Hugh J. O'Donnell

The cat sprinted across the savanna, a remnant of her kill clamped tightly in her jaws. She just had to get to the tree line. Her kits were always hungry, but it wasn’t safe for them out in the open.
The sun faded as it passed behind one of the floating islands that hung over the plains. They were home to the biggest, strongest predators, who weren’t particular about what they ate.
She heard the roar, and the sound of giant wings as the dragon pulled into a dive.
It follow her into the the forest.
She was almost there.

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They called what she did unforgivable. She was a necromancer, and she bound the vengeful dead.
She was not an exorcist. She did not help those who were trapped between pass on. But her job was similar. She found those who trapped between life and death due to unfinished business or unfulfilled desires. But she didn’t free them. She wrote contracts.
She found little ghosts bound to the location or circumstances of their deaths, fated to rage in eternal futility, and reforged them into weapons.
The way she saw it, everyone got what they wanted. Everyone got what they deserved.

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The monster made a nest for itself in the east hall of the palace. It had reaped out the massive windows to better access the sky and suspended a web of fibrous mucous from the walls.
The stink was overwhelming, and the knot of threads at the center dripped red with gore. The beast itself was out hunting.
I climbed up for a better look. Four squirming, squawking larvae were still inside. Each was the size of a large dog already.
I began cutting the threads. If we could get them out before the mother returned, we would be rich.

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The actor didn’t exist. His face was a composite of the best features of a dozen background actors, hired for a day’s work and scanned. His body was constructed by AI based on the latest social media fitness trends. His voice was synthesized by algorithm using data scraped from the top five romance novel audiobook narrators.
But one day, the machine just stopped working, and production shut down. The studio executive hauled the lead programmer into his office to demand answers.
“It’s the model. It won’t leave its trailer, so to speak.”
“What?”
“The AI is having an existential crisis.”

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“Which door would you like to open?” The guest host asked with a slight German accent.
“Number three!” The contestant shouted, jumping up and down in her excitement. The audience cheered.
“Very well,” the host said, studio lights glittering off his round spectacles. “But first, let us open door number one!”
A swimsuit model moved towards the technicolor-painted set piece and posed dramatically. The program suddenly cut to a commercial. When the game show resumed, the episode changed. They had put on a rerun with a different host and contestant.
Dt. Shrödinger’s tenure as a game show host was short-lived.

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He looked out at the space colony from the bridge of the ship. The peace conference would begin in just a few hours.
His rival, the enemy ace pilot, would be there as well.
Both sides were bringing their heroes to the table to garner public support for the treaty.
They’d spent months trying to kill each other in increasingly powerful mechanical monstrosities. And now they would sit together in the same room for the first time. The thought of meeting, without the safety of a cockpit between them made his throat go dry.
He could finally confess his love.

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When he was eight, his mother took him to The Wall. His father argued he was too young. She told him that she wanted their son to understand their reality.
The next morning, she woke the boy early. She took him past the town and farms and into the rocky hills. The Wall glittered in the sunlight. It stretched as far as he could see in both directions. The top vanished in haze.
“This is our cage,” his mother told him.
It was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. He vowed that day he would climb over it.

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He wanted to give her the Moon, but it seemed too far away. Most nights, they couldn’t see it except as a dirty orange blur hidden behind a picket of skyscrapers.
One day he rented a boat and took her out on the canal. He rowed toward a little footbridge in the tourist quarter.
“Why are we stopping here?” She asked.
“Just wait.” As the sun sank behind the office towers, the city lights came up, illuminating the underside of the bridge.
She gasped at the perfect, golden crescent reflected in the water.
He pulled the ring from his pocket.

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