Space Time Condiment
Author: Kathy LaFollett
“Screeeet!” His name. In another’s voice. From a hallway he wasn’t looking down. Screet was looking down at his lunch. Sitting down at a table in the SpacePort Employee Sustenance and Snacks, or SPESS. Acronyms in space save time. Space is time, ...
Intergalactic Game of Telephone
Author: Trevor Lancon
A distant star ejects billions of heavy ions every second, bestowing them all with its message: “I’m here.”
One of the heavy ions skirts past a nearby planet. The beings on that planet would describe the ion as iron if they spoke your language. They ...
A Cabinet of Curiousities
Author: David Barber
Honoured ones, welcome to my collection of curiosities.
These rare and intriguing items have been my hobby, no, my passion, for a lifetime.
This chamber is dedicated to a world called Earth.
These are pre-conquest curios: An embossed plastic ...
Border Crossing
Author: Barbara Brennan
Welcome to the terminal transit hub. No-one stays here; you go through and you leave. Papers please.
. . .
Thank you, that’s all in order. Once you pass through the turnstile, turn to your right, gate 95A.
. . .
Welcome to the transit ...
A Broken Partnership
Author: Lance J. Mushung
I dropped into the blue command chair of Kara. Her viewer showed countless glowing dots, with the two brightest being the suns of the binary system behind us.
Natalia, the AI of Kara and my only crewmate, projected her holo next to me. She'd been ...
Mister Ordinary
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
The man sitting in the waiting room looks like a typical, middle-aged office worker. His suit might be his best rather than his daily wardrobe, but from freshly-shined shoes to carefully slicked-back hair, he’s a shining example of average ...
Earth Café
Author: Jonathan H. Smith
The Earth Café was a new restaurant tucked away in a part of town where Calyx would have never gone -- had she not yearned to cheer up her grandfather. The tables were adorned with various oddities donated by the original settlers – the remaining ...
Serendipity
Author: Randall Andrews
“You all know about the meteorite that fell near here last month,” said Ryan Dunne, recently tenured professor of geology. “I’ve been studying the two recovered fragments and have discovered something remarkable. As you can see.”
With a flourish, ...
Beware Old Men in Dangerous Professions
Author: David C. Nutt
“Breaking in was easy- you’re way behind the times old man.”
I nodded. “Could be. I never trusted all the high-tech solutions to everything. Only use that stuff when I have to.” My dogs growled. I hushed them.
My captor chuckled and pet my dogs. ...
Swallowed by the Monster Planet
Author: J.D. Rice
Fingers scraped against hard ground, seeking a handhold against the sulfuric winds that battered against the environmental suit. The sky rumbled with cold lightning, and hail battered the suit's graphene plating, begging for entry as if it needed to escape ...
Float on By
Author: Brian C. Mahon
It takes Zax only one external sponson rotation after crawling out the sleep sack to yell, “Du’! This is complete crap!” Jackass throws a wrench at Viewscreen One, which, lucky us, I put a shield over.
“’Ey man, cut the gorbaj! We use that! I get ...
And She is.
Author: Hari Navarro, Staff Writer
Space.
I creep up vast multitudes of inky hills though they are not hills but rather mountains of soot and slowly I sink ever down into their glue.
My face is a hollow thing that has two windows and out of them I can see wells with ...
A Place in the Dusk
Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
Colin claws his way through a ruined doorway, his sight near-obscured by the blood smeared across his face. Slumping to the floor, he wipes his vision clear with his sleeve, then surveys his surroundings.
An ancient stone vault, lit by an ...
Mutiny
Author: William Kee
Captain J. P. Koontz was locked in the munitions bay. It was freezing. Thank God, I brought the suit. Soon he would need to put the helmet on. The crew was outside banging on the door.
“Give it up, Cap. We’ve turned off all life support except the ...
Yesterday Was Doomsday
Author: Kaci Curtis
You said that everything was going to change. I remember where we were sitting, sand clumped between our toes. I remember being afraid. Not of you; never of you. But of the picture of inevitability that you painted upon a rough and murky ...
Departing: One Zero Nine
Author: Hari Navarro, Staff Writer
There is a house that grows like a jar of cancer-rimmed razors from the very top of my head. I wear it like a hat and when it rains its central courtyard fills with water and makes my skull feel soggy with its burden and my neck hurts and ...
Repent!
Author: J.D. Rice
The end, it seems, is nigh.
I stare at the billboard strapped over the old man's chest, telling me to repent of my sins before the apocalypse comes. Crudely written scripture verses surround big, bold letters saying "REPENT!"
I haven't been to church ...
Hooked
Author: Chana Kohl
In the smallest nook of my consciousness, there is a tiny computer that tabulates risk vs. reward. It guides my decisions at any given moment. The ‘reward’ is clear, like a B-roll on a constant loop inside my mind. A split-level cabin built with my own ...
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