Issue Seventy-eight, May 2016

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Magnets of Faith and Knowing, Matt Dennison
“If my mind truly is broke, at least I’m the only one holding the pieces. That’s a rare claim around here, owning something outright. My own people never seen it for real, so all they can do now is walk around the fact of me like a pack of wild dogs barking at a boxed-up turtle, not knowing whether to shout or go blind in the terrible newness of it all.”

Dream Hard On, Rowdy Geirsson
“Björn Svensson was strutting around the rocky cove naked and bellowing fierce obscenities at the waves. I observed him from a safe distance, feeling like a genuine Euro-perv as he bent over, picked up a stone, and then chucked it into the water with a thunderous, ‘Må djävulen ta dig! Du onda jävla fitta!'”

What Feasts Might Follow, GJ Hart
“Duffor is frying insects with the remains of a digital watch when he gets a text from Munton saying he’s just seen old Jack wheeled backwards into an ambulance.”

Zoned, Joshua James Jordan
“Four moth heads stood over me while I lay on an operating table. They had split my abdomen wide open, and one of them held my liver in two claws while licking with its long straw of a tongue.”

I Give It Six Months, Ani King
“Thing is, you can’t trust the king of the underworld, not with her blue-black hair, and her blue-black eyelashes, and the way her pale triceps pop when she sheds her battered jacket to reveal a thin white tank top and all manner of mismatched tattoos. Mermaids, hellhounds, dragons, anchors; you name it, it’s inked into a calf or forearm or thigh.”

Luminary, Deanne Richards
“The glacial glow of mediocrity was the venom, full of fire that dulled his dream. A guitar of ice with chords of frozen popsicles stood in the corner. The reflection of his past was like a dog sniffing foot prints.”

Cover art: Of Mice and Rats, Jon Snoek