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The Last Peddler of Arch by Laurel Hanson

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A grieving merchant travels the dangerous Dread Road to sell her wares - if she can make it to town alive. Image generated with OpenAI Hawthorn had been trekking for over a day and hadn't seen another living creature, not even a lizard, let alone a reaver. The Dread Road was safer than it used to be. She supposed she was to blame for that. The sheer walls of the gorge trapped the heat, and the air rippled with it. It even smelled hot, a baked absence of life. She shifted her straw hat over her eyes. Mountain-bred, she was unaccustomed to the summers of the lowlands, but though mountain people are small, they have strong legs. She could walk all day without tiring, and she'd need to do just that. Any day now, the rains would break over the mountains, and the floodwaters would cascade down the Dread without warning. Then, there would be no escaping the deluge which would carry her out to the sea where there were monsters she didn't even want to think about. Which is what she ...
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With Distance Comes Perspective by Rick Duffy

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Retired engineer Janx is investigating a strange cosmic anomaly when a curveball causes him to discover more than he imagined possible. Image generated with OpenAI Falling nearly naked through an asteroid field is not how I envisioned retirement. I say 'nearly' because that's how it feels with no ship, no pod: just a safe-suit. Masses of drifting rocks covered in sky-wires and transceivers speckle my view, as if I'd sneezed in my helmet. I skitter between two monstrous slabs, like petrified hands waiting to clap. My com crackles. "Diver 18, status?" That's not for me. I pick it up since the omni-stations echo whatever signals hit them - when they're working. And though I'm millions of clicks from the Zeta anomaly, I'm already seeing its effects: magnetic lines of aurora swirl and weave around the antennas like an electric storm. Someone has to repair the sensors and transmitters when they glitch, but it's not my old engineering career that...
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The Black Box by Clayton James

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Rob and Paula are sceptical of their town council's unsettlingly bizarre new waste management system, and distracted by their nightmare neighbours. Image generated with OpenAI Waste Management dropped off our new kitchen trash container at some point that morning, and when I first laid eyes on it, I thought someone had made a mistake. Instead of a sturdy plastic tub with an attached lid and handle, as pictured on Waste Management's website, I'd received a black wooden box that looked like something Saruman might have stored his palantir in. Since the envelope that accompanied it bore my name - Robert Conners - and my address, someone had sent me the ugly, medieval-looking box on purpose. The box itself - measuring twelves inches on each side - was as heavy as it looked. After scooping the envelope off my porch, I grabbed the iron handle atop the lid and lugged it into my kitchen, where my calico, Wesley, eyed the box with wide-eyed contempt. When I placed the box on top of ...
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In Poor Taste by Luke John Spiby

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18th century beggar Archie applies for a job as the Queen's poison checker, but doesn't expect her to be so flirtatious. Image generated with OpenAI Chapter One The Queen's Antechamber It is much too decadent to describe. That would honestly be a waste of precious time and would probably require a dictionary. A better option, if you're wondering what this particular Queen's antechamber looks like, is to picture the most tacky, over-the-top person you know - if no one instantly comes to mind, that's because it's you - and imagine how they would decorate if they were alive during the Rococo period of the 18th century and had an essentially unlimited budget. Yes, it truly is that bad. Oh, and if you're wondering what exactly an antechamber is: well, it's basically a slightly smaller room that leads to the bedroom - like a waiting room, you could say, because what monarch worth their salt doesn't need an entirely separate room for their subjects ...
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