Challenge #00774 - B043: The Careful Calculation
Person #1: Fear is easy. Fear is cheap. Instead of fear, we’re going to give the people hope.
Person #2: Fear vs. Hope. Hardly an even match.
Person #1: That’s because you think of hope as something light and fragile. My version of hope has calluses and dirt under the fingernails and isn’t past bringing brass knuckles to a fight.
The board meetings of Cinderella Dreams were interesting. Around the Boardroom walls, circling the ceiling, was the company motto: omne quod est, semper fuit. They were words to be taken seriously, and only those who spent every day there knew what they meant[1].
The winners of the tri-annual Cinderella Dreams reality show always had an interview in this room, with the words neatly framed behind their heads. The Board lived for that part of the show. They adored the irony.
This year, as the life and times of last years’ winner was winding to a close, The board were considering the profiles of the potential next winner’s circle.
“Of course, we must be careful. We will keep the best of the plebes going with lucky chances. They must never be aware that they were pre-selected to win.”
“The entire year of selection is a ruse,” explained an elderly member of the Board to her successor. Tompkins to her granddaughter. “We give the plebes the hope that the people like them are going to win. Right up until the last moment.”
“That’s why the final circle for the year of games has to include one member of each hue, one member of each gender, one member of each minority, and one visibly disabled person,” said her neighbour, Jenson. “Of course we select for as much overlap as we can.”
“But the winner,” said the CEO, “is always white, abled, heterosexual, skinny and pretty. They haven’t noticed this in over five hundred years.”
“Why?” asked the junior Tompkins. She was thirteen.
“We’re very good at this,” explained the senior.
“No. I mean, why does the winner always have to be all that stuff? Why not pick one of the others?”
Tompkins patted her successor’s head. “Because all those other kinds are far too smart and won’t let themselves be manipulated. Nobody cares when another pretty white person vanishes from public notice. We have so many.”
“Hope is a very careful balancing game,” explained the CEO. “Too much, and they fight for it. Too little, and they surrender to despair. Just enough… and you can keep an entire planet tractable for generations.”
“That…” said Tompkins Junior. “That sounds kind of evil.”
“You’ll understand when you get older,” said her grandmother. “It’s for the greater good.”
[1] “All is as ever was” in case you wanted to know.
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Challenge #00773 - B042: It’s Physics!
I think the only apt description for particle physics these days is ‘punch it until its maths come out.’
[AN: I always thought particle physics was throwing tiny bits of the universe at each other to see what fell out of the crash…]
It looked like a cross between sanskrit, greek and cuneiform. Because of the lines and brackets, Kylie guessed it was intense math. She boggled in amazement at her roommate, Katie, as she worked on the complicated sigils before her. A girl five years Kylie’s junior was working on punching a hole in the universe.
And if you judged her only by the way she sprawled on the floor to scratch sigils into the battered notebook, one might guess that Katie Walker was playing at being a college student.
She finished half a page of complicated sigils and circled it in red pen. “This is it. This is the formula.” Katie grinned up at Kylie and showed her the page like any other kid her age would show her fan art of New Kids on the Block. “D'ye ken what this means?”
“I’m an art major,” said Kylie. “I don’t even know the names of half those symbols.”
“This is math that’s goin'a change the world.” She sprang up to sit next to Kylie, her auburn ringlets bouncing. “This is the trick o’ the universe. We’re goin’ le'p straight through all th’ stages o’ civilisation, ye ken.”
“…stages?”
“I keep tryin’ tae get ye intae science fiction…” Katie rolled her eyes. “Stage one is us, ye ken. Usin’ t’ resources o’ one planet fer energy. Stage two is usin’ the energy of their sun. Completely tappin’ ye ken.”
“Oh, like solar panels?”
“Er. More'n ‘at. Probably more like a Dyson sphere o’ solar panels, but yer gettin’ there. Stage three… is usin’ whole galaxy o’ stars. This,” Katie tapped her circled math, “Will be tappin’ a whole other universe. We’re goin’ tae pierce a brane.”
Kylie winced at her enthusiasm. “Is that murder or medicine.”
That earned her another pained sigh from Katie. “Not B-R-A-I-N. B-R-A-N-E. It’s short for 'membrane’. It’s the wee layer 'twixt one universe an’ the next. And I found one…” another tap at the math in her book, “that’s nowt but pure energy. We plug intae tha’… we never have another worry fer energy again.”
Sitting there in a dismal dorm room, staring at half a page of inscrutable math in a 99-cent store notebook, Kylie stared at the sigils that could change the world. She felt like she was standing on the edge of a cliff. Something like a caveman trying to jump to the moon. She wondered if Einstein had tried to share his theories with someone like this, and if they had felt the same way.
“Are you going to show your professor?”
Katie blew a raspberry as she put her book away. Just like that, she was a fifteen-year-old kid again. “Nah. He wouldnae understand. What I’m goin’ tae do is celebrate.” She took out her Savings Jar and unloaded it onto her bed. “Pizza and doughnuts.”
“Rock on,” grinned Kylie.
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Challenge #00771 - B040: Great for Business
I never just derail a train of thought. I make wrecks that catch the cars on fire.
Kalle had ‘disruptive influence’ on her permanent record. She had no idea what to expect when Central Administration sent her to a training camp. Her vague concepts were nothing like the experience before her.
“You are a disrupter,” said the uniformed Administrator Plexx on the stage. “You can use this to the advantage of many. Corporations around the globe will pay good money for strategic disrupters and SOME OF YOU–” she glared pointedly at a small group who’d started chatting, “–are more talented than others.”
Kalle couldn’t believe it. The people who had annoyed her mother at work… were people who were in the business of disrupting, interrupting, and otherwise breaking unauthorised chains of thought that could have lead to interesting inventions, profitable weapons, or lucrative medicines.
All because the people they were pestering were supposed to be doing low-level labor for their company.
Her mother had been on the verge of a eureka moment so many times… and now she was going to be one of Them.
Of course she studied. Disrupters got bonus pay. Bonus pay got perks. Perks got a better future for herself and her spawn. But… Kalle had seen what a Disrupter could do to a creative mind.
She had watched her mother wither with frustration. Pickle in anger and futility. Dim and fade with depression.
It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair.
Kalle vowed, privately, to be the sort of Disrupter who disrupted the current goings-on of the world. She would find places for the unauthorised ideas and the idea-havers. She would let them have their eureka moments and then quietly ask what lit them up like a firework.
And then… she’d find a place for them to take it. People to help them. It wouldn’t matter to the companies if they lost or gained lower-level employees. But it would matter to the planet and the people who share it.
She just needed to remain subtle about it all. Lest she get a bad reputation.
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Challenge #00770 - B039: Ancient Writings
Bring it the fuck on = Eam non valent, in (Eng->Lat)
[AN: My google translate disagrees and provides “adducet eam ad irrumabo” I trust any latin nerds in my audience will settle the debate]
Of all the things that could have possibly sated Shayde’s wanderlust, exploring he less popular areas of the station seemed the safest and least bother. What Rael hadn’t known at the time was Shayde’s capacity for finding adventures.
“Ey oop! Humans have been here.” Her sharp-toothed grin was a clear indicator that adventure was about to happen. “It’s real old, ye ken.”
“Really?” Rael did his utmost to show as little interest as possible.
“Aye, it’s in Latin. Near as I reckon, this were left behind somewhere by a pre-Alliance human colony. Or a bunch'a real nutbars.”
“Either is likely. Can we stick to the main corridors, please? Going down the path less travelled is what got us in this mess.”
Shayde turned to face him, gesturing at the ancient message, “But it says ‘bring it the fook on’. How can ye resist tha’?”
“Easily,” explained Rael. “I just walk away. Observe.” He picked a path based on the right-hand rule and began moving away.
“Three dead ends and a doorway tae the Glunk,” she warned.
He could see two of those. “You’re a daily reminder of why I hate magic.”
“Glad tae know I do somethin’ for ye every day.” She loosened the lock with a metallic squeal of protest. The door groaned as it opened.
Beyond was a rather dismal hall with another door. And beyond that…
A tastefully appointed…
Dimly-lit…
Dusty and musty drawing room.
Relief fought a losing battle with disappointment. “And here I was thinking you’d lead me through a fight with some forgotten tribe who’d been living independently on this station until we blundered into their territory.”
Shayde laughed. “Na. I’m savin’ that fer twenty rooms on.”
It was hard to tell when she was joking until it turned out that she was.
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Challenge #00769 - B038: Ballistic Rock
“We will, we will, Rock you!” As sung by the United Trebouchet Operators Choir. You figure out the circumstance. Have fun.
The trebuchets, massive siege weapons of wood and rope, fired silently. It was their payloads, landing against the stunt castle walls, that were part of the performance.
Two solid rocks, and a missile made of gravel and dried clay. They landed with a WHUMP-WHUMP, TSSSSHH. A relentless beat that required the scurrying co-ordination of hundreds.
“Buddy you’re a young man, hard man, shouting in the streets, gonna be a BIG MAN SOMEDAY. Got blood on your face, big disgrace, wavin’ your banner all over the place.”
Everyone manning the trebuchets sung in chorus, “WE WILL, WE WILL ROCK YOU!”
WHUMP-WHUMP, TSSSSHH. WHUMP-WHUMP, TSSSSHH.
“WE WILL, WE WILL ROCK YOU!”
The Ambassador for Shoggott, a class five deathworld, stared at the performance in shock and awe. She leaned over to the strategically-seated Ambassador Shayde. “Your people make music with weapons?”
“Oh aye. You should see the next act. It’s a Zeusophone.”
Nyansi looked at the demonically-shaped human. She seemed to be enjoying the show. “What is a Zeusophone?”
“They play music wi’ lightning. It’s a wee ripper.”
Nyansi was rather glad that they had sued for peace with these crazed, balding apes. They were beyond all realms of understanding.
Unseen, the frailer members of the Galactic Alliance exchanged touches of reassurance and congratulations. Their cunning plan had worked.
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Challenge #00768 - B037: Pure Badness
You venerate purity for its own sake, a most pointless exercise. Pure Iron is brittle, corrodes and shatters easily. Pure copper or tin do not have the strength of bronze. Alloys are Stronger
There was a civilisation on Tsarkis. If one could call it that. In the Galactic Alliance’s opinion, it barely passed the bar.
For a start, there was a very rigid caste system. Enforced by the military caste and massive walls that divided district from district. Few, if any, were allowed any kind of social or geographic mobility.
And as for the ruling caste…
Inbreeding had done its work. There were family lines distinguishable by their noses or foreheads or chins. They were all pale and frail albinos. Physically weak, twisted things.
All except for the ruling family of one island-continent in the tropics. There, the hostile life that bred there had lead to a high mortality rate, even amongst the high-born.
Therefore, every fifty years, they had a true Cinderella Ball. Anyone who was unmarried, with the means to arrive in a certain city by a certain date, had the chance to meet and mingle with the crown heir.
It was unorthodox, and frowned upon by the twisted and grotesque examples in the other city-states. And every kind of broken taboo.
And yet, that island-continent was the strongest of all the disparate nations extant on Tsarkis… and the other royalties continually borrowed from their line.
Of course, the instant that the Galactic Alliance set up a trading post on that planet, the potential for chaos increased exponentially with every passing day. Which was just how the Alliance liked it.
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Challenge #00765 - B034:
A human opens a Beauty Salon for Reptilian Customers, it occurs to me that its Male reptiles who often try to attract mates.
[AN: Thanks to Tumblr’s habit of dropping links when I copy/paste, I have a new “streamlined” and “easier” procedure in which I have the HTML of my tagline info in a separate file and, after I’m done doing the story, I swap to HTML and copy/paste that sucker in. Then I edit the muse food count accordingly. Thanks staff, for making me not trust the utilities on this site]
The concept of cosmetics is as old as dirt. Literally. But the humans, of course, were the first to take it to extremes.
This shop, Universal Beauty, was the one responsible for introducing the seal-like Iil'shur'aur'ur to hair gel. Though it was not responsible for the minor wars that followed[1]. It still does roaring business despite the fact that it’s run by humans.
“Welcome to Universal Beauty. Do you have an appointment?”
“PLEASE,” begged the lizard, “She said ‘yes’ and we’re going to meet face-to-face in three hours! I have to look my best for her, I have to! Please. I’ll pay double-time!”
The clerk took in the lizard’s general air of inspired desperation, and the offer of double time, and set off a softly musical alarm.
Experts swarmed, whisking the desperate lizard away and into the one studio that was always kept empty for such emergencies. Meryl Jonson saw all this on her monitors and descended from her office for a consult. They would have called her down anyway.
She arrived just as they were scanning the poor male in his underwear. He had a nice, matching bra for his heat packs. Good. That was a start.
“This is your first time in any beauty salon?” she asked.
“Yessir,” the hapless male squeaked.
“Don’t worry. We don’t use the more frightening aspects of the cosmetics industry. All we are going to do is… accentuate… your natural assets.”
“…but all of the options in the menu…”
“Are lies. You don’t want to be deceitful during your first meeting, do you? Starting a relationship on deceit is not the way to go.”
“Oh. Uh. Yes. Of course. I just want to look my best for her.”
“That’s what we’re very good at.”
He still got The Works, of course. Paying double time gets anyone The Works. Full derma, nail, and crest treatments, with the gentleman’s choice of alluring scent. He left glistening, with his clothes neatened and pressed.
And in good time for his date, who had booked an earlier appointment weeks ago.
[1] Because it’s surprising the lengths some people will go to to have selkie-smooth fur.
Challenge #00764 - B033: Emergency Procedures
“When in trouble, when in doubt. Run in circles, scream and shout!” Have fun with this!
These were the most bizarre aliens she had ever seen. Their emergency klaxon was a twinkly little tune suitable for Play School or Sesame Street[1] replete with singing. The jolly lady’s voice instructed the entire crew on how to panic in the same tone of friendly warning that other PSA’s would tell children where and how to cross the road[2].
Allie just danced through the panicking Gallusians and fixed the problem. It wasn’t even that big a deal. A simple solder and the diverse alarms fell into silence.
“Oi!” Cork protested. “Why’d you have to go and do that for?”
“It was broken?” Allie suggested. At their collected, avian, blank stares she added, “It needed fixing, so I fixed it.”
“That’s for the third chorus,” said Cork, as if the visiting human in their midst was beyond dense. “We get our panicking over with, and the automated systems then tell us who needs to do what so we can do it. Then we finish with a round or three of orchestrated panicking so everyone has it out of our systems and we can move on.”
“Why not just fix the problem and then do all the de-stressing?”
Cork looked at her as if she’d grown another head. “Where’s the fun in that?”
[1] Some things will last forever. Do not argue with me on this.
[2] Look up They Might Be Giants’ song In the Middle, In the Middle to hear what I’m talking about.
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Challenge #00761 - B030: What a Waste
A numidid who is the living embodiment of handsome - his feathers are perfectly aligned and gleaming, talons sharp and shiny, vibrant crest, and zygomatic arches to make everyone swoon.
He’s also a scientist. (from Amity or not)
Commence shenanigans!
Lu’iz had no idea he was handsome. He carried on in all his beliefs and allowed everyone else to be mistaken in theirs. Such was the life of a scientist.
And yet, every day, he would hear some female on the streets or public transits sigh and murmur, “What a waste…” as if his very existence was offensive to the order of things.
It plagued him ever since he passed puberty, and continued to confuse him for some years into his lonely adulthood.
Young storekeeps would coo or bob for him… right up until the moment he opened his beak and spoke like a scientist. It would be then that he heard those fated three words and the regretful sighs.
Sometimes, he received hate… as if his very existence was an aberration like none other in the universe. Lu’iz had very little idea how he had managed to capture their ire. He was, according to them, deceptive and dishonest. Trying to trap honest females in a sordid relationship with a -ugh- scientist.
He had given up trying to explain that he wasn’t trying to do anything of the sort when T’reka the Mad’s transmissions began from Toxic Island. He began avoiding going out in public, too. At least until the equally insane humans’ views began to infect the general populace.
His neighbour, Ii’ree was the first to talk to him. Nervous and clearly afraid of anyone seeing her at it, she asked, “Why did you go into Science? You could have easily been an actor. And far more acceptable.”
“Acting is the art of lies,” he answered honestly. “I have a far better relationship with the truth.”
“Do you have any idea how beautiful you are?”
“None at all. Everyone keeps calling me a waste. Or a liar. I… I don’t like that.”
Someone came through the hall, cutting off all opportunities to speak further.
Lu’iz thought nothing of it for the following months, until she found him calibrating a telescope on the roof of their shared domicile. It was late afternoon and he was checking the orbit of the local gas giant.
“You’ll burn your beautiful eyes out,” she cautioned. Ii’ree was gathering her laundry from the rooftop clothing lines.
“All is well,” he assured, “I am not looking at the sun. I’m observing the nearby planets.”
“In daylight?” she scoffed. “There’s nothing up there.”
“We see the moon, do we not? There is more to see if one knows how to look. "I have counted four moons around Stripy Titan already.”
Ii’ree looked up at the boundless blue. “There is nothing to see but the air…”
“Then come and look closer. I promise you won’t catch Science Germs.”
She put her basket down and hopped up to his perch. Peered skeptically down the eyepiece. And then Ii’ree squawked and leaped backwards. “Impossible!”
“Deep breaths,” he soothed. “Impossible is another way of saying ‘don’t look’. The universe continues to work without our observation. The blue Stripy Titan is proof.”
“…but… but… How?”
“It’s always there. Night just allows us to see it better. And I counted the moons by the shadows they cast. It’s quite fascinating.”
“It’s terrifying,” breathed Ii’ree.
“Why?” he asked. “How could it hurt you?”
Ii’ree had no answer. But for the rest of her life - including the passage of time when it was legal to be his wife - she would take the time to look at the sky in wonder.
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Challenge #00760 - B029: Hug-a-Bunch
“And here we have- please put the new ambassador down.”
“But (s)he’s so cute and cuddle able!”
Ha’ri still didn’t understand how she became an ambassador to her people. She was just one of the many, many asteroid-chasers trying to make enough money to pay for more than her ship and its fuel. Especially damages.
Then a ship belonging to the strange, balding apes had come out of nowhere and she made the mistake of hailing them.
Now she wore a gold version of her work clothes, and walked among giants.
The humans were all right, really. They were just mind-bogglingly insane. But insane in ways that bordered on genius.
No other species would have thought of tying a ship’s proximity sensors to the grapplers, and then programming the latter to take anything it snagged straight to the on-board processors. And nobody else would have considered calling the resultant, cthuloid monstrosity a harmless-seeming name like “the hungry caterpillar”.
It took Ha’ri all of ten beats, watching it in motion, to want to have that system attached to her ship. It was a nightmare made mechanics, but it was a potentially profitable nightmare.
And now, she was in another nightmare. An immense space station seemingly designed by a warped mind. Her human guide had explained that the station had just happened. Various people throughout the ages had added to it, reconfigured it, and otherwise messed around with how it was put together. Ha’ri was so used to humans by now that she was not surprised at all to learn that there was a cult of humans who considered the station to be a living being.
And then there was the welcome she got upon entering the Ambassadorial Conference Arena. There were already people there. If one greatly expanded one’s definition of ‘people’ to include a group of human-shaped machines playing instruments with a glowing-eyed creature with sharp teeth - while a blue-skin man looked on in resignation.
“Aaaaaawwww…” cooed the black-skinned humanoid with the guitar. Her glowing eyes had somehow turned pinkish. “Aaah ‘is such a cutie…”
“Shayde,” warned the blue man. “No…”
By then, the being known as Shayde was across the room and had literally picked Ha’ri up and was vigorously cuddling her.
“Put the new ambassador down!”
"Aw but she’s so cute an’ huggable…”
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