Her golden brown hair falls past her shoulder, to her waist. She pushes it back, pencil in hand as she scratches lines onto the realistic eye she’s been working on. She rounds off the pupil when the front door slams shut. Jolted, she pulls away and stands from the table, tromping loudly to the front door while grabbing an umbrella on her way out of her and her boyfriend’s bedroom.

She holds it at...

“I’m… I’m not who you think I am,” Ravi says, gazing down at the golden brown haired girl curled against him, full of affection.

“What do you mean?” Rylee asks, her eyelids are heavy as she lays on his chest. She sighs, raising her head to kiss his neck. She closes her eyes and snuggles in under the one blanket they’re sharing.

“I’m not just Ravi,” he replies, wrapping her up in the blanket, his...

Rylee stares at the pregnancy test, her eyes wide. She blinks slowly, then brings a hand down to her stomach. Two months pregnant, she thinks as she goes backwards in events.

Two months.

She lays the test stick on the counter and hobbles over to the toilet like she’s eight months in. She opens the lid calmly and sinks down beside it. Her chin over the edge as she empties her food into the white ...

Astralis Prime, The Planet of Warriors

Sword Academy, Hall of Blades

Shadow (looks at his small hand, tightly clenched around the wrapped handle of a dangerous sword): Why do they make me do this everyday, over and over. Is this the purpose of life? Swinging a sword, missing my mark- what’s the point? What’s the point of getting strong? I’m only five…

He raises the sword, aiming for the st...

“I wanted to see the old structure… it’s somewhere,” Rylee squints into the forest looking between her map and the greenery.

“We’re lost,” Ravi says in a foreign accent, making Rylee grin from over her yellowed map.

“We are not lost. It’s the forest. You can’t get lost in it. You walk one way, and… eventually you’ll find your way out.”

“You don’t know where we are,” Ravi looks at her, scowling...

“…I bet you taste expensive, pourin’ up, up, up by the liter. If you keepin’ up you’s a keeper…”

The car door is open, the music fills the air around the couple as they spin around in the rain, laughing and pulling each other close.

“Girl you might be a problem…”

Rylee pulls Ravi close and he spins her out across the wet pavement. Thunder roars overhead, lightning flashing, the wind whipping he...

“So you don’t eat fish?” Rylee asks, leaning forward on the log.

“I don’t eat fish. I already told you,” Ravi rejects, leaning away and making a face.

Minnows swim around their bare feet, tickling the soles as they dart around, hiding. Rylee smiles, watching them play.

“I don’t like fish much either. Once we went to this buffet, super expensive and shit. I found a glassy eyeball in the fish mea...

“I won’t get us lost,” Ravi says.

“I didn’t get us lost either,” Rylee shoots back, trying to snatch the map from him.

“Ah, ah, ah… nope,” Ravi holds the map above his head, smiling down at Rylee.

“Asshole, gimmie that,” Rylee laughs, jumping up at the map, grabbing at Ravi’s arms.

“Nope, nope,” he jerks back and forth, keeping the map just out of reach.

Rylee jumps, wrapping around Ravi’s wai...

Rylee skips rocks across the brown water while Ravi watches from a tall tree. She bounces one five times and Ravi snorts.

“Only five? I could beat you easily,” he says.

“Then get your ass down here,” she replies.

“I would but…” Ravi looks around the empty creek and smiles. “Come up here, come see.”

Rylee skips her last good rock across the water and turns to him, rolling her eyes and walking tow...

Crickets sing a riverside love song as a million stars twinkle overhead, barely visible against the reddened sunset. Nightfall will come quick tonight for the couple underneath the stars.

“Rylee,” Ravi whispers as they lay on their backs on the sanded deck and watch the sky glitter like a billion tiny diamonds.

“Yeah, Ravi?” Rylee slides her hand over and takes his in hers.

“Why did we come her...