by Jean Rabe
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Chance Corrigan and the Tick-tock King of the Nile
Foggy Goggles
The Battle of Cumberland Gap
Portrait of a Lady in a Monocle
Foretold
The Echoer
Of A Feather
Scourge of the Spoils
Edison Kinetic Light & Steam Power
The Nubian Queen
Opals from Sydney
The Whisperer
Imperial Changeling
The Transmogrification Ray
ABOUT THE EDITORS
Alva Edison knew her life would never be the same again.
“It can be done. I know it can,” her brother told her again.
“Thomas, I keep telling you, remember Mr. Franklin? The founding father never signed the Declaration because he foolishly stood out in a rainstorm, with a kite of all things. And stringing a key on the end? How foolhardly. Anyone with common sense knows that you do not want to be near any metal in a storm. No surprise that he was electrocuted. It was such a tragedy that could have been averted.”
“But his idea was right,” Thomas insisted. “The power of those thunderbolts can be harnessed as a new energy source.”
She snorted at that. “Thomas, dear, next you’ll be saying that thunderbolts can do all kinds of things, like that kooky Dr. Frankenstein and his outlandish, sacrilegious ideas about life and death. They took him off to the sanitarium and not soon enough, I say. Please stop such talk. I do not want to lose my only brother to some ridiculous notion.”
—From “Edison Kinetic Light & Steam Power” by C.A. Verstraete
Also Available from DAW Books:
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Here are thirteen tales of strong women, armed with weapons they are not afraid to use, as well as fists and feet of fury, from authors such as Tanya Huff, Mickey Zucker Reichert, Jane Lindskold, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, P.R. Frost, and others. These are urban and paranormal stories certain to appeal to all readers of this most popular genre. So sit back and enjoy as these empowered women take on all challenges with weapons, wit, and skill—and pity the poor monsters and bad guys who’ll need rescuing from them!
Timeshares, edited by Jean Rabe and Martin H. Greenberg
Welcome to timesharing like you’ve never experienced before. This is not your chance to acquire some rental property in the Bahamas. The stories you’ll find within these pages are your tickets to real timesharing—taking a vacation through time. Afraid of flying? The high cost of gas got you down? Want to really get away? Step into your local Timeshares agency office, venture through their time travel device, and you can find yourself in exotic, adventurous locations. Of course, you and your fellow vacationers may also find yourselves caught up in all manner of trouble and mysteries—and definitely in danger. With stories by Kevin J. Anderson, Michael A. Stackpole, Greg Cox, Donald J. Bingle, Chris Pierson and Linda Baker, and others.
Cthulhu’s Reign, edited by Darrell Schweitzer
Some of the darkest hints in all of H.P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos relate to what will happen after the Old Ones return and take over the Earth. What happens when the Stars Are Right, the sunken city of R’lyeh rises from beneath the waves, and Cthulhu is unleashed upon the world for the last time? What happens when the other Old Ones, long since banished from our universe, break through and descend from the stars? What would the reign of Cthulhu be like, on a totally transformed planet where mankind is no longer the master? It won’t be simply the end of everything. It will be a time of new horrors and of utter strangeness. It will be a time when humans with a “taint” of unearthly blood in their ancestry may come into their own. It will be a time foreseen only by authors with the kind of finely honed imaginative visions as Ian Watson, Brian Stableford, Will Murray, Gregory Frost, Richard Lupoff, and the others of Cthulhu’s Reign.
Copyright © 2010 by Jean Rabe and Tekno Books.
All Rights Reserved.
DAW Book Collectors No. 1528.
DAW Books is distributed by Penguin Group (USA).
All characters and events in this book are fictitious.
All resemblance to persons living or dead is coincidental.
The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal, and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.
First Printing, November 2010
S.A.
eISBN : 978-1-101-44516-7
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Introduction copyright © 2010 by Jean Rabe.
“Chance Corrigan and the Tick-tock King of the Nile,” copyright © 2010 by Michael A. Stackpole.
“Foggy Goggles,” copyright © 2010 by Donald J. Bingle.
“The Battle of Cumberland Gap,” copyright © 2010 by William C. Dietz
“Portrait of a Lady in a Monocle,” copyright © 2010 by Jody Lynn Nye
“Foretold,” copyright © 2010 by Bradley P. Beaulieu
“The Echoer,” copyright © 2010 by Dean Leggett
“Of A Feather,” copyright © 2010 by Stephen D. Sullivan
“Scourge of the Spoils,” copyright © 2010 by Matthew P. Mayo
“Edison Kinetic Light & Steam Power,” copyright © 2010 by C.A. Verstraete
“The Nubian Queen,” copyright © 2010 by Paul Genesse
“Opals from Sydney,” copyright © 2010 by Mary Louise Eklund
“The Whisperer,” copyright © 2010 by Marc Tassin
“Imperial Changeling,” copyright © 2010 by Skip and Penny Williams
“The Transmogrification Ray,” copyright © 2010 by Robert E. Vardeman
Introduction
Steampunk: It’s what the future would look like, I heard someone say, if it had come along earlier . . . say during the Victorian Era.
Me? I say steampunk is just good science fiction.
Or fantasy, alternate history, Western, etc.
Just so it’s got some steam power and airships and goggles and the like.
I liked it before they labeled the genre “steampunk,” back when I was a kid and picked up Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea in my favorite bookstore. I remember stopping there one late afternoon when my final class of the day ended and poking through the shelves at the back. That’s where the used paperbacks were . . . and that’s what I had the budget for. I was digging through the Westerns (I voraciously read Louis L’Amour at the time), and finding Jules Verne’s offering by accident. Someone had mis-shelved it. Cost me a whopping quarter. Good thing it wasn’t with the science fiction or I might not have noticed it . . . I was seriously into Westerns at the time.
I liked it. Enough so that I picked up a few more Jules Verne books after that . . . which were correctly shelved.
I enjoy the genre even more now, probably because there’s more of it, and because what I’ve been reading has been so very good. Conventions are dedicated to it, with lavish costume competitions. And this anthology is filled with it.
Because some of these tales are on the long side, I’ll keep this introduction short.
Enjoy! I certainly did.
Jean Rabe
Chance Corrigan and the Tick-tock King of the Nile
Michael A. Stackpole
Michael A. Stackpole is an award-winning writer, screenwriter, podcaster, game and computer game designer and graphic novelist.
His most recent novel, At The Queen’s Command, is the first in his Crown Colonies series. He lives in Arizona and, in his spare time, enjoys indoor soccer and dancing. His website is www.stormwolf.com.
It was the first time in a long time that he’d heard his name—his real name—spoken aloud. He hated it. “Never heard of him.”
“Come now, Mr. Corrigan.” The man had come up on Chance’s left side—his blind side—which is what men who thought they were clever tended to do. “I can assure you that my employer has been searching for you for the better part of four years. He was overjoyed to learn you were here in Port Said.”
Chance turned to face the center of the bar’s floor, where a woman danced to squealing pipes. She weaved and undulated, as supple and dangerous as the cobra that would have been charmed by those pipes. Dark, glossy hair, kohl-rimmed eyes full of fire, enough curves to make that rustling belt of coins hang at the perfect angle and flash with every snap of her hips. Luscious lips glistening, those little come-hither motions with her hands, and the seductive rise of eyebrows.
“Mr. Corrigan!” The man moved around to the right, turning his back to the woman. Tall and skinny, wearing a regimental tie despite never having been in the service, he had the arrogance of a minor noble who found commoners revolting. Didn’t mean he was really a blue-blood. Most of the Brits in Egypt acted as if they were the reincarnation of Alexander. More than the attitude, Corrigan hated the straight nose, the fancy clothes, the ridiculous bowler, and the gold pocket-watch the man glanced at.
“Still here?”
“Yes, and I shall remain until you do me the courtesy of listening to me.” He snapped the watch shut. “My employer . . .”
Even though it meant he’d be reduced to just listening to her dance, Chance turned back to the bar and his whisky.
“See here, Mr. Corrigan.” The man grabbed Chance’s right shoulder and pulled.
Chance Corrigan came around fast. He slid from the barstool and grabbed the little man around his throat. The starched collar popped. Muscles bunched as Chance lifted the fancy man from his feet, and tossed him toward a knot of men clustered around a hookah.
Chance growled. “I ain’t Corrigan.” His eye narrowed, then he picked up his drink and shot it.
The liquor burned like the dancer’s eyes. It wasn’t really whisky, just some local grain alcohol tinted amber. How they made it, he didn’t care. That it would kill brain cells seemed like a plus. Chance glanced at the bartender and nodded. The bottle appeared again.
The fancy man stood up. “I had hoped not to have to resort to violence, Mr. Corrigan.” He raised a hand and six men—six very large men with a battalion of scars and a regiment of ugly divided among them—stepped up. “If you insist, Mr. Corrigan, my associates will deal with you.”
Chance pressed his thumb to a nostril and snorted. He cleared the other side similarly. “Just remember, fancy man, I’ll save the worst for you.”
They came for him as a gang, which was just what he wanted. They meant to bury him in angry meat, since killing him wouldn’t get them paid. They were coming in to grapple, and all he meant to do was deal damage.
A fist flattened a nose. He felt the bone break and the first hot gush of blood. His left elbow came up and around, catching the guy on his blind side in the mouth. Jaw broke, teeth scattered. A knee crushed dangly bits, then Chance hit the third guy again, in the breastbone. Ribs cracked.
A roundhouse right caught him in the side of the head, pitching him against the bar. Chance kicked out, cracking a guy in the knee. He grabbed an outstretched hand and twisted it so the thumb pointed at the floor, then the ceiling and floor again. That man spun away, one shoulder lower than the other. Another elbow dropped an expat Australian. Chance’s barstool finished off a big-nosed Frenchman.
Chance slid his eyepatch back into place. He stepped over the Frenchman, toward the fancy man. “Don’t run.”
The man held his hands outstretched before him. “Mr. Corrigan, I have come to offer you a job, a lucrative job.”
“I ain’t Chance Corrigan.” Chance cracked his knuckles. “You shoulda listened the first time.”
The Brit took a step back, then another man, an Egyptian with remarkably blue skin, stepped between them. His shaved head gleamed in the bar’s wan light. He wore a loincloth and bore a lotus-headed staff.
The Egyptian looked straight at Chance. His eyes glowed, then he slammed the heel of his staff against the floor. An electric tingle ran over Chance’s flesh. The lotus blossomed, the petals danced, and Chance’s world went black.
The throbbing pain on the left side of his face woke Chance. He hadn’t been hit hard enough for that pain to be there, all fresh and raw. It didn’t hurt as much as it did when he lost the eye, but the difference was a rounding error. He tried to raise his left hand, but he’d been restrained.
They know what they’re doing. It wasn’t the first time he’d been strapped into a chair and blindfolded, but they were among the best at doing it. Chance pushed off with his feet, but the chair had been bolted to the floor.
“Very good, Chance, just in time. I see you’re with us again.”
Chance’s head came up. I know that voice.
Someone whipped the blindfold off his face. From his left side. Has to be the fancy-man.
Bright light made his eye water. Chance squinted, more trying to trap the tear than anything else. He failed. As his eye drained and the world focused, a large man loomed before him. Dark, curly hair, dark eyes, neatly trimmed beard, they all seemed familiar; he couldn’t connect them with the voice. Not immediately, because the man he should have been looking at should have been much more slender.
Then he plucked a pocket watch from one of a half-dozen watch pockets on his vest and flicked the lid open. He tapped the crystal and smiled. It’s can’t be . . .
Chance’s surprise apparently made it onto his face.
The large man smiled, his cheeks widening to nearly eclipse his ears. “Yes, Chance, the irony of it. A decade ago at university, you were the fat one. You have changed, too. Tragedy will do that.” He patted his own stomach. “And prosperity will do this. Life has been very good to Alexander H. Gavrilis.”
Chance glared.
“You have no idea how much time we have spent looking for you.” Gavrilis began to pace—a well-remembered and well-hated mannerism which confirmed his identity. “What they did to you was tragic, of course. It was sad to hear of the men who died in the explosion, but it did prove your theory correct. Then the swindle and breaking your heart, all understandably disappointing. We never bought your later ‘suicide,’ however, and we were right. Thorough waste of time, trying that.”
“How did you find me?”
“No matter how hard you try, Chance, you cannot escape who you truly are.” Gavrilis faced him, replacing the one watch, removing another and idly winding it. “We tracked little things, things you could not help but do. A locomotive making the run across Siberia faster than scheduled. Water wells being drilled a little deeper in the Australian outback. A tramp steamer having the power to survive the worst of the Cape storms. The improvement to the wireless range on the airship Selene when it went down in the Punjab. Had to have been you.
“But we leave nothing to chance—no pun intended.” Gavrilis listened to the watch for a heartbeat. “So the order of machine parts your ship picked up in Britain was an order we placed. Having my associate, Mr. Brinkworth, find you in Port Said and bring you to us was not that difficult.”
“Leave me alone.”
“You believe, Chance, that the offer we will make is . . . what is that colloquialism from your American south that I so love? Oh, yes, it is ‘a dog that won’t hunt.’ We consider your time too valuable to be spent on frippery. Let us assure you it will hunt, and hunt very well. But, let me first show you what we are doing, and what we have done, and then you can make your decision.”
Brinkworth, the fancy man, approached Chance, his hands laden with
chains. He locked them onto the leather cuffs at his wrists and attached them to wide leather belt around Chance’s waist. Bending down, he similarly chained his ankles together. The man then released the cuffs from the chair and Chance stood.
Gavrilis waved him toward a lift. “Please.”
Two large, muscular men entered the box with Chance, pinning him in the corner. The lift groaned as Gavrilis added his bulk. The fat man worked the lever as Brinkworth closed the gate from outside. The lift, creaking, ascended slowly through a wooden shaft.
After the first twenty feet, heat filled the box. Still in Egypt. The two toughs fidgeted, but Gavrilis seemed curiously unaffected. As the ascent continued a rhythmic clicking built. Gavrilis swayed in time with it, imparting motion to the lift’s box. The squeal of wheels wanting grease and the hiss of sand blown against the wooden shaft broke accompanied the sound, then all of them grew faint and distant as the box slowed.
Finally the lift stopped. Gavrilis slid the gate back, and then an oaken door opened onto a huge semi-circular room. They emerged into a foyer, then stepped down into an opulent den finished in dark woods and animal skins from around the world. Crystal sparkled from chandeliers and services, silver and gold glinted from platters and gilt-furnishings, and ivory gleamed from a throne built of enormous tusks. A variety of clocks filled shelves and cabinets. One even perched atop a wireless transmitter over in the corner.
Yet none of the decorations attracted Chance’s attention. It had been stolen by the bank of windows, ten feet high, taking up the entire western wall. The room looked out over the desert, and the dark ribbon of the Nile where it began its descent toward the Alexandrian delta. Down below, crews worked on a dam.