Braz forgot he had on sandals with no socks and ran as fast as he could up to Olin’s Meadow where they played football. He stumbled a few times climbing the slope. Gaining the ridge, he saw no one anywhere, and ran all the way through the meadow, the tall grass, and beyond the rocks and pines to the blustery overlook. Shivering and panting, he was calmed by the cloudless sky and newly greening mountains all around. But God might as well have reached in his chest, grabbed his heart and thrown it down in the gorge when he saw what was strewn on the furthest boulder. Darren’s new shoes, button up shirt, and jeans. He made himself step up and look over the edge, but it was hard to tell what was below except for trees. The time-stopping stillness ended as a hawk neared. Then another joined it, circling something below. No … not hawks, buzzards.
Continue reading...»Archive for the ‘Science Fiction’ Category
Elegance
| by Dave Pickering |
He feels the vomit rising in his throat. It is thick. The ants are crawling around inside it. They are laughing. They are talking to each other. The rag creatures are back again, or maybe they were always there, maybe they were sitting around the table having dinner, maybe they were crushing his eyes. His body is wrapped around with rags. He’s being mummified. They’ve taken out his insides and now they’re wrapping him up.
Continue reading...»Mandala
| by Scott Davis |
“My name is Andre Gremauld, and I ply the Cloforn line. I don’t need to tell you it’s lonely work, but it has its compensations: to be present at the birth of a star; to swing by a planet for a few minutes every seventy-five thousand of their years and watch them go from a scared little settlement to teeming alabaster cities before they even begin to get boring; to listen in the dark for messages beyond space and time only those on the cusp of light speed can hear. Is it like that for you?”
I awaited her reply. A courier is patient, he has to be.
Continue reading...»The Last Liverbeast
| by Steve Ramey |
Pittsburgh lay across the river valley like a skeleton unearthed, broken skyscrapers forming a rib cage above a spine of roads. McKitterick Kij descended, the antique Remington Safari rifle strapped to his back clip-clapping with each step. The last, he thought. But what else could he do? A hunter hunts. He zoomed his vision toRead more…
Brokers
| by Ryan Kinkor |
Despite a conscious effort to cease and desist, Will repeatedly found his hands rolling his black-and-brown spotted tie up and down his dress shirt. Nervousness was a common reaction amongst first-timers to a Negotiation, but that little factoid did little to still Will’s fidgeting hands. It felt just like the time he had stood trialRead more…
A Good Place for Graves
| by Clinton A. Harris |
On the seat between Vermillion Green and his pregnant wife, sat a syringe full of lethal purple liquid, visible through a semi-transparent plastic case, nested in a bed of foam rubber. It was either this or terminate Cerise’s pregnancy. A life for a life. It was the law. Adoria Leaf was the name of theRead more…
Together
| by James Bloomer |
Dear Elaina, The process of taking a pen in my hand and inscribing paper with ink is becoming less strange, relaxing even. Yet it cannot replace being together. Seeing you. Hearing you. Being reduced to the lowest bandwidth denominator is a frustrating experience, one that my brain tries to reject. I fail to believe thatRead more…
The Cold Pools
| by Chris Ward |
Coming up to the cold pools along the main approach road it was difficult to see anything other than the huge bluff that formed a natural barrier against the heat rising up from the valley as thick as smoke. Already, cheaper tourist hotels were beginning to make an appearance, with their gaudy facades and neonRead more…
Backlash
| by Steven Mathes |
The goal was to get home to Julie. Limping slightly and unable to turn his head, Cutter was the first soldier from his transport to get through the gate in Boston. It had been a long, painful ten years, but if he was lucky, he might be home in an hour. He understood that heRead more…
But a Moment Ago
| by Andrew S Fuller |
You’ve been searching for twenty-eight minutes for the heirloom fob watch, moving from the kitchen to the den to the basement, lifting piles of papers, opening drawers, digging through pockets, upsetting couch cushions, practically running now, scolding yourself because the event begins in thirty-two minutes and traffic will be simply awful. You’re beyond stopping andRead more…
A Matter of Time
| by D. B. Flynn |
Craig was getting away with murder. All he had to do was cross the street. He spread his fingers and looked at the stopwatch. The countdown had started the second he walked out the back door of Forgiveness, Inc. He’d sold everything he owned to buy thirty minutes and a one way Transfer. The illegalRead more…
Squares
| by Kurt Kirchmeier |
Anna-May stared down at her plate. It was square. It wasn’t supposed to be, she knew, but it was. So, for that matter, were her eggs, even the middle part, the part she always dipped her toast in. “Uh-oh,” she said, remembering the last time this happened. Her mother–her square-headed mother–paused from her breakfast dutiesRead more…
Chasing Jerohim
| by Martin Turton |
The drop-off point had been chosen well. So how could everything have gone so badly? Addison rested both elbows on her desk, her eyes focused on the screen of the viewer. It was the third time she had watched the recording, and yet still she felt as though she was missing something. The screen showedRead more…
Hoops
| by Doug Goodman |
loops like a fugue. It is confusing, not knowing where I have been. Raven screeches at me from his empyrean atop a trashcan on the gray sidewalk. Hozho, harmony in the universe, must have been upset. Carelessness destroys it. Ripple effects. Religious chaos theory before it sprouted butterfly wings and became popular. Anything in myRead more…
