The weekend before thanksgiving, found me trotting down the sidewalk through the predawn darkness. Benton was undergoing something of a Indian summer, along with the rest of central Mississippi. The hard killing frost of late October, had been replaced with warm, almost early spring weather.

The steaks I’d brought from Sunflower turned out to be perfect and my sister had seasoned and charbroiled them to perfection. We rarely ate steak, but tonight my sister wanted to celebrate. Celebrate what I have no idea, I did know she been working around the clock this week. Some crops where coming in on the farm and that required the hiring of extra field hands. Those crops where in now and had already been sold and a check for them deposited into the farm account. That much I knew from the small bits and pieces from over hearing my sister talking to some of her friends.

eather’s House Party was the bread and butter of PBS the American cousin of the BBC. Each week Heather Ford would welcome guest from all walks of life onto her show and for whole duration of the two hour block they would be toasted and welcome. Toward the end of the show somebody, be it a guest from one of the segments or a member of the audience would be put into the fabled “The Gunge Booth” a phone book looking box that was trimmed in faux gold and copper.

Ten minutes into my three hour shift and already a line was starting to form up in front of the booth. Lily was at the table collecting the money and handing the soft, round, brown leather balls. My sister had wandered off as soon as the booth had open. Something about checking the charity shops, see Benton has little in the way of a proper bookstore, I mean of course you could always use Amazon or order online from one of the major retail chains. But, often you had to pay full price for those, and unless it was somebody’s birthday or Christmas, we rarely brought something new.

The young adult’s section of Albert Sidney Johnston Memorial Library was my personal retreat from the outside word. Here among the old paperback novels and cheap pup fiction from the late eighties to the early nineties I felt safe for a time. Also for practical reasons, the library offered a place to cool down and relax on those long, hot summer days that Mississippi is known for.

The dry erase board in my room, told me the nurse for the morning shift was somebody named “Veronica”. It turns out that Veronica was a hand full of years older than me. A young nurse from school. She still had that freshly pinned shine about her. My eyes followed Veronica around the room as she checked on everything. She seemed a little ill at ease.

When a coven's spell to spice up their Halloween party goes wrong, it affects everyone in costume for thousands of miles, instead of just the people at their party. See how it affects people from Tokyo to Boston in seven stories by MrSimple, Rellawing, Roberta J. Cabot, and Trismegistus Shandy.

Prologue- Those 3 Years

Even now, after three long years, her words were still engraved in my memory.

‘I’m gonna be honest with you,’ she had said to me that day. ‘It won’t always be easy. And it won’t always be fun and games. But if this is truly what you want, if this is truly what you believe you need, then it’ll all be worth it. You’ll always have my love and support. You only get one chance at life, you have to live it your way.’

And that’s how the best 3 years of my life began.

Adventures of the Twin Tails

The Airship Lost Campaign, A Divine Blood Story by Branwen Gillen

Chapter One – Amaya’s Birth

No, no, no, no, no…

It’s ok, I’m here.

Something’s wrong. I’m not supposed to be like this.

I know. It’ll be ok, I know what we can do…

#

“I hate you, Yukimura!” Setsuko screeched at the top of her lungs, flinging two kunai at her de facto husband’s head.

As Jacqueline walked down to one of the surface transports, people turned to stare at her, not recognizing her appearance.

As she approached the transport bay, one of the male researchers dropped his binder and stared. "Jack! Is that you?"

She turned, "Yes. We've likely found a cure, exciting isn't it?"

"I-indeed!" the researcher scrambled to pick up his binder.

Seri sat in the dining area with Zhuang and Luka, watching Luka devour a bowl of rice. She looked at Zhuang and then said, "So Luka here is essentially your slave until she's paid herself off."

"I prefer to call her my consenting servant." said Zhuang.

"And I don't like either of those names!" Luka was red in the face.

"You're so cute when you're flustered." said Zhuang, giggling.

Seri and Zhuang sat around discussing what to do with the alien. Seri wanted it destroyed, partially out of hatred for the thing, partially because she feared its uses. Zhuang, being a scientist, wanted to study it, and possibly pass it onto other science colleagues. They bickered for several minutes.

"I want it dead. Rape by it was fucking painful, what possible use could it have?" Seri insisted.