@VisualInspiration
Eight years late, Ferris Gawalkow returned to Earth. The logfiles didn’t report anything special from orbiting Uranus obviously without using any oxygen, water or energy. The pilot himself couldn’t tell what he had done or what he had seen. He didn’t tell about slipping through spacetime and entering the Nandaii system, about making contact with the Fisaf, a peaceful and advanced cicilization of shapeshifters. He didn’t say a word about falling in love with A’Galsig and living with him for quite a time. He didn’t report being shown around on the Fisaf’s homeworld and seeing fantastic garden-like cities. He didn’t talk about their culture that had no word for possession at all and was founded on absolute respect for every individual. And he didn’t tell that he asked them to wipe his memory before they brought him back.
A’Galsig himself did it with just a spell and he made good job of it.
When Gawalkow returned, he had forgotten everything of the voyage. He didn’t know why he was aboard a spaceship or that he was an astronaut at all, so, traveling back to Earth for six months, locked in a narrow vessel, seriously traumatized him. The rest was done by the authorities’ efforts to find information in his dreams, later in his head. They tried it with hypnosis, neuroleptica, narcotics, electroconvulsive therapy, finally with brain surgery. He died in a mental hospital four months after his return. #writingprompt #microfiction #scifi
@VisualInspiration
I'm an Earth-head. Always have been. So 40 years ago I figured I'd try to trade with them, maybe score a Walkman. I painted the saucer like one of their shuttles and snuck into their spaceport.
As soon as I landed, they came boiling out, and they looked mad. I jumped back in and took off. Then I realized I'd dropped my phone.
Today I see a native on a phone that looks like mine. I guess they reverse-engineered it. I sure hope they don't figure out the AI part. #MicroFiction
La mère Rochon détestait les mômes, qui le lui rendaient bien. Elle les tracassait sans fin aux abords de l'immeuble. Lorsqu'elle aperçut Djézon en trottinette électrique, la harpie l'invectiva vertement, cherchant à le stopper.
Le Barbu viendra te prendre, graine de vaurien !
Djézon lui balança un coup de pied au tibia et s'enfuit de toute la puissance de son engin, non sans avoir jeté à la sorcière dépitée un retentissant "Gloire à Satan !" qui la laissa coite.
Hi folks, a periodic reminder that if you enjoy my daily #PowerOnStoryToot#MicroFiction posts, you are invited to consider enabling my bullshit with more coffee via https://ko-fi.com/unixbigot , and—special guest offer, this month¹ only!—perhaps assist with these current not-covered-by-insurance medical expenses.
It’s a /little/ bit harder than reverse-parallel parking, but once you learn to complex-park by rotating your car at 90 degrees to reality, you can park pretty much anywhere you like. Just be really careful to remember where. And stay out of the Mandelbrot set!
@VisualInspiration
Rudiger Kaminski, master puppeteer, lost his right arm in an accident. Luckyly his insurance was willing to pay for a transplant. So he got an arm from a wrestler. It was way to blunt and clumsy and Rudiger had it removed. His second replacement arm came from a mechanic. It was flexible and seemed perfect for puppeteering, but Rudiger noticed a lack of inspiration from the moment he woke up from surgery. He had it replaced with an eletrco-mechanical model. Finally, five years after the accident, he was able to work in his profession. The Kaminski Theater opened its curtains again.
Two weeks later, he died of a nervous disfunction of his immune system. But he left the world smiling.
The robot arm kept performing puppet shows and became director of the Theater, later the CEO of Kaminski Media, that we are now celebrating as #1 - world's leading entertainment company. Ladies and Gentlemen, raise your glass to the memory of Rudiger Kaminski. #microfiction #writingprompt #robotics
The human child decided not to tease their fish-tailed pal, and instead talked about marbles and their mutual love of turtles and pizza.
Decades later, the human had to admit that the siren looked so happy atop the firetruck she was assigned to, screaming her lungs out as they raced towards a blaze.
Angelo allait acheter des vêtements à reculons, une fois tous les quatre ou cinq ans. Il entrait dans la boutique, parcourait les rayons au pas de course, glanant un article ici ou là, puis payait et sortait avant d'être trop oppressé. A chaque fois il se retrouvait avec des pantalons gris, et des sweats à capuche avec en fait de poches une sorte de sac sur le devant.
I don’t know when I stopped breathing. I first noticed yesterday when I climbed the stone stairs leading up to the pedestrian overpass near post office square. I wasn’t panting in the slightest. I can breathe if I want to, and obviously I need to for talking, but otherwise the nanopores pull oxygen right through my skin.
I’m gonna get in so much trouble if the lab finds out I’ve been contaminated.
No, Doc, just kidding. Looks like space science, rocketry or so.
Can you read my some titles?
Er, no. Cryptical letters. Are these Chinese… ouch! What are you doing.
Only adjusting some params. How is it now?
Well, yeah, better. But I don’t understand anything yet. Tri-Lipi-what? Can you make me understand that stuff? Would be great, me a rocket scientist! Hihi…
Keep serious, man!
But you wired my brain to that machine, stimulating my neurologicacacack sweestymama Aiiiooh-gnarp-gnarp. Knairidoodlewagabbimucha trullaroo… What did you do.
Adjusting again. Better now?
Slightly.
What did you say?
You don’t want to know. Hey, the mags have gone. They’re apples now.
Really?
No kidding, Doc.
Try to grab one.
Can’t. I have no hands either.
What?
One is a screwdriver, the other a…broccoli?
Oh no! Try this.
Ooooh-oh! That’s funny! More of this, please.
Wait, I have an idea.
Tell me.
People would pay more to take a science mag for porn than the other way. Let’s try this out…
Erwann avait fait un rêve enchanteur, dans lequel il arrivait au petit sous-chef des choses déplaisantes à souhait. Il avait été éveillé en sursaut par ce même personnage frappant sur le bureau, au motif qu'on ne dort pas au travail. Erwann se dit qu'il ne tenait qu'au perturbateur, en cas d'insistance, de faire que le rêve fût prémonitoire.
The old fox that seemed to lead the way here is gone. The forest opens, like a portal, leading into a meadow. From the song of birds and the ever-companion, Wind's breath cool and damp, rustling in the leaves, you step into the hum of bees, the warm sun on your skin, grass tickling your ankles. Wind whispers softly in the grass, a dry breath from the south—an flash of orange, a white-tipped foxtail vanishing into the tall grass...
#PennedPossibilities 311 — What is a memory that makes your SC swell with pride?
That armor. The black dragon armor, light as an autumn breeze. The last who owned it, legends say, a million died to take it away from her, but failed in the end.
She gave it to me: The ruler of the world, the most powerful thaumaturge alive. I was the one who nearly killed her, when we fought for our lives incidentally breaking the Curse of Harmony upon her.
I didn't break the curse but was the one who nearly killed her. Yet...
My friend—whose life I saved by pushing her out of the way of a plasma bolt and getting my flank burnt as a result—reminded me of the legend. Made me test the magic, which let me fly like an arrow and loop and dodge more agilely than a sparrow. She added, "She told me it's the first time anyone's got that close in a century. It's a bribe, you know, A loan. She wants you to work for her. You impressed her. "
Thomas décida de couper par le parc. Devant les jeux pour les enfants lui revint le souvenir de ce jour lointain où il entreprit d'épater une grande brune en grimpant au sommet de la cage à poules, se rabotant les soeurs Brontë sur la barre supérieure ce faisant, sans laisser voir son calvaire, à peine pâlir. Thomas se méfiait des grandes brunes depuis lors.
What are the trees talking about? The willows, all turned out in bright new green, are trading gossip. The maples, still in the crinkled, unfolding-butterfly-wing stage of leafing out, are asking questions, all a-wonder. The hickories are popping their leaves out of giant buds like fireworks, and they're that excited. But the #pines, the evergreen pines, they're murmuring about winter. "This is just a warm spell. Wait a bit, a short six months, and it'll be cool again." #wss366#microfiction
Only once a year, the Masters of Tectophonics unveiled their Grand Mechanism for visitors. Not more than three applicants were selected to be led through the giant hall of gears, wheels, tubes, and spheres, chains, conveyors, and shafts. This year, the honor fell upon two fellow scholars and myself. Master Bonafide showed us around for two full days, leading us over stairs and ladders, through trap doors and security locks to peer into every corner from every angle we wanted, patiently answering any question that might occur.
My fellows had already collapsed and been escorted to the exit; my knees began to shiver as well, and I felt that it was time for me to leave, too.
“Is there anything else you wish to know?” asked Master Bonafide.
“Indeed there is,” I said. “Please excuse me if the question sounds offensive. But what is this all for? It’s an overwhelming experience to look at this fascinating machine – I could spend at least a year or two and still would not be able to say how it works.”
“Well, to be honest, we haven’t figured that out ourselves. And it does not matter. It is not important to describe the functionality of pulleys, levers, and the like. What really matters is to interpret them, to find meaning in them and to use the Mechanism right.”
“So what do you use it for?”
Master Bonafide smiled.
“We only use it once a year for one single purpose: To select the three candidates for the annual guided tour.”
@VisualInspiration
The bus pulled up and Trilobite leaned out. "Extinction line?"
"Yeah," said Bear, "guess so. You been picking up a lot?"
"Not as bad as after the astroid. That line went around the block. But more than usual."
"Human won't be popular when it's Their turn, will They?"
"Could be worse. The Anaerobes still won't talk to the Cyanobacteria. Hey, cheer up. You had a good run. Ground Sloth's looking forward to seeing you."
"Ground Sloth? Really? It's been ages!" #MicroFiction