She had never slept so well as when she was in space. Even when she dreamed that gray, dome-headed aliens were tapping at the windows of the shuttle. Karen sat up in the bed when she heard the bot coming, though it took some painful effort. via Pock… Clarkesworld Magazine - Science Fiction & Fantasy When Home, No Need to Cry by Erin K. Wagner via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2Eq9zCI via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io

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

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Aimee’s big trick is that she makes 26 monkeys vanish on stage. She pushes out a claw-foot bathtub and asks audience members to come up and inspect it. The people climb in and look underneath, touch the white enamel, run their hands along the little…

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io It’s a very old trope in fantasy stories and games: the wizard or healer who needs an incredibly rare, delicate, or deadly flower, leaf, root, or bark for a critical bit of magic, and the plant from which it grows may only be found an inconvenient d…

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io My name is Tetley Abednego and I am the most hated girl in Garbagetown. I am nineteen years old. via Pocket

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Towering cliffs topped with bright lush greenery. Cold clean waves crashing against the stone below, sleek gray clouds swirling through the unbound sky above. A woman dances along the edge, her long hair and scarf whipped wild by the wind. via Pocket

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Serolar existed in a state of curfew and of anticipation. Steam-powered mini-dirigibles issuing directives from the Governor’s Palace traveled from quarter to quarter every afternoon. Every seventh-day or so, klaxons wailed while the dirigibles advi…

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

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 "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 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…

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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

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…

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

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

When the dog dies, she doesn’t know she is dying. You shouldn’t feel sorry for her. To her, life lasts forever.  Infants and dogs recognize the flow of time, but not their presence in it. via Pocket

Each morning is a decision. Should I put on the brown mask or the blue? Should I be a tradesman or an assassin today? Whatever the queen demands, of course, I am. But so often she ignores me, and I am left to figure out for myself who to be. via Poc… via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest; Red Mask, Black Mask, Gentleman, Beast | Apex Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2Hzt7aG

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io This one was made of glass. He wasn’t all that similar to my son, but he was sweet with a high, gentle voice like wind blowing across branches. via Pocket

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Black stone lying on a white stone. César Vallejo, the author of the poem “Black stone lying on a white stone,” was a Peruvian writer living in Spain in the 1930s when he succumbed to an infection turned totalitarian. via Pocket Toward a New Lexicon of Augury | Apex Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2zuMo7L via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io

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

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io My parents were offered the usual platitudes: Einstein did not speak until he was in primary school(not true); did you try a body-based therapy(the answer a horrified “no!”); she will never shut up when she starts(in high school, I would often go fo… The Prison-house of Language | Apex Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2C5Xn9Q

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io Poets and sages like to say that there is clarity in certain death. That a calm resignation settles over the nearly deceased, and they embrace the inevitability of the end of life with dignity and grace. via Pocket Ghosts of New York | Apex Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2CgiA0E

via FREE Fiction / Raindrop.io https://raindrop.io MS. Orre. 1013A Miscellany of materials copied from within Master Leuwin Orrerel’s (d. Lady Year 673, Bright Be the Edges) library by Dominic Merrowin (d. Lady Year 673, Bright Be the Edges). via Pocket The Green Book | Apex Magazine via Instapaper https://ift.tt/2CgiJRK