Stories
SENTIENT AGGRESSIVE URBAN-LITTORAL LIFEFORM by T.H.Dray
Perched atop the highest vantage on Craig Street, webbed feet splayed upon a rain slick roof, I survey my territory. A wide thoroughfare of mixed domiciles: four-in-a-block roughcast flats and a cluster of new builds. North, lies a T-junction leading to a busy dual carriageway. To the south; a large supermarket with deep and luscious industrial bins.
The Last Call of the Deep-Lyndsey Croal
They say her teeth are carved from fallen stars, strong like diamonds.
They say her skin is formed of the sun, glittering silver and gold.
They say her eyes are powered by the moon, jewelled beacons in the deep.
They say she has lived for thousands of years.
They say she’s the last of her kind.
Oh Baby Teeth Johnny With Your Radiant Grin, Let’s Unroll on Moonlight and Gin by Cat Hellisen
It doesn’t matter how this begins.
I’ve had three glasses of what passes for gin in Eight to the Bar, and something that the bartender called rum but tasted like motor oil and gunpowder.
I’m not drunk. I’m just talking out loud to myself.
It doesn’t matter how many times you’ve died and died and died again, and rolled and rolled and rerolled yourself together.
Targets by Eric Brown
I was watching the three-dee with Kelly when the programme was interrupted.
“Uh-oh,” she said.
I gripped her hand. “Don’t worry.”
She turned and stared at me, the hologram pulsing on her forehead.
I stared at the three-dee in the corner. The frame was empty; then a tall man in a black suit appeared.
The Cuddle Stop
Arrivals was a nightmare, queuing for decontamination. But there was such a warmth to the wooden panels lining the walls. I had to lean in to smell them: printed. In between that thought and the long inhale, I imagined the ‘ponics needed to grow pine, bamboo, thick enough to create a veneer.