Lifespeed

Short Story by Carl Frederick

I'm strongly resisting giving this story extra points because it is the ideal wish-fulfillment fantasy for me. If only these damn fencers would take up chess instead, they could put this extra time to good use.

A chemist and a physicist compete for a spot in the Olympic fencing team and talk about the speed at which people experience time, and maybe it is genetic. The chemist finds an all too simple way to change his own "lifespeed" to match that of the physicist, then has moral issues about whether or not it is cheating and gets all emo about how boring weekends and normal people are. It is a well written story exploring the idea, but I don't really care as much about the cheating plot. The perfect length, although I wouldn't mind seeing a sequel from Frederick here. 3.5 out of 5