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==Contents== * "Road of Skulls". Originally published in the anthology ''20 under 35'', Peter Straus (ed.) 1988, Sceptre, {{ISBN|0-340-48637-6}}. *:Two men in a carriage travel over the eponymous Road of Skulls, to reach a distant City that seems to be constantly retreating and producing the infinite road. * "[[A Gift from the Culture]]". Originally published in ''[[Interzone (magazine)|Interzone]]'' #20, Summer 1987 with illustrations by [[SMS (comics)|SMS]]. *:A man in self-imposed exile from the Culture is pressured into committing an act of terrorism with the help of Culture technology. * "Odd Attachment". Originally published in the anthology ''Arrows of Eros'', Alex Stewart (ed.) 1989, New English Library, {{ISBN|0-450-50249-X}}. *:A lovesick alien encounters a humanoid explorer, and mutilates it in a game of [[He loves me... he loves me not|"loves me, loves me not."]] * "Descendant". Originally published in the anthology ''Tales from the Forbidden Planet'', [[Roz Kaveney]] (ed.) 1987, Titan Books, {{ISBN|1-85286-004-9}}. *:A Culture soldier and his sapient spacesuit struggle to survive after being shot down and crash-landing on a barren planet. * "Cleaning Up". Originally published in a limited edition of 500 by Birmingham Science Fiction Group as the Souvenir Book for [[Novacon]] 17 (1987) when Banks was Guest of Honour. *:An alien race discovers that a faulty teleporter has been sending junk onto the surface of Earth instead of the Sun, where scientists from across the world have been studying these "Gifts." The aliens covertly work with national authorities to recover the futuristic technologies. The last Gift to arrive is the malfunctioning teleporter itself, which the United States attempts to use for a [[Pre-emptive nuclear strike|first strike]] against the USSR. The teleporter fails and randomly sends nuclear devices across the world, devastating several nations. * "Piece". Originally published in ''[[The Observer]]'' Magazine on 13 August 1989 with illustrations by Peter Knock. *:A commentary on religion and fundamentalism in the form of a recovered letter from the [[Pan Am Flight 103|Lockerbie disaster.]] * "The State of the Art". An original edition appeared in 1989 as a separate book ([[Mark V. Ziesing]], {{ISBN|0-929480-06-6}}). The cover art was by Arnie Fenner, and a limited edition of 400 books in a slipcase appeared, signed by both artist and author. *:At 100 pages long, the title novella makes up the bulk of the book. The novella chronicles a [[The Culture|Culture]] mission to Earth in the late 1970s, and also serves as a prequel of sorts to ''[[Use of Weapons]]'' by featuring two of that novel's characters, Diziet Sma and the drone Skaffen-Amtiskaw. Here, Sma argues for contact with Earth, to try to fix the mess the human species has made of it; another Culture citizen, Linter, goes native, choosing to renounce his Culture body enhancements so as to be more like the locals; and Li, who is a ''[[Star Trek]]'' fan, argues that the whole "incontestably neurotic and clinically insane species" should be eradicated with a micro [[black hole]]. The ship ''Arbitrary'' has ideas, and a sense of humour, of its own: "Also while I'd been away, the ship had sent a request on a postcard to the BBC's World Service, asking for 'Mr [[David Bowie]]'s "[[Space Oddity]]" for the good ship ''Arbitrary'' and all who sail in her.' (This from a machine that could have swamped Earth's entire [[electromagnetic spectrum|electro-magnetic spectrum]] with whatever the hell it wanted from somewhere beyond [[Betelgeuse]].) It didn't get the request played. The ship thought this was hilarious."{{sfn|Banks|1991|p=149}} *"Scratch". Originally published in ''The Fiction Magazine'' vol. 6, No. 6, Jul/Aug 1987. *:A stream-of-consciousness narrative that samples random sections of the future, eventually ending in an abrupt nuclear apocalypse. The following text that opens the story is simultaneously the title and part of the text: "''OR'': The Present and Future of Species ''HS'' (sic) Considered as The Contents of a Contemporary Popular Record (qv). Report Abstract/Extract Version 4.2 Begins (after this break);"
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