Science Fiction & Fantasy

DesertCreatures_LightspeedAds_1_5

Advertisement

Illustrated Stories

Science Fiction

Surfacing

by Marissa Lingen

Author spotlight

Mishy had lived in the undersea city for twenty years. When she went down in the submersible, she was very young and very frightened, all bones and worries, but the years under the water did not feel like they had aged her on the inside. It was only when she had to look at the others that she could see that she was different after all.

In Mar. 2015 (Issue 58)

Science Fiction

And You Shall Know Her By The Trail Of Dead

by Brooke Bolander

Author spotlight

The mobster has a gun pressed to Rack’s forehead. The mobster has a god-shitting GUN pressed to her partner’s fucking forehead, and the only thing Rhye can do is watch and scream as the man smiles at her and pulls the trigger and blows Rack’s perfect brains out from between his ears.

In Feb. 2015 (Issue 57)

Science Fiction

He Came From a Place of Openness and Truth

by Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam

Author spotlight

Mickey and I worked together at Hillman’s Horror House, and maybe the thrill of scaring people was what made me notice him. I’d never thought about another guy that way before, and so when I first got that electric jolt as his hand brushed mine in the changing room, I felt like I might puke. I went to the bathroom, where instead of throwing up I jacked off into the toilet.

In Jan. 2015 (Issue 56)

Science Fiction

Pay Phobetor

by Shale Nelson

Author spotlight

8:00 PM: Congratulations! Your MindPlant has been successfully updated to version 5.0. You can now enjoy enhanced versions of all of your favorite think-apps, including text, email, social networking, and GPS, all delivered directly to your brain at lightning speeds. Platinum users enjoy access to our full library of XP technology apps: movies, games, books, and TV shows you can “experience” with all five senses.

In Dec. 2014 (Issue 55)

Science Fiction

What Glistens Back

by Sunny Moraine

Author spotlight

Come back. You hear the call as the lander breaks up around you. You’re aware of the entirely arbitrary concepts of up and down before you realize what’s happening, and then they’re a lot less arbitrary. Down is not so much a direction as a function of possibility, of what might happen to you, of what is happening now. You finally get down as an idea.

In Nov. 2014 (Issue 54)

Science Fiction

Dust

by Daniel José Older

Author spotlight

Very late at night, when the buzz of drill dozers has died out, I can hear her breathing. I know that sounds crazy. I don’t care. Tonight, I have to concentrate extra hard because there’s a man lying beside me; he’s snoring with the contented abandon of the well-fucked and all that panting has heavied up the air in my quarters.

In Oct. 2014 (Issue 53)

Science Fiction

Starfall

by Saundra Mitchell

Author spotlight

KV-62 went supernova today. Well, according to the news, it went supernova on March 14, 1592, but we’re just now finding out about it. Other things that happened on this day in history: Eli Whitney got a patent for the cotton gin, Charles I granted a royal charter to the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and I was fished out of a trash can in the Union Square subway station.

In Sep. 2014 (Issue 52)

Science Fiction

Herd Immunity

by Tananarive Due

Author spotlight

A man was far ahead of her on the road. Walking and breathing. So far, so good. That he was a man, Nayima was certain. His silhouette against the horizon of the rising roadway showed his masculine height and the shadow of an unkempt beard.

In Sep. 2014 (Issue 52)

Science Fiction

Undermarket Data

by An Owomoyela

Author spotlight

A drink arrived that Culin hadn’t ordered. No one sent drinks to the crowded annex where Culin sat, crammed in with seven other people, all with contagion bands on their sleeves and matching tattoos on their arms. Sending drinks was an affectation Culin didn’t see much in the Dead Engine at all.

In Aug. 2014 (Issue 51)

Science Fiction

The New Provisions

by Adam-Troy Castro

Author spotlight

Phil called the toll-free number he’d been given, and after the usual twenty-minute hold time, reached a human being who explained that the tow truck driver really did have the right to haul away his car. It didn’t matter that the car had been parked in his driveway or that it had been completely paid for, and it certainly didn’t matter that it was the only form of transportation he and his wife had for getting back and forth from work.

In Jul. 2014 (Issue 50)