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Amalgam Universe

A 2271-post collection

Challenge #01447-C352: The Gratitude of Some People

Two people in danger

[Person #1] has a plan and gets them out of it

[Person #2]: THAT WAS CRAZY AND STUPID AND WE NEARLY DIED!!

[Person #1]: But it worked! -- RecklessPrudence

"We still nearly died!" ranted Mr'kish.

"I made sure we didn't. And, more importantly, I made sure you didn't. The proper words at this point are 'thank you'."

"You used your livesuit as an escape pod. You shot us out a torpedo tube..."

"In my defence, I was aiming for the rescue ship."

"We still have technicians trying to undo your bodge job around us, Dale..."

"Also in my defence, they might not have got my message about letting their Hungry Caterpillar pick us up. My comms are... uh... a little bit toasted."

"They broke in the torpedo tube, didn't they?"

"Enough of your sass, madam, or I'll start calling you 'Mr Kish' again." A sigh. "Yes. They did."

"I told you that re-wiring the comms of your suit was a bad idea, Miss Dale."

Dale scratched her nose. "Yeah, you did. And it was a calculated risk. And now I have to stand here and suffer whilst the techies take apart my work to see how I did it."

"Yeah," cooed Chief Technician Mirrin. "If this looks real good, we'll issue a set of lifesuits where the adaptation is easier."

"And the comms stay intact," added Dale.

"Yeah, probably," agreed Mirrin.

"I'm surrounded by humans," Mr'kesh wailed.

"At least they took my helmet off so you can have fresher air."

"...still tainted by your body odour," she grumbled.

(Muse food remaining: 9. Submit a Prompt! Ask a question! Buy my stories! Or comment below!)

Challenge #01446-C351: Bad Head Day

:Merrily Doing A Thing:

:Pause:

(To myself) "Wait, no. Logic."

:Stops Doing The Thing: -- RecklessPrudence

Brain fog gets to everyone. Even those who do not, strictly speaking, have brains as we know them.

Rael caught himself in early morning lo-cal fog, holding a bread knife over a large cantaloupe. What he had been about to do was unclear but cutting had to be involved.

"This is not right," he told himself. He put the knife down, put the cantaloupe into the

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Challenge #01445-C350: Instruments of Entertainment

Dedicated to the Steam Calliope. -- Anon Guest

Rael was glad that the Archivaas who were going through the Vault of the 20th Century had finally decided to ship confusing items to Amalgam for analysis, rather than making Shayde, and himself, go all the way to it.

This one... seemed to be an unholy mess of pipes on wheels. There was an unseemly grin buttons and platforms that, on a smaller device, might have been piano keys. It had ornate works of

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Challenge #01444-C349: Instruments of War

Bagpipe players. -- Anon Guest

They say that nobody ever sleeps well in hotel rooms. This is true even when one is forced to bring one's own bed. Rael, as a niche species still battling for independence from his creators, did not expect any hotel to have what he called a bed in stock.

Therefore, on the rare occasions that he travelled, he brought along his heated tank with life-monitoring equipment. It was a routine a part of his luggage as toiletries

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Challenge #01443-C348: Mrs Widgery's Guests

Morris Dancers! To the tune of "Mrs Widgery's Lodger". -- Anon Guest

[AN: For anyone wondering what the flying heck - here you go. I apologise in advance for the mental trauma.]

There were white-clad humans wearing bells on their shins. Each one carried a large, white kerchief in each hand. Except for the one of them that was wrestling an accordion into submission.

The ones with the kerchiefs were skipping about, legs ringing, to the slow and grinding tune.

"What are

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Challenge #01440-C345: Trade Agreements

"Are you trying to seduce me!"

"That depends... is it working?" -- OohLookShiny

Zamree sighed. "Mx Frreep... I can see that your plumage is very pretty, but that's not the best way to found a long-term relationship."

"Is trade, is trade," sang Frreep. "Settle business, mate, raise eggs. For good of all."

Oh dear. "Mx Freep... we're incompatible species. The plumbing will not match. Secondly, my kind do not lay eggs. And third, I am life-bonded with another."

Frreep seemed greatly confused,

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Challenge #01438-C343: Paradise is Relative

http://deathcomes4u.tumblr.com/post/153665498898/humans-are-weird

The post: A continuation on the "other planets don't have temperature fluctuations and stuff like earth does" theme including things like humans living on/swimming in volcanic areas, sending humans to the antarctic because drones don't work in the cold, and whenever earthquakes knock everything down building on the same are a again but with better earthquake proofing. -- Anon Guest

[AN: Distracting GIF warning for that link]

Vri'thol was having difficulty with the concept.

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Challenge #01437-C342: Bringing Home Strays

It is common knowledge that humans crave companionship from cats and dogs. But one day the human rescues a pest animal, insisting the creature is their new companion. -- Anon Guest

The human pack-bonding instinct is a strong one. Always be certain that your human isn't bringing unwanted creatures back to your vessel with it. - From Every Cogniscent's Guide to Human Care and Maintenance.

Something in the human's vacation clothes was moving.

"Dee?" warned Kla'kish. "Have you found a pet?" Pet,

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Challenge #01436-C341: Bizarre Reactions

Dinosaurs in zero g -- OohLookShiny

Of all the things evolution in space has wrought, of all the new species discovered in long-abandoned space stations... This one definitely took the cake.

They started as small pterosaurs, and their prey were some kind of bipedal herbivore. Like all saurians, they also had feathers. There was also an ample supply of cockroaches, as well as the plants that had once been in the agri section and had since gone wild.

Everything had gone wild.

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Challenge #01435-C340: Slow Progress

Don't put my ai into something and expect me to be nice to you. -- SeaDragon1012

"Got'cha body," said Gunther, aka call-me-mister-damnit. "Fac'shree sec'nd."

Grammar was still a sticking point. From what she'd seen of the news channels on this planet, a slurring grammar had become normal. Mary let it slide.

"You checked that it was working, right?"

"Yeh, it pass'd full Diag. And it's gotta r'mote thing so y'ull still do the imp'rtant stuff."

Which meant printing him food. Mary had

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Challenge #01434-C339: Pack Bonding is Strange

Someone who doesn't understand all the hoopla over puppies and kittens gets a more unconventional pet and loves it to pieces -- OohLookShiny

I'm not everyone. They say everyone feeds the Skitties on the sly. I don't. They say everyone will say 'hello' to a dog or coo over a kitten or a puppy. I don't.

I mean, sure, they're cute and all, but... I'm just not into them. I've heard all the arguments, by the way.

"Humans are pack animals..." Yeah

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Challenge #01433-C338: Pressing Suit

Courting gifts given in hope of acceptance, they vary from culture to species. -- Knitnan

On the mating rituals of Galactic Species...

As a whole, the mating habits of Galactic Society are so wide and varied that one may be excused for missing the signals of another. For example, most species gift food to their desired mate, but the solitary and territorial B'la'b'lankh sing[1] for their mates.

To the Vigin, a food-gift of meat is the deadliest of insults, while to

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Challenge #01432-C337: Very Wrong Number

Phone numbers and... unxpected... results. Your choice, the FBI story, the Red Phone story, both in one, or one of both. -- RecklessPrudence

Not many people called her on the comms. Even Rael was satisfied by sending her Pings. Text messages somewhere between chats and emails, as she understood it. Some methods of communication had homogenised since the eighties.

Phones were the biggest. She didn't have a phone as she knew it. The closest she had to a phone was a set,

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Challenge #01428-C333: Educational Amusement

A bird prompt for the Numidids: The story of Kevin-the-deathworlder and the deathworlder bird. (Even their birds are brutal!) -- RecklessPrudence

"...and even... photographers."

The scene cut to a camera-wielding human cautiously pursuing a Killdeer plover doing its broken-wing act. He was making soothing cooing noises, but they were clearly not working.

The person behind the camera was giggling.

The bird floundered aimlessly around as the photographer attempted to capture it without hurting it.

After a total of five failed attempts to

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Challenge #01427-C332: Illegal Saviors

Someone going through human archives, and they find this story and the key phrase of it:

"It may be ‘illegal’, but those who risk their liberty to ~save the world~ should never be reprimanded, no matter what those in power say." -- RecklessPrudence

When the people of Pre-Space Planetary System #J4N3T-111811260516 finally get into Galactic Society, they'll find some funny things in the archives. If they go looking.

My name is Leon. And technically? I'm a criminal.

GalStands&Legs - that's

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