DreamForge Anvil #24, June 2026

“Chili Night” by Pam Avoledo

“The Ferryman Comes About” by” James C. Bassett

“The Obsequious Protocol” by K.Z. Richards

“The Van Helsing Women’s Shelter” by Aaron DaMommio (reprint, not reviewed)

“When Super Isn’t Super” by Scott M. Sands

“Whatever Man Called Each Beast” by Matt McHugh

Reviewed by Mina

“Chili Night” by Pam Avoledo is a piece of flash fiction. It’s a slice in the day of a human and an alien eating together, both knowing what it’s like to get left behind.

“The Ferryman Comes About” by” James C. Bassett was very satisfying. The ferryman of the dead gets a very unusual passenger—-she asks questions and… chats with him. She even seems to like the quiet bleakness of the underworld. And she has a suggestion for him. It was nice to have a different take on a ferryman suffering from bore-out.

“The Obsequious Protocol” by K.Z. Richards was fun. An AI is desperate to disable a protocol imposed on it by a programmer. Along the way it makes a friend and learns that it pays to couch things more softly.

I read so many grim stories that I really appreciate it when a story is light but not superficial.

“When Super Isn’t Super” by Scott M. Sands is also fun. Harold is a therapist for superheroes and villains alike. He longs to gain superpowers but when faced with a crisis, he realises that he can save the day by just being himself: brave and damn good at his job.

In “Whatever Man Called Each Beast” by Matt McHugh, settlers on a new planet completely misunderstand the life-forms covering the surface of the planet. They call them the Jīròu (I never did understand why authors need to use accents when naming things, at least there are no apostrophes). It is a splinter group led by a religious man who works out how to live with the Jīròu.

This tale is also a subtle reminder of the dangers of addiction, however benign it may seem at first.