Dead Lies Dreaming

by Charles Stross

eISBN 9781250267016

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  First Edition: 2020

  1 The only direction in which to expand in Knightsbridge being straight down, this decade all the hip billionaires were excavating grotesque mega-basements beneath their mansions. And once having dug, it was cheaper to inter the digger in the basement than to remove it, like pharaonic pyramids where the skeletons of its builders were sealed into the foundations. Today, an estimated three thousand mini-diggers are entombed below London, leaving a plethora of sacrificial sites to confuse the hell out of future archaeologists.

  1 For his personal collection. Bernard was, like most rare book dealers, a bibliophile and a hoarder.

  2 Imp could only emulate the power of flight when he got stoned enough to jump up and down on the trampoline in the back garden, which never ended well.

  1 It amused Rupert to give his Bonds the use of his Aston Martin when they were running errands on his behalf: it was better than leaving it to gather dust in a secure parking garage while he was out of the country.

  1 Rupert told her afterwards that a copy of the recording would be delivered to the police if she ever turned on him, but it wasn’t as if he didn’t already have enough leverage on her. What pissed her off about the incident was the way her calves had ached for a week afterwards—all because Rupe had to combine pleasure with business.

  1 At 117 miles or 188 kilometers, the M25, London’s orbital motorway, is accurately described as the world’s biggest car park—if car parks had ten lanes, variable speed limits, and speed enforcement cameras. The fastest unofficial lap time is believed to be just over forty minutes.

  1 And it was a special genius indeed, albeit one with alarming implications she was blessedly ignorant of. Google or IBM would have paid billions for ideal solutions to the Travelling Salesman problem or the Blind Knapsack problem, if they had known about it. The Pentagon would have paid, too, even if they had to strap Del into a chair and staple her eyelids open to use her.

  1 Lessons were Learned, the hard way, by everyone. In Imp’s case the lessons were: (a) don’t be a groper, and (b) burning hair smells terrible. Also (c) don’t whine to your big sister, lest she punish you harshly before forcing you to apologize to your victim.