Archive for Episodes

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Cast of Wonders 126: The Perfect Prom

Cast of Wonders 126: The Perfect Prom is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 18:45 — 17.2MB)

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The Perfect Prom

by Kat Otis

Everything was going perfectly.  My prom dress was a shimmery hunter-green ballgown that matched my eyes and I’d spent over an hour at the salon, getting my usually frizzy red hair tamed into elegant ringlets.  Theo’s jaw actually dropped at his first glimpse of my transformation from scruffy tomboy to fairy-tale princess. We were officially going together as friends, but he was as flatteringly attentive as a real date all throughout dinner and the dancing that followed.  A few people even proclaimed us a “cute couple.”

In short, it was as magical a senior prom as any girl could want, right up until the moment the prom queen spontaneously combusted.

Chaos ensued.
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Cast of Wonders 125: The Clasp

Originally published in Daily Science Fiction, December 2013.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 13:46 — 12.6MB)

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The Clasp

by Jarod K. Anderson

Our tribe didn’t have a word for the huge, winged race of reptiles who shared the cliff-faces with us. They were just “The Clasp.” Same as us. One tribe. One name. One shared livelihood as old as the great butte.

When I was young boy, before I knew better, I asked my grandmother if we were pretending to be like the big, scaly tribesmen or if they were pretending to be like us. After all, we didn’t look anything alike. When I finally made her understand my question, I hated the way she looked at me, like she’d tasted something bitter.

“There’s no ‘they’ or ‘us,’” she said. “We eat the same plants and insects, don’t we? We drink the same water, don’t we? All The Clasp warms our blood on the southern face and shelters from storms in the red caverns, eh?”

As we spoke, I remember a big male, in the gray raggedness of his shed, ambled along the ceiling of the cave where we sat. A curled sheet of semi-translucent skin fell between us, but I knew better than to mention the difference. I had learned. We would all be the same through sheer will and stubbornness.
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Cast of Wonders 124: Old People Rules

Cast of Wonders 124: Old People Rules is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 31:46 — 29.1MB)

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Old People Rules

by Holly Schofield

So I’ve figured it out. There are eight rules for old people.

Rule #1: Old people try too hard

I didn’t think anything was wrong until Milanda hit ‘upload’. The app’s progress bar had crept almost all the way across the hologram before I noticed the target website was Dad’s.

The icon I’d designed, a grinning 3-D dragon, began blinking its large eyes, showing my app had activated my spyware.

“Hey, it really worked. Uber-crystal, Fran.” Milanda said. She shoved back her chair and turned to face me.

I was sprawled on her bed, painting my nails. “Swing Me Hard, Girl” by BlueLulz surrounded us—Milanda’s new bedroom wall paint, with  nano-speakers embedded right in, was super-crystal. I’d love to design something like that. Some day.

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Cast of Wonders 123: Taxidermy and Other Dangerous Professions

Originally published as “Heaven’s Lot” in Not One of Us.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 18:17 — 16.7MB)

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Show Notes

Theme music is “Appeal To Heavens” by Alexye Nov, available at MusicAlley.com.

Taxidermy and Other Dangerous Professions

by J.R. Johnson

By late afternoon the day was hot, hot and hot, my feet burning up through flimsy red canvas shoes. My skin too, even with its built-in mocha café au lait sunscreen, out all day with no protection but a nondescript outfit topped with my stifling jean jacket. I kept that between me and prying eyes, always.

The last of my water went down warm and barely dented the void in my stomach. A police chopper flew overhead but I didn’t look up, just hunched deeper into my jacket before turning into the Joe’s Hot Dog Heaven parking lot. I was scared and running, sure, but the cops weren’t looking for me. No one was.

Aging picnic tables crouched at the edge of the lot were splintered and stained, but still looked more welcoming than the street. Crumpled napkins and used cups littered the gravel under my feet but the place felt safe enough. We used it as an after-school refuge when classes were on. The owner kept the place free from the worst trash; you wouldn’t step on a needle here. I needed shelter and this place, surrounded by dust and wild day lilies, was as close as I would get. Settling against the shaded wall at the back of the lot with relief, I closed my eyes against the day. Lord, my feet hurt.

“Come with us.”
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Cast of Wonders 122: Sundae

Originally published as a Kindle eBook.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 39:37 — 36.3MB)

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Sundae

by Matt Wallace

The old woman in the wheelchair has a brutal face and hands as soft as the mother of all children.

“You will be more than a warrior, little one,” she whispers in German, her delicate and wrinkled fingertips sewing a pressed metal button into his left ear. “You will be a guardian. You will protect more than tender flesh and frail bodies. You will be the sentinel that stands between the darkness and innocence itself.”

With eyes made of glass and wood he sees her thin, withered lips form the words. He cannot hear her; his ears, even the one with the signature button, were not made to hear, just as his mouth was not made to speak. However the small stuffed bear finds he understands her; the meaning of her words, if not the words themselves.

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Cast of Wonders 121: Little Wonders 5 – Trope Twists

Cast of Wonders 121: Little Wonders 5 – Trope Twists is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 34:08 — 31.3MB)

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Show Notes

This is Little Wonders, our collection episodes featuring flash fiction and poetry centered around a theme. This episode we bring you the conclusion of our flash fiction month: Trope Twists!

 

The Hero
By Jessica Holscher

Down a desolate and lonely dirt road, a young man walked toward the horizon.  With a sword at his back, he traveled for destiny. The famed fortune teller of the town he’d just left, Madam Mystic, told him he would defeat the three headed dragon and save the princess.  Without a moment’s hesitation, he headed for the beast to save the missing damsel.

Suddenly, a rustling caught his attention.  Surely, he couldn’t have already reached the monster.  He readied his sword and stood firm. The rustling grew louder and a female child emerged from the bush.

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Cast of Wonders 120: Master Madrigal’s Mechanical Man

Originally published in Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show, issue 29 (May 2012).

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 15:09 — 13.9MB)

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Master Madrigal’s Mechanical Man

by Scott C. Mikula

I tried to shut out the crowd’s roar, but the thunder of a thousand feet pounding above us in the arena stands rose until I could feel the breastplate of the mechanical swordsman vibrate beneath my touch.  Master Madrigal gestured with his palsied hand for me to replace the automaton’s helmet, but I hesitated to examine the delicate inner workings. Just one small adjustment

A cuff to the back of my head arrested my motion.  “We have spoken of this, Cetta,” said Madrigal. “There is no problem with the balance.”  He crossed his arms, tucking his useless right hand out of sight beneath his sleeve.

I persuaded my mother to send me to her uncle Madrigal after his illness, when I was just twelve years old.  The word apprentice was never used. Girls did not apprentice to craftsmen like Madrigal, and I don’t think he would have taken an apprentice in any case.  He referred to me as his hands. My deft fingers did the work his no longer could.
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Cast of Wonders 119: Pictures in Crayon

Originally published in Daily Science Fiction, June 3rd, 2013.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 7:03 — 6.5MB)

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Pictures in Crayon

by Elizabeth Shack

At recess the Arks dot the sky like unwinking stars. Ally and her friends aren’t supposed to talk about it, eyes wide above the breathing masks that muffle their voices, but they do. Where they’ll go, what they’ll bring. Every kid Ally knows has a suitcase packed, just in case they win. Hers has photos from the zoo and a birthday card her little brother Rafe drew in red crayon. He called the scribble Mars.

The only time they don’t talk is after the monthly drawing, when no one can bear it. Some kids, somewhere, were chosen, but it’s not anyone they know. At recess no one looks up. Those nights, Rafe crawls into her bed. He doesn’t understand–at four he’s barely old enough to enter the lottery–but he knows something’s wrong. Their parents are crying, and Ally will keep him safe.

Ally lies awake with her arms around her little brother. In the morning she repacks his suitcase for next month and tells him stories about Mars.
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Cast of Wonders 118: Perihelion

Cast of Wonders 118: Perihelion is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 5:03 — 4.6MB)

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Show Notes

Today we present Vajra Chandrasekera’s story, Perihelion.

You may know that we usually pay our authors using PayPal. We were amazed to discover that it is not possible to receive PayPal payments in Sri Lanka! There are many individuals and small businesses that provide online services like web development, graphic designing and more in Sri Lanka. But Sri Lanka not supporting PayPal has become a barrier for them to continue and progress in their careers. If you’d like more information about this and to help support creative people like this week’s author, please go to https://sites.google.com/site/ppforsrilanka/enable-receiving-money-to-sri-lanka-through-paypal.

Perihelion

by Vajra Chandrasekera

Hold on tight, we’re coming around again.

This thing crumbles a little every time we hit perihelion. Almost lost my footing again. You okay? Good. We’ve got a moment to catch our breath, except we don’t breathe any more. Words stick in language like vestigial tails in the womb. Not that we have either of those any more, either.

We still have eggs, though. And if you’re ready to leave yours behind, now would be a good time. We’re about as far from the sun as we’re going to get.

No? It’s okay, it’s okay. Take your time. You’re all right, I got you. Don’t worry, all right? If you can’t bring yourself to make the jump, I’ll carry you. I just think you’ll like to look back later and remember your first time flying.

We’re all afraid the first time.
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Metacast 2: State of the Union 2013

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 8:08 — 7.5MB)

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Show Notes

Theme music is “Appeal To Heavens” by Alexye Nov, available at MusicAlley.com.

Hello everyone! This is your editor, Marguerite Kenner.

Every year, one of my favorite game companies publishes a Stakeholders Report. As Steve puts it, while the company only has one shareholder, lots of people have a stake in its success and so he writes them an annual report about how well the company has done, what projects it tackled, and its plans for the future.

But we’re a podcast. Rather than writing you a long blog post, I’m taking a tradition from my American homeland. Welcome to Cast of Wonders’ first State of the Union address for 2013.

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Cast of Wonders 117: Pignus

Cast of Wonders 117: Pignus is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 14:01 — 12.9MB)

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Pignus

by Jez Patterson

Like most things in life, Ekram had discovered, the ways of getting it wrong dwarfed the ways of getting it right. It therefore paid to go with what you knew. Paid quite well, he hoped, as he travelled across town to check out the pawnshop Shami had told him about.

Times were hard. Shami’s mother had gone to the shop with a silver picture frame her mother had left her. Shami didn’t know how much his mother had got for it, only that the weird owner had forbidden her to take the photo out, insisting that leaving it in increased the value. The picture was of Shami’s dad, taken before the cancer stretched him about every which way and then discarded him: skinny and boneless.

Shami just had his mother now and government benefits definitely didn’t stretch every which way. Ekram had known him since primary school and they still crashed at each other’s places: Ekram grateful for a decent meal, Shami for a space on the bedsit floor to get away from his mother’s tears and complaints.
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Cast of Wonders 116: The Feathered Cloak

Cast of Wonders 116: The Feathered Cloak is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 19:35 — 18.0MB)

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The Feathered Cloak

by Edward Ahern

The trouble began when Rhys found the oak wardrobe. He stood barely four feet tall, but the free standing closet was twice that high. Its hinges were beaten brass turned brown with age. The carved wood was riddled with little worm holes. Rhys had never seen a piece of furniture so big and heavy, and he knew that if it fell on him he’d be squashed.

The wardrobe rested in a corner of a large, open attic. The attic was a jumble clutter of his grandfather’s collection of magic equipment. His grandfather had been a professional magician who had starred in New York and Paris and even Moscow.

The key to the armoire doors stuck out of the lock. It turned with a dry rasp. When Rhys opened the doors piles of theater costumes, tablecloths and curtains spilled out onto the floor. Their colors, once shocking bright purples and pinks, had faded over time into pastels.

I’m in trouble, Rhys thought. He pulled out the rest of the clothes so he could restack them and try and shut the doors. Under the cloth worms had eaten through one of the base boards. Beneath the rotted board he could see the shape of a box.

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