Another good day of free fiction and audio. More great dark fiction as ChiZine returns to quarterly publishing after completing its special weekly super-sized issue. Daily Science Fiction, Anotherealm, and Mindflights all contribute cool stories and Golden Visions Magazine has its 15th issue of Fantasy, Science Fiction, Spec. Fiction, and horror up (It's first listed here).
The Destroyer War concludes at Legend of the Five Rings, though more fiction to come there, and the first part of a new story at Phillipine Genre stories. There's great serial audio audio from Cthulhu and Scott Sigler, fantasy audio at PodCastle and a very creepy audio story at Drabblecast (plush flash audio).
More soon (likely tonight if I'm not too tired after work).
The Illustration is for "The Cold Equations" in Classic SF below.
Now Posted:
The Chiaroscuro Volume 48 (July–September, 2011)
"
Coyote at the Crossing" by Rachel Ayers. Dark Fiction.
"The sun is straight overhead, burning the day through the still air. Even so, sweat dries before it can form a trickle. Coyote likes the desert—the sand and the heat and the madness. The wide openness: so much room to romp."
"
Linking Words" by Grace Seybold. Dark Fiction.
"Three years the war raged in Esgarrat, lumbering back and forth across the great plain until all the low fields were mud and dust. The great general Volat Mors was killed by a mine late in the second year, and a bridge weakened by sappers collapsed and killed eleven soldiers on it and six bargemen under it."
"
Unpicking the Stitches" by Ilan Lerman. Dark Fiction.
"We’re halfway through a group therapy session when I lean over and poke Lawrence in the cheek. He looks tired. His eyes are slack buttonholes. I can’t resist, so I push the index and middle fingers of my right hand into his eye socket all the way up to the knuckle. "
"
Visions of Destruction Series, Mixed Media" by Polenth Blake. Dark Fiction.
"He puts down his brush and walks to the sound, an eye following close behind. A crowd has gathered near the front of the temple. A woman sprays words, blood red: Death to the Holy Mothers. She paints drops falling from the words and pooling on the floor."
@Daily Science Fiction: "
Freefall" by Eric James Stone.
"This was going to be so much better than her spacejump from the old International Space Station. She would have forty minutes of freefall before she even entered the atmosphere."
@Mindflights: "
Saplings" by Lindsey Duncan. Fantasy.
"Hevia was an herbalist before she obtained mysterious powers and found herself caring for royal children. When a menace in the trees steals away one of her charges, she sets off to bring him back with a nanny's magic"
@Anotherealm: "
Time Waits for Norman" by Tereasa Easton.
"He was not, by his own admission, a patient man, but that was not his fault. If his alarm clock had gone off, if he had filled his tank with petrol yesterday instead of waiting until this morning, if there weren’t so many damn idiots driving on his stretch of road, he wouldn’t be late for work. Again."
Now Posted:
Golden Visions Magazines #15 featuring Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror Stories by Nyki Blatchley, Charles R Richard, Georgina Kamsika, J A Belfield, Lee Clark Zumpe, Jeff Chapman, Joseph Farley, Elizabeth Baxter, Robert W Shmigelsky, Holmes Gray, Jeannie Patrick, and Christine Lajoie Golden. Also flash fiction, poetry, and more.
Classic SF
@Lightspeed: "
The Cold Equations" by Tom Godwin. Science Fiction.
"There could be no alternative—but it required a few moments of conditioning for even an EDS pilot to prepare himself to walk across the room and coldly, deliberately, take the life of a man he had yet to meet."
Serial Fiction@Phillipine Genre Stories: "
Sweet (Part 1)" by Marguerite Alcazaren de Leon.
"One night, Yna Santamaria watched a pineapple truck hit Lola Monina, vaulting the old lady to the neighbor’s driveway."
@L5R: "
The Destroyer War (Part 18)" by Shawn Carman. Fantasy.
"The final chapter in the saga of Rokugan’s ongoing war with the Destroyer horde. [. . .] The Destroyers were everywhere. The settlement called Silent Village was in the midst of its death throes, with monstrosities of every conceivable size and shape rampaging through the streets. Once the front line of defense had been broken, as it had been after more than a week of assault by the enemy."
@PodCastle: "
A Hunter’s Ode to His Bait" by Carrie Vaughn, read by John Trevallian. Fantasy
"It stepped out of the trees, out of the twilight mist, head low to the ground and nostrils quivering. A silver shadow in the form of a horse, seemingly made of mist itself. The long, spiral horn growing from its forehead reflected what little light remained in the world and seemed to glow."
@Drabblecast: "
Babyhead" by Aliya Whiteley Drabble. Horror.
"She didn’t want to look again. She considered going back into the house, crawling back into bed with Mikey, and putting it down as a beer-inspired dream. But that pinkish dome with the fuzzy down had felt soft under her fingers, and there had been the smell of manufactured newness, like a dusting of talcum powder wafting up to her nostrils, as she had pulled the coarse outer leaves of the cabbage apart..."
Serial Audio@Cthulhu: "
The Black Stone (part 1)" by Robert Howard. Horror.
"Today's show contains the usual three elements, the next part of Through the Brazilian Wilderness, a musical number from 1932 and the first part of another story by Robert Howard. It's one of his stories that is made from blood in the Lovecraft vein"
@Author's Site: "
The Starter Episode #21" by Scott Sigler. Science Fiction.
"With so many planets hosting GFL football teams, how does the league handle varying atmospheres and gravity to keep game-play consistent? Find out in this episode."
