Alfie Simpson's The Plant Room features one of our favourite characters to grace our pages, then proceeds to commit terrible violence. Claire Fitzpatrick and Michael Morris both channel Ursula Le Guin's dark side, while Hari Navarro's Black Holy asks what might happen if god were to die. Eugen Bacon offers a wonderful yet brief respite with Surfing on Neptune, introducing a whole galaxy of story in just over 500 words.