. It turned his body, fluffed his pillows, and lowered the room ...

The Faithful

Author: Bill Cox When I was eight years old, my step-dad put me in the hospital. One punch was all it took, but that punch eventually knocked me all the way through the social care system and out onto the streets. Funny to think that it might also have saved my ...

Marvin, Out of Whack

Author: Hillary Lyon "Ugh, what did I eat last night?" Marvin groaned, patting his belly. It protruded, solid and round, like a bowling ball. A pot-belly! Tracy, his girlfriend, wouldn’t be pleased. If Tracy bailed, he'd have to get a real job—until the next generous ...

Silent Sam

Author: Rick Tobin “Come in, Hanson. Close the door. What’s up?” A worn senior manager, with tie askew over his crumpled white shirt, sat hunched while peering at three connected computer screens. His visitor took deep breaths, removing his horn-rimmed glasses, twirling ...

For Those in Peril

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer Captain Jennie Ray arrives on the bridge to find her entire executive team bent over monitors or indicating things to one another on diagnostics displays. It’s a picture of activity she’d usually associate with blaring alarms and an air of ...

Like Sea and Sky

Author: Timothy Goss I awake with a start, like something bit my toe. Its dark, early hours of the morning when sound if muted and amplified simultaneously. I sit up and gently shake my head while caressing the sore appendage. My mouth is dry and thick with yesterday’s ...

CODE

Author: Aric Coppola The machine whirred and abruptly stopped. It had never stopped on its own before; it had to be told to stop. Yet now, the machine had come to a halt. “What did you do?” Alphonse asked, peering over his computer. “Me? What did you do?” Marie asked, ...

The Hat

Author: John Adinolfi Jessica always wore a tinfoil hat. Everyone knew everyone’s business in Prescott Bay, but no one knew why Jessica wore the hat - which didn’t stop them from having theories. “Look, here she comes,” called Mary Worthington. “Doesn’t she care what ...

Not The Land

Author: Majoki Doesn’t matter who I am. I am not the land. I walk it. Day in day out. One footing at a time. A footing is not a standard unit. It is determined by growth, the flora and fauna, in a defined area when it is clear nature has begun to rebalance ...

The Last Thing You Will

Author: Mikki Aronoff
We sit immobilized, re-reading the same fortunes wriggling out from our smashed cookies: "This is the last thing you will ever need to read." Slips of paper like unearthed, restless nematodes unsettle our party of poets ...

Blue Lined

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer A figure looks both ways along the street. Nothing but dust devils spinning across the plasmac. With a resigned shrug, he steps up to the entrance of the Constabulary House, waiting for it to scan him. Inside the building, he ambles over ...

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