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The Effluent Engine - Lightspeed Magazine
The Effluent Engine - Lightspeed Magazine
New Orleans stank to the heavens. This was either the water, which did not have the decency to confine itself to the river but instead puddled along every street; or the streets themselves, which seemed to have been cobbled with bricks of fired excrement. Or it may have come from the people who jostled and trotted along the narrow avenues, working and lounging and cursing and shouting and sweating, emitting a massed reek of unwashed resentment and perhaps a bit of hangover.
·lightspeedmagazine.com·
The Effluent Engine - Lightspeed Magazine
You Do Nothing But Freefall - Lightspeed Magazine
You Do Nothing But Freefall - Lightspeed Magazine
Once upon a time, a fox came across a cat in the forest. Or something very similar to a cat, at least. The thing was neither flesh nor fur, but pale enamel, the tip of its nose and the insides of its ears daubed with blood. It sat on its polished haunches atop a mossy log beside a babbling brook, paw metronoming in salute. “Hello,” said the fox to the cat, drawn to its gleam and its amiable expression, its bobbing foreleg, but mostly by the golden coin at its throat.
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You Do Nothing But Freefall - Lightspeed Magazine
The Old Women Who Were Skinned - Lightspeed Magazine
The Old Women Who Were Skinned - Lightspeed Magazine
There once were two sisters, close in age, who had been birthed and loved and became stooped and wise and were now old women together. They lived in a house in a courtyard surrounded by a tall stone wall, meant to keep out most children and all men, though starlings made their nests in the boughs of the elms. One day, the king---an old man himself---was walking by the wall when he heard the lilting voices of the sisters, who had become accomplished singers over their long years.
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The Old Women Who Were Skinned - Lightspeed Magazine
Al-Kahf (الكهف) - Lightspeed Magazine
Al-Kahf (الكهف) - Lightspeed Magazine
There once lived a man who was stolen from the sea. Rare and magnificent, he lived in his cave, rising to the surface every so often to pluck the strings of his violin for the birds before retreating into the water to play for his kin. They spent their days enthralled by the doleful songs of the man who lived in the littoral cave. But there came a day when the songs ceased and the people stopped going and the man was nowhere to be seen.
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Al-Kahf (الكهف) - Lightspeed Magazine
The Atonement Path - Lightspeed Magazine
The Atonement Path - Lightspeed Magazine
To think we used to put young criminals in jail. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to eavesdrop. Or should I say eaveswatch? What is the comparable term for using one’s visual sense in a surreptitious fashion? Dining establishments are a superb venue for such…
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The Atonement Path - Lightspeed Magazine
Queen Lily - Lightspeed Magazine
Queen Lily - Lightspeed Magazine
“It is the voice of my child!” the White Queen cried out, as she rushed past the King, so violently that she knocked him over among the cinders. “My precious Lily! My imperial kitten!” and she began scrambling wildly up the side of the fender. via P…
·lightspeedmagazine.com·
Queen Lily - Lightspeed Magazine
America: The Ride
America: The Ride
This story also appears in the anthology RESIST: TALES FROM A FUTURE WORTH FIGHTING AGAINST, edited by Gary Whitta, Hugh Howey, and Christie Yant. (Proceeds from the sale of the anthology go to benefit the ACLU.) via Pocket
·lightspeedmagazine.com·
America: The Ride
Our Side of the Door - Lightspeed Magazine
Our Side of the Door - Lightspeed Magazine
It isn’t until I realize I can’t find my son—really can’t find him—that I think of all the other things I can’t see in the starlit orchard. “Cruz!” I yell. “Buddy! You win!” There is no moon. The trees are thick with blossoms. I hear Cruz in the tal…
·lightspeedmagazine.com·
Our Side of the Door - Lightspeed Magazine
Oversite - Lightspeed Magazine
Oversite - Lightspeed Magazine
“It doesn’t hurt, Gram,” Renata says. My sixteen-year-old daughter pulls up her t-shirt sleeve to show her bare arm, the skin summer brown and the muscle swelling slightly into smooth biceps, flawless. “I had it done when I was little and see, you c…
·lightspeedmagazine.com·
Oversite - Lightspeed Magazine
Hapthorn’s Last Case - Lightspeed Magazine
Hapthorn’s Last Case - Lightspeed Magazine
My assistant said, “You have received an invitation from Holk Xanthoulian. He is embarking on a new menu and invites, and I quote, ‘a select coterie of the cognoscenti to sample its superlative assemblage of tastes, textures, and titillations.’” Or …
·lightspeedmagazine.com·
Hapthorn’s Last Case - Lightspeed Magazine
Moonboys - Lightspeed Magazine
Moonboys - Lightspeed Magazine
You ask how my brother died on the moon that day, but that’s the wrong question. Ask instead what he spelled with his bootprints when we first stepped down from the platform. Ask instead the one song he listened to, the whole flight there. Ask why h…
·lightspeedmagazine.com·
Moonboys - Lightspeed Magazine
Meet Me in Iram - Lightspeed Magazine
Meet Me in Iram - Lightspeed Magazine
We are familiar with gold, says Hume, and also with mountains; therefore, we are able to imagine a golden mountain. This idea may serve as an origin myth for Iram, the unconstructed city. The city has several problems. (1) It is lacking in domestic …
·lightspeedmagazine.com·
Meet Me in Iram - Lightspeed Magazine
Remaking History - Lightspeed Magazine
Remaking History - Lightspeed Magazine
“The point is not to make an exact replica of the Teheran embassy compound.” Exasperated, Ivan Venutshenko grabbed his hair in one hand and pulled up. “It’s the spirit of the place that we want to invoke here.” “This has the spirit of our storage wa…
·lightspeedmagazine.com·
Remaking History - Lightspeed Magazine
Song Beneath the City - Lightspeed Magazine
Song Beneath the City - Lightspeed Magazine
For decades, the four plumbers had answered the call of old widows who’d dropped jewelry down their drains. Sometimes, the plumbers unscrewed the U-shaped trap under the sink, knocked out its splat of tobacco-colored crud, and fished out a golden ring. But other times, there was no reclaiming the lost diamonds and gold. They tumbled blind through the maze of pipes below the city, never to see the sun again. Whenever the plumbers left a house, the widows would ask, “Do you hear it too? The singing that comes rattling up from the pipes?”
·lightspeedmagazine.com·
Song Beneath the City - Lightspeed Magazine
The Null Space Conundrum - Lightspeed Magazine
The Null Space Conundrum - Lightspeed Magazine
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” screams Aria. Her voice goes up raspily at the end of the exclamation, giving her the affect of a mewling cat, and she is embarrassed by the profound uncoolness of such a tone. She slams her fists on the Versa’s console to compensate, to physically demonstrate the depth and seriousness of her anger, causing the subtelar ship to rock violently in the warpwake. Don’t judge her; Aria Astra is usually a very cool person. She likes good food and knows a bunch about film and uses lots of swears and has great fashions.
·lightspeedmagazine.com·
The Null Space Conundrum - Lightspeed Magazine