via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io “Hello? Is anyone there? I can’t see. Is anyone out there?” “Yes, I’m here.” “Who are you? Where am I?” “I’m Kon. Can you tell me who you are?” “My name’s Harry. Harry Fitzpatrick. I’m an accountant for a firm on 8th street. I…I don’t know how I got…

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io A thin sunbeam streamed through a crack in the blinds. It lit John Kohl’s pregnant wife Angie as she snored quietly in bed. He sat at his desk drinking coffee. Watching her. via Pocket

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io It’s not easy being a psychopath. I’ve never felt a connection, and I’ve always been curious about what would happen if I did certain things to people or animals. via Pocket

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Skinjack | 365tomorrows via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2S25lYs We don’t like to use that word. It sounds negative, don’t you think? The whole procedure is much safer now. Please, try the caviar. It’s real. No, I insist. Our motto explains it all: “Freedom From Form.” Nobody uses their brain’s full processing po…

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Denizens of the Deep | 365tomorrows via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2S0y9QY Looking out. Or looking in. Do we stare into the expanse, or does it and its inhabitants look in on us? Which one of us is the exhibit in a zoo? In space, windows are structural weaknesses. Down here, if we have windows at all, they need to be over …

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io “Don’t act rash. It’s a small glitch. The error log’s sent and the patch fix will be here soon” Her voice now a car crash, teetering on the edge of conviction. Slumped in the kitchen drawer, I rose, wrestled despair from my hairy eyelids, then caugh… The Bad Patch | 365tomorrows via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2FZJBHT

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Well, nobody does. I like evenings along the Potomac, down near where my father worked; a civil engineer in the White House, he designed the new deep shelter and the tunnels. But I mostly stay in Silver Spring or Rock Creek Forest now. via Pocket Evening Sun Go Down | 365tomorrows via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2YNdx1j

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Two Cardinalis cardinalis, the northern cardinal. Five Zenaida macroura, the mourning dove. One Toxostoma rufum, the brown thrasher. And the highlight of the excursion – one Pandion haliaetus, an osprey! I couldn’t wait to tell Maria, but for now I … Take Two | 365tomorrows via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2YHhfcK

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Author: Will H. Blackwell, Jr. Three PM: As per daily routine, a 15-lb. allotment of raw horse-meat is cast, piecemeal, into the uncertain hollows of this Ohio cage. via Pocket Memories Inherent in the Afternoon | 365tomorrows via Instapaper https://ift.tt/30F8xMy

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io One of those tavern junkies invited me to the Skev for a brawl. I personally enjoyed these screw-ups. The one I talked to that night, around a week ago, was a tusked Griff named Young, and he was lean and almost terrifying. via Pocket Fregh and Young Brawl at the Skev | 365tomorrows via Instapaper https://ift.tt/30BmOtI

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Author: David C. Nutt We lost the robot revolution. Most of us missed it entirely and got the memo three or four days later when the internet came back on-line. Hey, we’re not as clueless as it sounds. via Pocket

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Summer 2039, Tokyo: Goats read the evening news on TV. Goats? Yes! Take it, or leave it! Not goats, Sam! Kamala had once corrected me. I had been silent then. via Pocket Goats in my Family | 365tomorrows via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2OhQmuS

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io The fan on the ceiling turns slowly, another kitsch feature of this fake colonial era hospital. I do not know when hospitals started to compete for trade, but the ‘healing ambience’ vogue has been out of control – and good taste – for a while. via P… Dark Chambers of My Heart | 365tomorrows via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2JHEmi0

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Distant stars blinked over Buguma island in the lower southern delta of West Africa. Sea waves turned, crickets droned, and guinea fowl warbled. I was on a forest path, walking to my village, looking over my shoulder, for I could hear something lurk…

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io

It is strange to imagine that serpent-men might love serpents. After all, they go to great lengths to wreak destruction on the beasts, travelling far out on the fickle and changing sea to slay them. One might not imagine, too, that serpent-men love …

The first catechism of Eulalia is DIVERSITY LEADS TO STRENGTH. Its sigil is a square made of four interlocked components, reminiscent of hands each grasping the wrist of the next, forming a box. via Pocket

There were many in the beginning, dozens of basil seedlings basking under the warm sky and nodding dreamily at one another as if to say, “you’re growing, as am I, and that is right and good. via Pocket

As she trudged down the alley, out of sight of the grey uniforms, Cenessa saw a small puddle. But how? via Pocket

Sona, on a quest for vengeance, has enlisted help of the Six Named to play a piece of heretical Music composed by his mother, the Lady Kristyk. via Pocket

Sonata II Shailani – L. Chan – Metaphorosis Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/38vK5Rj This is part 2 of L. Chan’s novella, Sonata. Part 1 ran in January 2020. What has gone before: Sona has travelled north, up the lawless swathes of the Periphery of the Empire Sound. He’s enlisted the help of Shailani, a former soldier with the Imper…

There’s a packet of powder taped to my inner thigh, and it feels like the plastic is burning a hole through my leg. Two police officers wave me towards the chem-detecting archway—one last hurdle before I can board the ferry. via Pocket The Propagator – Simone Kern – Metaphorosis Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/343ZdEC

Inquisitator’s Log: July 11, 20—; 11:53 pm The Donald Q. Haute residence, Springstump Township The electromail came in the night, heralded by a ping from my desktop computing-box. via Pocket

There is a city where the outer walls shift and entrances dance away, so that a passerby might think they are merely approaching from the wrong side. via Pocket There is a City, He Told Me – Evan James Sheldon – Metaphorosis Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2TqS2TA