Challenge #02690-G133: Labor of Love
A human who enjoys fiber crafts goes on a quest to find the perfect material to make a soft, cuddly…thing for a havenworlder friend’s birthday. The havenworlder is not from a culture that celebrates birthdays. – Anon Guest.
“This is for a Havenworlder,” said the Human in the store. “I need the friendliest fibre you’ve got. Soft, gentle, won’t tangle in their scales or rip their little baby claws if they get caught up. I’d really prefer they didn’t get caught up. They panic a lot.”
Craft stores see a lot of bizarre requests. Creatives often journey down strange and interesting rabbit-holes and surface in peculiar places. Anyone who makes jewellery knows the interesting possibilities of the hardware store. All creatives who make things know the irresistible lure of the Bits Shop[1], which generates bizarre requests on its own.
“And you are making this for a Havenworlder’s comfort?” asked the shopkeeper. There had been a brandished pattern for a soft toy, and an explicit list of chemical compounds not safe for the intended recipient, and the sense of an impending deadline. “When is it expected?”
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Challenge #02689-G132: Step by Step
The gods have sent you a message. For you it’s just scribbles, but if you tilt your head and squint your eyes, the message reveals itself. Ayy lmao. But something feels off… – Anon Guest
I don’t know why the gods chose me. I’m a nobody from nowhere and honestly, I’m lucky to have made it to sixteen. I only know how to mine slate. I don’t know how to read, I can barely count to fifty, I keep my head down and I don’t bother anyone. I don’t want for much. Food to fill my belly. A decent bed without bugs in it. Time to enjoy the sunset and one whole day above ground. It’s not that much. So when I found writing inside a stone, I couldn’t understand why.
I’m not stupid. I know what writing looks like. Since it was inside slate, I had to take both slices. One slice was reversed, I know that much. They were useless for sale, so I could keep them for my hut if I wanted. Other people get birds and bugs. I got… script. I didn’t know what it said, not initially. Like I said, I can’t read. I just knew that it was important, because the gods gave it to me, and it was mine.
That night, after my daily bread and bowl of stew, I lay down on my side and… I could read them both. They were sideways! It had to be the language of the gods, and it was a message for me, because the first thing I read included my name.
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Challenge #02688-G131: Big and Loud
In the depts of the Archive, a Song was found. It was made Public property.
Naturally, Pax Humanis found a good use for it….
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iP6yvrfOfLc
(Sorry, Not Sorry!) ;-) – Mike
[AN: Warning for ten-hour video. Please don’t do that to us again?]
War is an endless cycle. Tactics circle around and come blasting back from the past. In such cases, the siege turns an impasse into an endurance test. Of course, there are strategies to make certain a siege ends faster than the defending side expected.
Tactics that include flooding the base, attacking the supplies, sapping the walls, and psychological warfare. Only some of this has been banned by the Cogniscent Rights Committee. As far as battle tactics are concerned, sound assaults are a potential grey zone. The volume must not exceed a certain amount of decibels, and the frequency limit has been tested against all known tolerances.
Thus, when Pax Humanis has a siege, they have an approved playlist for the sonic assaults. This does not stop the besiegers from applying their own variations. They did maintain the songs on the list, according to the very letter of the law. The variation was in the spirit.
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Challenge #02687-G130: In Memory of– Oh Wait
Human: What’s everybody so upset about?
Crew: You’re here? But you told the Last Lie!
Human: Don’t you know me by now? I really hate lying. – Anon Guest
“Wait,” said Human Jef. “Are you mad that I’m alive?”
This quickly turned the mood, but not by much. “Of course not,” said Companion Ryl. “We were mourning your loss when you turned up at your own memorial.”
“And you were saying such nice things about me until you said, Oh flakking hell, there she is like a stray Powers-damned cat. I’m starting to think you don’t like me.”
Companion Ryl took a deep breath. “We’re not mad at you,” ze began. “We’re mad that we spent so much emotional energy on a falsehood.”
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Challenge #02686-G129: Small Messy Disruptive Creatures
It goes about on all fours, eats kibble, and gets into the trash to chew on things. Is it a dog, or a human infant? The answer is yes. And in this instance, we’re very glad it was the baby, because there was cocoa powder in the trash can, and she was chewing through garbage to get to it. – Anon Guest
Human Diz was looking even more tired than normal, and they had been tired for almost a year, but this was more than the current average. Companion Thrys was aware that Human Diz had gained a cohabitator recently, and these levels of exhaustion were supposed to be normal, but certain facts had evaded Thrys’ understanding. Such as the exact nature of the cohabitor.
Fact: There had been a monetary exchange involved in the acquisition of said cohabitor. This wasn’t a guarantee of animal status because there were still civilisations that felt cogniscent trafficking was a decent source of income and this was in the Edge where such things were mostly legal.
Fact: The cohabitor was small and had peculiar sleeping hours. They also required Human Diz’s constant attention as well as their mate, Human Lan’s, for most hours of the day. This was also not a guarantee, as Humans started out very small and were attention-seeking as a survival trait.
[Be sure to visit internutter (dot) org for a link to the rest of this story, and details on how to support this artist. Or visit peakd (dot) com (slash at) internutter for the stories at their freshest]