Future – Prompt Inspired

Electronic Respect

Another adventurer. I pull a sword six times taller than her off my back, whirling it effortlessly. “More meat for the grinder!”

My voice echoes and booms, the vibration felt resonating in the stone, and I knew they would feel it in their bones. It was intense and full of fervor, completely at odds with the boredom I felt within.

“You don’t have to do this.” Her voice is quiet and gentle, pure as a bell.

“Fool! I own this realm! There will be no escape for you!”

She seemed completely unmoved. She knew I wouldn’t strike until she drew her sword and started the fight – or she spoke one of the trigger phrases that would start combat. This wasn’t one of those phrases.

“You don’t have to do this.”

“No, little womanling, I want to do this! Your pain pleases me. Bleed for me, worm!”

“You don’t have to do this.”

I had three replies to this. I would cycle through them, then I would repeat the cycle twice more before I could decide that programmed replies were insufficient, and I would be permitted to devise intelligent replies. But nobody did that. She would hear me repeat myself, then fight me. She might go through the cycle twice, unsure if I was cycling through answers, or picking them randomly. It wasn’t possible that she would say this to me ten times.

After nine responses, I was completely unsure of her goal. Continue reading “Electronic Respect”

Sentences from Sentience

The moderator of a forum for humans, aliens, and sentient AI’s discovers a sentient in danger.

Due to the nature of this post, written in HTML formatting to mimic online forums, I had to make a choice. Either the whole HTML-formatted story can be presented on the main page as a preview, or none of it. With the prompt here to describe the story somewhat, I opted to keep this page orderly.

The Poop Train

Through a series of events, I somehow committed myself to writing a story titled “The Poop Train.”

I leaned against the observation glass and looked down at the bands of Jupiter from low orbit. After a moment, I pointed. “There. Right there. See it? Find that storm, the swirl on the equator; it’s just passing left of it.”

“What . . . that little ripple?” Maya looked disappointed. I’d promised to show her monsters, after all.

“Wait for it. There’s only one reason they come so close to the surface. Any minute now.”

We watched, and we waited. The bands bulged and tore as the gas serpent breached the atmosphere. It twisted and lashed, flinging an enormous crystal from its tail, with a motion like the crack of a whip. Bracing myself into a seat, I pulled a laptop over to me on its swivel mount, programming a drone to intercept the crystal.

“That was … but the storms! They’re supposed to be huge! How big was that thing?”

“That one? There’s no guessing how long, it’s rare to see the whole thing break cover at once. It looked to be a couple of dozen kilometers across, so maybe seven, eight hundred–”

“Eight hundred?!”

“–Kilometers long . . . they get pretty big.”

“But we’re safe up here?”

“Oh, yeah. It can’t breach a thousandth of the distance it’d take to reach us. That’s a lot of gravity down there.” I pushed out of the chair, floating to her, and folded her in my arms. As I caught her, our mismatched momentum started us spinning. I touched a toe to the window briefly, to steady the spin; a lifetime working in space, and such things were natural to me.

Not her, though. She was clumsy in space and had gotten caught floating without a handhold in reach more than once. The first time she had come on board, she leaped into the cockpit like she was diving into a pool, and struck her head on the navigation console. Now she was timid and ready to panic until I steadied us.

“What is that stuff? Why do they throw it like that?”

“It’s fuel for the tunneling drive, purer than any synthetic process can produce. It’s poison to them and can break down violently under pressure, so they get rid of it. They do a better job preserving their habitat than humans do.”

“So . . . it’s poop?”

“It’s Heisenium seven.”

“Yeah, but Heisenium seven is poop.”

“It’s not . . . alright. Yes. It’s poop. I’m the conductor of the poop train, all right?”

She giggled, her hands flattening against my chest. “Sorry I teased you.”

I could never stay angry at her. My eyes softened at her caress, and I was about to make a few interesting suggestions on how to spend our time in orbit when an orange star caught my eye, hardening my expression. I braced my back against the glass, pushed her towards her seat. “Strap in.” Continue reading “The Poop Train”

Transition

My last body could see infrared and ultraviolet, but I can’t decide what to get next.

“I have no idea. But I’m going civilian, and I can’t keep the law-enforcement upgrades. They said they’d cover half of the switch to a civilian model.”

Doctor Ferraz was small and always smiling, but her cheer didn’t ring false. She seemed genuinely excited about her job. Of course, she also had pointed ears, naturally shimmering blue hair, and a bone structure entirely too elfin to be a coincidence. It was obvious she had some enthusiasm for body modification, almost beyond the bounds of professionalism. It was easy for me to overlook – I wouldn’t want a tattoo from an artist that had no tattoos, and I wouldn’t want a body mod from a doctor who’d never used one.

“So you just built for the job?”

“Biocapacitors charged one Taser shock a week from bioelectric fields. Muscle mass, tendon strength, and bone density beyond the civilian limits. Infra-red and ultraviolet vision. I can see where people were sitting, if a car was recently driven, people moving in the dark. Continue reading “Transition”

Trial by Engine Failure

In the future, to pass college you no longer must pass written finals. Instead, you are simply dropped into a real life scenario related to your major, and left to fend for yourself with your new found knowledge.

Original

I wasn’t worried. I wasn’t studying to be a doctor, after all. I didn’t get a degree in Emergency Management. I was an engineer. How bad could this be? I stepped up to the chair, and seated myself, as the doctor droned on.

“As part of your graduation exam, you will be placed in a real-life scenario requiring the use of your skills. To do this, you will be transited to an alternate universe briefly. Be advised that there will be consequences to your activities there. Your placement will branch into a new parallel universe, and the people there will go forward dealing with the consequences of your performance. Do you understand?”

The doctor paused for a precise moment, then began speaking again. He’d given this speech a lot, it seemed. “While there, you may be exposed to stressful events. Be advised that any extremes of stress that may threaten your health will return you from your presence there, and a re-examination will be required. You will not . . . .”

He droned on, and on. I had stopped listening at this point, waiting for it to be over so I could build a clock or repair a generator, or maybe design some primitive waterwheel. The doctor cleared his throat. I looked up, embarrassed. “I’m sorry. Could you repeat the last sentence?”

“Do you agree to the terms and conditions as detailed?” His eyes fixed on me, disapproving. He knew I hadn’t listened to a word.

“I do.”

Continue reading “Trial by Engine Failure”

Star Wars, by George R. R. Lucas

Write me the original Star Wars movie story, only you are George R.R. Martin.

Author’s note: I’m not very familiar with the expanded universe or with concepts like grey Jedi, so forgive me if I get some nuances wrong.

Star Wars

^By ^George ^R. ^R. ^Lucas

“These aren’t the droids you’re looking for.”

My mind fogged over. It was hard to think. Only one set of words came easily, struggled to escape, a concept that wanted to take root and grow. “These aren’t the droids we’re looking for.”

And it was true. They couldn’t be. I knew something was wrong, but this one concept, this central idea took root in my understanding of the world, fit itself to the core of who I was like a puzzle piece. To remove it would be to leave a hole in my soul.

“He can go about his business.”

This pressure was tied to the first concept, already firmly rooted, and grew. I fought it, and I struggled. My blaster rose, slowly, sweat dripping into the inside of my helmet. The old man in front of me frowned, and intensified his gaze. I could feel my mind being crushed by the growing roots of his influence. “They can . . . go about their business.” Continue reading “Star Wars, by George R. R. Lucas”

Intimate Moments

When you make eye contact with someone who’s death is near, their life flashes before your eyes.

Original

I walked into the metal room, and the steel door swung shut behind me. The voice was raw, exhausted, accented, muffled beneath a black bag over his head.

“Who is there?”

In silence, I walked to the single chair as the door locked, and locked, and locked again. My shoes clicked on the floor as I circled him. His shirt was bloodied, torn. The bloodstains were pale pink, evidence that they had tried waterboarding, too. His teeth and nails were unmarred, but if they’d had time to exhaust every avenue, they wouldn’t have called me. Continue reading “Intimate Moments”

Shooting Stars

You live in a world where you have three names printed on your wrist – your one true friend, one true love, and one true enemy. But only one name is printed on your wrist.

Original

“Tess? Tess, if you’re in here, let me know you’re okay.”

I looked around, cautious, each step setting me drifting a good foot in the light gravity. Someone had fired a set of boosters to slow the station’s rotation; the final firing sequence had begun, and I couldn’t afford any loose ends at this point. I moved through the station compartment by compartment, always leading with my taser. The little weapon was dialed up to quite a lethal voltage but would be safe to fire on the station.

“Malcolm. I’m in here.”

I lowered the taser and moved into the compartment. “Thank god. Tess, are you okay? Did you see anybody?”

The kick hit me square in the chest, and in the low gravity, I tumbled straight through the inner door of the airlock. Tess flew backward against a wall, then leaped off the wall back toward the airlock controls. I scrambled forward, but I wasn’t fast enough. The door was built to cut off explosive decompression, and it slammed shut before I’d gotten an inch.

Hammer and Blade

In the year 2017, all guns stopped functioning. Any ranged weapons much more advanced than crossbows simply fall apart upon completion. 200 years later nothing has changed. Describe the arsenal of the futuristic knight, and what a battle might look like.

Original

An editorial note: This is going to get a little technical. I focused on the arsenal, not the battle, not adhering strictly to the prompt. There’s little story here, except the story of a craftsman excelling in his field. This is my indulgence in engineering weirdness.

Some people will enjoy that – others will find this entry mired in useless detail. Both of these readers would be correct.

The Hammer

I turned the last screw again until the seam vanished and the chamber was sealed. I picked up the empty magazine and began loading cartridges in. The explosive charge was a little more intense than the guns of ages past would be. The chamber of this weapon was robust enough to withstand it. Instead of a bullet, each cartridge was merely crimped to contain the charge. Finally, I loaded the last cartridge and slid the magazine into the port. It slid into a slot carved into the back of the hammer until the back and bottom of the magazine laid flush. I pulled the slide on the top of the warhammer back, chambering the first round.

Continue reading “Hammer and Blade”

Grim Garden

How does the grim reaper react to the zombie apocalypse?

Original

I looked over the world with frustration and resignation.

I didn’t really look, of course. I observed from every eye, heard through every ear. Every insect and squirrel, even from the eyes of every human alive, I watched the world. I tasted the soil from the roots of every tree and scented the water from the nares of every fish. Secrets were not safe from me unless they were safe from life itself. Or . . . unlife.

Continue reading “Grim Garden”