Stories
Fiction & Micro-Fiction
Twenty-four Blackbirds and the Great Blue Heron
Twenty-four blackbirds perched on a fence, observing a great blue heron in the drainage ditch before them. The ditch itself had about six inches of water in it, remnants of the previous night’s storm. The heron wasn’t doing anything in particular besides just standing...
Elder
Isme Blackwell played her flashlight off the walls of the warehouse. It was empty except for the racks, which stood like steel skeletons shadowed in the darkness. The place was perfectly silent, making her sneakered footfalls uncomfortably loud to her ears. The air...
Come This Far
The engines were down. Again. The Maritime Law had been adrift in space for several hours now, the latest in a series of malfunctions to the ship. Aston was at his wit’s end trying to solve the problem. “Malcolm, what’s our current position?” he called out. The...
The Key
The key didn't work. Which was confusing because he'd made the thing himself, and it had worked the first few times he'd used it. The keyhole in the back of her head hadn't changed. He was sure of that. But then, he was sure the key would still work, too, and it now...
Spawn
The children were shocked. Literally. The bolt of electricity that ran through them should have killed them all. But these children were no ordinary children. They were the children of a demon. Their systems were overloaded, yes, but they were also turbocharged. Their...
Stormy Weather
The wind howls outside my bedroom window. A tree branch, swaying in the wind, raps against the glass, tck tcking in an irregular rhythm. There are voices in that tempest, voices that I can just barely make out. They speak to me of times long past, of errors made and...
Critter
I have a sinking sensation in the pit of my stomach. That's where it lives. The critter, if you can call it that. It burrowed into my torso, and it took up residence there. All I can see of it is its mouth, sticking out of my abdomen, and it is insatiably hungry. I...
Crow
The crow talks to me. It sits on the road sign, with its black eyes, its black beak, and its black feathers, and it speaks to me. I don’t understand the words — they’re in bird, of course. But the words come, all the same. They take up space inside my mind,...
Pain
The lingering pain. It's all I can think about. It dwells in my consciousness like an open wound, even though there is no injury to be found. It's like fire in my flesh, a deep, crippling fury that makes me lose my sanity at times. I never should have made a deal with...