Kzine Issue 3 Read online

  ‘You gave me something in the drink, didn’t you?’

  Mr Tibs took the glass from his slackened hand.

  ‘It will help you sleep, and in the morning you will remember nothing of our conversation. Tomorrow you will be back inside the dream, safe and warm, waiting for us to awaken reality.’

  Bill dreamt he was in a tiny boat, tossing back and forth on a rough sea. ‘Wake up, Bill’ shouted Betty. She shook him hard by the shoulder.

  ‘What?’ he asked. The word slurred and his brain felt fogged.

  ‘He’s here. James is here. And he’s brought wee Jamie, Mary and even Chloe.’

  Bill sat up bed, rubbing his eyes. A small six year old girl threw herself at him. ‘Grandad!’ She cried and threw her arms round his neck. Behind him stood James. He looked a little sheepish. He nodded his head at his wife, ‘Chloe said we should come and see you now rather than wait.’ He pulled up a chair and sat down between his parents beds. ‘In fact, she’s been even cleverer than that. There was a job going at this home. Research into some new drugs and she convinced me to apply for the fellowship. We’re moving here.’

  ‘There’s a new village development down the road,’ said Chloe. ‘It’s lovely. There’s even a small local primary school. It’s almost too perfect to be real.’

  Tears were streaming down Betty’s face, ‘So we’ll see you every day?’ she asked.

  ‘Yep,’ said James. Then he hugged her. ‘I don’t deserve you Mum. You and Dad. You were the best parents ever. I should have come home earlier.’

  ‘Nothing matters now, son,’ said Betty. ‘Except you and the rest of the family being here.’

  Bill felt as if a thousand cares and worries had suddenly lifted from him. ‘Here,’ he said to little Mary,’ do you like Tiddly Winks? Only the staff round here are ever so nice and I bet they could find us a set.’

  Before he could even ring the bell, Mr Tibs was by his bedside, handing the box to the little girl. ‘You watch him,’ he said kindly, ‘your Grandad is a very smart man.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Mary politely. When he was gone she whispered to Chloe. ‘Mum that man looks like Grandad’s old cat.’

  ‘What an imagination,’ said Bill and set up the game.

  CONTRIBUTOR NOTES

  Caroline Dunford is now Writer in Residence for Theatre Company Siege Perilous. She’s author of the Euphemia Martins Mysteries, a light English Country murder mystery series (available in the amazon kindle store), but she is still in love with Sci-fi and Horror. She has two Young Adult novels awaiting publication, keeps writing plays about murders and hopes one day to write sci-fi for tv. Her play about the Edinburgh serial killers, ‘Burke’, has now completed its tour. Fundamentally she likes frightening, challenging and entertaining others. Writing seems the safest way to do this. www.carolinedunford.com

  Anthony W. Eichenlaub has been published in Kobold Quarterly and has written for a blog for over six years at www.eichenblog.org. He also works full time at IBM as a software engineer.

  Milo James Fowler is an English teacher by day and a writer by night. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in over 40 publications, including Daily Science Fiction, Shimmer, and Macmillan’s Criminal Element. Stop by anytime: www.milo-inmediasres.com

  C.I. Kemp is a member of a local caving organization, the Northern New Jersey Grotto, and has been active in cave exploration for several years. He has published numerous articles in that organization’s newsletter and participated in cave rescue simulations. His caving experience was the subject of an article in the June 2006 issue of 201, a magazine dedicated to activities in Bergen County, New Jersey. The descriptions and non-supernatural events in ‘Depths’ are drawn from his personal experience.

  Donald Norum has had stories published in Sybil’s Garage #6 and Bull Spec #4, as well as online at Cosmos and Pseudopod. The story “Neap Tide” was a storySouth Million Writers Award Notable Story of 2009, and another story, “About 77 Degrees, West of Nassau”, received an Honorable Mention in Best Horror of the Year, Vol. 2.

  J. Michael Shell has had fiction published in the Shirley Jackson Award nominated ‘Bound For Evil anthology’ (Dead Letter Press), the ‘Panverse Two All Novella Anthology’ (Panverse Publishing), the 2007 edition of the ‘Southern Fried Weirdness anthology’ (Southern Fried Weirdness Press), ‘Hadley/Rille Books’ Footprints anthology’, ‘Space and Time magazine’ (USA), Spectrum Fantastic Arts Award winning ‘Polluto’ magazine (frequent contributor, UK), and ‘Tropic’: The Sunday Magazine of the Miami Herald (USA), to name just a few. He has also had a novella podcast on Nil Desperandum, and Sniplits—Audio Shorts To Go has produced one of his stories for MP3 download. His novel, The Apprentice Journals is scheduled for release (Dog Horn Publishing, UK) some time in 2012. At the University of South Carolina (BA in English) he studied under James Dickey and William Price Fox.

  Ian Welke has been published at spacewesterns.com, the winter 2011 issue of Big Pulp, and in the upcoming Long Beach Writers Anthology. He is a member of the Greater Los Angeles Writers Society and the Horror Writers Association.

  Dave Windett is a professional illustrator and comics artist, his work has been published in Britain, Europe and America. He has drawn comics featuring licenced characters including Inspector Gadget, Eek the Cat, Ace Ventura, Daffy Duck and Korky the Cat. For the Scandinavian market he has illustrated educational books, business manuals and comics. He has also designed original characters for a variety of publications and provided illustrations for everything from magazines and websites to mobile phones, games and children’s shoes. Samples of his work can be seen on his website at www.davewindett.com and on his blog.

  Graeme Hurry edited Kimota magazine in the 90s and an anthology called Northern Chills in 1994. And is branching out into the ether with Kzine

  Table of Contents

  Contents

  Editorial by Graeme Hurry

  A NEW CONSCIENCE by Anthony W. Eichenlaub

  ARTIFICIAL by J. Michael Shell

  DEPTHS by C. I. Kemp

  THE DANGER IN BETWEEN by Ian Welke

  IN HIS EYES by Milo James Fowler

  THE HORRID MUSIC OF THE HYDROGEN BAND by Don Norum

  DREAMWORLD by Caroline Dunford

  Contributor Notes