Challenge #02732-G175: Rescue Human
A human stands still, eyes closed, at their work station. Their lips move. They are talking to themself, softly.
“You’re having a flashback. You’re having a flashback. It’s over, it’s done with, you’re healed. There’s nothing wrong with your wrist, and no one can ever make you that helpless again. You’re having a flashback.” – Anon Guest
The Galactic Alliance had initially shunned Humans, save for those existing in or near the Edge Territories. Shortly after their admission to the Alliance, the demand for Ships’ Humans outstripped the supply. This lead to the beginnings of Rescue Humans.
Humans are terrible to each other, especially in some of their more rigid colonial identities. Some were desperate to escape by any means, including risking their lives by sneaking aboard freight ships. They came with scars that weren’t always visible, and required a greater amount of understanding from their Alliance crew. One such Rescue Human was Human Nad.
For the most part, Nad was fine. Ekkus etiquette had it ingrained in the crew of the Risk Reward Ratio that one approached a crewmate so that they could see you approaching. Nobody crept up from behind Human Nad, and that made them more relaxed than when the crew had found them. Which was a definite improvement for Human Nad, but also disturbing for the knowledge that sometimes Humans were so horrible to each other that they never wanted to see another Human for the rest of their lives.
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Challenge #02675-G118: The Bad Old Ways
A human got tired of the crew saying that humans are insane, so they decide to show their crew what true human insanity looks like by taking them on a field trip to the nearby insane asylum. (Bonus points if Said asylum happens to be Arkham Asylum.) – Cheshire
[AN: Punishing the mentally disabled for being mentally disabled is not the best way to deal with that sort of thing. Besides, insanity is a matter of perspective, as I keep stating in my stories. Your perfectly logical is my mentally deranged, as it were. More thoughts on this over here]
“Please stop calling me that,” said Human Shay. “They’d lock insane people up and hurt them and stuff.”
Companion Lree stopped walking and said, “They do this where you are from?” They were immediately concerned. Not just for Human Shay, but also for her fellow citizens back ‘home’.
Human Shay fell quiet, as she was wont to do when someone asked her questions about her place of origin. Companion Lree read the mood and said, “You are free of them, now. You can speak without fear.”
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Challenge #02543-F353: Good Kitty
A nonhuman deathworlder learning about major depressive disorder and suicidal ideation from a human so used to suffering from those that they treat the loss of their medication as an inconvenience, and apologize to the poor sap they got stranded with while they ask them to keep an eye out for self destructive behaviors.
“So, I’ve only got a few days worth of my meds, and it’ll be at least a couple of weeks before we get rescued. Mind keeping an eye on me so I don’t off myself?” – Anon Guest
Human brains can be sensitive organs prone to disorder. Thraak knew this on an intellectual level. Humans had all sorts of things that could go wrong with their ever-profitable, yet squishy brains. Ze had not known until Human Gar told hir that he had some troubles with his own vulnerable organ.
They were in the middle of jury-rigging a life-boat to get off the planet they had accidentally become stranded on through a series of bad mishaps and accidents. They were both determined to prevent anything further, but Human Gar had re-sorted their inventory and muttered, “Aw, flakk.”
There was a problem. Of course. Humans tended to downplay those things for the ease of their companions. Nevertheless, ze had to know what the problem was in order to defeat it. “If it’s something I need to worry about, I need to start now. Please.”
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Equally Sick, Unequally Seen
I swear I posted this yesterday, but this week I went off about gender discrimination in the mental health industry.
Challenge #02247-F057: Slow Progress
Being an anxious over-thinker is hard. You usually scare yourself. – Anon Guest
Why, oh why, did clinging to the very bottom rung of the social ladder feel like hanging desperately from a trapeze… roughly a hundred Sidu’s up[1] and with no safety net? CL-3 tried not to hyperventilate and faint -again- as things continued to deviate from her expected norm. Not that she had been much better within her expected norm, but at least there was a routine. Everything changed into certain uncertainty when the soldiers came.
They had come during free play, a time in which CL-3 attempted to hide in one of the cubbies from the bigger, meaner girls and play quietly with a stuffed poppet. She had screamed as the big suits came crashing through the ceiling and huddled up over her toy baby as they made loud noises. She’d wet herself when the big, armoured hands scooped her out of the cubby and carried her to a pod. The mean girls had laughed.
This wasn’t like the other times, when she was told to walk along a path in her underthings, turn around, and go back. She wasn’t going to be Selected. This was different. She was Taken. Admittedly, she was taken to a place with much warmer rooms, softer beds, and nice colours, but it was too different. There were no pictures on the walls with helpful signs of what was right and what was wrong. Green ticks with arrows showing the picture of the reward. Red crosses with arrows showing the punishment. There was no right way. There was no wrong way, and CL-3 now lived in a permanent haze of fear.
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Challenge #02029-E205: Humans Are Breakable — Steemit
Human Polli was a Team Mom type Human and the gentlest soul anyone could care to meet. But she had also proved her Space Orc credentials by almost wiping out a Vorax Raid Ship by entering Mama Bear Mode. After the Vorax carapace piece had been pried gently from her teeth, and after she had come down from the adrenaline overload, Polli seemed… distraught.
Mediks and Therapists alike classed it as Survivor’s Guilt mixed with Action Remorse. Human Polli would not normally tear cogniscents limb from limb with her bare hands and sometimes her feet, but Mama Bear Polli had. There were depths of rage lurking inside Human Polli that she hadn’t believed herself capable of. And now she knew what evils lurked inside her secret heart. And it terrified her.
She had nightmares, disrupted sleep. Flashbacks every time she saw a crustacean[1], and wouldn’t go near her former favourite meal - Marinara Fry. She seemed… extraordinarily fragile as they limped their way back to Waypoint Station. She would jump at sudden noises. Have disrupted sleep. ‘Zone out’ and emerge in seeming terror. She needed more sleep than normal and lost her appetite. Her joints ached and refused to work at their normal capacity. And the Kavi who shared the ship with her could not find a medical reason why this would be happening.