Challenge #00600 - A235: The Challenge at the Third Act

“I never saw you face a wall that, if you couldn’t go over it, you’d not try to find some way around, through, or under, or blow it up with sapper’s charges. Or just bang your head against it till it fell down.”

Ten Standard Years can make a lot of differences. Most of them physical. They can also serve to emphasise the similarities.

Sahra sized up the area. This was open ground in the Cursedland wastes. There were no vents for her to crawl through. And she was way past being of a size to crawl through them, anyway. She had the resilient remnants of a crashed vessel’s bulkheads, a lot of similar wreckage strewn about, and a bunch of headstrong idiots shooting at her.

Ten years ago, they were her headstrong idiots and therefore valuable. Now…

“An orbital plasma cannon ain’t the answer I’m looking’ for,” she reminded herself. “Splash zone’s too dang wide anyhow.”

“Really? Orbital plasma cannon?” said Simy. “I know that isn’t you. You’re usually more subtle.”

Sahra glared at him. “You is talkin’ to the gal who rained yaller all over th’ Tuatta. An’ got the walls bleedin’. An’ vanished a whole bunch'a humans overnight[1].”

Simy considered this. “Fine,” he allowed, “You used to be a lot more creative. I’ve never seen you face an obstacle that, provided you couldn’t surmount it, you’d otherwise manage to disassemble, sabotage or otherwise just headbutt it into submission. Think. You’re good at that.”

“It’s real hard t’ think when your own folks is shootin’ at ya.”

“Fine. Then what kind of miracle would stop them?”

“Y'all got m’ spare dress? Reckon I’m up fo’ a spot o’ bi-lo-cation.”

Simy grinned, even as he transformed into Sahra’s double. “That’s my girl.”

[1] For a full chronicle of Sahra’s ‘miracles’, please read the Hevun’s Child Trilogy.

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Challenge #00599 - A234: The Worst Levels of Fame

“All the geniuses I ever met were so just part of the time. To qualify, you only have to be great once, you know. Once when it matters.”

He’d called it the Spline Actuator out of self-amusement and it turned out to be the most useful tool in the Galactic Standard Toolbox. It had spread virally across the Galactica alliance as thousands of JOATs made their own from equally viral how-to-make-it videos.

Every now and again, someone remembered to send him a few Seconds for the original idea.

But more frequently…

“Wow. That’s got to be the most beat-up looking Spline Actuator I’ve ever seen.”

Five thousand, nine hundred and thirty eight… thought Probost. “That’s because it’s the first one.” He extracted himself from his work and offered his hand. “Hi. Probost Flit. Inventor of the Spline Actuator.”

A big, wide grin. An active shaking of the hand. “Oh wow. I never knew anyone invented that thing. It must have saved my life thousands of times. You must be rolling in Years. How much profit have you made?”

Sigh. “To date? Three Days.”

“What? How? Why? Everyone in the galaxy uses them…”

“Yes. They also make their own. And then they make their own how-to-make-it video. People pay them for their Time. If they remember, they send me a few Seconds because everyone figures I’m rolling in Years by now. If they remember.” It was hard not to be bitter. JOATs everywhere owed him their lives and he was still a lowly maintenance techie on the endless parade of tweaks and re-jigging in his regular beat.

The cogniscent who had once been so overjoyed looked alarmed. “I’m going to add information to any video I see that isn’t yours. And tell my networks.” Ze dug in hir pockets. “This isn’t nearly what I owe you, but think of it as a down payment.”

“Thanks,” said Probost. Three more Hours, twenty-two Minutes, and a handful of Seconds. “This means a lot.”

Not all of them believed him. In fact, damn few of them believed him. It was still on the Galactic Wiki that he kept his day job on a voluntary basis. Like anyone would volunteer to do backbreaking, repetitive maintenance work for their productive time.

“Are you working on anything else? The Spline Actuator’s a work of genius.”

“Sorry… but it’s looking like I was only ever a genius once.”

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Challenge #00598 - A233: Aftermath

Thank God you’re safe and I’m going to strangle you with my bare hands.

Rael picked up a forkful of double-chocolate beignets with fruit preserve stuffing a la mode, looked at it critically, and put it back down again.

“Playing with your food?” boggled Nik the Gyiik. “For you, this is a dangerous sign. Is all well?”

He made himself eat because he knew his body needed sustenance. For Gyiik cooking, this was almost sacrilege. “You remember Shayde,” he said.

“The pain in the anatomy clothed in an enigma, wrapped in a mystery and talked nothing but riddles? Yes. I liked her. I have a recipe for all sorts of lost Terran delights, thanks to her exquisite memory.”

“She’s gone.”

“What? She was relatively young… or was it young by relativity?”

“No, she’s not dead. The alleged gods that dropped her on me took her back.”

“What did they look like, these gods?” asked Nik. “I didn’t see it, but there are conflicting accounts and the securicams picked up nothing.”

“To me? They looked like really cheap special effects. Tacky, even. And I couldn’t do anything to stop them.”

Nik smiled. “Ah. I see. You like her more than you tell.”

“Not like that. Honestly. What is it with you evolvers and breeding?”

“Eh. Liking children helps there be more of us.” Nik shrugged with all his four arms. “But there is something you miss,  no? Some way you are worried about her… something you’d like to see again.”

Rael tried to taste his food in a desperate effort to avoid the implication of romance. Romantic love was a dreadful cliche. And most likely impossible, given that, as an engineered life form, his breeding specs were -well- specific.

And he didn’t really want to know what they were.

“Eh…?” Nik waggled his crunchy eyebrows. He wasn’t giving up.

“All right. Fine. Against my better judgement, yes. I miss her. Not just any one thing… all of her. Even the annoying aspects.”

There was a sound like tearing silk as a black talon tore a temporary hole in reality and the unlikely entity known as Shayde slithered through it. “Ah I knew ye loved me! Gi’ us a hug.”

All his unlikely and unwanted emotions spilled out of his mouth at once in a flustered, “Thank the Powers you’re all right! I am going to strangle you with my bare hands!”

She just laughed and french-dipped him into a kiss.

“Er,” said Nik. “Any particular reason that you’re naked?”

Shayde looked down at herself, shrieked, and covered her censorable portions with her hands. “Really long story. Can I do the shadow-hop, then?”

Good grief. She actually remembered to ask first. Rael nodded mutely.

Once again, she was gone. But this time, he knew she would be coming back.

He still didn’t know whether to be elated or furious.

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Challenge #00597 - A232: Detective Work

“We have advanced to new and surprising levels of bafflement.”

The body in the vents was hundreds of years old. Dating back to some of the last territorial wars that occurred in or near Cuidgari space. Tracking down the insignia remaining on the body required nosing around in the Archivaas networks.

Something which Lyr had drafted Rael for on Hours Plus. In this case, Hours, plus food and lodging. The food part was going to set her back a great deal, he knew, because his metabolism was permanently set on ‘searing hot’.

Rael had stopped when he’d run out of sources and kibble simultaneously, and pinged Officer Marken to meet him at Unsuitable Food Eat for some paid taste-testing.

“Progress?” asked Lyr.

“I have reached new and surprising levels of bafflement.”

“Well, crap,” she slumped in her seat. “I still owe you for your time. How much is this going to set me back?”

“This is a pre-menu item. I’m being paid to eat,” he smiled. “Something of a holiday job for me. Win-win, on this case.”

“Yeah. I saw your average food bill. Sherlock’s going to get sarcastic.”

Rael slid across the tablet with his findings. “The insignia had three possible factions depending on their placement on the uniform. All of them Cuidgari rebels against the forced overtaking of Amalgam Station by… B'dauss military.”

“Wow. Ancient history.”

“Yes. There’s little extant sources from that time. The Archivaas have done what they can, but…”

“Damn.” Lyr shook her head. “I know this is going to turn up again. Did the forensics department give you anything?”

“Acid. Hydrochloric acid. Highly concentrated. But there’s no evidence of how it impacted the poor fellow’s thorax from above.”

“Not any more. This station and its sundry parts have been re-tooled so often that it’s surprising there’s anything to use as evidence.” Her gaze went unfocussed and her body straightened in her seat. Something else spoke with her mouth. “When a shadow walks, we’ll know.”

“Pardon?”

Lyr shook herself. “What?”

“You just said something very strange.”

“Well write it down. I don’t prophesy often. It’s probably something important. Oh, and send me a copy for the records. The religious quadrant is checking my hit-to-miss ratio.”

Rael made a dismissive noise and rolled his eyes, indicating his general opinion of the religious quadrant. But he did make note of Lyr’s strange words.

How in the realm of possibility could a shadow walk?

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Challenge #00596 - A231: One Miserable Afternoon in an Observation Lounge

An attempt at discussing the weather:

“My, the vacuum is hard out today…”

There is something about human nature that compels them to look up at the stars. And, once in space, staring out a window at them will suffice. Shayde had managed to perform both, thanks to a pillow pit in this particular lounge.

The faintly luminous cushions gave enough light to find her by. Lounges like this were deliberately dim so that observers could see the stars as well as the ships that made Amalgam Station vital.

She seemed to be at rest, but there was some subtle tension radiating out of her.

It took him a few minutes to realise that this particular observation lounge was the one closest to the Sol system.

There was also something about human nature that made them look back to the place they came from.

He couldn’t ask if she was homesick. She had to be homesick. Starting a conversation on the obvious was… inane.

“Vacuum’s hard out innit?” she said.

He almost jumped out of his clothing. “You… know I’m here.”

“Aye, and I ken ye want tae talk. Or ye think I need tae talk.”

He sat primly on the edge of the pillow pit. “Psychologists say that talking helps.”

“I cannae get back to where I was. I’m forced tae move on. What’s tae talk about?”

Rael thought about this. “The legitimacy of your emotions. Where you are in the healing process. Whether or not it would do you any good to see what’s happened to the places you used to know…”

“Eh. D'ruther not. I’ll just sit and stare and cry in the dark.”

“Then I’ll sit in the dark and pass tissues.”

They watched a cargo vessel sail past, escorted by tug drones. Blinking to the night together.

“Thanks,” she said at length.

Someone on micro-debris patrol went past in their life suit, straddling a small vehicle and trailing a net.

“You’re welcome,” murmured Rael. He passed a tissue.

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A Mother’s Curse, used elsewhere

Someday, [name], I hope you live to have a dozen subordinates just like you.

(#00595 - A230)

T'reka didn’t understand the curse. Not in her youth, when she’d innocently said, “Oh that would be delightful.” And not now, when she had achieved half a dozen subordinates, one of them human.

Her five Numidid scientists, including one student-underling - Tyrtyr, sought only to perform their tasks as carefully and precisely as possible. Even the human, Wila, endeavoured to keep up with the flock.

Human ingenuity and apparently recreational insanity had invented the Flight Suit. A set of artificial wings that allowed a human to glide once they had sufficient initial velocity. The model Wila wore included an additional set of detachable wings so that she could keep pace with her Numidid flock.

Wila, among the first humans to be born on this planet, didn’t know a life before alien contact. Ze spoke Ulu fluently and adapted the Numidid mannerisms to hir lanky, upright frame. Ze even figured out how to sit on Numidid perches where other humans knelt on the floor.

T'reka did her rounds. “Progress?” it was the only question she ever needed.

“I’ve found the gene-link,” sang Wila, indicating a dancing simulation on hir monitor. “These ribosomes can work in parallel and splice the genomes of Terran biota samples and Hu'lu'a biota samples. Theoretically, it may even be possible to gengineer a Numidid-Human hybrid.”

“Let’s not make any new species before we classify the ones we already have, all right?” suggested T'reka.

“Yeah, right. Hands already full,” Wila laughed and got on with hir work.

Tyrtyr, on the next desk, held up a presentation frame. “This is the third one,” she announced. “Seventeen subspecies of arboreal moth, labeled and arranged artistically as a gift to retired Mayor T'terik a’ Srii.”

“Your grand-uncle will love it,” T'reka examined the display appreciatively. “And they’re cross-coded with their archive reference. Well done.”

Tyrtyr almost glowed with pride.

Lilip had a supplicant’s posture and a presentation display… and an eager gleam in her eye. “I have finalised a plan to investigate the chasm at co-ordinates fifteen, seventy-one, gleep-thirty.” She set up the display and activated it, “With a team of volunteer humans and their s'pee-loonk-aing equipment, we should be able to fully investigate the caves, collect samples, and map the entirety of the cave system. Including the use of aerial and aquatic probes, of course.”

“I assume you have a team of humans already in mind.”

“Er. Well. They’re already going. May I escort them?”

“No flying blind.”

“Yes, Honoured-Teacher.”

T'reka still couldn’t understand the curse. Maybe it had something to do with her leadership style.

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Challenge #00594 - A229: Peggy deCulco

“The [name] family motto might as well be, Anything worth achieving is worth overachieving”.

She could see the immigration clerk’s eyes widen at the name on the galactic passport.

“You’re a deCulco?”

“I’ve spent my life being the black sheep of the family,” she smiled. “You can relax.”

Not that there was much trouble to be expected at a station called Podunk. She wanted to disappear. Become someone else. Be anything else than a hero from a long line of heroes.

And it was looking like a great idea. Until the Hol’vath showed up.

They were deathworlders with their minds bent on unthinking conquest. Loot and pillage, but, thanks to their being descended from some kind of newt, raping was out of the question.

They caught Peggy while she was shopping for bathing supplies. She’d lashed out with the only weapon she had.

A bottle of Easy-Squeezy soap.

Which turned out to be deadly poison to newts.

She then filled her trolley with boxes of squeeze-bottle soap and threw them to any survivors capable of using them,

Peggy’d never wanted to be a deCulco. She’d wanted to be obscure. To labor along with the common throng.

And then she became the Saviour of Podunk Station. With a bottle of soap.

Catapulted into the spotlight, she had only one thing to say, “The deCulco family motto might as well be, ‘Anything worth achieving is worth overachieving’.”

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Challenge #00593 - A228: History Lesson

For decades Earth’s biosphere, at least insofar as supporting human civilisation, basically rested on everyone being very rational and _not_ pushing the shiny, candy-like button and firing _all the nukes_. How we got in that situation is textbook humanity, but being in that situation, pushing ourselves as far and as hard as we did, with all the diplomatic and military provocations - but _not_ managing to go that step too far? That’s not how humanity behaves… It was basically two of the largest power blocs in human history playing ‘chicken’, with the future of the entire human race held hostage.

Tyrtyr took rapid notes. It had taken her all of five seconds to work out the tablet and two hours to figure out the human alphabet. There was even an add-on built just for her so that she could take notes in Ulu.

But now, months into her full recovery, she took notes in Human English so she could practice.

There was more than one way to fly.

The political situation that gave rise to the Cold War… boggled Numidid minds. She considered it part of her work to study these humans and translate their convoluted and conflict-ridden history into Numidid understanding.

Two vastly conflicting theologies. Presented equally in the classroom. Neither side presented as ‘wrong’ or 'right’. Each presented with their fatal flaws. For capitalism, the desire for profit ultimately causing the ruin for the workers. For communism, leaders not wishing to surrender their power and truly share the wealth, paired with administrivia slowing the sharing down until the goods were rendered worthless.

Two extremes fighting for what they believed was right. Both in charge of weapons that could have melted their world.

Both playing games of espionage, sabotage, and puppet governments that later caused more strife when one side inevitably collapsed.

Tyrtyr wrote, Humans are so used to conflict that they used to unconsciously sow the seeds of more conflict in other nations. Used to. Not here. Here, they were striving to make a better world with less conflict. Here, they went to illogical extremes to ensure that all children were treated equally. That all hues of hide were valued. That they were inclusive, not exclusionary.

Even to the point of allowing another cogniscent life form in their classrooms.

She raised her hand.

“Yes, Tyrtyr?”

“Query… How is it that neither nation opened fire?”

“Ah yes. Well… they both had charge of a weapon so terrifying that neither would risk retaliation with the same weapon. They were called nuclear bombs because they utilised explosive nuclear fission. Numerous tests conducted at the time demonstrated the power they had. Thus, they were scared to shoot, and also scared to blink.”

“Could they have not come to a co-operative arrangement?”

Sigh. “They could have, but they didn’t.” The human teacher clapped his hands. “Which leads us to our thought experiment. What could have changed to make the Cold War end earlier? Come back with your thoughts tomorrow.”

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Challenge #00592 - A227: Bad Advice

When an evil god laughs. run.

When a good god laughs run quickly.

Once again, Shayde had stopped at a registered Graffito Intersection to read the collected wit and wisdom from the kinds of people who wrote on walls.

“Na that’s just bad advice.”

Rael sighed and played straight man. “What would that be?”

“When an evil god laughs, run. When a good god laughs, run quickly.”

“Oh… kay…?”

“Aye, it doesnae do any good. Running from an evil god just pisses ‘em off. Runnin’ from a good god’s even worse.”

Rael didn’t know which bothered him more. The fact that she had personal experience or that she was divulging this information to a sworn atheist. “How in the name of the Powers could a good god be worse?”

“They condescend at ye… Like, 'aw that’s cute of ya’ or 'puir wee thing’ an’ the worst of the worst is 'be not afraid’. As if ye didnae just have a good reason. Na. Best thing tae do against gods is nod, smile, and bugger off as quick as ye can get awa’ wi’ it later.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” he allowed. “In the meantime, you have to keep a schedule.”

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Challenge #00591 - A226: Unreliable Witness

“The reactor explodes from something the monkey does.”

Lyr surveyed the damage. “Sir, this is not the fall-out from a reactor.” Indeed, if a reactor had gone off, they would be mopping up the damage and the dead in hazmat suits. But there were no dead. And minimal damage.

The smaller saurian nodded as if in understanding and repeated hir statement. “The reactor explodes from something the monkey does.”

“Fer the fifth time, I only flipped the fookain switch,” objected the ‘monkey’, officially-human creature of magic and mordant self-entertainment. “Correlation isnae causation.”

“The reactor explodes from something the monkey does,” insisted the saurian.

Lyr glared at Shayde. “You didn’t do anything…” meaningful wiggly fingers, “extra… did you?”

“It’s a science fair. I wasnae s’posed tae touch, but— c’mon. A bakin’ soda volcano? How’s a gel tae resist?”

“She did insist on pulling the lever,” testified Rael, “but I detected none of the usual symptoms of her -ah- extra abilities.”

“Mith,” insisted the small Mustaelid. “Mith, it’th my fault, mith. It’th not the ambathador…”

“The reactor explodes from something the monkey does,” this time, the saurian pointed vigorously at Shayde.

“Let’s hear everyone,” said Lyr. “Yes…” she checked the name tag. “Kerrit?”

“It wath me. I didn’t uthe baking thoda for my volcano…”

“Ah…?” Lyr cooed encouragingly. “What did you use?”

“Well… Um. In the cauldera, I had a mixture of water, yeast an’ dish thoap? And the thtuff that got added with the thwitch? It watch hydrogen peroxide…”

Shayde roared laughing. “Aw ye wee ripper! Ye overclocked a bakin’ soda volcano wi’ elephant toothpaste!”

“Okay,” muttered Lyr. “That explains that weird dream…”

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