It was the end of all chaos. The room was clouded with murky smog. Ling Xi had coughed herself awake. via Pocket

When we set out to weave a new world from the old, broken one, we knew we pledged the lives of our clutches and our clutches’ clutches to wandering the wastes. via Pocket

It was midsummer when I arrived in Corcaigh from Sadbhsfort, and the famine parties were in full swing. I don’t know if you remember the posters for them—in a vibrant shawl, a red-headed woman stands, holding a twin in each arm. via Pocket

The rooftop is quiet except for the hum of a plane passing overhead, heading to a faraway elsewhere. The sharp stench of ammonia rises from the bucket hanging from your window-cleaning belt. via Pocket

If there was one thing Briar Redgrave hated most about her current profession, it was the clients. “But I wish it to be yellow, and vibrant,” the client insisted with a shake of her head. via Pocket

The sky was a thick nuclear gray over the parkade where Bo and Violet were scanning the streets for Bo’s othermother. Violet sat on the hood of a battered white Nissan, while Bo watched from the edge with his elbows hooked over the railing. via Pock…

There is a silent war that is waging on every surface of the planet, in every droplet of water, and on the skin and within the bodies of everyone you know. It’s hypothesized by some that this war began near the dawn of life on Earth. via Pocket

Little fists, clenching: one of the cameras, set to motion-cap, zoomed on them automatically. Two others watched the adults, mother, father on opposite sides of the room. The machines watched the players: half a world away, Stavros watched the machi…

Earth began to rise over the lunar hills as the Mighty Slinger and the Rovers readied the Tycho stage for their performance. via Pocket

A Lei was a young worker at the 045 Meat Union factory on Continent Three in starship Rhea. When the dinosaur uprising overwhelmed the factory, he used a hunting rifle to drop two great beasts that got in his way. via Pocket

It was a century ago today that you found the spark of life in this freeze-dried valley of death. via Pocket

“You sent this good for nothing wimp to me?” Her pointed finger inched upwards in the air until it settled on my face. Meixiu pulled back her finger and formed her other hand into a cup, tracing her right finger along the inside of the palm of her l…

Halfway up the winding cliffside guideway, Zhang Lei turned his bike around. He was exhausted from three days of travel and nauseated, too, but that wasn’t the problem. He could always power through physical discomfort. via Pocket

Art’s funeral is full of crying girls. Law thinks this should tip some of them off, but there it is. Crying girls everywhere. White flowers in their hair. Black dresses and the scent of clean underwear and Ivory soap. There’s a ghostly snake wrapped…

For weeks, Sprite had told herself that Ratchanee Malakul was helping her hero get better, but no. “You have to accept that Jaran is never going to have sex with you,” the lifeguide told Sprite, as she was leaving on that last day. “You’re wrong,” s…

At the nurses station, Qina and Auntie Han were the only two left on duty. Everyone else had already gone home, relief flooding their faces as they exited the ward. Qina wasn’t her usual carefree self—but who could blame her? She was in the middle o…

This is a story that ends as all stories do, eventually, in deaths. When Ada’s parents died in the winter of her sixth year, she was sent to the neighboring parish to live with her aunt, Margery. via Pocket

And then there was quite a long time with nothing to chase. No suggestive tracks in the ice, no hopeful stories told by misinformed strangers. The air didn’t hold any name glancingly resembling her name, and there weren’t even rumors about intriguin…

Sometimes the Discontinuity kinks and curves and flips about as if it is alive. Openings slide along its vast length like undigested morsels down the gullet of a cosmic serpent. via Pocket

Sister Nadine’s first true thought is of beauty. Father Paul is delivering a sermon on sacrifice in his deep voice, pausing for emphasis every so often, when the bird lands on the ledge of her squint with a silent flutter of wings. via Pocket

“I rise today on this September 11th, the one-year anniversary of the greatest tragedy on American soil in our history, with a heavy heart . . . ” —Hon. Jim Turner September 9, 2001 Jessica slumped against the inside of the truck door. via Pocket

Landing planetside used to be a good feeling. via Pocket