via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io You couldn’t talk about the Helmets, which looked pretty ordinary displayed in a glass case in the lobby of the Smash Pad, the converted mattress warehouse where we practiced. via Pocket

She had known that she would end up like this, but she gave in. Lights. Music. She closed her eyes. In a sea of beautiful visages, she reached out to the one and only beloved face. “Thoreau—I know it’s a meaningless name to you all. Yet this Thoreau…

I know what Dave wants even before he says it, before I’ve even taken off my stupid work cap or thrown my keys on top of the pile of crap beside the door. via Pocket

Szanna, do you remember this game from the twentieth century? Skip along the informational alleys of realspace, leap the archives inter-generationally. A descending white cascade of snow. #FFFFFF. Pixelated scrub. You’re a miniscule skier. via Pocket

The Eagle Knight came like a star in midday. I looked up, and I saw the profile of his helmet’s beak so sharp against the light, the golden feathers of his wings so bright in the glare of the sun. As though he were Huitzilopochtli himself. And then …

With a clunk, the shaking of the hawk-eagle came to a stop. After confirming through the monitor that the spaceship’s four legs were properly grounded in the beansprout garden, Brook got out of the pilot’s seat, put on the helmet of her spacesuit, a…

In the giant arachnid’s shadow, her silken face mask—Uranian-blue, luminescent, and vaguely human in countenance—was always a welcome focal point. via Pocket

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io "Always." At the moment I'm standing in my darkened cabin at base camp in Mare Nubium. By headlamp only I carve a chess piece—a knight—out of moon rock. I'd crushed one earlier after Tchaikovsky called me out on a dumb move. The screen and radio cut…

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io “That’s Ifenwa,” the captain said, pointing at a smear of light almost directly overhead. Inlesh repeated the name dutifully to himself. “That’s Ontok.” A pentagon of bright sparks halfway up the sky. “They’ve each got their own names, but you don’t… Shattered Sidewalks of the Human Heart by Sam J. Miller Clarkesworld Magazine - Science Fiction & Fantasy via Instapaper https://ift.tt/325fgRm

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io My grandfather was a rickshaw coolie. He was born in China in the late 19th century, in a tiny village upriver from the coast of Fujian province. It was a time of misfortune. The rice harvests had failed. The landlords were heartless. His mother had… Xingzhou by Ng Yi-Sheng Clarkesworld Magazine - Science Fiction & Fantasy via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2YsmaxV

Shenroos is a lucky man. He can relax at a fireplace in green velvet on the moon. He is lucky because he has solitude. Eight days, he has been the sole inhabitant of Draftyhouse. via Pocket

“The king certainly likes fire,” said Cohl. We could see the smoke rise from beyond, from another forest. I pulled off my gloves and rubbed my back. Once we relaxed like this, I could feel all my muscles ache. Cohl took a bite of the lump in his han…

Thrsk is, or claims to be, the only town in England without a vowel to, or in, its name. People who live there say the Vikings carried it off a thousand years ago. via Pocket

By David Hering. I The street is wrong; it is obvious now. On the way back to the house, wrapped square in right-hand pocket, the disarrangement is visible to her. It is in the position of the branches. via Pocket

By Mazin Saleem. via Pocket

By Greg Gerke. There were many things he did wrong in the relationship, though calling her cold-hearted slag and ripping the picture of them at Niagara Falls were not part of the many, but more an assertion of his masculinity—through admittedly femi…

There’s blood on Dee’s jacket. Dee reckons Bobby knows where he took the dog. “I buried him after.” “I didn’t want him to go. But you took him. Now you’re sayin you think I wouldn’t wanna say goodbye to my fuckin dog?” via Pocket

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io At sunfall, the sellward, the spellcaster, and the wyrmrider paused at the foot of a dune and peered at the sun wester across the Sahael, the sea of sand. They had walked thirty days and were yet to come upon an oasis, caravan, or waykeep. At this r…

You’d think it would make us happy when a kid checks out the same book a zillion times in a row, but actually it just keeps us up at night. The Runaway Prince is one of those low-budget young adult fantasies from the mid-nineties, before J.K. via Po… A Witch’s Guide to Escape A Practical Compendium of Portal Fantasies | Apex Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2C1ax4Y

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io “Shit,” Charlotte Berry whispered as the fog of sleep began to clear. She heard Arthur fumbling in the bathroom cabinet and saw his reflection in the mirror, salt-and-pepper hair and a small bald spot as he hunched over, a medicine bottle close to h… Fugue State | Apex Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2JWuf85

In memory of Bob Yano Sr. As the house A.I., she always projected her voice as if just around a corner or down a hall, and it gave the illusion that a real person waited barely out of sight. via Pocket Master Brahms | Apex Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2S6FOvZ via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io

Alec Chu traveled the high road, swinging his bot through the trees. The wet branches shook with the storm’s convulsions but penetrating the kidnapper’s camp perimeter was easy from up here, and the rain and wind didn’t touch him. Not in the Hole. v… Riding the Signal | Apex Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2BBnxRS via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io

THE MAGICAL NEGRO—It’s easy to believe that this trope came from a good place or at least rose out of benign neglect. After all, a white writer is “writing what they know” or appealing to their target demographic, which is typically people like them…

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Welcome to Your Authentic Indian Experience™ | Apex Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2ul7GB6 In the Great American Indian novel, when it is finally written, all of the white people will be Indians and all of the Indians will be ghosts. You maintain a menu of a half dozen Experiences on your digital blackboard, but Vision Quest is the one th…

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The little girl reached up and tugged on her mother’s sleeve. “Mommy. That man’s here again!” The woman looked over at the odd man who’d been at the park for the last several weekends to see that he was, indeed, smiling at them and waving. via Pocket Godzilla vs Buster Keaton, Or I Didn’t Even Need a Map | Apex Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2OHrQyu via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io