Trust Firedrake, Inc to give you the ride of your life.Image is everything. That's the mantra of city life. But, the city is a vicious and cruel thing. It's stingy with what it has, and doesn't like to let people go. But, what waits on the otherside is something even more terrifying than Life in the City.With the advent of the timequake ships, mankind spread so rapidly out into the galaxy that chaos and corruption soon became the order of the day. So Union Fleet was formed to defend and protect mankind from his worst enemy — himself. To keep the peace, Union Fleet enforced the laws on all of the planets of the Union. For the most part, the people of Union Fleet were good and decent folks. For the most part, this all worked just fine on all of the civilized planets, but in the outworlds … well, that was another story. In the outworlds, where civilization was thin, evil thrived. Pirates plied their ancient trade in the outworld spaceways.Even so, the pirates were not the worst that mankind had to face. The Jatarian Alien Group was mankind's worst nightmare. But there was one ship that fought them off and saved the people of Benara-3 -- the Crystal Dragon. It defeated the whole Jatarian battle group and sent what was left of them back to their own with a message -- don't come back!Created with alien technology, this ship single-handedly did what a whole fleet of Union starships could not. But that was a long time ago. The people of Benara-3 forgot and went on with their lives. Corrupt Union Admirals tried to confiscate the Crystal Dragon to steal its secrets. When it slipped their grasp, in spite, they declared it an outlaw ship. As time went on, everybody forgot the Crystal Dragon and got on with their lives.But the Jatarians did not forget ...

ALL SHE WANTED WAS A FAMILY SHE COULD CALL HER OWN.... As an orphan girl, Crystal was one of many -- and utterly alone. But she still dreamed of a shining life of love and happiness, and freedom from the dark legacy of her past...

Trace spent the first year of the zombie apocalypse just figuring out how to stay alive. He's spending the second year trying to figure out what keeps zombies alive.This is the tenth story in the series and the final release for year 2011. Come back mid-January 2012 for more stories in the Cities of the Dead zombie apocalypse anthology.The Endeavor is a colony ship from Earth, and she's in trouble. Caught in the massive gravity well of a black hole, the ship is just barely managing to keep itself from being pulled in. In fact, the ship would have been pulled in long ago if it wasn't for a Coven of witches on board led by Munji. When things take a turn for the worse for the ship and its passengers, Munji must save them all.Also Included in Space and Waste, Anthology #1 (ISBN 9781476008561) and Anthology #3 (ISBN 9781476122038)

Charlie gets much more than he bargained for when he breaks into a house across the street from a construction project he's working on. All he is looking for is some drugs to carry on his dependency, but he finds that sometimes dangers lurk where you least expect them.A SHORT STORY: With extra bonus chapter from "The Steel Van Man"Derry Brown looks through an otherworldly lens. In Derry's warped sense of reality, a mundane architectural review takes place in a bleak future ruled by high-tech racing. With the executive assistant protesting the race sponsors in the hallway, and a spectacular crash taking place between a marker and an eraser on his whiteboard, Derry has to try to maintain his sanity long enough to ask the most important question: Is spending money on this code change worth saving twelve cents?Start your engines, it's meeting time.

My Florida Idyll. For the first time, the Black Centipede's closest friend and most implacable opponent, the mysterious and deadly Mary Jane Gallows, pulls back the shroud on her life in her own words. Thrill to her surreal encounters with Ponce De Leon, Cotton Mather, Professor James Moriarty, Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin, Mary Pickford, H. P. Lovecraft, and her father, Jack the Ripper.The pioneer of what has come to be known as Psychedelic Pulp brings his mix of madness and adventure to digital singles. Chuck Miller, the creator of The Black Centipede introduces The Fabulous World of Zenith, a new and original series that will examine the world of the Black Centipede, Vionna Valis, Mary Kelly and Doctor Unknown Junior from a variety of strange and oblique angles. The first episode in Miller’s series focusing on the city in which his characters live and die takes a look into The Journal of Blood Mary Jane: My Florida Idyll. For the first time, the Black Centipede's closest friend and most implacable opponent, the mysterious and deadly Mary Jane Gallows, pulls back the shroud on her life in her own words. Thrill to her surreal encounters with Ponce De Leon, Cotton Mather, Professor James Moriarty, Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin, Mary Pickford, H. P. Lovecraft, and many others-- including her father, the diabolical genius known as Jack the Ripper

A ghost story for adults. Like all good coaching inns, the Green Man is said to boast a resident ghost: Dr Thomas Underhill, a notorious seventeenth-century practitioner of black arts and sexual deviancy, rumoured to have killed his wife. However, the landlord, Maurice Allington, is the sole witness to the renaissance of the malevolent Underhill. Led by an anxious desire to vindicate his sanity, Allington strives to uncover the key to Underhill's satanic powers. All the while, the skeletons in the cupboard of Allington's own domestic affairs rattle to get out too.

Seeking the immortality promised in an ancient manuscript, The Book of Skulls, four friends, college roommates, go on a spring break trip to Arizona: Eli, the scholar, who found and translated the book; Timothy, scion of an American dynasty, born and bred to lead; Ned, poet and cynic; and Oliver, the brilliant farm boy obsessed with death. Somewhere in the desert lies the House of Skulls, where a mystic brotherhood guards the secret of eternal life. There, the four aspirants will present themselves–and a horrific price will be demanded. For immortality requires sacrifice. Two victims to balance two survivors. One by suicide, one by murder. Now, beneath the gaze of grinning skulls, the terror begins. . . .

The Taylors love Christmas and everything that goes with the holiday. But this year a series of unexpected Christmas cards from a complete stranger make Christmas a holiday they will never forget."Have a Bloody Christmas" is not your typical Christmas tale as it combines the festivities of Christmas with the horror that comes on Halloween.Some cases are over before they have begun... Boxing Day in London is shaping up to be one of the worst on record for Detective Neil Townsend. When a young family discover what appear to be their own bodies in a sealed cellar, Neil finds himself asked to work with an eccentric assistant of Scotland Yard. Torn between his duty and his partner’s need to get to the pub before closing time, Neil is embroiled in his most testing case to date. With possibilities running out and bars on every street, can Neil remain sober enough to solve the case before we all run Out of Time.

It makes you kill and eat those around you if you take too much. Yet the street drug Vision is growing in popularity. Detective Steven Phillips knows he must do something after yet another gruesome crime scene. Something no one would approve of. He did it before. But he finds something far more dangerous than a drug that gives you a bad case of the munchies.It makes you kill and eat those around you if you take too much. Yet the street drug Vision is growing in popularity among the down and out. Detective Steven Phillips steps into each resulting crime scene that are brief windows into a personal hell. He knows he must do something. Something no one would approve of. He did it before. But he finds something far more dangerous than a drug that gives you a bad case of the munchies. A exciting prequel to the novel Shifter by John Sharp.

Two couples become lost in the woods when their relaxing boat excursion comes to an abrupt end after their Bayliner runs aground. Their situation worsens when they realize they are not alone. Something is after them. And as day makes way for night, and the terror of their surroundings makes itself known, it becomes a fight for their very lives.Frankenstein.com is the sequel to Resident Fear. Two years on from arresting the serial killer involved, a new challenge faces D.C.I. Renton. The story is once again set in the Northeast of England, but this case appears to be more complicated than expected, compared with the stepwise murders of a serial killer. Several victims have apparently been simultaneously selected for a common purpose, and the perpetrator invites attention from the internet. Renton is in new territory again, and initially struggles to handle this window of the world into his department.

A short prequel to "Thule". As the Luftwaffe casts its shadow over London, a mysterious evil walks the streets. Only one man knows of its existence. If he can just warn the world in time...Join new characters on another IPMA (Institute for the Preservation of Magical Artifacts) story about real Leprechauns in the foothills of the Northern California Sierra Nevada mountains. Discover gold and secrets of one of the least known faerie folk as James Peterson, an IPMA intern studying at the state college, and Professor Byrne as they attempt to recover solid evidence of the legendary creature. This story is in the vain of other short stories and novellas in the IPMA collection and add to the overall mythology of the Troll Brother series and others by author P. Edward "Eddie" Auman.

"A Matter of Time" follows a day in the life of Nathan, a teenage boy who has made some bad choices in his life. This short story is more dramatic and explores the hallucinogenic drug world, based on a real-life experience.Can you imagine what would be like if you woke up in a surreal world ? Filled with pieces and fragments of your own mind, your own sub-conscious tricking you into believing what you are seeing, until you realize it's all an hallucination ? Can you imagine if you got stuck in your hallucination, without realizing it ? "A Matter of Time" is a short story written as a part of my Creative Writing class, it is not as developed as I wanted, saddly. A longer edition should be released in 2015.

She whined about her summer being boring, but she would give anything if she could make things go back to the way they were. Unexpectedly pulled into a darker perception of the world she lives in, Kennedy is forced to face the horrors that she had always tried her best to deny – and maybe even a broken heart – as the fight for survival begins.Kennedy Riser never thought that she'd want to go back to her boring life in the suburbs of Villa Chica. But, after all was said and done, she found herself wishing that she could return to her former Freak Girl status and continue to lead her once inconsequential life away from demons and shadows and overgrown insects from hell. But, fate had other plans for her and now she had to hide, to run away from everything that she knew and thought she hated. The one good thing that came out of it, a fire that burned at the pit of her stomach ignited by electric blue eyes and a crooked smile.Shadow Riser is the first book in Deborah Barreto's Shadow series.

In a season of dead weather, the mind clutches at reality; but what does it find instead? Madness, or monsters? Ghosts, or things more terrible than ghosts? Illusions, or invasions? Dreams, or the darkness at the end of all nightmares? One thing is clear: these are tales that echoes tell, in a season of dead weather.The weird, the uncanny, the strange: these are the local conditions of dead weather.And these are stories based on dreams and nightmares, on things barely glimpsed in the moonrise, on places perfectly normal by day but haunted by the light of winter stars.Along with stories that appeared in "All Hallows" (edited by Barbara and Christopher Roden) and in the ROC anthology, "Alone on the Darkside" (edited by John Pelan) are tales that have never seen the light -- but now, as daylight fades, the stories can be told.(May be too intense for younger readers.)The cover was designed and drawn by Tragelaphus.

"It Waits" now has a new beginning, new middle, and a new ending. It has been totally reworked. It is now a true short story in the horror fiction genre.Somewhere out there It Waits. It is very hungry.A comatose man is discovered on the side of the highway late at night, battered, broken, and bruised. Who is he? How did he get there? Was he the victim of a heinous crime? But there's more to Broken than just the fate of a nearly dead man, or the crime's investigation. Everyone touched by the crime discovers something about his or her own life, something that will impact each so intensely that they will never be the same. The college student who stumbles upon the body. The trucker who comes to his aid. The young surgeon who saves his life. The nurses who help him to heal from the accident.But what brought the victim to that point on the highway is the heart of Broken, as well as what happens to him as a result. He eventually recovers only to discover that the passions that once drove him are gone, irrevocably stolen from him by the man who almost took his life. As he searches for why bad things happen to good people, will he see the good in the tragedy, or will it destroy not only his devastated hopes and dreams, but his desire to find new ones, options for his future that aren't rendered impossible by his irreversible injuries.And what about the fate of the man who almost killed him? Will the victim and his family find forgiveness in their hearts for the criminal? Will he be brought to justice? And what does true justice entail?Broken is a legal thriller, but it's also a tale of hope and forgiveness, one that just might impact you as dramatically as the characters in the story.