Dead Lies Dreaming

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In memory of Cecilie Stross
17 April 1929–8 September 2019


CRIMES AGAINST MARKETING
Imp froze as he rounded the corner onto Regent Street, and saw four elven warriors shackling a Santa to a stainless-steel cross outside Hamleys Toy Shop.
“Now that’s not something you see every day,” Doc drawled shakily. His fake bravado didn’t fool anyone.
Game Boy shook his head and blew a scummy pink bubble. When the alfär executioner held his heavy-duty electric screwdriver against Santa’s wrist, the screams were audible over the rumble of passing buses. Game Boy’s gum bubble burst; blood dripped from Santa’s polyester sleeve. Numb-faced police officers blocked the pavement to either side, directing the flood of Christmas shoppers across the street, holding up the traffic.
This was the second public execution they’d run across this week, but it still had the power to shock. “What’s this one in aid of?” Imp asked wearily, as Game Boy slurped his gum back in and gave him a guilty, sidelong glance: “That’s disgusting, kid. Show some respect.”
“Hold on, I’m reading.” Doc squinted at one of the execution notices taped to the lamp posts. “Huh. He’s an unregistered transhuman.” Superpowered, in other words. Like us went without saying. “Identifies as, well, Santa. Guilty of breaking and entering, animal cruelty, flying under the influence, violating controlled airspace—” his eyebrows rose steadily—“human trafficking, slave labor, shoplifting toys, breaking rabies quarantine with reindeer.” Which explained why he was being scragged outside the world’s biggest toy shop. Under the old regime the worst he’d have gotten would have been a couple of years in the slammer, but the New Management had brought back the eighteenth-century Bloody Code, so named because it prescribed capital punishment for just about everything.
“Fuck.” Deliverator turned her back on the scene, shoulders hunched—from anger, not fear, Imp figured.
Imp shook himself. “C’mon, guys.” As their self-appointed leader, it was up to him to keep them moving. He detoured around the execution site and marched smartly into the toy shop. Game Boy drifted in his wake, followed (in his usual desultory manner) by Doc and, finally, Del, shivering and averting her eyes.
The New Management had taken over the British government some nine months ago, and Del wasn’t handling the changes they’d wrought very well. Admittedly, life with an Elder God for Prime Minister was harsh, especially for the fringes of society. But to Imp’s way of thinking, Del’s perpetually seething low-key state of rage was a potentially lethal weakness. Imp expended considerable emotional labor on a daily basis, keeping his more vulnerable housemates from losing their shit, then they stumbled on something like this on their way to a job.
“Don’t worry,” he reassured her, “it’s probably not real—a seasonal marketing stunt or something.” He sent her a tiny mental push to solidify the supposition in her head, soothing the raw edges of her outrage. It was his talent: with a little mental muscle, he could convince anyone of absolutely anything by force of will alone—but only for a short while, and only face to face. Normally he tried not to use it on his friends, but prior consent be damned if it kept Del from making a scene and bringing the Black Pharaoh’s wrath down on their heads. “By the time we’ve finished, Santa will be taking a tea break, yucking it up with his pointy-eared homies.”
Doc was about to contradict him, but Game Boy elbowed him in the ribs sharply and gave him a wide-eyed look, and Doc held his tongue. Time for a distraction, Imp thought. He spread his arms as if in benediction and turned in place, in the glittering lobby of the largest and oldest toy shop in the world. “Behold!” he cried. “The place where dreams are made!” He nudged Del and added, “And by dreams, I mean supervillains.”
The ground floor of Hamleys was decked out in green baize carpet and bleached pine. A gigantic Christmas tree loomed over elaborate Lego and Playmobil displays on every side. Imp led them towards a bank of escalators, passing between dueling toy franchises—a line of Disney Princess demonstrators facing off against a My Little Police Unicorn cavalry charge. The magic staircase lofted them into childhood heaven: model railways and Sylvanian Families, party costumes and wishes granted. A seasonal frosting of spray-on snow dusted every display surface like the icing sugar on a diabetic nightmare.
“What are we looking for again?” Doc asked.
“Three motorized turnouts, a bunch of track segments, an’ a kicking second locomotive,” said Game Boy.
Imp sighed. Game Boy was single-minded. “Priorities, kid: you’ve got to get your ducks in a row. We need the costumes first. Your model railroad will have to wait for another time.”
“But, but, shiny!” Game Boy’s face was pressed up against a display cabinet almost as high as the top of his flaming orange crop-top, nostrils flaring twin plumes of condensation on the glass in front of a halogen-spotlit Class 23 Baby Deltic in 1970s British Rail livery.
“Homie.” Del laid a warning hand on Game Boy’s scrawny upper arm.
“It’s, like, only three hundred quid…”
“Dude. You can’t afford it right now. Add it to your Amazon wish list and move on.”
But Game