Daikaijuzine

I have an avatar. I am forty-three years old.  I am balding and thickening around the middle.  I have a mediocre job with a mediocre company which is outwardly ambitious to be in the top ten in their sector in five years’ time, but inwardly, all they wish is to still be in business.  My […]

‘That’s the worst thing about the end of the world,’ Elsie said, staring mournfully into a teacup that had long ago been licked clean of every last drop of Tetleys and soggy crumbs of custard cream. ‘Routines go straight out the window.’ Harry glanced away from the TV, which was showing aerial footage of a […]

The rat squeaked in outrage from the confines of its cage, its beady black eyes glaring at Sophie through the bars. She stared back, her brows furrowed. Curse it. How would she fix this? She hadn’t meant to transform her professor into a rat; she’d been aiming for the quill on her desk for a […]

“You realize you’re going to die, right?” the tiny skeletal gerbil said, poking his body out from the top of Nick’s breast pocket. There was a green flash and an explosion of hellfire, the warehouse’s concrete floor shaking beneath him. “I mean, that’s Marco Bianchi back there and you’re…well…you.” “You’re not helping, Mortimer.” Nick ducked […]

Peggy brings me popcorn while I watch the Preservers handing over my father to a UN security detail at The Hague. The event is being broadcast live on every newsfeed. Peggy’s head flitters birdlike between me and the screen. The robot squawks, “Doc Dinosaur has been defeated.” Dad designed Peggy to resemble a pegomastax, but […]

There wasn’t much left to pack. The final box, only half full, had the last of the comics and journals from Jeremiah’s childhood. There was the inventory, of course, but he’d hired movers for that. So many dreams being stored away. Jeremiah stroked the cover of a Conan comic, and it rippled under his touch. […]

We left on a mid-August morning in Danny’s old silver hatchback. I was at the wheel because Marisa didn’t know how to drive; she sat barefoot in the passenger seat, watching cows and pine plantations and pro-life billboards glide past. Now and then, she fiddled with the radio dial, and the static would resolve into […]

The room was too hot, the clock was too loud and the form was too long. Still, Lonny Spake did his best to balance the clipboard on his knees and work his way down the application. Experience. Education. Special Skills. Desired Salary. His life jammed into tiny squares. He signed the bottom and carried the […]

They always find me. Don’t get me wrong. I love my profession. But it’d be nice to have an occasional drink in peace. Disguises don’t help. My skin is brown this time, my eyes grey like my hair. Still, he knows me. He sits on the next barstool, orders a beer. I ignore him. Stare […]

I married too young. I was fresh out of high school and still going by “Mighty Girl,” even though I was technically a woman. HOUSE—the Homeland Organization of Undercover Super Enforcers—assigned Mighty Man, one of their first recruits, to check out all the places where super-phenomena had been reported and track down more superheroes for […]