At the Rialto By Connie Willis Seriousness of mind was a prerequisite for understanding Newtonian physics. I am not convinced it is not a handicap in understanding quantum theory. —EXCERPT FROM DR. GEDANKEN’S KEYNOTE ADDRESS TO THE 1989 INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF QUANTUM PHYSICISTS ANNUAL MEETING, HOLLYWOOD, CALIFORNIA I got to Hollywood around one-thirty and started …

Folk By Eden Royce In a place beyond far, my braids are woven into the sweetgrass basket encasing me and I am surrounded by the scent of the ocean and its dead. A crack of light breaches my intricate prison and I shift, twist only a fraction, to take advantage of its brightness — there …

The Fall Shall Further the Flight In Me By Rachael K. Jones There are things that fly and things that fall. You must remember this distinction, because they are not the same. Devils are flying things that learn to fall. Lovers are falling things that learn to fly. Do not confuse them. Saints do not …

What Glistens Back By Sunny Moraine Come back. You hear the call as the lander breaks up around you. You’re aware of the entirely arbitrary concepts of up and down before you realize what’s happening, and then they’re a lot less arbitrary. Down is not so much a direction as a function of possibility, of what might happen to you, of …

Your Body, By Default By Alexis Hunter They brought you back because they want something from you. Maybe one day they will bring people back because they can or because it’s the right thing to do — but for now there’s you and there’s them and there’s the unspoken obligations that lie between you both. […]

We All Scream By Marie Vibbert We weren’t, any of us, heroes. Aiden was a downright chicken. I’m allowed to say that; I love him. My husband doesn’t have to live up to your expectations of masculinity. I’ll beat the crap out of anyone who says otherwise. Me? I don’t stick my neck out. I […]

On the Fringes of the Fractal By Greg van Eekhout I was working the squirt station on the breakfast shift at Peevs Burgers when I learned that my best friend’s life was over. The squirt guns were connected by hoses to tanks, each tank containing a different slew formula. Orders appeared in lime-green letters on …

Ms. Figgle-DeBitt’s Home for Wayward A.I.s By Kurt Pankau I watch with hope as Ms. Figgle-DeBitt samples a slice of caramelized banana upside-down cake. She takes a nibble and seems pleased. She sweeps cybernetic fingers through the shock of gray hair that sits on the human half of her face, a gesture I’ve learned is […]

A House of Her Own By B. Balder Aoife was only eleven when she caught the little house in the forest. She surprised it as it drank from a puddle, half-hidden under a writhing tree root as large as her own body. Fast as an eel, she snaked her hand around it and held on …

Islands in the Dark By Sarah Goldman Road out from Kaysee was boring as ever. The kids we’d picked up this time weren’t anything to sneeze at: soft-spoken boy with eyes too teched up to blink, real young bratty kid who kept trying to backseat drive me from the hatch of a goddamn pickup, and a …

The Wind You Touch When You Run By James Beamon This pursuit starts as they all start, going after the Underground Railroad. It will end as it always ends, with us feeding the Minotaur. The in-between is where I tell tales. I wipe sweat from my eyes while my son Langston squints under the blue-white …

The Spice Portrait By J.M. Evenson They said my love for my daughter was excessive, that I made her weak by kissing her and singing in her ear at night. They also said I killed her. My mother did not believe in tenderness. She was gaunt, all teeth and hair, her face hard as a stone …

Planetbound By Nancy Fulda There’s a moment that comes, the first time you step on the rim of a planet, when you suddenly realize how breakable you are. When you finally understand that despite the bone density treatments, despite the braces cradling your back and legs, despite the half-dozen hands that support your first faltering […]

When All the Clocks Are Wrong By Beth Goder Jen locks her bike and heads towards the theater. She needs a break from studying, but more importantly, she needs to find Ash, who has her Soil Science notes. Jen promises herself she won’t try to kiss Ash–they’ll see the midnight movie, Ash will hand her the …

Four Seasons in the Forest of Your Mind By Caroline M. Yoachim Spring My tree is a pyramidal cell in the prefrontal cortex of your brain. There are millions of us here, in the forest of your brain, each with our own region to tend. My region is a single tree, for I am newly […]

Rocket Surgery By Effie Seiberg We’d tested plenty of missiles before, but Teeny was the only one that convulsed when we cut him open. Oh, your viewers need more background? OK, I’ll back up a bit. Lemme tell ya, kids today don’t know their history. Even locked up in here for the past ten years, …

Seb Dreams of Reincarnation By Aimee Ogden They unplugged Seb’s neurodes at the end of his ten-year tour of duty. He’d known it was coming, had been told before he ever signed the contract that if they left him in any longer his health would start to deteriorate. What they hadn’t mentioned was that his […]

By Gwendolyn Clare Read by Mur Lafferty Discuss on our forums. First appeared in Warrior Wisewoman 3 All stories by Gwendolyn Clare All stories read by Mur Lafferty Driving X by Gwendolyn Clare Carmela wouldn’t have stopped if she had known that the kid was still alive. She spotted the body lying under a creosote …

By Gwendolyn Clare Read by Mur Lafferty Discuss on our forums. Originally appeared in Asimov’s, 2011 All stories by Gwendolyn Clare All stories read by Mur Lafferty Rated 13 and up Ashes on the Water by Gwendolyn Clare I hoped that Ranjeet’s friends were as disreputable as promised. Ranjeet himself was late, of course. I’d …

The 1st Annual Lunar Biathlon By Rachael K. Jones Raji and I were always designing new torments for ourselves, and then calling them good, and running around the Moon was just the latest idea. We tattooed wedding bands on each other’s fingers after our courthouse elopement, and for good measure, each other’s names. Raji ran […]