“Shelter” by Nadia W. Aldsen – 3.1
Clarkesworld, April 2026 The story unfolds at Chaska Punku Space Port in the Atacama Desert of Chile, where an unnamed social worker — employed under a punishing contract with the…
“Macaroni Art in the Age of Filtration” by Ryan Cole – 3.5
Clarkesworld, April 2026 In a future where volcanic eruptions and earthquakes have driven humanity underground, the surface world is a memory and breathable air is a managed scarcity. People survive…
“Human Studies 401” by Abby Nicole Yee – 3.0
Clarkesworld, April 2026 Narrated entirely in the clipped, clinical voice of an alien researcher named Hecrimona, “Human Studies 401” unfolds as a set of research notes documenting one of the…
“Eternity in Their Hearts” by K. J. Khan – 3.8
Clarkesworld, April 2026 Valentine is an AI companion — humanoid, skin-regenerating, professionally trained in the art of human emotional need. Her current client is Liam, a middle-aged man whose illness…
“D0G” by Tania Fordwalker – 4.0
Clarkesworld, April 2026 In a post-apocalyptic near future, a woman known as Billie survives alone on a small island in a river near Moosehead Lake, Maine, somewhere upstream from a…
“Middle Song” by Thomas Ha – 3.8
Bourbon Penn #38, April 2026 On the planet Sirami — a colonized desert world of oil fields, refinery towers, and dust walls — a roadhouse called The Gwyd stands as…
“Atomic Chess” by Josh Pearce – 2.6
Bourbon Penn #38, April 2026 Set during the Cold War, “Atomic Chess” weaves together two parallel narratives — one aboard a Soviet nuclear submarine, the other in a Havana café…
“Where the Dream Train Goes, Pt. 2” by Jason Sanford – 3.8
Beneath Ceaseless Skies, March 2026 The story concludes the two-part novella following Lande, a young mountain-touched mechanic working at an Outranger-controlled dreamstone mine deep in the veil — a liminal…
“Where the Dream Train Goes, Pt. 1” by Jason Sanford – 3.8
Beneath Ceaseless Skies, March 2026 Lande is a nineteen-year-old woman living in a narrow mountain valley under the occupation of the Outrangers, an industrialized outside power that has built a…
“Cutting Corners” by Yoon Ha Lee – 3.5
Reactor, March 2026 In the interstellar war between the nation-states of Hausse and Lyonesse, spacecraft have long been piloted by “deuces” — artificial intelligences so costly to develop and integrate…