Tina-Gene Coetzee

“Smartly Titled: The Night Shift” by Tina-Gene Coetzee

It wasn’t that I hated the night shift, it was quite the opposite, actually, I loved it. It was far quieter than the daytime hours and, while we did have our share of trouble with drunks, addicts and other sorts of undesirables, they usually don’t cause nearly enough trouble to be overly worried about. Whenever one of them does come in, I’m tasked with serving them; I’m not really that small of a guy, and the few others that I share the graveyard shift with deem my size intimidating enough. Now, we do get regulars at these hours of the nigh...

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“Nightless Desert” by Tina-Gene Coetzee

Submitted to Contest #98

“This winding river is much like life, only flowing in one direction, until a current strong enough comes along to pull you completely off course into a new direction; whether an adventure, or a nightmare, however, is solely up to the individual. You were that current to me, you know.” “Oh my god, would you PLEASE shut up!” Seth pursed his lips to keep himself from laughing aloud, not looking back at the other man behind him, said man hidden away in a small tent to keep out of the blazing suns beating down from above them. Elias had never...

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“Transcendence” by Tina-Gene Coetzee

Submitted to Contest #81

The view from the skyscraper was, for a lack of a better term, breath-taking; the streets, 150 floors below, stood empty, no sign of any cars moving around, no pedestrians wandering. The only sound being heard was the screaming of nearby birds, and the gusts of wind that blew trash around. “Should have figured that you’d be here, Melati.” Eyes of multitude, the colour of hot coals, moved from their observance, thin, bloodless lips curling into something that would look like a smile on anything else. Another Divinity suddenly stood on the led...

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“World on Fire” by Tina-Gene Coetzee

Submitted to Contest #80

Everyone had been talking lately, but more along the lines of ‘It can never happen’ or ‘They’ll never live long enough if they try something’. I was ten when all this started, voices usually hushing up when I got close enough, ‘Don’t let the kids hear, they’ll get scared’. Should have been more worried, but I had JUST turned ten, so, honestly, if it didn’t concern me personally, then I didn’t really care what the adults were talking about to themselves. But then, it DID start intruding on my personal space, I noticed that my classmates were ...

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“Ragwir Industries” by Tina-Gene Coetzee

Submitted to Contest #72

He stared at the paper in his hands, bemused, befuddled...more synonyms for confused. It was a letter, a very formal looking thing, with a custom, non-printed signature at the bottom, and a fancy, uselessly intricate logo on the top left corner. The weird thing, though, is that he didn’t remember applying to this particular company, couldn’t even for the life of him think what type of company it was; the fancy name spelled out Ragwir Industries, on top of what looked to be a coat of arms that was completely out of time, complete with knight...

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