I. It was Bethany’s job to wind the queen. Every morning she woke in the blue-pink dawn before the birds sang, slipped out from under her quilt and took down the great silver winding key that hung over her bed.…
Doctor Fantastique’s Web Originals
My Best Friend Julian
by Gerry Huntman • • Comments Off
First published in Anthology of Steampunk (edited by Tonia Brown, Sonar4, 2010, out of print) I want to tell you about my best friend Julian. He has been gone for over a year now, and today a depressive pall…
Icarus
by Crystal Hilbert • • Comments Off
Icarus By Crystal Lynn Hilbert Blood siphoned through the clockwork. Gears thrummed and beat against the pads of his gloves, whispering threats into the thick leather. All of their planning, all their research finally come to fruition. The horrible,…
Mrs. Pug, or, The Flesh Age
by Hunter C. Eden • • Comments Off
Part 5 of 7 Diary, September 30, 1888 Tonight we went out in the streets, Father and I, or should I maybe say Jack and I. It was late, and we were up in Grandfather’s study. Father stripped all…
Mrs. Pug, or, The Flesh Age
by Hunter C. Eden • • Comments Off
Part 4 of 7 Dear Diary, September 17th, 1888 It’s been too two or three days since I wrote in you. I wanted to everyday but Grandfather won’t leave me alone with his questions and demonstrations and plans. To whit,…
Mrs. Pug, or, The Flesh Age
by Hunter C. Eden • • Comments Off
Part 3 of 7 Dear Diary, September 14th Still, 1888 Still I put you away when I heard footsteps on the stairs and wasn’t sure what to do. Grandfather appeared, leaning on his cain cane with a sheaf of papers…
Mrs. Pug, or, The Flesh Age
by Hunter C. Eden • • Comments Off
Part 2 of 7 Dear Diary, September 13th, 1888 Firstly: 1. It is spelled JEWS, not Juwes. I apologize for my sloppyness. I was in a state of great nervousness yesterday, and even so minor a word as Jews I…
Mrs. Pug, or, The Flesh Age
by Hunter C. Eden • • Comments Off
Mrs. Pug, Or, The Flesh Age Part 1 of 7 Dear Diary, September 12th, 1888 I’m not supposed to write. I’m not even supposed to understand letters. But before letters I was just a simple dog, even as before I…
Ragtime
by T. Fox Dunham • • 1 Comment
The Preacher declared that the unbelievers be destroyed, in a land faraway where they mocked the Testament. Nameless workers—their names appropriated by the state when their status changed—mined coal deep in the barren earth and iron, mixing their blood in…
Steampunk Lies that Lie
by Kayla Bashe • • 2 Comments
I hate books that deceive with golden gears embossed on sepia sleeves, with titles like, “Her Majesty’s Robot” or “The Clockwork Twin” luring one into a world of gleaming ticks, and then it turns out that the plot just focuses…