Search Worlds Without End

A lost classic of science fiction.

Birk Aaland is a political outcast from Earth's tyranny, and has been living for years on a planet inhabited solely by robots, ever since his ship crashed here.

Now another ship has crashed, and there is again a single survivor -- a woman who's desperate to warn Earth of an alien invasion.

But Birk is perfectly happy with his current exile -- until a twist of fate intervenes, causing each of them to re-evaluate their lives and their total existence.

Table of Contents:

• 7 - Introduction (Alternities) - essay by David Gerrold
• 11 - Sand Castles - short story by Jack C. Haldeman, II
• 29 - Before the Great Space-War - short story by Barry N. Malzberg
• 35 - The P.T.A. Meets Che Guevara - short story by Robert Wissner
• 41 - The Legend of Lonnie and the Seven-Ten Split - novelette by E. Michael Blake
• 65 - Webster - short story by Greg Bear
• 79 - The First Few Kinds of Truth - short story by James Sallis
• 84 - A Gross Love Story - short story by Arthur Byron Cover
• 97 - Recourse, Inc. - short story by Vonda N. McIntyre
• 119 - Sign at the End of the Universe - short story by Duane Ackerson
• 120 - No Room for the Wanderer - short story by Lee Saye
• 127 - Hung Like an Elephant - short story by Joseph F. Pumilia and Steven Utley
• 139 - Delta Flight 281 - short story by James Sallis
• 141 - Message of Joy - short story by Arthur Byron Cover
• 150 - Womb, with a View - short story by Steven Utley
• 157 - How Xmas Ghosts Are Made - short story by David R. Bunch
• 161 - Cowboys, Indians - short story by Edward Bryant

Dream broadcasting is the latest entertainment medium. Wayne Corrigan and his colleagues at Dramatic Dreams can broadcast dreams directly into your mind as you sleep for the ultimate in personal adventure.

But when a mysterious malfunction occurs, Wayne is called on to enter a Dream started by another Dreamer. Once inside, he finds a situation run wild and people enslaved by the original Dreamer--a genius bent on self-destruction.

Now, tens of thousands of people--including the woman Wayne loves--are in danger of dying or going insane unless he can find some way to wrest control of the Dream away from a madman.

Table of Contents:

• 9 - Introduction (Ascents of Wonder) - essay by David Gerrold
• 11 - Tom Sawyer's Sub-Orbital Escapade - short story by Lisa Tuttle and Steven Utley
• 21 - The Light at the End of the Penumbra - novelette by Gregory Feeley
• 51 - Love Among the Symbionts - short story by Michael Reaves
• 67 - A Modern Parable - short story by Christopher J. Crowley
• 75 - Portrait of the Artist as a Young God - short story by Stephen Goldin
• 93 - The Exempt - novelette by George Alec Effinger
• 115 - Scrapings - short story by Kenneth Von Gunden
• 127 - The Perambulator - novelette by Mel Gilden
• 161 - White Hole - short story by Daniel P. Dern
• 171 - Just an Old-Fashioned War Story - short story by Michael G. Coney
• 191 - Contact Myth - novelette by Joseph F. Pumilia
• 227 - Equinoctial - novella by John Varley

Ardeva Korrell, captain of a small interstellar trading ship, has fought prejudice, both because she's a woman and because she's an Eoan, a native of a world with an unpopular religion. Now she's fighting the god-like rulers of a backward planet to save not only her crew, but the entire native population as well. Their mission is straightforward: to storm the gates of Heaven itself.

Table of Contents:

• A Sort of Introduction - essay by David Gerrold
• What Makes a Cage, Jamie Knows - shortstory by Scott Bradfield
• I'll Be Waiting for You When the Swimming Pool is Empty - shortstory by James Tiptree, Jr.
• In a Sky of Daemons - novelette by Laurence Yep
• The Last Ghost - shortstory by Stephen Goldin
• Afternoon with a Dead Bus - shortstory by David Gerrold
• Eyes of Onyx - shortstory by Edward Bryant
• The World Where Wishes Worked - shortstory by Stephen Goldin
• Cold, the Fire of the Phoenix - (1971) - shortstory by Leo P. Kelley
• Oasis - shortstory by Pamela Sargent
• Holdholtzer's Box - shortstory by David R. Bunch
• The Five-Dimensional Sugar Cube - shortstory by Roger Deeley
• And Watch the Smog Roll In... - shortstory by Barry Alan Weissman
• Chances Are - shortstory by Alice Laurance
• The Naked and the Unashamed - shortstory by Robert E. Margroff
• My Country, Right or Wrong - shortstory by Andrew J. Offutt
• Side Effect - novelette by Pg Wyal

A dozen life-forms never before imagined... creative projections into the possible that only the best science fiction has to offer... escapes into a dozen new kinds of minds, some hostile, some loving... even to death.

Contributors include: Kathleen Sky, Vonda N. McIntyre, Alan Dean Foster, Miriam Allen deFord, Arthur Byron Cover, Rachel Cosgrove Payes, C.F. Hensel, Stephen Goldin, Thomas Pickens, William Carlson, Alice Laurance, S. Kye Boult, James Tiptree Jr., Edward Wellen.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction - essay by Stephen Goldin
• Lament of the Keeku Bird - shortstory by Kathleen Sky
• Wings - shortstory by Vonda N. McIntyre
• The Empire of T'ang Lang - shortstory by Alan Dean Foster
• A Way Out - shortstory by Miriam Allen deFord
• Gee, Isn't He the Cutest Little Thing? - shortstory by Arthur Byron Cover
• Deaf Listener - shortstory by Rachel Cosgrove Payes
• Nor Iron Bars a Cage - shortstory by C. F. Hensel and Stephen Goldin
• Routine Patrol Activity - shortstory by Thomas Pickens
• Call from Kerlyana - shortstory by Alice Laurance and William K. Carlson
• The Safety Engineer - novelette by William E. Cochrane
• Love Is the Plan the Plan Is Death - shortstory by James Tiptree, Jr.
• The Latest from Sigma Corvi - shortstory by Edward Wellen

Hundreds of human bodies have been placed in coffins in a military warehouse. But they are not dead, merely frozen in a cryogenic process meant to preserve an army of men to be restored to life if ever they are needed. The Earth they arise to inhabit is a world completely different from any they have known or imagined.

Their only task is to fight and kill in the wars that plague the planet. They are not treated as men, but as fighting machines to be endlessly duplicated and used up. By having had their genetic patterns programmed into a computer, they are doomed to live over and over again, as part of an army that will not die and cannot escape.

Yet one man is determined to break the pattern and free himself, truly believing that there must be a way out... of eternity.

Nebula Award nominated short story. It originally appeared in the anthology Protostars (1971), edited by David Gerrold and Stephen Goldin. It can also be found in the anthology Nebula Award Stories Seven (1972), edited by Lloyd Biggle, Jr.

It's the 1980s in an alternate-world America. U.S. society has fallen apart under food shortages, fuel shortages, racial unrest and a host of other problems.

Peter Stone predicted the Collapse, but was helpless to prevent it. Now he's joined a group of people who intend to escape to another planet and start a whole new world... if they can make it safely across the country--stealing gas and fighting off bandits--to reach the ship before it leaves.

Wesley Stoneham, an ambitious lawyer and politician, has just murdered his wife in a fit of rage. Now he's planning to frame an innocent man for the crime.

But he doesn't realize there was a witness to the crime: an invisible alien who's visiting Earth via astral projection. Now the alien has two problems: Should he report the crime to the authorities... and if so, how?

On an urgent mission of mercy to a dying colony, the USS Enterprise is diverted from its course by Enowil, an unpredictable exile in charge of a world gone mad. With a Klingon and a Romulan warship already under his control, Enowil puts Kirk and his crew through an agonizing, dangerous test of wits while the colonists of Epsilon Delta 4 await evacuation - or certain death.

CAPTAIN'S LOG, STARDATE 6191.8

I am faced with one of the most difficult decisions of my career. Three days ago, the Enterprise was ordered to proceed at maximum warp to Epsilon Delta 4, where 700 colonists are slowly dying of radiation poisoning. Our journey there was interrupted when Enowil, an eccentric being of unbelievable power, seized control of the ship, as well as one Klingon and one Romulan star cruiser. Offering anything in his power to give as a reward, he has asked all of us for help in solving what he refers to as a "private matter." I've seen evidence of his power: it's incredible. If I decline, if I take the ship and leave, both the Romulans and the Klingons have a chance to obtain what could be an unstoppable weapon... and change the galactic balance of power. But if I stay, I am surely condemning the 700 colonists on Epsilon Delta 4 to a slow and painful death...

The Empire of Earth, spanning more than a thousand solar systems, is threatened by a conspiracy from within. Now, with more than three-quarters of the Galaxy ready to fall into enemy hands, the Empire is forced to call on its top-secret weapon: the renowned Circus of the Galaxy featuring the d'Alembert family, a clan of circus performers with uncanny abilities. But even these super agents may not be in time to save the Empire.

Gone from the galaxy...

A startling discovery has shaken Earth's galactic Empire: more than two hundred and fifty thousand people have vanished from the resort moon, Vesa, without a trace! Called to duty, SOTE's most daring secret agents, Jules and Yvette D'Alembert - the former aerialists from the triple-gravity planet Des Plaines, possessed of lightning-reflexes and super-strength - are faced with a lethal and baffling conspiracy.

Together the D'Alemberts have conquered many of the Empire's most dangerous foes, but now the mighty pair must divide forces - each to challenge a deadly evil terror alone!

Stranglers' Moon is the second book in the "Family D'Alembert" series.

TREASON THREATENS THE GALAXY

A robber captured in far-off Kolokov knows a secret that threatens the stability of the succession of the Throne of the Empire of Earth. But he withstands the powers of the fatal truth-telling drug nitrobarb and dies before revealing the traitors' names.

Daring secret agents Jules and Yvette d'Alembert, possessed of lightning reflexes and super-strength, are faced with a far-reaching and baffling plot. They join forces with the rest of the d'Alemberts to uncover the "time bomb" that menaces the Princess' life and the control of the Galaxy's most populated sector, Earth!

When Helena, daughter and second-in-command to the Head of the Empire of Earth's security forces disappears - the future safety of the whole intergalactic network is threatened. Especially the lives of SOTE's two most highly trained operators - Jules and Yvette d'Alembert.

For Helena was one of the very few people who knew their real identities and who understood the vital significance of the d'Alembert Circus as SOTE's ultimate weapon for dealing with treason. So Jules and Yvette are sent on a top priority assignment - to find Helena and save SOTE from destruction.

Fourth volume in the Family d'Alembert series.

The Empire's boldest agents - Jules and Yvette d'Alembert - blast off against the most dangerous conspiracy in the Galaxy. But even the lightning-powers inherited from their triple-gravity planet are no match for their adversary, the beautiful and ruthless star-warrior called... Lady A.

THE MARCH OF THE ARMY OF THE JUST

What is happening on Purity - an obscure planet peopled only by religious introverts? Hitherto the hairshirt brigade have turned their backs on the rest of the Empire. But now, inspired by the aggressive zeal of sinister evangelist Tresa Clunard, the Puritans are preparing to fight a holy war.

Time, once more, for SOTE's crack agents, the Family d'Alembert, to spring into action. And the responsibility for this mission rests with the new time of Yvette and Pias Bavol. Theirs is an awesome task, for the future peace of Stanley Ten's interstellar civilisation hangs in the balance...

For centuries, the planet Gastonia has been a planet of exile, an escape-proof prison world for the worst sorts of traitors. But now, it seems, prisoners are indeed escaping, and all evidence points to the sinister, all-knowing conspiracy that continues to shadow the Throne.

The D'Alemberts must infiltrate this world of traitors - and they must do it without a safety net, because if they fail they themselves will be trapped on this inhospitable world.

The evil conspiracy of Lady A takes a new and mysterious turn when Grand Duke Zander von Wilmenhorst - the secret Head of SOTE - is implicated in a deadly plot against the Empire. And an enemy is impersonating Jules and Yvonne d'Alembert and luring SOTE agents to their deaths.

The trails lead the Family d'Alembert out into deep space to tackle the source of this disturbing operation. And Etienne d'Alembert has his own mission - to clear the name of Zander from accusations of treason. Before long, SOTE's top agents are locked in mortal combat with some of the Empire's most powerful foes...

Devastated by alien invasion, one of the Empire's far-flung planets - Omicron - is the destination for an astonishing mission. For the first time in many years, top SOTE agents Yvette Babol and Jules d'Alembert agree to co-operate with the treacherous and dangerous Lady A. it is strictly an alliance of convenience.

Together with the Empire's deadliest enemy and two of her followers, the two SOTE agents set off for Omicron - easily the most distant planet ever settled. With them is Captain Paul Fortier of Naval Intelligence. And what they find on Omicron could lead to intergalactic war...

The awesome forces of the Empire of Earth have destroyed most of the evil conspiracy's fleet, including the ship bearing the ice-blooded Lady A, when the Family d'Alembert uncover a plot on the planet Newforest, proving that the conspiracy commanded by the mysterious C is even more widespread than they have dreamed.

For Yvette suddenly realises who - or what - C actually is, and she knows the terrifying true meaning of Lady A's boast that the conspiracy is the Empire!

Revolt of the Galaxy is the tenth and final exciting novel in the enthralling space adventure series whose heroes and heroines are the intrepid Family dAlembert

Mindflight is about a spy who desperately needs to come in from the cold. Earth is able to maintain what control it can over its former colonies by using telepathic spies. But what even the spies don't know is that, once they reach their late thirties, they begin exhibiting mental instability and must be eliminated to protect the program as a whole. Alain Cheney is one of Earth's best telepaths, but this only makes him more susceptible. He has to battle not only his physical condition, but also his own organization in an attempt to survive.

The idle rich of galactic Society had little to do that was productive, so they loved to invent useless little games to keep themselves occupied--and the greatest was the Scavenger Hunt, held only once every 20 years. Visit different worlds, pick up hard-to-get items that can't simply be bought, and have a fine time. A clever way to pass empty hours.

Tyla deVrie and her twin brother, Bred, follow the family tradition of entering the Scavenger Hunt. Their parents died during the last Hunt 20 years ago, and they mean to regain the family honor. But as they hop from planet to planet aboard Bred's decadent space yacht with its all-woman crew, fate seems to be making the Scavenger Hunt far more than just a game. It will irrevocably change their lives--that is, if it doesn't end them first.

The Scavenger Hunt is a race through space, and the winner will receive the Society's greatest accolade. DeVrie is one of the leaders, but he is sickened by what he has seen and done. He wants to quit, but is tricked into continuing by his sister.