The Drabblecast – Page 17 – Strange Stories, By Strange Authors, for Strange Listeners

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Drabblecast 308 – Happy Old Year

On December 31, 2013

In Drabblecast, Drama, Fantasy

This week the Drabblecast Presents “Happy Old Year” by Tim Pratt.

Tim is a regular Drabblecast contributor, bringing us such classics as Postapocalypsemas, Rangifer Volans, and fan-favorite Morris and the Machine. He also runs a Patreon page where you can read and download a new, unpublished story from Tim every month for a little as a dollar. Why not check it out?

This year, instead of our usual Tim Pratt Christmas special, we decided to run with a New Years Eve them—something new… and something old. Lots of old. Maybe too much. Because in this story, nostalgia can be a cancer that lasts forever.

Story Excerpt:

The night I met Elsie I was up on the roof of my apartment building with a bottle of Kentucky Gentleman, because it’s sort of like bourbon, but cheaper, and better at blotting out reality. Technically it wasn’t “my” building anymore since I’d been evicted and had to be gone by morning if I didn’t want sheriff’s deputies to dump all my possessions out on the sidewalk. Joke was on them — what possessions? Everything I could sell, I already had, in a vain attempt to keep up with rent. What remained was so crappy I couldn’t even give it away on Craigslist.

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Drabblecast B-Sides 36 – Warm Regression

On December 24, 2013

In Drabblecast B-Sides, Strange

There were always bright rings on the doorbell and smiling faces carrying covered dishes. There was always a peck on the cheek for us kids when grandma came, and always a strong handshake from grandpa. His big warm hands always convinced us that he was as strong as he was wise. All of them would pile in, cherry red cheeks and warm mittens. They would brush off all the snow from outside and remind us how cold it was where we lived. It was true, we lived in one of the coldest parts of the country, and there was always a blizzard on Christmas Eve.

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Drabblecast B-Sides 35 – Teaching Bigfoot to Read

On December 24, 2013

In Drabblecast B-Sides, Sci-Fi, Strange

Dear Bigfoot,

Life on the moon sucks. Dad got home early from the air factory today and I wasn’t done cleaning the dishes from breakfast so he broke my breakfast bowl over my head. Guess I’ll have to eat out of his bowl tomorrow.

Dad says he’s gonna have to get a new job. Not that he told me. He told Melinda, the girl he’s been bringing home lately. They drank the last of his screech — that’s this nasty rum like they used to make back on Earth — then started poking each other on the bottom bunk while I sat on the top. Dad caught me peaking and near took my eye out when he threw his boot. Melinda calmed him down at least, and they got back to poking at each other.

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Drabblecast 307 – Unbelief

On December 19, 2013

In Drabblecast, Drama

IT HAPPENED IN BRYANT PARK, a little after six o’clock in the evening. He was sitting by himself in lamp shadow amongst the trees, at one of the rickety green metal tables along the north side, close to where the Barnes & Noble library area is during the day. He was warmly dressed in nondescript, casual clothing and sipping from a Starbucks in a seasonally red cup, acquired from the outlet on the corner of Sixth, right opposite one of the entrances to the park. He queued, just like any normal person: watching through the window you’d have no idea of who he was, or the power he wielded over this and other neighborhoods.

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Drabblecast 306 – Trifecta XXVI

On December 17, 2013

In Drabblecast, Fantasy, Horror, Strange

While sipping my tea in the morning, I find a small, only two inches long, naked female corpse on the bottom of the cup. Her white skin fades int the white porcelain, tiny gobs of tea leafs cover her round breasts. I immediately slap the cup down, and snick across to the phone to call the police. I forget all about checking if she’s really dead. Of course, how could I give her a mouth to mouth resuscitation, if not? Her body is about the size of a match-stick.

Read More

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Drabblecast 305 – Testimony Before an Emergency Session of The Naval Cephalopod Command

On December 6, 2013

In Action, Drabblecast, Sci-Fi, Strange

The squid is a solipsistic psychopathic God with a lust for submarine hull and a mandate from Ronald Reagan branded on its hunting tentacles. It sweeps east from Iceland in the cold under the
thermocline, alone in the dark, solitary lord of a solitary place.

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Drabblecast B-Sides 34 – Drabblecast Interview: Elizabeth Bear & Sarah Monette

On December 1, 2013

In Drabblecast B-Sides, Interview

A special Drabblecast interview with authors Elizabeth Bear and Sarah Monette, Authors of Mongoose, Boojum, and The Wreck of the Charles Dexter Ward.

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Drabblecast 304 – Hero, The Movie pt. 2

On November 23, 2013

In Action, Drabblecast, Sci-Fi

Rick takes the money the Mayor of Corkscrew has wired him and flies to Florida, feeling his oats, full of hope. He’s met at the airport by one of Mayor Delameter’s staff and driven to his hotel, the old but clean and dry Swamp Hotel in downtown Corkscrew. The next morning he’s out at the edge of town where Main Street runs along the Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary and he’s surveying the marching battalions of Gecarcoidea natalis—little, red, forest-dwelling crabs about the size of your palm that are migrating, as they do each year—though not usually in such numbers—through the town, back to the swamp to breed . . . and taking their sweet time doing it. .

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Drabblecast 303 – Hero, The Movie pt. 1

On November 18, 2013

In Action, Drabblecast, Sci-Fi

This romantic comedy begins where all low-budget ’50s creature-features ended: The mutant insects born of atom-bomb radiation (or invaders from space, or monsters from the sea, or fifty-foot women) have at last been defeated and our small-town hero, with girlfriend Janie or June or Betty at his side, must now face the rest of his life. Didn’t we wonder what his life would be like after the final credits rolled? After you save the world, what’s left? You can marry the Professor’s daughter, sure. You can sell the rights to your story. Be on national talk shows. Hold onto fame a little longer. But then what?

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Drabblecast B-Sides 33 – Free Range

On November 15, 2013

In Comedy, Drabblecast B-Sides, Fantasy, Strange

After she lost interest in the green eggs—yes, green chicken eggs (taste the same, look dyed, so what’s the point?)—my neighbor Johanna started raising black chickens. Yes, black ones. They’re popular in China for reasons ranging from nutrition to superstition, and she’d gotten three hens and a rooster from a guy in Chinatown—in exchange for the last two green-egg chickens she had.

“Green is good now in China,” he said. “Helps make a man’s pole longer.”

“Right,” she told him. “Don’t need to kill rhinoceros and go to jail for long pole anymore.”

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Drabblecast 302 – The Next Logical Step

On November 13, 2013

In Drabblecast, Drama

“I don’t really see where this problem has anything to do with me,” the CIA man said. “And, frankly, there are a lot of more important things I could be doing.”

Ford, the physicist, glanced at General LeRoy. The general had that quizzical expression on his face, the look that meant he was about to do something decisive.

“Would you like to see the problem first-hand?” the general asked, innocently.

The CIA man took a quick look at his wristwatch. “O.K., if it doesn’t take too long. It’s late enough already.”

“It won’t take very long, will it, Ford?” the general said, getting out of his chair.

“Not very long,” Ford agreed. “Only a lifetime.”

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Drabblecast 301 – Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned

On November 9, 2013

In Action, Drabblecast, Fantasy

Just as we were all getting back into the mainland domestic groove, somebody started in with dragons and crop blights from across the North Sea. We all knew who it was. A turncoat Norwegian monk named Naddod had been big medicine on the dragon-and-blight circuit for the last decade or so, and was known to bring heavy ordnance for whoever could lay out some silver. Scuttlebutt had it that Naddod was operating out of a monastery on Lindisfarne, whose people we’d troubled on a pillage-and-consternation tour through Northumbria after Corn Harvesting Month last fall. Now bitter winds were screaming in from the west, searing the land and ripping the grass from the soil. Salmon were turning up spattered with sores, and grasshoppers clung to the wheat in rapacious buzzing bunches.

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Drabblecast B-Sides 32 – Headlife

On October 31, 2013

In Drabblecast B-Sides, Horror

“Everything on the list,” says Quentin.
“Expensive,” says Dr. Derwent. “You’re sure?”
“Dave, I own this fucking place,” says Quentin. He’s taken to swearing more as the decades have worn on. An inhibition thing disappears out of the brain with age, he’s read that somewhere. Angry old men capering around in their institutional PJs, dribbling pee and yelling at the nurses. That won’t be me.
“So, everything?” says Dr. Derwent, smiling his unctuous ass-kissing smile. He seems nervous. Hope he’s not on drugs, wouldn’t want those pricey fingers to slip.

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Drabblecast 300 – Bloodchild

On October 31, 2013

In Drabblecast, Drama, Horror, Sci-Fi

My last night of childhood began with a visit home. T’Gatoi’s sister had given us two sterile eggs. T’Gatoi gave one to my mother, brother, and sisters. She insisted that I eat the other one alone. It didn’t matter. There was still enough to leave everyone feeling good. Almost everyone. My mother wouldn’t take any. She sat, watching everyone drifting and dreaming without her. Most of the time she watched me.

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Drabblecast B-Sides 31 – The Black and White Animals Trilogy

On October 23, 2013

In Comedy, Drabblecast B-Sides, Fantasy, Horror, Sci-Fi

The complete Black and White Animals Trilogy, uncut. Written by Kendall Marchman, Luke Coddington and Norm Sherman, produced by Norm Sherman. Originally appeared as episodes 11, 22, and 24… Part 1: Secret Weapons, Part 2: Vengeful Hearts and Part 3: Chromatic Conclusions.

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Drabblecast B-Sides 30 – The Tribe

On October 15, 2013

In Drabblecast B-Sides, Strange

The grass is cool against my skin. A nice contrast from the burning hot sun hanging in a sky the color of pale skin, sickly and suffocating. I’m naked but I think I’ve always been this way. There’s a moment of comfort, like everything is going to be OK, before I remember that nothing is going to be OK, and everything is fucked.

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Cover for Drabblecast episode 299, The Revelation of Morgan Stern, by Jerel Dye

Drabblecast 299 – The Revelation of Morgan Stern

On October 11, 2013

In Drabblecast, Drama, Horror, Romance

It is July 31, your birthday, and I can’t reach you. I’ve been trying all day, but the cell networks are down, the internet is down. I even tried a pay phone–there are two left in town that I know of, and I collected all of my change and walked to the 76 in the village. It was on fire. I watched it for a while from a distance as it painted a brown, toxic streak across the sky. It was a long walk back to the house, or what’s left of it. My feet hurt, and it was too quiet.

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Drabblecast 298 – Flying On My Hatred of My Neighbor’s Dog

On October 3, 2013

In Comedy, Drabblecast, Sci-Fi

The week we present to you Flying On My Hatred of My Neighbor’s Dog by Shaenon Garrity.

Have you ever been so exasperated that you could feel the energy rippling off of you? Just how far could the power of that hate carry you? Could it fuel your car? How about a rocket ship?

I know my neighbor’s dog as a bark: a deep, dark, venomous yawp that begins and ends on a snarl. It’s loud, louder than it should be. Earplugs do nothing. It penetrates. Once it starts, it continues, relentlessly, for a period ranging from one to four hours. It can start at any time, day or night, dropping from the veils of morning to where the cricket sings.

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Drabblecast B-Sides 29 – The Lemon-Green Spaghetti-Loud Dynamite-Dribble Day

On September 25, 2013

In Drabblecast B-Sides, Strange

Testimony of Witness No. 5671 before the Special Presidential Investigative Commission. Leonard Drucker, thirty-one years old, unmarried, of 238 West 10th Street, New York City, Borough of Manhattan, employed as a salesman by the Har-Bern Office Partition Company of 205 East 42nd Street, New York City, Borough of Manhattan. Witness, being placed under oath, does swear and depose:
Well, I don’t know, the telephone woke me up about eight A.M. on that Wednesday morning. I grabbed at it, half falling out of bed, and finally managed to juggle it up to my ear. A girl’s voice was saying, “Hello, Lennie? Is that you, Lennie? Hello?”

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Drabblecast B-Sides 28 – TGIF

On September 25, 2013

In Comedy, Drabblecast B-Sides

TGIF, a covers medley by The Drabblecast’s Norm Sherman

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