Archive for Podcasts

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Escape Pod 1000: A Thousand Names for God and Infinite Mustard

Escape Pod 1000: A Thousand Names for God and Infinite Mustard is an Escape Pod original.

Contains some harsh language

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 30:27 — 42.3MB)

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A Thousand Names for God and Infinite Mustard

by Matt Wallace

Kimo found God hiding out inside a dark nebula in the MACS0416_Y1 galaxy. He trapped God in an empty mason jar and duct taped the lid shut.

God was not happy about any of it. “I wasn’t ‘hiding out.’”

“What?” Kimo asked.

“In the nebula,” God said. “I wasn’t hiding.”

“I didn’t say you were hiding.”

“The asshole writing this story did, and I don’t appreciate the miscategorization.”

“What in the hell are you babbling about now?”

“Never mind, it doesn’t matter,” God grumbled, then added as a bitter-sounding afterthought, “Omniscience sucks.”

(Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 999: Eros, Philia, Agape (Flashback Friday)

Eros, Philia, Agape originally appeared on Tor.com and first appeared on Escape Pod on Episode 250, July 22, 2010.

Marital strife and implied child abuse

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:14:29 — 102.8MB)

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Eros, Philia, Agape (Excerpt)

By Rachel Swirsky

The objects belonged to them both, but Adriana waved her hand bitterly when Lucian began packing. “Take whatever you want,” she said, snapping her book shut. She waited by the door, watching Lucian with sad and angry eyes.

Their daughter, Rose, followed Lucian around the house. “Are you going to take that, Daddy? Do you want that?” Wordlessly, Lucian held her hand. He guided her up the stairs and across the uneven floorboards where she sometimes tripped. Rose stopped by the picture window in the master bedroom, staring past the palm fronds and swimming pools, out to the vivid cerulean swath of the ocean. Lucian relished the hot, tender feel of Rose’s hand. I love you, he would have whispered, but he’d surrendered the ability to speak.

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Escape Pod 998: The Carina Nebula

The Carina Nebula originally appeared in Analog Science Fiction & Fact, July/August 2023.

Includes a few A-grade curses.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 46:31 — 64.4MB)

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The Carina Nebula

By Kelsey Hutton

I heard the soft shit shit shit just when I’d almost floated past the blue hatch door that led into some kind of storage room. I had to laugh. I mean, how many times have I said that? Plus the voice sounded older, a woman’s, and I love when adults just say what they mean, instead of carefully guarding every word around “the kids.”

I wasn’t really doing much, just wandering through some of the ship’s back tunnels. So I reached out right before momentum took me past the hatch and grabbed onto the cool metal. I pulled myself back and shook my head side to side a little to clear away my clouds of dark hair.

We were in zero G these days, and like, I knew that tying my hair back was probably the smarter decision when zooming around, but whatever. My hair was kinda curly, kinda wavey, with some straight pieces thrown in for kicks. The sculptures it made floating around my head was probably my best feature, so hair ties be damned. (Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 997: Sanctuary, Part 2 of 2

“Sanctuary” first appeared in Kyanite Press, Winter 2020

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 44:04 — 61.0MB)

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Show Notes

Don’t miss “Sanctuary, Part 1”

Sanctuary (Part 2)

by Alexis Ames

3.

Eilan slept for thirteen uneventful hours while I sat at the helm and wondered if it was possible for an android to die of boredom. I had the autopilot off because at least flying the ship gave me a task to focus on, though as tasks went, it was far from challenging. This area of space was truly a void—there weren’t even micrometeoroid clouds to avoid, or random space junk to scan and analyze. Two more weeks of this—I wasn’t sure how I was going to survive. I knew that I would, of course. It was just going to be an incredibly painful two weeks.

And then, at the end of it, I would be free. My criminal record would be expunged, and I would be released from the clutches of Veduvis Authority, free at last to return home and resume the life I had started all those years ago.

(Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 996: Sanctuary, Part 1 of 2

“Sanctuary” first appeared in Kyanite Press, Winter 2020

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 34:33 — 47.9MB)

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Sanctuary (Part 1)

by Alexis Ames

1.

The king of the galaxy died the day before the biggest holiday of the year, and six hours before I was supposed to be on a shuttle home. It was lousy, rotten timing, and I reflected that I should’ve done as Cecil said and called in sick, telling my superiors that I picked up a virus from the case we worked last week and taken the dawn shuttle instead of the evening one. But I knew it would’ve caused me more problems than it was worth, namely because the director would want to put me through a battery of tests when I returned to make sure I couldn’t pass the “virus” on to any of the computers or other sensitive equipment at the station.

I should’ve done it anyway, because if I had, I wouldn’t be sitting here in the director’s office, listening as she handed me an assignment that almost certainly meant I wouldn’t be returning home for the foreseeable future. Cecil and Halvor both were going to kill me.

(Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 995: This, My Body (Flashback Friday)

This, My Body originally appeared in Interzone 2005.

Contains graphic sexual and culinary scenes. Rated X.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:05:39 — 90.6MB)

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This, My Body (Excerpt)

By Jeremiah Tolbert

I am the lover. I am the chef. I am the preterite priest.

I am the secret, unknowable ingredient. You may taste me a thousand times, but never hold my essence on your tongue or capture it in your memory.

I am the flavor of ecstasy. Taste me and know God.
–Prayer of the Assaisonnement Saints

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Escape Pod 994: Magical Girl Antifa War Machine

Escape Pod 994: Magical Girl Antifa War Machine is an Escape Pod original.

NSFW. Includes violence, death, mental health issues, global disaster, explicit sex, consensual BDSM, war trauma, a brief mention of COVID, and a brief mention of rape.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 35:59 — 49.9MB)

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Magical Girl Antifa War Machine

By Esther Alter

XYLIA

We were at the bottom of a hole, a new construction site that went deep into the bedrock. I was the first to touch the artifact, a thing that didn’t quite have shape or color. I grabbed it. My new consciousness slammed into my mind so fast that there was just enough time for only one last wholly-human thought: You’re a girl, you fucking idiot.

My new form was sleek. Mathematically perfectly curved. Hyperfeminine in the truest sense. Breasts extending into six dimensions. A tall, lithe, highly reflective body. A smooth face with eyes burning with seductive rage. And strength, immense strength. I flexed and felt a distant star flicker a warning. (Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 993: That Thing With Bob and the Crop Circles

Escape Pod 993: That Thing With Bob and the Crop Circles is an Escape Pod original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 30:13 — 42.0MB)

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That Thing With Bob and the Crop Circles

by T. Kingfisher

So last Tuesday, long about noon, I found myself down at the hardware store to buy chicken feed for the ladies.

I never gave much thought to keeping chickens, I must admit, but my niece Donna said I needed something to give me structure now that I’m retired. I had figured that going to the coffee shop every morning and reading up on my journals counted as structure, but apparently it does not, according to Donna. She came over in her little Subaru and set up a chicken coop and put three prime specimens of Gallus gallus domesticus in it for me.

Two of them are hens and one of them is a rooster who believes very firmly that it’s a hen, and since I respect everybody’s right to go through life in the way that suits them best, I call them all the ladies. And I have to admit that keeping chickens is soothing, whether or not you’re retired, since they make very nice little burble-burble-cluck noises and there isn’t a lot of angst to a chicken. Too many animals around now who are full-up on angst, if you ask me, which I blame on domestication gone a little bit too far. I met a dog the other day that was part Basset Hound and part Chihuahua and one look in that dog’s eyes was enough to make you reconsider a lot of life choices.

(Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 992: Nerves Into Circuits

Nerves Into Circuits was originally published by Heartlines Spec on November 30, 2023

Includes mention of chronic pain and suicidal ideation.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 26:39 — 37.1MB)

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Nerves Into Circuits

By Lyra Meurer

Metal arms descend to press skin-soft conductor strips over my shoulders. The Neurasuit has been in warming mode for a few minutes–my overwrought senses accept the lines of heat like a gift. Despite my anxiety for the fight, my trapezius muscles relax, creaking in the silence. Released from the tension, my vertebrae settle into place with small snaps, one or two with each breath.

Wires snake through my hair, massaging the scalp pain I didn’t notice was there. More swirl around my neck, tickle between my toes, seeking the overabundant bristles of my nerves. The Neurasuit folds around me with a hiss and a click, shutting out the cold night air. Before the systems launch, before the fight begins, I have a moment of perfect comfort in a little space built for me. (Continue Reading…)

Escape Pod 991: After the Rain

Escape Pod 991: After the Rain is an Escape Pod original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 25:42 — 35.8MB)

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After the Rain

by P. A. Cornell

I love a heavy summer storm. I love it when the rain falls so suddenly there’s no avoiding it and you’re drenched in seconds, or when the drops hit the ground so hard they bounce right back up at you. I love the crack of thunder that precedes the rain, and the rainbows that come after. This was the kind of storm I was riding through, just returned to our village after one of my courier runs to the neighboring communities.

Racing through puddles, I didn’t mind the mud splashing up at me or that all this moisture was going to make a frizzy mess of my long curls. I spread my arms and raised my face to the clouds, relishing the coolness after building up a sweat over the miles I’d ridden. As I cut through our food forest, the tree canopy abruptly ended my impromptu shower, so I went back to focusing on my path, careful to keep my bike to the walking trails so as not to damage the ground cover plants.

Passing one of the lower bushes, several chickens taking shelter burst out, startled, clucking their displeasure. That’s odd, I thought. Someone must’ve left the coop open. I hoped no predators had gotten into it.

(Continue Reading…)

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