LIGHTSPEED MAGAZINE - Science Fiction and Fantasy Story Podcast (Sci-Fi | Audiobook | Short Stories)

Dragon brides are notoriously difficult women. We have lived with dragons, after all, those strange and terrible animals with their curiously human eyes, and some of us come back down from the broken mountains with their hisses still in our ears. I was taken by the green dragon of Mahr when I was fifteen, and it was a full year before my lord brought me back down. Forty years would pass before I would come to those steep paths again. | Copyright 2016 by Nghi Vo. Narrated by Claire Benedek. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At rest, coiled up, Michael’s mother is about the size of a riding mower. Michael’s living room is not much bigger than her. With a shudder, she rises. Her little piston feet march, pulling her out of her coil. Lifters above the feet kick out like dancers in a line. She snakes into the kitchen. Julie shrieks in horrified delight. Their mother opens the refrigerator. Julie and Michael watch as she prepares them lunch. She nudges them into chairs at the table. They haven’t eaten at the table in a long time. Maybe she’s getting better. | Copyright 2016 by Marie Vibbert. Narrated by Larry Nemecek. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tain held a pistol toward me. The black gel of the handle pulsed, waiting to be gripped. “Better take this,” she said. I shook my head. “I never use them.” We sat in an unmarked police cruiser, the steering wheel packed away in the dashboard. Tain’s face was a pale shimmer in the cool blue light of the car’s entertainment system. “Your file says you are weapons trained.” “Yeah,” I said, “I got one of those cannons at home, locked in my kitchen drawer.” | Copyright 2016 by Craig DeLancey. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

“There’s a dark side to sloths,” she said, using her straw to plumb the ice at the bottom of her glass, flicking red-blonde hair out of blue-blue eyes. “Sometimes they go to grab a branch, but accidentally grab their own arm, and then fall to their deaths.” “Because of the mossy fur?” I guessed, also guessing at the best way to put my hand onto hers on the bubbled-glass patio table. I could see her suntanned legs underneath and it put sparks under my skin. | Copyright 2016 by Rich Larson. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You take a shortcut through the hydroponics bay on your way to work, and notice that the tomato plants are covered in tiny crawling insects that look like miniature beetles. One of the insects skitters up your leg, so you reach down and brush it off. It bites your hand. The area around the bite turns purple and swollen. You run down a long metal hallway to the Medical Clinic, grateful for the artificially generated gravity that defies the laws of physics and yet is surprisingly common in fictional space stations. | Copyright 2016 by Caroline M. Yoachim. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On the third day of the sightseeing trip, among walrus-laden icebergs, they run into slurry. At the fore, Skipper sticks a boat hook into the water. “There are plenty of critters here,” he says. “It’s like playing grab bag. You’ll always catch something on the hook.” He thrusts the boat hook up and down a couple of times, stirs it in the slush, and pulls it out again. A transparent little rag is impaled on the tip. | Copyright 2016 by Karin Tidbeck. Narrated by Judy Young. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The rock star washed ashore at high tide. Earlier in the day, Bay had seen something bobbing far out in the water. Remnant of a rowboat, perhaps, or something better. She waited until the tide ebbed, checked her traps and tidal pools among the rocks before walking toward the inlet where debris usually beached. All kinds of things washed up if Bay waited long enough. | Copyright 2016 by Sarah Pinsker. Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The scent of fresh lilacs and the boom of a cannon shot muffled by distance prefaced the arrival of the rabbit hole. Louisa jerked upright in her seat, and her book fell from her lap to slap against the cold pavement of the station floor. Dropping a book would normally cause her to cringe, but instead she allowed herself a spark of excitement as a metal maintenance door creaked open on rusty hinges. Golden light spilled out onto dazed commuters. Was this it? Was this finally it? | Copyright 2016 by Jeremiah Tolbert. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At night she pores over the corpus catalogues online: Incorporated Incorporated, Modern Anatomy, and Shoulders, Knees, & Toes. She weighs the merits of femur length and belly fat, redundant kidneys, attached earlobes, and pronated feet. Most people buy pre-configured corpi with symmetrical faces and standard organ kits, but she wants a custom build. Something completely unique. | 2016 by Rachael K. Jones. Narrated by Karyn O'Bryant. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As soon as the recorded message pinged in her peripheral vision, she accepted and listened to the call on her cochlear implant. “Suzanne, I need to see you. It’s urgent. I . . . well, I’ll tell you when I see you. All my love.” | Copyright 2016 by Keith Brooke and Eric Brown. Narrated by Bonnie MacBird. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

She had never intended to be a nineteen-year-old virgin. She wasn’t opposed to the idea of sex, didn’t think the simple act of having sex with someone had to be a big deal, and sure, she went to Mass and knew what the priests taught, but she figured God was actually a lot less concerned about that sort of thing than they were. She just hadn’t ever wanted to badly enough. | Copyright 2016 by Kat Howard. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

“Admit it, the only option left for that body is getting rid of it.” Cousin Aloysius says this as he sprawls uninvited along the length of my bed, and I hate him for that. | Copyright 2016 by JY Yang. Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

My essence, my soul, whatever you wanted to call it, burst into that place beyond places. After dozens of trips, the ecstasy of the reverse-explosion was as intense as the first time. | Copyright 2016 by Will McIntosh. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Beatrice’s heart skipped and skipped again, the tiny pistons clattering in their brassbound prison. Her ribs ached, and there were narrow darts of pain throughout her chest. She was dying. | Copyright 2015 by Jay Lake. Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jean-Paul crawled out of storage and stretched his arms and legs. He avoided going into storage whenever he could help it, but the ship had insisted this time. “Hello, Jean-Paul,” Unattributed Source said. “I woke you as soon as we arrived within visual range of Amala.” | Copyright 2014 by Aidan Doyle. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Begin at the beginning: His many hats. Felt derbies in charcoal and camel and black. Sporting caps and straw boaters. Gibuses covered in corded silk for nights at the theatre. Domed bowlers with dashingly narrow brims. The ratty purple silk top hat, banded with russet brocade, that he keeps by his bedside. | Copyright 2015 by Rachel Swirsky. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Wolflord (title): nomadic, nameless survivors of destroyed warships; those who did not accept ritual immolation during the Decommission. No allegiance to the Principality; outlaws. The antiquated title is self-taken from the first deserter, whose name and memory were erased upon execution; precise origin unknown. | Copyright 2015 by A. Merc Rustad. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The war has turned us into light. Transforming us into light is the fastest way to travel from one front to another, and there are many fronts, now. I always wanted to be a hero. I always wanted to be on the side of light. It’s funny how things work out. | Copyright 2015 by Kameron Hurley. Originally published on Patreon.com/KameronHurley. Reprinted by permission of the author. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sometimes I set stories in San Francisco because I have friends who live there. No family yet, sadly. I like to imagine them reading what I write and maybe smiling. I’m setting this story in Tokyo-Tokyo for the same exact reason. Greg, for one, lives in Tokyo-Tokyo. | Copyright 2014 by Toh EnJoe (translated by David Boyd). Originally published in GRANTA. Reprinted by permission of the author. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There was a game we played at my primary school called “Giant in the forest.” Every day, even if it rained, the fourth and fifth grade teachers took us to this small playground with a jungle gym, swings, and a big grassy space where we could run if we wanted to. | Copyright 2015 by Helena Bell. Narrated by Judy Young. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I am a spaceship. My insides are oozy, and my outsides are metal. If you were to cut me open with a laser-gun, then it would not precisely hurt, but it certainly wouldn’t be a nice thing to do. | Copyright 2015 by Rahul Kanakia. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ten years ago, Clara had attended a creative writing workshop run by Karen Joy Fowler, and what Karen Joy told her was: "We are living in a science fictional world." During the workshop, Karen Joy also kept saying, "I am going to talk about endings, but not yet." But Karen Joy never did get around to talking about endings, and Clara left the workshop still feeling as if she was suspended within it, waiting for the second shoe to drop. | Copyright 2015 by Nike Sulway. Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It had all gone very well, Brooks told himself. Very well indeed. He hurried along the side corridor, his black dress shoes clicking hollowly on the old tiles. This was one of the oldest and most rundown of the Smithsonian’s buildings; too bad they didn’t have the money to knock it down. Funding. Everything was a matter of funding. He pushed open the door of the barnlike workroom and called out, “John? How did you like the ceremony?” | Copyright 1979 by Gregory Benford. Originally published in UNIVERSE 9, edited by Terry Carr. Reprinted by permission of the author. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Once, not so long ago but before our time, all people were the same person. That’s not to say that they weren’t immersed in their own lives; they were, of course, as people always have been—millions of fish in their millions of bowls. It’s just that they were equally immersed in everyone else’s. | Copyright 2014 by Kevin Brockmeier. Originally published in UNSTUCK 3. Reprinted by permission of the author. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There was a man who built a whale out of wood. He built it in the middle of a field out in the dry country, where nobody bothered him but birds and a couple of farm cats. The whale was white, and it took two years to build. He made it out of planks from old barns, which he stole in the night. He didn’t steal them from anyone who’d miss them. Most people were gone. There were a lot of things falling down. | 2015 by Maria Dahvana Headley. | Art © 2015 by Reiko Murakami. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How They Met: They met at a wedding. He was in the wedding party. She was serving canapés at the reception. On some level, reclining in a fountain while holding a tray of canapés is more efficient than circulating through a crowd with them. On most levels, it isn’t. “Canapé?” the mermaid asked the werewolf when he wandered near the fountain. “Isn’t this just garnish?” said the werewolf, picking up a wilted stem of parsley. | Copyright 2015 by Heather Lindsley. Narrated by Harlan Ellison®. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I have written a thousand letters to her in my head. Part of me is always writing to her, while I sit in front of the dusty yellow windows in the coffee shops on Market Street, or roll sticky cinnamon dough on my cold granite counter, or stand in the smooth gray sand at the very edge of the sea. I never wrote to her while she was alive, not even at the end, when letters might have comforted us both. | Copyright 2015 by Megan Arkenberg. Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The sun had descended behind Lakefell as seven times seven goblin artisans gathered before the throne of Castellerine Lynder in the Serpentine Garden, their choicest and most enchanting creations for the year past held high. Chancellor Arrender walked slowly along the lines of scarlet cushions that glowed softly around the delights placed upon them, inspecting what the castellerine would soon consider. | Copyright 2015 by Sean McMullen. Narrated by Paul Boehmer. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mei dreamed of a new Earth. She took her telescope onto the balcony of her North Philadelphia apartment and pointed it east, at the sky above the Trenton Strait, hoping for a clear view of Mars. Tonight the light pollution from Jersey Island wasn’t as bad as usual, and she was able to make out the ice caps and dark shadow of Syrtis Major. | Copyright 2015 by Caroline M. Yoachim. Narrated by Karyn O'Bryant. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The bank didn’t pay for the oranges. They should have — offerings were clearly listed as a reimbursable expense — but the turnaround time and degree of nudging needed when Agnes submitted receipts made the whole process prohibitive. If she bugged Trask too much around the wrong things she might lose the job, and with it the gas card, which was worth a lot more money than the oranges. | Copyright 2015 by Sam J. Miller. Narrated by Roxanne Hernandez. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I don’t remember her birth. My dream baby, the baby I have in my dreams, the one who crashed into my head one night and took roost. She is a day old, a week old, a year old, eight years old, three weeks old, a day old. She has fine blond hair, except when she has tight black curls. Once she had cornrows that lengthened every time I looked away. “Her hair grows faster than I can cut it,” I said to my dream family. | Copyright 2015 by Sarah Pinsker. Narrated by Judy Young. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Put them all in a room together, and give them each a knife. They’ll hardly notice the change of circumstances. Their tales are nothing but this struggle, and they’re well enough used to being run through. You begin. At first it would be chaos. Fragile beauty and a kind heart does you no good here. (Never does; that’s what made it fairy stories, that so many people would help them just for kindness.) | Copyright 2015 by Genevieve Valentine. Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lao Sun lived on the seventeenth floor facing the open street, nothing between him and the sky. If he woke in the morning to darkness, it was the smog’s doing for sure. Through the murky air outside the window, he had to squint to see the tall buildings silhouetted against the yellow-gray background like a sandy-colored relief print. The cars on the road all had their highbeams on and their horns blaring, crammed one against the other at the intersection into one big mess. | Copyright 2015 by Chen Qiufan. Translated by Ken Liu and Carmen Yiling Yan. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The bell for the last task of the night started chiming before I got to my station. I had the office to myself, and a mug of espresso. It was time to start tracking zombies. I took the mug of espresso from the beverage table, and zigzagged through the darkened cube farm toward the one strip of floor still lit for third shift staff, only me. Zombies are orphan Internet services. They wander aimlessly, trying to execute some programmed task. | English translation copyright 2015 VIZ Media. Translated by Jim Hubbert. Japanese version copyright 2013 by Taiyo Fujii. Originally published in SF MAGAZINE in Japan. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For the next few weeks Delia wrestled with hope. She walked the Island talking with Rainbow, who always lashed the tube to her back and stuffed cornbread in one pocket and a peach in another. Delia didn’t show Rainbow the hidden valley, just the inhospitable perimeter. An occasional ship passed in the distance. Nothing got close to the Island. | Copyright 2015 by Andrea Hairston. Narrated by Lisa Renee Pitts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Miz Delia’s Island was protected by deadly reefs on the Georgia/Florida side and nine hundred feet of jagged cliffs on the other. Indians called it Thunder Rock, a place where the wind and sea played rough and tumble. Spaniards named it Ghost Reef because of whirlpools, deadly fog, and wailing drowned folk who wouldn’t rest. English sailors claimed that Delia was a vengeful slave haint, howling demon talk and luring men to a bloody death. | Copyright 2015 by Andrea Hairston. Narrated by Lisa Renee Pitts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

George was about to declare his undying love for Annabell when the front of the train station fell over. Ross, the actor playing George, yelped and dashed away, his army cap flying off. Arlene — Annabell — merely put her hands on her hips and glared at the offending backdrop, a piece of dressed-up plywood that looked very much like the front of a train station, until it collapsed and revealed the braces behind it. | Copyright 2015 by Carrie Vaughn, LLC. Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hinahon didn’t belong in that hotel. On that Monday, she should have been at her apartment on East Bradford Street preparing to meet Natalie at a cozy restaurant downtown. It was their two year anniversary, and she was expected in a few hours. | Copyright 2014 by AMJ Hudson. Originally published in ARDEN, VOLUME XVI. Reprinted by permission of the author. Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Madeleine remembers being a different person. It strikes her when she’s driving, threading her way through farmland, homesteads, facing down the mountains around which the road winds. She remembers being thrilled at the thought of travel, of the self she would discover over the hills and far away. She remembers laughing with friends, looking forward to things, to a future. | Copyright 2015 by Amal El-Mohtar. Narrated by Paul Boehmer. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

“Paris? Paris is ruined for me, alas. It has become a haven for Americans — or should I say a heaven? When good Americans die, perhaps they really do go to Paris. That would explain the flood.” “What about the others, Mr. Holland? The ones who aren’t good?” “Ah. Have you not heard? I thought that was common knowledge. When bad Americans die, they go to America." | Copyright 2015 Chaz Brenchley. Narrated by Paul Boehmer. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

“System Error ahead. Please turn around,” the Concierge’s voice speaks over the metallic growl of my dirt bike. I rev the throttle and lean into the warm wind. My seat bounces as mud ricochets up around me. Ahead, knobby limbs and crisp leaves dissolve into broken pixels. The SimGrid mutes as the soft voice fills the space between my ears, again. “System Error ahead. Please turn around.” | Copyright 2015 by K.M. Szpara. Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

“What do you think it would feel like to die in a black hole?” Joey asked, then immediately added, “Not being morbid.” Kant laughed. He had a loud belly laugh that made the bare bedroom feel full and bright. The mattress they were lying on had no bed frame, and, at the moment, no sheets. The only set not being used as makeshift curtains were drying in the basement. | Copyright 2012 by RJ Edwards. Narrated by Paul Boehmer. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gramophone music crackles out over the quad. “Read that last part again, Jay,” Professor Norris says. I raise my voice. “‘They’ has been used as a singular pronoun since Chaucer: whoso fyndeth hym —” A champagne cork pops, the drinkers cheer. I can’t compete. “Oh, for goodness’ sake.” “You don’t approve?” asks the Prof. “This college isn’t a theme park.” | Copyright 2015 by E. Saxey. Narrated by Paul Boehmer. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jake acquired his target as soon as he stepped into the cafeteria. For the good of the war, he had passed without a trace through forests and mountains to reconnoiter and assassinate. For the good of the subsequent peace, Jake now needed to have lunch with a random stranger and emulate a human being. | Copyright 2015 by John Chu. Narrated by Vikas Adam. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I work the tip of a flathead screwdriver into the barely visible notch along the sternum and pry up the aluminum polymer casing covering the android’s chest. My fingers burn when they make contact with the exposed skeletal components — no time to let it cool down. If I were back in the R&D lab at Hess Industrial, I’d spray the unit with a liquid nitrogen compound to get it down to temperature quickly and use therma flec gloves to handle the carbon-nanotube motors. | Copyright 2015 by Kate M. Galey. Narrated by Cassandra Campbell. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The moment Erm Kaslo’s flesh touched the substance of the entity, he understood everything — but only for that moment. Then it turned out that everything was far, far too much for a human brain to take in all at once. He felt as if his skull was straining not to burst its seams, and as if the mind it housed was a thimble into which someone had crammed a barrel’s worth of knowledge. Just sorting all the information into gross categories would be the work of several lifetimes; subdividing it into manageable portions would take millennia. | Copyright 2015 by Matthew Hughes. Narrated by Paul Boehmer. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Female spotted owls have a call that doesn’t sound like it should come from a bird of prey. It’s high-pitched and unrealistic, like a squeaky toy that’s being squeezed just a little bit too hard. Lots of people who hear them in the woods don’t even realize that they’ve heard an owl. They assume it’s a bug, or a dog running wild through the evergreens, beloved chewy bone clenched tightly in its jaws. | Copyright 2015 by Seanan McGuire. Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Karron leaned over the rail of her boat, the Tarik, and watched the meteor shower from its reflection in the river below. The bright streaks of light looked like underwater fireflies and the Ring more like a soft blue disk, a monochromatic rainbow that ruled their lives in constant reminder of how broken the world was. “Water, water, everywhere,” she murmured to herself. | Copyright 2015 by Annie Bellet. Originally published in THE END HAS COME, edited by John Joseph Adams & Hugh Howey. Reprinted by permission of the author. Narrated by Emily Rankin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I shot the sparrow because I was starving. Though truthfully, I was aiming at a pheasant; the silver snow and the silver birches played tricks with the light, and as if by magic, pheasant turned into sparrow. When I saw what my arrow had done, I cried with empty eyes, too dry to make tears. | Copyright 2009 by Merrie Haskell. Originally published in ELECTRIC VELOCIPEDE. Reprinted by permission of the author. Narrated by Judy Young. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mornings were queues and cigarettes. Queues for the underground turnstiles and queues for the train, queues for stale bagels and queues for lukewarm coffee at the kiosk outside the station. By the time he queued up at the west gate of the pit, Alexander Gerst — tall and grizzled at forty-five, slope-shouldered and running slowly to fat — was lucky if he wasn’t already halfway through his daily ration of tobacco. | Copyright 2015 by Dale Bailey. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices