Challenge #00602 - A237: Don’t Panic!

“I’m not panicking, I’m watching you panic. It’s more entertaining.”

This was the first time she’d been locked in a room with a human. While it did bring people watching to new and increasingly intimate levels, it did rather limit the options, should said human start lashing out.

As it was, this one seemed to like saying ‘okay’ a lot.

“Okay… Oh….kay. Okay, okay, okay. Okay. Okayokayokayokayokayokay… Ooooohhhhhhh… Kay. Okay. I can handle this. I’m okay. Okay.” The human seemed to notice Jaka for the first time and said, “It’s goin’ tae be all righ’. No need tae panic…”

“I am not engaged in activity - panic,” said Jaka. “I am much more entertained by your panic.”

“Glad I can help,” said the human. “I go by Shayde.”

“Jaka,” said Jaka, shaking her hand. She was trembling. “Are you feeling cold? I am assured this is optimal temperature.”

“Aye, it’s that.” jiggle jiggle jiggle. “I don’t like small rooms. I really don’t like small rooms.” She dropped to a whisper so she could mutter, “…keepittogether, keepittogether, keepittogether…”

“This is unusual, so far from Sol.”

“No’ me fault. Bunch'a reet bastards dropped me off in here. Cannae go for’d… cannae go back… in more ways than one. I’m sorta kind'a a little bit stook. An’ na ’m stook werse.”

Jaka took off her info viewer and put it on display mode. “Here is map of service crews. They are coming to fix the problem. See? All little orange dot. Friendly orange dot. Friendly red dot, also. Coming to help. They has excellent sedative for you. Fun sleep.”

Shayde’s obsidian nail picked out a rainbow dot. “And one JOAT on me side. Ee! 'E’s gone in tae the vents. Poor bugger’d have tae shapeshift. I’m no likin’ this bill…”

“I’ll accept payment in baked goods,” said an almost-cat inside the ventilation grille. It carried a plastic blow pipe.

“Rael! Aw yer a sight fer sore eyes. This is Jaka. She’s nice.”

“Stop trying to fix me up with a date and let me have a clear shot at your jugular.”

“Don’t tell me… repairs are goin’ tae take more'n a bitty while.”

“Hours,” said Rael, readying the blow pipe.

Shayde pulled aside her hair. “Stand back. I go down like a brick.”

If Jaka had one complaint, it was that the human was not allowed to panic for longer. Hours in a dim veet, watching a human sleep were not as fun as the minutes watching her fear reactions.

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Challenge #00601 - A236:

“The point is, you haven’t let the lack of Seconds stop you. Or the rules. Or respect for reality, as far as I can tell.”

Shayde still wore Public Property Grey, but this time, her footwear was a pair of Hazard Yellow thongs. Indicating that she was both off-duty, and a potential danger to the public. Someone had given her a silver fan brooch, indicating that she was also offensive without training.

“I take it you’ve been freed,” said Rael in the tones of mock-optimism usually reserved for five-year-olds who ‘found’ puppies.

“Oh aye. Turns out, reliable information’s a hot ticket. I could make a mint buskin’ if I had me axe. Or wi’ info services if I had a comm link. Or an account. I could find a bunk if I had the Hours…” she fished in her pockets and bought out two Second coins. “I got two Seconds, the clothes on me back, the knowledge in me head, and a number of things in pocket dimensions nobody’d bother sneezin’ on.”

Rael thought back on the past two weeks of her incarceration. “The difference now is, you’re a free agent. You can do anything you like.”

“Aye. Wi’ nowt tae invest. I’m skint, homeless, and buggered. What next?”

“There’s always the Free Listings. Anything you can get for free…”

“Is worth exac'ly woh ye pay for it. D'ruther pay sweat equity. Least then I know it’s worth sommat…”

“You can also find those on the Free Listings.” He sighed. “Look. I’ve known you for all of two weeks and in that time, I’ve never seen anything stop you. Not a lack of money. Not any of the rules. Not even reality, in so far as I can tell… Stop looking at what’s missing and work with whatever you can get. There’s plenty of real estate that requires fixing up.”

“Reckon you could find a good one in two seconds?” she rattled her change.

He took the money. “I found it while you were busy being miserable. It’s in a forgotten area near the dry dock end. We’ll take the free transits.”

“…worth exactly what ye pay fer 'em…” Shayde mumbled.

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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 #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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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 #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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Challenge #00590 - A225: It’s ALIVE! …and Needs Counselling…

“What’s that? You say my creation is currently nigh unstopable and wants me dead? SUCCESS! It can move, self determine goals and figure out how to accomplish them! Now all I need is to figure out this sanity thing.”

“Master,” slurred Igor. “I don’t think you understand the severity of the problem…”

“Well, yes, there are a few little problems to iron out, but nothing a little careful negotiation can’t solve.”

“Master!”

“Yes, yes, I heard the ‘nigh unstoppable’ part. The key is 'nigh’. That means something can stop it. I’m going to need a megaphone, a jetpack, and an emergency set of retractable glider wings.”

“Master?”

“Just because I’m a mad scientist doesn’t mean I’m completely insane, Igor. I’m willing to negotiate, but I’ll have to do so from a safe distance. And that requires planning. Ooooh! And about three gallons of chamomile tea!”

“…chamomile… tea… Master?”

“Well we do want my creature to calm down, Igor. I’m perfectly willing to fix whatever it views as wrong or erroneous, but negotiating from a calm centre is advised. Poor little dear’s very likely to be upset…”

“Little? It’s nine feet tall, Master…”

“Little in terms of experience. It’s just seven hours old. Being upset with the universe is to be expected. Start brewing the chamomile!”

Sigh. “Yeeeessss, Master.”

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Beware the Creatures of the Night…they have Lawyers!

Lawsuits filed by supernatural beings. Bonus points for mentioning Wolff and Byrd!

(#00589 - A224)

“All rise.”

Lou Pine looked meek and mild at the defendant’s bench. Bracketed on one side by a tall woman with distinctive white hair, and on the other by a small man of seemingly permanent nonchalance. Noth lawyers seemed very happy to be defending miss Pine.

“Your honour, this is a blatant case of harassment,” began Ms Wolff. “The local police know miss Pine has a prescription for Wolfsbane on a medical concession she won in this court just last year. The police continue to harass her and stop and frisk her more regularly than any other citizen of that neighbourhood.”

“We have evidence to back that up,” added Byrd.

“It’s clear that the police want to start trouble with Miss Pine simply because of her medical condition.”

“Which is–?” prompted the judge.

“Lycanthropy, your honour.”

The judge made a little groaning noise and muttered, “…I thought this was one of the normal ones…”

“May we approach, your honour?”

“What’s going on?” whispered Miss Pine.

“I’m very sorry,” murmured Mr Byrd. “But it looks like we might have to present this case in front of another judge. Prejudice and all that.”

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