Tag: mouse

Where Have All the Mousies Gone

by Mary E. Lowd

Originally published in Daily Science Fiction, December 2021; recipient of the Ursa Major Award for Best Short Fiction

“My grandmother died ten years ago when the cats invaded our world, landing their flying saucers on top of our cities, crushing our skyscrapers, and then chasing our people like we were nothing more than animated rag dolls.”

Does it matter what your last thoughts are when you die?  If you could choose them — they would be hope, wouldn’t they?  A bright future.  Waiting.  Ready.  And you’re going to miss it, but wouldn’t you rather die looking out on a shining expanse of golden sunlight, reflecting off ocean waves and filtering through leafy forests?  Cities full of smiling people, whiskers turned up in happiness.  Bare paws dancing on the concrete streets, and long tails tied together, turned like skipping ropes as adults, filled with laughter, act like mere kits. Continue reading “Where Have All the Mousies Gone”

Catacomb’s Orchestra

by Mary E. Lowd

Originally published in Daily Science Fiction, April 2020

“Mice minds were so small. So easy for Catacomb to read.”

Catacomb laid her paw across the tiny heaving belly of the almost drowned mouse.  The poor thing was frightened out of its mind; she could feel its fright through her paw, prickly and tingly.  Mouse emotions were so funny.

“I saved you from the koi pond, Little One,” Catacomb purred.  “Now your life is mine.”  Never mind that the mouse would never have fallen in the koi pond if Catacomb hadn’t been chasing it.  She could see herself through the mouse’s eyes:  massive, terrifying, death-personified.  The asymmetrical orange and black splotches that had inspired her human to name her Peaches (after a bowl of peach cobbler) looked like a devastating Halloween mask to the mouse.  No sweetness.  All murder. Continue reading “Catacomb’s Orchestra”

Go High

by Mary E. Lowd

Originally published in Daily Science Fiction, January 2018

“The flashes of lightning came faster and brighter, each one pulling her deeper into a story unfolding in the fish alien’s eye.”

Evban flapped her mechanical wings joyously, dipping and swooping through New Jupiter’s soupy pink-and-gold clouds.  Her whiskers tickled against the glassy bubble of her breathing-helmet, and her long tail streamed out behind her.  She’d drifted away from the flock of avian aliens.  Their organic wings were broader and stronger than her little mechanical ones, but she knew her friends would come back for her before the space shuttle returned for them all. Continue reading “Go High”

Winged Folk Only

by Mary E. Lowd

Originally published in Daily Science Fiction, January 2018

“Evban flapped her ultra-light aluminum wings as hard as her little arms could, but she didn’t have the strength for it. She kept falling.”

“You can’t come on the voyage,” the Ululu sneered, folding his wings in a very cross manner.  “Winged folk only.”

Evban tried to object, but all the other avians lounging about the bar took up the Ululu’s catchy cry:  “That’s right!  Winged folk only!”  The feathers around the Ululu’s eyes crinkled happily; if he hadn’t been a beaked species, he’d have been grinning.  The Ululu had been looking for a way to exclude Evban from Avian Night at the All Alien Cafe since she’d first started coming, but the cafe owner stood up for the little mousey alien’s right to participate.  Even if she wasn’t any sort of bird. Continue reading “Winged Folk Only”

Tortoise Who

by Mary E. Lowd

Originally published in Exploring New Places, July 2018

“I’m a Time Tortoise from Galapagofrey. We’re both larger and smaller than we seem.”

By the concrete steps up to the footbridge over Dixon Creek, a tortoise shell phased in and out of existence, accompanied by a strangely cheerful wheezing sound.

Rosie the mouse was too busy running away from a cat to notice.  The cat, a gray tabby named Shreddy, was having too much fun to care. Continue reading “Tortoise Who”

The Mouse Who Was Born a Bear

by Mary E. Lowd

Originally published in A Glimpse of Anthropomorphic Literature, Volume 3, August 2016

“Wait,” Maureen said. “Can I–” she hesitated, looking at the closed clone pod. “Can I look at my new body first?”

Maureen lumbered toward the Re-Incorpus Center, feeling horribly large and conspicuous.  Wire fencing on either side of the sidewalk protected her from the yelling protesters.  Nothing protected her from reading the hateful slogans on their signs:  Re-Incorpus Is Murder!  Vat-Bodies Have No Souls!  Death to Gen-Clones! Continue reading “The Mouse Who Was Born a Bear”

Shreddy and the Christmas Ghost

by Mary E. Lowd

Originally published in Anthropomorphic Dreams Podcast, AD 049, December 2012

“Shreddy’s dreams were haunted by sparkling mouse eyes. They hung on the Christmas tree, replacing the colored lights.”

Everything was going wrong this Christmas, and the dogs were too stupid to care.

Usually, after the Feast of the Giant Bird, Shreddy and the dogs were given table scraps to eat.  As a cat and a mediocre hunter, Shreddy relished the chance to taste the flesh of an avian larger than himself.  He looked forward to it all year.  Thus, he watched in utter horror as one of the Red-Haired Woman’s dinner guests scraped all the plates off into the trash.  No taste of turkey this year. Continue reading “Shreddy and the Christmas Ghost”

One Night in Nocturnia

by Mary E. Lowd

Originally published in Tails of a Clockwork World: A Rainfurrest Anthology, September 2012

“In my own eyes, my mouse life was nothing more than grist for the mill of Nocturnia’s stomachs. Yet, those stomachs were connected to hearts that loved my kind for our sacrifice. Was I the monster?”

Mice tell a myth of fearsome creatures with scaly talons, massively muscled bodies, and sharp, hooked beaks. Death from the sky, instant death, for any mouse foolish enough to be above ground when these creatures come hunting.

The name of the myth is owl, and few mice see one and live to tell the tale. Owls are creatures of shadow — both the shadows of trees in a darkening forest and the shadows of misremembered tales retold by forgetful minds. Continue reading “One Night in Nocturnia”