Apex Magazine Issue 10
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About this ebook
Apex Magazine is an online digital zine of genre short fiction.
FICTION
The Bride Replete by Mary Robinette Kowal
Beyond the Garden Close by Mark Robinette Kowal
Scenting the Dark by Mary Robinette Kowal
Horizontal Rain by Mary Robinette Kowal
POETRY
Exobiology by F.J. Bergmann
Interstellar by Freeman Ng
EDITORIAL
Editorial Dispositions: Mary Robinette Kowal by Jason Sizemore
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Book preview
Apex Magazine Issue 10 - Apex Book Company
Apex Magazine Issue 10
Mary Robinette Kowal FJ Bergmann Freeman Ng
Apex Publications
The Bride Replete
Copyright © 2010 by Mary Robinette Kowal
Beyond the Garden Close
Copyright © 2010 by Mary Robinette Kowal
Scenting the Dark
Copyright © 2008 by Mary Robinette Kowal (Originally appeared in Apex Science Fiction and Horror Digest, Apex Publications, 2008)
Horizontal Rain
Copyright © 2007 by Mary Robinette Kowal (Originally appeared in Apex Magazine, Apex Publications, 2007)
Exobiology
Copyright © 2010 by F.J. Bergmann
Interstellar
Copyright © 2010 by Freeman Ng
Cover art by Stefan Keller
Publisher/Editor-in-Chief—Jason Sizemore
Senior Editor—Gill Ainsworth
Graphic Designer—Justin Stewart
ISSN: 2157-1406
Apex Publications
PO Box 24323
Lexington, KY 40524
Contents
Editorial: Mary Robinette Kowal
Jason Sizemore
The Bride Replete
Mary Robinette Kowal
Beyond the Garden Close
Mary Robinette Kowal
Scenting the Dark
Mary Robinette Kowal
Horizontal Rain
Exobiology
FJ Bergmann
Interstellar
Freeman Ng
Pimp My Airship Ad
Editorial: Mary Robinette Kowal
Jason Sizemore
One of the great aspects of being a publisher is that you get to watch talented newcomers become masters of the craft. Apex has been fortunate enough to ride the rising crests of a number of authors as they have went from fairly obscure to well-respected and more widely appreciated. I like to believe that Apex Magazine (and Apex Digest), in some small way, gave an assist.
Mary Robinette Kowal’s past three years has been quite impressive. She won the 2008 Campbell Award for Best New Writer. Her short story Evil Robot Monkey
earned a Hugo Award nomination in 2009. She’s an award-winning puppeteer. She’s a talented voice-actress currently working for Brilliance Audio. Mary is the current Secretary for the SFWA. Her first collection,Scenting the Dark, was published by the highly-regarded specialty house, Subterranean Press. Her first novel-length work,Shades of Milk and Honey, is set to be released this August by Tor Books.
I first met Mary at Chattacon in January, 2006. Her being a writer, me being an editor/publisher, we naturally talked about writing. I was impressed by her intelligence. I asked her if she’d ever sent anything to Apex Digest. I *believe* the answer was ‘one time, but it was rejected.’ I asked her to try again, I wanted to see something else from her. Mary laughed me away, dismissing her abilities.
A few months later, she submitted a fantastic story (Cerbo en Vitro ujo
) that we published in Apex Digest.
And the rest is history…
Jason Sizemore
Editor-in-Chief
The Bride Replete
Mary Robinette Kowal
Mary Robinette Kowal is the 2008 recipient of the Campbell Award for Best New Writer. Her short fiction has appeared inStrange Horizons, Cosmos, and Asimov’s. Mary, a professional puppeteer and voice actor, lives in Portland, OR with her husband Rob and eight manual typewriters. In 2009, her story Evil Robot Monkey
earned a Hugo Award nomination.
She has performed for LazyTown (CBS), the Center for Puppetry Arts, Jim Henson Pictures and founded Other Hand Productions. Her design work has garnered two UNIMA-USA Citations of Excellence, the highest award an American puppeteer can achieve.
When the matriarch announced that she was sending the sixteen members of Pimi’s small-family across the ocean to settle in Repp-Virja, Pimi thought it the end of her life. For though she had seen only seventeen full years, Pimi considered herself ready to fill her crop and begin the social rounds, seeking a mate. Her mother and the matriarch felt otherwise, though how they could expect her to find a mate in a strange, sideways land like the colonies was beyond Pimi’s understanding.
But Pimi packed her luggage and prepared to leave the warm underground rooms of their home. Before her small-family departed, the matriarch held a feast to fill everyone’s crop for the voyage. The gas lights gave a gentle glow to the Deep Hall. Four stations with each of the food families, nuts, fruit, dairy, and grain, stood in corners of the room. Like the two fingers on a hand, the nuts and dairy stood at one end of the room; the fruit and grain at the other end represented a hand’s two thumbs. Each a distinct group, but vital for grasping life.
Assigned to the fruit dishes, Pimi ate until her crop distended the spotted green and amber skin of her belly like a bride’s. She adjusted her tunic to show off her growing roundness.
Pimi’s older sister, Ero, hissed in amusement. Are you readying yourself for a bridegroom?
Pimi’s toes curled and gripped the ground in anger. No.
Perhaps her crop was not so like a bride’s as she might wish; she still only rounded out to an adolescent’s half-orb, not burgeoning into the sleek sphere for which she longed.
Good. My turn is next.
Ero adjusted the scarf around her head to show off as much of her fine smooth scalp as propriety would allow. The flat bone of her ear plates barely peeked from the edges of the scarf. She had widened the blue spots above her eyes with paint, enhancing the grace of their pattern. The spots lightened as they continued down her face, past her perfectly round black eyes, until they almost vanished around her nose so that her chin and neck were smooth, pale and nearly white.
Pimi’s own amber and green complexion was the more common, a thing of which Ero never failed to remind her. That, combined with her mannishly small stature, made her feel as if she would never find a mate.
Pimi glanced sideways at the engorged belly of their mother. As was natural, Mother would serve as the small-family’s replete for the journey. When full, her crop would hold enough to feed them sweetly flavored pap for the half-month voyage. She reclined on a couch accepting food from the hands of their deep-family. Pimi’s cousins, aunts, uncles and siblings wore their Fest Day tunics. Red and orange scarves lay over their scalps and fluttered about their shoulders like fire, as they carried dishes to Mother. Her long, slender limbs lay in beautiful contrast to her speckled blue belly, which ballooned onto the floor.
When Pimi became a bride, her crop would be that large.
On the seventh day of Planting Month, Pimi’s small-family boarded a Tep-Tep’s steamship bound for Repp-Virja. The captain lowered a special