This article explores how contemporary Arabic speculative fiction, particularly after the Arab Spring, addresses ecological concerns and conceptions of futurity. Focusing on Ahmed Naji’s Istikhdām al-ḥayāh (Using Life), it examines the text’s portrayal of hegemonic techno-futurist visions akin to Gulf futurism and its resistance through an assemblage aesthetics. This approach, central to the novel’s counter-futures, redefines the human relationship to urban ecologies and literature by emphasizing embodiment.