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These Invisible Forces

There was pain, lots of it. And it seared. It felt like fire, or like being eaten alive. Vincent screamed, using that one scrap of energy he had left to aim the dartgun at the sheath of Pretenders making their way up his...

Someone Else Will Help

Is the goodness of a man determined by the purity of his intentions or by the deeds he brings into the world? And what, then, of the man who stands idle, neither acting nor choosing? Some claim that those who are caught between...

Deliverance

Odessa accepted the fact that the Metro Manila she had known thirty years ago was now a mere memory. Seated inside an old van that barely moved beyond 20 kilometers per hour, Odessa stared at the promenade that was now unfamiliar. She imagined...

A Triangle of Triangles

She's a great little housewifeThough sometimes she talks like a foolBut she helps at the store in the holiday rushAnd she picks up the kids after schoolAnd she puts down the phone when her husband comes homeAnd she changes from mother to wife'Til...

Love by Algorithm

“Good morning, Doc.” “Have a seat Mr. Peñaflor. I am Dr. Anton Abalos, but you can call me Ant or Doc Ant, whichever makes you more comfortable. Before anything else, may I have permission to record our consultation?” “Will that be uploaded, Doc Ant?” “I only...

Born of the Earth

We were all once born of the earth— keeper of her breath, kin to root and river, to feather and fur, to the anito, the diwata, and the taw’t talun, spirits who dwell around us. But that was before conquest, before the forgetting. The invaders came with the sword and the cross, with maps and muskets, naming...

Random Pickings

Echoes of the Blue Fire

Our ancestors believed the butat-iw were bad omens. They appeared when I was alone—wild orbs of floating blue fire, the size of my Baba’s fist....

Something More

BY THIS TIME next year, Teresita could be elsewhere, unmindful of the biting cold. She could see herself walking along a cobblestone path strewn...

Long before Darkness, Or, The Night Ileana Fell in Love

She had lived in the shadows all her life. Literally this meant the shadows of the mountains in the rural town where she was...

Cut

I stretched my fingers, and there I feltA cut, a slit of tender fleshUncertain where it came from, or when —Maybe yesterday, over piles...