by Michael Kingswood Autonomous Drilling Unit Seven detected an overspeed condition on one of its drill motor drivetrains. Motor number six was approaching the upper limit of its allowed operational speed band, and the monitoring speed sensor flashed an alert. This prompted a series of diagnostic algorithms, which ADU-7 performed in the background while it…
Category: Short Story
Suspended Sentence – Part 3
by Silent Draco Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 2050, 20 Jun 45, Base Gold Four, American Zone of Occupation “Colonel Sellers, pleasure to see you and colleague again!” boomed Colonel Novoshenko. His face grew long as he added, “But news with ill wind have you? Comrade Lieutenant Simirov, your radio said,…
Heaven’s Gate
by Michael Kingswood The central marketplace in Theomor, the capital city of Heaven’s Gate, extended for a kilometer in every direction, and housed merchants of all kinds, and without much in the way of rhyme or reason that Manolo could figure out. A sparkling clean, brightly lit, three-story store decorated in the latest modern flash…
Suspended Sentence – Part 2
by Silent Draco Part 1 Part 2 1925, 20 Jun 45, Base Gold Four, American Zone of Occupation “… Right. Aside from d-driving on the wrong side, you Yanks make excessive sp- speeding into an art form!” exclaimed Griffin, “’Twas all my poor driver could do to remain caught up!” “We’re here an additional 12…
Cupid’s Arrow
by Michael Kingswood “You know Cupid?” The young fairy who asked the question beamed at me through eyes grown wide with amazement. Her cheeks seemed to sink as her jaw dropped open in time with the expanding of her eyelids, and the cute little dimple just above her jaw vanished before the sudden tension in…
Suspended Sentence – Part 1
by Silent Draco Part 1 1850, 20 Jun 45, near Eisenach [Soviet Zone of Occupation] “Well. This is rather a dog’s breakfast, eh what?” came dryly in the evening air. “Major Griffin, if you please, not now!” growled the American. “Why, Colonel Sellers, after your time with … staff agencies, you should have some sense…
Revelator
by Michael Kingswood Barnam licked his lips and bent forward. Squinting in the darkness, he could just make out the lock at the bottom of the window in front of him. It looked simple; an easy pick that should just take a minute or two. Too simple. He turned his head to the right where…
A Cabin In The Woods
by Michael Kingswood The wind rushed past, making the thin wooden sides of the tiny cabin Nancy huddled in shudder. A high-pitched whistling advertised its penetration through the cracks around the cabin’s latched door, and she shivered as what warmth there was fled before its incursion. She wrapped the threadbare wool blanket that she had…
The Greenhorn Tree
by Michael Kingswood Once upon a time, far away in the land of Quenith, lived a young man and his brother. Their names were Gideon and Marnik. They lived with their father, Gregor, halfway up the foothills of the mountains on the west side of the kingdom, where they helped their father fell trees and…
Shell Shock
by Michael Kingswood The shell landed three feet away from me. I was crouched—really pressed prone into the dirt with my hands thrown over my head—in my pitiful attempt at a foxhole, but we’d had so little time to get on station and then prepare to repel the oncoming attack that I’d only been able…