Dystopian Short

The balloons fell. The trains derailed. The shelves went bare. We got sick. We died. Survival in the midst of an unknown threat, one that appears on the brink of ending life as we know it.

Addison Inquisitor awoke on the island with only the clothes on his back and a pack with a few days of supplies. Suffering from amnesia he desperately wants to find who he is and where he belongs. With the aid of a curious service robot, he begins to explore the island and also try to learn the truth about himself. What he finds is nothing he would ever expect.....

What if the greatest threat to the future isn’t war or disaster… but control disguised as order? In a world rebuilt after economic collapse, towering city-states enforce rigid systems, surveillance, and silence. Malik Varen is just another citizen in the Walled City—until he uncovers a hidden protocol from the old world. A blueprint not for domination, but for freedom. As he races to share the truth, Malik becomes the target of the Watchers—silent enforcers who erase dissent without warning. With time running out and betrayal lurking in every shadow, Malik must risk everything to ...

Two soldiers debate what it means to love and live on a battlefield A short, dark, and dystopic vignette of war throughout the ages. If you ever supported any war, you’ll get the message. You won’t feel good. The tale shows what we have become, what we are living, and where we may be going

They say a man without options can be dangerous. In the far flung future of Bangkok, a young man’s every move is dictated by his boss, the evil Minister of Defense. When a terrifying secret is revealed beneath the capital city millions of lives hang in the balance. He must choose between his loyalty to his country and his ideals, with either choice having drastic consequences for those he loves. Don’t miss Rising, by A. L. Lorentz, for the best of science fiction world building in exotic locales right here on Earth. If you enjoy Rising’s ancillary tale be sure to read what happens to ...

The Sound Of It All Crashing Down is a collection of stories encompassing surrealist horror, apocalyptic sci-fi, and lovecraftian lore, merging these elements to create a sinister mythology all its own. -A man makes a terrible bargain with the denizens of a post-apocalyptic city where experiments are conducted to bring the dead back to life and learn the secrets of the grave. -A woman who uses experimental technology to explore her client’s dreams becomes trapped inside the decaying brain of a dying person. -A grave robber in the far future opens an alien tomb and awakens a monstrosity. A...

"How do you form a more perfect union?" Unlock the continuing mind-bending possibilities of ethical and moral dilemmas with "After Dinner Conversation - Season Six," the next (and final) installment (look for the After Dinner Conversation - Best of" series) of the must-read collection of the best short stories from the critically acclaimed After Dinner Conversation magazine series. Spanning all genres, from science-fiction to historical fiction and everything in between, each story is guaranteed to captivate you and leave you questioning your own beliefs. Perfect for philosophy students and...

William and his friends have battled scores of the diseased and left communities behind them on their journey to find what lies south of the wall bisecting the country. They’ve lost loved ones and overcame many challenges, but they’ve never faced an obstacle as great as the one before them: the wall, steel, sheer, and 200 feet tall—an insurmountable barrier designed to separate the north and south. Their dream should stop here, but the group has a plan to get to the other side, and it might just work.

She signed a contract to carry his heir—he plans to claim far more than her womb. Melissa Lawson came to Solara Sands for one thing: to fix her broken body and reclaim her future. What she got was Ruhn Kez—her assigned “Genetic Guardian”—a massive, war-scarred Drexilian warlord with ice in his stare and fire in his touch. The contract said, “No emotional entanglement.” But nothing about synchronized surf therapy sessions, rogue vortex trials, or bioluminescent bonding lagoons feels clinical. Ruhn is cold, commanding, and terrifyingly focused on legacy, but when he shields her ...

Welcome to future-shock. Hold on tight and buckle yourselves in, because the future is on a relentless onslaught, for better or worse. This is a collection of the short speculative fiction of Gabriel Walker Land. Most stories are flash fiction, meaning less than 1000 words. Each contains a story of mystery, action, romance, and suspense.

In the 12 unforgettable tales of Lesser Known Monsters of the 21st Century, the strange is made familiar and the familiar strange, such that a girl growing wings on her legs feels like an ordinary rite of passage, while a bug-infested house becomes an impossible Kafkaesque nightmare. Each story builds a new world all its own: A group of children steal a haunted doll; a runaway bride encounters a sea monster; a vendor sells toy boxes that seemingly control the passage of time; an insomniac is seduced by the Sandman.

The machines started popping up around the world. The offer was tempting: with a simple blood test, anyone could know how they would die. But the machines didn't give dates or specific circumstances - just a single word or phrase. DROWNED, CANCER, OLD AGE, CHOKED ON A HANDFUL OF POPCORN. And though the predictions were always accurate, they were also often frustratingly vague.

Brace yourself for the ULTIMATE MIND-BENDING NIGHTMARE! "The Night Shift" isn't just a story – it's a reality-shattering experience that'll electrify your soul! Step into Sally's shoes as her ordinary night at a gas station explodes into a heart-stopping battle against unspeakable horrors. Feel your pulse thunder as the veil between worlds tears, unleashing mind-warping entities into our reality!

Shelby is struggling with parenthood, marriage, a passive-aggressive mother, and unemployment. But she also has a sweet escape in her beloved Hallmark movies. When a secret admirer promises to sweep her away into a world of those same romantic tropes, the temptation is so heady, Shelby can already smell the pumpkin spice. But this rom-com dream has a whiff of conspiracy....

🔥"HUNGER GAMES Meets DIVERGENT—with a Gothic Twist!"🔥 🌟 From New York Times, USA TODAY and Amazon Top-100 Bestseller Tamara Rose Blodgett, comes a poignant glimpse into the emotional core of her #1 Dark Fantasy bestselling series. 💬 “Unexpected and beautiful... the perfect in-between moment of the series.” — Verified Reviewer What’s Inside: Set between Unrequited Death (Book 6) and For the Love of Death (Book 7), this 6,300-word novelette explores the quiet, sensual bond between two beloved side characters: John Terran and Tiff Weller. As the world unravels around them...

In the peninsula country of Raktsthaan, protruding from the India and Pakistan border in Asia, the draconic government decided that they, come what may, would build the tallest statue in the land. A monument for the god Taahya. Construction of the statue began, and the people of Raktsthaan, a poorer nation than its surrounding neighbors, by order of the dictator President and his commanders, were made to surrender all of their gold to the building of this monument. As the days passed, even more gold was forced from famine-stricken hands and malnourished stomachs. Intellectuals who opposed ...

First published in sci-fi magazines of the 1950s, these early stories from Philip K. Dick showcase the budding author’s uncanny ability to forge strange new paths into alternate realities. Already in command of the themes and techniques he would later employ in his novels, Dick here envisions alien infiltrations, far-off worlds at war, nightmarish totalitarian societies, and uncanny depths lying just beneath seemingly commonplace realities. Fantastical, sinister, paranoid, and darkly amusing, these are seminal works in Dick’s justly celebrated career.

There are no zombies here! But lurking within the pages of this creepy anthology is every other type of ghoulish creature a horror enthusiast could want. Do you love monsters? We have plenty. Are demons your thing? You have your choice of the amusing type or the kind that will make you go insane. Men in Black? Check. Cannibals? Yep. Serial killers? We got ‘em. There’s even a witch thrown in for good measure. The settings in this collection range from a decaying urban city to a sinister lighthouse island...from an isolated forest to a decrepit gas station in the Arizona desert…from a ...

Family meant everything to Ayden Stratton. It always had even when he didn’t always allow it to show. Because of that, he understood the fury in Tobias Blaise’s eyes when they learned that his sister had been dragged out the backdoor of her restaurant despite every effort to stop her from being kidnapped. Fury didn’t begin to describe what he saw in his brother’s face. Cassidy Blaise might be Tobias’s sister, but she was Benjamin’s entire world. Tobias Blaise never expected to find any woman he wanted to spend his life with, let alone one who looked at him the way Ellis did, ...

'EPICS 3' is S.E. McKenzie's 3rd collection of Epic poems. This collection includes poems #29-#43.