CW: grief, disassociation, presumed death of a child “Why give water to a goose at dawn if it is being slaughtered in the morning?”                   – Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, Papyrus St. Petersburg 1115 (ca. 2000-1750 BCE) ~~~ The light seared into my eyes like a knife. I closed them again. They weren’t much […]

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Around the time the boys in my class turn eleven, we start asking where the Starter Boys have gone. We start asking why there are grown-up girls, but no kids who grow up to be girls. Why our moms never leave Rexford. And that’s when Civics Class starts. I’m standing in the auditorium line in […]

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Content Note: aftermath of sacrifices, blood, body horror, offscreen abuse, suicide There is a hole in the wall by Shadow Jack’s bed. It is no bigger than a pin prick, and the wind that blows from it is cold and bitter and smells of death. Shadow Jack knows that smell better than his own. He […]

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Abi / Yakima Washington, July 1970 She finds the fairy in a suitcase. It’s the start of Abi’s weekend at the Bumping River cabin, and Nana tells her hurry up eat your breakfast while it’s hot. She should be home having cereal: Mama with Special K, Abi with Lucky Charms, the milk turning a sugary […]

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Señores, venga el aviso.                                                             Good people, here’s the notice. In my thirty-third year, this Spanglish-speaking, feet-in-two-worlds, gringa Latina realized it was time to go to Mexico and save my mother. To be clear, my mother had died shortly after I […]

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Garrett listened to the man listing what ingredients he wanted in his latte while Garrett imagined choking him to death. He could see it clearly—the spindly neck beneath his fingers, the starched collar crumpling, the look of shock as— “Did you get that?” the man snapped. Garrett stared at him, at his expensive suit and […]

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Content warning: suicide ideation, torture The call for Regan to operate on Entente citizens from the Elders’ latest raid inevitably caught her off-guard—she was the implant installation facility’s specialist in removing preexisting brain hardware before the new implant went in, and preexisting hardware was rare. Those who had it were mostly military personnel; the Elders […]

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Kavita stepped into the communication booth on Artemis Station and put on the glasses. An image of David Worthington, Immortal of Solar Standard, Inc., appeared in front of her, as if they were both standing in the middle of a black void. There was still a couple of seconds delay in transmission between Artemis and […]

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