Teardrop

By Lisa Mason

On the exotic planet dubbed XYK-834, rogue human John Dixon has fallen in love with the alluringly alien NanaNini--but that puts him in bad with the corporate Network goons. Yet maybe the enigmatic Sparkle can set everything right.

The Paul Di Filippo Presents series showcases the best in modern speculative fiction, personally selected by one of the most acclaimed authors and critics in the science fiction and fantasy fields.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wildside Press
• Release date: May 14, 2021
• ISBN: 9781479458974

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Table of Contents

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

TEARDROP

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

Copyright © 2008 by Lisa Mason.

Originally published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, March 2008.

Published by Wildside Press, LLC.

wildsidepress.com | bcmystery.com

TEARDROP

LISA MASON

1

She is dreaming of the Sparkle, how Aumakua the All Spirit slides through her, sweet and smoky, till she bursts apart as fine and many-many as sparkles in the highsky. She drifts like the gust filling every chasm of the World. Ensparkled, she rises up and up, as lofty as Mother Bu when the sacred grinders beat upon the rocks of Bakdoor. She is everywhere, everywhere is she. This extremely true.

NanaNini, she is dreaming.

But NanaNini sleeps not.

Gremlins bang clear stone cups on the bar made of wiliwili wood. Tiki’s Place is thick with bakka fumes, tunes twanging on the jukebox, and no good. Ugly-sin gremlins, these two sitting at the bar with their goggle eyes and slick skin stained scarlet with saltburn. They crack filthy jokes and snicker sniffily, a sound like the squeaking of silverback wingies NanaNini hunts in the lowsky and cooks for her eating. The gremlins are stinking drunk when three Networkers march into Tiki’s Place, looking for EeDee.

Boss says, Wake up, NanaNini, you lazy wench. Boss is an ugly-sin gremlin, too, giving her his evil eye every which way. He growls like skankamangus lurking in the gust, snout snapping at her back, teeth agleam. Hah. Boss has got shiny teeth square-cut, not like skankamangus at all. Skankamangus will give whoever meets her the long sleep, her teeth of blood leaving only the bones behind.

Boss says, Always goofy, you lokes. As if Boss knows what the goofy do in the gust when the Sparkle comes. Which he knows not. NanaNini, those guys are askin’ for another round of zombie. Git go, girlie, before I tan your hide. And ask these guys what they want.

O, she scared. NanaNini moves slow-molasses. Gremlins drink too much, anyway. She knows not much of gremlins, but this she can see plain as a face.

And these guys, what they want? she says sweet as meat to the Networkers while