A stranded pilot learns the cost — and quiet technology — of naming. Bureaucracy, blue lights, and a tow paid partly in syllables.
I’ve posted a new flash, ‘Mercy in Advance‘. It’s a small spacefaring fable about paperwork and grace: a pilot who won’t name his ship, a tow crew who’ll take payment in jellyfish and haiku, and the idea that mercy lands better if you pay it before things fail. I wanted the piece to move like a recovery — slow hook, careful haul — so you’ll find a pause where the cockpit becomes a waiting room, then a clang, then a reckoning.
Read it here → Mercy in Advance
It’s also about the superstition of labels: how once we name something we owe it food and patience. The ending owes a debt to every engineer who keeps a quiet liturgy of bolts and cranes.
Image created with AI.
