Dark Moments

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Theme: May 2026 - Discount Superheroes

Give us your discount champions, knock-off crusaders, and bargain-bin defenders. The ones whose powers should never have made it past quality control.

Perhaps they can communicate with animals—but only through their little toes. Perhaps they can curl paper with a glare, summon mildly damp socks, or predict events that happened three minutes ago. Maybe their enchanted sword is possessed by a petty bureaucrat. Maybe their cape won't stop offering terrible advice.

We want flawed heroes, failed heroes, accidental heroes, antiheroes, and those who were never hero material in the first place. Show us sidekicks who seize power, relic-bearers corrupted by trinkets from dubious sources, and small-time guardians whose tiny gifts lead to enormous disasters.

Give us magical mishaps, catastrophic misunderstandings, ego-driven crusades, and powers so laughably specific they should be harmless—until they're not.

Blend fantasy, horror, dark humour, speculative fiction, and twisted adventure. Make us laugh. Make us cringe. Make us wonder how anyone thought handing this person magical abilities was a good idea.

The fate of the world has never rested in less capable hands.

This theme will be open for submissions from 1st JUNE 2026 and will close midnight 30th JUNE 2026 (last place on Earth). Submissions received outside of this timeframe will not be read.

You must include the theme in your email subject (as shown above). Reading will start once the submission period has closed.

The BEST 12 drabbles will be chosen for publication in JULY 2026.

• Word count : EXACTLY 100 words, excluding title and pen name
• Author eligibility : Open to all.
• Reprints : Not allowed
• Simultaneous Submissions : Not allowed. Please do not submit your story to other publishers while it's under our consideration. As a small team, we focus our efforts on pieces with a genuine chance of publication, and we appreciate your respect for our time and process.
• Multiple Submissions : One per pen name, per theme. If you send more than one, we will reject them all, unread.
• Publication : Online in Dark Moments.  May be included in a single anthology in print and digital formats at a later date (but within one year of initial publication)
• Author compensation : 0.04 USD per word via PayPal

Submit to : darkmoments@BlackHarePress.com

Don't forget to check out our Submission Guidelines.