Three Strikes

Author : Duncan Shields

The black non-stick plastic of the cop’s fist presses my fat lips up against my teeth until they split. The drugs from the gas are slowing all this down and adding the colours. I’m seeing so clearly and feeling none of it. My own blood squirts hot into my ...

The Flawless Nature of Deductive Reasoning

Author : J. S. Kachelries

We had been in Antarctica for two months studying the alien spacecraft. It had been discovered a month earlier when a portion of the Ross Ice Self caved into the sea. Based on the thickness of the ice covering the ship, we estimated that it was buried ...

Tears from the Sky

Author : C. Hale

Shortly after the perfection of the gravity lens telescope, astronomers had tracked a celestial body twice the size of Earth and calculated its trajectory as intersecting Earth's orbit. A full year of recalculations and simulations had all yielded the same results. ...

Dream of Other Days

Author : David Zhou

"Have a good weekend, Mr. Lark," he said, scooting his chair underneath his desk and shuffling his papers a bit.

"Don't stay too late, y'hear?"

He laughed, and shook his head. Smiling faintly, he grabbed his bag and started for the door. He had a ...

Mesmerized

Author : Jim Stitzel

The bag of chips was all but empty, just a few crumbs left in the bottom. He shook the bag, bouncing it in his hand, so that the niblets would fall together in the corner. There were so few left - and he wasn't one to waste anything - so he tilted the bag to ...

I Pledge My Life

Author : Steve Smith, Staff Writer Unsol remembered his twelfth birthday, remembered his fathers face alight with pride as he read aloud Unsol's draft notice. 'You're going to be a pilot, Unsol.' His father beamed 'You'll be the most valuable commodity in the Corps.' Thirteen years ...

Gone with the Solar Wind

Author : Patrica Stewart

The finals of the twenty-fourth biannual solar wind races were in their thirty-ninth day. The race course was a 15,000,000,000 mile Z-shaped trek within the Alpha Centuri system. The Alpha Centuri system was considered ideal for solar wind racing because ...

The Wall

Author : Benjamin Fischer

“The Americans’ new weapon is unstoppable, sir.”

The Admiral grunted. “That’s a bold claim, Commander Caswell,” he said, shifting in his deep leather chair before the wall of screens. “Care to expand on that?”

“We ...

Original Death

Author : Martin Spernau

This time it hurt. Which was rather odd.

He could remember losing body parts in battle before, but never had it hurt. He clearly recalled losing most of his right leg to a direct plasma hit on his way into the bunker at 23-0-9. That had only slowed ...

Potential Loss

Author : Steven Perez

Ix looked out the main window, sighing as she viewed the once-vibrant blue world below her, now gray and barren. She wondered if the strange fate that befell this place could have been avoided, and was embarrassed to admit that she couldn’t think of any way ...

The Language Barrier

Author : Michelle Pitman The Janovian language is pure torture on the back of the throat, at least for those who haven’t learned it from birth. If we weren’t being paid for doing these language classes, I don’t think there’d be many of us left on the course. The pay is good, too good ...

Altitudal Lapse.

Author : S. Clough

Guy Daschien released the breath that he'd been holding. The seal between his helmet and collar snicked shut, and a little hiss announced that it had become airtight. He gripped each of his wrists in turn, pulling his gloves on tighter, making sure that the burrs ...

Sshh! Quiet!

Author : Catherine Preddle

Jericho sighed contentedly as he eased himself into the contoured leather recliner of the Virtual Library booth. He’d spent most of his lunch break scouring the Multi-Mall for an empty VL booth and was determined to make the most of the remaining ...

Classroom 010

Author : B. York, Staff Writer The bell rang and the world became a bustling mass of eager students. Halls were like vessels pumping the mind-blood of the future through the academy to give it life. Each brain pattern that registered into the student ID banks was safely secured inside ...

Guerillas in Our Midst

Author : Steve Smith, Staff Writer Janko was living the high life, running guns along the fringe and reaping the rewards just outside regulated space. People brought their goods to him, and he delivered them to those in need, those who could afford them at least. That was until the ...

Binary Thinking 101

Author : Patricia Stewart

The war against the Centauri was not going well. For the first two decades of the war, the combined forces of the Earth Coalition had battled the military forces of Alpha Centauri to a virtual draw. However, in recent years, the Centauri offensive had ...

The Delicacies of Zombiekind

Author : Kathy Kachelries, Staff Writer That Halloween, the ship decided to be a ghost. The ship itself wanted to use an oversized sheet, but Tommy laughed at the artificial intelligence and pointed out that there was no way his mother would be able to find a sheet that big. It was ...

Footprints

Author : Jim Wisniewski

They say the wind carries the souls of the dead, forever blowing to remind us of things past. At least, that's what the kasht say, but then our worlds usually have less wind than Tun Ekshati. Most humans don't believe it.

Marcus might. He's been ...

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