Phil Stitelmann’s latest Cyberpunk novella, Worst Case Scenario, was released today. It follows a gang of mercenaries taking on a seemingly simple job, which inevitably goes to the brown stuff.
Synopsis –
There are bad days, then there are legendary bad days.
When a veteran mercenary team accepts a corporate extraction job in Neo Los Angeles, little do they know that a routine payday is about to spiral into an absolute disaster beneath the city.
With their cover blown and every exit closing, Cole Anderson and his crew must drag a defecting scientist through corporate kill squads, lethal maintenance tunnels and toxic sewers.
Experience, firepower and vicious banter might keep them alive… But Murphy’s Law has other plans.
Worst Case Scenario opens in media res, with an introduction to the mercenary team in an unenviable situation, before taking you to the beginning of the story, two days earlier. Army veteran Cole Anderson is offered a job, infiltrating a corp, and facilitating an ‘employee transfer’ of sorts. It’s sold to him as an easy job – they have a floor plan, his team of mercenaries is experienced, and the ex-soldier knows that preparation is key. Armed with information, and a tight plan, you would expect things might actually go smoothly. Of course, they don’t. Partly because this is a cyberpunk thriller, wherein things NEVER go well. But mostly, because however well prepared you are, no matter how tight a plan you’re following, there’s one thing you can’t account for. People.
Worst Case Scenario is the third of author Phil Stitelmann’s novellas set in his Digital Gods and Fallen Angels series. His previous two novellas, Dissociation Delirium and No Future Tonight, paint a bleak picture of the cyberpunk future, with very dark themes, and a lot of brutality. Worst Case Scenario is a little bit lighter, as cyberpunk thrillers go, but there are some overriding themes that carry over despite the tone, and one of them is people. The ones you can trust, and the ones you can’t.
Worst Case Scenario is a fun, action-packed romp, as a group of experienced mercenaries attempt to carry out an extraction, from one corp to deliver to another. It’s a short and snappy story, with constant forward momentum. The characters at its heart are colourful, and there is a lot of humour in the story to accompany the breathless action. The book continues to build out the setting of Stitelmann’s cyberpunk series. The members of the mercenary team work well together, and have a strong camaraderie, but are very different in terms of skillset and background. It’s a fun way to introduce different augmentations, tech, and weapon sets. The way these are used and introduced are always interesting, with names and context given to the equipment when they’re mentioned to make the world feel authentic, whilst not bogging down the story in too much description – it is efficient world building, something that isn’t necessarily easy to get right.
One of the other elements that tie the three novellas together is a deep mistrust of corporate culture. In our present day, the actions of powerful corporations can often be dubious at best, and that is dialled up to eleven in the Digital Gods and Fallen Angels series. Employees can be considered too valuable to lose, or they can be considered entirely expendable. Neo Las Angeles is ruled by powerful corporations, with many job positions basically indentured servitude in all but name. And they take job termination deadly seriously.
Worst Case Scenario is a fun, entertaining heist story, dripping with satirical humour, whilst not compromising on the series’ scathing view of corporate culture. If you want to know more about Phil Stitelmann’s Digital Gods and Fallen Angels series, and his previous novellas, check out our Author Spotlight feature, which you can find here – https://cyberstopia.com/author-spotlight-phil-stitelmann/ You can also visit Stitielmann’s website at https://digital-gods-and-fallen-angels.com/
Worst Case Scenario is available now on Amazon Kindle, and you can find it here https://mybook.to/worstcasescenario
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