Fictional Worlds

Author : Priya Chand, Featured Writer Red lights flapped in an artificial breeze. For the observer whose data banks were lacking, most of the lamps were identical: a big round input, and an output …

Author : Beck Dacus Six feet from the cave entrance, we all turned on our flashlights and moved toward the mouth. The only way to get down was a steep flight of natural rock stairs, giving us footh…

Author : Daniel S. Helman Malia read the paper and then again. It was hard to believe. “Really?” you thought. “They’re offering money for that?” It was midweek, and yo…

Author: Timothy Goss Lieutenant Tann wiped his fuzzy torso. Months in a Chrono-tube caused the growth of a downy hair that matted together on the backs of his legs and arse. The computer suggested …

Author : Gray Blix It had been the perfect plan. Throw spitballs at the substitute English teacher, get sent to the assistant principal, spend an hour after school in detention, and walk home in pe…

Author: David Barber Sometimes spacers come back to see us. Anyone chosen for a visit gets notified, which is why Vera is waiting in a tidy house, with a home-baked Victoria sponge and wearing her …

Author: Salvatore Difalco Clanking past the barber shop, the parking bot looked ramshackle—steel alloy and green rubber, with the jaw of a hippopotamus. “They could’ve made those things more attrac…

Author: David Barber In the darkened room, snores come from the bed. The dim figure in the doorway is noiseless on bare feet, except when its toenails, two inches long and yellow as piss, scrape th…

Author: Jae Miles, Staff Writer Sweating people are moving quickly down the High Street, frantically making angular edifices with cardboard boxes and spray paint. I’m working with Heather, rigging …

Author: Anne Dewvall The tiny blue pill gleamed in Jerome’s palm as it danced with electrical impulses. This capsule had the power to transform the human experience, and through that, the wor…

Author: Jae Miles, Staff Writer The way it filters the light through dizzying shadows within to cast patterns on the ground like sun through stained glass. To them, the seemingly impossible tessell…

Author: Hari Navarro My daughter was raped as a baby. Does the fact that she was nine and not a baby make me a liar, does it take any of the sting from an opening sentence surely designed to shock …

Author: Jules Jensen Things are changing. The line in the sand is gone, washed away by changing tides that everyone saw coming but not this fast. In his eyes, I see the difference. I see the tech. …

Author: Steve Smith, Staff Writer Darlene remained in her body through dinner, Jocelyn having prepared Osso Buco, and a strawberry flan for dessert, so it was worth listening to Arnold’s self…

Author: R. J. Erbacher This was bizarre. He hovered over the planet and examined it. During the last check of this planet, there were more than eight million different species. Most were instinctua…

Author: Kent Rosenberger Everything was about to pay off for Riley. All of the years of planning, preparing, researching, waiting and traveling had all brought him to this particular spot on this p…

Author: Hari Navarro, Staff Writer “How long have you been here?” “Well, it’s hard to say with any degree of certainty but, maybe, ten or fifteen minutes” “Do you know when you were born?” “Well, a…

Author: Jae Miles, Staff Writer The room goes dark when the streetlight across the road goes off. I feel her tense, then relax: rising maturity overcoming instinctive fear. When I first came here, …

Author: M.D. Parker A chime signaled the readiness of the mixture. She considered it for a moment; There should be celebratory horns of cheer, she thought. If only this machine knew what it had jus…

Author : Beck Dacus I have worked for eleven years figuring out how we lost everything. Anecdotes passed down from people who were alive before this War, I have discovered, have long since deterior…

Author: Alzo David-West My name is VC-60. I am a mechanical intelligence. The two letters in my name stand for “Virtual Cognition.” The two numbers mean I am the sixtieth-generation model. My maker…

Author: Moriah Geer-Hardwick With a single, well-practiced motion, Ernst flicks a cigarette up from the pack and brings it up to his mouth. The filter barely touches his lips, but as he swipes the …

Author: Jae Miles, Staff Writer Jesus came strolling through the corn, two women in winged armour following behind. He had a hemisphere of light flickering about his head and nothing caught on his …

Author: Elizabeth Hoyle “Do you remember me?” The machine they were strapped to was hot. “No. Do you?” “No.” They were silent for a long moment. “What are we going to do?” The woman could not remem…

Author: Elaine Thomas The warm sun felt good on the old man’s skin. He stood on the balcony, gazing down into the garden. “A beautiful day,” he thought, “a good day to die.” He examined his hands, …

Author: Hari Navarro, Staff Writer “Do you want to go on an adventure?”, asks Lee. “To where?”, answers Lindsay. “Up and into the universe.” “In that?” “Yes, in that. It’s an M2-F2 Star Hopper.” “D…

Author: Michael Edward Sabat It must have been the sound like wind chimes. Everything is so dark but the ethereal music plays in my head so clearly. “Thom…” I hear her voice. I know that voice. “Th…

Author : Steve Smith, Staff Writer The elevator descended to the hospital basement, and she followed the orderly through the open doors and down a pale green hallway. He was speaking, but she liste…