E-Book, Englisch, 384 Seiten
E-Book, Englisch, 384 Seiten
Reihe: Laksa Anthology Series: Speculative Fiction
ISBN: 978-1-988140-00-1
Verlag: Laksa Media Groups Inc.
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)
Nominated - 2018 (Canadian SF&F) Aurora Award Shortlist (anthology/Best Related Work)
2018 Alberta Book Publishing Award Shortlist (Best Speculative Fiction) Finalist
One story selected for Best of British Science Fiction 2017 (ed. by Donna Scott)
One story selected for Best Indie Speculative Fiction, Vol. 1 (Bards & Sages Publishing)
Five stories on Tangent Online Recommended Reading List 2017
One story nominated - 2018 (Canadian SF&F) Aurora Award Short Fiction Finalist
One story - 2018 WSFA Small Press Award Finalist
One story nominated - 2018 Sunburst Award for Excellence in Canadian Literature of the Fantastic Short Fiction Shortlist
Three stories - 2018 Sunburst Award for Excellence in Canadian Literature of the Fantastic Short Fiction Longlist
How can a henchman keep up with a mischievous retired supervillain? Can a dog help a hockey player score again? Will an odd couple with a zany sense of adventure and diminished capabilities survive an earthquake? Where does a stray cat go to find love every night? What secret does a pious monk have with a cargo of sleeping human? Will terrorism in space take out a young apprentice and a blind welder? What does an oracle tell a lover about her final days? Can a 'heart of gold' prevent a soldier from crossing the enemy line with the governor's children? These, and many more.
Featuring Original Stories by Colleen Anderson, Charlotte Ashley, Brenda Cooper, Ian Creasey, A.M. Dellamonica, Bev Geddes, Claire Humphrey, Sandra Kasturi, Tyler Keevil, Juliet Marillier, Matt Moore, Heather Osborne, Nisi Shawl, Alex Shvartsman, Karina Sumner-Smith, Kate Story, Amanda Sun, Hayden Trenholm, James Van Pelt, Liz Westbrook-Trenholm, Edward Willett, Christie Yant & Caroline M. Yoachim
With Introduction by Dominik Parisien
Edited by Susan Forest and Lucas K. Law
Anthologies in this series (Strangers Among Us, The Sum of Us, Where the Stars Rise) have been recommended by Publishers Weekly, Booklist (American Library Association), Kirkus Reviews, Library Journal, School Library Journal, Locus, Foreword Reviews, and Quill & Quire.
REVIEWS for THE SUM OF US
'A strong collection . . . make it worth reading.' -Publishers Weekly
'Definitely consider buying a copy, if not for yourself, then for someone who is serving as a caretaker. At the very least, it should make us all appreciate caretakers for all they do.' -Lightspeed Magazine
'Thought provoking page-turners.' -Tangent
'These stories take a broad exploration of what care can mean . . .' -Speculating Canada (Derek Newman-Stille)
Autoren/Hrsg.
Weitere Infos & Material
the dunschemin retirement home for repentant supervillains
Ian Creasey Here we go again. Mornings in the Home always began the same way. No matter what time Stafford reached Anarcho’s room, Anarcho was invariably awake, waiting for Stafford to open the chintz curtains. But he never reprimanded Stafford for being late or wasting time. In the old days, Anarcho had been as impatient as all supervillains, ever eager to pursue some cunning scheme. Now there was no rushing and shouting and clanking; no messy experiments left bubbling overnight; no lairs to build or dungeons to dust. Today’s tasks were more homely. Stafford pulled back the duvet to reveal Anarcho’s shrunken frame, tinged green from over-exposure to tachyons. First came the bathroom routine: toilet, sponge wipe, shave, and so forth. Then the mechanical maintenance: eye lube, claw sharpen and polish, exobrain defrag and reboot. These prosthetics were all obsolete. Anarcho was the Home’s oldest resident, his life convoluted by time travel. “Attention all residents,” the intercom blared. “Please report for roll call in the lounge. This is not a drill; the perimeter alarm has sounded. Urgent roll call!” “Sounds like mischief,” Stafford said. “I presume it’s not yours.” He didn’t expect an answer. For form’s sake, he checked the control panel on Anarcho’s wheelchair but saw nothing. It had been years since Anarcho’s last caper. Stafford couldn’t decide whether he missed the old days. Back then, life had felt too frenetic, with a never-ending list of chores; every new plot always needed its own elaborate control room, destruct mechanism, and escape tunnel. Yet he’d enjoyed the craftsmanship of building vast laboratories and sinister machines. Now the chores were mundane: the new enemy was incontinence. Had all those intrigues been for naught? “Let’s get you down there,” he said. He settled Anarcho into the motorized wheelchair and draped a tartan blanket over his knees. The blanket lacked even the most basic hidden enhancements: no blast-proof shielding, no explosive tassels, not even a hypnotic fractal pattern on the reverse. It was merely 100% wool, soft and warm. The Home bustled with activity as the residents and their carers converged on the lounge. Stafford ducked aside as Madame Mayhem and Miss Rule zoomed past on their hoverchairs, racing each other along the corridors. Proceeding more sedately, Stafford and Anarcho were the last to arrive. “Hurry up!” roared Betty Beast. “I’m missing breakfast for this.” “Oh, I’ll get us some breakfast,” said Doctor Havoc. With a well-practiced dramatic gesture, he conjured puffs of blue smoke from his hand. The clouds of nanites drifted through the kitchen doorway, returning with toast and mushrooms. One blue globule collided with a hoverchair and tried to drag it back, to Madame Mayhem’s furious protests. She retaliated by stealing slices of toast before the smoke took them to Doctor Havoc. In the tussle, stray mushrooms fell to the floor, where three of Legion’s tiny scuttling avatars scooped them up. “Hush!” cried Matron. “Stop playing with your food.” A tall, spindly woman dressed in an old-style black-and-white nurse’s uniform, Matron seemed to glare at everyone simultaneously. “Please answer the roll call, and I’d better not hear any cackling. Phipps will physically check that everyone’s here. No decoy holograms!” Stafford said, “What do you reckon, Anarcho—is it an escape or a kidnap?” Some supervillains couldn’t bear retirement and returned to the metropolis like grizzled rock stars craving one last comeback. Matron called out, “Narinder Atwal.” “Here,” said Doctor Havoc. “And hungry!” Phipps, Matron’s diminutive assistant, touched Doctor Havoc’s shoulder to verify his existence. Coincidentally—or not—a blue puff of smoke swirled into Phipps’ face and made him sneeze. “Sophie Béranger.” Matron only ever used civilian names; she insisted that every retired supervillain must abandon their alias along with their antics. While no-one openly defied her, many surreptitiously clung onto their monikers and misbehaviour. “Here,” replied Madame Mayhem, her fingers idly stroking a memorial necklace of fangs from Fidosaurus, her deceased pet dinosaur. The roll call continued until it reached, “Russell Fletcher.” Stafford waited a few seconds, then pinged Anarcho’s exobrain. “I’m here, wherever this is,” Anarcho said, his voice low and hoarse. “It ain’t heaven, that’s for sure,” said Doctor Havoc. “Come sit on my hoverchair, and I’ll show you heaven,” Madame Mayhem purred. The supervillains dissolved into giggles until Matron raised her voice to resume the roll call, which ended with no absentees—or none detected. “That’s reassuring,” said Matron, addressing the group. “But what set off the alarm? I’ve checked the video, and most of the outside cameras are obscured. It’s remarkable how fast the ivy grows in our grounds. Quite remarkable indeed.” She stared at the motley reprobates. “If anyone knows anything, please enlighten us.” “I know why galaxies collide,” said AlphaMega, his bass voice augmented with infrasonic rumble. “Yeah, your huge ego turned into a black hole and sucked them in,” retorted Madame Mayhem. “If you can’t be helpful, be quiet,” Matron said. “I’ve warned the authorities about the perimeter breach. If anything happens outside and it’s traced back here, there’ll be consequences.” She paused for emphasis. “This is the Dunschemin Retirement Home for Repentant Supervillains. I may overlook your little pranks when they’re confined within these grounds. But I will not tolerate the slightest nuisance to the public. Any culprits will be expelled from the Home and transferred to the Lockdown Penitentiary, where I can assure you they don’t bake monster-shaped cookies for afternoon tea.” Her gaze pinned each one of them, in turn. “While you have breakfast, we’ll sweep the grounds and clear the ivy from the cameras. Until we know what’s happening, I want you all to stay indoors. No exceptions.” Stafford smiled, hoping for a peaceful morning with everyone on their best behaviour. Perhaps he could make progress on his writing projects. He’d nearly finished the script for a musical about Anarcho—renamed Anachro in the show, for a veneer of deniability. Yet Stafford also wanted to write his own material, his own stories. Expediting Anarcho’s fame was his job, but it wasn’t—quite—his life. On Anarcho’s wheelchair, a red light began flashing: a relay from the control room hidden below the pond in the Home’s garden. The relay also triggered an emergency Alertness mode in Anarcho’s exobrain. Drat, thought Stafford. No rest for the wicked. He hurriedly grabbed a breakfast tray and steered Anarcho back to his room. Anarcho flailed into life as jolts of electricity galvanized his meatbrain, sparks coming out of his ears. He consulted the wheelchair’s control panel to see what had roused him. “The Time Hole has activated,” Anarcho announced with glee. “Bye bye, Matron. Hello, world domination! Starting with a new timeline for recent decades....” Clearly the Alertness module had already run the Revoke Repentances subroutine and the I’m Back, Baby! nefariousness boost. However, the Same Old Plan loop was still stuck. “Are you sure you want to go back?” Stafford asked. “It didn’t work out so well last time.” Many years ago, Stafford had just built Anarcho’s first lair when the older Anarcho arrived from the future, envisaging himself as the younger version’s mentor. Their meeting was a battle of bristling egos. The young Anarcho denounced the arrival as a senile old failure and rebuffed him with a barrage of explosivators. “I’ll choose a different year,” Anarcho said. “Last time, I arrived when I was young and confident. If I appear after the Nebulon debacle, I should be more receptive.” “But why go back at all?” Stafford asked. “You’ve already given it your best shot. Maybe you should stay here and take it easy. Your musical can be notorious on your behalf.” It was hard to finalize the script if Anarcho resumed scheming; conquering the world would mean a major rewrite, or at least an extra song. “I need to visit the Regeneration Chamber before it gets destroyed ten years ago.” Anarcho flapped a feeble arm and scowled at its steel claw. “This body is old and worn out. It’s letting me down. And I don’t like things that let me down—” Stafford deftly interrupted the rant. “We can’t go yet: Matron asked everyone to stay indoors while they investigate the perimeter breach.” He frowned. “Why would the Time Hole activate on the same day the alarm sounded?” “It means there might be an extra passenger,” said Anarcho, with an Enigmatic Mode smirk. “If there is, make sure he goes alone—no interference. Just be ready to leave soon, when everything’s quieter. While we wait, I’ll download Wikipedia and whatnot, so I can take the latest science back.” Stafford shook his head at the sudden outpouring of meaningless drivel. Another stuck subroutine, no doubt. He walked behind the chair as Anarcho took control and drove to the computer room, where other staff could watch him for a...
