One clear night, a freakish bolt of lightning felled a giant oak tree in a park, and a shapeless creature emerged from the smoking crater at its base. The creature flattened into a pool of “tar,” slithered under a boulder at the lake’s edge, and silently brooded there.
Continue reading “The Gift by Arthur Pitchenik”
Three months to Election Day
“Mazie Tanner has a real likability issue to contend with,” said the slick, over-Botoxed TV pundit. “Folks just aren’t that into her. Polls show her earning a paltry thirty-two percent if the election were held today. That’s no bueno in a gubernatorial race against Robert ‘Mr. Charisma’ Sturgill, who’s got well over sixty percent. Now, if the lady tried smiling once in a blue moon—”
Continue reading “The Likeability Problem by Kirsten Smith”
The children tumble into the church basement, pushing, dodging, and shouting. Good boys and girls, but wild with pent-up feral energy. Deacon Grumpus pauses at the top of the stairs. He understands the cacophony and approves. Good old-fashioned childish exuberance. So human, organically human, as it should be. Exactly what the Divine Order of Cellular Humans teaches its followers.
Continue reading “Sunday School by Marco Etheridge”
When an Antarctic scientist uncovered an alien space ship while digging for a latrine, he sent for the best crypto-biologists, archaeologists and astronomers to come to the Antarctic base. After the local Antarctic scientists were assembled, they entered the ship which had unrecognizable instruments and made weird sounds like those of a Theremin. They quickly discovered something encased in ice, which they hauled off to their camp.
Continue reading “Brave (not nude or new) Newt World by Doug Hawley”
There are, of course, spooks and sprites, goblins and ghosts, on every habitable planet in all the galaxies. Even here, in the Ant Nebula.
Are they indigenous to those planets? Or were they brought there by the space travelers who journeyed millions of miles from the earth?
Who knows?
Continue reading “Goblins and Ghosts in the Nebula of Ants by Steven Lebow”
How do I prove humanity isn’t a computer virus? Xander Neurix wonders. He’s getting desperate. Is desperate.
As his wife rubs his shoulders, he bounces his son on his knee. “You’re so tense,” Astra says.
Xander quiets his leg to concentrate on his wife’s massage. “Things at the Chamber are … complicated.” Xander hates to keep something so important from Astra, but is unsure how to tell her about the alarming situation unfolding.
Zaden kicks his heels against his father’s thighs. “More turbulence.” Xander begins bouncing his leg again.
“I need a break.” Astra shakes her hands. “You’re practically living at the Chamber. I thought Helix was requiring less and less from you and your team? We hardly see you.”
Continue reading “Helix by David Henson”
I watch the middle-aged man in the tailored suit with disdain as he states commands to the soulless, unblinking Ernest.
Continue reading “Write me a story in the style of Hemingway by Stephen James”
I do not recognise the face of the man who sits across from me at my dining table. Like a patchwork quilt, his skin is stitched together with different shades of white, pink, and brown. He does not blink; one glassy grey eye gazes listlessly at nowhere, while the other stares directly at me as it flits and shutters like an old-fashioned camera lens.
Continue reading “After the Robot Wars by Kim Morrissy”
I am standing on the beach. The sand under my feet feels like soot. An uncanny, organic look emerges from the bowing, rusting skeletons of the sea-view skyscrapers. He is gone, like his father, into the ominous, omnipotent water.
Continue reading “Disconsolate Chimeras by Jie Wang”
Bob the same backwards and forwards existed. In every universe in an upholstered mustard colored armchair watching the Eagles who were no goddamn good and why did they ever let that guy Michael Vick be their quarterback? In the Farrago quadrant, 34th century, he was known as the constant and studied in advanced quantum mechanics classes, but was unknown to lesser beings in our 21st.
Continue reading “The Eternal Bob by Lewis Braham”
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