"An Encounter at the Dawn of the Time War" by JT Petty + "Lotus Dew for the Emperor's Tea" by Vanessa Fogg

Summary

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LIGHTSPEED MAGAZINE PODCAST

March 19, 2026 — “An Encounter at the Dawn of the Time War” by J.T. Petty + “Lotus Dew for the Emperor’s Tea” by Vanessa Fogg

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Episode Overview

This episode of LIGHTSPEED Magazine presents two thought-provoking speculative short stories, each exploring the manipulation of time, memory, and mortality, but from wildly different angles.

• The first tale, “An Encounter at the Dawn of the Time War” by J.T. Petty, is a tightly wound science fiction glimpse into how technology could reshape history, identity, and truth itself, set against a near-contemporary backdrop.
• The second, “Lotus Dew for the Emperor's Tea” by Vanessa Fogg, is a lush, mythic fantasy exploring themes of immortality, loss, family, and the bittersweet beauty of change.
  Both stories are anchored by atmospheric narration and invite listeners into worlds forged by warping time or cherishing the fleeting present.

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Story 1: “An Encounter at the Dawn of the Time War” by J.T. Petty

Read by Susan Hanfield
[01:50–14:30]

Key Points & Discussion

• Setting & Characters:

  • Set in August 2019, grounded by references to real-world events (Somalia, Yemen, El Paso shooting, Jeffrey Epstein), giving the story a disturbing plausibility.
  • The unnamed narrator lives in a tent under an overpass, surrounded by society's marginalized and vulnerable.
  • A mysterious woman arrives, fleeing pursuers—mercenaries described as "aggressively unremarkable... mostly white men, mostly bearded" ([02:36]).

• The Grothendieck Lens:

  • The central SF device is a black tube called a “Grothendieck lens”, which allows the user to see roughly five seconds into the future ([04:40]).
  • The device induces nausea and vertigo as one’s actions become visible as predetermined when viewed through the lens.
  • Using it, the woman and narrator demonstrate unsettling predictions of immediate events, blurring agency and determinism.

• Rewriting the Past:

  • The woman reveals it’s the least dangerous application—what truly matters is that information can now be sent into the past, enabling surgical, untraceable changes to reality ([07:24]).
  • Any alteration instantly rewrites all records and memories, except for the meticulous notes kept by the “engineers of historic modification,” who are complicit but sacrificed—always aware of the ever-shifting truth ([08:12]).

• Consequence and Memory:

  • Truth becomes mutable—if the past is changed, the very memory of reality slides to fit. This is illustrated as the story’s timeline “loops,” with recurring references to the same day’s headlines, but with subtly altered details:
    • “Jeffrey Epstein had taken a plea deal...”
    • “Jeffrey Epstein had been killed by a fellow prisoner...”
    • “Jeffrey Epstein had killed himself by hanging...” ([06:00], [09:35], [12:22])
  • The narrator grapples with existential uncertainty, at times doubting their own perceptions and the reliability of history itself.

• Notable Quotes

  • “She looked like broken comfort, an American girl approaching 30 whose safety nets had been suddenly snatched away. She was dirtier than I was, but her teeth were beautiful. All the cuts on her hands were fresh.” ([02:08])
  • “Math isn’t a map for understanding the territories of the world. Math is the territory. All this meat and metal, that’s the map. Our broken approximation of the real experience. Existence is numbers… And once science has identified a thing, it can manipulate a thing.” ([07:55])
  • “Any notion of a butterfly effect was childish. A meat-based understanding of a math-based world. A primitive attempt to apply pre quantum mechanical cause and effect.” ([10:07])
  • “From here on out, the future is set. Only the past is unstable.” ([13:42])

• Memorable Moments

  • The chilling demonstration of the lens, where actions are seen before they’re performed, signals the hollowing out of self-determination ([05:10]).
  • The repeated, troubling re-writing of real-world events as history is altered — a gunman, an infamous suicide, the shifting fates of those caught in history ([06:00]).

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Story 2: “Lotus Dew for the Emperor’s Tea” by Vanessa Fogg

Read by Su Chen
[17:53–68:52]

Key Points & Discussion

• Mythical Setting & Multigenerational Scope:

  • The story unfolds in a timeless empire ruled first by an immortal Emperor, kept young by tea brewed in dew collected by pure-hearted maidens from sacred lotus blooms ([18:10]).
  • It blends classical myth, fairy tale, and epic scope—tracing the ripple effects of a single act of “greed or joy” across centuries and dynasties.

• Cycle of Immortality & Change:

  • The youngest dew maiden, after years of duty, impulsively drinks a drop of sacred dew meant for the Emperor. The paradise’s spell is broken: “The dome of paradise cracked, and mortal time stepped through... The First Emperor’s aides and ministers ran to his rooms. They threw open the doors. They shouted his name. He was gone, back to the Courts of Heaven from where he’d come...” ([23:45])
  • As punishment or blessing, the maiden becomes a white heron, scattering dewdrops into the sky—the origin of the Milky Way.

• Loss, Longing, and Art:

  • The myth continues with her lover, the tea master’s apprentice, who seeks the moon to join her—a quest that becomes both a romance and a meditation on grief and perseverance.
  • The Emperors of subsequent generations try (and fail) to reclaim immortality by imitation, amalgamating folk myths, court intrigues, and alchemical follies.

• Evolution of Tea & Acceptance:

  • The narrative is continually interrupted by the presence of a present-day narrator—an exiled princess, returned to a bedridden, voiceless Emperor (her father), serving him mortality’s own medicine: “...even our tea changed...we’ve learned to appreciate age. But still people grieve what was lost.” ([42:30])
  • Grandmother Tea’s legend transcends generation and identity, suggesting wisdom and comfort in the ordinary, mundane, and fleeting.

• Themes:

  • Impermanence: The ending of paradise enables the advent of autumn, artistry, poetry, and more complex joy—a recurring motif: “Your poets and artists love this season, you know. They love its bittersweet beauty. It’s growing chill. They love saying goodbye...” ([29:50])
  • The Value of Mortality: Mortality is not merely a punishment, but a source of new kinds of beauty, invention, and meaning—for if nothing changes, nothing can create or grow.
  • Female and Queer Agency: The narrative foregrounds the choices and desires of women—dew maidens, Grandmother Tea, and the princess herself—who claim their right to shape stories and destinies.

• Notable Quotes

  • “To hold on. A moment of weakness, a traitorous act? Or perhaps, I think, a pure impulse of joy?” ([22:05])
  • “The emperor’s aides had tested her rigorously and found no fault. She was free of envy and meanness, greed and self-interest. Temptation. Even the faintest impulse toward it should never have entered her heart. It didn’t. For long years, it didn’t.” ([19:37])
  • “I want the choice to stay in the mortal world. To move between worlds, like the First Emperor himself. So I need to brew mortal tea leaves. Leaves grown from plants firmly rooted in this earth.” ([66:14])
  • “Should I share this tea with the world, as Moon Heron shared what was left in her vial of dew?...What new stars might be born?” ([67:20])
  • “I came back to see your face as I speak these words. Your Majesty. Father, My tea is now ready. Father. Father, what do you think I'll do next?” ([68:42])

• Memorable Moments

  • The transformation of the dew maiden into a heron, and the scattering of stars (origin of the Milky Way) ([25:00]).
  • The bittersweet reunion of the tea master and moon heron “in a snowy field, in a realm of white light, in the moon’s eternal pure winter” ([34:38]).
  • The multi-generational search for immortality—waves of princes sent out to sea, the persistent but fruitless longing of emperors ([47:00], [52:30], [59:00]).
  • The closing ambiguity—will the returned princess brew the cup of immortality tea for herself, her father, or share it with the world?

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Opening, Introduction: [00:06]
• Story 1: “An Encounter at the Dawn of the Time War”: [01:50]–[14:30]
• Discussion of Story 1 (Host Commentary & Credits): [14:30]–[15:54]
• Story 2: “Lotus Dew for the Emperor’s Tea”: [17:53]–[68:52]
• Discussion of Story 2 (Host Commentary & Credits): [68:52]–[70:23]

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Conclusion & Takeaway

Both stories employ the speculative genre to probe deep existential and philosophical questions—about agency, the fabric of history, the necessity of endings, and the allure (and cost) of immortality.

• J.T. Petty’s fiction warns of a future where truth itself is contingent and unknowable, framed by chilling, matter-of-fact language.
• Vanessa Fogg’s lush, lyrical storytelling celebrates the ultimate value to be found in loss, longing, and generational change.

These stories together are a rich tapestry: one a caution about forgetting the lessons of the past, the other an elegy for paradise lost—and the hope of beauty yet to come.

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Transcript

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

Light speed.

[Janina Edwards]

Hello, starshine. The Earth says hello. And welcome to the Lightspeed Magazine Story Podcast. I'm your host, Janina Edwards. In this episode, you'll be listening to An Encounter at the dawn of the time war by J.T. petty and Lotus Dew for the Emperor's Tea by Vanessa Fogg. First up is our short An Encounter at the dawn of the Time War. Coming up right after this message.

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[Narrator of 'An Encounter at the Dawn of the Time War']

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Welcome back. And now, An Encounter at the dawn of the Time War Narrated by Susan Hanfield.

[Narrator of 'An Encounter at the Dawn of the Time War']

An Encounter at the dawn of the time war by JT Petty. This was in August of 2019. A day old newspaper reported civil wars in Somalia and Yemen. A gunman killed 22 people in an El Paso Walmart. Jeffrey Epstein had taken a plea deal, promising to name names. Promising to name the name. She looked like broken comfort, an American girl approaching 30 whose safety nets had been suddenly snatched away. She was dirtier than I was, but her teeth were beautiful. All the cuts on her hands were fresh. She said the people who were chasing her would seem aggressively unremarkable. Mostly white men, mostly bearded, with the thick torsos of aging soldiers. They would be wearing cargo pants and polo shirts. They would favor knives over guns for silence and to confound forensics. My tent was one of eight beneath the overpass. I liked my neighbors. Dorothy is in the next tent over. She is schizophrenic, but she is quiet. If you can ignore the whispers, Ming is addicted to heroin, and none of us speak her language. She often cries. The rest of my neighbors are simply unlucky or undocumented or were born in the wrong time. Back home I completed six years of university. She came to our block around midnight, breathless and sweating, wearing stolen shoes. She asked us to hide her, and we asked no questions. She did not hesitate to enter my tent. She accepted me immediately, as a woman. She looked at my few books. I keep things tidy and I don't keep much. If something goes down, I intend to jump up and fast. We sat facing each other, cross legged, inside my tent. She pulled from the small pocket within a pocket on the right hip of her jeans a black tube of stacked octagons, like a tiny kaleidoscope. She called it a Grotendieck lens. I asked her to repeat it, to spell it out. G R O T H E N D I E C K the glassed end of the device glowed faintly, more like a tiny port window than a flashlight. She told me to look through it. I raised the lens to my eye and watched her clap her hands, sharply but somehow silent. There was something wrong about her motion. My stomach lurched as if from a sudden drop. I lowered the lens and two seconds later she clapped her hands, the exact same motion, and this time I heard the report. I felt sick. She told me it would get easier. Try it again, she said. I looked through the lens and watched her lips move, watched her reach past the lens toward me. I felt nothing. I lowered the lens. She said, it's okay, and put a hand on my shoulder in again the same motion, and this time I felt the touch. I felt back against the nylon of the tent, unsettled in gravity, awash in some directionless vertigo. She said the lens was tuned to not quite five seconds into the future. To prove it, she took the lens and watched me, predicting two seconds before I clapped, before I dropped a book, before I made donkey ears with splayed fingers and thumbs at temples. I tried to break from her predictions, but my body was already in motion by the time my mind registered the words. I felt hollow, unreal, afloat. This was in August of 2019. A Dale newspaper reported civil wars in Somalia and Yemen. A gunman killed 22 people in an El Paso Walmart. Jeffrey Epstein had been killed by a fellow prisoner who had managed to get a gun from one of the guards. I asked her who she was and why she was showing me this. She said the Groten Dieck lens was evidence of a program, one piece of technology secreted out of a defense contractor's laboratory, a private company that was creating the technology for a new era of silent war and the economy that would follow. She said lensing devices were the earliest iterations of the technology. Judith holes a little way into the past or future. Looking is cheap, she said, at considerably more effort and expense. They can send information into the past. I asked if they could send information into the future. She said that technology had been around for thousands of years. Paper and pencil, a charred stick and a cave wall. It's not an optical lens, she said. I wrote this all down as soon as I could, in the last throes of some belief in posterity now of course rendered violently absurd. It's not an optical lens, she said again. It's a mathematical lens. Everything post Los Alamos proved it. Math isn't a map for understanding the territories of the world. Math is the territory. All this meat and metal, that's the map. Our broken approximation of the real experience. Existence is numbers, not even it's algorithms. And once science has identified a thing, it can manipulate a thing. It was a short hop from being able to observe the past to being able to fudge the numbers. Sending information into the past affected immediate change. Surgical alterations of historic events. It had no immediate effect on memory, but every piece of evidence, every record would instantaneously revise memory, individual and cultural, followed with terrifying alacrity. The scientists and businessmen who effected the changes were themselves required to keep and study rigorous notes in order to preserve their pre adjusted memories of history. The engineers of historic modification designed changes with explicitly shabby details, like the plotting of a poor storyteller, so that people would doubt the basic chain of events rather than suspect the fundamentals of their memory. I said it wasn't possible. One thing changes everything. The altered sequence of events, the downstream consequences, she said. Any notion of a butterfly effect was childish. A meat based understanding of a math based world. A primitive attempt to apply pre quantum mechanical cause and effect. Electrons leap to a point of existence upon observation without having traveled and determine ex post facto how they arrived there. I don't know how much of our history they've changed already. They probably have already forgotten how much of it they've changed already. The memory, the record, it all adjusts to fit, she said. This was in August of 2019. A day old newspaper reported civil wars in Somalia and Yemen. A gunman killed 22 people in an El Paso Walmart. Jeffrey Epstein had killed himself by hanging. The whole sad process captured on security camera footage leaked to YouTube. She had been trying to get the Groton die cleanse to a professor, an agent of foreign intelligence, like nuclear weapons. Maybe the technology would be slightly less dangerous in the hands of multiple adversarial governments. She had found the professor. It had cost the lives of multiple friends and strangers. The increasingly desperate mercenaries informed by technologies known and unknown were ever at her heels. The professor had taken one look through the Groten die glens and cursed a lost God in some foreign tongue. She watched him pull a gun from a drawer and shoot himself in the chest. It took him minutes to die. And now here she was, tired and alone and lost, needing to disappear. She had come for sanctuary among the city's ubiquitous invisible why don't they just alter history so the lens was never stolen in the first place? Maybe the theft was too long ago, she said. I don't know how far back they can make changes. Maybe a gun can't shoot itself. I don't know. I asked, does the future always happen the way you see it? Through here? Yes, she said. Or your memory alters with the past to whatever future arrives? She kept saying. I don't know. I asked. Even if you do get away with it, what's to stop them from just changing what happened sometime in the future? She spread her hands helplessly and said, get away with what? I said. I knew it. I knew something was wrong. Something's been wrong for a long time. It only seems that way because you're human. The future belongs to math. We can change it. I don't think we can, she said. From here on out, the future is set. Only the past is unstable. This was in August of 2019. A day old newspaper reported civil wars in Somalia and Yemen. A gunman killed 22 people in an El Paso Walmart. Jeffrey Epstein had killed himself by hanging, a death missed by conveniently malfunctioning security cameras, casting the entire event in doubt and suspicion.

[Janina Edwards]

That was an encounter at the dawn of the time war. By J.T. petty Narrated by Susan Handfield J.T. petty is a writer and director of movies, video games, and television. His movies include the horror western the Burrowers and documentary Sandman. His work in video games includes Splinter Cell, the Walking Dead, and Outlast. Along with a diverse career on stage and screen, Susan Hanfield is a prolific audiobook narrator with hundreds of titles to her credit. Susan is an Earphones Award winner, three time Audie Award finalist, and a Voice Arts Awards nominee from her professional studio in Los Angeles. Susan's favorite fiction genres include literary fiction, historical fiction, young adult, and science fiction, fantasy Nonfiction genres include faith based, inspirational, personal, self development and business. Susan is known for her wide range of voices, accents, intonations and her ability to bring the written story to life. Next we have Lotus Dew for the Emperor's Tea By Vanessa Fogg Coming right up.

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[Janina Edwards]

Now please enjoy Lotus Dew for the Emperor's Tea Narrated by Su Chen

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Lotus Dew for the Emperor's Tea Vanessa Fogg the first Emperor was the first and last of true immortals on Earth and no winter touched his realm, no autumn wind blew. His orchards bloomed and fruited and bloomed again in his court. Death and old age were shut out and every day he drank a cup of tea brewed in the dew of lotus flowers which had been collected that morning from the lotuses that grew in a heaven touched lake at the easternmost point of his palace grounds. The new girl from the north, wide eyed and awed at her new surroundings, had been Raised all her life to join the Emperor's service. Her mother, who had served sweets to the palace ladies in her youth, had drilled the girl in court etiquette. She taught the girl duty and obedience, grace and charm. Yet even she was shocked when her daughter was chosen for that rarest of honors, to collect dew for the emperor's tea. It was a small group of maidens who were given this task, no more than eight at a time. They woke before dawn, and they slipped their boats into the lake just as the sky began to whiten in the east. In the pre dawn light, they rowed from shore. And so they were ready when sunrise broke, when the pink lotus flowers unfurled and a glowing pink dawn spread across the lake. Even as dawn spread above in the sky, the heavenly scent of lotuses filled the air. Dew drops glistened on petals and leaves. But only petal dew would serve the emperor, and time was short. The maidens had only a few hours to gather the Emperor's dew before the precious drops evaporated in summer air. Each girl had a glass vial and tiny glass dropper. It was laborious work to fill each vial, to collect each dew drop one by one. But they all took pride in their task. The newest girl had never dreamed of such an honor. Memorizing the various levels of salutations for different court officials, learning to arrange a plate of sweets just so, Practicing how to hold her arm properly, gracefully as she poured a cup of tea. She had never imagined she could be where she was now, on a blessed lake, breathing in the sacred scent of these lotuses, touching their silken heads, surrounded by color and beauty like a dream. Her neck ached as she bent her head to her task. Her hand cramped as she squeezed her dropper, drawing up a crystalline dew drop. Her heart sang with joy. How could it happen, you might ask. For the maiden's heart and mind were pure. She was guileless, transparent as morning dew. She'd been carefully chosen, like all the dew maidens. The emperor's aides had tested her rigorously and found no fault. She was free of envy and meanness. Greed and self interest. Temptation. Even the faintest impulse toward it should never have entered her heart. It didn't. For long years, it didn't. Each morning she gathered dew with her dew sisters, working with joy. She was honored for her position and had few other tasks. She learned to take pleasure in the luxuries of the first emperor's court. Music and poetry, song contests in the garden, tea tastings in the peach orchard, fine wines under moonlight dances and parties. Delights for all five senses. Fine silks on the skin and rose scented baths. Exotic perfumes, dishes to thrill both tongue and nose. Beauty to dazzle eyes and ears. But our greatest joys were always the cool mornings on the blessed Lotus Lake. Floating amidst that field of bright flowers beaded with dewdrops, numberless as the stars, collecting those crystalline drops in Quyon alongside the women she now thought of as sisters, she drew liquid light off dawn pink petals and drew the light of morning itself into her lungs. Years passed in the manner of time at the beginning of the world. The newest maiden was no longer new. The group of dew maidens had changed. More senior girls retired and new ones were brought in. A dew maiden's time was limited, like that which she gathered. One could not harvest those drops of light for too long without change. One could not be trusted with the Emperor's dew water forever. And the days grew only more precious as time passed. The hushed mornings on the lake. Not just the lotuses and their dew, but the bird calls at dawn, ringing off the bright air. The shadow of leaves, the splash of a frog. White herons among the flowers, looking for fish. And then to row back with the filled vials to hand them over with satisfaction at the palace. A cup of jasmine tea and hot pastries for breakfast, fresh from the oven, banter with a kitchen staff. All this was precious. The daily routine, the company of her sisters, the presence of friends. Laughter in the garden under an arch of wisteria. Fireflies at dusk, walking hidden garden paths hand in hand with another. A beloved voice in her ear, murmuring her name. She was on the lake again. And the light was all around her. The light of the world that glowed everywhere, that ran under the surface of all things. Something thrummed in her veins. She'd had only scant hours of sleep the night before. She'd been with her sweetheart. And she still felt his touch. The lotus dew shone. The light was there in droplets, right within reach. Was it truly greed? What happened next? Greed to take what wasn't hers? Or just greed to hold on, to preserve the moment. To capture and keep the light she'd collected for so long. To take it into herself and hold on. Oh, to hold on. A moment of weakness, A traitorous act? Or perhaps, I think, a pure impulse of joy? She did not think she brought the lotus bloom to her mouth. She tasted and swallowed one precious drop. The sky darkened, although there were no clouds. The birds fell silent. The earth stilled. The transparent dome of the first emperor's paradise Cracked. A cold wind blew through, and mortal time stepped in. Your majesty, I know how you mourn the passage of mortal time. You've sought to slow it, halt it, and even reverse it. This portion of my story angers you. I can see it in your eyes, although you cannot speak. Patience, I ask of you, Let me tell it in full. The dome of paradise cracked, and mortal time stepped through. The earth shivered. Until this moment, time had been slowed for the First Emperor's subjects. They aged, but far more slowly than people of today. But now they all felt time's tempo quicken. A shadow fell across their hearts. The First Emperor's aides and ministers ran to his rooms. They threw open the doors. They shouted his name. He was gone, back to the Courts of Heaven from where he'd come back to a realm of light and eternity where they could never follow. And our Dew Maiden, our foolish girl, our hapless thief, her sisters on the lake said they saw her turn into a bird. A white heron lifting into the sky. The heron held a vial in its beak. It soared into the suddenly dim sky, which was the shade of gray dusk. It flew up and up to where the air grew thin, luminous white against the dark, and the vial fell from its beak. Dewdrops spilled out, and they scattered as white stars against the sky. And that is what we now call the Milky Way, which others may refer to as the White river or Bridge of Stars. There are compensations for the maid's act, don't you think? You mourn the end of an eternal summer. But consider, your majesty, the glories of fall, the blaze of red maples, the golden gingko trees, the crispness of air. The summer dew gives way to autumn frost. A lacework of crystals on grass and stems, a burst of final autumn flowers. Chrysanthemums, orange and purple and gold. Autumn mist on the hills lit by the sun's morning rays. The melancholy of autumn, the shortening days, the falling blue twilights, the call of geese overhead as they leave us? Autumn rains rained and rain. The tapping sound on our walls as rain fills autumn pools, as it fills the black nights. What would our poets do, your majesty, without autumn, without an autumn moon to sing of round and full over the waters, without the mists and falling leaves. Your poets and artists love this season, you know. They love its bittersweet beauty. It's growing chill. They love saying goodbye, winter. The breath freezes in air. A crust of snow breaks underfoot. The moon so cold and white above. It's said that it's always Winter on the moon. The white heron flew into the sky, spilling a vial of stars. And it's said that she flew straight to the moon and resides there even now amid its white mountains and snowy fields. Some say she lives there alone and weeps. Her tears fall like crystal stars into the night and melt swiftly away. But there's another story, too. He was the moon heron's sweetheart before she flew away. They met in the kitchens. He was the newest apprentice to the First Emperor's personal tea master, and before the promotion, he'd spent years studying with others. He'd learned to brew every type of tea existent in the realm and was always experimenting with new variations. It was an honor beyond his imagining to learn to brew the First Emperor's tea. One of his tasks was to collect the vials of lotus stew from the First Emperor's maidens. He would meet them at the kitchen door and take their vials one by one. When he first met the girl who would become a heron, he was so struck by the sight, by her sparkling black eyes, her face brimming with light, that he nearly forgot to close his hand around the vial she held out. It was months before he could make himself say more than a few words to her, but from the beginning, he made sure the best jasmine tea was always served for her breakfast. The night she broke the world, they'd walked the garden paths together. At dusk, they'd stood on a bridge over a pond, staring at the reflection of the moon below. They'd had a private meal in a hidden arbor and retired to her private quarters. They'd spoken of their future. Her time as a dew maiden was limited, but she could stay on at the palace. If she married him, she could find another job. It was true that one day they would both have to leave. Although the First Emperor's subjects aged slowly, they did age. And in his court, old age and death were shut out. After a certain point, they would be exiled from his inner realm, but they would leave together. They pledged to be together forever. Then the Du Maiden betrayed their emperor. The light of the sky dimmed. A cold wind blew. The royal team, master's apprentice felt a shadow cross his heart. And he knew he who had held the vials of lotus dew in his hands each day, who watched his master bring it to a just simmering heat, who had begun to help brew the First Emperor's tea himself. He knew. The young man ran to the lotus lake. An eerie dusk had fallen. The sun was gray in the sky. His love was gone. Her sisters pointed to the Air where she could no longer be seen. But a hazy band of stars illuminated the sky overhead. A new marvel, brighter at that moment than it has ever been since. He went in search of her, even as the world broke and aged all around him. In the palace, the first emperor's ministers squabbled for power. The gardens and grounds fell into disarray. The first autumn frosts fell. The young man left it all behind. He traveled the world looking for a way to get close to the moon. He sought out sages, sorcerers, people of spiritual power. He consulted a great kite maker, asking if he might make a kite large enough to fly him to the moon. He visited temples and prayed. He begged all the birds of the world, the herons, the cranes, the eagles, and more, to fly him to his beloved. He sold tea as he traveled to pay his way. Only one type of tea. Her favorite. The delicate floral green jasmine he had created just for her. He poured it for customers from a red clay pot he'd taken from the palace. And it never ran out. Eventually he found his way to the highest mountain in the world. He was no longer young. Age had caught up with him. His black hair was tipped with white. He made his way slowly up the peak, and winds howled all about him. It was silent at the top. The night sky stretched above the great sweep of the Milky Way, a haze punctuated with glittering stars. He could almost reach out to touch it. Here he would be closer to her than anywhere else on Earth. He set out his red teapot and cups. He waited for the moon to rise. The moon rose, and the white heron of the moon looked out and down. She saw her love so far below, his hair streaked with white. Lifting to her a cup of jasmine tea. She wept. Her tears fell as a rain of crystal stars burning in the night sky. He stayed on the mountaintop. He felt her pure white light. He wasn't sure if she could hear him, but he spoke to her each night. Stories of all he'd seen and done in her absence. Memories of what they'd seen and done together. Light musings and jokes, as though she were sitting with him now. He poured her cups of tea. He drank his own cup and set hers out for the night air and moonlight to take. He grew thin. There at the top of the world. The roof of the sky was so close the stars glittered above. Sometimes it seemed that if only he could jump high enough, if he were light enough, he. If he could float for an instant and he could catch hold of the nearest star and climb his way up to the moon, he began to work on a new tea. He took rolled balls of tea leaves brought with him from the first emperor's stalk and set them to steep in starlight and moonlight. He layered the leaves with his yearning and love. He brewed them in pure snow water caught in the moonlight before the flakes touched the ground. He drank and felt himself growing lighter. He jumped, pushing off from mountain peak again and again, but always he landed back on Earth. The moon Heron wept, seeing her love. He was so thin now, so frail. And though his face was not yet too aged according to the view of mortal men, his hair had turned pure white. She was close to the hazy band of the Milky Way, the bridge of stars. Moonlight blotted out the view of those stars from Earth. But the stars were still there. And then the moon entered the Milky Way itself, the midst of that river, its full light glorious in the sky. Her tears fell and they were crystal drops, freezing and then melting as they hit the roof of the world. But a white bird, a white heron, heard her call. From the warmth of a summer lake, it flew. It caught one of her tears before it could melt away. Gently, the bird flew down and dropped that tear, frozen light itself, into the tea master's cup of tea. The white haired tea master, he who had once been apprentice in an emperor's household, drank. And now it was finally light enough. He leaped off the peak. And this time he didn't fall back to earth. He caught hold of a low star. The Milky Way hung before him, and he began to climb. He climbed, stepping upon crystal dewdrops, a bridge, a road to where she waited above. And she was there. In a snowy field, in a realm of white light, in the moon's eternal pure winter. She was there. Your Majesty, are you crying? Do I see a tear in your eye? Well, I admit it. This is something I never expected. There's so much I never expected about this meeting, you, Majesty. I imagined you old and frail. I didn't expect you half paralyzed, unable to speak, glaring at me from your bed pillows, unable to wipe your eyes, helpless despite all the power of your title and name. I didn't know what it would be like telling you this story. Now. Here, let me wipe your face. Are you comfortable? Shall I prop you a little higher in the bed? You used to hate stories of the white heron of the Moon. I remember how you railed against them. You said they glorified a thief, a selfish, unthinking girl who stole the first Emperor's immortality due. But I wonder now Are you a little in love with her, like most of us are? Have you merely grown soft in old age? The Heron, Woman of the Moon, lived happily ever after with her lover. This is one story we tell. But the stories we know are the ones we live here on Earth. Here, where the seasons spin past faster and faster as we age. The First Emperor left, and his empire fell. He left no named heirs in his wake. New kingdoms and empires rose. New emperors followed. The winds of mortal time blew. And in this new world, there was suffering. But also new art, music and poetry, perhaps richer and more beautiful than what had come before. A sharpening of feeling, A new taste of loss. New patterns to be made with shadow and light. Even our tea changed. Did you know that, you, Majesty? In the First Emperor's time, only green tea was drunk. Delicate, floral, refined. Made from fresh picked leaves and buds, quickly heated. But in the after days, tea masters learn to expose the tea leaves to time. To let the leaves first brown and blacken in the sun. Even to age them again after the initial processing. To let them ferment for years in bamboo sticks or baskets. To let time do its work. And so now we have teased the First Age. Never dark and complex, full bodied and rich, we've learned to appreciate age. But still people grieve what was lost. And some of our emperors, remembering stories of the past, have sought to create those stories anew. To claim for themselves the glories of the First Emperor's rule. To claim immortality for themselves, or as near as they can, to brew the First Emperor's immortality tea. There is no recipe for immortality tea. No written directions from that time. And yet generations have searched for the First Emperor's lost grounds. For the tea orchard that once grew on a shaded hill near his palace. For the Lotus Lake where immortality dew once fell. It's said that the moment Moon Heron stole her droplet of dew, the remaining dew on the lake's lotuses all turned to plain water. Yet still people search. In the markets, vendors sell what they claim are ancient seeds from the Lotus Lake. Hopeful fools plant them, trying to recreate a lost field of flowers. Others have tried to collect dew from elsewhere, anywhere. Other lotuses, other flowers and plants. The First Emperor's lotuses were lost. But perhaps some other dew, consumed every day in a large enough cup, might still have some power. The Twelfth Emperor drank dew shaken from broad lotus leaves, for his servants could not collect enough dew from the petals alone. And his grandson builds a statue of the immortal First Emperor in worship and aspiration, as tall as the Tallest tower in his realm, and holding high a bronze plate to catch heaven's dew. Other emperors moved on to other ingredients. Rare herbs to crush into their tea, crushed jade and pearls and melted gold. They hired alchemists to devise entirely new elixirs, drinks of cinnabar, silver, mercury and lead, poisons to give eternal life. These emperors aged prematurely. They sickened and died. A new emperor came to the throne, strong and powerful and vigorous with life and desperate for yet more life, for life beyond mortal reach. Like his forebears before this, one heard tell of an old woman in the market, an unexpected master of tea. She was round and cheerful, with sparkling black eyes and hair white as snow. And despite her wrinkles and age, every step she took was imbued with lightness, as though with a single jump she might flow entirely away. Her fame started in the markets of the south, where word spread of an old woman who brewed miraculous teas. Teas that settled stomachs and fevers, that cured chronic coughs and tremors, that brought vigor to the listless and calm to the anxious, that eased aches of the body and aches of the heart. Teas that were different for each customer. Delicate teas and shades of light gold. Strong teas of red, brown to nearly black, a bright grassy tea of jade green. Teas that comforted, refreshed and renewed, that brought hope to the despairing and will and courage to the weak. Each tea poured from the same spout, from the same red clay pot. The crowds around the tea woman's stand grew. No one saw her change or refill the pot. What was in it never ran out. A local magistrate, suspicious of fraud or dark sorcery, ordered the tea woman arrested. But she was gone when the magistrate's men came to seize her. And then she was seen in a market several provinces away, and a month later, in a market in the north. Grandmother T, people called her. Crowds gathered wherever she appeared. She never stayed long in one place. She took as payment whatever customers offered, whether that be coins of silver or a plea and a prayer. Finally, she set up shop in her kingdom's capital. The emperor, nerves strained from his search for immortality, restless and sleepless, issued an invitation to her to come to his palace to serve him a cup of tea. She came, the humble seeming old woman, and bowed before the emperor's throne. In a glance, she took in the tension of his bearing, the strain on his pale face, the desperation barely controlled. She brewed him a pot of dark tea, rich yet soothing. He drank, and his brow relaxed at the first sip. From then on, Xi was ordered to come every morning to serve the Emperor tea. The tea helped him. It settled his stomach, eased. The hunger of his heart lessened. For a little while, his fear, the fear that accompanied his every moment. The fear of age and death, of inevitable decline and weakness and loss. The fear that had haunted his forebears and driven some to an early grave. He drank Grandmother T's brew, and for that moment, the fear receded. He wasn't looking ahead into the terrible future. He didn't hear the panicked wing beats of dread. There was only the present, the warmth of the cup in his hand, the rising steam, the rich, full flavor. Smoke and honey and apricot tones, a hint of roasted grain and the barest, faintest edge of bitterness, somehow enhancing the sweetness and making it whole. The Emperor drank, and he was soothed. He was able briefly to again take pleasure in the present moment, to notice the light in his gardens, the charm of the palace girls, to savor a meal and conversation with companions. His realm was rich and at peace. He was at the height of his powers. It seemed now and then almost enough, but not quite. Grandmother T came every day with her pot, easing his heart's hunger with her brew. But that hunger for eternal life was great, fueled by deep fear and stoked and re stoked by others. Alchemists who came with their fake elixirs, priests and sages with arcane rituals and spells, physicians with charlatan treatments to extend life, advisors who cynically supported his quest, currying favor and manipulating his desire to serve their own ends. He drank Grandmother Tea's brew in the morning, then met with men who presented him schemes to achieve immortality. Maps to distant lands where fruits of immortality grew, funding requests to seek out more rare herbs, promises in exchange for silver and gold. Grandmother Tea had been in the capital a month. She served the Emperor and then served tea to the market crowds. But she would not stay long. Everyone knew that the Emperor had sent his men to follow her, to try to find where she stayed after she closed shop each night. But she, fleet and light footed, always eluded his men, melting away in the crowds. Now, before the close of a second month, he drank his tea and asked her, as he had asked her before, to enter into his permanent service. And as before, she politely declined. He nodded, feeling gracious. The tea was warm in his veins. He felt clear headed and keen. And he asked her the question he'd been wanting to ask since first learning of her Grandmother. He said, do you have the skill to brew immortality tea? She Raised an eyebrow. Your Majesty, the ingredients for that are long lost. The First Emperor's tea plants are gone, and the dew drops for the brewing are beyond our reach, shining high above in the sky. The Emperor nodded. But what if they were found again? He said. For just yesterday a man had come to him claiming that he knew of a shaded hill where rare tea plants grew, descended from the very ones that had provided the First Emperor with his morning tea. The old woman said nothing. You will speak, the Emperor said, and she did not. And then you will stay until these ingredients are found. And at a gesture, his men moved to take hold of her, but she, light footed, twisted under their reaching hands. A puff of wind, a glitter of light like snowfall. Some swore afterward that they'd seen for an instant a white bird, and Grandmother T was gone. Your Majesty, you are impatient with these old tales of dead emperors. I know I have kept you waiting. One more tale, I promise, and you will have your answer. But first, to ease you another cup of tea. Grandmother Tea disappeared before a court's wandering eyes. But she's been seen again here and there through the ages. Sometimes she's a round faced old woman with snow white hair, and sometimes she's younger with hair of iron gray or black. But always she's a cheerful woman with brightness in her eyes, light footed as someone who swallowed the light of the moon. She never stays long, but while she's here, she'll share what she has freely with either emperor or beggar, as free as the light of the stars and the moon. It's been many years now since she's come to Earth. But 20 years ago there were rumors, you probably heard them, that she'd returned to mountain villages of the West. The woman who was said to be the daughter of Moon Heron and her lover, daughter of she who stole the First Emperor's dew, and also daughter of the greatest teammaster of the First Age. At that time, 20 years ago, there was also a princess living in this palace, the last of the Emperor's recognized children. He paid her little attention, for he had many children, and those other children were sons, and he'd never particularly cared for her mother. And there was something that the Emperor cared for more than he cared about any of his children, and that was to create or discover or recreate the brew that would grant him immortality. For this he pressed the greatest talents of the realm into his service. For this he funded expedition after expedition in search of rare minerals and plants. For this he hid the last magical horned horse, killed for its golden blood. For this he did far worse. He could not retrieve an immortality dewdrop from the night sky. He did try. With the wealth of his treasury, he commissioned kite makers and engineers to design him a flying machine. And they succeeded. But their flying machines never came close to the stars. And taking inspiration from the story of Moon Heron's lover, he sent sage after sage to remote mountaintops with stern directions to somehow climb up and retrieve a Milky Way star to keep them light of body. Like the great Tea Master, he did not give them food. The sages all froze or starved to death. Finally, a scholar unearthed for him a forgotten legend. The legend claims that long ago, in a great battle of the heavens, a dragon carelessly knocked a star from the Milky Way out of the sky. The star fell into the sea and became an island. And on that island it was always summer. Birds forever sang, and orchards bloomed and fruited and bloomed again. Clear springs ran from the earth, and whoever drank from those springs would live forever. The island was said to lie somewhere to the east. The emperor became determined to find it. This emperor did not trust his own admirals. He feared that if they were successful in finding the Isle of Immortality, they would keep its water to themselves. And so he sent his eldest son out to command the first fleet. His daughter was but an infant at the time, still nursing in a maid's arms. As her mother had died shortly after her birth, she did not notice when her eldest brother left. That brother never returned. And the emperor grew tired of waiting. Six years after his first son left the emperor. The Emperor sent his second son to sea with a fleet only slightly smaller this time. The princess was old enough to know, old enough to attend the departure. She hardly knew this brother, a distant figure. But she was excited by the pomp and ceremony of it all. The cheers of the crowds, the songs of flutes and drums, the ceremonial dances and blessings. Her brother standing on the dock before his ship, handsome and tall in a coat of ocean blue. And her father beside him, praising his son, looking at him with what looked like love. Years passed. There was no word of Second Brother's fleet. Five years after its departure, the emperor sent out another expedition, this time with his third son at the helm. This son also never returned. And so the princess's childhood passed. Brothers disappearing at intervals, each interval shorter than the one before. And the size of the fleet shrinking each time as well. She was raised on stories of her lost brother's heroism, the glory of their quest for the immortal Isle. She grew up on stories of other quests for immortality, of distant Lands found and mapped and sometimes conquered, of daring adventures and deeds and accomplishments, like the capture of the horned horse or the great dew gathering statue of the immortal Emperor, built by one of her father's forebears, a lost wonder of the ancient world. She learned stories of the First Age, its lost glories, and the tale of Moon Heron and her lover who climbed to the moon. The princess dreamed of distant lands, of seeing the world's wonders for herself. She hardly ever left the palace. She was a princess, and she was to be protected within the palace walls. Her father did not much care what she did or did not do. But there were ministers and servants to uphold tradition, a rigid, impersonal bureaucracy to keep her in place. In her 18th year, her fifth and sixth brothers, a pair of twins, were sent off to sea. Together, together, but also apart, for they were sent in opposite directions, one toward the east and one to the west. If the world were round, as a scholar said, the emperor had reasoned, perhaps sailing west to go east might be the way toward immortality. To find out, he set his twins against each other in a race. The treasury had been suffering from overspending, and so the sons were given command of only one ship each. They set sail, promising one another that they would meet on the Immortal Isle. And then there was only one son left, the seventh son and the princess's favorite, the only one she was truly close with. He was only three years older than her, and they'd played together as children. Even now, with his many duties, he. He made time now and then to visit with his younger sister. She was 20 years old, and her last brother was called to go to sea. Her father had once thought to keep this one at home, to be sure of an heir if his other sons never returned. But as the emperor aged, the thought of mortality made him ever more frantic. He felt he was running out of time. He was ready to sacrifice everything. The week before her brother's departure, the princess requested an audience with her father. He was in his private chambers, head bent over paperwork. The aide announced her name. Her father looked up and blinked, and she knew that for a moment he did not know who she was. She bowed, restating her name and position, and asked permission to accompany her brother on this last voyage. The emperor stared, mouth agape, and then he laughed. Absurd, he said. Young ladies like you don't go on expeditions like this. And he bent back to his papers. It was a dismissal. He said. Nothing more. At their last goodbye, the princess squeezed her brother's hand. Come back, she said. Promise me. He pressed her hand back. And then, in full view of the crowd, in defiance of all court decorum, he pulled her suddenly into a full embrace. He held her tight. She felt the tremble of his breath. But he made her no promise. And then the princess was alone in the palace with an attentive staff and few real friends and a heart full of dreams and longing. It was then that she heard the first rumors that Grandmother T was back, selling her tea in mountain villages to the west. Her tea was said to cure all ills of the world, to change a person's life. Others in the palace dismissed the rumors, saying it was merely servant gossip or the story of yet another pretender. But the princess was determined to see for herself. There was a famous temple in the mountain town where Grandmother T had last been reported. So the princess submitted a request to make a pilgrimage there with her retinue to pray for the good health and fortune of all her brothers, and for the gracious and magnanimous emperor as well. The request was readily granted. She had never been to these mountains. Only a week's ride away, she'd hardly been anywhere. The road climbed under her carriage. Birds twittered from the trees. Streams and rivers rushed past. Valleys opened up under sunlight. The country inns and markets were filled with strange new foods and wares, with people speaking in local accents she barely understood. They passed pretty towns and ramshackle huts, green fields and shrines, and an abandoned garrison. Monkeys called shrilly from the forests. Deep river gullies opened under their feet as the road became a stone bridge. The princess imagined walking through one of the villages or forests alone, without the company of her maids and guards. She imagined wandering through the world like Grandmother T. Alone and utterly fearless. The air thinned. The road hugged sheer cliffs, winding up and up. The night before the princess visited the temple, she stood in a stone courtyard beneath the night sky. She stood near the roof of the world. The Milky Way shone as a pearly haze above a great river of misty white light. She could almost reach out and touch it. At dawn, she entered the temple to make her offerings and prayers. Then she made her inquiries. Discreetly. She learned that Grandmother T had, of course, left the area weeks ago. Grandmother T. Had left. But on the journey back to the capital, the princess's retinue stopped at a town for supplies. She walked through the market to stretch her legs. There was a woman selling tea at a table. She was middle aged, with just graying hair, a deeply tanned face, wiry body, and sparkling black eyes. The princess had a cup of tea. It was bright gold and tasted like spring. In her mouth. It tasted like holidays, like the sight of a beloved ship coming back into port. Like hope and adventure and a call to courage. The tea seller looked into her eyes. The princess's maids and guards stood nearby. But the question in the tea woman's eyes was silent and understood by the princess alone. Do you want to come with me? Those sparkling eyes asked. Yes, the princess mouthed, and her heart repeated. Oh, yes. The tea woman smiled. She was not grandmother t, the princess would later learn. Not the grandmother t she had sought. Instead, she was one of grandmother T's students. For honor visits here, grandmother t occasionally takes on an apprentice. And occasionally one of these apprentices takes on one of their own. This t master was not grandmother t, but she knew some of her tricks. She was fleet and light footed. She took the princess's hand, and even as one of the guards stepped forward, the two women vanished with a puff of wind, a glitter of light. And now, your majesty, we are nearly at the end of the story. I know that you have waited long for this moment. Longer than I've been alive. The princess roamed the world with her teacher, learning and seeing, thinking and doing. And when teacher and student at last parted ways, the princess continued to roam on her own. Finally, 20 years later, she turned her steps toward home. Her father was still alive. She had learned old, older than anyone could reasonably expect. The rare herbs and elixirs he took had an effect, after all. But they could not ward off time forever, nor guarantee health. She'd heard that he'd suffered a seizure, an occlusion in the brain. He could no longer walk or talk, could barely move. She turned toward home, bearing her father gifts. She sold tea as she traveled, and her fame as a tea master preceded her. Her father's men met her at the city gates. Some in the palace could still recognize her. And so she was admitted into the emperor's presence, his innermost chamber, the only one of his children to return. And so I am here, your majesty, with tea to ease your discomfort and pain, to hopefully soothe your last days. I am sorry that this brew can do no more. It cannot heal, cannot restore speech or movement or time. It cannot reverse the damage in your body or give you back youth. Grandmother tea herself could not do that with the ingredients she had on hand when she first appeared. And that's the question you want to ask, though, isn't it? With the ingredients she had on hand. You want to know if I brought back something more? If I found that ingredient you seek? If I succeeded where my brothers did not. You want to know if I found that missing thing? Dew from lotus blooms or a star from the sky? A teardrop from a moon goddess? Or water from the springs of a starborn aisle? Your Majesty, you never trusted your admirals to bring back immortal water if they were ever to find it. And yet you believed my brothers would do so. Respectfully, why? Why would you trust anyone, even the most dutiful son, to return to you with such treasure? You never thought they might keep it for themselves? You never thought that given ships and crew and supplies, at least one might seize the chance to be free. But I am your daughter, and I have returned. I have roamed the world and crossed into countries unmapped without your funding or aid. I've traveled through mountains and deserts, forest and jungle and plains. I've sailed the rivers and lakes of this country and set sail over the sea. And I found it. I have some now in this flask. Water to brew Immortality tea. Enough for a single cup. I came back because I need tea leaves to finish the drink. A single dewdrop gave Moon Heron eternal life. But I don't want to spend eternity on the Moon. Nor do I want to stay on an immortality isle, forever removed from human affairs. I want the choice to stay in the mortal world. To move between worlds, like the First Emperor himself. So I need to brew mortal tea leaves. Leaves grown from plants firmly rooted in this earth. I need the tea leaves the First Emperor once grew. And here I am, lucky, for one of your schemes has worked after all. That special tea grove you planted after I left, the one on that shaded hill. The man who convinced you of the scheme was correct. Those plants are indeed grown from cuttings, descended from the First Emperor's grove. Brewed with ordinary water, they make mostly ordinary tea. Yet I hear the taste is exquisite. I picked some this morning and pan roasted them within the hour. Now it comes, you, Majesty. I have the water heating in this pot. I'll steep the First Emperor's leaves. The question is, should I drink it? Should I break the world as a Dew Maiden once broke it long ago? I've always loved the tale of Moon Heron. You've hated her, blamed her for everything wrong in her world. But I love that she stole a dew drop. I love that she took what wasn't hers. She was a dutiful maiden, raised all her life for obedience. And she took what wasn't hers. What was claimed by the First Emperor for himself alone. Impulse. Rebellion. An irresistible moment of greed. A thoughtless impulse of Joy. We don't know what it truly was, why she did it.

[Narrator of 'An Encounter at the Dawn of the Time War']

But I love her.

[McDonald's Advertiser]

And there is a tale told to me by my old teacher, who heard it from her teacher, who heard it from Grandmother T herself. And this story says that it was all faded. That Moon Heron was always meant to do what she did. That the First Age was meant to be broken, the dome of paradise cracked. Humans were not meant to live for as long as they once did. Fall and winter are our inheritance, too. In this story, the First Emperor knew what would happen. He bears Moon Heron no anger. And though he left our world, there are days that he visits Moon Heron and her lover on the moon. And they all sit down for a cup of tea. Your Majesty, I ask you now, even though you cannot reply, do you think I should do it? Shall I drink this tea and claim immortality for myself? Break the world again and remake it from the shattered bits? In place of the First Emperor, I would set myself up as an Empress. I'll declare a new age and accept all that it brings. Or perhaps I should take this brew now and go to the harbor and pour it into the sea. Perhaps I should go to a high mountain and fling it up at the stars. Maybe I should let it simply sit out for the night air to take. Let the tea evaporate and then rain down from the sky on us all. Perhaps I should share this tea with the world, as Moon Heron shared what was left in her vial of dew. As her daughter and her daughter's students, as my old teacher, share freely what they have. Should I do that instead? What new stars might be born? Your Majesty, I've come back to you. The daughter you ignored. The one who was never expected to travel out in the world to do anything to achieve anything of her own. I came back to see your face as I speak these words. Your Majesty. Father, My tea is now ready. Father. Father, what do you think I'll do next?

[Janina Edwards]

That was Lotus Dew for the Emperor's Tea. By Vanessa Fogg Narrated by SZ Chen Vanessa Fogg dreams of selkies, dragons and gritty cyberpunk futures. From her home in Western Michigan, she spent years as a research scientist in molecular cell biology and now works as a freelance medical writer. Her writing has appeared in Lightspeed Podcastle, the Deadlands, Giganotosaurus, Neil Clark's the Best Science Fiction of the Year, Volume 4, and the Bram Stoker Award nominated anthology, Unquiet Essays by Asian Women in Horror. Her debut collection, the House of Illusionists, is now out from Interstellar Flight Press. Her fantasy novelette the Lilies of Dawn is available from Anna Lunda Books. For a complete bibliography and more, visit her website@vanessa fogg.com Sut Chen is an actor passionate about stories that show the beauty and complexity of the immigrant, queer and Asian experience. They are a classically trained violinist and violist, native Mandarin speaker and has an extensive science background ranging from robotics to AI on camera highlights include roles on she Hulk, Guardians of Galaxy, Holiday Special and Wolf Pack. On stage highlights include Off Broadway performances at Daryl Roth Theaters and the Public

[Narrator of 'An Encounter at the Dawn of the Time War']

Theater,

[Realms of Peril and Glory Advertiser]

Legendary stories, awe inspiring sound and endless adventure. Welcome to the Realms of Peril and Glory. Explore the mechanically magical vistas of Vale, the paranormal mysteries of liminal London and the cyberpunk chaos of Cyborg. Fall in love with our core cast or be awed by our incredible guests from familiar shows like Oxventure, three, Black Halflings and no Rolls Bard. Ignite your imagination and discover the realms of Peril and Glory today. Go to realmspod.com or search realms of Peril and Glory wherever you listen to podcasts two 1.

[McDonald's Advertiser]

You win.

[Glass Cannon Podcast Advertiser]

The war is over and both sides lost. Kingdoms were reduced to cinders and armies scattered like bones in the dust. Now the survivors claw to what's left of a broken world, praying the darkness chooses someone else tonight. But in the shadowdark, the darkness always wins. This is old school adventuring at its most cruel. Your torch ticks down in real time and when that flame dies, something else rises to finish the job. This is a brutal rules light nightmare with a story that emerges organically based on the decisions that the characters make. This is what it felt like to play RPGs in the 80s and man, it is so good to be back. Join the Glass Cannon podcast as we plunge into the Shadow Dark every Thursday night at 8pm Eastern on YouTube.com theglasscannon with the podcast version dropping the next day. See what everybody's talking about and join us in the dark.

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The world of Sonic the Hedgehog has been thrust into a not so dark, not so stormy hard boiled detective story that probably nobody saw coming. Follow Sonic and the intrepid Chaotic Detective Agency as they take on their biggest case yet. This high flying, action packed adventure will take them across the world fighting for every clue they can find. It's one heck of a tale, which is good because this story might be the only thing that can save their lives.

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[Janina Edwards]

Wait, what

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

all will be revealed in Sonic the Hedgehog Presents the Chaotix Case files. Listen now wherever you get your podcasts,

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the chaotics are on the case.

[Janina Edwards]

Lightspeed Magazine is edited by John Joseph Adams and published by Adamant Press. The podcast is co produced by Stephan Rudnicki and Allison Belle Buse at Skyboat Media and the stories and podcast are copyright 2026. Post production was by Alex Barton at Phase Shift and our music was composed and performed by Jack Kincaid. Thanks for listening, Starshine. This is your host, Janina Edwards, reminding you that everywhere you look, you'll find what you're looking for.