CM Simpson: Writer & Gamer

This week’s verse moves from a science fiction verse about mining asteroids to a slightly futuristic fantasy poem about trolls and rising heroes. It is taken from 366 Days of Poetry , a collection of mixed-genre poetry released in 2016. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------   Rising Knights Singing, the troll birds come from beneath the bridges of the world, swarming and screaming, hunting across the sleeping suburbs, worse than the zombie herds, that trample from the undead lands, moaning. We shut the bridge-doors down, but, ev’ry single night, they open once again, gateways of death, horror, and bloody doom, until from within us, bloodlines stirred, long dormant, but, now awake. Children, chosen by chance of birth and parentage, at first bewildered and confused, then not, rising to the challenge of a changed world, whe

This week’s short story takes us from a s cience fiction tale of a crashed colony and its salvation to an urban fantasy world of pixie-dust and policing . Welcome to Road Trip . When Melange feels the pull of utter dread emanating from a road train parked at a rest stop near her home, she investigates. She had no intention of being trapped in the cab on the driver’s unexpected return, nor of being stuck in the truck when he is murdered during the first delivery. But she can’t stay there. She’s discovered the prisoners that were the source of the dread, and the trolls are coming to take them away. With time running short, she must find a way to avoid capture, and summon help, and that means getting past the troll and humans standing guard. Road Trip is available as a stand-alone short story at the following links: books2read.com/u/31g1Mw . You can also find Kristine Kathryn Rusch's latest free short story over on her blog: kriswrites.com . Why don't you go a

LAST WEEK, Simone revealed that she was adjusting to the mutation and that Odyssey's Agent Delight was there to help with the process. This week, Tiger reveals more about the mutagen that infected her. Chapter 10 Excerpt – Shared DNA Dear Simone It was great to hear you had visitors, and could even let them in. To answer some of your questions: ‘yes’. Yes, there is DNA from more than one alien, and—before you ask—yes, they were all girls and from one family. Good call, by the way. We were even able to note that there were at least two DNA profiles that didn’t make it out of your room—and those were the samples you got back into their bags, but not before they infected you. Thing is, we found particles throughout the slime moulds. It was like the slimes shared bits and pieces without sharing a whole strand, but because we weren’t looking for individual strands, we missed that the pieces came from different sources. Well, now we know. ---------------