What inspired you to create the dystopian world of the seven corporations?

For this piece I started out with two clear things: the title and the image of Zan’s father being this sort of harbinger of doom. The title being clear was a rarity; that’s almost always one of the last elements I solidify. Between that and my frustrations at healthcare woes, rent increases, and just trying to survive under capitalism, the rest of “Seven Obelisks” unfurled.

The corporate structure of this story is absolutely inspired by cyberpunk as a genre overall as well as my own queer disabled American experiences beholden to a healthcare company, always praying I won’t go into debt over medical bills. It’s not the most unique element, but cyberpunk has always called to me because of its anticapitalism components. And often its transhumanism ones, but that features less in this story. I think dystopian stories that call out power imbalances are very, very important. Also, I just wanted to experience some catharsis over two queer people connecting in spite of everything and also changing things. It’s not quite that simple in actuality, but sometimes in fiction it’s nice that it can be that simple.

One aspect of the story that I found fascinating was Zan’s ability to create “glass-rendered constructs” that influence a person’s sense of reality. How did you develop this idea? Why did you end up using glass as a material?

I was inspired by the visual of it rather than the logistics—I have no clue if we could actually make glass-rendered anything, though that would be neat. Science, please fulfill my dreams. But it was the image of glass and beautiful structures essentially being paywalled that clicked for me as a good and immediate cue about the power structure in the story. Plus, some of the visual elements especially at the end, with the glass office, were just cool! The fragility and slightly archaic but high-tech combination spoke to me.

Also, I’ve been longing for the late 90s/early 00s see-through tech and by those powers combined: glass-rendered constructs! I love SFF because I can play around with what is real and what isn’t. That factors in as well.

As a reader, I found the way the story gave me small moments of worldbuilding while keeping the focus on Zan’s mission to be really effective at building up intrigue throughout the story. Do you have a process for deciding when you want to introduce new ideas/world building in your stories?

Thank you! This is one of the biggest compliments I could receive because I often struggle with worldbuilding in short fiction! Which is to say I overdo it on the worldbuilding, so it often feels like I’ve stuffed a novel setting into a short piece. It’s the most common piece of feedback I receive. For “Seven Obelisks” in particular I wrote three separate versions and angsted over the pacing and exposition for months. Shoutout to the folks who beta read all three versions for me. Ultimately, it was this third version that made it. It’s a blend of the worldbuilding rich exposition of the first version and the more cinematic heist-y elements that focus on Zan and Luciana of the second. But really, I just like building worlds, they’re often as much a character as the characters themselves.

Zan’s ability to create an “infected construct” seems connected to their sense of reality and emotions. How did Zan’s identity and relationships shape their plan to take on the seven corporations?

Many of my stories are about finding connection and community, finding home when the world doesn’t want you to exist let alone find your people. I wanted Zan and Luciana to be able to change things, to be together, to carve out a little moment for themselves regardless of how everything shakes out in the end.

Zan being biracial, nonbinary, and working to get by paycheck to paycheck is, frankly, a relatable existence that’s also an infuriating one. I wrote this back in 2024, prior to the election in the U.S. and other events related to CEOs that transpired, so this story feels eerily relevant in a way I never intended. But that’s how it goes, right? “Seven Obelisks” was born from a raw, angry, and exhausted place—from a “fuck, why does it have to be this way? It doesn’t have to be this way” refrain made of pure weariness and spite I think many queer and disabled and marginalized folks feel every day. I wanted that emotion to shape things.

There’s one paragraph in the story that perfectly encompasses this desire: None of them knew Zan wasn’t trying to climb up to meet them. Zan was the hammer, mid-swing towards glass.

Is this story part of a larger work?

In true me fashion, the answer is complicated—yes as well as not yet, but maybe someday!

Yes: There is a small connecting thread to my short story “Emotional Resonance” (bit.ly/4nuYK6Z). Both are technically set in the same universe. A corporation briefly mentioned in “Seven Obelisks” (Plenti, Inc.) is the parent corporation of the one in “Emotional Resonance” (ExoPLENTI, Inc.). It’s not required knowledge. It’s a little detail for an observant reader and mostly there as a fun tidbit for myself.

Not yet, but maybe someday: I haven’t solidified the plot yet, but the glass-rendered elements and seven corporations have been steeping in the background for a while and clearly want to become a novel. Who knows, it might feature Zan and Luciana in a bigger narrative. This is how short fiction always goes, inevitably the story expands because the world slowly expands and my brain, ever stuck on its hamster wheel spinning, yells, “Ooooh, wouldn’t it be neat if—” and on it goes.

Are there any future projects that you’d like to talk about?

I’ve been working on a queer mecha space opera novel (an entire trilogy, really) for the last three years. Ideally, by the time this is released, I have finished my third draft and am either beginning the querying process or about to begin. The novel is very Dragonriders of Pern meets Pacific Rim. Which is to say the giant robots are giant robot dragons, and there’s lots of Voltron level power of friendshipping and maybe some Locked Tomb goopiness as a treat! I’m very excited to be finished and to dive into searching for a literary agent.

I am also a cofounder and editor of OTHERSIDE (othersidespec.com), a new speculative magazine by queer writers, poets, and artists! We open submissions January 2026 and if you give me your queerest cyberpunk, I personally would love that.