Category Archives: Fiction

Fiction

NEW FICTION: MIGUEL AND THE VIATURA by Eric Gregory

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One of the best things about publishing new stories is seeing writers take old ideas and remake them afresh. A few months ago, we had Sandra McDonald remixing the post-apocalypse trope, and now Eric Gregory updates the urban vampire for a nanotech-infested near future in the favelas of the Global South.

“Miguel and the Viatura” mashes up religion, poverty, exploitative corporations and transcendant technology, but remains at its heart a powerful story of character, of a younger brother led astray. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I have.

Miguel and the Viatura

by Eric Gregory

“We’re close,” said Joaõ. “Keep your eyes open.”

It was hard enough to watch the road. Foot traffic was heavy, and police in hardsuits patrolled the walks, faceless behind their faceplates. The air was usually fine in Pinheiros District, but Joaõ had insisted they both wear masks, and Miguel’s eyepieces fogged constantly. “Are we late?” he asked. The only thing worse than crossing the city to see his father would be doing it for no reason at all. If they missed him, Miguel would punch something.

Preferably Joaõ. Continue reading NEW FICTION: MIGUEL AND THE VIATURA by Eric Gregory →

Fiction

NEW FICTION: WINDSOR EXECUTIVE SOLUTIONS by Chris Nakashima-Brown and Bruce Sterling

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Take one Futurismic alumnus (Chris Nakashima-Brown), one bona-fide science fiction legend (Bruce Sterling), and one grim meathook future in the United Kingdom, as monarchy, politics and altermodern culture smash together in the wake of economic collapse…

I don’t think I’ve ever been so proud to be publishing a story as I am of this one. It’s going to blow your mind, I promise. Now, read.

WINDSOR EXECUTIVE SOLUTIONS

by Chris Nakashima-Brown and Bruce Sterling

10 June 2026

JEKYLL Look, I can’t get you off the hook with these 140-character txt-msgs.

JACKAL Colonel Falstaff suspects I am press.  Since I failed that beltbomb test, well you know what

JACKAL you know what these devils will do to me!  Where would that leave you, Dr. Almighty Blogger?

JACKAL Leaking satellite shots of Prince Harry’s field maneuvers.  You call that “the news”?

JEKYLL No, my mercenary friend,  I do not.  So tell me what Falstaff wants.  Drugs, women, grain, petrol, lingerie?

JACKAL Save me, Jekyll.  You do owe me.

JEKYLL He’s very fond of beer, your Colonel?  I have thirty barrels of Nigerian Sorghum Stout.  Ready to move at your word.

JACKAL Falstaff wants a hot feed of the flesh of the Queen of England. Private and exclusive.  Falstaff is American.  You know how they are about royalty.

JEKYLL You lot are the Canterbury altar boys of our national death cult. Continue reading NEW FICTION: WINDSOR EXECUTIVE SOLUTIONS by Chris Nakashima-Brown and Bruce Sterling →

Fiction

NEW FICTION: OUT WALKING THE STREETS by Eric Del Carlo

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After his excellent study of gender politics in “Fluidity” last autumn, Eric Del Carlo returns to Futurismic with another look at the unanswered yet imminent questions of posthuman identity. Short, sharp and timely – enjoy!

Out Walking The Streets

by Eric Del Carlo

I’m ravenous for sights and sensations, for the leathery creak of the seat beneath me, for the subtle reassuring hum in the metaplastic hull of the train car.  I feel the speed; I record in my mind the tug of force against my body, basic physical principles acting upon me at every moment.  It is new.  It is all worthy of my acute attention.

It is not new.  I am thirty-four years old, and the laws which oversee reality are as familiar–and discountable in day to day life–as the thump of blood in my veins.

I exert the effort not to make a spectacle of myself.  I’m hardly alone on the train, but no others, I feel sure, are as mesmerized by the cityscape streaming past both rows of windows.  I want to, but do not, press my nose to the clear ‘plastic and cry out at the pearlescent architectural wonder on display.  They’ve put me on this train, among regular people.  I’ve promised to control myself, and my promises have convinced those who needed convincing. Continue reading NEW FICTION: OUT WALKING THE STREETS by Eric Del Carlo →

Fiction

NEW FICTION: TUPAC SHAKUR AND THE END OF THE WORLD by Sandra McDonald

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Seems like we’re all a little culturally obsessed with impending apocalypse at the moment; a minor flurry of end-of-the-world tales a few years back has grown into an everyman’s meme, with the cinemas full of zombie hordes, desolate wastelands and rugged survivors. That ubiquity has been a bit off-putting, to be honest… I love me a good post-apocalyptic story, but I’ve become a bit bored of them, and didn’t think we’d be publishing one here at Futurismic any time soon.

But Sandra McDonald has managed to prove me wrong, by subverting the cliches and turning the end of the world on its head with some darkly post-modern humour; “Tupac Shakur and the End of the World” is a post-apocalypse yarn for people who are bored of post-apocalypse yarns. Enjoy!

Tupac Shakur and the End of the World

by Sandra McDonald

The worst part – well, one of the worst parts, disregarding the collapse of modern civilization – is that it was my own stupid choice to leave Florida in the first place, and here I am spending my last days trying to get back there. I don’t have the Creep yet but let’s not pretend I’m special or mysteriously immune. I’m not the plucky heroine of a summer blockbuster who will find true love (shaggy-haired Brendan Fraser would be nice, or Daniel Craig with his icy blue eyes) and then become matriarch of a community of ragtag survivors. I’m just me – Susan Donoghue, thirty-one, former textbook writer, currently hiking down I-95 in North Carolina armed with a .45 handgun, pepper spray, and a hunting knife. I won’t let anyone touch me.

Let’s not pretend, either, that I’m on anything but a fool’s errand. My sister Marie, her husband Mike, and my baby niece Monica are probably already dead. The best I’ll be able to do is bury them. Take their hardened, Creepified bodies and put them in the dirt, then drop down beside them. Continue reading NEW FICTION: TUPAC SHAKUR AND THE END OF THE WORLD by Sandra McDonald →

Fiction

NEW FICTION: BITING THE SNAKE’S TAIL by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

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Our second story of the new decade is yet another return visit from a Futurismic fiction alumnus. We loved Silvia Moreno-Garcia‘s “Maquech” enough to publish it back in 2008, and “Biting The Snake’s Tail” takes us back to an exotic and ecologically crumbling Mexico City… but this time it’s in a noir-ish near-future police story, where what you don’t see is even more important than what you do. Enjoy!

Biting The Snake’s Tail

by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Cops don’t go into the alcazabas. They’ll do raids every few months and confiscate mod-drugs for the sake of the TV cameras, but they don’t care what happens in the alcazaba’s colorless alleys. The gang leaders have established their own code of conduct, so what happens in the alcazaba is the business of the people who live there and not of the outsiders circling and enduring these cities within a city.

That’s why it was so bizarre to see all those officers in their blue uniforms running around La Catrina. I bet they were also pretty surprised to see me there in full gear with Arkasha at my side.

Gonzalo hadn’t told me what was going on. All he said was I had to get to La Catrina fast. Therefore, I was wearing the exo and the helmet, just in case things were really nasty. Arkasha was an added form of insurance. It’s funny how many people will run at the sight of a large dog, but not of a gun. Continue reading NEW FICTION: BITING THE SNAKE’S TAIL by Silvia Moreno-Garcia →