Author: Kate Lu Perched on a hard chair, Vivian stared at a sharp-lined logo on the opposite wall: The Murphy Corporation Clinic for Genetic Testing. The blue of the font looked almost black in the otherwise all-white room. Vivian felt like a stain. She didn’t realize she ...

Author: Glenn J Hill “Poachers. Ugh, I hate poachers.”, I muttered under my breath. Since way before I came along, my family’s ranch has been beset by poachers. The property is way outside normal populated areas, and it takes a long time to get here. Nobody accidentally ...

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer Wish I’d been braver. I knock. Nineteen. Kim opens her door. Eighteen. “Pete? Are you crying?” Seventeen. “I’ve always loved you.” Sixteen. “I love you, too.” Fifteen. Now she’s crying. Fourteen. Wish we had ...

Author: Dave Williams When the warnings blasted on radios and TVs and cellphone texts, Sasha called Tony and their frantic voices collided. “Is this real”—“Do what we planned”—“I’ll come get you”—“Get in the bunker”—“It’ll be faster if I get you”—“Stick to the ...

Author: Glenn Leung The two of us stared at each other for a tense second of silence. My face was reflected in his eyes, which were also my eyes. We both scratched our chin and were startled by the discordant mirror image. He was wearing a navy blue polo-tee, I was in my ...

Author: Paul Warmerdam I navigate the metropolis ruins with compromised optics. The ash storm has yet to break. A whole continent of organic life has been reduced to dust and now seeks to penetrate my circuitry. I maintain a marginally acceptable survival rate in these ...

Author: David Barber Wu was already waiting outside the offworlder craft at dawn. He’d glimpsed it by chance, drifting like thistledown across the Plains of Gold, and had set out at once. “I hear your kind buys history,” he said to the offworlder. “Yang has found a prize ...

Author: Michael Hopkins The root scurried across the garden and stopped. I had just dug and chopped it free from the ground, ripped it up with my bare hands, and threw it to the side. I was clearing some new space behind the old barn for potatoes, garlic, onions and other ...

Author: R. J. Erbacher Joe Shit (that’s what everyone called him, inevitable when you have an unfortunate last name) was a ragman. Not ragman in a good sense either. Not a Scottish legate who compiled records in the 1200’s and he was unlike the catch phrase for early ...

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer We were battling the Roekuld, part of humanity’s last stand against an overwhelming foe. We fought for hours. I wonder how it ended? Our heavily armoured assault cruiser, Thunderer, got well and truly stuck in. We reaped the rewards: cut ...

Author: Geoff Nelder Xiq curses her commander’s recklessness as the escape pod is buffeted in the atmosphere of the blue planet below. Tempted to go to manual, she turns off the alarms, tries not to breathe in the increasingly smoky air and wriggles to mitigate against the ...

Author: Coleman Bomar Push. She clenched teeth, winced, her toes curling against the black sand of Tennessee nuclear wasteland. A home birth, on ...

Author: Ken Carlson Ensign McDonald, a young officer and recent addition to the spaceship SS Artillery’s crew, stood across from Doc in the galley. Doc suggested they meet there, late, away from prying eyes to take pressure off the kid. Doc poured some coffee. “It was ...

Author: David C. Nutt It had been a thousand days of bliss. I rocked him. Cradled him. Carried him. Fed him, made love to him, protected him. It has been so much more than I could have ever hoped for. “Status report.” “So formal Mikey?” He laughed. Oh how I loved that ...

Author: Katlina Sommerberg Empty walkways and closed souvenir shops surrounded Lady Stone on all sides. Today’s overcast summer day, the warmest of the century, should’ve coaxed tourists to visit the park. Their absence indicated humanity hadn’t yet recovered. Her ...

Author: David C. Nutt The young man burst into his grandfather’s study. “Gramps we gotta fight! Corporate is going to kick us off the station!” The old man sighed. “So you know better than our enclave council? They’ve got things well in hand so don’t worry- the ...

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer I used to lie awake, listening to the wind blowing through the old telegraph wires that criss-crossed our street. That eerie, ephemeral howling could wake me from the deepest sleep. On nights when the rain turned fine, I would wait for the ...

Author: Rex Caleval “You have to run. Every day for the rest of your life, you have to keep running. Nothing else we can try will work. I’m sorry.” “But I haven’t done anything wrong,” replied a sweating, red-faced man. “I haven’t broken any rules. I’ve done what you ...