Microfiction
Omniview: ECHO
The passkey blinked open with a soundless flick. Sora sat still for a long moment, heart thudding, eyes stinging from hours of sleepless white light. He didn’t know what he expected to find, only that it wouldn’t be her. The key had taken him all night to crack. His rig was a patchwork of scavenged parts and code he’d written himself, sorting through encryption layers like a digital locksmith picking a thousand locks at once. When the directory finally bloomed open, its name glared at him in stark white letters: ARCHIVE//VERACITY_CONTROL.
By Alyssa Cherise3 months ago in Fiction
The Door That Wasn't a Door
The key to the thirteenth floor was heavier than the others. It was an old, skeleton-key thing, iron and tarnished, attached to my janitorial ring with a separate, sturdy chain. My boss, a man named Mr. Henderson who smelled of stale coffee and resignation, had handed it to me on my first night with one instruction: “Sweep the hall. Do not, under any circumstances, open any of the doors. Especially not 13A. The locksmith is coming next week to change the lot.”
By Habibullah3 months ago in Fiction
The Recluse
I sit in the closet with the skeletons. It’s dark here. Grayscale. A single candle lights the room—a flame that I’ve been trying to snuff out for years, but it keeps coming back, like a trick candle on a birthday cake, its only purpose to remind me that I’ve spent another year smothering my dreams. Each time I blow it out, it takes longer and longer to return.
By Aura Starling3 months ago in Fiction
Private Window
The husband hired me to prove his wife was cheating. I didn’t expect her to be the only one innocent. You learn to keep your voice low in my line of work. Not just in a hallway outside a hotel room or on a stairwell while you count the steps. Inside yourself. The private investigator who shouts in his head misses the small things. The blink of a light. The dip in a timestamp. The way someone looks at a doorknob like it’s an audience. Nobody pays for your opinions. They pay for the small things.
By Aspen Noble3 months ago in Fiction
The Moon That Cried Silver Tears
The people of the world first noticed it during the great drought. The skies had been relentlessly clear for months, and the land was parched to dust. One night, a new star appeared, trailing a faint, silvery light. But it wasn't a star. It was a tear.
By Habibullah3 months ago in Fiction
