Author: Sandra Lloyd Lewis

The light from the window brushed her face in soft yellow, and picked out the gold in her chestnut hair. She was reading a book, absorbed in its world and he thought she isn’t here, she’s somewhere else. The long black dress and black ribbon in her hair gave her an old-fashioned air, as if she belonged in a different time, and in the coffee shop surrounded by a uniform of jeans and a top, or young teens in a variety of sweatshirts and joggers, or office workers, like himself in a shirt and black trousers, she was a curiosity. It was more than her attire, though; he saw others cast sideways glances at her, taking her in. She wasn’t beautiful in the normal way; if he was being critical, he thought her nose was too long, but she had something interesting.   The teenage group were looking over and laughing, brave in their flock, but the others, men especially, were admiring. Or at least he was.

There’s a buzz in the outer hall, echoing around its rock walls and bouncing the urgent whispers from the low ceiling and Ash watches the advance scout, Morgan, just back from patrol, as she imparts her news to the those nearest the tunnel mouth. Whatever it is, its big, her gestures frantic, her mouth moving fast and people huddle around her, heads bent to catch the words.  Ash hangs back, comforted by the weight of rock, solid at her back, as the group passes the news from person to person, each mouth opening in shock, before passing the message on. Ash is tense and even before the news reaches her, she catches fragmented echoes: The Day patrol are coming back, wounded. Then: only one of them is wounded. And another: No, no-one is wounded; but they have someone with them. As the news approaches, she hears the dread word uttered but dismisses it, until she feels Ayla’s hot breath against her ear and she can’t avoid it: Outsider.

By Sandra

I hadn’t planned to be in a stinking alley at two am with the Fry brothers, and as a fist smacked into my jaw and my head snapped sideways, I had time to regret a number of life choices, which included – in no particular order –

Not learning a martial art from a young age – which would have seriously improved my chances in this situation.

Pretending I could play poker – a large part of why I was in this alley getting lamped.

Not moving out of mum’s house years ago – so I wouldn’t have been involved with Aunty-Pat-next-door’s problems.

Agreeing to help Aunty Pat find her missing – and annoying, and useless – son.

Making friends (of a sort) with Andy Pritchard, see above.

Oh, and not kissing Tracey Evans, in first school, when I had the chance. Nothing to do with this situation, but just representative of my life decisions.

He stood at the edge of the beach taking in the expanse of wide dark sand, peppered with rocks and stones. The high tide mark near his feet had deposited a raft of plastic bottles, some blue rope and a chewed foam body board. The constant drizzle meant the beach was empty other than two people at one end, too far to make out faces, heads were bent to the sand searching the beach.

He fumbled with his rucksack, rechecking the contents, his hands numbed by the wind and looked back to the old Fiat, its windscreen cloudy with salty drizzle. Mandy still sat, a study in sullenness, in the passenger seat, arms folded and mouth tight with frustration. He’d had to work hard to convince her to come this far and now his brain failed him when he thought about how to get her to the water’s edge.  Let alone actually in the water. He looked at the waves crashing lustily onto the beach, unlike their usual gentle teasing. It wasn’t going to be easy. Easy? Impossible more like.

I was born at uhta, that time just before dawn when the mists roll in across the low hills and, some say, the wihts are abroad.

I had refused to be born, so my sweat-soaked mother had to strain harder than she had with any of my siblings, to push me out. Uhta, being neither dark nor light, and my reluctance to join the world, clinging instead to the otherworld, was the reason that, as I finally made an entrance, Mim-mim spied two creatures watching from the edge of the woods, across the sweetgrass meadow: a heorot, standing firm and sound, with eyes of soft brown and a wulf, eyes dark and ravening.

These were my birth omens.

Of course I didn’t know any of this then, I was too busy objecting to the slaps, taking my first lungfuls of air and expelling them on angry wails.

I looked at the dead man, his body lying half in, half out of a puddle of water in the alley. At least, I hoped it was water, although there was the pungent aroma of urine perfuming the air. His eyes were open, holding a look of confusion as if his death had come as a surprise, which to be fair, it must have done. But I felt they were directed at me, which wasn’t fair at all, although, I suppose I was sort of death ‘adjacent’.

I looked at Sally, standing to one side; her dress, if such a small amount of material could be called one, was dishevelled and she was on the verge of tears.

By Sandra

1

First: identify the right time. The purple hiota plants come into flower, just before the Cull, which was a good time, because the Akkers -sorry, that’s what we call them on account of the noise they make eating, Akk, Akk, Akk – lick the nectar and it makes them high. All the guards do it, although forbidden, because more prisoners escaped then than any other time of the solar. Some guards take so much they wander off into the jungle and die there, probably as happy as lice in a dormitory.  

Two: pick your alien wisely and cautiously. The most obvious targets were the guards of course, but that had been tried many times, and the escapees were quickly recaptured. Of course they were. Guards were missed almost immediately, no matter how dopey some of them were – unless they were hiota high. And once recaptured, the prisoners were made an example of.

By Sandra

There she lay, under the pink eiderdown, her face slack, cheekbones hollowed, mouth open. For a long moment Amy thought she’d arrived too late, but then she saw the almost imperceptible rise and fall of the chest. Still alive, then. Leo had said she’d be too late if she left it any longer, but no, the old bag was still going and would probably keep them all waiting on her, if history was anything to go by.

Well, Amy wasn’t going to wait on her; she had made that decision an age ago and the small matter of her death was no reason to change that in her mind. Amy tapped her fingers on her leg and sighed, ‘Well. I came, I saw and all that. I’m off.’ Leo turned from the bed, her face showing the shock she plainly felt, ‘Amy, you only just got here.’ She stood up and crossed the small bedroom, her long floral dress and white cardigan, fitting in seamlessly with the flowered wallpaper, and Lladro ornaments on the bedside table.

She took Amy’s arm and gently ushered her out the door. In a soft voice, she said, ‘Mum is dying, Amy. I know you had your differences, but…’ she began.

‘Differences,’ Amy said, and gave a broken laugh, her voice mocking, ‘is that what we are calling it? It’s called narcissism in my book. Not exactly mother of the year, was she?’ She flung her arms up, frustrated as always whenever the subject of Sherri -she didn’t deserve the moniker mum or mother– came up.

The cube was clear green grass, the smoke inside moving slowly. Now here was here, he was didn’t want to open it, but Mint was waiting by the door, huddled in her thick coat, and he could sense her impatience. He had come here after all, against her better judgement.

‘That’s why we put memories in boxes, Tor. So we can leave them behind.’ She had stroked his arms softly as she spoke, gentle movements that calmed him, but it wasn’t enough.

They had said the procedure was one hundred percent successful. In most cases. But in some, like him, the procedure left a sort of psychic residue. The online forums called it the Aftertaste and that was exactly what it was like, the unpleasant taste of something repeating on you. He couldn’t remember the memory itself – that part at least had worked – but there was a constant sense of disquiet, that he couldn’t shake off. His mind kept trying to work out why he felt it, and, like a newly removed tooth, he couldn’t help probing the missing hole.

The road this time is long, wet and so dark I can only make out the faintest glimmer of light reflecting on the wet tarmac ahead. The man walking beside me stares straight ahead fixing his eyes on some distant object. His mind is difficult to read, but we push on together. I am not sure what I expected but it wasn’t this. You can usually tell what you’re going to get, or as near as damn it, so this is a surprise. There is a deeper darkness than usual from the space either side of the road, a sense of something there, that doesn’t wish us well, and I shiver. This is not going well, why the hell did I take this job? Apart from paying the rent and buying food, and feeding George, I was fine. Really. And I’ve done plenty of jobs like this, so this is no different. Except I have the uneasy feeling this is very different. The road has never been this dark, for one thing and for another, Mr Fink is a closed book, like he is keeping a very tight rein on his thoughts. And he’s walking so fast I feel like I’m in some army march and an irate sergeant will bellow, Move yer arse, yer lazy worm. He’s walking like he is being chased by the hounds of hell. Why am I thinking of the word Hell over and over? I take a deep breath and refocus ahead, listening to the sounds of my breathing. Mr Fink’s chest is rising and falling in panicked breaths, and I hear a moan from him. I start to sweat, this is not good. The darkness on either side of the road has thickened into a wall of seemingly solid black and I sense dread from it. Mr Fink’s eyes are now darting left and right to the dark and ahead I see a small white flesh shape emerge from the gloom. As we come closer, I see what it is and my scalp crawls: it’s a child’s hand, bloodless white, and wrinkled, as if the owner had been in water too long. Mr Fink is eyeing the hand out of the corner of his eyes, as if to look directly at it would cause its owner to come out…