When the pendulum of civil rights and social change initiatives swings toward progress, the LGBTQIA community often holds its collective breath in anticipation of the inevitable backlash when the pendulum swings back. Even with these gains, we are constantly looking over our shoulder—waiting for the next shoe to drop, for the next attack on our personhood. The community’s enemies see progress as a perceived danger to their own heteronormative bubbles—and any advancement threatens to burst those fragile bubbles. Even as we hoist the rainbow flag in celebration, a dark rainbow rises on the horizon…

For this third volume of the award-winning Unspeakable Horror series, we are seeking original short stories up to 6,000 words that explore this idea of great terror growing from the LGBTQIA community’s great strides forward. We want your terrifying interpretations and extensions of this theme—not a literal reading.

Questions to explore:

Does the unspeakable horror manifest in a subtle, growing sense of unease that our enemies must surely be plotting to thwart our efforts—or does it present in outward paranoia?
Do we settle into a false sense of security and not see the unspeakable terror that rises behind us?
Do we turn on each other now that our external enemies are (seemingly) defeated?
Do we leave part of our community behind in some misguided act of self-preservation?