Butterfly

I staggered out of the time machine, wiping blood from my nose. Like Doctor had warned, radiation attacked my brain as time lapsed.

The man I hunted was under the tree. He’d dismantled humanity and our future.

He waved. His chubby cheeks reddened from the sun.

“Look,” he said. Resting on his small palm, a butterfly.

Wrong year. I didn’t expect to see a child.

He smiled innocently. “For you.”

Smiling back, I reached out.

He closed his fingers, and squeezed. A familiar smirk appeared. “Uh-oh.”

I reeled backwards.

No. I am not a monster. I am not a monster.

From Guest Contributor Umi Agawa

Prevail

The Nazis took drastic measures to make me obey their cause. I had been beaten so badly, it took weeks for my swollen eye and broken arm to heal, and that wasn’t the worst of it. They threatened my wife and daughter. If I didn’t do what the Nazis wanted, they would kill my only family.

My parents were shot dead in their home because they hid Jewish friends, and I had been told they begged for their life.

If I continue to refuse, my wife and daughter will be next. I had to prevail; I wouldn’t let that happen.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

The Boat

At summer's end, Marta found her dead brother's phone charging in the boathouse, though she had emptied his pockets herself in May. The screen showed one message, unsent: Don't sell the boat.

She laughed, because the boat leaked and because Erik had never repaired anything before being asked twice.

Outside, pines scratched the roof. The red mailbox leaned toward the road, waiting for bills.

Marta carried the phone to the jetty. Under the seat, beside a rusted thermos, lay fresh gray putty around the seams.

She launched at dusk. Halfway home, the phone died. The boat did not sink either.

From Guest Contributor Niklas Pettersson

The Trouble With Being Born

It was called Oak-something – Oakwood? Oakdale? – Diner. Waitresses, dressed as for mourning in all black, moved through the maze of tables and booths with the dull resignation of fish in an aquarium. Mom was sitting across from me, looking unusually happy. I felt kind of happy myself. Our waitress, a flyblown blonde, came over to refill our cups. She sloshed some coffee on the table as she poured. Mom rolled her eyes. Then I noticed the smell and her skin hanging down in strips like peeling wallpaper, and I realized I was screaming and that she was 20 years dead.

From Guest Contributor Howie Good

Howie's latest poetry collection, True Crime, was published by Sacred Parasite in Berlin this year.

A Matter Of Degree

To explain what had happened to me, my friends showed me a movie called “Blast from the Past,” about a man who spends 35 years in a nuclear fallout shelter before entering the world.

Like him, I’d lived my 22 years underground with my family, never knowing there was anything above us.

Now, looking at the blue sky, sun, stars, and trees, I was sad to have only experienced light from cooking fires and candles.

So my friends showed me another movie called “Encino Man,” about a Cro-Magnon man who’s thousands of years old, frozen since the first Ice Age.

From Guest Contributor Susmita Ramani

Falling From The Sky

In the Arctic North, a flock of snow geese were all aflutter. It was time for them to fly south. They gracefully ascended on the Arctic winds.

The birds flew through the ribbons of primary-colored lights adorning the vast sky.

Further south, a very strange sight appeared above them. Falling through the sky, a human with man-made wings was flailing his arms as a flurry of feathers erupted in all directions.

A group of the geese flew to the man, clutched the wooden wing frames, and escorted him gently to the ground.

"May Zeus reward your kindness," said the man.

From Guest Contributor Deborah Shrimplin

Baby Boy

When you opened the door, Rob stood with a bouquet of red roses and a smile on his face. He had been deployed over a year ago, and you didn’t know anything about his mission, only surmised the danger.

You greeted him with a hug and kiss, crushing the bouquet, then stood back and clutched your chest, while tears streamed down your cheeks. “I can’t believe you’re home!”

You took him by the hand, pulled him into the house and hugged him again fiercely this time.

You had something wonderful to show him.

The baby boy upstairs in his crib.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

The Polish-Russian Frontier

Eurasian red squirrels live on the border of Poland and Russia. During severe winter storms they shelter inside their nests lined snuggly with twigs and moss. Ralph and Rayette were two Eurasian squirrels. After a fierce four-day blizzard, Ralph poked his snout out. It was 15 below…

“Look at the snow drifts, Rayette.”

She knew that when she’d seen one drift she’d seen them all.

“Hey, I forget, do we live in Russia now?”

“No, Ralph… The Russian frontier's 20 yards that way.”

“Well, that's a relief.”

“Huh?”

“I don't think I could survive any of those brutal Russian winters.”

From Guest Contributor David Sydney

The Wall

The city was surrounded by a wall. In the distant past, whatever architects built the city had ensured there was plenty of room to expand, with the wall erected far from the center. They probably believed there was so much space that they'd never run out. Or that the city would die before it grew so large as to matter.

But here we were teeming like a coffee cup, the only thing holding the place together an invisible tension that might burst at any moment.

No one knew what, if anything, existed beyond the wall. Only that it was dangerous.

For the prompt Frontier

Lost In Space

It is a sweltering summer evening, and Dad bursts through the back screen door, home early from work, carrying a paper bag stuffed with green frilly leaves. “Look,” he beams unpacking the strange-looking vegetable. “Something new. It’s called Romaine lettuce.” He tears off a long tapered leaf and glides it over my upturned hand. “Try it,” he grins. “It flies—like a supersonic r-r-rocket!”

It is the age of Sputnik, Explorer, ballistic missiles and orbital launchers, and we kids are all enthralled. I bite into the crisp, tall leaf, savor the pleasantly cool, exhilarating blast and I am riding high.

From Guest Contributor E. C. Traganas