On a cold November night, she heard it first — a primaeval cry that rent the air outside the walls and pierced the boundaries of the garden bedroom she shared with her husband of a little more than six months. “What the fuck was that?” she asked, sitting up in the bed and shaking her husband, Robert, awake. “For fuck's sake, Jane! What’s wrong?” he demanded angrily. “I heard a woman screaming,” she said, “at least I think...

Mira stretched and sat up. “Rick?” Rick came into the bedroom, 2 mugs of coffee in his hands. “Best boyfriend ever.” Mira smiled as he handed her one mug. “Not going to think so, babe. I got to go to work.” “Quit,” Mira said, dead serious. Rick kissed her. “Unless you’ve got a new job or are going back to the old one, one of us needs a paycheck.” “Well, got time to fool around?” “I thought you said you never had sex a lot...

I had recently returned home to the UK from working overseas in Spain for a summer season. I was back, staying with my mum. This was back in 2007, and I was 23 years old. I had gone to work as a Holiday Rep for a major UK tour operator. I had an incredible season, working in the sun, with the holiday makers, making sure that they had an enjoyable holiday, and didn't lose their phones, their wallets or their passports, but...

I've attended more nursing conferences than I care to count, but this is the first one where I'm hoping to leave handcuffed with a cop instead of the continuing education credits. These things are mandatory for tenured faculty; it’s where we present our research, learn, and mingle with other faculty, practitioners, and students at dinner events. Everyone smiling politely, making small talk, pretending they aren’t counting...

Five centuries after the development of quantum hyperdrive, the first human-built robotic drones reached the solar system of the giant blue star Zeta Ophiuchi. Traversing the vast, sterile expanses of space, these ultra-sophisticated cybernetic emissaries found the Zeta Ophiuchi system to be a dazzling realm of light and colour, a place of astral wonders and planetary marvels. Bewitchingly beautiful as the system was, aut...

Digital record May 2060. I am writing this in case my former company makes me disappear because of my job. I would not be the first person to go missing from this company. My given name is Vionex. It comes from the Quantum Nexus Societies. It means Life within the circuit. My IQ is past any known measurable to date. In short, I am a genius. The year 2060. Much has changed in this century. I am a scientist with too many de...

It had started to spit as I carried Lily home. I'd dropped my sister and her friends off at their houses on the way back, but Lily's house was a little more out of the way, and she'd got really tired trick-or-treating. My sister and her friends were eleven years younger than me. I was home for the weekend from university and had been roped into taking them out trick-or-treating. As the rain picked up, I'd scooped Lily ont...