Tales From A Fomorian Detention Centre

Four teenagers leaning against a wall in a yard next to a drainpipe. Two have fangs coming out of their lips. Another has a cigarette in his mouth. The fourth has an old-fashioned shawl draped around her. The image has a sepia overlay to resemble an old photo

Night shift. God, how I hate it. Eight hours fighting against my natural urge to fall asleep while checking the cells every thirty minutes in between another boring game of cards. I’d swear Eddie Jones is looking at my cards when I have to make my rounds, but fair is fair – I’ve done that to him as well.

I glance at the clock on the wall. The corridor is quiet enough that I can hear it tick-tocking eight feet away – either that, or it’s a bloody noisy thing. Eleven-twenty-nine p.m….time to check on the prisoners – oh, I’m sorry, the patients. Prisoners, patients – they’re all orcs. Fomorians. The mutated. Whatever you want to call them.

Night Shift

A collection of short stories set in a British-run detention centre for orcs, centred around two children who weren’t born as orcs. Nor did they choose to become orcs.

  1. Night Shift. A jaded, weary guard on night shift ruminates on the orcs he’s guarding.
  2. Maladaptive Vigilance. Hypervigilance is a recurring condition among orcs who leave the Connacht Disaster Zone.
  3. Samples. Diarmuid and Siobhán reluctantly undergo an biopsy.
  4. Rage Against The Mirror Self. Siobhán does not like what she thinks she sees in the mirror.
  5. Washing-up Wrangling. While washing the dishes, Diarmuid muses on his life before being forcibly turned into an orc.
  6. The Dwarven Tea Machine. Dwarven technology is elegant, state-of-the-art, and far more complicated than it needs to be.
  7. What Next? Siobhán and Diarmuid discover their fate.

If you like the sound of those…


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