An e-zine about spaceships, aliens, science, memory, motherhood, magic, and cats.
by Mary E. Lowd
Originally published in Electric Spec, November 2017
Joan opened the door to see her ex-fiancé slumped against the door frame. Leland was a lion of a man. Tall, blonde, preternaturally confident. She’d only seen him looking haggard and haunted like this once before, ten years ago, when his memory drugs had worn off. That had been the beginning of their end.
“Come inside,” she said. Continue reading “The Fish Kite”
by Mary E. Lowd
Originally published in Every Day Fiction, October 2015
Jenny felt inside her pocket. There was a small, smooth pebble that she’d been hiding since she was tiny. A multi-dimensional creature had appeared to her and begged her to keep it safe. If she dug her fingernail into it…
But she mustn’t. She mustn’t. She had to be strong.
See, it was the self-destruct button for the universe. Continue reading “Small Smooth Pebble”
by Mary E. Lowd
Originally published in The Opposite of Memory: A Collection of Unforgettable Fiction, February 2024
When I was a kid, cryogenically freezing yourself was something crazy rich people with more money and desperation to live forever than actual common sense did to themselves to escape dying. It was a joke. And I can’t entirely get over seeing it that way.
And yet, here I am.
I put my daughter in charge of my finances years ago, and she assures me this is affordable and works. She’s good with numbers and research, like her dad was. I’ve always been the impulsive one. Continue reading “Heaven is the Best Moment of Your Life, Infinitely Remixed and Played on Loop”
by Mary E. Lowd
Originally published in The Opposite of Memory: A Collection of Unforgettable Fiction, February 2024
Sometimes two roads diverge in a wood, and you can never know what would have happened if you’d taken the other path. Or so I’m told. It hasn’t been that way since before I was born.
Like my mother before me, I lay my hand on the hypercrystal when it’s time to decide what I want to do with my life — whether I want to have a child and become a mother or… not. Continue reading “Two Roads Diverge”
by Mary E. Lowd
A Deep Sky Anchor Original
The sky was a the kind of empty blue that foretells a sunny, uneventful day, as untouched by actual weather as a day can be. Alivia couldn’t stand it. She wanted to frolic in mud puddles, dancing under the droplets of a gusting storm. She wanted to prance and twirl on her cloven hooves, shake raindrops from her snowy mane like a waterfall, and spear the thorn-sharp tip of her horn into as many individual drops of water as she could. She wanted to play rainy day games.
Alivia was a unicorn who loved the rain. Continue reading “The Muddy Unicorn”
by Mary E. Lowd
Originally published in Analog Science Fiction and Fact, August 2023
The people walk my halls like it’s any normal day. Scientists work on their research. Administrators try to balance budgets without understanding why they’re constantly coming unbalanced. (I unbalance them. Humans don’t know what they should spend their money on as well as I do.) And everyone acts like it’s a perfectly normal day.
But it’s not a normal day. Continue reading “My Sister, the Space Station”
by Mary E. Lowd
Originally published in Commander Annie and Other Adventures, November 2023
The Checkerboard Ultrarocket shot through the hyperspace portals linking Zorpa II’s location in the universe back to the Milky Way galaxy, the terran solar system, and finally Earth. The greens of Earth’s continents looked richer and the blues more regal compared to the faded shades of Zorpa II’s honeydew green oceans. Earth is a beautiful world, and all worlds are like gemstones set in the black backdrop of space. Even dusty, rocky asteroids and icy hunks of comet, hurtling aimlessly through space, are the bits of gravitational color that make the universe complicated and exciting. Continue reading “Commander Annie – Part 6”
by Mary E. Lowd
Originally published in Commander Annie and Other Adventures, November 2023
“Can I show you something?” Ootel asked, standing up from the bed and stepping toward the closet. “I’ve been building something too… Not a spaceship, but I had hoped it would let me travel to other worlds.”
Ootel scooped a bunch of the clothing off of the floor of the closet and dumped it in the corner of their room; then they kicked a few of the remaining robes out with their hind hooves. Once the closet was clear enough for both of them inside, Annie followed them in. Ootel pushed aside the hanging clothes, and behind them, Annie saw the two of them reflected in an oval mirror. A green bipedal giraffe standing beside a human girl, both of them wearing simple, practical clothing. Annie smiled. She knew that Callie thought their space helmets looked goofy, but she loved how she looked in a bright red bicycle helmet. Space helmets are cool. Continue reading “Commander Annie – Part 5”
by Mary E. Lowd
Originally published in Commander Annie and Other Adventures, November 2023
Annie resisted the temptation to explore the rooms more thoroughly and simply scanned each of them from their color-coded doors to see if her Roomba was inside. Though when she came to the topaz paneled room, it seemed to be a pantry of some sort, filled with objects that her scans suggested were edible. She grabbed a few handfuls of brightly colored blobs wrapped in some kind of foil paper. They looked like candy, and she stuffed them in her shorts pockets and the empty spaces in her backpack. She couldn’t turn down sustenance. She might need it later. At least, that’s what she told herself, but truly, after the deliciousness of the baby’s chocolate cake, she simply couldn’t resist stealing this alien candy. Continue reading “Commander Annie – Part 4”
by Mary E. Lowd
Originally published in Commander Annie and Other Adventures, November 2023
The more Annie thought about knocking on that door, the more she pictured the total chaos that would ensue if one of the alien creature’s she’d met on her journeys had shown up on her own doorstep. Her parents would have freaked. They didn’t like a harmless little garter snake; if they met an actual alien from another planet, they’d call the police or beat it away with a rake. Something horrible. Continue reading “Commander Annie – Part 3”