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Violet Plays With Raindrops, 2024 With a fingertip, I caught raindrops on the windowpane one by one, letting the coolness shock my skin and obscure the whorls of my fingerprint. “They broke the fabric again at the accelerator site,” my brother said as he passed through the room and turned on the TV. He flopped down on the futon and scrolled through streaming services. He didn’t seem to see me, but I saw him perfectly well even without looking at him. He was in my peripheral vision, not to mention he was doing the same thing I’d seen him do every day forever. “At least that’s what the weirdos are calling it. They say the accelerator ‘breaks the fabric of reality.’” He snorted. “All anyone really knows is they’re detecting unusual energy fluctuations.” He shifted sideways to face me. The old futon creaked. “Are you even listening to me? What are you doing? You should close the window. It’s raining.” I caught another raindrop. “I know it’s raining. That’s why I have the window open.” “Honestly, Violet. How old are you? Four?” “Times a few.” I muttered the words into my forearm, because I was resting my chin on my folded arm, and I was just as happy if he didn’t hear me. I was eighteen and saw nothing wrong with raindrop-catching at any age. Besides, it kept me facing away from him, which made it easier to hide the fact that I was more interested in his talk about the fabric of reality than I wanted to admit. I didn’t know why I resisted showing interest, except that it plucked a string inside me that resonated with half-formed ideas, things I didn’t want to have to try to describe because I had no words for them. Violet Feels the Crossroads of Dimensions, 2034 The side room of the bio-physics lab was a mess. It was the space dedicated to cutting-edge molecular and subatomic research that would one day be used for new medical technology, yet somehow it had collected more than its share of junk. The fume hood contained a few kilos of dried leaves for reasons only one of the grad students knew, and I had to turn sideways to get past all the clutter in the room—boxes, a broken stool, a bin of stained glassware. Two thermocyclers were running at one end of the bench, alternately heating and cooling DNA to allow the heat-tolerant Taq polymerases in the tiny tubes to make thousands of copies of the genomes within. I knew not to touch those, and I also knew not to touch the plasma particle collider at the other end of the bench. My only job was to wash and put away the day’s glassware and shiny steel spatulas and scoopulas, make sure the hot-water bath and shaker plates were all turned off for the night, and sweep the floor in here and out in the main lab. My job was not to think about the text from my brother, who was on an overnight solo hike in the desert mountains. The text that said only, I screwed up and forgot to pack enough water. Ran out before nightfall. That’s fifteen miles to go tomorrow before I get anything else to drink. My job was to be a good assistant and clean things well so next year, when I applied to grad schools, Dr. Farmer might consider letting me join her lab. Worrying about my brother wouldn’t aid that cause, since I couldn’t do anything to help him.  Someone had left their electrophoresis apparatus on the counter between the thermocyclers and the particle accelerator. I needed to wash the apparatus and put it away or Dr. Farmer would be annoyed with me in the morning. To get to that side of the room, I stepped over one of the boxes that stood crooked on the floor, misjudged the distance, and tripped. My hand shot out, jostling the particle accelerator. In the space between stumbling and catching myself, the room dissolved. My own matter became not the solid suit of meat I was used to but something that shimmered, something indefinite yet more truly me than I’d ever been before in this life. A crystalline grid of stardust surrounded me, instead of the familiar lab. I caught myself on the black epoxy resin bench before my nose would have smashed into it. The particle accelerator slid a few inches and came to a stop. The machine was unharmed, as far as I could tell. But I was not the same as a moment before. I still felt made of shimmering light, and the air, the walls, and everything else seemed to pulse in time with the vibration of my body. I straightened up and took a deep breath. Maybe I was just dizzy from the near-fall. The air pulsed again, stronger this time. It felt like the waves of sound that hit you physically when you’re near a jet taking off, except I heard nothing. My torso compressed and released in rhythm. My jawbone vibrated. “What’s going on?” Since I was alone and no one could hear me, it made me feel better to speak the confusion aloud. As soon as I said the words, the pulsing calmed to a low buzz in my chest and in my bones. Relieved, I took a deep breath, gazing absently toward the fume hood, toward all those red maple leaves spread out to dry inside it. A form appeared in the hood’s shadowy glass. I whirled to see who’d come up behind me, but there was no one there. When I turned toward the glass again, the form remained, a pattern of shadow vaguely humanlike in shape but lacking any distinct features. “Must be a trick of the light.” We are not a trick of the light. I looked around again, pulse pounding. Still no one there. We have always been here. “What do you mean, always?” There was still no one in the room that I could see, but I felt the presence of someone—or some ones —as surely as I heard their words in my mind. Always is always,  pulsed the voice in my mind.  Time is not what you think. Time is not linear, or cyclical, or multilinear. All time is simultaneous; all pasts, presents, and futures, as you would name them, are equally real and equally here. I sat down on the grungy tile floor and closed my eyes. The pulsing from earlier returned and vibrated the marrow of my bones, my brain stem, my heart. In my mind’s eye, I “saw” the beings who were talking with me, but I didn’t see them as a visual image—just as I didn’t hear what they were saying as sounds. You don’t have to close your eyes to see us,  they say. We’re non-corporeal, which means we’re not made of matter. Our decisions are not determined at the quantum level. Distance does not exist for us, neither in space nor in time. Humanity will know this in time. We wait for opportunities such as this one, when a disturbance in the quantum field allows you to perceive us. The words didn’t fully make sense, but I felt  their meaning—just as I felt my body and the room and all the world beyond it made up of billions of points of light. You are bound by a vast set of either/or decisions made every moment at the quantum level,  said the voice, now seeming warm and familiar even though I’d only been acquainted with it for a few minutes. In physical reality, there exist an infinite number of parallel realities, each unfolding from a quantum possibility. My hands felt warm on my knees. “So there’s a reality in which my brother will walk home without a problem, and a reality in which he’s about to die, and another in which he’s already dead.” The air pulsed again, placing an even pressure on every surface of my body. Yes . And every other possibility that exists across all multiverses. They all exist. They all, also, do not exist. I sat feeling the pulsing for a few minutes, listening to the loud rush of the overhead ventilation system and the lower hum of the various small machines in the room. “You said humanity will know this? Have other people had the same experience I’m having now?” A few have. Many more will in the near future, as plasma particle colliders become more common and as you expand their usage. When you corporeal beings look at the world, what you think you are perceiving is not technically inaccurate, but it is only a fraction of the story of reality and therefore not truly correct. “How do I know I’m not just hallucinating you?” Our access to your realm is weakening, but if we act quickly, we can show you something that will remind you of these moments. Name one thing you would like to change in the version of physical reality you inhabit right now. My eyes opened and I sat up straighter. There was no question about what one thing I wanted to change, even though I knew it was impossible.  “ I want my brother to have water. But he’s a thousand miles away.” The feeling of soft laughter vibrated in the air around me. The apparent distances in your spacetime are not real, not in our dimension. I pictured myself filling a bottle of water and handing it to my brother but shook my head. He was several states and two time zones away. Try it,  the voice urged. I got up and went to the computer area in the entrance to the lab suite, where I’d left my blue plastic one-liter water bottle. Outside in the hall, next to a dark window looking out on the quad, I filled the bottle at a water fountain.  As soon as I screwed the bottle’s cap back on, I felt the air around me grow warmer. Close your eyes,  urged the voice. I did so, and in the dark of my temporary lack of sight, I saw myself standing in a dark desert landscape, bending over, and placing the water in my brother’s green hiking pack. When I opened my eyes, I didn’t have the water bottle in my hand. Probably I’d wandered out here into the hall without it. Probably, I was half-dreaming all this and needed to go home and go to sleep. I re-entered the lab, and the air inside it felt normal again. One of the thermocyclers had finished its run and entered its overnight hold at four degrees Celsius. The other thermocycler was almost finished, and the particle accelerator had entered automatic shutoff mode too. By now, the data it had collected had been transmitted to Dr. Farmer’s computer and would be waiting for her in the morning. I checked the water bath and the shaker plates. Satisfied that everything was shut down for the night, I turned off the lights and locked the lab. Violet Wakes in the Certainty of Rain, 2040 The morning of my dissertation defense, I woke to a steady rain, looked up at the gray window, and put my hand over my heart to feel the steady beat. Whatever happened today, I would be at peace. There was a reality in which I would pass the defense, a reality in which I would fail, and a reality in which the defense never happened at all. The sound of each drop striking the windowpane contained a world of possibility. I picked up my phone to read the screenshot of the text from my brother six years ago, the same thing I read every morning as a reminder of how I, and the world, had changed. Thought I forgot to pack an extra water bottle, but I was wrong! Found another in my pack. Didn’t even know I had a blue water bottle like this one. A.J. Van Belle is a nonbinary biologist and writer who lives on Vancouver Island with their husband and two dogs. Their stories have appeared in journals and anthologies from 2004 to the present. A member of HWA and SFWA, A.J. is a literary agent intern at the Booker-Albert Agency, volunteers as a submissions reader for Apparition Lit, and a mentor in two novel-writing mentorship programs. They are represented by Lauren Bieker of FinePrint Literary.

With enough years of practice, I easily store six days  of outfits in a single backpack pocket Crumpled five dollar bills tucked in bunched socks stuffed in  every jacket pocket—-  I pray to the gods of Just in Case of What If  of What We’ve Had to Do Without It Most of the orange safety bottles hold hoarded prescriptions  needed but rationed— yet some hold thumbtacks  coarse salt  old to-do’s as scrolls,  as fortunes   Nothing unconsidered,  an ex’s birth certificate stored with the lack of fulfillment  of medical records requests  from the institution  where I was unfree  on my sweet sixteen I leave this baggage behind,  filling space with tarot cards  I bought my best friend  three Christmases before her last. She died on my little brother’s birthday so I pack something he gave me in the before times  willing this magic enough  to extend the lives of those left in my usual and expected absence. I pack eyebrow tint  but never concealer  I am trying to look older  not prettier… I don’t want to be spoken to,  just want to look alive enough no one tries to change that. Hot pink hairbrush unsheathes  cold pink plastic knife, serrated blade too dull  to slice bread, to defend  A memory aid, a false sense of safety.  A tube of San Marzano tomato paste contrastive enough from toothpaste they won’t get confused  When my depression creeps Mom’s sauce recipe  far exceeds the importance of brushing my teeth. Caidyn Bearfield (she/her) is a queer Italian-American poet from Columbus, OH. Her debut chapbook, INIZIARE, was published by River Dog Press in 2024. She has featured all across the Midwest at festivals, museums, punk shows, and more. Caidyn is also a peer and legislative advocate for current and former foster youth who enjoys making anything from crafts to cakes to change.

My Sufi guide and I are meeting on Zoom. She welcomes me with a home-run smile and a “Hi” laced with joy. “Read me one of your poems,” she says, eyes glistening. When I finish, she exclaims, “That’s wonderful. You’re doing holy work.” She taught me to typeset my poems by hand, then published them in a beautiful letterpress book, seeing me with God’s eyes. “How are you feeling about the surgery?” I ask about her six-hour operation next week. A hint of anxiety flits over her angular face. “I’ve asked my son to be with me in the hospital. I’ve been doing practices to calm myself, but I still feel a little nervous,” she confesses, willing to be vulnerable. “Many of us will be praying for you,” I tell her, referring to all the people who love her, a fountain of light illuminating my life and so many others, the mother I might have had. Ralph Dranow works as an editor and poetry guide. His most recent book is At Work on the Garments of Refuge , poems of his and his late friend Daniel Marlin. He lives in Oakland, California with his family.

Letter from Wolfgang Jakob Welsch to his friend Julius Hofmann, 1627. Translated from the original German by Dr. Angela Windsor, 2009. My closest friend and colleague, By the grace of God I have found the opportunity to send a last protestation against the fate which has befallen me. As I have never married and have no children, and my mother and father and dear sister have long since ascended to Heaven, I entrust you and you alone with this message; I have assured the guard who carries it that your lips are sealed as tightly as the grave, and neither his complicity nor my own story will be revealed. Though these will not be the last words from my tainted soul, they are final words I will write as my own man. There is no truth I can give to them that will satisfy the court; resisting will only prolong the torture, which my own foolish stubbornness—a trait you had admonished me for!—has perpetuated for an age of agony. I cannot be honest with my judges and jailers, and therefore I must be honest with you. I am not a guilty man. I have had no hand in the crimes of which I stand accused, and I pray that you will believe me when I say I have not committed any witchcraft they have laid before me. Yet there are things I have never told another living soul, not even one so dear to me as you.  My confession will be within the week. I have stood silent for as long as I can, but my resolve has failed me; I must tell them something, gain some last bit of peace, even if it requires bearing false witness against myself and my fellow man. May the Lord forgive me for the petty sins I have committed and the worse ones yet to come. May you, my friend, forgive me for the stories I will relay, and for the request I must make. Before I relay my present, I must relive our past, as it is the only way for you to truly understand the circumstances I now find myself in. I am forever grateful to you for your tender care during the weeks after the Lord recalled my sister’s soul these two years past, for I was inconsolable; the grief made me weak as if with fever, and I wept incessantly, unable to rouse myself from my bed. The patience and diligence with which God has blessed you made you akin to a saint to me, and I know now that without your presence I may never have recovered my strength. But you could not always be with me, and in-between the hours you spent standing vigil at my bedside I became aware of other visitors. Perhaps my fever had awoken them, or else the depths of my grief, or something else entirely. Regardless of the means, it began as a stirring in the corners of the room, a shapeless whirlwind sweeping aside dust to leave behind clean floor. Though I held out my hand to feel the air, I could discern no wind against my fingers. It was a mild enough occurrence, but it shocked and terrified me, my body weakening until I could barely raise my head. An old fear, and one that seems strange to me now, after all the fresh horrors I have seen. These events continued throughout my convalescence; wind from no source ruffling my hair, unseen hands rattling my chairs and bed, sweet and quiet laughter from places I could not locate. Eventually they ceased to frighten me; though they moved in my home they never harmed me, and as the weight of mourning began to lift and the memory of my sister’s pious, humble nature and kind demeanor lost the sting of pain, I began to go outside again for short walks. It was then that the unseen transitioned to the seen, and I could, for the first time, observe the phenomena that had visited me. An aside: I swear to you that I have never kept company with the Devil, though I know not whether you will hold my promises in any regard after you have read my account. Nevertheless, I so swear to you now; though the things I have seen are strange and frightening, I believe them to be God’s creatures as surely as you and I, and I speak of them not to admit to witchcraft but to divulge a long-held secret. I saw them in the woods and fields most often, though occasionally they would venture into town. Their shapes I can hardly describe for they were so varied. Some were as if the branching flashes of lightning had fashioned bodies with which to stride upon the earth, jagged arms and legs in constant jerking motion as they danced, shining blue and white. Others were gnarled, with twisted, crooked features that put me in mind of the knots of a tree, shambling hunched and uncanny through the streets; still others were playful creatures with the lightness of eiderdown, which had the sweet laugh I had heard so often in my home and which left behind strands of gossamer web and a smattering of fish scales. Soft beings lived among my clothing in nests of discarded hair and dust, their entrails pulsing with gentle light through their skin, and things with many eyes and twining arms of wrought-iron hung from the eaves of each house, watching the passersby. And there were more, some apparitions of unimaginable ugliness, others of beauty so awesome I could barely keep from weeping. I have seen these beings every day from my recovery until the day I was interred here, in this prison for witches, this Hexenhaus , and never once have I been acknowledged.   Here it is that we come to my true reason for writing to you. Since the testimony of Herr Gottlieb’s daughter Liesel I have been a captive (and do not judge her, for she has begged forgiveness from me and I have given it! In this place we try to save our souls in any way we can, and since her own confession was recanted she has spent as much time in this Hell as I). I do not care to enumerate my torments or detail them too thoroughly, but let it be said that I have been fortunate. I was not stretched on the rack, and my feet were not pressed between the metal plates of the boot to be crushed; nor was I subject to those more often fatal forms. And yet the pain was such that at times I was sure I was viewing myself from the outside as they took to my body, buzzing like a hive in their pursuit, until the thread of agony drew me back to my anguished form and my vision narrowed to the size of a pin-prick, obscuring even the face of my executioner and leaving me in darkness. It is here, in this place of pain and blood, that I have seen something terrible. The beings outside do not come here, but something else does; it lives in the pools of blood and waste on filthy stone, crawls in darkened corners, seeps from every shadow and crack in the wall. Things, pale as maggots with tiny, black eyes covered by a noxious film of foul water, move among these moaning and wailing forms. Sometimes a poor soul catches their attention with their cries; then they form a circle around the unhappy subject and reach out with spindly arms to grab at bleeding skin and torn flesh, pulling gobbets of pain from the sufferer and glutting themselves until their stomachs are bloated with the signs of their feast. Their mouths have no teeth or tongue, merely a dark, empty hole through which nothing can be seen but smooth, pink ridges of muscle, and when they are not eating they open and close it mindlessly in the manner of a fish. These beasts, shadows cast by the pitiless hearts of men, are here always save for on the days of an execution, upon which they follow the executioner in rank and file. On those days we are left alone, each dwelling within our own torments. Upon my arrival I was stripped and shaved, left naked and shivering in the rank darkness, surrounded by faint whimpers and coughs from my fellow prisoners. They began with no torture, merely questions, threatening and cajoling in turn, offering small mercies and promising dire punishments. Then, when my only response was to insist upon my innocence and pray upon our Lord for forgiveness, they began to pull my limbs into awful contortions, poking and prodding at me with their pins. They declared that I had the witch’s mark and insisted against all evidence that I felt no pain, even as I thrashed and howled. The sun could have risen and fallen a thousand times in that span, and I would not have known, for every question seemed the same, until all voices turned to drones and all faces to masks. Eventually they left me upon a cot and beset upon another prisoner, and I lay with my arms and legs bound in chains, lacking even the strength to turn my head. Yet I did not lose faith. I prayed for the strength to withstand the ordeal I was now facing. I believed, then, that there was still hope. Time ticked on, and pressure mounted. The clearest horror in my mind is of my first personal encounter with the creatures: the memory of when they made me observe the torture of old Frau Schafferin , whose son Peter was burned winter last. Her wrinkled skin was fragile and translucent as the membrane lining the inside of an eggshell, veins bulging blue on skeletal hands. She shook with cold and fever, and though they had taken her prayer beads from her I heard her praying to our Lord and to the Blessed Virgin as if she still held them—until they placed a pair of pincers in the fire and raised them to her flesh, and then her prayers turned to the cries of an animal, as all the while they urged her to give up her accomplices in witchcraft. When I struggled in my bonds, calling out to her and cursing our captors, they beat me until I could no longer move. I sagged, helpless in my chains, watching as they jeered at her. In the shadows cast by the fire their faces looked as ghoulish as those of the creatures, and I saw then that the monsters had begun to gather around our captors, around Frau Schafferin, around myself. Helplessly I watched them surround us, moving like spiders with broken legs. Some were small and stunted, and others towered over me. Their fingers were blunt, ill-defined things like the digits of a newt, their hands misshapen and cleft in such a manner that the thumb and first two fingers dwarfed the others. They raised these curled appendages to stroke the brows and cheeks of the interrogators, a trail of dark slime marking where they had touched, and those who had been marked stood taller and glared fiercer, as if the anointment had solidified their resolve. All the while Frau Schafferin  cried and wailed, unable to see the dozens of glittering eyes and gaping mouths around her, even as the numbers grew until I could not make out where one creature ended and another began, only a sea of writhing, pale flesh. At some unseen signal the ranks broke and creatures covered her and I, burying her frail and injured form under a hoard of bodies, filling my vision with grasping hands. Someone screamed—perhaps her, perhaps I, perhaps both. When the beings retreated, she was dead. Since then the executioners have applied the pincers to me, and other methods besides. I have attempted to remain pious, faithful to God, to myself—to you—but my resolve is failing. I have felt hands slick with filth grasping immaterial pieces of my being and ripping them from my body, I have seen toothless mouths gulp the last bits of my strength. I have tried to be a good man, but now my striving is near its end, or has been over for quite some time. I wish to no longer be in pain. I hope my soul will find its way to Heaven, though I fear that after my confession to the court it will not. O, dearest, how I wish that this letter should never have had to be written! How I wish that you should remain innocent of the creatures that breed within the shadows of cruelty, lurking in the deeds of man against man! But I must ask you to endure one horrible sight, for the sake of my own soul. I will give my false confession soon, and my execution will follow shortly. If I am fortunate I will be subject to the sword; if not, to the fire alone. Either way I do not desire to look into the crowd on the day of my death and see solely those faces waiting for me, beady eyes staring and mouths agape, drooling at the thought of my despair. Before you flee—and you must  flee, for while I will not name you they may still find you—I beg you to attend, though I know it will cause you great pain. If I am to die a witch, though I insist to you forever that I am not, then I wish to die with the image of your face in my mind—your curls, your ruddy cheeks, your shining eyes—and with love in my heart. Then leave this place and never return. May God’s light grant you the rest I cannot have. Keep this letter close, and show no one; it is a piece of me. Yours faithfully, Wolfgang Translator’s note: This letter was found among the belongings of Markus Ruppel, who is listed among the recently hired employees of the Vogelsberg prison during the time of the writing of this letter. Ruppel can thus be assumed to be the guard briefly mentioned within; however, trial records from the time state that he was arrested on suspicion of witchcraft within a week of the letter’s writing, leaving it undelivered.  Wolfgang Welsch was executed on September 10th, 1627, by sword. Though Julius Hofmann is known to have resided in Vogelsberg during this period, his whereabouts following Welsch's imprisonment and death are unknown. H.M. Shrike (he/him) is a debut short story author and graduate student. When he isn't writing, studying, or watching horror movies with his boyfriend, he's usually petting a cat.

The breeze blew only so softly, the dandelions merely teasing their release. The entire field waved with the gentle wind. Massive stones covered in glowing runes stood still to contrast the movement of the green. Scattered between were the stone figures of war. The faces of the statues shared shock, anger, and fear. Only the concerned woman rustling through the field created noise to overcome the whistle of the moving air. Her simple dress disturbed the fuzz more than the wind had done, but without enough power to be carried, the seeds only fell. She moved from statue to statue, searching out something familiar. Her fret grew with each successive disappointment. Nearly at tears, she leaned against one of the monoliths, pulling at her blonde braids in idle measure. Though she was still young by many standards, lines of worry formed easily as her concern grew with the passing time. “You have come far,” spoke an older voice, this one not far away. “What is it I am feeling? Surprise? It has been so long.” The young woman jumped. She spun to see another nearby monolith, this one missing a large enough portion to make for a natural ledge. In this instance, it acted as a throne. Upon this seat of power lounged an older woman, refined and classically beautiful. “Few, if ever, come this far,” the new woman said. Her own purple dress of elaborate brocade glistened in the sun. The elegant lady held a dandelion to her noise, letting the fuzz tickle her skin. With a sideward glance, she smiled. The younger turned to run but the purple-clad royal already stood in her way. “Please forgive my intrusion,” the young woman said as she threw herself to her knees. “I mean no disrespect, your majesty.” The queen in purple bent down to take up another dandelion. “Searching for someone?” “Yes, your majesty.” “And you don’t feel your life is in danger?” “I—” “It is.” “Yes, your majesty.” The queen glided over to the closet statue, this one locked in agony. She beckoned her young subject to follow. “Is it this gentleman?” the queen asked. “No, my queen,” the woman answered, only raising her eyes to glance at the frozen face. “Yes, too old,” the queen realized. “This one has been here quite long. You can tell by the stone, you see?” The queen continued on towards a grouping of soldiers, her own dress somehow immune to the collection of dandelion fuzz. “One of these, perhaps? Newer, younger.” The woman paid closer attention to the faces, recognizing none. “I suppose not,” the queen hummed. “I’m being awfully base. There are so many here in my field. I feel myself growing tired already.” The woman raised her eyes to view the horizon. Its entirety held the silhouettes of soldiers and runed monoliths alike. “Young one, do you have a name?” “Bolly, your majesty.” “Yes. Bolly,” the queen said before pausing, lost in her wandering thoughts. “You are from?” “The eastern reach, near the mountain pass.” “Delightful,” the queen answered. “We are in the proper area for a start.” The queen floated forth, her hand reaching for another dandelion. “Thank you, your majesty,” Bolly began as she attempted to keep pace. “Thank you for helping my search.” “Do you know why there are so many here, Bolly?” “The fate of those who oppose you.” “I suppose that is a way to put it,” she said, pursing her lip. “The stones, you see, they protect me. You see them?” “Yes, your majesty.” “They have stood for centuries, old at the time of my ascension.” “Yes, your majesty,” Bolly’s only possible answer. “My sentinels stand watch. The stronger the urge to bring violence against me, the quicker one turns to stone.” “The ones we passed?” “The unsure, the reluctant heroes, and would-be thieves. Cowardice gets you closer than bravery, but all stone by the time they mustered their courage and intent. Tell me, Bolly, was your man brave?” “My man?” “Bolly, why else come?” the queen said with a wave. “Husband, betrothed, father, brother.” The queen turned for a glance. “Young yet. A husband? A son born early?” “My eldest son, your majesty.” “Be relieved you found him not at the center. You’ve raised well a brave soul.” The queen said little more as they followed the eastward path away from the center. In checking each statue, Bolly found no trace of her offspring. The day wearing thin, Bolly’s hope grew sour. The queen found dandelions. “Ah, this lot. I remember them well.” The queen and mother came upon soldiers in the thousands, stoic in stone display and columns rigid. Her majesty walked to the horse-mounted general and blew him a kiss. “Poor souls, barely into formation and stone in a moment. How brave they were to come for my head. And foolish.” The queen lectured to an audience of none. She heard the sobbing a distance away. Following the sounds, she came upon Bolly beyond the army and at the feet of a stone statute, its visage that of a boy not yet a man. “The bravest stands just inside the outer ring,” the queen said while approaching. “Was he doing it for you? Oh, what will love not do? A boy for his mother.” The queen hummed. “Is there nothing to be done?” Bolly cried. “Betrayal is an act of finality.” The queen circled Bolly’s child. Her eyes squinted at his frozen form. “He is not completely turned, there is life.” Bolly sprang to her feet. “Your majesty, I beg you to be merciful.” “I suppose I can grant one such mercy.” From her hair, the queen pulled a long silver needle. With the gentlest of pressure, she put it to the side of the boy’s neck and pushed. “He will suffer no more.” Satisfied with her mercy, the queen turned to face Bolly, now transformed to stone with her own expression frozen in rage. “Betrayal is an act of finality, Bolly,” the queen began. “And your love shall stand forever as a monument to it.” The queen bent to take up another handful of dandelions. She casually walked away to her castle, humming a love song that rang old at the time of her ascension. The fuzz blew gently in the wind, settling on the two newest statues only for a moment. Kyle Brandon Lee is a Texas born and raised writer of poetry, prose, and plays. As a graduate of the University of Texas at Dallas with a degree in Literary Studies, he has published multiple short stories, poems, and non-fiction pieces. These include works at Backchannels Journal, El Poral  and Fiction on the Web . If someday they open an old and dusty tome made of pecan bark and armadillo hide, perhaps they'll find his work within. Hopefully, it will be plentiful. He can be found at his website  www.hillsdreaming.com   or on Instagram @HDTMountains

My arrowroot forgives me easily For lax unintentional dry spells when Leaf blades fold in when parched, like palms upright, Tight clasped in prayer, awaiting baptism That unstitches greenness, relaxed at last, Unfurling from its rigid pose, relieved As a discarded lover welcomed back, Preening and awaiting veneration. Native New Yorker and Elgin Award winner, LindaAnn LoSchiavo is a member of the British Fantasy Society, HWA, SFPA, and The Dramatists Guild — and a spooky Scorpio who loves Hallowe'en. Current books:  Messengers of the Macabre: Hallowe’en Poems , Vampire Ventures , Always Haunted: Hallowe’en Poems  [Wild Ink, 2024], Apprenticed to the Night [UniVerse Press, 2024], and Felones de Se: Poems about Suicide  [Ukiyoto Publishing, 2024].

I sit in the middle of the wild  to watch the last of my wilderness  build a shed, take shelter,  carve a canoe from my bones. Here the quietness does not  compete for my departure.  Lymph nodes that tire from  maternal desire, to ruin me in the slaughterhouse where I  have gaped without being sewed,  a fashion-show of oddball birth.  I still myself in the wilderness offered by the shed, Flapping  Tawny-Frogmouths camouflaging  their tendons to trees. Once my  carcass has fed the feral to a calm, I leave a maple note behind,  vowels on veins. Yes, you own  the discovery of me.  Everything is as serious  as a frost-bitten illness. I slip into the thin skin of dawn to  follow suit of the oddball crowd.  Pay taxes, fill the Subaru with gas,  roll my eyes and proceed with being born. Nicole F. Kimball is an emerging poet and artist from Salt Lake City, Utah. Her work can be found in Atlanta Review, Mom Egg Review, Lit. 202, and elsewhere. A four-time Best of the Net Nominee, her debut work of fiction is forthcoming in print later this year. Nicole loves to spend time with her husband, and Chihuahua named Tinkerbelle.

“Tell me a bedtime story, mother,” the child says. “What kind of story?” the mother asks. “One of your scary ones. One about the creatures in the woods.” “Are you sure? You might get bad dreams.” “I don’t mind bad dreams.” The mother sighs and runs her fingers through her child’s sand-colored hair. “Close your eyes first,” the mother says. The child closes their eyes. The mother sighs again. “Long ago, in a mossy forest, there was a rabbit,” the mother says. “Do you remember what a female rabbit is called?” “A doe,” the child says. “That’s right,” the mother says. “A doe. This doe lived in fear, for there were many predators. The doe was always running, and was always nervous. She wanted a way out. “One day, the doe was grazing in a clearing when she saw a figure in the trees out of the corner of her eye. The doe turned and saw a huge owl blinking at her. This was odd, the doe thought, because owls only come out at night. The owl blinked and twitched its head back and forth like it was looking to make sure they were alone in the clearing. The doe was paralyzed with fear for a moment. She had lost friends and even a couple of her babies to hungry owls in the dark of night. But there was something about this owl’s eyes that put the doe at ease. “‘Why are you out during the day?’ the doe asked. “The owl clicked its beak together and spoke. “‘I have come to help you,’ the owl said. ‘You tremble with fright, day and night. Your neck hurts from looking over your shoulder so much. You have always had a good heart, and you deserve to live a peaceful life. “‘Therefore, I’m offering you the ability to move invisibly through the forest. As long as you remain in these woods, you may pass through it without leaving a trace. You’ll be invisible, and you’ll be without scent. You won’t leave any tracks. You’ll graze placidly and sip from the crystal clear streams for as long as you’d like.’ “The doe thought about this. She imagined what it would be like to drift through the trees, unknowable as the breeze. Like a sound that nobody else can hear. She smiled. Just as she was about to give her answer to the owl, another sound arose on the other end of the clearing. “Hooves. Scraping on the mossy forest floor like a bony corpse being dragged to a predator’s den. Then the doe heard a huff of air through wet nostrils. “The doe turned and saw a bull at the edge of the clearing, pawing at the ground like it was about to charge. Tar-black ooze dripped from its snout and its sharp horns, which stretched five feet to each side of the bull’s head. The bull exhaled clouds of smoke from its nostrils. The smoke crawled across the meadow like morning fog. “‘Why settle for merely drifting through the forest when you could have dominion over it?’ the bull asked. His gravelly voice sounded far away. Like it was coming from a deep hole. ‘The owl can make you invisible. I can make you invincible,’ the bull said. “The doe turned to face the owl and saw its feathers were puffed out and its chest was on display. ‘Begone from here, foul beast,’ the owl said. ‘This is not yours.’ The bull huffed again, spewing black liquid and another puff of smoke. ‘She has not yet decided,’ the bull said. ‘She still has a choice. Survive…or thrive.’ “‘What is your offer?’ the doe asked the bull, suddenly interested. For she had long been at one end of the food chain in the forest and was curious what it felt like on the other end. “The beast bared its teeth in a hideous smile. ‘My offer is to make you human,’ he said. ‘You can rule this forest, and all forests. You can rule this stream, and all streams. You can rule these animals, and all animals.’ “‘Don’t listen to his lies,’ the owl hooted. ‘Don’t be tempted. My offer will keep you safe. His offer always comes with a curse.’ “The doe tensed and looked at the bull. ‘What is your bargain, mysterious one?’ The beast’s tail flicked behind its body, and the doe thought she could hear a sizzling coming from the brush behind the beast. The bull’s dark eyes sparkled. “‘Something small to a rabbit like you,’ the beast said. ‘All I ask is one child. Your first child, on their fourth birthday. I will come to collect it. One night your child will be there and the next they will be gone. There will be no pain, no suffering. In exchange for that, you will have all the benefits of being human. You will have no predators. You will live ten times as long as you live now. You will rule the earth along with the other humans.’ “The doe’s ears twitched as she considered this offer. ‘Don’t take it,’ the owl said. ‘Stay in the woods. You do not understand everything about being a human.’ The doe snapped its head up toward the owl. ‘Quiet! I’m trying to think!’ The rabbit continued thinking. She had birthed many offspring, and many of those children had died at the hands of the beasts of the forest. Including owls. What was just one child in exchange for all the power in the world? After all, the owl hadn’t offered protection for her children. They would still grow up in this dangerous forest. “The doe looked first at the owl, then at the bull. The owl shook with fear on its perch. The bull huffed its guttural snarl again. “‘I take your offer, beast,’ the rabbit said. ‘You may have just one child of mine in exchange for a full life as a human. I wish to walk the earth without looking over my shoulder. I wish to take deep breaths and sleep peacefully.’ “The owl screeched and the bull roared. Lightning cracked the sky even though it was a clear day. The ground shook. Trees desperately clung to the forest floor as wind swirled through the woods. The world crumbled around the rabbit, and she was terrified. And then, suddenly, it all stopped. The doe looked down at herself and saw she had become human. “She laughed. She picked up a stone and threw it. She splashed into the nearby stream, knowing she could not be harmed. And then she began her life.” The mother strokes her child’s forehead. The child has long been asleep but the mother needed to finish the story. Every story needs an ending. The mother wipes a tear from her eye. She runs her fingers through her child’s hair again. “Happy birthday, darling,” the mother says. She walks to the hallway and casts one last look back at her child. “I am so sorry,” she says. Down the hall, a sound breaks the silence of the house. Hooves. Scraping on the carpet like a bony corpse being dragged to a predator’s den. A.K. McCarthy is a writer of dark fiction based in St. Louis, Missouri. In addition to his award-winning journalism, his short fiction has been published in numerous independent horror anthologies. He finds inspiration in hikes, giallo films, and frightened expressions from his three cats.

Rising from the murky depths of an unconscious soul or a conscious id; whether Freudian, Jungian or surrealian, "nightmares" is too soft a word to couch the wounds they bring bubbling up into view. Popular wisdom has it you can’t die in one, but oh, the pain, the pain you can suffer; sense turns to no sense then becomes nonsense that seems more real than any fact, and facts discolor and melt meanings. Rating them would not be for content, but for implausibility, as details ebb and flow with each viewing, becoming twisted with each iteration, blurring identity between observer and observed; to both see and be. Sound? - sometimes; smell? - perhaps for some with strong associations to odor; and, color? - on occasion, but like strong film noir shadows and angles have dialog all their own, at times a confusion of mirrored reflections. Like a Screaming Starry Night seen past fog, a conflation of van Gogh and Munch, wherein details are superfluous and only emotions reign, unbidden dreams become a playground for the unsettled spirits still clamoring for resolution. Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school teacher (remember the hormonally-challenged?) who just moved to northern Illinois from southern California (?) with his wife of fifty years, Sally Ann (upon whom he is emotionally, physically, and spiritually dependent), one grown daughter, and ten cats! Like Blake, Emerson, Thoreau, and Merton, he believes that the instant contains eternity.

September rains christened the old cemetery with a bleakness that blackened the gravestones tumbled among the trees grown up in neglect. The sporadic communion of sun did little to dispel the clinging mist and declined to warm the ossuaries of the once proudly provident now in impoverished exile. It appealed to Vasquez, a Sage of the Charon Order, like the breath of a lover in a dream.  The crumbling house across the narrow dirt road leading from the cemetery to the town still had remnants of furniture. Vasquez sat in a tattered brocade loveseat he had pulled to the unbroken window. The rivulets of the day’s drizzle etched the glass, blurring his vision of the stone sentinels marking passages. His damp clothes added to the mustiness of the deserted homestead avoided by the righteous as an unnatural place likely cursed by sins it had witnessed. He did not believe in curses or that the unnatural was suspect. Still, he always felt some uneasiness with the dead, the province of his Order.  Maybe it’s all the same. Fifty-fifty. Long shadows wove light and rain into ominous veils. It was twilight and the fire he had made from broken furniture scraps brought tendrils of steam from his clothes. The fireplace drew well and flickering light cast his outline on the parlor wall, a note on a score unplayed.  He waited.  Two The cemetery’s namesake began as a rough clapboard village. Six months after the first board was nailed the cemetery made it settled country. The town disappeared after a virulent flood and graves routed by the Acheron torrent gave testament to the diaspora, the dead unsettled in their wandering without the stones above to anchor them. Vasquez felt welcome in the parlor built by a prominent pioneer, a practical display of prosperity of the time. Over the years, it was a house beset no less by the elements than the eccentric excesses of its occupants. The cemetery across the road completed its reputation as a place where haunts quibbled in the darkness. The first guests glimmered by the fireplace, a couple flowing in and out of the flames with familiarity. Vasquez watched the parlor fill with ageless apparitions for their appointment in the ruins of Samarra. He wondered if he should move the loveseat out of the way so the dead would be unimpeded in their orchestration, a poltergeist parody of indifferent serenades unheard in the susurrations of the living. Vasquez crossed himself languidly in jest, an old tradition of the Order. Not serious, yet. Still, the prescience of a prudent seer led him to pull his necklace from under his shirt, resting the reliquary above his heart. He reached into a shirt pocket for his Chesterfields and matches. The exhaled smoke bloomed into the parlor wavering among the glimmers. He laid the pack and matches on the loveseat in case any wanted a smoke. The rain had stopped, the night turning cool anticipating the coming October frost. Vasquez added a chair to the fire and the glimmers seemed glad of the glow, gliding in the aura unfelt. Moonlight eluded clouds lingering on a small wind.  Peaceful. It was time to dig up the guest. Three The graveyard was wet and the shovel almost hissed as it cut through leaves. The dirt got drier closer to where the coffin should be. Opening the casket was the least favorite part of the ritual for Vasquez. Most of the remains were bare bones and dust, but some were skin desiccated to parchment that crumbled and tore in his hands, the taint clinging. There was only one guest to free; the parlor was already crowded with the gossamer revelers who came at his invitation.  His shovel struck the rotting wood of the temporary tomb. He cleared dirt to get a grip on the lid’s edge to pry it open. It broke apart in his hands into the box, showering the inside with debris that clung as he pulled remains from the grave and stacked them beside it. The bones flickered white through shreds of moldy clothing in the passing moonlight. Vasquez was pleased as he climbed out of the hole. He carried the bones across the road to the parlor, leaving the shovel behind for next time.  The fire had burned to embers. He placed the bones on the loveseat and added a table leg to the fireplace. The wood began to smoke and he blew on the coals to establish a flame. Three breaths and he was able to add more to the fire, preparing it for the bones of the guest. It was the ritual to establish a place for the unsettled dead to anchor their essence. The glimmers in the parlor were testament to his success in the unnatural awakening. Vasquez was confident as he prepared the bones, cleaning them to bareness with his hands. The bones cracked as they burned, freeing the spirit from the last stygian tentacles of mortality. Vasquez sat on the loveseat and noticed the pack of Chesterfields was empty, spent matches on the floor. He smiled. Good to know. D Bedell has a BA in Writing from Missouri State University and an MS from the Center for Defense and Strategic Studies. His work has appeared in Floyd County Moonshine, Susurrus , and SciFanSat .

Necklaces of jasmine-flowered words  cling to the throats of whimsical tourists before blending with the bustle of Bangkok  like clownfish among coral in a tumultuous sea. Some are as red as chilies whose ancestors ripened  on Brazilian hills  and dried below the decks of Portuguese ships. Others are as white as coconut milk or Cape Gardenia flowers. And still others—blue as the Chiang-Mai sky in the middle of May. Sometimes they are swallowed with pennywort juice  by the baskets of lotus roots, tamarind plums, and tassel flowers at the Pak Khlong Market;   muttered playfully at the caged puppies at Chatuchak Park;   grumbled across King Rama’s Memorial Bridge;  shouted from the decks of taxi boats  up and down the Chao Phraya River; whispered in every bar along the Patpong Road;  bounced above the tuk-tuk seats as they glide around the Democracy Monument; strung together to form cognac-flavored wishes;  drowned and resurrected by the same bottle of Mekong. And in the early hours   they come to roost like the leaden darkness  upon the roofs of the spirit houses. Frank William Finney is a poet from Massachusetts who taught literature in Thailand for 25  years.. His work can be found in BarBar, Hare’s Paw Literary Journal, Hearth and Coffin Literary Journal, 7th-Circle Pyrite , and Tales of the Strange (anthology) with work  forthcoming in Blue Unicorn . He is a Letter Review Prize for Poetry winner, and the author of The Folding of the Wings (FLP Books, 2022) and other collections.

October 15, 2043 I’ve been accepted! By train and boat we journey to join the other initiates. We’re allowed three final phone calls – “chatter away to your heart’s content!” the email instructed. I called my mother and father first, but found I had little to say, and mostly listened. They cried of course, and pleaded with me to speak, so I described the fog-licked moors and tannin-soaked peatlands, the jaunty heather and juniper. “Speak normal Cormack,” they said, “stop banging on like a pious knob. Just speak normal before we forget what ya sound like.” But I find it impossible to speak the same way, now I’m aware of how many words I have left. My sister is furious with me, but she answered when I called her separately. “It’s not your fault they made the choice they did, Corm,” she said angrily. “A choice isn’t right,” I said back, “that’s not quite the right word.” I decided not to use my third phone call.  November 7, 2043 Apologies. I haven’t written for weeks. Well, except for the violent waterfall of consciousness we pour into our lab books, exorcising the cathartic and the mundane, to be burned in the evening fires. Ash settling into earth; our thoughts soaked up by layers of soil. This journal they don’t know about. My bunkmate, Yongyi, has one too, and we have a silent pact (haha) not to tell.  November 22, 2043 Most initiates fail to join the Inner Canal. They fail one of the Four Tests that Yongyi and I JUST PASSED: The Comic (We did not laugh) The Tragedist (We did not weep)  The Unjust (We did not gasp, or rage) The Romantic (We did not fall, but we Love) November 25, 2043 No one can tell us how bad it hurts, obviously. Yongyi and I have ours this afternoon. We stayed up all night by pilfered candlelight, sticking our tongues out and wagging them around – slimy, red slugs. We sang in bold whispers and flailed around the room, we told all the childhood stories we knew, we talked shite and nonsense and tongue twisters, we told each other our secrets because we won’t be able to speak them after today, and he told me he didn’t blame me for stealing Maxwell’s girlfriend in biology class, it wasn’t my fault he made the choice he did, plus my presentation on regenerating coral reefs was epic and objectively hot, and there were clearly bigger issues he was dealing with. Then I didn’t want to talk much anymore, but Yongyi made me sing a song about a turtle who was born without a shell and thinks he’s a person, and we laughed so hard, and neither of us slept a blink because to be honest we were scared shitless.  February, 2044 I know it’s been months. You must be wondering how it went. I’ve got the hang of swallowing again, though I went through a phase of swallowing non-stop until my throat swelled up. We eat endless potatoes (I can still taste variations in earthiness and sweetness in my soft palate and mouth), dry biscuits with gravy, seaweed, the occasional bit of mutton (finely chopped). Yongyi and I have fully graduated and when we’re not Listening, we walk through the old castle grounds and pretend to be crows convening and scheming amongst the stone circles, our robes billowing behind us—burnt amber wings. When one of us lies on the mist-whetted ground with our legs and arms toward the sky, teeth gnashing, this means we had a day of HARD Listening. We are supposed to visit the caves and purify our bodies and minds, to cleanse ourselves of everything we hear and absorb into our nervous system and spirits, which we will do, but first we come here and gnash gnash gnash.  February still (I think), 2044 People tell us everything. They confess their crimes, the horrors they live with, their desires and their shame, their unbearable fears, they confess the grotesqueness and beauty of their psyches, they confess how much they love, and how they fear failing the ones they love. We are trained to bear true witness, and in doing so become a conduit down to the molten earth and up into infinite galaxies, creating space for pain and suffering to be transmuted into unbounded possibilities. Some Listeners fail because they cannot handle their own silence—when a person vows to suicide, we do not argue with them or convince them or persuade them or threaten them or comfort them. We do not know if our Listening will amount to a life extinguished or a life lived. I take comfort in knowing what it was like twenty years ago: So you call the number right, you worked up the guts, because it’s embarrassing to ask a stranger for this kind of help, the soul kind. And you get this automated voice, wait twenty to an hour, probably longer. Finally, some sleep-deprived, unpaid social work student who needs it for their CV answers – you hold back a volcano, but the words bubble out. And then, the checklist. How suicidal are you: a standardized questionnaire design.  Choose from two options: 1 - Not enough: Well, if you don’t have a means or a date set, you’re probably just attention seeking. A few minutes of platitudes, some subtle shaming about how terrible it would be for your family, call back if you’re actually suicidal.  2 - Too suicidal: Now you’re a legal liability. The cops are called and you’re carted off to a facility where they lock you up against your will and force meds down your throat and they don’t provide therapy, only more suicide checklists, and you’re forced to lie and say you’re fine because you must escape that hellscape.  I remind myself of this, and other reasons, when the not knowing is difficult.  April? May? The crocus are blooming. 2044 There is a kind of sickness moving through the Listeners. We have been informed to increase our grounding (stomping bare feet into mud) and purification (the caves) exercises. Some Listeners appear to be… psychically disintegrating. I wonder… yesterday I was Listening for a man who felt his existence was pointless, he only repeated life (his children who do not respect him) but he has not created anything of meaning, and also he feels his only worth is his paycheque, and nothing was particularly unique about the call, except my body evaporated, I mean completely disintegrated into the atmosphere, and I was tethered to this reality only by his words, and I nearly cried out. Imagine! They would have put me on bed rest.  Whenever the fuck it is.  People are whingebags. I’ve heard enough of their mundane, shitty problems. GET A GRIP. If I Listen for one more second, I will kill myself. And who will Listen to me???  Probably June, 2044 I decided not to cross out the last entry. It is all part of this exhilarating discipline. Today I feel such love for all life-forms. Such an impossible, brutal yet resplendent ecosystem we exist in! The complexity is unending, without edges or point of origin. I love. I LOVE!  TIME IS A CONSTRUCT Are we not God? They speak to us, into the abyss. And we listen, silently, and they trust that we listen.  Probably still June or maybe July, 2044 Got a tad grandiose there, sorry. But it’s difficult sometimes, all this silence. Yongyi and I have learned a type of morse code, through blinking. If someone finds this journal, please keep this knowledge to yourself. Or come find us in the stone circles, and we can teach you! But only if you’re cool.   I was actually warm today. August? 2044 I haven’t experienced the disintegration again. They’ve been giving us longer breaks, more time spent with the chickens and the sheep, even games to play like mancala and crokinole. Yesterday a young woman called—you can tell age through the texture of the voice. She didn’t want me to change her mind. She wanted a witness for the end, a kind of confessional. And that I gave her. Sometimes people yell and scream and flirt (the smuttiest things! It’s hard not to respond, I admit) and plead with their Listeners to make a sound, even a mumbled yes or no. But this girl sounded exhausted mostly. I think she was relieved by the full silence. I want to specify that it is a full silence we give. There is nothing empty about it. We never let anyone feel alone, like they did before, even with all their advising and diagnosing and chastising.  August, 2044 I can’t find Yongyi. There is a search party tonight. I’m worried, but I can’t stop thinking about that girl, either. I’m certain she’s dead, but maybe my Listening helped her. Maybe she hung on to this material plane. Sometimes I think I possess the power to traverse the expanse of space and time. I will find Yongyi, and I will find that girl, and I will bring back my friends. But this is attachment, which is BAD apparently. I don’t know. I like attachments. If we’re not attached, we might float away.  Later in August, 2044  Yongyi is still missing. He is my best living friend. There was a spontaneous laugh attack in the Listening Hall today. I giggled too. No, I roared with laughter!!!! Which is probably not so great, because the person I was Listening for just lost her husband to cancer. But then… she shrieked with laughter too! People are disintegrating and reintegrating, and even the Master Listeners are all a jumble. I miss being a crow with Yongyi. Sometimes he would peck my arm really hard and draw blood.  Later today, 2044 Just so you don’t think he’s a wanker, he also nuzzled into my neck and blew air on my ears and made crow noises (which is not allowed, but he does it anyway, which is one of the things I love about him. Another thing is that he saves me extra biscuits). October 15, 2044 (the other initiates are joining today)  Yongyi has been missing for two months. When people glance at Yongyi’s empty seat, I’m sure they think of the sea and its unforgiving rocks. Maybe I’ve got everything backwards. Maybe he was close to the edge all along.   His seat will be replaced this afternoon by a new initiate. I buried a tack into the chair’s fabric so they can’t see the shining metal tip.  March 3, 2045 Daily rhythms have settled down again in the Inner Canal. The Masters have added group expression sessions so we don’t bottle things up and erupt in laughter or tears while Listening. We’re allotted ten minutes a day to scream and make any noise we wish. We continue to Listen. I don’t want to talk about it here, but Listeners have been reporting a repeat caller who doesn’t speak but makes garbled sounds. A dam’s cracked open; blood surges through my veins again.  Listeners don’t police calls like they did in the past, but this morning they taught us how to track calls. Training Listeners is an expensive investment and we signed contracts to stay here. They punish those who shirk their duties, but losing a finger or two isn’t so bad after what we’ve been through.  March 7, 2045  Yongyi knew it was me by the weight and shimmer of my silence. He made our cawing noises and I had to bite my lips to keep from cawing back.    My friend Maxwell, he used to have a pet crow. The crow had fallen from its family nest, and Maxwell made him a bed out of socks and put him in a cage for safekeeping. The crow would nuzzle our fingers and play with us, but his eyes became harder over the years, little accusing shards.  Yongyi doesn’t know about the track command though. When he comes back, he’ll see that things are better. I’ll keep a watchful eye on him. We will leap atop the standing stones, crouching like bullfrogs. Croaking doesn’t need consonants like cawing does, so we can bound through sea haar making all the noises we want, and we will sound perfect. Robyn Thomas is a Canadian writer and filmmaker currently living in Scotland where she’s completing her PhD in anthropology and discovering her love of haggis. Her writing has been published in Orca Literary Journal, Hunger Mountain Review, Marrow Magazine, Carmina Magazine, Psyche Magazine and other publications.