Keoki’s Unfortunate Business

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by C.A. Fulwell

When Keoki lost the client in the jungle mist, he feared for his reputation, his business. That was hours ago, in daylight.

Dog-tired, he hunted for the clumsy, rich, white woman playing Lara Croft, with perfect teeth and $300 nails.

Piercing cackles from the dark triggered goosebumps on his arms. Laughing gulls—noisy fuckers.

The air grew cold. More gulls. Then whispers. Keoki froze.

A hiss. The arrow struck his calf; as Keoki buckled, breathless, the archer emerged, naked, bloodied. Cruel laughter from the trees: not gulls. More crimson nightmares appeared.

The archer drew her bow, smiling with perfect teeth.

C.A. Fulwell

C.A. Fulwell is an author from Oxfordshire, England, where he lives with his wife and two young children. His work has been accepted for publication at 101 Words. When not writing, he can often be found snacking, or thinking about writing.

Instagram: @caf.writer

 

 

Alive in the Jungle

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by Jonathan Worlde

Damp ferns conceal my position. The relentless beast draws nearer, but I’m not defeated that easily. I must survive for the sake of my unborn. This creature is gigantic, but I can play that against it. I have stealth on my side. The early jungle mist provides cover. When it passes by this tree where I perch, I can use the element of surprise, targeting a vulnerable spot.

Here it comes, close enough. I leap, my eight legs gripping tight. I’m driving venomous fangs into the human’s exposed neck. Screaming, he crashes to the jungle floor and into my web.

Jonathan Worlde

Jonathan Worlde’s novel, Latex Monkey with Banana, was winner of the Hollywood Discovery Award. He has over forty mostly speculative stories published in various journals, including Cirque Journal, Raven Review, Antietam Review and Gettysburg Review, most recently Mystery Tribune, Stupefying Stories, and Daily SF.

 

 

Sleepless

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by Patrick Campbell

Months after returning, he still awoke at night sweat-drenched with lingering dreams of the terrors that had kept him awake in the Amazon. Spiders that lay eggs under your skin. Parasites that swim up your urethrae. Frogs that paralyse you with venom.

He inspected the bite on his hand. The guide had said it was nothing, but it wasn’t healing.

He poked it.

The scab moved. Broke.

There was something underneath.

A thin black spindle emerged: a spider’s leg.

He awoke breathless. A dream. Thank God. He turned to his wife lying beside him. Eight black beady eyes stared back.

Patrick Campbell

Patrick Campbell resides in Birmingham, UK, where he writes to exercise his demons. Find more of his work at:

Website: linktr.ee/PatrickCampbellWriter

 

Foraged

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by Amy Tasillo

We’re lost, but that’s beside the point. I don’t know how long we’ve been wandering—I remember nothing before we ate the fruit. We grabbed it by the handful and ate desperately. It grew low over the forest floor, its crimson inside gelatinous and painfully tart.

Feeling dizzy, I yell, “Stop.”

The man walking ahead of me calls back, but I can’t understand a word. All I can tell is the ground beneath me is breathing. And I’m running, and the sky is green, and something is following me. And there’s no man ahead of me, and possibly never was.

Amy Tasillo

Amy Tasillo is a writer and filmmaker based in New York City. She lives with her extremely judgmental Jack Russell Terrier mix. Her screenplays and short fiction focus primarily on gothic fantasy, and she works as an educational animator by day.

 

Forbidden Fruit

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by Randall Andrews

From the look of it, the jungle Kai and I are gathering fruit in could be the Amazon back on Earth. But it’s not. Not by twenty light years.

“Have you tried one of these apple-looking things?” he asks as he reaches for a low-hanging branch.

I fail to respond because I’m distracted by a message from base camp. The scientists have finished dissecting the giant snake the soldiers killed. They’re intrigued by the bulbous red tip of the creature’s tongue, and I can see why. In the picture, it looks just like an apple.

“Kai, check this out. Kai…?”

Randall Andrews

Randall Andrews is the author of two books, Finding Hour Way and The Last Guardian of Magic, which won the National Indie Excellence Award. His shorter works have appeared in places like Abyss & Apex, Space & Time, Mystery Tribune, and Sci-Fi Lampoon. Check out the books at:

Website: thelastguardianofm.wix.com/author

Home

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by Amanda Bergloff

“You’re not my family!”

“We are now, Zuri, and when you call us, we will always answer.”

Zuri paced the floor, remembering their last words to him. Words that bound him to them.

Words that condemned him.

You’re not my family, Zuri thought when the pain drove him to his knees…his mouth fixed in a soundless scream as his bones realigned and shaped into something no longer human.

The howl that finally broke loose from him was answered by the ones in the distance, understanding his longing to join them in his new form.

Understanding his need to come home.

Amanda Bergloff

Amanda Bergloff is a speculative fiction writer who has had short stories included in anthologies published by World Weaver Press, Darkhouse Books, and Transmundane Press, among others. She lives in Denver, Colorado, and collects vintage toys and books.

Father’s Hungry

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by Ryan Van Ells

Father hasn’t eaten. His rumble reverberates from the basement stairs, rattling the walls.

Mother is little more than a skeleton, unable to feed him. Your sister trembles beside you. The noises scare her.

You go down the basement steps.

Father, too large to move, lies in his too small bed. A malodorous rot burns your nostrils. His greedy eyes fixate on you and he wriggles excitedly.

You extend the crook of your elbow to his mouth. He opens his toothless mouth like a babbling babe. You bring the knife to your vein. Blood wells. He clamps down and slowly sucks.

Ryan Van Ells

Ryan Van Ells is a queer author and lawyer from Wisconsin. You can find him @ryanvanellswrites on Instagram and Bluesky.

Dad’s Secrets

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by Jordan Chase-Young

Candice sneaks into Dad’s lab using the passcode she watched him enter through her binoculars.

The lab is cold and dark, hissing with fluids and stinking of formaldehyde.

What greets her first is a cross between cat and spider. She doesn’t know whether to pet it or run.

“Winston?” she whispers. “Is that…you?”

The spidercat’s ears twitch; eight moist eyes ogle her.

The next thing is a mix of garter snake and goldfish. Her goldfish.

More hybrids come out of the dark, one by one, crowding her.

One speaks: half-pillbug, half-boy. “Daddy said you’re not meant to be here.”

Jordan Chase-Young

Jordan Chase-Young is an American-Australian SFF writer. He’s obsessed with the future: What will it look like? What sorts of creatures will shape it? His stories have appeared in Clarkesworld, F&SF, Escape Pod, and many other publications.

The Look

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by Weird Wilkins

As a child, I always feared the picture my mother kept by her bedside. I never understood why she would frame an image of such a grotesque monster. It looked like a man deformed in ways I can barely fathom. Those bulging eyes, skin so pallid it was translucent, sunken cheeks and swollen lips.

“He didn’t always look that way.” She’d tell me, but I didn’t believe her. How could a man become something so haunting?

It’s a question I never wanted answered, yet the answer becomes clearer every day.

I really am starting to resemble my dear old dad…

Weird Wilkins

Weird Wilkins is long-time writing enthusiast taking the terrifying plunge into the world of actually submitting work for publication. He’s rooted firmly in the “weird fiction” subgenre of horror with a particular passion for stories revolving around a mounting sense of dread and healthy lashings of body horror. He plans to forge a reputation as a purveyor of frightful short stories in both collaborative collections and his own anthologies.

Twitter: @WeirdWilkins

Picking Off a Bloody Show-Off

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by C.L. Sidell

Uncle’s hosting this year’s family get-together.

I steer along the winding road. Birdsong floats through the open windows, spring foliage perfumes my nose.

Reaching Uncle’s cabin, I spy a tattered man running towards me from the woods.

“Help!”

He extends bloodied hands, right as a pinwheeling hatchet strikes him dead.

Uncle strides into view, smiling sheepishly. “Shoot”—he yanks blade from bone—“I thought the party was tomorrow.”

“You just wanted to show off,” I reply, eye-rolling. “But the best hunter catches their mark completely off-guard.”

Stealthily, I remove the pick hidden in my braid.

I really cannot stomach braggarts.

C.L. Sidell

A native Floridian, C. L. Sidell grew up playing with toads in the rain and indulging in speculative fiction. Her work has appeared in Cosmic Background, Factor Four Magazine, F&SF, Martian Magazine, Stupefying Stories, and others.

Website: crystalsidell.wixsite.com/mysite/publications