The Astral Queen
The Astral Queen landed on the planet's surface. The pilot descended. Wind whipped her face and her green skin was blasted by sand. She surveyed the land. Black clouds blotted out sky and sun. Mangled metal towers sprouted from dunes of ash and sand. She turned and boarded. Inside she paused before a glass chamber. […]
The Streets Turned Blue and Green
“The whole neighbourhood is abandoned.” Aleyah adjusted her hijab and grinned at her two friends. “Literally.” They dangled their legs from the edge of the floating school. At this time of day, the great Neo-Mahaweli River surged through Colombo, its tides raised by the drainage canals and influx from the mangrove belt. “Nobody cleaned it […]
Sea Change
The Sea was rising; there was no doubt about it. Tiuwike had heard the grownups converse about it in hushed voices, falling silent if children were visible—frequently, however, the children were invisible but within earshot (the children held their own councils). Of course, it was also possible that the Island upon which they lived was […]
In the Event of a Famine
“Everything in this house is edible,” the real estate agent said. “I mean everything, the foundation, the brickwork, the plaster, the windows. That is to say, in the event of a famine, a family of three would be able to survive for approximately ten years eating the house.” I studied the dark-hued foyer. A minimalist […]
Regenesis
Beyond a small dark door, in the magical-genomic laboratory of Irindeh University of Subtle Mechanics, Nenadi’s mistake waited. Nenadi guided Anahah, her partner-in-all-things, past the scarred worktops and equipment cabinets, all dyed crimson by the light that filtered through an afternoon dust blizzard. Golden sensory circuits glinted in Anahah’s terracotta skin. “And you want to […]
Chaser
Cara thumbed off the launcher’s safety, wishing she could as easily shut down the monster-sized butterflies bouncing around in her belly. Though not her first time in the field, it was her first time leading a team she’d built herself. It was also her first time firing live chill-mines in the field. She’d done it […]
The Barber of Manaus
Felipe Santos da Silva swallowed. His palms were slick with sweat—whether due to the tropical heat or his nerves, he couldn’t tell. He looked at the city that, twenty years earlier, had been a boomtown, the jewel of the Amazon rain forest. Before the population decline that started in the early 2020s began to take […]
This is an Optimistic Science Fiction Story About the Future
We all have jetpacks. I’m an old, overweight man with hairy legs, and I have a jetpack. No one judges and the jetpacks don’t care. They run on clean energy and smell like sesame seeds. The right-of-way laws are complicated. The danger of jetpack injuries results in a new type of “helicopter parent,” though some […]
False Alarm
The bickering voices behind him, Mayor Edmund Parker stood at his study’s west window. He looked down Belmont Hill, out over the rest of his city, Boston, and to the pepper fields beyond. Tall, lean, famously blue-eyed and grey-haired, he allowed himself a scowl. He was a politician, yes, but a businessman first. He didn’t […]
The Evac
The landing craft shook like an ancient washing machine as it broke the planet’s atmosphere. Staff Sergeant Jacqueline “Jax” Caruthers, 5th Planetary Beachhead Division, 3rd Space Wing, United Nations Marine Corps, sat cool as a cucumber, gnawing her bubblegum. The dropship, unwilling to land without a fight, gave one final lurch before touching down. Jax […]
