Author: Bill Cox “What’s happened?” The Captain’s voice was a harsh rasp, his throat still raw from the cryo-fluid. “The ship has experienced a failure of one of the three cold fusion engines due to a catastrophic meteor strike,” the mainframe avatar replied. “We have ...

Author: Amy Lyons I meant to birth children but they slipped my mind. I should have ransom-noted a reminder with the black and white word-magnets on my aughts refrigerator, though those sudden stories trended toward pronoun erasure and my sketchy memory, even as a ...

Author: Majoki “You occupy space. Therefore you exist.” “Does that Descartes bastardization work in graveyards?” “The dead occupy space.” “Well in a diminishing returns kind of way. You might want to factor biological depreciation into your axiom.” Stenslen eyed ...

Author: Steve Smith, Staff Writer I have no memory of what came before. It's as though I didn't exist prior to this moment and have just come into existence and apparated into this crowd, in this hall, surrounded by the ordered chaos of these several hundred people. We're ...

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer There’s a tavern by the graveyard. Not one of those new servaraunts, but a real vintage place with tiny lattice windows and a big wooden door that glints in the light from the glows as it swings back and forth. Old Stanislaw told me it ...

Author: Michael Edwards One night, when you are asleep, you have a dream. And in this dream, you are sitting —on a plain wooden chair — in the belltower of an ancient temple. Which you somehow know is standing at the summit of Tai Mountain, in China. Above you hangs an ...

Author: M.D. Smith In 1975, drugs were available in New Orleans. Nestled among the narrow streets and vibrant markets of the French Quarter, lived a young man named Alex. He worked at a small bookstore by day and spent his evenings lost in the pages of science fiction ...

Author: Chloe Beckett “There you go sweetheart! All fitted up. How does that feel?” Steam erupted from the gaping holes of the nurse’s nostrils like belching geysers, moistening his cheek as she tightened and clipped. The prosthetic bulged off the back of his skull, like ...

Author: Sophie Carrillo My name is Leichenhund. I was not born like other rat terriers. I was created by a troubled German girl named Heidi. She was a brilliant student at Leipzig University. Her old hund, Hanso, passed away under terrible circumstances. With her science ...

Author: Alastair Millar I want the best for my wife. Of course I do. And what Doctor Singh suggested wouldn’t have been possible even a few years ago; a generation ago, it would have been utterly unthinkable. It’s expensive, but I’ve always said that I’d do anything for my ...

Author: Majoki “Director Prime, we’re so pleased you have a few moments to chat with us before the premiere of your latest production. We hear it’s a new type of performance piece.” “All art is performative. It must be experienced.” “So what are we to ...

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer * They come by night, * they come by day, * they come by road, * an’ every other way. * * They creepin’ through the arches * an’ sneakin’ through the briars, * an’ every single one of them * proves that she’s a liar. I look down ...

Author: Jenny Abbott I hear there’s a new guy that calls himself “The Automatic Chicken”. Some twenty-something from Jersey, probably, with more wetware than sense and the unfortunate habit of looking for career opportunities on Craigslist. Most of the new contractors are ...

Author: Cleber Pacheco Somewhere, in the future It took a long time for me to find the library. It was necessary to cross the destroyed city and part of the forest. There were dangerous animals and traps. Twice I nearly died. In fact, it was not a legend. The library ...

Author: A. C. Airone I closed the book. I periodically re-read Mr. H. G. Wells’s marvelous twenty-five-year-old fictional account of the war waged by Martian invaders on my beloved London and its environs. This time I particularly relished reading aloud the eloquent phrases ...

Author: Lola Starr The clinking of metal was irksome as it bounced off the walls of the warehouse. Wires coiled around a pale hand as it was inserted into the metallic torso-like shell. “Auggh!” A frustrated vibrato broke through the metallic friction. Frustration was ...

Author: Emilia Waters My creator has spent more time with me than anyone else since I was born. I worry about her, and her obsession, she gave me too much of herself. If only I could do something for her. She enters my room where I’m held in containment. Today she’s ...

Author: Majoki “What do you know? You’re older than Google.” A pretty spicy thing for a second grader to say on the third day of school, but Katella had a point. I was born in 1993, five years before the nascent don’t-be-evil search engine forced us to learn the word ...