Fraser Sherman is another of my fellow Drollerie Press alums, and he’d like to tell you all about his collection of four fantasy short stories, including “Original Synergy”, “Red Moon Rising”, “Jack Be Nimble” and “Learning Curve”. This post features Serena Dean, protagonist of the story “Original Synergy”.

And did I just hear several thousand Browncoats cry “WHAT DOES SERENA KNOW?”

If you’re wondering why I joined the Knights Templar, you can blame my mother.

“Serena,” she told me, “a new business owner needs to network. And becoming a Templar will get you much further than the Lions Club.”

I wish. Sure, it sounded sensible. The Templars covertly manipulate the world economy, they could certainly help my new business MeetSmart (“When you fail to plan your conference, you plan your conference to fail. Call MeetSmart today!”). And it’s been eye-opening learning how the world really works: why the Buffalo Bills must never win the Super Bowl and the real reason Fox had to cancel Firefly.

But what I didn’t realize is that every time the Templars launch some bold new venture, we cross paths with another conspiracy—the Illuminati, the Trilateral Commission, the Men in Black—operating at cross-purposes. The end result is that nothing gets accomplished on either side.

So now the Templar Grandmaster has a solution: Synergy 21, the conference that will bring together every secret conspiracy, from Skull and Bones to They (as in “That’s what They say.”), to work out some sort of common ground for us all. And my tight-ass superior, Master Reginald, just told me I’m going to handle all the arrangements. A great break for me, right?
Except that I have two weeks to pull it all together. In Florida. At the height of the tourist season. No conference rooms booked, no suites reserved, nothing.

Of course, as a Templar, I have resources and methods no ordinary meeting planner does—and the help of a very sexy Illuminati—but still, that’s not much time. And if I fail, Master Reginald has told me, my head will roll.

He’s not using a metaphor.

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