April 2, 2010

From “Across Worlds Book IV: Sands of Taas” by Altos Wexan

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The crowd below began to cheer loudly even before Steyr stepped onto the podium; cries of joy and praise filtered up from below, bringing a smile to the young Prime Minister’s face.

“Citizens!” she cried, her voice echoing from speakers up and down the plaza. Steyr had to wait a moment as the cheers died down before she spoke again. “We stand at the threshold of the greatest event in the history of our fair nation! The dream of my mother, her mother, and all the Prime Ministers back to the foundation will now at last come to fruition! We have fought, we have suffered, and we have triumphed over all who would oppose us!”

“Victory!” came the cry from below.

“All resistance has been crushed. All are now included in our glorious vision. Only the final step remains: we shall once again go forth, and attain what eluded even the Founding Ministers themselves: a victory so absolute that a thousand years will not dull its memory!”

 

March 29, 2010

From “Steel Order” by Nellie Carnahan

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The impact slammed Matthias against the bulkhead like a limp rag doll. He could still hear the alarm blaring, mingling with the ringing in his ears, but his body felt drained, empty. He didn’t even feel any pain, just a dull sensation in his lower back.

“Depth charge! Depth charge!” Someone—it might have been the captain—was screaming, but it was hard to hear him over the roaring and rattling that filled the air.

Matthias thought it all very silly; what good was it yelling about anything? He was too relaxed to care, and despite the seawater beginning to pool around his ankles he felt quite warm.

Everything would be all right after he’d had a little nap.

 

March 24, 2010

From “Andromeda Dawn” by Zachary Taylor Kimball

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Zero gravity does funny things to your mind. One minute you’re clinging to the floor, then it becomes a wall, then a ceiling. Tim had a little zero-g training, but nothing had ever been this bad. His one ride on the Vomit Comet paled in comparison to the real thing, and even that had filled two puke bags. Tim was on a nonstop roller coaster with shifting directions, and it was making him sick.

Angrily, he thought of what he’d been told before signing up for the trip—that the artificial gravity was foolproof, that there was no need for any specialized training, that no commercial craft’s gravity had failed in over ten years.

Then again, the men in those fancy suits were safely on terra firma, and who could have predicted such a catastrophe?

 

March 23, 2010

From “Côte d’Ébène” by Donovan Williams

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“You don’t understand me,” Brown cried. “This city’s about to fall! She’ll be killed if she stays! I’m just trying to do my job!”

The bartender sighed. “Listen to me, Marine. Perhaps you are right; perhaps when the rebels come they will kill Ms. Anne. But perhaps not. Perhaps the rebel at the very front of the column was a schoolmate of hers. Perhaps the soldiers that burst in here know her from playing in the streets. She grew up here, and cannot believe the land would allow any harm to come.”

“But…”

“I have survived several coups, Marine. I will survive this one as well. The men are always thirsty. They are thirsty for other things as well, and if Ms. Anne wishes to wait, to see her old school friends’ faces when the men come for her, who are you to deny her? Go. Ms. Anne does not want to leave, and I will shoot you if you try and take her.”

 

March 18, 2010

From “Rumble on the 50” by Kellie Vincent

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This was too grievous an insult to bear. The Marching Wildcats stood for a moment, stunned, until big Jacob Yotz held his sousaphone aloft and uttered a guttural cry before heaving it at the ground. The crowd and the players froze, watching silently as Yotz pried a piece of piping from the mangled instrument at his feet and charged forward, screaming.

The tubas followed him, and then the trombones, the trumpets, and the entire band. The percussionists threw aside their heavy drums, brandishing their sticks as the Marching Wildcats erupted into hoots and hollers and charged. They plowed into the enemy, cutting a swath through them as the Battle of the Band was joined.

 

March 17, 2010

From “Escape to Sea” by R. Maxwell Clay

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Joshua nodded. He glanced out the window, eyes streaming with tears. The intense light had faded from his eyes, and now they brimmed with sunlight.

“So what do we do now?” Margie said. “They’ll be looking for us. When Wright doesn’t report, they’ll send someone out.”

“We’re stabbed the Entente in the back,” Lightoller sighed. “We’ve stabbed the Germans in the back. Everybody here is going to be wanted wherever we land.”

“We’ve got to go on,” Joshua said, finding his voice. “Henriques and Lily gave us that obligation through their sacrifice. If we sit here, if we turn ourselves in, if we give up…we’ve betrayed everything they gave up for us.”

There was silence for a moment. “So what do we do now?” Margie asked again.

“We live,” Joshua said, “and we keep on living.”

 

March 14, 2010

From “Across Worlds Book V: Xencobourg’s Fury” by Altos Wexan

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“We have been content to watch from afar, to feed. Still, we always expected that someone would arrive,” said one of the Children.

“Just as the ruins of the old world gave birth to us, so too did we beget suffering and chaos unprecedented even in the time of its destruction,” said another, who might once have been a woman. “That was our ultimate revenge.”

“But we knew it could not last, just as the strife that burned for generations before our coming. Now that the wall has been breached, the time has come for the children of the old world to begin the next phase.”

“We have seen the suffering we have wrought echo across a hundred generations, but no more. As in all matters of revenge, we must now move on to death.” The Child who had spoken smiled, the eerie green light of the glass reflected in its eyes. “The Children of Xencobourg will sear our enemies to dust.”

 

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