The Fifth Science Fiction MEGAPACK ®. Darrell Schweitzer
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The Fifth Science Fiction Megapack
Version 1.2
COPYRIGHT
The Fifth Science Fiction Megapack is copyright © 2012 by Wildside Press LLC. Indiviual stories are copyrighted by their authors. Cover art © Heywoody / Fotolia. All rights reserved.
For more information, contact the publisher through wildsidepress.com or the Wildside Press Forums. For publication information on individual stories, see the Acknowledgments page at the end of this volume.
A NOTE FROM THE PUBLISHER
Over the last year, our “Megapack” series of ebook anthologies has proved to be one of our most popular endeavors. (Maybe it helps that we sometimes offer them as premiums to our mailing list!) One question we keep getting asked is, “Who’s the editor?”
The Megapacks (except where specifically credited) are a group effort. Everyone at Wildside works on them. This includes John Betancourt, Carla Coupe, Steve Coupe, Bonner Menking, Colin Azariah-Kribbs, A.E. Warren, and many of Wildside’s authors…who often suggest stories to include (and not just their own!). For instance, Pamela Sargent’s alternate-worlds story in this issue was suggested by George Zebrowski, after we approached George to reprint “The Eichmann Variations” (which we remembered from its original publication in Michael Bishop’s excellent anthology, Light Years and Dark [1984]).
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In The Fifth Science Fiction Megapack, we include two award-winners and a bunch of nominees. “Or All the Seas with Oysters,” by Avram Davidson, won a Hugo Award. And “The Peacemaker,” by Gardner Dozois, won a Nebula Award. “The Eichmann Variations,” by George Zebrowski, was a Nebula Award finalist; “Code Three,” by Rick Raphael, was a Hugo finalist; and “May Be Some Time,” by Brenda Clough, was both a Hugo and a Nebula finalist.
If you’re in the mood for more Avram Davidson after reading “Or All the Seas with Oysters,” Audible is releasing his short story collection Or All the Seas with Oysters (which contains the title story we reprinted here—plus many others) in audiobook format. This will be the third Davidson audiobook they have released in the last year. Good stuff!
A NOTE FOR KINDLE READERS
The Kindle versions of our Megapacks employ active tables of contents for easy navigation…please look for one before writing reviews on Amazon that complain about the lack! (They are sometimes at the ends of ebooks, depending on your reader.)
We continue to work on improving our ebook navigation, and with this Megapack, we hope to have the table of contents at both the beginning and the end. (If not, we’re sure we’ll hear about it...)
RECOMMEND A FAVORITE STORY?
Do you know a great classic science fiction story, or have a favorite author whom you believe is perfect for the Megapack series? We’d love your suggestions! You can post them on our message board at http://movies.ning.com/forum (there is an area for Wildside Press comments).
Note: we only consider stories that have already been professionally published. This is not a market for new works.
TYPOS
Unfortunately, as hard as we try, a few typos do slip through. We update our ebooks periodically, so make sure you have the current version (or download a fresh copy if it’s been sitting in your ebook reader for months.) It may have already been updated.
If you spot a new typo, please let us know. We’ll fix it for everyone (and email a revised copy to you when it’s updated, in either epub or Kindle format). You can email the publisher at [email protected] or use the message boards above.
—John Betancourt
Publisher, Wildside Press LLC
www.wildsidepress.com
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THE MEGAPACK SERIES
The Adventure Megapack
The Christmas Megapack
The Second Christmas Megapack
The Cowboy Megapack
The Craig Kennedy Scienctific Detective Megapack
The Cthulhu Mythos Megapack
The Ghost Story Megapack
The Second Ghost Story Megapack
The Horror Megapack
The Macabre Megapack
The Martian Megapack
The Military Megapack
The Mummy Megapack
The Mystery Megapack
The Science Fiction Megapack
The Second Science Fiction Megapack
The Third Science Fiction Megapack
The Fourth Science Fiction Megapack
The Fifth Science Fiction Megapack
The Penny Parker Megapack
The Pulp Fiction Megapack
The Steampunk Megapack
The Tom Corbett, Space Cadet Megapack
The Tom Swift Megapack
The Vampire Megapack
The Victorian Mystery Megapack
The Western Megapack
The Wizard of Oz Megapack
AUTHOR MEGAPACKS
The Andre Norton Megapack
The B.M. Bower Megapack
The Andre Norton Megapack
The Rafael Sabatini Megapack
AGAPE AMONG THE ROBOTS, by Allen Steele
When Samson met Delilah, the first thing he did was crush an apple against her head. Delilah didn’t react in any way; she sat calmly on the park bench, her hands folded primly in the lap of her long purple dress, staring straight ahead as wet pulp ran down her face and into the neckline of her lace collar. She didn’t even look up as Samson walked around the front of the bench, bowed from the waist, and gallantly offered his hand.
In the Samson Team control van, though, we were either cracking up or gaping at our monitors in dumb surprise. All except Phil Burton; glaring through the one-way glass window, almost apoplectic with rage, his mouth opened and closed several times before he finally managed to give utterance to his thoughts.
“W-w-w-what t-t-t-the…what the hell was that?” he demanded. “W-w-who pr-pr-programmed th-th-th-tha-that…?”
“Nobody programmed it, Phil,” I said. I had worked with him long enough to intuit what he meant when his speech impediment got in the way. He looked sharply my way, and I hastily coughed into my hand to hide my grin. Phil had a tendency to think people were laughing at him even when something else funny was going on. “Honest. I checked Samson’s routine myself. That wasn’t supposed to happen.”
“I-I-I know th-th-th-th…” Phil shut his eyes, took a deep breath, and silently counted to ten. While he was counting, I glanced past him at Keith D’Amico; although he was still chuckling, he had already checked out his own screen. He caught my eye and shook his head. No, he didn’t have a clue as to what went wrong either.
“Phil, Jerry…I’ve put Samson in standby mode.” This from Donna Raitt, seated at the console on the other side of me. Unlike Keith and me, she hadn’t lost it when Samson had assaulted Delilah with a deadly fruit; she was watching her screen, her hand cupped over her headset mike. “It looks like D-team has done the same,” she added quietly. “I haven’t heard from Dr. Veder’s group yet.”
“Oh, but you will…you will.” Keith was doing his Yoda impression again. “Beware the dark side, Luke…”
“Knock it off.” Phil had managed to get control of his stutter. He glared at Keith, then turned back to me. “Okay,