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  “Got it,” Julie said, and cleared her throat self-consciously. “The partition materials will be here any minute, but if anybody doesn’t feel up to physical labor, if you return to your cabin, Flower will find something else for you to do today.”

  “How heavy are the partitions?” a woman asked.

  “According to this, they’re honeycomb aluminum with Dollnick closed-cell foam, so they should be pretty light,” Don said. “It looks like all of the hardware is attached so this will be a breeze. Does anybody have experience with layout?”

  “Do you mean measuring and marking?” a woman asked. “I’m a stagehand when the union has work and I’m not off at cons. I’ve set up lots of props.”

  “Perfect, you’re my foreman. Anybody else with construction experience?”

  A few more people admitted to having worked on occasion, and Don quickly organized those who didn’t head back to their cabins into six crews of four each. Then a pair of maintenance bots guiding a train of floating dollies piled high with partition panels arrived. One of the bots approached Don and handed him an ear-cuff translation device.

  “Like this?” He placed it over his right ear, listened, and then laughed. “All right everybody, this is going to be even easier than I thought. The ship’s AI can tell exactly where we are by tracking our badges, and since the panels are all the same size and they lock together, we won’t have to do any measuring after placing the first one. And she wants a person on each corner of the panel when you lift them. They feel light now, but wait until you’ve put up a couple hundred and you’ll appreciate the help.”

  Twelve

  “I can’t stay for the whole meeting because I have to get to theatre practice,” Harry informed the other board members as he took his seat. “And I’m sorry I’m late, but I met Irene for an early dinner at the food court because she’s doing an extra volunteering shift today.”

  “We were just discussing the potential for recruiting new cooperative members at the con,” Jack told him. “Flower has a plan in motion to promote the independent living deck that I have to admit isn’t half bad, but I’ll wait until Dave gets here so you don’t have to listen to it twice.”

  “Dave’s not going to make it,” Maureen said, setting down her coffee. “I ran into him in the corridor and he said it takes him an hour to get prepared for if he has to stand in for M793qK.”

  “An hour?” Harry asked. “I had a disastrous fling with method acting in college. I hope he’s not standing in front of the mirror trying to get inside the Farling’s head.”

  “It’s his new costume. I think it just takes him that long to get dressed. I’m going to go back and grab a Danish. Flower has me working so hard that I need the sugar.”

  “Bring one for me if there’s anything good left,” Brenda said, looking up from where she and Nancy had their heads together over a large tab.

  “Really?” Nancy asked, pointing at a sentence in the fine print. “All presentations and lectures become the property of the con unless otherwise negotiated?”

  “I made Flower put that in the contract,” Brenda said. “She wants to record all of the sessions and be able to publish a transcript, and without the intellectual property clause, the speakers could take her to court for copyright infringement. Laws vary across the different species, but everybody agrees it’s safest for the promoter to do a rights grab.”

  “And what if any of our presenters want to reuse something from their con sessions in a book? Does that mean they need to license the rights back from Flower?”

  “Dollnick law states that the right to publish always remains with the creator unless there’s a specific contract proving it was work-for-hire, like if Flower employed you to write an instruction booklet about, I don’t know, living on board.”

  “So two parties can end up holding the copyright to the same material?”

  “More than two under Dollnick law, but they’re restricted to different publication domains. For example, the rights Flower takes under this contract are limited to verbatim reproduction of the sessions for educational purposes, and snippets up to ten seconds for promotional use.”

  “Last cheese Danish,” Maureen said, setting a plate before Brenda.

  “So let’s get started and I’ll fill in Dave when I see him at lunch tomorrow,” Jack said. “Maureen? Do you want to explain the lists?”

  The marketing director for the independent living cooperative, and now MultiCon, washed down a bite of her apple Danish with a swallow of coffee. “Basically, Flower got conned, if you’ll pardon the pun, when she bought attendee lists for defunct cons on Earth. It turns out not to matter because she also ended up with the Con Anonymous list somehow and that in itself was enough to make up for all the duds.”

  “You mean the people from those other cons aren’t interested in SciFi or anime anymore?” Harry asked.

  “They’re mainly deceased,” Maureen said. “Half of the opt-ins dated back to the first couple decades after the Stryx opened Earth. We segmented all of the lists aside from ConAnon, and burned around twenty percent of the names before we realized that the low response rate wasn’t a fluke. I finally figured out that the average age of the people who were still alive is two years higher than it is here in Flower’s Paradise.”

  “So they’re probably all retired and have time for traveling,” Harry said. “It doesn’t cost that much, relatively speaking, to take the elevator up to orbit and catch a commercial spaceliner from Earth to Union Station.”

  “The problem wasn’t with the cost, it was with the pitch,” Maureen said. “Most people our age can’t get excited about traveling halfway across the galaxy to dress up like aliens when they can do it at home. So Flower and I came up with the idea of staging an ElderCon and running it at the same time. The response rate jumped through the roof.”

  “So let me get this straight,” Harry said. “In addition to fixing up a whole deck for MultiCon, Flower wants to duplicate the effort with a con dedicated to growing old? What can she possibly gain by hosting both cons at the same time?”

  “We’re actually going to do a mash-up,” Maureen explained. “All of the ElderCon sessions will be available to MultiCon participants who are of retirement age, and everything at MultiCon will be open to ElderCon attendees, though Flower insists on a health screening for seniors who want to try the LARPing studios on Union Station.”

  “We’re hoping that the ElderCon attendees will spend most of their time on the con deck, but I told Flower we could manage a couple of tracks here by repeating the lectures and classes we’ve already put on for our cooperative members,” Jack told Harry. “Nancy will be in charge of the programming, and we’re hoping that you’ll be available to talk about your work on Everyday Superheroes and in the fruitcake production business.”

  “I’ve barely been retired a year and I’ve never worked so hard in my life,” Harry complained. “What else are you going to offer them?”

  “I’m going to run a track on elder law, and M793qK is going to move his pop-up clinic to one of our classrooms during business hours for the duration of the con,” Brenda said. “I’m going to ask your wife if she’ll participate in a session about selling a small business and retiring to space.”

  The five board members batted around ideas, agreed to let Flower handle all of the details and not to overwork themselves, and then Harry had to grab his sword cane and get to the theatre. He was relieved to find he wasn’t the last to show up, even though he was almost five minutes late.

  “Where’s M793qK?” the Grenouthian director demanded. He made a quick circle around the stage as if he expected to spot the Farling hiding behind the props box. “The writers will be arriving at a quarter past for a script walk-through. I can’t believe the Farling would be late for the first rehearsal of the new season.”

  “I can go get him,” Dave volunteered, his raised hand also lifting the appendages on the right side of his new beetle costume.

  “No, we’
ll need you to stand in if he doesn’t show up,” the director said and gave the old salesman an approving nod. “Your costume looks much more realistic than the pillowcase you used to wear.”

  “Flower suggested I get help from some of the con addicts who arrived early. They’re working on multi-faceted eyes for my head so I should have it by next week. They really know their stuff.”

  “I’m glad somebody does. Now before we—there you are,” the Grenouthian interrupted himself when M793qK appeared. “What’s your excuse this time?”

  “Flower picked up the crew of a Horten ice harvester that had been drifting without power or shielding for two cycles,” M793qK rubbed out on his speaking legs. “I had to thaw them out and start them on radiation protocol, not to mention trimming all of their nails, which continued to grow out in those cheap emergency stasis pods. Then on my way here, I encountered a young man in the corridor with acute appendicitis, and using his pocket knife as my only—”

  “All right, we’ve heard it all before,” the bunny cut him off. “As I was telling the cast members who arrived on time, today we’ll be doing a script walk-through with the writers. I know you all must be feeling pretty good about yourselves after we won two awards, but I can tell you from experience that making a splash your first season is easy. Sustaining audience interest after the novelty wears off is hard.”

  “You’ve directed anime drama before?” Harry asked.

  “Well, not anime, but the same holds true for stage productions. Everybody wants a new theatre company to succeed when it opens, but selling season tickets the second year is the real challenge. Now, before the writers get here, do you have any questions about your promotion to principal animation actors?”

  “Do we have to join a union?” Julie asked.

  “Excellent question,” the director said. “The anime actors union is particularly strong with the Hortens and Drazens, but the other species generally run open shops. Unless Flower Studios grows by an order of magnitude, the fees and overhead for starting a local chapter for actors would likely cost us more than we earn by providing voices and motion scaffolding for the animators. I’ll vote against union membership myself, but I can’t dictate to the rest of you.”

  “It costs money to be in a union?”

  “Setting aside payroll deductions for pension benefits and such, which aren’t really costs, the interstellar parent organization charges a basic fee for setting up a local chapter and requires contributions to the strike fund, etcetera. It really doesn’t make sense to fund the local infrastructure, elect officers, and appoint a business agent for just a dozen members working a few hours a week.”

  “Are we going to get paid the union rate?” Bill asked.

  “You’ll earn the prevailing wage for principal animation actors working in space, which amounts to almost the same thing. I know, you’re all thinking that I have points in the production so I profit from keeping costs down, but check the math with Brynlan if you don’t trust me.”

  Bill turned to the Verlock who played Slomo, and the bulky alien shrugged. “For the two evenings a week we’re working, it really doesn’t make a difference,” he said slowly. “But if you plan a career in animation acting, every hour counts towards the pension.”

  “Which doesn’t vest until you reach five thousand hours,” the Grenouthian added hastily.

  “Five thousand—that would take almost fifty seasons at the rate we’re going,” Bill calculated.

  “Very good,” the Verlock complimented him. “Your math really seems to have improved since the last season.”

  “Yaem will be joining the cast today,” the director continued, “and the animators have worked up a char for him. So let me introduce the newest member of Everyday Superheroes—Skeleton.”

  The Sharf strode onto the stage wearing a skin-tight black body stocking that was printed with a wrap-around skeleton. Between the alien’s naturally protruding bones and the costume, he really did look like a skeleton.

  “I can’t tell you how excited I am to be here,” Yaem practically gushed. “I’ve watched anime all of my life, and to take part in a production is a dream come true.”

  “Do you have a special superhero skill?” Harry asked.

  “I fall apart, but I can put myself back together. The animators showed me a rough draft of the sequence, and the sound that my bones make collapsing in a pile is spot on.”

  “How is that going to help us win battles against the evil Farling mastermind?” Julie asked.

  “The writers had an idea for sneaking me inside M793qK’s null-space compound. When I’m broken down, I fit in a box no longer than my thigh bones. Zick said they plan for your Refill char to take up cello because the case will have room for my skull.”

  “Do you have any musical talent?” the director asked Julie.

  “I’ve been taking voice lessons with Rinka, but singers don’t need equipment.”

  “You could lug around a karaoke setup,” the Vergallian who played Battle Royale suggested. “Then you could infiltrate the mastermind’s compound and even get a chance to perform.”

  “I just sing for myself, I don’t think I could manage in front of the immersive cameras,” Julie said nervously.

  “Don’t worry, the animators will make you look confident and Flower can fix your voice,” the director told her, clearly taken by the idea. “We could even get Rinka to dub.”

  “She’d like that,” Jorb said.

  “But if Refill is already infiltrating, what’s the point of smuggling me past security in her equipment case?” Yaem asked.

  “You could stay behind after she leaves and do your mission behind enemy lines,” Lume suggested. The Dollnick sat down in his stage chair with his lower arms holding his knees and his upper arms supporting his chin in the modified ‘Thinker’ position that invoked his planning superpower. “Yes, that should work.”

  “Skeleton will never make it out of the secret lair alive,” M793qK boasted. “My minions might be fooled by a waitress who moonlights as a karaoke singer, but we have procedures in place to prevent superhero exfiltration.”

  “Yaem won’t walk out. As soon as your minions catch him, he’ll collapse in a pile of bones and they’ll dump him with the trash,” the director said.

  “I’m not sure that’s in keeping with the dignity of—” the Sharf began, but he was interrupted by the writers trooping onto the stage.

  “It’s bad enough the Farling makes up his own lines,” the head writer complained. “We heard you plotting scenarios for the new guy and it sounds like you’re trying to put us out of work.”

  “I just want to smooth the way for you, Jeanie,” the director said diplomatically. “I’d like to introduce you to Yaem, our new—”

  “We know Yaem,” Jeanie said. “He recruited us all for panels in the anime track for MultiCon. It’s going to be awkward writing lines for somebody who has the power to schedule our sessions against stiff competition.”

  “As long as I do get lines and don’t spend the whole season as a pile of bones in the corner,” the Sharf said. “But if you can avoid having me escape as trash…”

  “Did you bring the latest scripts?” the director asked.

  “Zick,” the head writer said, and the young writer/animator began handing out printed sheets of stiff thermal plastic to all of the actors. “After reading your feedback from last season, we’ve started showing all of the lines on every actor’s script, rather than the shorthand of ‘Slomo speaks’ or ‘The Blacksmith groans.’”

  “Speaking of The Blacksmith, did you figure out how to rescue me from that block of ice that M793qK froze us into at the end of the last season?” Razood asked.

  Jeanie frowned and pointed to one of her group of writers. “Continuity,” she barked.

  “In the final scene, The Blacksmith and Refill were helping Gerryman escape from the genetically engineered turtle guarding the sewer,” the continuity editor said. “The evil Farling mastermind flash-froze
them using his thermal whatsit.”

  “My thermodynamic vision,” M793qK said.

  “But this script starts with all of us back at headquarters talking about a suspicious increase in criminal activity in the Orion sector,” Razood pointed out.

  “Then you must have escaped the ice during the offseason,” Jeanie said. “Now, if you’d all read your lines in turn, we’ll get a feel for the rhythm and produce the finished script for Episode One by Thursday.”

  “What’s the point of tracking continuity if you aren’t going to proceed in a linear fashion?” the Frunge objected.

  Jeanie spun on the director. “I knew this would happen when Flower made you all principal animation actors. If your actors keep trying to tell us our jobs, I’m going to file a union gripe.”

  “You’re in a union?” Julie asked.

  “The Interspecies Academy of Anime Writers Guild.”

  “And I’m in both the Writers Guild and the Animators Guild,” Zick added. “I don’t get overtime if I split my daily hours between the two, but it all earns pension points in the same system.”

  The director sighed and explained to the glowering actors, “The writers and animators work full time on our production. You’re working five hours a week for twenty weeks a year.”

  “Yeah, being a principal actor for anime scaffolding sucks,” the continuity editor commented.

  “Now that everybody is here, I have an exciting opportunity to talk about,” Flower announced over the public address system. “The early con arrivals have all been asking me about Everyday Superheroes and I thought it would be fun to let them come and watch a behind-the-scenes production session. Does anybody have any objections?”

  “Yes,” a dozen voices said all at once.

  “I guess I should have asked earlier because they’re already on their way. Besides, it will be good practice for you to work in front of a live audience.”

  “Practice for what?” Bill asked. “We’re just here to make the work easier for the animation artists. It’s not like we ever have to perform live.”