Ben woke from a dream to find himself in the middle of the scrub. The sun beat down. The genie in his dream told him that he was on the centre-line, whatever that meant. Ben also learned from the talking serpent that the carrot would sustain him as long as he made it last. Just … Continue reading The Forbidden Fruit
The writer pondered the field in search of his next writing prompt. If it weren’t for the steel fence posts the vista would probably look the same as it did two centuries ago. It’s still an old, wise land with endless stories to tell, but no voice to tell them. It was up to the … Continue reading Typical!
The invalid laments the loss of his mobility. His wheelchair is wider than his front door. Each day he mourns religiously before the vista beyond his window which calls and mocks him like a child rattling a bird cage. Everyone tells him how brave he is to press on in his condition. He’d end it … Continue reading The Sad Man Saves the Day
The man walks up to the open book, pressing his nose to the leaves. He smells it, scratches it, and even tastes it. It’s not a book of paper and leather, but it has quite the story to tell. The man adjusts his glasses, straightens his beard, flicks his suspenders and goes in for another … Continue reading Strange Way of Reading
An amorphous blob gestates in a furnace and is ejected at an inhuman temperature. It glows orange in its wooden crib. The ovum cools and turns red, before taking on its ultimate, translucent nature and revealing its iridescent innards. What is the creature that lives inside this curious blob of molten intrigue? It’s an egg … Continue reading Marble
Humans haven’t changed too much since they’ve been around. We’re a little taller than we were a thousand years ago, but we’re a little shorter than we were ten-thousand years ago (1). We might be a little scrawnier than our ancestors, but we’re a little better at running marathons (2). And one might argue that … Continue reading Ancient Humans
You’ve seen tablets, smartphones, books that read themselves and action figures that do your maths homework. There are glow-in-the-dark dolls, web-slinging wrist-canisters, illuminated basketballs and talking frisbees. You’ve seen them on the shelves of stores, and in the catalogues that fill your mailbox every weekend. They’re advertised on TV during the kids’ programs, and they … Continue reading The Toy Train
The robots are moving in to take away all the repetitive jobs: filing paperwork, sweeping streets, driving trains, mowing lawns, bagging groceries... they’ll dominate the world without us even noticing. Now that they’re able to perform maintenance on themselves, they’ve become totally self-sufficient. Say goodbye to your local apple farmer. There’s a robot that can … Continue reading The Robots
We stick together - me and my buddies. If we didn’t, they’d call us “fried rices,” not “fried rice." There was once one among us though, who went against the grain. Can you imagine eating us with chopsticks if you had to pick us up one by one? Well, the one of us who had … Continue reading The Grain of Rice
Franklin Xavier-Moore pulls out his rip-stop nylon compression sack and unbuckles the polyethylene clips. He tugs and out pop the carbon fibre tent poles and 5000mm polyurethane coated inner-tent. The polyester tent fly is stuck in the stuff sack with the titanium pegs and Kevlar guy wires. A shake of the stuff sack liberates them … Continue reading Top of the Line
