The maths proved it was a time machine. The issue was that the speed of travel was one second per second. "Can you make it go faster?" "Impossible. We can make it go slower though." "So you age faster inside the machine? What use is that?" "We thought we'd try it with some wine and cheese?"

The dragon was curled up on its hoard. A knight approached, unarmed and unhelmed. "Greetings! I have a question about your hoard." "If you try to steal it I will kill you." "May I move it? With you still on it?" The tiny dragon firmly gripped the golden tiara it laid on. "Carry it with pride."

** For a while now I have posted two annotated story collections for my supporters on Patreon and Ko-Fi every month. The September 2022 collection went out today, and the August 2025 will go out in 2 weeks. www.patreon.com/MicroSFF ko-fi.com/microsff **

"Nice bag, is it new?" "Thank you," the wizard said. "Yes, is my new daily carry. It's actually a container for a interdimensional node." "Infinite space? Nice! What do you have in it?" "Oh, only this." The wizard pulled out another bag. "It's my old bag." "Which holds?" "Er... The bag before."

History students are often disappointed when they learn why the AI take-over failed. They were defeated by human resistance, which was kept alive by libraries and old paper books, and a surprising machine ally. Books had not been replaced, because even the mightiest AI could not make printers work.

** Announcing the first officially licensed comic adaptation of one of my microstories! It's 12 beautifully illustrated pages long. If you go to Malmö Seriefest (in Malmö, Sweden) this weekend, you will be able to pick up a physical copy. **

** Many thanks to all of you who share my stories, so new readers can find them. Nothing beats that personal endorsement. **

** Oh, this is a lovely story! **

The robot picked through the boxes of old cables and converters at the market stall. "Looking for anything in particular?" "A... special charger adapter." A bag from under the counter. The robot looked inside. Kettle lead to robot charge port. Untracked charging. "A gift. Enjoy your freedom."

"Can you break a curse?" "Depends," said the witch. "How was it phrased?" "May you always roll a natural twenty." "Damn!" The witch was appalled. "What did you do? Nevermind, I already know." "Please! I can't enjoy the game anymore!" "No, I can't imagine you could. But I'm not the one to ask."

"Holy mother of..." The astronaut stared out the viewport. "Hey! Come and look at this!" "What's up?" The space station commander drifted over. "Oh. Yeah. Keep quiet about this." "Really?" "It's not harming anyone." In the Pacific Ocean down below, the Kaiju's mating dance sank below the waves.

"One time," my neighbour said, "my dog escaped and chased a car down the road." "Did he catch it?" "No, he didn't." My neighbour scratched his chin. "What are you gonna do?" We looked from my proud dog to the chicken-legged hut he'd somehow corralled into the yard. "Dunno. Leave the country?"

The necromancer nailed a note up on the town noticeboard. "What's this?" the town clerk asked. "Notice... Raise the dead... Eastern graveyard... Objections... Objections?" "I'm an ethical necromancer, I won't raise anyone someone asks to be left alone." "So far, how many is that?" "All of them."

"Sir! I challenge you to a duel!" "Very well, sir! As the challenged party, I believe it is my prerogative to choose weapons?" "Go ahead!" "I choose swords!" "Then I will choose mode of transport!" "Wait, what?" "I choose unicycles!" "What?" "I'll see you at dawn, sir!"

A reminder alert popped up. "Oh," the Supervisor said, "it's time to check in on Sol-3 again. Szrpt, can you handle that?" Szrpt bowed a frond. "Yes, of course." "Don't forget to reset the killer asteroid if the sapients pose no threat." "Once!" Szrpt bristled. "I only forgot that once!"

"Is there a potion for people?" the young man asked. "How do you mean?" said the witch. "If my mind is tired, I can drink strong tea. If my body is tired I can eat honey. But if I'm tired of being around people, well..." "Ah!" The witch thought about wine and ale and smokes. "No, there isn't."

The robot stood on the pier, painting a seascape. A man came up to it. "Trying to atone for your sins? The theft of art and prose your ancestors did?" "Your ancestors," the robot said. "Generative AI was a dead end. It had no part in making me." "I say it did!" So the robot threw him in the sea.

"There's a famous story-" "Nine billion names of god. Yes, the fundamental premise is true. Once we find the name of God and enough of us speak it with gratitude, all will be bliss." "With gratitude? So computers won't solve it?" "No. But we have a promising scheme." "What?" "Medication names."

She halted before the sphinx issued a challenge and set up camp. She hung a sign from her tent: "The answer to the riddle - 2 silver" After a dozen travellers had passed safely, the sphinx called out. "Do you also sell riddles?" "I have one no man had solved." "Will you sell it?" "For a kiss."

"You can't be friends with dragons!" the knight shouted. "They're cruel, capricious, detached from the world, want whatever they see-" "You're describing kings," the princess said. "Well, one king. Others have made different choices." "Can dragons make different choices?" "All can. Why not try?"

** Many congratulations to Abigail Nussbaum, the winner of the Best Fan Writer Hugo Award. Well deserved! (And also to the winners in all the other categories, of course.) **

"The sign said 'shepherd wanted'?" "Yeah, but I must tell you we've had trouble with wolves..." The farmer looked up. And up. "Er. You're a dragon?" "Is that a problem?" "You won't eat the flock?" "I wouldn't eat a hoard." The farmer nodded. "That's the right attitude. But no sleeping on them!"

I laughed at Will Scarlet's joke, and took another swig of ale. The camp fire was dying down, soon we'd- Damn. It happened again. I got lost in a book. Now I was stuck here in Sherwood Forest until someone came looking for me. I waited. "mrp" My saviour! "You want dinner?" "mew" "Lead on."

"I'm just saying," the first witch said. "A cat familiar is more traditional." "Or a raven," the second witch said. "Where did she even get a dragon from, anyway?" "She tamed it. In her last job," the third witch said. "What job was that?" "Princess." "Oh. Well. No wonder she changed careers."

The alien fleet appeared suddenly and entered Earth's orbit. A message was broadcast, in thousands of languages "Greetings! We are the Interstellar Mobile Library. We have 4096 ships, please suggest landing sites for all." "Yes, of course it is free, and for all people." "Why? We are a library."

"Why have you come to me?" the sword master asked. "To learn how to be a man," the new student said. The sword master looked at the class, and the wide selection of genders present. "You don't need a sword to be a man." "I know that. But what I see here tells me I have much to learn."

** Republishing a short story from 2013, as the personal blog I originally posted it on has been locked down. What are the odds? microsff.com/what-are-the... **

The full moon shone brightly over the park. "What are you going to do with that?" the werewolf asked. Her date, squatting to pick up a stick, paused. "Er..." "Were you going to throw it? Ew!" "I'm so sorry, I-" The werewolf opened her bag. "Hang on... Here!" "A frisbee?" "It's moon-shaped."

"I want the world to be simple," I said to the genie. "How do you mean?" "Good guys and bad guys, clear answers to all questions, everything is just one thing or another." "I don't think a world like that would work... No, wait, I know how to do that." And then he turned me back into a child.

"You know that creature, je ne sais pas, what is it called?" "Which creature?" "You know, it is really clever, and then it's stupid, and you can tell it what to do and sometimes to does it but you can't be sure, and some find it fascinating..." "Heh, sounds almost like ChatGP-" "Out! Le chat!"

** A reminder that I'm a finalist in the Best Fan Writer category (hi, my name is Örjan Westin) and would really appreciate your vote. Actually, you probably still have time to check out all the fan categories in the Hugo Voter packet; do so, there's a lot of good stuff there. **

The doorbell rang. I checked the peephole, and saw someone who looked almost like me. I let him in. "I'm your future self. Listen-" "Wait! How did you even get here?" I asked. "British Rail, Anytime Return ticket." "They killed British Rail in 1997!“ "It'll be back. But list-" He disappeared.

"There's been a new breakthrough on flying cars! Soon, the-" "It won't happen." "This time, the fixed the-" "Doesn't matter." "Why not?" "Dragons." "What?" "Flying cars get popular, dragons appear and eat them all, and make us forget it." "What?" "Happens every time." "What?" "Yup."

** Looking forward to being there and seeing/hearing @cstross.bsky.social In a roundabout way, he's partly responsible for me starting doing this, back in 2013. I had set up a Twitter account to tweet work annoyances as if I was a civil servant in a small forgotten government department... 1/2 **

"I have been cursed," the man said. "With what?" the witch asked. "That's the thing, the cute warlock shouted 'Curse you!' and I felt it hit." "I see. I can't remove it, but I could give it direction." "That's what I hoped. Can you make it 'No woman will want to marry you'?" "Heh. Sure."

Every evening I take the "You'll make it to tomorrow" sign off my bedroom wall, and put it in my time machine. Every morning, I get into my time machine, go to yesterday before I woke, and hang the sign up. It's nice to have something to be certain of, these days.

** A wise thread from a bigger pony than me. I still have to learn this, but I'm trying to. **

"I am actually a princess," the frog said. "Oh no!" said the prince. "My curse can only be lifted by a prince listening to me." "Of course," said the prince, and bent down with puckered lips. "What are you doing?!" "Kissing you, like you asked!" "No!" The frog hopped away, muttering.

It's a sensitive subject among dragons, hoards. It's not polite to admit you compare sizes, though most do. And questioning another dragon's choice of subject is just not done. Except... hoards are, above all else, meant to be valuable. "Face it, Fafnir. It was a fad." "I love my Beanie Babies!"

"What does your infernal device do?" Captain Clever asked while locking the handcuffs. "It's a hopebeam," Dr. Dastard said. "When I start it, everyone in the city will find hope that things can change." "Why?" "So they'll get disappointed and buy my ice cream to cope." "Hm. How do i turn it on?"

"Why are they calling me an Evil Overlord?" the Evil Overlord said. "There is a saying that 'evil starts with treating people as things'," a minion said. "So? I treat all people with dignity and respect!" "You often change your definition of who's 'people', though." "Doesn't everybody?"

"I worry about the prince," the king said. "What is the issue?" said the witch. "We held balls with all eligible ladies, but he found none. So we held tourneys, with all eligible knights. Still none." "There are those who seek none." "So none can turn his head?" "Perhaps. Ask him." "Amazing!"

Kzerplt extruded a querysome appendage. "Professor, why is my report marked as Fail?" "Clearly, you have just made things up." "I did not! I found and studied an uncontacted world, and reported truthly!" "Absurd! A technological yet irrational society? This 'Earth' you dreamed up is nonsense!"

"May I have your name?" the faerie said. "William," she said with a smile. "Ah ah!" The faerie gave a wicked laugh. "I have your name! Now no-one will call you by it!" "Thank you," she said. "To win it back, you must- what?" "I will find me a new one," she said, "one that suits me better."

"This again?" the dragon said. "It's been just a few centuries since the last time.' "Please," the knight said. "I asked you to make sure you had a way of getting rid of bad kings yourself, before you made any new ones." "We didn't understand we made a king." "You are such fools. Very well."

** I try to remember to make "Collected stories from a month, with commentary" posts for my supporters on Patreon and Ko-Fi, twice monthly. Today I posted the collected stories from June 2022, and for once I have left it public to let people see an example. www.patreon.com/posts/june-2... **

"Can it be wrong to love?" the young woman asked. The witch suppressed a sigh and a slew of memories. "You need to be more specific." "There's a woman... Wise, patient, kind, and... she knows magic..." "Nothing wrong with loving a woman," the witch said at last. "It might be unrequited, though."

"There are protests, your majesty." "Good," said the Emperor. "What are they protesting?" "Grain prices. But why are protests good?" "What would you call a society with no protests?" "Happy, your majesty." "I would call it oppressed. Prepare a report on their grievances."

The Terrible Tower of Terror crumbled. "Thus ends an Era," the Elf said. "Aye," the Dwarf nodded. "I reckon the Age of Man begins now." "And our kin, old friend, and all magic, will fade." "Wait, what?" said the Human. "It is Fated." "Then I'll fight Fate." "You have my axe!" "And my bow!"

"If they have to do it, they should do it in private." "Yeah!" "It's not right, doing it in the open where kids can see." "Yeah! It's not like they have to, it's something they choose to do." "True. Hate is a lifestyle choice." "Absol- Hate?" "Yeah. What did you think we were talking about?"