Challenge #02513-F323: Sensible Steps
The two ships had collided as one had a severe navigational error and the other had been stolen by a youth who wanted to go out for a joyride. They crashed together on a planet that, for both of them, was just barely habitable. The surviving humans called out to the other ship and found it to be filled with Nox who were even younger than the human youths who were barely into their teens. Despite a rocky start, the two groups begin to work together to survive the ordeal. By the time rescue comes to take the kids back to their homes, the teens, once barely getting along, were good friends. After all, it’s hard to avoid becoming friends when putting aside differences and working together was the only way to survive. – DaniAndShali
Given the Human book called Lord of the Flies, the rescue crews didn’t expect to find the surviving Human teens nor any surviving Nox younglings in any kind of good condition. In fact, given Human Media on the topic, they expected to only find sad remains.
They never expected to find a fully-functioning proto-society with a kind of improvised daycare for the Nox built in the remains of the ship, with passable structures for the rest and shelter of the young Humans. Together, the young Humans had created work-arounds for everything they needed given everything they already had. This, despite the fact that the logs in the wreckage indicated that half the young Humans were at the throats of the other half.
Yet, there they were, working together to farm, raise animals, and create tools, clothing, and shelter for all. Certainly, there was an invisible line of demarcation where one alliance was a definite distance from the other, but all Humans and some Nox were crossing that line in a calm and relaxed manner by the time the rescuers came. There were no lingering signs of violence, though there may have been some signs of pranking. All in all, the village was incredibly well-thought out.
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Challenge #02512-F322: One Complex Thought Experiment in the Void
An empath and a sociopath trying to help each other interact with people. – Anon Guest
Here are two humans. Call them Abe and Bee. Abe cares too much about others and other’s feelings, to the point of neglecting their own. Bee doesn’t care about anyone but themself. They are both abnormal Humans. They are both trying to get back to civilisation as they know it with a group of strangers for a crew on their kludged vessel. They’re a rag-tag bunch of misfits in a bucket that was held together with spit and hope.
“Okay,” said Bee. “I acknowledge we need the rest of these people, but… do I really need to care about their emotional wellbeing?”
“For the thousandth time, yes,” said Abe. “Caring about them means that they will care about you. You want someone who’s got your back, right?”
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Challenge #02511-F321: A Pound of Cure
I told you not to come here during New Years but nooooooo “I want to experience the culture there” and now we’re running low on stress relief medication – Anon Guest
“In my defence, the cultural displays looked very pretty and relatively harmless,” said Prrit. Ze was currently huddled under a big, soft blanket and had mufflers over hir tympanum. “They looked so pretty and the music was so nice.”
“Mus–” Human Dee tutted and tisked. “You had the offensensitivity filters on. I keep telling you to read the descriptors. Why didn’t you read the descriptors?”
Now Prrit’s voice was less than an inch tall. “…they were censored for my protection.”
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Challenge #02510-F320: Fractal Flaws
it just basically just captured lighting – Anon Guest
Humans can freeze lightning. That was the original claim. On the edge territories, blocks of acrylic plastic or panes of glass are sold with ‘frozen lightning’ patterns etched impossibly into the inside of the structure. Some carry them in their vehicles as protection against plasma storms in Hyperspace. Nobody’s certain if they work, but belief in sympathetic magic is a powerful thing.
The actual trick of it got out eventually. Of course it did. One can’t have a technology as cool as one that can 'freeze lightning’ and not have it get out into the greater collection of knowledge in the known universe. It involved electrostatic charges and an igniting incident to induce a destabilising cascade in the crystalline structure of the medium.
Watching it happen was fairly awesome, too. It really did look like the person making them was capturing lightning in a solid medium. So instead of the phenomenon dying out as the knowledge spread, the Frozen Lightning Stall became a semi-scientific mainstay in stations and stops all over Galactic space.
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Challenge #02509-F319: Berry Small Problem
It’s inevitable that one person’s treat is another person’s hallucinogen, especially when it comes to dealing with various species in the Galactic Alliance. There is a plant that, for most Galactics, it’s no worse for them than a human having some chocolate. In fact, it’s sweet fruit is quite popular. However, if a human eats some, it’s inevitable the human will sit for hours completely blitzed. So while it’s a treat for some, for humans, it’s a potential medicine to help those with damaged minds. – DaniAndShali
For every world, there is something that is harmless to the dominant lifeform, that can be considered toxic, dangerous, or hallucinogenic to other species. Sometimes, this happens for multiple species per world. Some species, though they can ingest theobromine, find the variant in terran Coffee to be hallucinogenic.
The same is true for Faraxian Dreamjuice and Humans. It’s the Humans who call it Dreamjuice, despite the fact that it is available as a fruit in most ports of call. Blame First Encounter Syndrome[1] for the resultant grammatical landmines. The fruit, and anything imitating the fruit, is tightly controlled in Human spaces.
This, of course, has lead to a healthy black market, smuggling rings, and illegal trade in certain Faraxian saplings. Because if there’s one thing in the universe anyone should not do, it’s tell a group of Humans what they can’t have. When something is valued and forbidden, crime becomes rife. Which is supremely ironic because, as drugs of choice go, Dreamjuice is fairly harmless.
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