Challenge #00334: The first Christmas in Space

Someone has set up a little model nativity scene, and then has to explain to the others “why they are sacrificing that baby to the animals”

The ships’ human had set up a small altar in their assigned space. There was a small pine tree (live) that had been stasis-shipped from Britania. There was assorted sparkly lights, a metallic plastic substance referred to as ‘tinfoil’ and numerous spheroids hung about the little branches.

The saurians who were the rest of the crew observed in shifts. Everything the human did was recorded out of understandable paranoia, of course, but watching it happen in person was part of the experience.

When the human was done with the tree - not very many leaves showed through by the time she was done - she began on another strange ritual.

It was a diorama, they were certain of that. The scene was contained - more or less - in an effigy of a wooden hut. Sheep, cows, goats, chickens, a horse and a dog turned the hut into a barn.

There was a human figure with wings. Enquiry revealed it was an angel. A divine figure of some bizarre human theism. And they were all bizarre.

There were other humans in strange garb. Three very ornate ones were the 'wise men’. A man and a woman in simpler robes were called 'Mary’ and 'Joseph’.

It was the centerpiece of the diorama that caused shock and alarm. The tiny figure of an infant, lain in a sacrificial bowl.

It took days of explaining for the human to help them understand that it was not a scene of sacrifice, but one of celebration. There was a lot of singing involved. And three documentaries. And five story-books.

The human, by the end of it, didn’t want to get started on Santa Claus.

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Challenge #00333: Look at This Photograph…

That’s what chilled me most about the picture when I saw it again, when I really got a good look the second time. Without that single detail, it could’ve really been perfectly ordinary, like any other plain old image taken a million times by a million other people. It looked so deceptively normal except for the one thing that could never, ever be normal. – Josh

It was blurry, but the eye could make out what appeared to be a white man in a suit and tie. He had no hat. He had no hands.

And he had no face.

Not even the blur of a face.

Just a white, shiny orb that took the place of a head to the casual observer.

But I knew what to look for, now. That figure had been in the background of every photograph since I turned eighteen. Every casual photograph I was in… he was there, too.

I lined them up, once, in chronological order. Put them together as a gif.

That figure’s been slowly advancing on me for twenty years.

And he’s almost caught up.

Even though he’s over my shoulder, he’s still blurry. You still can’t make out a face. But you can see that he doesn’t have hands. He has talons.

I can control the photos people I know take of me. They pass it off as vanity. Not wanting a record of my aging. They laugh. But I can’t control the photos people take… that have me in there.

I don’t know if he’s in those. They are photos taken by strangers.

And every now and again, there’s this urge. The need to take just one selfie.

To see how close he is now.

But there’s also the knowledge that that selfie may well be my last.

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Challenge #00332: Wark

Someone has been crammed into a penguin suit, protesting or not, and wow does it look good on them

The last thing he remembered was a voice demanding, “FORMAL ATTIRE IS MANDATORY,” before the minions descended.

He missed his JOAT coat the most. At least the shoes were marginally serviceable. Too shiny and too thin, but they could do in a pinch.

The pants were completely wrong. Black was not his colour. He was anti-religious. The white waistcoat fit his skill with languages, but… there was too much white. And not enough engineering blue.

And the trailing lengths of fabric hanging down the back were a mystery.

The minions shoved him through a door and vanished.

It was a ballroom. Dating from around the Nineteenth Century, according to his best guess.

Someone wolf-whistled.

He knew that whistle.

Shayde was elegantly decked out in ancient frou-frou in her usual tones of gold, white and grey. “I’d hazard a guess that our host knows some style,” she grinned. “Penguin looks good on ye.”

“I see they managed to restrain your hair,” noted Rael, valiantly attempting to ignore the effect the dress. “We must obtain the technology for civilization.”

“It’s called loads of hairspray.” Shayde grinned as music started to play. “Looks like this bubble’s going tae be easy to pop. Shall we dance?”

“What do you mean, ‘penguin looks good on me’?”

“Suit an’ tails. Penguin suit.”

He caught his reflection. Even with his blue-ish skin, he did look a bit… penguin-ish.

“Wark,” he growled.

“Aw shut it. At least your legs ain’t covered in petticoats.”

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Challenge #00331: Unexpectedly Useful

“What a good thing you had all those clockwork ducks”

[AN: Your Girl Genius fandom is showing. And so is mine, because I know exactly where that line came from]

Rael peeked through the one hole in the barrier that let him see without being seen.

“Okay,” he recapped. “They’ve got our ship surrounded. They’re armed to the teeth. And there’s hundreds of them. And only two of us.”

Shayde was checking her Pockets. Not the ones in her clothes, but the tiny entrances to pocket realities where she kept an impossible array of articles which she simply summed up as “me shit”.

Rael watched the soldiers rather than watching Shayde’s hands dip out of reality. “We’re already in a lot of trouble, just being here. You’re not going to cause any of your famous collateral damage, are you?”

“No’ if I can help it. They’re jus’ folks doin’ their job. Better tae distract them.”

That was less reassuring than she hoped it was. “Not one of your epic distractions?”

“Ha! Got it. Just the thing.”

Rael stared at the box in her hands. “Clockwork ducks?”

“Start windin’.”

*

This was not your average clockwork duck, that spasmed erratically for ten minutes, falling over in the process mere millimeters from where they started. These were the sort of clockwork ducks DaVinci would make if he had the patience to do more than one.

They walked. They quacked. They randomly pecked at the ground. They roamed in stately grace in directions of their own choosing.

Shayde timed it so that the next duck was released just after most of the attention was on its previous copper sibling.

And, just like the obligatory stupid guards of Shayde’s old-time adventures - the guards wandered off after the ducks. Rael watched in stunned amazement as it worked like a charm.

“It shouldn’t work. It’s beyond stupid…”

“If it’s stupid and it works, then it ain’t stupid,” Shayde released the last duck, grabbed his arm, and bolted for their ship.

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Challenge #00330: Fool Me Twice

Friends help you move, real friends help you move bodies.

[TW: Rape, violence]

“Ari, what the shit?”

“I told him. I warned him. I said. You heard. I said. I told him. I’d survived one. I escaped two. I told him. Never again.”

There was no doubt she’d been defending herself. The RapeX was still clinging to his shriveling and bleeding member. Ari bore the bloody evidence of a struggle. She clung with a white-knuckled grip to the kitty-cat key ring that had very obviously been used to stab her attacker multiple times.

Were it anyone else on the floor… there wouldn’t be a problem.

Except this was the high-note senator who had championed Shelters For Survivors. Who used the cause of ending rape in all its forms to gain the women’s vote.

Ari had got in a lucky shot to his neck.

He’d bled out before he could kill her.

Ari was going into PTSD tremors. She got between her and the body. Blocked her sight. “You did good. You survived again. He only got it in once, right?”

Ari nodded.

She didn’t question that Ari wore the RapeX all the time. After the first encounter, it had been her best friend. After the second time… her security blanket. After the third… well… Ari knew and kept all the legal concealed weapons that a person could own.

Senator Whyte had used her story. He knew it. How the hell he thought he could get away with trying something on her and then ignoring every ‘no’ that must have come out of her mouth… was a mystery for the ages.

And then his wife walked in.

“John,” she sighed, “you stupid piece of shit.”

Well. Someone said it.

Pauscha Whyte bit her bottom lip, then turned around and locked the door behind her. “Right. We all know the press would never let this rest until Ari was in jail. They’d hound her to suicide. So. My stupid-ass husband has had a sudden illness. We’re going to sequester ourselves in our private resort for his health. I have lookalikes for the paparazzi. We can fake a gradual decline. Help me with the desk.”

She leaped to action. Shifting the desk away from the rug. Helping Pauscha wrap the rug around the body and, when necessary, gently steering Ari out of the way.

Then she and Pauscha shuffled the body in its rug into the panic room and the freezer therein.

Senator John Whyte insisted on panic rooms. In case his life was in danger. He didn’t think for one second that a paranoid survivor could be any kind of hazard.

Stupid shit.

Pauscha called a lookalike, also called John. “Remember that thing you warned me about? I owe you a box of doughnuts. We need you in here with a big cup of chamomile. Yeah. Ari. There’s still a spot on the carpet.”

She was busy scrubbing it out when the other John arrived. He came bearing tea, a fresh suit, makeup and a squirt bottle with a lable that read Wet Spotter.

She got the tea off John and gave it to Ari. The last thing she needed was someone who looked a hell of a lot like John Whyte in her field of view. What she needed was time apart from the world, therapy, and someone special to help her feel safe.

She and Pauscha would get Ari out. And put up enough of a smokescreen to make sure that murder was not on the menu.

Only once everything was set up and the press was watching the other John lying around in a private retreat… they’d come back and make certain his body was ready for the state funeral following his inevitable demise.

That was what friends were for.

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Challenge #00329: Old Wars, New Combattants

Getting inventive with the dress code

There is a Galactic adage: if you want something done, tell a human it’s impossible.

Kasib Campbell had purchased the JOAT conglomerate and decided to begin bringing order to the naturally chaotic JOATs at Amalgam Station.

Shayde, somehow always by his side, was seething. She’d tried to warn him, and he’d dismissed it as one of her many mental disorders. But, right now, in this room, a Campbell had come to turn their world upside down.

“You are all professionals,” said Campbell. “But when I look at you, I do not see professionals. I see a discordant spectrum of loose cannons and that image. Must. Change.”

The big screen showed a rotating average humanoid in a work unitard and a coat. The unitard and majority of the coat were Engineering Blue. The shoulders and sleeves displayed a regulated rainbow with the colors lined up neatly and symmetrically as they marched through the majority of disciplines.

Rael could tell that all of the JOATs hated it on sight.

“Since the majority of JOATs are Engineers, the engineer design is the default. If your discipline is different…” the image’s main colour flipped through some popular ones. Medical red. Services orange. Food Prep yellow. “A more readable uniform is available for you. A copy of the dress code has been sent to your inboxes. Be in your uniforms by assembly tomorrow. There will be penalties for deviations from the dress code, and the assembly rules.”

*

“Aw fook that,” Shayde said for the umpty-fifth time. They’d retreated to her Ambassadorial office to absorb the enormity of the change. “Anal retentive, OCD, pick-ass fookain CAMPBELL! Get this. We have tae assemble in alphabetical order. No more chummin’ wi’ yer pals or neighbours. No talkin’ in assembly. No food. Is he mad? Those meetin’s go on fer ages. No knittin’?”

Oh, that had to be some variety of a last straw. JOATs measured how long an assembly went by how many people were doing something with yarn. Rael was going through the minutia of the dress code while Shayde pored through the code of conduct.

Aha. A loophole. If anyone knew how to exploit it, Shayde would. “It says here, Small articles of individual heritage are permitted to be displayed on the uniform, so long as they don’t exceed two articles per individual.”

Shayde slowly grew her Ominous Grin of Doom. “Ooh aye, that’ll do nicely. Very nicely indeed.”

“Do you need help shopping?”

“And risk ye stoppin’ me?”

*

The JOATs were not happy. The uniform did nothing to flatter any body type and was equally ugly on everyone.

Shayde marched up to him and determinedly stood by his side.

“What are you doing here? The esses are on the next row.”

“Aye. I want tae be noticed.”

“What are you wearing?”

She pointed at the simple decoration keeping most of her hair in order, “Sioux hair decoration, adequate fer me station,” and then to the cloth wrapped diagonally around her torso. “Clan MacDonald war tartan.”

The Campbells, Rael recalled from ancient Terran history, used to have a long-standing war with the MacDonalds. And nobody held a grudge like the Scots.

Kasib Campbell mounted the dias like any dictator proud of their work. Peered down his nose at the rigid ranks of JOATs until he spotted the one person where they didn’t belong.

“You are out of order,” he said. The screen behind him picked Shayde out. Highlighted her for all to see.

“What are you going to do about it, Campbell?” she demanded in perfect Old Doric.

Blink. Something… changed.

Shayde had a natural affinity for altering reality on a temporary basis. Most of the time, she could control it.

This time, he wasn’t certain that she had.

Now they were standing on a fog-wreathed moor amidst the stench of blood and woad and sweat. Shayde at the head of ranks upon ranks of pissed-off JOATs, Rael at her side.

…the weight of a battle-axe and a shield in his arms…

…the feel of a tartan across his shoulder…

…the distant sound of bagpipes…

And Campbell, alone, opposite them all.

Here and now, in this instant, they were all MacDonalds after the blood of their ancient enemy.

Campbell went stone white.

Blink.

Everyone was back where they were as if nothing had happened. All that was left was the lingering miasma of bloodlust. Hanging in the air like the Cheshire Cat’s smile, only far more malevolent.

Kasib Campbell had wet himself.

Anger turned to laughter. Thousands of JOATs gave voice to their mirth.

Campbell fled the stage. The station. And then any notion of organizing the JOATs at all. Rarely to be heard from again.

It was surprisingly easy to gain permission for the bonfire to burn the hated uniforms.

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Challenge #00328: …and Wherefores

Gil took longer than most children to grow out of the “why?” stage (either Klaus or Von Pinn dealing with him at that age, you pick, I just want to see toddler!Gil and hilarity)

It was a little celebration amongst the rigger rats. They called it Family Day, and used it to remember the people they had left behind. Gil enjoyed the stories the others told but, when it came to his turn, his joyful mood fell to ash.

“I don’t have a family,” he confessed. “I don’t know where my home is.”

The others laughed at him. He ran away.

Von Pinn found him in the Escape Rig hangar, hiding between the emergency supplies and the mammoth baits. She reacted to his tears the way she reacted to anything outside of her field of order. With anger.

“Who harmed you?”

Gil automatically unfolded to show a lack of injuries. “They jus’ laughed at me, m’m,” he quavered. “Why don’t I have a family?”

“You do have a family,” Von Pin soothed. Or the closest thing she could get to ‘soothed’. “They are just… not here. Come along, this is a dangerous area.”

“Why?”

“Child, you are sitting next to poison in an area full of flying machines, with a door that leads to a five-thousand-foot drop. Which one of these features escaped your notice?”

“No, why is my family not here?”

Von Pinn picked him up by his suspenders and carried him at arm’s length. “Because they are located elsewhere.”

“Why?”

“Because they could not be here.”

“Why?”

“For your safety.”

“Why?”

Von Pinn tutted and rolled her eyes. “Young master Gil, are you asking to know or are you asking to annoy?”

“I wanna know. Where are they? Why aren’t they here? How can I be safe if I don’t have a mama or a papa? Who am I?”

“I give you leave to come to me after bedtime. I will tell you then.”

“Why?”

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Challenge #00327: A Gru-some Predicament

The minions have unionized and gone on strike

[AN: I just fell over backwards in the bathroom and did something horrible to my right arm. This fillet is being typed left-handed LIKE A BOSS. PS: it’s not broken, but it hurts like fuck]

“DE BA DO! DE BA DO!” the minions chanted, marching in circles in the underground complex that was both their workplace and their home. They carried placards with their grievances.

Alas, they were written in minionese.

“Gu ba de nuka se?” read Lucy.

Gru glared at her. “This is your fault. All your ’freedom’ and ’inalienable rights’… Now they are all wanting the upstairs bedrooms.”

“You can read that?”

“Of course I can read that. I created each and every one of them. I know them like back of my hand.” He sighed. “I just can’t afford what they want. Being hero is not so good on the budget.”

“So move into my place.”

“What, that tiny little flat in city? We’d never fit.”

“Not my cover-place, silly. My secret base place.” Lucy grinned. “I have an island…”

“You have island? How you manage island on hero salary?”

“Oh, some king gave it to me, one time. Want to see?”

Gru got puppy-eyes. “Does it have volcano? I have always dreamed of having villain base on volcano…”

“But you’re a hero.”

“I still have needs!”

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Challenge #00326: Metrics

“This homework has an unacceptably high cussing: work done ratio.”

Going to college was an eye-opening experience. Katie had seen the world, but little was more fascinating than white kids trying to be individuals when their own sphere of experience was very sadly limited.

The fact that she had become a kind of instant guru in her dorm because of her experiences was one shocker. The fact that someone had mistaken ‘in college’ for 'of age’ was a surprise to that someone - and so was the knowledge that Katie had picked up some very interesting self-defense skills.

And she’d shattered a few Granola Girls’ dreams about being one with nature with a few home truths about getting back to it.

But that had almost settled, now.

Janice watched Katie as she carefully wrote two versions of her assignment. One for Hackmeyer, which justified his erroneous grasp of physics, and one for herself, which shredded his theories into a fine dust.

“Tough night?’

"Oh aye,” said Katie. “This one’s got a high swearin’ tae accomplishment ratio.”

“I thought Hackmeyer was this brilliant physics wonderkind…”

“He was, once upon a time. The understanding of the universe has changed since his theories were world-changin’…. And in order tae fookain pass, I have tae back 'em up wi’ his own bullshit.”

“And that’s why the swear jar is getting full,” noted Janice.

“Aye. Me only problem’s gonna be not handing in my version.”

Janice watched Katie’s hand jink between notebooks. “Do you keep your versions?”

“Aye, of course I do.”

“Maybe… you should send them to someone.”

“And who’d listen to a fifteen-year-old girl?” she shrugged. Her mind may be sharp enough to get her into college young, but after that, people judged the age and the breasts first.

Janice shook her head. “Jesus. I keep forgetting you’re a kid. And Hackmeyer gropes you?”

“Accidentally-on-purpose, aye. Nobody’s doing anything 'cause of tenure.”

“Fuck,” Janice got up and put a quarter into the jar. “I’m glad I’m just doing medicine. You physicists have it rough.”

“Try bein’ a guy nurse sometime.”

“I said I stopped giving him trouble,” Janice twiddled with her hair. “I guess it’s the same everywhere. Go where you’re not expected and you catch trouble from the people who don’t expect you to stay.”

“Then it’s up to us to wake others up on occasion, aye?” Katie put her pen down and stretched. In the process of getting up, she stuffed a ten dollar note into the jar. “Fer me sins.” She toured the common room, smacking her butt to bring life back into it. “The more people as wake up and stop bein’ nasty… the better off we’ll get.”

Janice was staring out the window. “If anything happens? Like, if Hackmeyer happens to you or something? I’m gonna take your 'beta versions’ and try to publish them. The world needs to know.”

“The world probably won’t care,” sighed Katie.

“I’m still doing it,” said Janice.

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Challenge #00325: The Unnypical

I’m tired of villains being the only representation of people who aren’t 100% mentally typical.  Show me a hero coming out as having anxiety disorder/depression/Asperger’s/something (I know not all of those are equal but you get my drift).  Show me a place in heroics for people like me, that isn’t either as a villain or locked up in an asylum, or both. (Marvelverse or DCverse would be awesome

[AN: Attempting to do this while also staying away from the Magic Cripple trope]

There are fine lines between ‘mild-mannered’ and 'antisocial’. And why not be antisocial. All my attempts to be social resulted in infamy, ignominy and just outright humiliation.

It took me a very long time to learn how to seem normal. It took me longer to even want to. I had to, and there is a gulf of difference between having to and wanting to do anything.

Normal is cruel. And I could never bring myself to be cruel to anyone. Not on purpose.

Normal is self-centered. But in order to understand this, I had to step out of my own head and imagine what it must be like. I just can’t be normal, there.

Normal doesn’t care if the wrong amount of pressure can hurt someone else. I had to care about that since puberty.

I don’t know how or why it happened, but it did. I’m one of the very many supers out there who can fly and are strong and are almost invulnerable.

Nobody sees where I come from because Normal doesn’t pay attention. They ignore the weirdo on the train with the rainbow stockings. Or on the street. Or -youknow- anywhere.

All I gotta do to go from weirdo-on-the-street to The Unnypical is take off the big coat that helps the Normals not bother me… and after that, they’re all looking at the silver dress and the rainbow stockings and the combat boots.

It took me a while and I really don’t wanna hurt your feelings and that? But Normal is also kind-of stupid.

I asked Nightcrawler about it, once. How he can get away with not using the image inducer if he just puts on a hoodie and keeps his hands in his pockets. I mean, he doesn’t even hide the tail! And his shoes have to be made special.

He just said, “People don’t look that far down. Usually.”

I’ve lost count of the crimes I stopped just because I saw things other people would miss. I had to learn to wait until things actually started to happen, though. You can’t arrest folks for attempted crimes.

Well, most of them. Murder’s the big exception. Of course.

Oh, and don’t look at me about the name. That’s the news at work. They had no real name for me and 'eyesore’ doesn’t sell papers or get an audience for CNN or whatever. Someone analyzed my voice patterns or something during a fight? And they said I wasn’t nypical and it sorta stuck.

It’s way better than some of the things I get called.

Normal is cruel.

It’s why I hang out with all of the visible mutants. They get it. They get me. Sure, some of them think I’m 'slumming’ just because I can scrub up okay, but then we get talking and… well… they know I’m not 'slumming’.

Normal came up with 'slumming’.

But Normal also came up with heroes. And helping folks because it’s the right thing to do. And learning about things. And social justice.

It’s why I gotta keep being nice. It’s why I have to be the hero. It’s why I want to be the hero.

Because someone has to teach the Normals how to be good.

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