The Carvers arrived on a Tuesday, which Claire would later think was significant. Not a weekend move, full of optimism and pizza boxes and friends making jokes about your furniture. A Tuesday — gray and still, the kind of day that doesn't commit to anything. The house at 14 Vellum Street was beautiful, in the … Continue reading The House on Vellum Street
Something I Made Up
The Last High Ground
The smell of salt and rot had become the same thing. Maren Voss stood at the edge of the seawall — what was left of it — and watched the morning tide crawl a little further inland than it had the day before. It always did. Every morning she made this walk, and every morning … Continue reading The Last High Ground
The Starfire Legacy
Captain Jayna Corvax stood on the bridge of the Crimson Marauder, her boots planted wide as the ship shuddered through another barrage of plasma fire. Red emergency lights painted her sharp features in dramatic shadows, highlighting the scar that ran from her left temple to her jawline—a souvenir from the Ganymede Heist three years ago. … Continue reading The Starfire Legacy
The Weight of Wings
Content Notice: This story deals with themes of suicide and mental health crisis. If you or someone you know is struggling with thoughts of self-harm, please reach out for help. National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 988 (call or text) | Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741 | You are not alone, and your life has … Continue reading The Weight of Wings
Between Sleep and Waking
The flyer had promised better sleep for $200 and a free sleep mask. Maya signed up because her student loan payment was overdue and because she'd been having the kind of insomnia that makes you feel like you're living underwater—everything muffled and distant and wrong. The sleep clinic occupied the third floor of a medical … Continue reading Between Sleep and Waking
The Signal from Kepler-442b
The message had taken 1,200 years to reach Earth. Dr. Mikayla Banks stood in the observation deck of the Remembrance, watching Kepler-442b grow larger in the viewport. Somewhere down there, the descendants of the original colony ship Independence were waiting—if any had survived at all. The signal had been simple, almost primitive: a repeating sequence … Continue reading The Signal from Kepler-442b
The Smoke of Progress
The morning sun cast long shadows across the Nile, but Nefertari barely noticed. She stood on the palace balcony, watching black smoke rise from the foundries along the eastern bank—pillars of soot that stained the sky where once only temple incense had climbed toward the gods. Three years ago, those factories hadn't existed. Three years … Continue reading The Smoke of Progress
The Awakening at Lincoln
Matthew Robinson had eaten lunch on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial every Thursday for the past two years. It was a ritual born of necessity—his cramped studio apartment on Dupont Circle had no outdoor space, and his graphic design firm's break room felt like a fluorescent-lit prison. Here, surrounded by tourists and joggers and … Continue reading The Awakening at Lincoln
The Last Dance of Valdoria
Sir Waylon of Greenhaven had rehearsed this moment a thousand times. The cave mouth yawned before him like the gateway to the underworld, which, he supposed, it might very well be. His armor—still too new, too shiny—caught the morning sun as he dismounted. The horse whinnied nervously, sensing what lay within. "Stay here, Tempest," he … Continue reading The Last Dance of Valdoria
The Scribe’s Paradox
Brother Thomas had been copying manuscripts in the scriptorium of Glastonbury Abbey for seventeen years, and in all that time, he had never once questioned the steady rhythm of his days. Dawn prayers, breakfast of bread and ale, then hours bent over vellum with his quill, carefully reproducing the words of Saint Augustine or chronicling … Continue reading The Scribe’s Paradox
The Confusing Middle 