InterNutter

More about the mentioned-once Captain’s Cup

(Prompt from CallMeGallifreya on Tumblr)

Working with humans was always a rocky path...

Bal'thox watched in confusion as her human captain installed a small heat plate near the Captain's chair. Humans had been all over this ship. Adding insanity upon insanity.

Certainly, some of them worked. Like the gravity generator that was half technology, half cargo cult.

Others mystified. Like the twin, plush representation of six-sided die that now dangled above the main screen. And this. The resting place for the Captain's Cup.

"I do not understand," said Bal'thox. "You purposefully bring an open beverage onto the bridge, and make certain that it is too hot. And you place it on a heating plate to cool down?"

"Exactly," said Captain Blaise. "Top marks, that officer."

"It will not cool rapidly. It will barely cool at all."

"Yes," said the human. "That's the point."

"Is it?" wondered Bal'thox.

Blaise played with one of her short curls. "Well, if it cools down quickly, I'll have to drink it. Then the poor ensign would have to refresh it. And that gives us an entire five minutes without the most sensitive alert system we have. And a lot can happen in five minutes."

Her explanation left Bal'thox completely confused. "A cup of hot liquid is the most sensitive alert system..."

"It knows something's up before anyone else does," Blaise shrugged.

Bal'thox, of course, kept a scientific monitor on the cup's success rate. And was alarmed to note that this particular piece of human superstition was scarily accurate. It could detect trouble up to five minutes in advance of any other instrument or sensory system.

The word about it just went viral from there.

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More about the mentioned-once Captain’s Cup

(Prompt from CallMeGallifreya on Tumblr)

Throughout the Galactic Alliance, one common factor became well known. There is no instrument more sensitive than a cup of hot beverage next to the Captain's chair.

Captain Eloise Fortescue put things together first, and had a habit of keeping a nice, hot, cup of tea by her captain's chair. And of course it helped that humans were the only ones who had gravity generators as standard technology.

Which allowed

http://immaplatypus.tumblr.com/post/128003023050/bethosaurus-sunslammerdown

(Prompt from CallMeGallifreya on Tumblr)

[AN: For those of you who can't be bothered following the link, the text reads as follows:

OP: What if aliens visited Earth during the Jurassic Period, found it to be occupied with a bunch of mean, giant lizards and thought "Well, fuck this planet" and never came back?

1stReply: what if when humans went out into the galaxy all the aliens panicked because if the dinosaurs tiny fur snacks

On the training plane for the Space Shuttle, the gearshift had three setitings: “fly like a plane”, “fly like a brick”, and “fly like the shuttle”. Please note that “brick” was used as an intermediate step between “plane” and “shuttle”

(Prompt from RecklessPrudence on Tumblr)

"Now this," said the human in the tones of someone sharing something delightful, "is old school."

"It looks like a simple re-entry vehicle," Tarb'nathad tapped a wing. "Primitive, yet effective."

"You have 'primitive' right," Kanta, too, had