Bethany didn't write this story and that is the greatest tragedy of all. She'd earned a scholarship to UCLA for journalism and poetry, and the one short story she allowed me to read struck me as sensual, razor-sharp and pure genius. It was frighteningly angry, but also vulnerably deep. If she wrote the story you're reading now it would've been a work of art...
Cassandra was running down the hall looking for a way out. She had lost her gun and she barely escaped from the grip of a huge, ugly monster. The rest of the team was not responding through the intercom. I need to find a way back to the ship. This mission is a total failure. There was a lot of activity in the complex but not the way it was supposed to be....
This story is one of a continuing series of connected stories known as "Tales from the Shack." Normally these go into LW because the Shack series started here, and it is much easier for those that follow the stories to find them if I keep them all together. Even so, this one very much belongs in the LW category. This story stands on its own, though it is par...
Author's Note: Edited by Expoh, AnnabelleFalls13, Michael Scott, and Zald. **** It had been a good handful of hours since Jackson had gone with Shaka into the mountain. Chaki was sitting at the campfire outside her family's tipi. Landri sat with her. Palla was sleeping inside. The night was cold, so they brought out a blanket to cover themselves. It was...
Dawn, a Northfield University RA, had a fun game that was lighthearted in the past but this year it may have had deadly have. It was voluntary, so only a handful of the girls accepted the challenge. It was a game of name change. First, you lost your last name altogether. Then your first name was changed to a sexually demeaning phrase. Dawn would inspect the...
The overland bus leaned into the mountainous turn, as if to give the passengers a better view at the steep mountain side. Desert dust, no plants, only a few large boulders pigmented the drab sight. Regardless, the class was cheery. The rare field trip let them see something other than a ruined city. Mountain peaks, drop offs, and large boulders were still a...
"The citizens of the great State of Mississippi," Stuart Whitman loved the sound of that phrase each and every time he said it in front of a television camera, "must be certain that the gaming industry they have voted for is run cleanly, fairly, and transparently. Beyond the reach of organized crime, answerable to the people. And as Attorney General, it is m...
Author's Notes: Each episode in the "An Inhuman Love" series will be a stand-alone novelette, meant to be read and enjoyed in a single sitting. Expect a monster/human pairing in each episode, with all the juicy details included. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Tumbles fell. As sand and rock and a desert night sky taunted him, insulte...
It was with some trepidation that I approached the place. A casual observer, on seeing me tentatively push through the doors, might have thought that I had no business there, or that I wasn't a customer, and may have instead assumed that I was going there merely to repair a vending machine or a cash register. Still, needs must, and I had to start somewhere....
Chapter 1: How It All Began Everything is quiet in the quiet town of Mulberry, Nebraska. But something happened, something bad, very bad. On this very night, the town will suffer terribly as well as the people in it. The people will not be normal people, the town will not be a normal town. While the people die along with the town, Mulberry will be destro...