Migration

On July 27, 2019 by Jaye

Migration by Various (LGBTQ+ Speculative Fiction Anthology)

Blurb

MI-GRA-TION (noun)

1) Seasonal movement of animals from one region to another.

2) Movement of people to a new area or country in order to find work or better living conditions.

3) Movement from one part of something to another.

Three definitions to inspire writers around the world and an unlimited number of possible stories to tell. Here are 120 of our favorites.

Migration feaures 300 word speculative flash fiction stories from across the rainbow spectrum, from the minds of the writers of Queer Sci Fi.

Series Blurb:

Every year, Queer Sci Fi solicits stories around a one-word theme. We receive hundreds of entries with almost as many possible interpretations, and we choose some of the best for this annual anthology.

Exclusive Excerpt

Night Comes to the Bea Arthur, by Rory Ni Coileain

“Oh, God! What did we do?”

I had to hold Melinda back – she wanted to embrace the gossamer-swathed alien, but we didn’t dare rupture the autodoc’s semistasis. Not until we knew what had killed its fellows.

What, besides us.

I could see now that what had looked like a larger-than-human oval, trailing rippling iridescent membranes, was a tiny creature cocooned in a sail many times its size.

There had been thousands of them, a murmuration migrating through interstellar space.

“Katie, come look!”

Melinda had called me over to the scope, grabbing my hand and pulling me beside her.

I had held my breath at sight of the flock, gleaming pearl and rainbows in the light from Bea Arthur’s drive. A soaring ballet in the silence between the stars.

“Let me get you a better look,” Bea had said.

And then… hell. Fragile bodies hurling themselves at the ship, contorting themselves, bodies breaking in the silver light of the FTall drive.

One survivor.

Removing containment, the ‘doc said. A laser scalpel sliced the membrane.

The ‘sail’ bled light. And the figure embedded inside had no face.

Yet it screamed. It took us horrible seconds to realize the screams were inside our minds.

WHY

DYING

Melinda clung to me, sobbing. I couldn’t look away from the flyer. I felt like I owed it… something. The dignity of not dying alone.

We’d stolen everything else.

LIGHT

PAIN

IMMOLATION

The glow of the fucking FTall drive had lured them to their deaths.

BETTER DEATH

Melinda’s breathing was ragged. “Better than what?”

We saw the Bea Arthur, the way they’d seen it, a hypnotic suicidal swirl. Then, back along the flyers’ path, an inexorable lightless cloud, swallowing the annihilation-flares it created as it advanced.

I reached for my wife’s hand, one last t