The Fantasy Star Miniology,
Three sci-fi romantic, erotica tales,
by Mae Powers

Can you imagine having all your fantasies come true while traveling through the cosmos, on a futuristic cruise ship? Well then, welcome aboard The Fantasy Star, where all pleasures are possible in space. Imagine you’re the ship’s captain, or you’re the tri-level chief bartender; or even the cruise director of entertainment, or even the ship’s engineer. All work and no play? Not for this crew. But hey, you can be one of the many passengers who can achieve some otherwise unobtainable fantasy pleasure you’d like to experience. Then join us on this space-faring leisure liner for entertainment beyond your wildest dreams.

Welcome Aboard, Story One. Captain Mera LaFayte, of  The Fantasy Star, learns from visiting alien hunk, Captain Roc Devahl, how some close encounters can be a very tantalizing experience.

Station Sexx, Story Two. At Space Station Sexx, Supply Officer, Tantra Evans, finds getting needed supplies turns out be an unusual intergalactic exchange of sensual fun.

Guest Relations, Story Three. Guest Marla Samuels' soured vacation becomes a scrumptious night of pleasure in one of the elite holo-suites, where Marla cannot find anything to complain about.

Monstrous Passions
An Eerily Sensual Miniology
Three speculative romantically schintillating tales,
by Marguerite Turnley

A Taste For Blood
Life sucks for Carl. He’s a vampire with a conscience. Blood is what he must have but he’s picky about who he bites. Working at the meat processing plant is a short-term solution. Carl leaps over rooftops until he finds a soul mate. Valerie is into betrayal and other nasty activities. Serena is more to his taste. It all comes to a head when the knives come out.

 Robotic Wet Dreams
When Peter woke on a slab in a laboratory, he realized it was all a dream. Metal implants did not make him a man. His creator did. Then he found out he had company and they were all female. How could he escape? Did he even want to?

 Bleeding Hearts
Pip has decisions to make. He can become anyone or anything he chooses. Shape shifting is what he does. It’s a family tradition. Just don’t turn your back on your relatives. They might bite you when you’re not looking.

Azure Masquerade
by Megan Hussey

Chapter One

 The sight of ruby-hued rose petals, strewn with sensual abandon across sheets of azure satin, always aroused Lillith Munroe.

Yet on this evening, with these sheets bathed in the golden rays of a forlorn, solitary moon, this arousal became tinged with an undeniable sadness. In evenings past, Lillith shared the soft, slick sheets of her Victorian four-poster bed with her husband Gregory. The two tumbled often into the luxurious depths of their bed - prompting Lillith to stare wondrously at the silken pastel canopy that oversaw their nightly trysts.

Although a happily and properly married couple, they never gave up on caressing, flirting, or, if the mood hit, even making love.

During the course of their five-year union, they exchanged their modest college apartment at Port Emerald University for an expansive, two-story, ivory-hued home on nearby Port Emerald Beach. And they traded in their student ID cards for a small business license. Their rec room became a home office for the fastly growing Munroe Marketing Firm. And the multicolored rock’n’roll poster that once adorned their ceiling was replaced with a luminous, two-tiered chandelier.

Even so, the couple never stopped ‘making out’ or ‘sneaking around’ - sometimes even venturing into the velvet-upholstered backseat of Gregory’s restored 1945 Rolls Royce.

Although admittedly the site of some interesting marital memories, Lillith now hoped with fervor that she would never see the car again; though she knew in her heart that the Rolls was not responsible for her husband’s deadly accident.

Six months ago, the actions of a drunken, reckless driver ended Gregory’s life. As a blissfully unaware Lillith lay asleep in the couple’s bed, her husband’s car was pummeled in a violent collision on a dark, rainy road.

“That was the last night he lived,” thought Lillith. “And the last night I truly slept.”

Even so, it helped sometimes to play the old jazz CDs, pour the glass of crystalline champagne, and coat their sheets with a fresh supply of radiant rose petals in bloom.

“Just so something in this house feels alive,” she thought.

* * * *

The decorative French doors that bordered Lillith’s master bedroom suffused the next morning with a kaleidoscope of light, rays adorned beautifully by a Florida sun.

She shifted slightly in her bed, finally sitting up to greet the morning with a smile, something she hadn’t been wont to do since her husband died many long months ago.

“Despite the great temptation to do so, I can’t lie here wrapped up in my sheets like a mummified pasta shell,” she mused. “After all, if Gregory and I are going to work in a morning jog. . .”

Suddenly, she fell back against the pillows, her chest constricting with the hard, unyielding weight of a certain truth. Her husband never would make another morning jog. And she wasn’t altogether sure she would make it through another day.

Again sitting upright in her soft satin sheets, Lillith buried her head in her hands and let loose with a torrent of tears.

Weeping, while often considered therapeutic, was only a means of temporary relief for the newly minted widow. She knew the anguish would return - perhaps a bit less dramatically next time, or maybe in a different form.

Yet it would return. In a life turned upside down, that was the only certainty she felt left.

A loud, annoying ring of her doorbell disrupted Lillith’s troubled meditation.

“Who is it and how quickly can they go away?” she pondered, rising with great reluctance to her feet.

Lillith pasted an abiding smile on her face as she donned a long pink robe and made her way down the spiral staircase that lead to her living room.

She knew people meant well when they delivered gifts of brownies and homespun advice. Yet sometimes, she felt too weary, too impossibly drained, to respond to their kindnesses.

Even so, she always managed a smile of thanks, and greeted her friends warmly as she welcomed them to her home.

That is, until this morning. For when she greeted the man who now stood at her doorstep, a dozen dew-glistened pink carnations clutched dutifully in his grasp, her smile turned to a barely concealed sneer. And her intended greeting of “Good morning” morphed into a hearty “What the hell?”

The man who faced her threw back his leonine head, his azure eyes crinkling as he laughed openly at Lillith’s exquisite word choice.

“That’s my Lilly,” he praised, leaning forward to plant an affectionate kiss on her cheek.

The dusty little store appeared crowded with merchandise, if not shoppers. Macy Green looked over the eclectic collection of oddities in Madame Zena’s Mystical Shoppe, amazed at the various loads of crap the old woman tried to pass off as antiques. She eyed the dozens of brass items, all badly in need of polish, and a collection of old oriental rugs.

“Suppose these carpets fly?” She fingered one and looked up at her friend Tina, browsing on the other side of the counter.

“Yeah, you bet.” Tina chuckled absently, digging through a small jewelry box. She held up a pair of dangly turquoise earrings. “Hey, Mace, look here. Don’t these look like real silver?”

“Let me see.” Macy took the earrings and studied them closely. “Nah, I don’t think so. But they’re pretty, and you look good in turquoise. You should get them.”

Tina took the earrings back and held them up to her ears, looking at herself in an old mirror on the wall. “I do like them. They make me look like Cher, circa 1970.” She flipped her long black hair over one shoulder and raised her eyebrows. “Whadaya think? Gypsy, tramp, or thief?”

Macy laughed at the old song and nodded. “Definitely gypsy. I like the look a lot.”

“Okay, I’ll get them. But you have to buy something, too.”

“Uh, gee, Teen, I don’t know.” Macy looked skeptically over the rest of the items on the counter. She glanced at the old woman sitting up front and said quietly, “I don’t really see anything that’s my style.”

“Keep looking.” Tina wandered through the small store and stopped when she got to the back, where a half-drawn curtain attempted to close off the storage room. “Oh Macy, look.” She marched into the back room and grabbed a blue bottle off a table.

Macy followed her to the back room and whispered harshly, “What are you doing?”

“This is so cool!” Tina held up the bottle. “Very retro."

“Totally,” Macy agreed, secretly admiring the bottle. It was cornflower blue with silver accents, and reminded her of a genie bottle from the days of Aladdin.

“It looks like Jeannie’s bottle from the TV show!” Tina waved it at her. “I loved that show. I have to get this.”

“Ezz not for sale.” The woman from the front counter appeared in the doorway to the storage area. “You not allowed back here. Out! Out!”

“I’m sorry.” Tina turned on the charm, and Macy smiled. Her friend was a public relations agent for a very big company in Chicago. If anyone could talk the old woman out of the bottle, Tina Brewster was the woman for the job. “I spotted this beautiful bottle here on the counter, and it just called to me. You have such lovely things in your shop. I’m having trouble deciding what to buy!”

“Ezz not for sale,” she repeated and reached for the bottle.

Tina smiled and held it just out of reach. “Madame Zena…you are Madame Zena, aren’t you?” The woman nodded, and Tina continued, “I have a real love for things from this era. I’m sure we can agree on a price that will make both of us quite happy.”

Madame Zena looked in Tina’s eyes and then seemed to study the bottle in her hands. After a moment, she looked back up at Tina and shook her head. “Ezz not for sale.” She reached for the bottle, but Tina jerked it backwards.

“Tina,” Macy said, embarrassed. Persistence was one thing, but sometimes too much could be foolish. “She doesn’t want to sell the bottle. Let’s get the earrings and go.”

Tina smiled through gritted teeth and said, “But I want it.”

Macy gritted her teeth and smiled right back. “You’re acting like a spoiled brat. Put the stupid bottle down, and let’s go.”

She reached for the bottle, and it practically jumped into her hands.

“What the hell?” Macy held on firmly with both hands until the bottle stopped shaking. “That was bizarre.”

“What?” Tina asked, irritated. She obviously hadn’t noticed the shaking that Macy felt.

Perhaps it was all in her mind. Macy gave the bottle a little shake, and it shook back at her. She glanced up at Tina, who seemed oblivious to anything unusual.

“Ah ha.” Madame Zena smiled widely, exposing several missing teeth and a chaw of chewing tobacco. She nodded and winked at Macy. “For you, twenty dollars.”

“For her, twenty dollars?” Tina screeched. “You’ll sell it to her but not me?”

The old woman closed her eyes and shrugged.

Tina looked at Macy and smiled, nodding her head quickly. “Buy it.”