G'day, greetings, and bonjour. Welcome. You're about to launch into an adventure at AntipodeanSF, the online magazine that's devoted to the regular monthly publication of fabulous and original science-fiction, fantasy, or horror mini-stories of about 500–1000 words each, with occasional feature stories of 2000 words and beyond.
AntipodeanSF will entertain you, get you out there, and land you in places — perhaps with creatures you never expected to imagine — yet won't take hours to read.
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Read on...
Nuke.
A woman walks into a bar, sits down, adjusts her little black dress, and orders a mistletoe margarita.
A man at the end of the bar raises his neat tumbler, filled to the brim with translucent single malt. He confesses that he spent much of his youth in Japanese internment camps and runs through a list of recent troop movements in various parts of the adjoining territories.
Max hammered his thumbs on the steering wheel in time to the music. If there was a better song in the world than Highway to Hell, he was yet to hear it. He turned up the radio volume almost blasting AC/DC through the roof, then with adrenaline pumping through his veins, he pressed his foot down harder on the accelerator, exceeding the speed limit by forty kilometres in seconds flat. The road ahead was one long stretch, why take it easy?
“A knob by any other name still requires a hand to work it.”
“February is a month never spoken about on Planet Hy Man,” I said to Bunnie.
Bunnie, a master of multitasking, was spring cleaning and listening, while Mex was sitting on the couch, feet up, trying to get to grips with the Radio Times.
The master craftsman dipped his brush into the ink and let its tip touch the surface of the paper.
“Mass manufacturing can also create incredible, one-of-a-kind paint brushes,” he mumbled. “No, rather, mass producing companies are the ones creating most masterpieces,” he lowered his voice and added in haste.
Read more: The First Artifact to Reach the End of the Universe
Major Strom brought his craft into low orbit and rolled into entry attitude. He loved the feel of the controller in his hands. He squeezed it firmly, took a deep breath, and fired the reverse thrusters to begin his descent.
Although his primary objective was reconnaissance, he was asked “to initially assess the native inhabitants and draw preliminary conclusions about their developmental capacity.” In other words, if he saw anything notable he should call it to the attention of High Command. In actual fact, there was little they had not already seen from the mother-ship orbiting high above. He was basically a decoy to draw fire from any hidden weaponry the inhabitants might have. He knew it, and High Command knew it, and this gave him an unspoken carte blanche to do pretty much whatever he wanted.
Lilly watched the buildings to the west as they began their morning submergence. The sun was steadily approaching, creeping up on the realm’s inhabitants. She turned to gauge how long she had before it arrived. When she looked back the western horizon was just as flat as the eastern; the rooftops of the city were all now flush with the streets.
As she made her way to the bunker an unusual sound caught her attention. It cut softly through the stillness of the desert and gradually grew louder. A camper van was approaching from the east, speeding along the dusty road with the sun in hot pursuit. There was still enough twilight left in the morning so Lilly decided to wait and see who was coming her way.
Keeping someone alive when they’re hell-bent on destroying their body isn’t easy. But that’s where I come in.
Back in ’82, I met Jim — just after his first coronary; a result of four decades shovelling crap down his throat and acting as though the sofa was sown to his ass. His original heart fluttered weakly and then gave out. Enter yours truly.
Through the endless expanse of space a train is traveling. That’s what the humans call it—the Space Train. It’s not a train per se, there are no tracks to guide its way, nevertheless it does have a trainlike look. Each carriage is connected to the previous one via a rubber tube that carries the essentials: air, water, electricity. Beneath each carriage lies the interconnected propulsion system, pulsing with energy in five-second bursts. The train has no stops. Carriages join and depart as it passes populated systems, the tail growing and shrinking over time. The engine room of the train—the head, so to speak—is automated. No driver, no conductor.
How I wangled an invite to a party thrown by Howard Kippax I'll never know, but there it was — gilt-edged and as solidly real as the frisson of excitement that ran through me in anticipation.
Kippax was the poster boy for self-made tycoons, larger than life in both physical presence and exploits. Hardly a boy any more, the latest feat of the forty-five year old had been funding an obscure biotech start-up that had come up with some startling gene copying and modification techniques which were set to revolutionise treatment of genetic disease and hinted at seriously marketable longevity treatments.
How many nights since the Wolves of Woe leapt upon us in lupine lechery and hate? From shadowed crags they found us: my watch faltered and by cold moonlight the vulnerability of our camp was laid bare. I need not recount the terror for it recounts itself in nightmare; my heart cannot bear reliving how my error nearly cost us our lives as we fled to the relative safety of Umbra’s Root, perpetual shadow beneath the mountain. Gúð-wine, my theroid companion and friend, was greatly wounded and here we are in subterranean depths as ancient as the Dionysian drama whose music ruptures my breast to subtend us in resonance.
The old woman in her indigo cotton jacket dragged her bent body into the garden shrouded in early morning mist. She spotted a gray piece of paper among the tiger lilies. With her boney, age-stained fingers, she picked up the dew-wet paper. It was a miniature parachute with a piece of wood tied to the end of its string. School Starts, the piece of wood read. On Monday in the Square, continued on the back. Her village had no school when she was a young girl. How she wished she could have gone to school!
Frank and Jimmy responded to an emergency at space dock 2. A medical problem, but no further detail.
***
In the spacecraft, the two pilots flopped over in their seats. Both had gaping holes in their heads. Blood and gore spattered most surfaces.
I hate rye bread. Those weird little seeds get stuck in my teeth, and then I spend all afternoon trying to suck them out. Too bad I didn’t notice they gave me the wrong sandwich. I’ve already bitten into it, excising a precise half-moon from the top right corner. Guess I’m stuck with it.
The infirmary door slides open and I walk in, chewing unhappily. Someone is sitting at my desk. She looks just like me: same frizzy hair, same rumpled lab coat, same unfortunate sandwich. She’s staring wide-eyed at a bloody cut on her fingertip. Her gaze snaps toward the med bay. Another version of me appears, only this one is older, wrinkled. She points a surgical laser at the “me” at the desk.
Sam had to hide his Halloween stash. The tiny Tootsie Rolls, chewy taffy, rainbow tinted chocolate candies, all had to go into hiding. His sister Anne was relentless, after eating her candy she would go on a mission to find his. In a week hers would all be gone. So his candy was in danger.
The hiding place would have to be clever, unusual, private yet accessible. He finally decided on a plastic pencil box that he had left over from school. In a bottom desk drawer, it would be safe. And it was, sort of.
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Coming In Issue 270
333 Years
By Susan Cornford
Evan
By Ian Breen
Golf for Beginners
By Joanna Galbraith
HSC (Hancer School Certification)
By Sue Oliver
Incident at the Yarralumla Shops
By Wes Parish
Karen's Secret Story
By Gillian Polack
Luck - A Matter of Perspective
By Brian Catto
Maelstrom
By Kevin J. Phyland
Name Please
By Elwood Scott
Snuggles
By Ashley Noel
The Birthday Party
By Chris Karageorge
The Box
By James Patrik
Noisy Winds
By Binta Ohtaki - translated by Toshiya Kamei
The Hive
By Botond Teklesz
The Senate Inquiry
By Len Baglow
Worksite Stories
by S. F. Lowe
Speculative Fiction
Downside-Up
ISSN 1442-0686
Online Since Feb 1998
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