History That Never Was

I had one new story out in August this year. “Damage Abatement” appeared in the August 2025 issue of Utopia Science Fiction Magazine. This is my fifth appearance in this magazine, with two flash fiction pieces and two poems previously included, but this is my first short story there!

“Damage Abatement” is also a Cobalt City story, which was inspired by a throw-away line in Brother’s Keeper about whether or not there was a superhero called “Bulldozer Man.” One of the audience members at a Cobalt City reading said there needed to be a story about Bulldozer Man, and I agreed. I wound up making the character a woman and renaming her Excavator, but the basic premise remained. This story also gave me an opportunity to bring back the members of Triple Threat (Dulcamara, Terra Firma, and Ex Spiravit) and another character from Brother’s Keeper. This story takes place after the events of Brother’s Keeper, which you don’t need to have read (though there is a tiny spoiler in “Damage Abatement” for that novella).

I also had a drabble out from the Reach Your Apex Community Drabble, “It Is Done,” in which a reaper devoted to their duties deals with the end of all things.

(I also failed to mention another drabble that was out in July from the Reach Your Apex Community Drabble, “Possession Roulette,” in which characters attempt to guess who has been possessed.)

Tags: august, cobalt city, Damage Abatement, drabble, It Is Done, Possession Roulette, publication, short story, superheroes

This entry was posted by dawn.vogel on Thursday, September 4th, 2025 at 6:00 am and is filed under Announcements, Publishing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.