Game on.
THE UNDEAD ABOLITIONISTS were easily swayed when I presented them with a plan of action. They were tired of the city hall scene; I think it was the perpetual smell of the hot dog vendor next to their protest site.
“Free zombies!” they chanted as we marched on Pixie Bridge.
I chatted with Lisa, the cute abolitionist in the orange sundress. She reminded me a little of Andrea, sans the hellfire and brimstone.
“Will you pay a living wage?” she asked, after I explained my plan to offer employment to the free undead.
“Oh, I’ll pay an undead wage. I think they’ll be happy with that, especially the brain bonus. I’ve got a great recipe for grey matter au gratin.”
Lisa smiled, but it was an unsure smile. I think she hadn’t thought through the whole zombie diet thing.
A crowd drifted along with the procession, growing block by block. By the time we reached the excavation site, we had a couple of hundred sympathizers, oglers, and hecklers, although they were surprisingly hard to tell apart.
A pixie, if you’ve never met one, is about the size of a pencil eraser. They are easily overlooked individually, but what they lacked in physical mass they made up in magical heft. One was trouble enough, but when dozens of the most powerful ones had swarmed together to form the Pixie Syndicate, they’d taken trouble to a new level.
That trouble had fermented into a diversified portfolio of drugs, protection rackets, and contractor fraud, and now the Pixie Syndicate was using their ill-gotten gains to build a gleaming new headquarters under their namesake bridge.
At this stage of construction, the building was a hole in the ground; a hole filled with zombies pawing in the mud with their bare hands. Poor guys.
A construction trailer sat at the edge of the work pit. The protestors and assorted hangers-on surrounded the trailer. Lisa started the singers on a rousing rendition of “We Shall Overcome.”
The trailer door opened. A pixie swarm flowed out and reconstituted in the shape of an angry old man. “Quiet! We’ve got a meeting in progress!”
The singers continued, “We are not afraid!”
“Well, you should be!” stamped the swarm. “I’ve half a mind to melt all of you like peeps in a microwave!”
“The truth shall set them free!” sang the crowd. Lisa waved an End Zombie Slavery Today sign in front of the swarm.
“Who’s in charge here?” said the swarm.
Lisa looked at me. I suppose I had gotten folks into this. I stepped forward.
“We believe you are unfairly oppressing the undead.”
“We oppress everyone. There’s nothing unfair about it,” said the swarm. The crisp edges of the swarm blurred momentarily as its members laughed at their own joke.
“Set my zombies free,” I said. Hopefully my plagiarism was fair use.
“No.” The swarm turned to go back into the trailer.
“Yes,” I said. “Or we’re not going anywhere.”
Lisa started the singers on “If I Had a Hammer.” They were amazingly off-key. The dissonance sent shivers up my spine.
The swarm froze, then turned back to the crowd. “Ok, ok. The syndicate has a traditional method for resolving problems like this. We’ll pick a champion, you’ll pick a champion, they’ll have a duel. If we win, the rest of you go home.”
“And if we win, you set the zombies free?” I said.
“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” The swarm blurred again. “Who’s your sacrifice?”
I scanned the crowd, looking for the meanest, most magically powerful, abolitionist. There wasn’t a whole lot to choose from.
Then I saw Lisa was looking at me with adoring puppy eyes. Damn it.
I raised my hand. “I’ll represent the abolitionists. I’m going into the trailer. Send your best pixie in after me.”
Lisa gave me a kiss, while the crowd sang, “You’ll never walk alone.”
I walked alone anyways.
The trailer was small, hot, and stuffy. A single desk and chair sat at one end, a couple of shovels leaned against the other wall. Not much to work with. I grabbed one of the shovels and crouched behind the desk.
How had I gotten myself into this, again? Oh, yeah, Lisa’s kiss. A very fine smooch—hopefully, not our last.
Assuming I didn’t die in the next five minutes.
The door opened, then shut. The light flickered, and a small bolt of lightning flashed across the room at my feet, making me jump. I lunged across the trailer, swinging my shovel at the source of the lightning.
I hit nothing.
This was going to be difficult. I backed up against the desk, then caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of my eye; I swung my shovel again. Nothing.
My shovel turned into taffy. Grape taffy. It drooped to the ground in the warmth of the trailer.
The pixie was playing with me.
I was never going to catch it. I couldn’t even see it. Even if I glimpsed it, hand-eye coordination wasn’t my strong point—I’d once spent three hours trying to catch a fly in my kitchen, and failed to even wing it.
A fly. That was the answer.
I hit speed-dial number one on my cell phone. “Andrea, I’m sorry you got so irrationally mad at me. Let’s make up.”
My phone glowed, and my perspective shifted—the room grew, and my field of vision wrapped practically behind me. My legs felt thick and powerful, my tongue long and sticky.
Being a frog was kinda neat.
A tiny pixie hovered in the corner, etching into the air what looked to be runes of total annihilation.
I jumped, flicking my tongue across the room.
He was tasty.
THE ZOMBIES CAME HOME with me. In exchange for Andrea un-frogging me, I returned most of the cash to her mom, but decided the possibility of a zombie dance troupe was a real opportunity. I replaced the Teletubbies DVD with Michael Jackson and asked Hank to work up some choreography. I think it will come together nicely.
Lisa and I had a date. We went bowling, and it went pretty well. Turns out she is a fortuneteller and already knows where our relationship is going.
And she’s ok with that.
MOON LANDING
Lavie Tidhar
1
Neil and Buzz are in the lunar module, heading down. The Eagle smells of farts and sweat and metal and oil. Mostly, it smells of each other. Neil and Buzz are tossing a coin. Buzz says, “Heads,” and watches the coin tumbling through the canned air of the Eagle until Neil slams it on his wrist. Neil raises his hand, carefully, so the coin won’t float away.
“Tails,” he says, with quiet satisfaction.
THE EAGLE TOUCHES the lifeless surface of the moon. Neil is the first to step out. His feet touch the lunar surface and he takes his first steps on the alien soil. “That’s one small step for man,” he says, as Buzz watches from within the Eagle and millions of viewers watch back on Earth, “one giant leap for mankind.”
Moments later Buzz follows him to the surface of the moon.
2
Neil and Buzz are in the lunar module, tossing a coin. If Buzz were religious, which he’s not, he would have said that, at the exact moment the coin goes tumbling through the canned air, he felt a tremor.
He watches Neil, but if Neil had felt it he says nothing. Still, Buzz is feeling a little odd. As if space-time had suddenly curved around them, and tiny, quantum fluctuations went this way and that, making tiny changes …
“Heads,” he calls. Neil raises his hand, carefully, and for a brief second a look of disappointment and disbelief flashes across his face.
“Heads,” he says, and his voice is flat.
THE EAGLE TOUCHES the lifeless surface of the moon. Buzz is the first to step out. His feet touch the lunar surface and he whoops and jumps high into the air, tumbling like a coin, and lands again. “I never thought we’d make it this far,” he says, to Neil back in the Eagle, to the millions of viewers back on Earth. He takes a deep breath and looks around, at the
moon and up, at the rising Earth, a tiny blue-white marble in the distance.
“It’s beautiful,” he says.
3
Neil and Buzz are in the lunar module. “Did you feel that?” Neil says.
“Feel what?” Buzz says.
“Nothing,” Neil says.
They toss a coin. “Heads,” Buzz says. But the coin comes down tails.
“Let’s toss again,” Neil says.
“What for?” Buzz says.
“Something else,” Neil says.
They toss the coin. It comes up tails again.
THE EAGLE TOUCHES the lifeless surface of the moon. Neil is the first to step out. His feet touch the lunar surface and he takes his first steps on the alien soil. “Good luck, Mr. Gorsky!” Neil says.
Buzz shakes his head.
Mission Control: “What was that?”
Neil: “Nothin’. One small step for man…”
BACK ON EARTH, Mr. Gorsky turns to his wife. They are sitting in the living-room on the old couch, watching the lunar landing on TV. “Remember when you said the only way you’d give me a blowjob is if the boy next door walked on the moon?” he says.
“Fair’s fair,” Mrs. Gorsky says, moving closer.
4
Neil and Buzz are in the lunar module, tossing a coin.
“I definitely felt something,” Buzz says. Neil just shrugs.
NEIL AND BUZZ STAND on the surface of the moon. It’s green.
Their feet sink into the lunar surface.
“It looks like cheese,” Neil says, dubiously.
Mission Control: “What was that?”
Neil: “Nothin’.”
Buzz takes off his helmet. He peels off his glove. He dips a finger into the lunar surface and it comes up with a globule of green goo. Buzz puts it in his mouth, tastes it, finally swallows.
“Tastes all right,” he says.
5
Neil and Buzz are in the lunar module, tossing a coin.
“I have the strangest feeling…” Buzz says.
NEIL AND BUZZ STAND on the surface of the moon.
“Houston,” Neil says, “we have a problem.”
Thousands of insectoid creatures surround Buzz and Neil.
“They’re selenites,” Buzz says.
“What’s that?” Neil says.
“Moon creatures,” Buzz says. “After the goddess of the moon, Selene.”
“They look just like ants, if you ask me,” Neil says.
The selenites watch the two astronauts.
“What shall we do?” Buzz says.
“Let’s squash them,” Neil says.
NEIL AND BUZZ ARE JUMPING around on the lunar surface. Every time they land they crash a selenite. When they do, the selenite explodes. Neil and Buzz are jumping all over the surface of the moon. There are a lot of selenites.
6
Neil and Buzz are in the lunar module, tossing a coin.
“I don’t like this,” Neil says.
“What?” Buzz says.
Neil has a strange look in his eye. Buzz thinks it makes him look constipated.
“I don’t know,” Neil says. “But I don’t like it.”
NEIL AND BUZZ STAND on the surface of the moon.
“Is that a moth?” Buzz says.
They turn and look at the giant moth. It comes gliding over the moon’s surface.
“It’s a lunar moth,” Neil says.
There are a lot of plants on the lunar surface. Neil and Buzz take off their helmets. The voices of Mission Control remain inside the helmets. Their voices are tinny. Neil and Buzz drop the helmets on the ground.
“Welcome to the moon,” the plants say.
“Hey, look,” Buzz says. “Talking plants.”
“Well, how do you like that,” Neil says.
The giant moth is resting on the ground ahead of them.
“Maybe we could get a ride back to Earth on it,” Buzz says.
“Race you!” Neil says.
NEIL AND BUZZ RUN across the surface of the moon, laughing.
7
Neil and Buzz are in the lunar module, tossing a coin.
“I’m sure I felt something,” Buzz says uneasily.
“It’s the beans you’ve been eating,” Neil says.
“Heads,” Buzz says. They watch the coin tumble through the air.
“Neil?”
“Yes, Buzz?”
“Whose face is that on the coin?”
“It looks like…” Neil hesitates. “That’s strange,” he says.
NEIL AND BUZZ STAND on the surface of the moon.
“Houston? We have a problem…”
“Ja,” a new voice says. The new voice has patched into their comm. units. The new voice comes from the leader of the men facing the Eagle. There are a dozen of them. They all wear spacesuits. They are all armed. On each suit there is a patch, and on the patch is a swastika.
“Ja,”’ the voice says. It has a German accent. “You have a problem.”
The German raises his hand in a salute. “Heil Hitler!” he says.
“That’s who it was on the coin!” Neil says.
“Fire!”
NEIL AND BUZZ ARE LYING on the surface of the moon. They aren’t moving.
“Damn Nazis,” Buzz says, with what’s left of his air. One of his lungs is punctured.
8
Neil and Buzz are in the lunar module, tossing a coin.
“It looks kind of Chinesy,” Buzz says. They watch the coin.
“HOUSTON? HOUSTON, wo˘men yo˘u yīgè wèntí,” Neil says.
There’s a big city on the moon, under a dome. There are banners in red with Hanzi characters. Neil and Buzz approach the domed city. They enter through an airlock and take off their helmets. There’s some sort of a party going on, with a dragon dancing in the street and lots of firecrackers.
A short man with dark hair pushing a cart comes towards them. “Would you like a moon cake?” he says.
They each take one.
“Xièxiè!” Neil says.
“It tastes real good,” Buzz says, politely.
9
Neil and Buzz are in the lunar module, tossing a coin.
“Did you see that?” Buzz says.
“See what?” Neil says.
“I thought I saw something flash past outside,” Buzz says.
“Like what?” Neil says.
“I don’t know,” Buzz says. “It was nothing.”
NEIL AND BUZZ STAND on the surface of the moon.
“There it goes again!” Buzz says.
“Looks like a flying saucer,” Neil says.
“Yeah. I didn’t want to say anything before,” Buzz says.
“There’s another one!”
“Houston—oh, forget it,” Neil says.
The sky above the moon is filled with flying saucers. More saucers rise up from the surface of the moon.
“There’s a whole fleet of them,” Buzz says.
They watch the flying saucers.
“They look like they’re heading for Earth,” Neil says.
“Well, there’s something you don’t see every day,” Buzz says.
10
“Did you feel that?” Buzz says.
“No,” Neil says.
“Me neither,” Buzz says. They toss a coin. “Heads,” Buzz says.
Neil shakes his head. “Wrong again,” he says.
THE LAST DRAGON SLAYER
Chuck Rothman
“It looks like the king’s dropping by,” said Runge.
Hal didn’t look up from the boot he was stitching. It was just like the old man. Runge was just short of mad, always talking about some ridiculous project or other. Hal had learned to ignore half of what he said. The king didn’t visit a cobbler’s shop.
So when the herald played the fanfare in the doorway to the shop, Hal was so startled he jabbed his thumb with the needle.
King Grimwood IV, wearing gold and jewels and a ratty ermine collar, stood
in the doorway of the shop. “We need a dragon slayer,” he said.
Hal sucked his sore thumb. “A dragon slayer? There aren’t any dragons.”
“Of course there are,” said King Grimwood. “Don’t you listen to the town crier? Our kingdom is infested with dragons—well, with one anyway—and we need a dragon slayer.”
Hal stood up, holding up his work. “You see this? This is a boot.” He gestured. “That is a cobbler’s bench.” He pointed at the walls. “Those are shoes. Most people might get the impression I was a cobbler.”
Grimwood looked distressed. “Isn’t this the home of the Dragon Slayers Guild?”
“No,” said Hal. “And—”
Runge cleared his throat. “Well, strictly speaking, it is.”
Hal stared. “What?”
“Well, not just dragon slayers. A lot of the old guilds had trouble getting members. We had to merge. Then people kept getting behind in their dues and…well, I’m the only one left. I opened the cobbler’s shop until things picked up.”
“So this is the Dragon Slayers’ Guild?” the king asked.
“Well, technically, it the Guild of Thieves, Assassins, Dragon Slayers, Greengrocers, and…“ He pointed to a square wooden box in the corner, large enough to fit a small duck. “Computer Repairmen,” he added significantly.
“What’s a computer?” the king asked.
“I have no idea,” said Runge. “But a seer told me they were the wave of the future, so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to start early.” He pointed at the box. “I do wish the seer had been more specific. I first thought that a computer had something to do with counting, you see. The problem was, all I could do was make a machine to count ones and zeros, and what good is that?”
The king turned to Hal. “You will come to our castle and rid us of this dragon.”
“Me? Why not him?”
“Then I realized it didn’t matter,” said Runge. “All I had to do was invent something, call it a computer, and my fortune was made.”
“Do you really have to ask?” said the king.
“All right,” said Hal. He long ago learned not to argue with a madman. “Suppose I agree to slay this dragon. What do I get out of it?”
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