Challenge #02780-G223: Redo From…
It started as a Company raid, aided by a hacker who crashed the system of a Rival company. It escalated, every computer system in the World crashed. Hospitals, Electricity, Money. All were lost and the only way to even get the beginning of a re-start needed electricity. – Anon Guest
The moral, if there was one, was always add extra stop clauses in your trojan worms. Some would say it should have been, don’t create trojan worms that will end the world as you know it. Regardless, ConnSafeT should never have hired hackers to end the profits of MegaGloboSecuriCorp. Having had the idea of hiring hackers to do that, they really should have looked into those hackers’ records.
Now the world was ending. So had ConnSafeT and MegaGloboSecuriCorp.
The global power grid went down, and so did every system of records with it. Surges fried just about every hard drive and server in the world, and those that remained could not work without power. For twenty-four hours, those in urgent need of electricity scrambled to attain some. Power corrupts, but electricity is life. For twenty-four hours, volunteers manually pumped ventilators that kept tiny premature newborns alive. For twenty-four hours, transactions that could not go ahead electronically did not go through. Communication died between nations. Between states. Between cities. Between towns.
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Challenge #02779-G222: And There Was Only One Bed
Archivist finds a Treasure Trove in a Library’s donation of ‘source material, just old papers’. Stored in time seal conditions. Just one problem to the end of all their funding problems it was all hand written. – Anon Guest
It was a sealed box in one of the Pre-Shattering Permaplastics. Someone had scrawled, “rando papers” in permanent marker across the lid. Scanners indicated that it was still hermetically sealed. This required care and attention to detail.
Good thing the Archivaas were an order of information-obsessed weirdos for whom that was a normal Twosday night. Sealed room with clever air pressure modifications to keep any ancient pathogens in, check. Also heavily sealed livesuit with touch-reaction gloves, check. Every possible means of recording the unboxing at every angle including the helm and eyecam, check. An entire team of fellow nerdy historians looking on and prepared to commentate the proceedings. Of course, because these were like-minded nerds, they were also prepared to give opinions that nobody asked for.
This was a treasure chest of incalculable historical value. Priceless to the right people. Worthless to the wrong ones. The Archivaas could not think otherwise, since Terran history had lost vast chunks of its records via colonisation waves known as The Shattering. The fight to get even the smallest fragment of it back was known by Archivaas everywhere. That said, they were a cult so magnificently obsessed with their own mission that even other Humans called them insane.
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Challenge #02778-G221: To Walk Away
Call it what you will, the dollar shop, the thing store, they are inevitably tied to poky little book stores designed by Escher in that they contain far more than they should, and often never store the same thing twice. They are inevitably attractive to maker types as they have things you cannot find elsewhere, or ever again. They also have the phenomenon of wandering in “for a quick look-around,” and emerging days later with a full shopping bag, an empty wallet, and the illusion that you were only in there for five minutes. It has been postulated that such emporiums are fae realms in the modern era.
But what if they were…
(from https://peakd.com/fiction/@internutter/challenge-02690-g133-labor-of-love) and an ode to my Bits Shop which I’m pretty sure is a pocket dimension.) – Anon Guest
[AN: By me. It has been postulated by me. ~~And I might be correct.~~]
There are places in reality that grow thin. The rubber sheet of space-time is bent, this is true. It is also warped, spindled, and mutilated[1]. In these weak spots, beings from other realms come through. Some visit, some stay, some… fall.
Science periodically comes along to at least patch a hole or two, but for the most part, there are still places where the walls between worlds grow thin. They come, and they learn, and they apply protective camouflage. Forget My mother said I never should… just be very, very careful about where you wander.
You will find them, if you know how to look, in those strange little shops with poky entrances and moebius pathways between the shelves stacked high with the oddest assortment of bits and bobs. Look for the shopkeepers with the slightly bladed smiles, or the eyes that are just a little wrong. Look for the bodily proportions that edge into the wrong side of the Uncanny Valley. The hair that’s too neat. The skin that’s too perfect. The unsettling almost grasp of common phrases and idioms.
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Challenge #02777-G220: Signal to Noise
Chuckled “I sense death behind us”
The moment the human said that some ordinance were detonated behind us, and a Vicious growl to our south – Anon Guest
Human methods of memetic communication leave much to be desired. One has to know a certain volume of Terran art forms, especially popular Terran art forms, in order to understand what a memetic Human is attempting to communicate.
In this example, a stylised Human is sitting in a means of public transit and giggling about being in mortal peril. There is no further context. Humans have been known to fake a chuckle and say the phrase in a creepy falsetto. Usually, this happens before something explodes. Usually, the something explodes because of something the Human arranged beforehand.
Strangely, this phrase has never been any given Humans’ last words. Statistically speaking, most Humans’ last words are similar to, “They can’t possibly hit us at this ran–”
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Challenge #02776-G219: Peculiar Parenting Problems
There were things I expected to say to my children when I got into this whole parenthood thing. Things like “don’t eat that” and “put your pants on” and “stop drawing on the walls” or “do your homework”.
Then, there were the things that took me by surprise. “Don’t put that in your butt” was one, and “NO! DON’T PUSH YOUR BROTHER DOWN THE STAIRS!!” was another, but most recently, “If you make me faceplant into broken glass, you will be in so much trouble” took the cake. – Anon Guest
[AN: Honestly, one could collect a whole encyclopaedia’s worth of “Things I never expected to say as a parent” and there would still be new submissions by volume 128…]
Some things about parenthood are universal. Some are timeless. Some are both. Parentals of all genders, identities, and relations to the young have heard themselves saying things like, “What have you got?” in a semi-warning tone. Phrases like, “No you can’t,” or, “Get that out of your mouth,” or, “Stop messing about,” or, “Put that down,” are so common that they might become rote.
It’s the other things unique to the situations at hand that end up stunning the adults in the room. For perfectly logical reasons, various parentals have had to say such things as, “Get down out of there before you fall down out of there,” or, “That is not for your bottom,” or, “That is neither nutritious nor delicious,” or, “Back-to-front, dear.”
A parental would have a perfectly logical reason to say, “You have your feet on backwards,” for instance. Today, in this family, in this house, it was, “I thought I said that should stay buried.” It’s not easy living in a household of natural necromancers.
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