Excerpts From Nonexistent Books

The first complaints started trickling in at around 7:00 am: soda pop machines on campus had suddenly stopped accepting cash and student meal plan dollars. This was ignored as a minor inconvenience, though university employees found it somewhat odd that their calls to the machines’ manufacturer wouldn’t go through.

By 7:30, though, the trickle had turned into a river. Students waking up for class had found that their student meal plan dollars were not accepted, and that the registers would not recognize employees’ card swipes for payment in cash. Around this time, too, the IT department started receiving sporadic complaints of a network outage–unusually, all complaints were delivered in person, as people complained that IT’s phones were not accepting incoming calls.

Around 8:15, the local cell phone network collapsed under the strain of thousands of students, staff, and professors using their data plans to try and bypass the internet and telephone outage. Local merchants facing a flood of hungry students unable to purchase food even at campus retail outlets soon found that they were suffering from the same problem: their registers would not accept most transactions and refused logins. Only the smallest mom-and-pop establishments with completely manual cash registers were able to conduct any business, and even then only in cash.

Overwhelmed, the university was forced to cancel classes. The issue clearly caught the administration flatfooted, and by the time they authorized IOUs for food students had fled campus en masse for surrounding towns and several angry groups had raided stores while university employees looked on passively.

At fault? The school’s much-vaunted digital overhaul. Everything from soda pop machines to cash registers was connected to the internet and used remote servers managed by contractors to authenticate and track purchases (even those made in cash) and logon authorized users. No provisions had been made for a campuswide network outage, because such a thing was considered an extremely remote possibility.

So when a backhoe ran over the main fiber-optic pipeline outside of town, it had the unusual effect of completely disabling a system that had wormed its way into every aspect of the university community. That incident only lasted a day, though the company responsible never faced any charges.

But others had been watching and paying close attention to the situation. Next time would be far, far worse.

• Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!

EvilCo Annual Employee Evaluation Form

Employee Name: Chris [redacted]
Job Title: Henchman 1
Reviewer: Lord Deathness, Vice-President for Henchmen and Lackeys

General Quality of Work:
Chris [redacted] has performed poorly during the survey period and has not met the standards expected of an EvilCo employee in the Henchman 1 position.

Dependability:
Mr. [redacted] has proven to be extremely unreliable. His unit of henchmen were ordered to lay down their lives to delay the Alpha Squad on no less than four separate occasions, and Chris [redacted] has always managed to return alive rather than being born gloriously anew in the EvilCo cloning tanks.

Job Knowledge:
While Chris [redacted] possesses the necessary proficiency in laser weaponry to fire madly at the dastardly Alpha Squad, he refuses to obey the marksmanship principles outlined in the handbook and actually fires his weapon aimed from the shoulder rather than the hip. I have also caught him attempting to blow up Alpha Squad jets in such a way that the pilot cannot parachute to safety, an unforgivable lapse in judgement.

Communication Skills:
Chris [redacted] is unconscionable in questioning the directives of his EvilCo betters. He routinely asserts that our Grand Leader’s plans for global domination are too convoluted to succeed, and is unusually concerned with our revenue stream and how we can afford to throw vast sums of men and treasure at the Grand Leader’s most flamboyant whims.

Achievement of Goals:
None of the goals set out for Chris [redacted] have been met this year. He has consistently failed to obey without question, lay down his life, and play by the long-established rules governing the conflict between EvilCo and Alpha Squad. I’ve even caught him making plans for new and “more successful” evil plots using nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons (or the threat thereof).

Overall:
I am forced to recommend that Chris [redacted] be removed from his Henchman 1 position as soon as is feasible. In accordance with EvilCo’s severance package, he will be given three months’ salary and his brain will be implanted in a Mecha-Horror.

• Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!

“When Vicente Mejia died, you inherited his job. You also inherited his deals.” Eldridge Hensley lit a cigarette with the stump of the old, flicking the butt into the dry bed of Sucker Creek. “We paid Mejia to let us land a few planes full of White Widow from Ontario at the airport while your outfit is tearing it down.”

Francisco Garza, supervisor for Norris Construction after the untimely death of that bastard Mejia in an automobile accident, was stone-featured. “For the same price?” he said.

Hensley laughed. “That money’s already been spent. You’re going to do it for free.”

“Considering what will happen if I get sent up the river for that,” Garza said evenly, “you’re going to have to do better than that. Mejia was an asshole and I owe you nothing.”

Hensley toyed with his cigarette. “I’m a big fish in a small pond, Garza,” he said. “I know things. I make it my business. It’s the only way to keep things smooth when some Johnny Law or John Q. Public decides to interfere with my livelihood.”

Garza was silent, expressionless.

“It might be one of my boys found some brake parts going through one of those Norris Construction bins that that two-bit county airport you’re tearing up, looking for scrap,” Hensley drawled. “How was it that Mejia died? Brake failure, wasn’t it?”

“Is that supposed to scare me?” said Garza.

“My boy was wearing gloves, too,” continued Hensley. “It’d be an awful shame if the law dusted them brake parts for prints.”

Turning away, Garza put his back to Hensley.

“Here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to let my bird land until the runway’s torn up, and do a damn slow job of that, and you’re going to use your Norris Construction company car to help me move my product. And if you don’t…well, them’s the brakes.” Hensley chuckled softly at his own joke.

The small-time drug lord’s laughter stopped quickly when Garza pressed an old electric cattle prod to Hensley’s ribs and fired it. Sucker Creek was a corruption of the old French Soucher, but in this case it was awfully accurate. There was a shallow grave dug in the fields further back from the road–Garza had come too far, sacrificed too much, to let anything stand in his way.

• Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!

L wkrxjkw lw ehvw wr frqfhdo pb zulwlqjv iurp brx, pb gduolqj. Eb wkh wlph brx uhdg wklv, lw zloo eh wrr odwh wr fkdqjh dqbwklqj wkdw kdv wudqvsluhg. L’p vruub li lw vhhpv gliilfxow wr xqghuvwdqg lq uhwurvshfw, exw brx pxvw nqrz wkdw pb uhdvrqv iru grlqj zkdw kdg wr eh grqh zhuh vrxqg. Uhphpehu ph qrw dv wkh suhvhqw exw wkh sdvw; lw zloo eh ehwwhu wkdw zdb.

Dqg l lpsoruh brx, gr qrw xqvhdo wkh zdoohg-rii flvwhuq xqghu wkh krxvh, ru doo wkdw kdv ehhq grqh zloo xowlpdwhob eh iru qdxjkw.

• Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!

I wonder, sometimes, about that little disclaimer you see everywhere in ads for herbal, homeopathic, and other quack medicines: “This statement has not been evaluated by the FDA. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.”

One wonders what the FDA is for, if not to evaluate statements about how quack products can have positive effects beyond a placebo effect. After all, there’s a pretty significant harm if people buy a $20 bottle of snake oil.

But I suppose moreso than that I worry about the sort of person that buys such a product. If all it takes for us to believe that a product works is a spinning computer-animated DNA molecule in a slick TV ad, maybe the FDA doesn’t investigate those claims because there aren’t enough hours in the day.

• Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!

Do you think you may have been the victim of a homicide?

Did you wake up recently in a morgue or crematorium?

Was that accident you walked away from definitely not survivable?

These and more are warning signs of zombification. Despite evidence to the contrary, our state teaches an abstinence-only form of zombie education, and that leaves many people having their first experience with zombification vulnerable and frightened.

Do you think you may have been zombified? Are you scared? Call 1-800-ZOM-BIES to reach a hotline staffed by caring operators who can help you find a local clinic and get a Z-section right away. Don’t be scared – there’s help.

This advertisement paid for by Planned Zombihood, the Anti-Zombification League, and the American Zombie Liberties Union.

• Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!

Among the clockwork tinkerers and inventors of Steamspout Row, the best-known for many years was Stindt Mecias of the Stindt gens but long distanced from that noble and corrupt lineage of ministers of the Imperial chancery. The name still opened many doors for the young Mecias that would not otherwise have been so, and he was able to obtain a much-coveted technical education and set up a workshop in the most affluent part of Steamspout.

In the old Chancery Era, weak figurehead Emperors and Empresses, often children, were on the throne while the real power rested with their ministers who fought endlessly for power. Their byzantine machinations meant an overall breakdown of tradition and weakening of Imperial governance, even in the great capital city. Mecian’s contraptions, which harnessed various radiant spiritual energies to do useful work, would have been branded heresy in an earlier (or later) era and earned him a quick death in purifying flame. But there was no interference from above, and his mechanisms became something of a fashion among the capital’s aristocratic elite.

Even so, Mecian rarely took commissions and even then grievously overcharged for them, as they were only a means to keep himself funded for his ultimate project, one which took an increasing share of his time and his efforts. Orders for bizarre parts, metals with no known alloys, medical cadavers with specific diseases or that had died in specific ways, and even items from abroad shipped in sealed cases labeled “death penalty for unauthorized opening.” Twenty years after the fact, the first strong emperor in many years attempted a full audit of Mecian’s doings, but eventually had to throw up his hands in frustration.

All that the Imperial investigators could establish was that Mecian’s device ultimately included the complete radiant spiritual energies of at least one living person, kidnapped off the streets and sacrificed for the purpose.

None are even sure what the device looked like. It has long been assumed that the engraved sphere found in Mecian’s quarters was the ultimate product of his obsession, but it remained inert and resistant to the efforts of investigators to the end of the Imperial dynasty. Mecian himself could not be questioned, as he had disappeared in a massive, explosive conflagration that had consumed the top floor of his apartments.

Over a hundred bodies were recovered afterward, but the erstwhile tinkerer was not among them.

• Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!

“Harrington, I need you to tell me the truth. Did you actually perform the safety inspection?” Jacobson, late of the Lodestar Line transatlantic passenger and shipping service, regarded his close friend with an air of resignation.

“Well, Jacobson, the fact of the matter is…no. I forged the safety inspection certificates and pocketed the money.” Harrington did not sound terribly broken up about this; in fact, his tone was positively, and perversely, cheery.

“Really? Those were forgeries? I suppose that’s to be expected given our circumstance, Harrington, but they were quite well done,” Jacobson laughed. What more could he do, when confronted with such a gleeful admission of guilt?

“Thank you. I’ve found I have quite the gift for forgeries; I have been forging things as your chief safety inspector and pocketing the money for years now,” Harrington said. That explained his positivity, at least: he’d doubtless been on eggshells for years that his friend would find out their relationship was built on lies and thievery.

“If we make it though this, I’ll have to set you to work forging a divorce certificate for me,” Jacobson said.

He cast his eye out on the wreckage that surrounded them, the flotsam of the foundered luxury liner SS Croesus. Then he looked at the solitary lifeboat that remained, watching water seep inside over and around the official inspection tag.

• Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!

Why choose the Savage Pie Hole for all your tender flaky filled crust needs?

– Over 500 years’ Savage family pie-making experience, dating to Second Era Minosha before electrification!

– Free Pie-Fi allows you to stream pies in glorious high definition, including our signature holocaust berry pie, always a hit with dwarves and orcs.

– Ask about our Pie Phones, enchanted pies that allow you to communicate across great distances by eating a slice! Monthly and pay-as-you-go plans available.

• Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!

For the first six months after Oliver Twist was removed, the system was in full operation. It was rather expensive at first, in consequence of the increase in the undertaker’s bill, and the necessity of taking in the clothes of all the paupers, which fluttered loosely on their wasted, shrunken forms, after a week or two’s gruel. But the number of workhouse inmates got thin as well as the paupers; and the board were in ecstasies.

The room in which the boys were fed, was a large stone hall, with a copper at one end: out of which the master, dressed in an apron for the purpose, and assisted by one or two women, ladled the gruel at mealtimes. Of this festive composition each boy had one porringer, and no more—except on occasions of great public rejoicing, when he had two ounces and a quarter of bread besides.

The bowls never wanted washing. The boys polished them with their spoons till they shone again; and when they had performed this operation (which never took very long, the spoons being nearly as large as the bowls), they would sit staring at the copper, with such eager eyes, as if they could have devoured the very bricks of which it was composed; employing themselves, meanwhile, in sucking their fingers most assiduously, with the view of catching up any stray splashes of gruel that might have been cast thereon. Boys have generally excellent appetites. Oliver Twist and his companions suffered the tortures of slow starvation for three months: at last they got so voracious and wild with hunger, that one boy, who was tall for his age, and hadn’t been used to that sort of thing (for his father had kept a small cook-shop), hinted darkly to his companions, that unless he had another basin of gruel per diem, he was afraid he might some night happen to eat the boy who slept next him, who happened to be a weakly youth of tender age. He had a wild, hungry eye; and they implicitly believed him. A council was held; lots were cast who should walk up to the master after supper that evening, and ask for more; and it fell to Oliver Twist.

The evening arrived; the boys took their places. The master, in his cook’s uniform, stationed himself at the copper; his pauper assistants ranged themselves behind him; the gruel was served out; and a long grace was said over the short commons. The gruel disappeared; the boys whispered each other, and winked at Oliver; while his next neighbors nudged him. Child as he was, he was desperate with hunger, and reckless with misery. He rose from the table; and advancing to the master, basin and spoon in hand, said: somewhat alarmed at his own temerity:

“Please, sir, I want some more.”

The master was a fat, healthy man; but he turned very pale. He gazed in stupefied astonishment on the small rebel for some seconds, and then clung for support to the copper. The assistants were paralyzed with wonder; the boys with fear.

“What!” said the master at length, in a faint voice.

“Please, sir,” replied Oliver, “I want some more.”

The master aimed a blow at Oliver’s head with the ladle; pinioned him in his arm; and shrieked aloud for the beadle.

The board were sitting in solemn conclave, when Mr. Bumble rushed into the room in great excitement, and addressing the gentleman in the high chair, said,

“Mr. Limbkins, I beg your pardon, sir! Oliver Twist has asked for more!”

There was a general start. Horror was depicted on every countenance.

“For more!” said Mr. Limbkins. “Compose yourself, Bumble, and answer me distinctly. Do I understand that he asked for more, after he had eaten the supper allotted by the dietary?”

“He did, sir,” replied Bumble.

“That boy will be hung,” said the gentleman in the white waistcoat. “I know that boy will be hung.”

Nobody controverted the prophetic gentleman’s opinion. An animated discussion took place. Oliver was ordered into instant confinement; and a bill was next morning pasted on the outside of the gate, offering a reward of five pounds to anybody who would take Oliver Twist off the hands of the parish. In other words, five pounds and Oliver Twist were offered to any man or woman who wanted an apprentice to any trade, business, or calling.

“I never was more convinced of anything in my life,’ said the gentleman in the white waistcoat, as he knocked at the gate and read the bill next morning: ‘I never was more convinced of anything in my life, than I am that that boy will come to be hung.”

As I purpose to show in the sequel whether the white waistcoated gentleman was right or not, I should perhaps mar the interest of this narrative (supposing it to possess any at all), if I ventured to hint just yet, whether the life of Oliver Twist had this violent termination or no.

• Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!