Apocalyptic Short Stories

Steven E. Wedel offers four short stories that run the gamut from pure horror to shocking hilarity. First, in "The Zombie Whisperer", a young lady living in a secure compound with a few fellow survivors of the zombie apocalypse invites in a man who says he can communicate with the walking dead.

RIZEN is a chilling collection of stories that will have you on the edge of your seat! A plague has caused the dead to rise and stalk the living.... "The Chosen": Ten years after the zombie apocalypse, Dan and his family try to stake out a new life for themselves in rural Wyoming. When he encounters a mysterious group of survivors who call themselves The Chosen, Dan is unsure whether he can trust them. "The White Fist": Five years after the first of the infected reach Texas, pockets of survivors are reminded that the living can be even more dangerous than the dead.

Don used to believe climate change - global warming repacked - would be the end of us. Give man enough time on the planet and we'll make it inhabitable for all creatures. Trying to force mankind into action, eco-terrorist altered the course of history by activating dozens of volcanoes around the world. Don survived the eruptions, but can he survive the fallout? If not, can he secure mankind's future?

Jennifer Benton has made it through the zombie apocalypse and has fallen in love with Mark, the charismatic leader of a group of fellow survivors. He's brought them from Illinois to hoped-for shelter at his family's Texas ranch, only to discover it destroyed. The survivors have one more chance when Mark befriends Todd in a nearby refugee camp; he invites the group to fly with him to his wealthy family's home in Oklahoma. But what's inside Todd's house may be worse than the zombies outside. And now Jennifer has more than Mark and herself to worry about....

In the winter of 1872, Captain William Trace and his men were ordered to investigate a series of unexplained attacks on local citizens in the remote villages of the wild and untamed Washington Territory. What Captain Trace found was pure nightmare fuel, and what had started as a simple reconnaissance mission had become something far, far more. For Captain Trace, the winter of 1872 was about survival, not just of the body, but of the mind.

The quirky mind of famous science fiction writer Lester del Ray gives us three wonderful tales ranging from zombies ("Dead Ringer"), time travel - how do you convince your earlier self it is safe to get into the time machine, eh? ("And It Comes Out Here") and eternal life ("The Dwindling Years"). Listen and enjoy.

Emma Johnson is 12 years old. She lives with her aunt and her two cousins, as her parents died when she was two years old. At home, she is treated more like a servant than a member of the family. She often thinks about her parents, who were both virologists and worked on secret government projects. She wonders what really happened to them. A few theories exist as to the real cause of their disappearance and if they really are dead.

The new coronavirus has spread through the world on an epidemic level. A vaccine initially meant to cure infected patients turns them into deadly zombies. Bradley finds himself between life and death as he tries to bring his family to safety.

A quirky collection of flash fiction based in the realm of post-apocolyptic fiction with forward by Daniel Humphreys. From the Pollenocalypse to zombies, you're sure to feel right at home with the end of the world.

Into the darkness within; or else the light.... When Margaret Atwood wrote these words, she left open the possibility that even our darkest tales may harbor a glimmer of hope. In Or Else the Light, the third and final entry in the Dystopia Triptych, more than a dozen of the best minds in science fiction conclude their stories with a descent into darkness, or perhaps a ray of light.

A military VR trainer, wanting to keep her relationship with a fellow scientist hidden, must pass a security inspection in her lab by the vicious Atlas Crusade that has swept to power. When the leader of the security team demands an unusual VR request in her lab, Prof. Meliss must decide between keeping her lover safe or secretly undertaking a consciousness swap that could end the Crusade’s five-year long relentless rule.

To some this is may seem like a symbolic story of the karmic stagnation of the Human Collective, which is saved by the wisdom and guidance of an over soul, by using the primordial elements of pure creation and the loving union of the Divine Female and Male Principles. Actually, this is just another story of astral space sex, twin flames, tuxedo tee shirts, and one more apocalypse diverted by multidimensional intergalactic sperm.

Notions of the undead have fascinated and terrified humanity for centuries, and none more so than those tales revolving around zombies. From the very root of the zombie myth back in the Haitian slave days to a saturation through popular culture, zombies have crawled their way up out of their graves, refusing to stay interred. Now, as their hordes increase and their hungers grow, the undead plagues cannot be stopped. It isn't just a case of no room left on Earth. The apocalypse is here.

The story of The Scarlet Plague takes place in 2073 in the San Francisco area, 60 years after an apocalyptic pandemic called the Red Death or Scarlet Plague has depopulated the Earth. James Smith, one of the survivors, lives with his grandsons who are hunter-gatherers in a tribal world. He relates the horror of the plague to them, and tells them of the time when he was a professor of English, and of the start of the pandemic. His grandsons, who are of limited cognitive ability, refuse to believe him; they cannot believe that the disease was spread by germs.

If you love dystopian stories, you came to the right place. This is an anthology of the short story series, Dystopian Health Collection - stories about human health in dystopian societies. In each story, we explore a new topic around health and how modern developments can turn into a dystopian society. Four dark stories around health with a bonus story available only in the audiobook version.

From the creator of the Krakenstein Trilogy comes a tale of mounting terror fueled by scientific curiosity, government secrecy, and U-238: When a geology student stumbles upon a bizarre little cube that absorbs incoming energy and defies dissection and analysis, it's passed up through the university to government scientists who can't get any further with figuring it out either. Incapable of solving its mysteries, they decide to expose it to a nuclear fission reaction...which is exactly what it's been waiting for.

From the author of the Hugo-winning Six Months, Three Days, a new wrinkle on the old story of three wishes, set after the end of the world.

After eight years in the sandbox, former fighter pilot Brock Blount heads to Hollywood for his new life. Can a decorated hero find purpose in flying charters by day and starlets by night? Yes, please! Then a fat cat billionaire and his two much younger mistresses hire him for a last-minute flight to their secret bug-out bunker - just in time for the end of the world as we know it. Coincidence or mind game? A survival situation or a simulation? In a world where nothing is what it seems, Brock and his girls band together to make sure humanity survives.

Corporal David McAllister was a good old boy from the mountains of Kentucky. He did his time in Afghanistan with the Marine Corps Reserve. But one day a report came on the news about a virus spreading through China, turning the locals into cannibals. The virus hit Singapore. Tokyo. Mexico City. El Paso. Then Louisville. David was called up for active duty again, and the virus was all around him. Collecting the first three Thin Line of Life books, this omnibus, The Thin Line of Life: Volume 1, tells the linear story of the Zombie War in a non-linear manner.

Have you ever wondered what lies behind every click you make on the internet? What if the data from your online life is used to change your own future? As the internet shapes a new era, three corporations become the rulers of a virtual world called Etherea. Mr. Davis, the CEO of Apollo Corporations, will have to fight against two unprecedented enemies that seek supremacy in the universe.