Hard Science Fiction

In my third year at the Eden Center, I forgot how to play guitar, forgot the rhythm of rock and roll, and forgot the name Melody.
They used twelve thousand electric shocks and seven hundred hours of sleep deprivation to scrub my name down to Number 2963.
Now, I'm their perfect instrument. No preferences, no pain, only commands.
My parents finally got the perfect daughter they'd always dreamed of—u...

For half a box of rations, my former comrade put a bullet in my back. As I gasped my last, the world reset—three days before the apocalypse. I didn't go after him for revenge. I floored the accelerator, racing toward the Texas borderlands where my grandfather—a Vietnam veteran—had spent forty years hoarding "junk" that everyone mocked. When the heat turned the earth into a furnace and Drake’s war-...

"I was bonded with an alien system that issued nothing but 'benevolence' missions.
Supply food to violent thugs, shelter the mutants, embrace the Zombie King, and share our planetary defense technology with the entire world.
It claimed that as long as we were merciful, the civilization could survive.
I nodded, then promptly tweaked the task annotations.
I laced the food with neuro-suppressants, ...

The more I cry, the hornier my sister gets.

Not a metaphor. Stone cold reality. Me and pop superstar Melody share a sick "emotional link" — the worse I suffer, the more she glows on stage.

My husband Christian discovered this secret.

Then he chose to betray me and crawl into bed with Melody.

Now every time Melody has a big show, Christian locks me in the basement, force-feeds me depression pil...

After the apocalypse began, my husband's female assistant stole my viral experiment data for the ninth time. I couldn't take it anymore and confronted her publicly.
My husband said I was just jealous of her, punished me by making me apologize to her in front of everyone, and demoted me.
Later, he sweet-talked me, promising compensation.
The next day, his true love showed up at the lab wearing his ...