Category Archives: Short Stories

New story available: “Deus exed”

I’m excited to appear once again in the webpages of Nature with “Deus exed,” a story about an AI that’s believed to be a god and the false prophet who controls them. You know, real Steven stuff. Like with my last story in Nature, I was very eager to see Jacey’s original art for this story, and holy guacamole it’s perfect.

In the story notes, I mention the intro to StarCraft: Brood War as a key inspiration for the feel of Deus exed. After reading, I recommend watching the 4-minute video yourself. It has apparently been living rent-free in my brain for decades, and rewatching it for the first (and second, and third) time in 20 years still gives me chills.

New story available: “Selling One’s Self on a Multi-Dimensional Marketing Scheme”

I’m thrilled to have a new story, “Selling One’s Self on a Multi-Dimensional Marketing Scheme,” published in Daily Science Fiction. I’ve been reading Daily Science Fiction for years, and so to see my name come through in their daily newsletter was very exciting.

I first drafted this story during a Codex flash contest last year. After noodling over the mechanics of a multi-dimensional multi-level marketing scheme, the story itself fell into place quickly as soon as I realized that the easiest path to success would be to simply sell to yourself, which is right where the story starts:


After Bas signed up to be a distributor for Healinair, he asked his uprift for tips on cold calling through the multiverse.

His uprift–who was also Bas, but from a parallel dimension–laughed.

“Don’t waste your time. The training materials suggest starting with friends and family, but here’s a question. Why not start with yourself? After all, if you don’t believe in yourself, who will?”


A frequent criticism of MLMs is that the market is oversaturated: There are too many sellers, and not enough buyers. If there were infinite universes, this specific problem would vanish. But a multiverse would only further obfuscate who’s really actually making money, and how many “business owners” are actually just customers.

If you’d like to learn more about MLMs, check out r/antiMLM. Bonus: My story was posted there, so I say: Write the stories you want to see picked up by the subreddits you love.

New story available: “Practice on a pulsefish”

My story “Practice on a pulsefish” was just published in Nature! This story marks a lot of firsts for me: First sale to a SFWA-qualifying market, first story where I got to include author notes, first story that includes original art (and oh is it perfect).

Fair warning, it’s also pretty dark, too. If you’ve ever wanted to read about space pirates trying to rob a fisherman who’s just trying to enjoy some electric sashimi for lunch, head over to Nature. Bon appétit.

New story available: “Acquisition: Earth”

I’m stoked to have a new story published in Translunar Travelers Lounge. It actually kicks off Issue 3, but you’ll do yourself a favor if you stick around and read the rest of the issue. TTL’s focus is on publishing fun stories, a welcome respite in these fun-starved times.

“Acquisition: Earth” is about an alien who’s tasked with integrating Earth into a galactic corporation. It’s a sci-fi humor story that’s a little Invader Zim, a little Office Space, and that takes less than 5 minutes to read, so hop on over to the Lounge and read it!