Amalgam Universe

A 2271-post collection

Challenge #00434 - A059: One Extraordinary Shift in the Museum of Disturbing Things

1.

No-one was quite sure if the now-almost-constant presence of at least a couple of humans wandering around the Museum of Disturbing Things ooh-ing and aah-ing at the exhibits made things better or worse..

What made the Disturbing Things so disturbing was not only that they existed, but the history that went with them.

Unsurprisingly, the humans had an entire wing. Some were gruesome exhibits from old Terra, like the skull of a man who survived being pierced through it with an iron rod. Some were more modern, like the replica of Andrew Jones’ space armour. The man had defeated ninety-nine planet-eaters. Or an eternally-turning human cookbook compendium, which demonstrated all the unusual, unappetising, or unconventional foods that a human could consume.

And now, almost every day, there were humans in it, too.

Shayde stopped at the diorama of a tyrannosaur menacing a fun-park jeep. “I ain’t seen it, but I’m pretty sure tha’ was a movie.”

“I’ll make certain the staff are notified,” drawled Rael. “Obviously, there’s been some confusion over your realities versus your fictions.” He sighed. “And sometimes, there still is.”

“Cannae help it if we’re good at it.” Shayde pondered the diorama. “This must'a been when we still thought tyrannosaurs were carnivores. And definitely before we figured out they had feathers.”

“Let me guess. You managed to travel back in time and see it in person?”

“Na, nuthin’ like that. I looked it up.”

Of course. Just when he was used to the impossible, she had to use mundane measures on him.

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Challenge #00433 - A058: Registered Toxic Passenger

(unfortunate real-life inspiration time!)

Considering how the aliens react to comparatively non-corrosive/hazardous materials, they must have either gone into DEFCON 1 or completely catatonic the first time a human vomited.

Other humans making sympathetic noises and cleaning up  (*gasp* without even a hazard suit, the horror) while the aliens panic are completely optional

(No wonder the humans are insane, they’re full of hydrochloric acid strong enough to melt their own internal organs)

“We have lost spin,” said

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Challenge #00432 - A057: Arachnaphobia

It took a surprisingly long time for the other cogniscients to realise how much /they/ scared the humans too.

Of course, some got the message more quickly than others

Lo-grav worlds are rarer than high-grav ones. For reasons that become quickly obvious the more one learns of physics and biology.

When low-gravity life evolves, it happens in artificial environments.

Which are also targets for scavengers.

The spider-people of H'nuf'ruf learned of humans through such expeditions. They never saw humans as dangerous, and

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Challenge #00430 - A055: Ballroom Blitz

Everything was going swimmingly until someone pulled out a disco ball.

“The music’s nice and all, but there’s somethin’ missin’.”

“By now, I dare not ask,” deadpanned Rael. “Just accept that whatever it is is most definitely a bad idea and leave things alone for a change.”

“Aaaahh… What sort'a party would it be wi'out a disco ball?”

*

The answer to that question, especially with Meyahndans sharing

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A gentle reminder that all three of these books are available for download at Smashwords. Please buy the ones you can buy? And pick a price...

A gentle reminder that all three of these books are available for download at Smashwords.

Please buy the ones you can buy? And pick a price for One Year of Instants?

My ability to keep my software running kinda depends on sales. I have this way of killing computers…

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Challenge #00426 - A051: When You Meet a Stranger...

K'iiv and Del are adorable, how did they meet/begin their relationship?

K'iiv preened his plumage nervously. He hated meeting new people. All the good advice for conquering social anxiety never, ever worked. It was either completely wrong for the situation or just… completely wrong.

Nevertheless, he attempted to use them anyway.

Going into a situation without a plan was infinitely less preferable than going in with a bad one.

Today’s plan was, picture the stranger without their feathers

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Pugs.

Because you can’t say Peter Lorre and not get my attention.  Something to do with an Uplifted pug or pugs.  Possibly freaking everyone out with their good intentions couched in their minion-ish voices. – weirdlet

(#00422 - A047)

Buddy, Igor knew, was not the best dog for the negotiations table. Buddy would literally say ‘yes’ to anything, provided someone was scratching his ear.

Igor… tried.

He had Buddy fitted up with the Diminished Responsibility locator bracelets, of

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Challenge #00421 - A046: A Peculiar, Yet Typical Argument

If no-one from the future comes back to stop you, is it really that bad an idea?

“Yes it is,” said Rael, gently shoving Ambassador Shayde onwards. “Especially when time travel is a theoretical impossibility trapped in the realms of science fiction.”

“They said tha’ about goin’ tae the moon. Now look at it.”

“That’s not the point and you know it.”

“Ach, why’d ye have tae

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Damn Dame Nature, and Cursed Kismet. Always ready with the sucker-punch. “Two lifesigns in a small vessel with no fuel, limited air,...

Damn Dame Nature, and Cursed Kismet. Always ready with the sucker-punch.

“Two lifesigns in a small vessel with no fuel, limited air, and at least one dying passenger. Initiate Protocol SNAFU.”

Hevun’s Ambassador, now on Smashwords and all good e-bookstores everywhere.

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Challenge #00419 - A044: So Long, Lefty Loosey

It turned out the galactic standard for things that screw onto other things was the opposite direction to the international Earth standard.

“What the– this screw isn’t turning.”

“It’s an old-Earth vessel.”

“Yeah? So?”

“They have it backwards. Counter-clockwise loosens their screws.”

Sigh. “Typical human insanity. How hard is it to learn ‘Counter time, fix it fine’?”

“Given the trouble they keep giving us

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Challenge #00409 - A044: Intergalactic Ambassador Spot

“We’re here to conquer yo-

Awww lookit the cute little fuzzy. Whooosa fuzzy.”

Sir, the aliens seem to have become distracted.

Only humans, they later said, could take a pursuit predator and make it completely servile. And for some time in the Galactic Alliance, it was something of a mystery as to where and when dogs originally hailed from.

Some refused to believe that such a useful animal could come from the same planet as “a bunch

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Challenge #00408 - A043: Releasing Pressure

Carbonated drinks: for most creatures, a harmless fizzy beverage.

However if your species happens to be incapable of burping to release the gas, a painful experience. Perhaps not deadly, but certainly not comfortable. 

Gox stared at the beverage. At the perpetual bubbles within. In his experience, bubbles came out and never came back.

This was one amongst the many new things he was dubious about encountering as a reluctant ambassador.

“Why do the bubbles form?”

“It’s a

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Ma Johnston still cooked for eighteen children. She still quietly wept at the presence of leftovers. There were seventeen children. There...

Ma Johnston still cooked for eighteen children. She still quietly wept at the presence of leftovers. There were seventeen children. There would be eighteen again, of course, but that did not matter to a mothers’ heart. What mattered was the empty chair. The cold bed that didn’t need making. The silly little doll made out of rag and dirt that found its way to her wall of pictures, where it rested on a bump in her wall near Sahra&

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Challenge #00406 - A041: One Sad Afternoon on a Street Corner of NuFurria

Found another one

http://deathcomes4u.tumblr.com/post/73661805922/buggy-heichou-rotking-johnthedragon

Walking was a problem. And it was a problem because of Boxing.

When an owner got tired of their Uplift, or the cute Bull-Terrier/Wolf pup became too big, or it chewed the furniture or peed on things or otherwise acted like a dog who the owner hadn’t bothered to train… they were put in a box, and left on a corner, and told to wait for someone to

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Challenge #00399 - A034: Creative Critiquing

An excellent “non-sequitur, thud”. 8.4, minus a 0.5 because you didn’t faceplant into the convenient messy food. 

When one has a real, live almost-human from Earth’s twentieth century as a resource, one can expect a certain amount of things. Revivals, for instance. Things got dredged up from the extensive lists of entertainment footage in possession of the Archivaas. T-shirts made a comeback when they really should have stayed away.

Disco came back from the

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