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I am free, I am happy. I am free, I am happy.

Akiowa repeated the words over and over as she walked along the ravine floor. She’d fallen into the habit to stop herself fretting about what being the Storyteller would mean – how could she live another person’s life? But a small treacherous voice wondered if it was also to convince herself it was entirely true.

Read Akiowa Finds Freedom

When Mike McMurphy injected the serum into his arm, he had no idea that he was bringing all the world’s suffering to an end. He’d spent less than two weeks developing the virus: a simple bundle of protein with barely the complexity to be covered by US copyright law. The syringe caused no pain – and Mike had used the oldest, bluntest needle he could find – but he could feel the serum spreading through his blood.

Read When Pain Went Away

The Slave Girl and the Storyteller is a new twelve part story for 2018 written by © Damaris Browne

“Old story, new story; tall story, true story…”

The words echoed around the canyon, piercing as an eagle’s cry, thrilling as a coyote’s call. Akiowa’s heart leapt. The Storyteller!

Read The Storyteller Finds Akiowa

The 2018 Story of the Year Award goes to Samuel Poots for The Glass-Eyed Girl

When was your first? That is always what we ask one another. When and what? When in your life was that moment, the time that revealed the world to you and sent you scurrying under the bed sheets? When I think back, the thing I always remember is the house. Not the inside, where the shadows gathered and hid. Those memories came later. I remember the front, the black and white Tudor facade with roses growing around the door, and the crunch of a gravel driveway under car tyres. God only knows how my father afforded such a place, although I suspect the Devil might have a better idea. Not a grand house, but beautiful and caught in my memory in a moment of eternal summer. Memory can be an ironic little bastard when it wants to be.

Read The Glass-Eyed Girl

The coastal road between Southport and Ainsdale is edged by sand dunes, covered in long rough grasses that look like hair. Cars rush past at sixty miles an hour, headlights glaring, stereos blaring.

I walk home on the seaward side of the road, traversing the dunes as clocks tick past midnight. It feels like I am walking on the spine of a massive sleeping dog that’s waiting out the years until humanity disappears.

Read Shifting Sand Dunes

Ba beckoned forward the soldier who carried the scrolls. “In Spotted Turtle Valley I found evidence of collusion between imperial army officers and the bandits who slew my brother,” he said, his eyes squarely fixed on General Gao. “Confess your crime and surrender yourselves into my custody, or face the consequences.”

Read The Purple Demon – Justice is done and Ba Renzhong finds more than he bargained for

When was your first? That is always what we ask one another. When and what? When in your life was that moment, the time that revealed the world to you and sent you scurrying under the bed sheets? When I think back, the thing I always remember is the house. Not the inside, where the shadows gathered and hid. Those memories came later. I remember the front, the black and white Tudor facade with roses growing around the door, and the crunch of a gravel driveway under car tyres. God only knows how my father afforded such a place, although I suspect the Devil might have a better idea. Not a grand house, but beautiful and caught in my memory in a moment of eternal summer. Memory can be an ironic little bastard when it wants to be.

Read The Glass-Eyed Girl

Ba Renzhong took a fresh horse from the military district and set out for Spotted Turtle Valley alone. A short distance into his journey he spotted a cloud of dust behind him. The Purple Demon tied his horse to a tree, unsheathed his sword and hid up the road, ready to ambush whoever was tailing him.

Read The Purple Demon – The Demon’s wrath is terrible and Ba confronts General Gao

Breaking down her body, I can tell her parts are different from anything else in my collection. I remove her carbotanium panelling and unscrew the protective plate. Resting it on the oil-smeared workbench, I open up the wire-meshed housing unit and connect to her sternum slot.

Read Diagnostic Report

Ba Renzhong set out for Fort Silverheart the next day, accompanied by a hundred soldiers and mules carrying pay and supplies for the distant fortress. After many days of marching, he finally reached his destination, and was met by Wu Jin, also known as the One-Horned Goat, on the road.

Read The Purple Demon – Ba Renzhong visits Fort Silverheart and finds tragedy waiting in Ganyang