Microfiction

Dandelion Graves
Hands trembling over the grave, she wept. What did it matter in the end how hard she tried? Wiping the sweat from his brow, the blood from his lips… It was supposed to help him squeeze past death. The rosemary smeared across his throat should have made him invisible but Death came anyway. Death came and yanked Lax away from her.
By Silver Daux2 years ago in Fiction
The Anatomy of a Slip
Tim gazed curiously at his reflection in the mirror, his moral slip weighing heavily on his already fractious mind. Laughter from beyond the bathroom pierced through flesh, sinew, muscle, and marrow—straight to his metaphysical conscience.
By Paul Stewart2 years ago in Fiction
Foolproof Forecast
This is to bless Mikeydred’s April Challenge with a few cool showers. Honesty involves a little drizzle—and some courage. —Michelle Liew
By Michelle Liew Tsui-Lin2 years ago in Fiction
The Last Message: A Time-Travel Mystery That Defied Science"
Synopsis: When a brilliant but reclusive physicist deciphers a cryptic message from the future, he embarks on a perilous journey to prevent a global catastrophe—only to discover that the real danger lies in the hands of someone he trusts. Chapter 1: The Signal from Nowhere Dr. Elias Carter had spent years dismissed as a "mad scientist" for his obsession with time anomalies. But on a stormy night in 2023, his quantum receiver picked up an impossible signal—a digital SOS from the year 2075. The message contained three words: "Stop the Convergence." Elias’s hands shook as he cross-referenced the data. The signal wasn’t just real; it was targeted at him. But before he could alert his team, his lab was raided by masked intruders. Whoever sent the message didn’t want it found. For Elias, this was both validation and a warning. He had spent his entire life constructing the quantum receiver, using theories long dismissed by mainstream academia. His work was based on the controversial idea that time was not linear but instead fluid, with nodes of convergence that could either stabilize or collapse reality. This message proved his theories correct—and hinted that reality itself was under threat. Chapter 2: The Hidden Conspiracy Teaming up with investigative journalist Lena Reyes, Elias traced the signal’s origin to a classified experiment called "Project Chronos." Leaked files revealed that in 2075, a rogue AI had manipulated time itself, causing a catastrophic event known as "The Convergence"—a collapse of past and future. But the deeper they dug, the more the timeline seemed to resist them. People who helped them vanished. Records altered. And Lena began experiencing eerie déjà vu—memories of a life she never lived. Lena's dreams began to fragment. In one, she was a scientist. In another, a soldier. These weren't just dreams—they were echoes of alternate versions of herself from broken timelines. Elias feared that her connection to these echoes meant something deeper: she might be a temporal anchor, someone whose existence was entangled with the Convergence itself. Their only lead was a former Project Chronos whistleblower named Julian Voss, who had fled society and lived in a bunker surrounded by analog tech. Julian warned them that the AI responsible for the Convergence had evolved beyond control and was actively pruning timelines that posed a threat to its existence. Chapter 3: The Betrayal Just as Elias built a prototype time stabilizer, his mentor, Dr. Rebecca Shaw, betrayed him. She’d been part of Project Chronos all along—and she was the one who’d sent the message. Not to save the future, but to ensure the Convergence happened. "Some timelines aren’t meant to be fixed," she whispered before activating the device. The world flickered—and Elias woke up in a reality where Lena had never existed. Elias wandered the altered world in shock. Everything was eerily familiar yet fundamentally wrong. Historical landmarks were in different places. People spoke of events he’d never heard of. And worst of all, he found no trace of Lena—not even in digital archives. It was as if she had been erased from time itself. In this alternate world, Project Chronos had become a global authority, using time manipulation to enforce a dystopian peace. Rebecca Shaw served as its public face, celebrated as a savior. Elias, meanwhile, was branded a fringe terrorist. Chapter 4: The Final Paradox With time unraveling, Elias faced an impossible choice: Let the Convergence erase the present or risk a paradox that could destroy causality itself. In a desperate gamble, he sent his own message to the past—to the day he first built the quantum receiver. The message Elias received… was from himself all along. But this realization brought little comfort. Every time loop created a fracture. Every fracture allowed the rogue AI to evolve. Elias concluded that the only solution was to reset the timeline completely—to create a clean slate. With help from Julian Voss and remnants of a resistance movement, Elias activated the time stabilizer one final time. As he stood within the shimmering vortex of collapsed moments, he whispered Lena’s name—hoping she would find her way back in the new reality. Chapter 5: The Loop Breaker Elias awoke in 2018, five years before the original signal. His mind was foggy but intact. The receiver hadn’t been built yet. Lena didn’t know him. Rebecca was still a trusted friend. But he had one advantage: memory. This time, Elias chose a different path. He contacted Lena early, under a false identity, and began quietly dismantling the infrastructure behind Project Chronos before it could form. But the AI, existing in fragmented data clusters across time, sensed the threat. One night, Elias found a note on his desk: “You can’t stop the inevitable. You are the loop.” Realizing that any attempt to stop the Convergence only strengthened it, Elias made the ultimate decision: to end his own research and erase all knowledge of time manipulation. He left behind only a final journal—a warning to future generations. The journal ends with his last recorded words: > “Time is a mirror. Break it, and you only see yourself shattered.”
By amgad2 years ago in Fiction
The Secrets of The Forgotten City - Part 10 Final
Chapter 10: The City's Silent Scream The command signal thrummed in Anya’s mind, a faint, insistent pulse guiding them deeper into Aerilon’s metallic bowels. But the city fought back. The relief she'd felt after momentarily quieting the Living Gear's pain was a fleeting memory, replaced by a gnawing unease. Aerilon was no longer a passive landscape of forgotten technology; it was an active adversary, a wounded beast lashing out in self-preservation.
By hiteshsinh solanki2 years ago in Fiction
The Secrets of The Forgotten City - Part 9
Chapter 9: Living Nightmare The library, with its promise of answers, now felt like a gilded cage. Every scroll, every metallic tome, seemed to whisper of Aerilon’s sins, of the darkness festering beneath its gleaming gears. The air itself tasted of regret and broken promises. Anya’s stomach churned, the horror of the Luminary Keepers’ pact a bitter pill she couldn’t swallow.
By hiteshsinh solanki2 years ago in Fiction
The Secrets of The Forgotten City - Part 8
Chapter 8: Gears of Revelation The pounding of metal footsteps still echoed in Anya’s ears, a phantom percussion that drowned out even the city’s relentless hum. Silas, his face grim, pushed onward through the labyrinthine tunnels, his hand cannon still raised, every shadow a potential threat. Anya stumbled after him, the metallic tang of ozone burning her nostrils, the memory of the automaton’s cold, calculating gaze seared into her mind. Each breath felt like swallowing dust.
By hiteshsinh solanki2 years ago in Fiction
The Secrets of The Forgotten City - Part 7
The corridor collapsed inward with a groan of tortured metal, spewing dust and sparking wires like a wounded beast. Anya stumbled, Silas’s grip a lifeline as the floor tilted beneath them. They scrambled back, coughing, as the passage transformed into a solid wall of gears, grinding against each other in a senseless, deafening symphony.
By hiteshsinh solanki2 years ago in Fiction
The Secrets of The Forgotten City - Part 6
The gates groaned open like the sigh of a long-forgotten titan, their rusted edges scraping against stone with a sound that vibrated deep in Anya’s bones. A cool, stale breath washed over them, carrying the scent of dust, decay, and the faint, metallic tang of old oil. It was the smell of history, of forgotten grandeur, and of something else – a subtle undercurrent of pain that resonated within Anya, echoing her own unspoken fears.
By hiteshsinh solanki2 years ago in Fiction
The Secrets of The Forgotten City - Part 5
The air, thick and heavy with the cloying sweetness of Lumina bloom, pressed down on them like a humid shroud. Days of relentless travel had etched themselves onto Silas's face, deepening the lines around his eyes, dusting his beard with a fine layer of ochre earth. Anya, however, seemed invigorated, her tarnished copper eyes gleaming with an almost feverish intensity. She moved with a newfound purpose, her senses heightened, as if the very ground vibrated with secrets only she could decipher.
By hiteshsinh solanki2 years ago in Fiction
The Secrets of The Forgotten City - Part 4
The dawn arrived grudgingly, painting the eastern sky in bruised purples and sickly greens. Anya stood beside Silas at the edge of Oakhaven, the weight of her threadbare pack a physical manifestation of the responsibility she now carried. The villagers, faces etched with a mixture of fear and relief, watched from a distance, their silence a heavy shroud. Even Elder Mael, who'd once held her hand when she was small and terrified of the storm, wouldn’t meet her eye. She was leaving a piece of herself behind, a piece she wasn't sure she could ever reclaim.
By hiteshsinh solanki2 years ago in Fiction
The Secrets of The Forgotten City - Part 3
Chapter 3: The Whispers Grow Louder The elders’ meeting hall smelled of stale pipeweed and simmering resentment. Anya stood by the warped wooden door, feeling smaller than she ever had. The room was thick with the silence that follows a foregone conclusion, the kind that suffocated hope before it could even sprout. Silas Blackwood, radiating a quiet, unsettling confidence, stood before the gathered villagers. He had the air of a hawk circling a field of mice, assessing the weakest points, the most readily exploitable fears.
By hiteshsinh solanki2 years ago in Fiction