Excerpts From Nonexistent Books

The dark figure sidled up next to Russ at the bar. “I understand you’re a man who knows about the Sizzle.”

Russ sipped at his drink. “Everybody knows about the Sizzle; what they read in storybooks and see in cartoons.”

The figure pressed the subject, motioning to the bartender to freshen Russ’s drink. “But you know more about ghosts. You’ve seen the Sizzle, communicated with the Sizzle, even banished the Sizzle.”

“Not anymore,” Russ said, taking another sip. “Not for a long time. Why do you want to know?”

The figure let their dark cloak slip off. “Because I am the Sizzle, and I need to know what this means.”

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The dark figure sidled up next to Russ at the bar. “I understand you’re a man who knows about ghosts.”

Russ sipped at his drink. “Everybody knows about ghosts; what they read in storybooks and see in cartoons.”

The figure pressed the subject, motioning to the bartender to freshen Russ’s drink. “But you know more about ghosts. You’ve seen ghosts, communicated with ghosts, even banished ghosts.”

“Not anymore,” Russ said, taking another sip. “Not for a long time. Why do you want to know?”

The figure let their dark cloak slip off. “Because I am a ghost, and I need to know what this means.”

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The waiter approached the table, bearing a single gilded toothpick upon a silk napkin. Vandercarn picked it up and delicately prodded at his teeth.

“May…may I have a toothpick as well?” said Stubbs.

“Ha! Dear Stubbs, this toothpick is an electrum-gilded miracle, one of a kind, and it’s in my mouth besides. Do you really want it that badly?”

Stubbs sucked audibly on his teeth. “I’d settle for a wooden one.”

“Oh, there are no wooden toothpicks here,” Vandercarn laughed. “A thing you only use once! How wasteful. No, you may use your fork once our business is done and not a moment before, are we clear?”

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“Is that…?”

Toriop’s hands tightened in their gloves on either side of the isolation chamber. “Yes. The last of the invader’s eggs.”

“If that were ever to hatch, it-”

“It won’t, at least not under these conditions. A species is not to be exterminated lightly.”

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In most Elevener circles, any depiction of any part of any living body is forbidden. Personal mirrors are allowed, but no illustrations or objects may contain or depict any part of a living body, in whole or in part. This includes animals, plants, single-celled organisms, and even viruses (thanks to a ruling by an Eleven high circle that anything that might be alive is considered alive).

This has an effect on the use of illustrations for educational purposes and signage. Conservative Eleveners insist that the prohibition is universal, and that technical publications must omit any living beings, often depicting items being suspended in midair or in the middle of an oval blob, roughly human sized but not human shaped. More liberal Eleveners make exceptions for technical and medical manuals but require them to be produced elsewhere and only handled in emergencies and specific training situations, followed by symbolic ablutions to purge the ritual impurity.

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“If water spell and earth spell, why not sky spell?” the student said.

“There is not sufficient mass in air,” replied the professor. “It would require too much magical power, too much effort.”

“I beg to differ,” the student said, floating up off the floor like a soap bubble and drifting out the window.

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The first memetic virus ever discovered was the so-called “intrusive amethyst” noticed by Sir Walter Goodall. Goodall, a don at Oxbridge in comparative literature, had been comparing two early editions of Tennyson for errata when he noted that one of the poems had the phrase “a brilliant amethyst” on pg. 244 of the newer edition. Puzzled, Goodall made a note of it and retired for the night. In the morning, he returned and resumed his studies, only to note that the phrase “a brilliant amethyst” was now in the older book as well, apparently since they had been left touching.

Goodall soon established by experimentation that any book or other written work were left in contact with an “infected” manuscript, the phrase “a brilliant amethyst” would subsequently appear within it. Goodall himself took care in his studies, but a mistake by one of his assistants led to the entire library being contaminated, at which point Goodall kept one book in a sealed glass book and burned the rest. At least one other book must have survived, however, because the problem spread to several other major libraries in the next ten years.

A subsequent researcher, Henry Danton, attempted further experiments with an Austen omnibus contaminated by “a brilliant amethyst.” He slept with the book as a pillow, which resulted in the phrase and a mental image becoming a persistent intrusive thought for the rest of his life, eventually driving him to suicide.

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“I can’t go back in there. I can’t. I won’t.” Jimmy was hyperventilating even as she spoke.

“What’s the matter?” said Roger. “Was Great Uncle Frank being racist again?”

“No, it’s…it’s…”

“Cousin Mary trying to sell you NFTs?”

“It’s that ghastly fig bisque your mother made,” Jimmy wailed. “It’s the worst thing I’ve ever tasted, and I can’t be in the same room as it.”

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Detective Slim Diamond passed the statuette of the Rhodes Owl over to the policeman. Once considered to be a magical talisman capable of putting even the greatest insomniac to sleep, it had rested by the bedside of knights and kings for centuries.

“What’s this?” the cop said.

“The stuff that dreams are made of,” quipped Slim.

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“See, that’s where you’re wrong. You’re thinking of a maze, which has multiple paths and is intended to confuse and disorient.”

“Uh-huh.”

“This is a labyrinth, meaning that it’s convoluted but there is only one path. Following it is meant to be an ordeal and a test of faith.”

“Uh-huh. So how much longer do we have to go?”

“There’s no way to be sure.”

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