by Blaise Langlois Route 37 at night is a lonely stretch. My eyelids feel the weight of sleep, but the next exit promises 24-hour coffee. The car lot, bathed in a sick, yellow light, is practically deserted. I order a coffee and venture round back to use the restroom, but a foul smell makes […]
Two friends find themselves stranded in a merciless desert. Their journey quickly turns from a fight against the elements to a chilling struggle for sanity.
by C.L. Steele Hunched over, his glass head slid across the ceiling tiles of her office. She cowered in the corner. She could see through his pristine cyan outline—a glass man. His protracted fingers extracted her with an ease that whispered experience. She trembled in the valley of his palm. He examined her with […]
by John Lane Born in a pan of green beef, seventy-five of us reached maturity in two to three days. We laughed when Mom warned that “talls” wanted us dead. Our compound eyes and thin wings could evade them. Or so we thought. The “talls” caught us while we rubbed our six legs on […]
by Miriam H. Harrison They had warned us of giants, and so we watched for the swaying of trees, the sudden flight of birds. Yet all around us were silent forests and barren hills. From the highest of these summits we could see even more of this land, unclaimed and quiet. “Have you ever […]
by Chris Bannor They towered above us, blocking out the sun in their magnificence. We tried to fight, but how do you stop a creature so massive it engulfs your house with a single footstep? The government made mechanical monstrosities to combat the invaders, but the damage grew worse. The aliens came to subjugate, […]
V.A. Vazquez: My husband loves to speculate about the day-to-day lives of henchmen in action films. Like when they go home for dinner at night, do they have to explain to their spouses that Mr. Big Baddie spent a billion dollars on a laser gun instead of making a larger contribution to their 401(k)s? When it’s Career Day at school, how do they explain their profession to a group of fidgety four-year-olds? Do we see so many British henchmen because they don’t need private medical insurance through their employers? So when I was asked to write a story for 13 Victims, I decided I wanted to write about two low-level drones who get caught up in trouble that’s way above their pay grade.
by Bernardo Villela It was a marvellous night to sleep under the stars. Soon, I awoke. The moonlight seemed wrong somehow. Rubbing sleep from my eyes, I saw massive branches asway. Not branches but antennae, leading to a gargantuan ovoid shadow blotting out the moon. I couldn’t be seeing what I thought I was […]
by N.E. Rule Khiiki strokes the silky hair through the cage bars, pleading, “Dad, I can’t choose.” “Darling, we can’t get both. They’re cute, but when they mature, they won’t like this handling.” Tsts nods at his spawn tickling the female’s belly. “This male will grow hair everywhere, it needs constant grooming.” What Tsts […]
by Joe Buckley So hard to hide at this size. Even harder to protest innocence. The littles never want to talk. They never give up the chase. They swarm and bite and buzz. He cannot hear a word, but he knows the sound of hate. So easy to run at this size. Leaping bounds […]