The summer sun gave way to the falling leaves, marking the onset of fall. For once, Lacey found herself blanketed in the comfort of a routine. Her guard fell with each passing month. Syler’s intentions remained steadfast, and he proved himself daily. His kind personality helped her heal her heart after the traumatic first months ...

Luna fussed with her hair for the hundredth time. The pair of diminutive silver barrettes she’d snagged at Al’s Emporium functioned to hold the strands out of her face, but old habits die hard. Distracted, she stepped backward and almost knocked over a display of Omarite healing crystals. Under normal circumstances, she was careful to ...

Author’s note: This piece includes brief mentions of suicide. Please read with discretion. “The Trump Administration Orders Termination of National LGBTQ+ Youth Suicide Lifeline, Effective July 17th.”  I recall seeing these words appear on the explore page of one of my social media platforms. A storm of shock and denial consumed me with each word ...

Luna paced the deck in her quarters until the hunter-green carpet turned a dusty shade of moss. The argument with Astor flickered in her mind like the light of a pulsar, its intensity re-surging as soon as it subsided. Her eyes stung with bitter tears that refused to fall. The memory of the pain plastered ...

Despite the look on Wesic’s face when Luna tossed his ship, building a case against him would be harder than making him jump at the accusation. She paced the lift on the return trip to the command center. Thus far, the evidence she’d collected was circumstantial, little better than the case some asshole could build ...

Even with Astor’s head on her shoulder and her fingers tracing post-coital patterns along her side, Luna couldn’t get Dunnagan’s stupid expression out of her mind. Inhaling the floral scent wafting off her golden waves only strengthened Luna’s conviction of her innocence, but left to the stillness of her thoughts, the irreconcilable information she’d learned ...

Memories of the previous night danced across Luna’s mind and settled in the pit of her stomach. She discovered from the station logs that there’d only been three new residents in the last month: the physician’s assistant who’d waited twelve weeks for transfer orders, an ensign assigned to the astronomy team, and Astor. The passing ...

A routine could be a blessing but also a curse. Lacey found herself at the height of a constant work rotation. She taught ballroom dance in the morning and worked as a bartender at night. Her world appeared so structured and small. Despite all the rigidness in her schedule, she made time for her evening ...

The hard blow fell across her back from behind. “Get fucked by a Beluvian tocar!” Luna swore at the offender. Her electric orange outposter splashed down her shirt and onto the data pad she was reading. She turned to locate the dead grinter who’d doused her in her favorite beverage, only to find a trembling waitress backing away from ...

The sugar bowl was reduced to this: two dollars and thirty-six cents. A year of high rents, bills, and groceries ravaged this reservoir of money, until today, the twenty-third of December. Miranda replaced the lid and sat at the kitchen chair, dejected. She covered her face with hands warmed by a cup of tea to ...