“Kid. Hey, kid.”
Stuart felt a hand slap his cheek.
“You okay?”
Stuart groaned and opened his eyes. Something bright and orange hovered above him. “Yeah, I think so.”
He pulled himself up as his vision focused. The orange solidified into an upright tapir with a tortoise shell, the dorsal appendage of an anglerfish
Pam: I saw one
Jimmy: srsly? What do they look like? I hear they’re so orange, they’ll burn your eyes. Like the sun.
Pam: How’d you now what I’m talking about?
*know
Jimmy: Because it’s all anyone is talking about. Cam got sent to the hospital last week for getting too close
The ornate front door of The Inventor’s house had a glass knob and engravings of vines crawling over the edges. I didn’t knock—there was no need. The Inventor wouldn’t answer, anyways. Mother had tried to convince him he needed an assistant to run the house, but The Inventor wouldn’t have it.
Read it now
Halfway down 22nd Avenue, a linebacker wannabe nearly knocked me over. I twisted around him, threaded between a mother and daughter, and sidestepped a yapping fur ball. All the while, my focus never left the woman.
She stood with her back against a storefront wall, staring at me with purple eyes. Yep. Purple.
Aham drew a deep breath, anxious anticipation swirling through him like dust kicked up across the Sancen Desert.
It’s a race, like any other.
Hasi rested her scaled snout on Aham’s shoulder, as if she sensed his anxiety. The reptile stood twice his height and her girth rivaled a wagon’s. Glorious creatures, cardants
No flower could ever be prettier than Ederra. She stands underneath a kukka tree, rimmed by violet blossoms.
Stop staring, Zoran.
Hands sweating, I eye the buffet spread on the reception table. A plate of berry-topped taikinas makes my mouth water, but I’d rather not deal with cheek swelling and mouth burning today.
Boom!
Christopher jumped up, knocking their board game off the kitchen table. He turned toward his sister, Paisley. “What was that?”
She shrugged. “Sounded like it came from outside.”
Rushing to the window, Christopher tore back the curtain of their third-story apartment and stepped onto the balcony. The view made him gasp.
Yesterday was the awfullest day in the history of awful.
Morning light intruded on my doze, bringing back another rehash of those bullies tormenting my almost-friend, and me doing nothing about it. “Stay out of this, Ade-lame!” they taunted, so I did.
Any minute now, mom would yell, “Adelie, get up!”
I pulled
Flying through midair, I brought my megabot’s blade down hard on the neck of the tentacled beastie. Inky-blue blood splattered across the rough, uneven surface of the Antarctic ice.
A direct hit! I yelled in exultation as my megabot landed on one leg, slid in the ice, and crashed onto its side.
“Psi Team Leader, this is Command. Perimeter is secure. Go.”
Seeker Soren Pentam activated his helmet camera and radio. “Copy, Command.” He pounded the door with a gloved fist. “Tomaz Blue, this is the Protectorate! We have a writ for arrest and search!” He paused, counting seconds. His teammates, Enforcers Fennik and Jacosett,
Dr. Jacob Martin stood on the prow of The Cloudscuttler, leaning on the rigging and watching the thick stratocumulus clouds pass under the ship’s hull. The fog rolled away in every direction like folded sails, broken only by the occasional towering formation.
Yes. This is where he was meant to be.
I arch my back and gasp awake.
I lie in a circle of grass. Blades flutter in a gentle breeze. Despite the wasteland of ice and snow that swirls outside the circle, the wind reaches me as a warm summer breeze.
My ruined mech lays at my feet, inches past the green.
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