Billy’s Desires
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I had convinced myself that being born male was the best thing in the world. I mean, men run it – the world I mean. Men are in charge. Women have babies. Women are meant to look pretty and look at their men adoringly, but they offer nothing when it comes to leadership or innovation – that was my position, back then. Somehow it seemed that the more I said it out loud, the truer it became.

I was in a grassy field, but I couldn't tell what I was.

I saw a green-skinned girl enter the field, a prepubescent girl with green skin and no hair, and seemingly naked. She came pretty close, maybe examining me, whatever I was. She walked about 100 feet away, dug a small hole with her hands, and squatted down over it. Maybe she pooped there? She covered it up with the dirt and grass she dug from the hole, then left.

The next day, a group of girls similar to the first one came by. I couldn’t tell if the original one was part of the group. They came right up and touched me. I could feel the touches even though I couldn’t tell what it was they were touching. One of them said something I thought sounded like “Soon, soon.” Sort of, anyway; I don’t think I actually heard the words, but I definitely understood it even though I’d just arrived here and had no idea what language they might speak. Some of them went to other spots in the field and pooped in holes like the first girl did.

A group of people wake up in video game world and are forced to work together to survive and find out how to escape.

Chapter 45 Revenge.

Chapter 13: Ashes and Embers

Chapter Nineteen.

A group of people wake up in video game world and are forced to work together to survive and find out how to escape.

Chapter 44 Revelation.

Changing back to the previous posting time so last chapter was 12ish hours ago in case you missed it and don’t want spoilers!

A group of people wake up in video game world and are forced to work together to survive and find out how to escape.

Chapter 43 Escape.

CHAPTER 75
I couldn’t remember ever being as tired as I was those first few months, but it was Maz who bore the heavier load at first, as she was the food source. Both of us felt rather stupid when the health visitor talked us through the secret of rewarmed previously expressed milk, and I am sure Maz felt relieved rather than embarrassed. Kul asked us if we hadn’t actually sprogged in England, leaving the kid with persistent jet lag, as his circadian rhythm seemed utterly disconnected from Western Australia. Dal picked up on that, naturally, and suggested that Ish was an alien changeling from another planet.

Hazel's fingers danced across holographic interfaces, cycling through various local online channels. Her search pattern was methodical, filtering through social media, local news feeds, and obscure internet forums. The displays - what she would have once called cyberpunk back when such technology seemed extraordinary, but now were simply her standard work environment - shifted with each query, breaking apart and reassembling data streams in complex geometric patterns.

A group of people wake up in video game world and are forced to work together to survive and find out how to escape.

Chapter 41 Caged.

“Avoid playing games of chance for money, young lady.” His eyes twinkled. “Yes. You have a question. So, ask it.”

Part Six by Iona Laing.

Chapter Sixteen.

CHAPTER 74
There was nothing either of us could do for him, of course, being so far away, apart from simply doing our best to be there, wherever and whatever ‘there’ might be, if he needed us. Maz, as ever, spent so much of her energy worrying about others that she had let herself fade, just a bit, and I was slowly beginning to realise what a gamble she had taken in almost literally throwing herself at me.

I was in trouble big time. A first year college student that got arrested when trying to break in to a girlfriend’s house over the holidays. I was promptly bailed out, but my parents who lived in Las Vegas were flying in for the arraignment.

I spoke to Mom over the phone offering no reason for my arrest after repeated attempts for her to understand what in the hell was I thinking. Since I was not forthcoming with any information she hung up on me, although I did find out she had an attorney post my bail.