Author: Greg Roensch The transport came in for a bumpy landing on Hos as the twin moons rose on the horizon. A medical technician by trade, Rael-6 had known this journey would come one day, though he worked hard to put it off. “It’s just normal aches and pains,” he’d say to ...

Author: Lily Shen Zayla lies down in bed beneath her blankets. Her plush down comforter feels like a warm bath. She listens to the soothing voice on her cell phone, guiding her meditation. The soft, furry darkness envelops her like a cocoon. Just let go, Zayla says to ...

Author: Leo James Topp Late night, deep in the Volkov Tower data-centre. I stand at one of the consoles, tapping furiously at the interface, hard drive’s smooth black casing jacked into the terminal. Alex is taking cover behind a server bank, aiming the carbine down a row ...

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer The cargo bay seems deserted. It should be packed. We know someone performed a ‘war action’ here. They overrode emergency reseal functions and warning routines, closed off internal access, then dropped the environment fields. We don’t know ...

Author: Kathleen Bryson The moon was out that night and had turned to a slight pink. Taffy coloured, maybe cotton candy fresh from the sweating fairground. The moon was pastel. That is how one can be delicate about things; the moon can set a good example. I walked inside ...

Author: David Berger They all lied. The ones who went around suborbital and the first ones in orbit and the ones who went to the Moon and the ones who rode the space shuttle and lived on the Mir. They all must have felt it a little bit. But they all lied. They all ...

Author: Stephen C. Curro Clive Olsen reclined in his lounge chair with a sigh. It was past eight pm, and the city lights in the panorama window behind him glittered like a galaxy. Before him, a massive computer screen gave him a live god’s-eye-view of the factory floor of ...

Author: Tim Goodwin Rosetta found herself with some downtime between contracts, and was within shuttle-distance: why not see mom? In person? Why not see Earth? Her mother, bikinied and martinied, was polite, but opted for air kisses in lieu of hugging her dirty spacer ...

Author: Robert Beech The corpse had a handsome face. He had a strong jaw with a two-day stubble of beard, a straight somewhat aquiline nose, high cheeks, and full eyebrows over steel-blue eyes, now half-lidded in death. There was only one thing wrong with the corpse’s face. ...

Author: Brian Maycock The sound of sirens rising and falling as they pass by outside his room at night makes him feel alive. Someone, somewhere is fighting crime. He falls asleep around 5 am. When he sees it is Jell-O for breakfast he wonders if the plastic gloop he ...

Author: I.W.Ray I don’t know what I am anymore. My river is the Styx but am I a ferryman, a passenger, or a trespasser? I fear no coins will ever pass through these hands. I am alone, the singular soul who has devoted an eternity to this endeavor. No, that’s not the right ...

Author: Rick Tobin My sister’s eyes would never be warm or human again, now showing only metallic, sparkling haze from a Tantalus Worm wriggling in her infected body. She could walk, again, after agonizing, bone-breaking seizures evaporated from the powers of her ...

Author: Adam McDaniel In the world, there are many secrets--those  that bare themselves to the mighty, those that bare themselves to the wise, and those that bare themselves to the fool. The mighty find the will to lead. The wise find the strength to rule. The fool only ...

Author: Stephen Dougherty The four-month voyage to The Mirror came to an end when the faintest light of the instruments filled Navigator TwoJade’s eyes with figures. The engines fell silent and a barely perceptible feeling of fulfillment bathed the deck of the Excitation. ...

Author: David Barber “What did you say this place was called?” repeated the alien. “The Large Hadron Collider.” The man’s name was Theo Jacobson, and before the aliens came, he’d been in charge here. This was where debris from colliding protons had sparkled through ...

Author: Tyler James Russell We shook her and asked if she was okay but she wouldn’t budge. Even when Davey tugged on her jacket and said Mommy she held her position on the sidewalk like it was something that might be taken from her. She clutched her briefcase, a paper bag ...

Author: Steve Smith, Staff Writer She studied his naked body as he slept, unconsciousnessly comparing the network of scars to a mental map burned into her subconscious. Every knife wound, bullet hole, piece of shrapnel, every evidence of every torture session, a testament ...

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer Two guns: one an Earther automatic, the other a Lenkormian beamer. “Holy Marduk, that’s a Grifone!” And we have an enthusiast. I grin at the young trooper. “Only by looks. It’s a custom Perez .557 automatic. I spent some time at his ...