Stretch your brain
After a long period, the charge on my arrestor capacitor finally ran down to zero, flipping a mechanical relay deep in my hull over to deep-cycle power. I woke up. I think I dream, but I can't be certain. I believe that—like the humans who designed me—remembering dreams would require periodic waking, and, lacking that… Continue reading More Cats Than I Remember
It looked like I might be in the bathroom at Club Manic, but it was tough to know for sure. I mean, there was no mistaking Manic's bathroom—red lit like the waiting rooms in hell; white subway tiled walls with dark grout, graffitied in kanji; narrow enough to make a cave diver feel claustrophobic; muffled… Continue reading In the Moment
The six-worlds rule had been a fact of life for thousands of years. It predated even the Solidarity. Long enough that no one questioned it anymore. It was a fact that turned a healthy profit for savvy pilots like Kadence. She wasn't famous, but those in the know knew her. The six-worlds rule said that no… Continue reading The Right Price
"What the hell is this?" Aixa was distrustful of police to begin with, but this was just blatantly wrong. The fact that they'd let her—a known black market dealer—see it only revealed their desperation. It didn't make her feel good about her prospects of being released. They wouldn't want her to go spreading rumors. "I… Continue reading Mind Reader
There was a peculiar scent in the air, a mix of spilled petrol and roasted pork with sweetsop. Bata had visited many of these metrolettes, and they all had their own smell. He removed the clear regulator mask from beneath his robes, the rubber hose snaking back beneath the folds, situated the mask over his… Continue reading An Audience With the Presider
Eliza padded barefoot along the glass-smooth deck, humming softly to herself on her way to the simulum. He was waiting for her when she arrived. Right on time. He always appeared when she'd find him most distasteful. The Avatar of the Apostle. She walked right through him—his voxels exploding and reassembling in her wake—and took… Continue reading Avatar of the Apostle
Meredith Aves looked upon her husband's ashen face through a veil of hot amber sparks that erupted in the space between them. His voice carried a dread she'd never before heard as he asked her pleadingly, "Are my eyes open?" She awoke with a start and barely suppressed a scream. Carter was standing beside the… Continue reading You’re Not Yourself
When the sound of her flatcamel's hooves changed from a shifting of sand to a clopping of stone, Perla allowed herself to grow hopeful. She'd heard many stories about the rocket lands, but this was the first evidence that they'd borne any truth. The fiery breaths of a thousand human-made engines upon the sand had… Continue reading Hopes and Dreams
I had that fever dream again. I'm walking around the habitat. My feet make hard clicking sounds against the floor, but I can't look down to see why. I'm too busy looking at all the corpses. It's the rest of the team: Wilkens, Kang, Singh, Tenderman, and Din. They're all going about their jobs, cleaning,… Continue reading Waking the Clockmakers
Yensuensu'suneasun—Yensu, for simplicity—awoke in a bath of bright silver light. The long night was not over; it was too early to wake. He stretched his proto-limbs against the strong thin filaments of webbing and the syrupy fluid within the interior of the pod. He did not know the word mother, but that was what his spindly… Continue reading Star Child
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