Cupids

Sometimes you get more than you bargained for. Castros Bianchi lives for his Menagerie. His vast fortune now buys the rarest specimens of the galaxy’s diverse life forms. An old collector. A private moon. A cherub run amok. Come along for a delightful romp reminiscent of pulp’s Golden Age. An excerpt from Cupids: The furry teddy ignored him, which was strange. Stranger still, Manfred was trying to crawl between the roots of one of the hybrid cypress-oaks. The trees took tremendous effort to keep alive, but Castros liked alien creatures in Terran settings. And here came his cupid. Castros sat down to watch, heedless of his ridiculously expensive genuine linen pinstripe trousers. He loved to see the ways his different creatures found to play together. The cupid spiraled above Manfred, beginning its eerie hum. Suddenly, it plummeted onto the teddy’s back and began to— “Great jumping Jezebels!” Castros cried out, right before being violently sick.