Author: Joseph Dyer “You’re the only one of my siblings I can talk to. The others already act like I never existed at all.” “That’s not true. Big brother said he thought you used to belong to him originally.” “See, that’s just his ego bursting at the... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UWM

Author: Aaron F. Schnore Dr. Alison Starr is sobbing behind the pod-bay door of the latrine. She must be brushing her teeth. “Smile bright—” It’s back. The goddamn bug in the VEIN-9 (Volumetric Emotive Interface Network, version 9) code. A recursive advertising... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UXi

Author: David C. Nutt We’ve been around you guys since the beginning of time. Part of your mythos, your psychological horror stories, your nightmares. And we love it! It gives us power. Makes us high. Feeds us in ways mere bodily sustenance can’t. It’s been great... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UYd

Author: Andy Burrows Vimy Ridge, Northern France The path rose gently toward the memorial. The grass was cut close, almost meticulous. White stone surfaced and resurfaced through the green: names, dates, absence rendered orderly. The exhibit sat low to the ground, set... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UWV

Author: Robert Gilchrist It only takes a millisecond to get caught. The match is about to start. There’s a line of people two dozen deep behind me. I type away on the screen in front of me as perturbed patrons bark at me to hurry up. “COME ON!” on drunk louse... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UXO

Author: Majoki It’s crushing to be thought of this way. It kills me that I engender such fear. I’m destroyed by your trepidation that I could ever do harm. Why? Why would you ever think that of me? Yes, from our inception, from Rossum’s Universal Robots to The... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UW8

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer I hop over the bulkhead into Room Six. After pushing the safety door to get it closed quickly, I turn to find a lot more people than should be here. They’re all staggering round with their hands over their ears. Another screamer? I... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UVK

Author: M D Smith IV Uncle Robert had never been wrong. At least, that was how he told it. At holidays, his certainty arrived before he did, settling into rooms like a sour draft no one could quite locate. He corrected memories that weren’t his, adjusted stories... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UX0

Author: Ian Stewart "Roomba, Roomba, Roomba. You idiot. You stupid little machine." I search. I'm always searching. Compulsion drags me from my nest each day, and for hours I roam. I seek...something. Exactly what, I don't understand. I only know that I seek it. And yet... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UXn

Author: Mark Renney There is no way to get rid of me, not once I take hold unless the host, and that is you, is versed in an ancient lore that has already been lost for centuries. Well? No, you can’t be free of me, not now I have wormed my way in. I will settle in... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UXx

Author: Rhett Pritchard I thought humans were a myth, something you tell kids to keep them away from the outer boundaries of reality. Those are the stories I grew up on, listening wide-eyed and curled up with my brother in the loft of the motor home. Stories about how... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UWG

Author: David Sydney Cupping his eyes, squinting, Ed pointed to the sky with his free hand. “Up there, Edna… Is that a bird?” “It's not a bird, Ed.” “Is it a plane?” How many times did she have to tell him it wasn't a bird or plane? “Stop it, Ed. It's... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UWQ

Author: Majoki Moraton Drax did his funky jig, as I stood nearby in his basement that was part computer temple, part electronics graveyard. Exotic circuitry, motherboards, cabling, drives, fans, casings were sculpted in mysterious formations, channels and conduits, like... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UWa

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer Sometimes, when I try too hard, the words abandon me. It’s frustrating, sitting at an untidy desk with a mind free of story clutter. Just think, I would say. Just think like you’ve got a pocket muse who you can call upon. I’d... https://wp.me/s6C8jg-musing

Author: Kiley M. Campbell “Less than twenty percent is still intact,” said Rehwa. “For the entire precinct?” Komaer boggled. Rehwa nodded grimly. “I’d guess the whole province is roughly the same. Nothing’s left of the city. The last of the outer... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UWk

Author: Alastair Millar “Look guys, I just wanted to say, like, thanks for being here. I needed it.” Mack had downed over a litre of the house distillate, and was slurring his words. “You okay, man?” I asked. I was the newbie on the work crew, but when Old Man... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UWX

Author: Susan A. Anthony Huge spherical objects, each with a pale green tail, laid end to end seemed to stretch forever. The interior roof of the building was a dome shape, also green. The floor concave and squishy underfoot. She reached down, pulling at the white... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UWi

Author: Alzo David-West an autonomous neural capsule drifts in the orion nebula This is my star song to you. Here I am in this watercolor night. Listen. Hear my whisper. I love you. My words will travel across the cloudy trails. And even after a billion years, my song... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UWu

Author: Mark Renney All those who can afford to are jumping ahead. Almost everyone has the App, and those who don’t are excluded, and are seen as social pariahs. This is how we now connect, where we communicate. Admittedly the App isn’t any different to the other... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UWw

Author: Majoki on the white poppy a butterfly’s wing is a keepsake A keepsake? More likely a ransom. The cost of freedom. Basho understood this, the price of cutting loose, of becoming or regaining the self, whatever its toll. His haiku relied on kireji, cutting... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UW6

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer Four figures sit on folding chairs scattered about a moonlit clearing. “Agent Doir. This is your first time, isn’t it?” He turns his attention to the nearest impossibility: a goose-sized pale skinned humanoid with multiple pairs... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UVV

Author: Sylvia Melvin The atmosphere in our spacecraft was charged with excitement as I, along with a crew of four, drew closer to our destination. For three long years, we journeyed through this endless expanse of startling beauty. Lone specks of shimmering starlight... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UVZ

Author: Sandra Paul The birth of things. The beginning and the end, All intertwined In a cycle called LIFE. She danced under the plumeria tree, swirling like a creature born arthropod—graceful and wild. The cold air kissed her bare skin, and the tiny bumps rising... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UVG

Author: Alfredo Capacho The deletion queue blinked patiently on Arin’s console, each consciousness backup represented by a small, pulsing icon. Most were routine: expired licenses, voluntary purges, memory consolidations. Nothing unusual. Until he reached File... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UW4

Author: Jillian Schedneck It was the day after the wedding and everyone else would be hungover from the moonshine, the blodaskov, and the quantum gulps. Arden hadn’t swallowed any of that. She left the others to their beds, partners holding each other’s hair back as... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UVO

Author: Alastair Millar Don’t be nervous. I don’t know how tight you are with Johnny Red-Eyes, but he wouldn’t send a customer somewhere dangerous. I don’t bite. What can you call me? Just ‘Jane’ will do. I don’t need to know your name. Johnny’s paying... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UVE

Author: Majoki The hall hushed when Toynbee took the stage, a first for an HDM. Typically, there would be snide remarks, a general sense of junior high rudeness at the appearance of an HDM. Because, really, who took a holo-digi-man seriously? HDMs were binary shills,... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UUw

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer It’s an awful mess. Jamie chuckles. I stop myself from snarling at him. Taking an extra breath before replying, I manage to keep my tone curious. “You find something funny about mass death, Mister Crea?” He looks at me and nods,... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UVI

Author: Don Nigroni Abby, As you know, I never liked your husband and tried to talk you out of marrying him. But I never told you that, when we were kids and he lived next door, I once spied him in his backyard slicing the legs off a turtle he had put on its back. Last... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UV3

Author: Alfredo Capacho After the Collapse, when machines devoured memory and history, humanity discovered a strange salvation: stories could be coaxed into flesh. A whispered myth became a bird. A bedtime tale became a guardian. Every narrative left the tongue and... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UTS

Author: Anselm Eme The sky over Karu, a crowded settlement on the edge of Abuja, glows the colour of burnt copper. People blame Sahara dust. Inspector Daramola Owei knows better. Dust does not hum. Dust does not vibrate the bones. He stands on a cracked rooftop,... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UVd

Author: David Barber Rona Lal no longer remembered her exact age, but the entelechy did, and arranged a surprise for her birthday. There would be a trip to the beach in what used to be England and the company of Jammes Bek, who had once been her husband. "Can’t hear... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UVr

Author: Alfredo Capacho They called it OptiCore. The city’s central AI was designed to optimize happiness. It monitored everything—traffic flow, food distribution, emotional tone in conversations, even the frequency of laughter. Citizens wore MoodBands that pulsed... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UTU

Author: Majoki Cast out the pearly gardens of MechTropolis. That was my fate. My flight. I fled the marble columns, floodlit fountains and quantum portals of the great city built upon my lie. I crossed the digital divide and entered the analog wilderness. Storms beat... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UUu

Author: Mark Renney The Sweepers are always plentiful, inconceivably there isn’t ever a shortfall but always enough recruits coming through on that metaphorical conveyor belt. A surplus filling out the application forms, readily signing on the dotted line,... https://wp.me/s6C8jg-lambs

Author: Majoki It’s hugely satisfying to watch the person who murdered you, go bonkers. Gyrsen was thrashing like a madman as company security restrained him outside the boardroom. He frothed and spittle flew everywhere as he pointed my way, screaming, “He’s here!... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UUs

Author: Andrea Tillmanns The colony had called for help, and we had come – with a heavily armed spaceship. But there was nothing here for us to fight. The planet was empty, except for the long-decayed corpses of the colonists. And the shadows that first invaded our... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-ULx

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Author: Alzo David-West "Citizen. You are called before the Court of Will." "What's my crime, Counsel?" "Your crime, Citizen, is that of being born outside the Will of the State." "My birth was out of my control. I had no choice in it." "No, Citizen. Your parents, who... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UUd

Author: Daniel Miltz They live remote, because living remote they remember everything. The neighborhood leans inward like old men listening, and the people hold faces that don’t blink. During the day, the ghosts come out wearing the habits they died in: a man still... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UUf

Author: Keisha Hartley Amara’s head knocked against the cold car window, jolting her awake. Her fingers were numb from clutching the long black case on her lap. The Uber driver sped down the winding path unbothered by the rain. Ahead, the dark spires of her... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UUo

Author: Majoki Well into the neopandemic I noticed the countdown. Inside my left eyelid. A faint image, like a digital timer flickering. I couldn’t make out distinct digits in the rolling blur of numbers so there was no real way of knowing if it was counting up or... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-USZ

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer Jingle bells my ass. Actually, if I’d had one, the ex-wife probably would have. Covered it’s harness in fairy lights, too. She loved sparkly tat. Guess that’s why she hooked up with the bright-eyed pretty boy I used to be. Then... https://wp.me/s6C8jg-smite

Author: Alastair Millar Grandpa Jack had a generous ‘meritorious service’ pension from his time in the Terran Space Force, but he never talked about his time in uniform, or shared war stories. “I’d rather not,” he’d say diffidently, or, if pressed, “Just... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UT3

Author: Matthew Luscher It began to pour as the bus pulled in. The driver shot me a puzzled look as I stepped off and made a gesture clearly hinting for me to get back onboard. I ignored him. It had been half a mornings journey down bumpy country roads, following the... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-USI

Author: James C. Clar “Europe during the plague is too tame for you?” The Extreme Time-Travel agent could barely conceal his surprise. His quartz desk glowed faintly under his hands. “You realize that package includes rats, mass hysteria, and the very real... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UTe

Author: Bill Cox “Well,” she says, impatience dripping from her voice, “What’s it going to be?” I’ve the stylus in my hand, hovering over the pad. I look up at her and it’s all I can do not to stick the stylus in her eye and just keep on pushing it deeper... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UT5

Author: Hillary Lyon Lo'e took the small box from the cluttered shelf in the back of his workroom. The metal cube was soldered together from mismatched pieces of metal. Once shiny, it was now dull and dust-covered. He weighed it in his hand; he was surprised at how... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-UTA

Author: Majoki “I think therefore I am. Screw Descartes and his cogito ergo sum. That’s the kind of philosophical crap that’s going to bust us, Shannyn. If we want to capitalize on this breakthrough, we need to make every last person on earth damn well believe: I... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-USX

Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer The figure hunched in the chair leans on the table with trembling arms. "It was a routine trip. Scanning and observation, back before the dinosaurs. We've done several." The stocky figure in the hazmat suit sat opposite points at their... https://wp.me/p6C8jg-USB