Instant Story

That wonderful feeling when you’re on just insufficient meds, or high on fatigue toxins, or had two hour’s sleep per night, max for the last week. After you’ve gone through the feeling-horrible portion, when you’re in the feeling great, can do anything, everything is so clear and sharp and makes so much sense…

And then, when you’ve had sufficient sleep, rest, or meds…

How the world actually is, and how you’ve been behaving. – RecklessPrudence

Charlie awoke in a med booth feeling amazing. It had actually been a good day, even if it did have an abrupt end. And a puzzling reset here.

She gripped the exit handle and pulled her booth out enough so that she could look out into the hallway. “Uh, hi there,” she chirped to the approaching nurse. “Can you tell me what I’m in for?”

He wasn’t wearing an iso-suit, so it wasn’t anything infectious. There was that bonus. Charlie waited patiently while the nurse checked his files.

“There you are. You suffered a near-catastrophic chemical imbalance and had to be sedated. You’ve been asleep for three shifts.”

Eighteen hours. Jeesh. “I didn’t feel imbalanced,” she argued, trying to recall the previous evening.

“You were arguing with a Racist citizen of Greater Deregulation North.” A redundancy of terms if there ever was one. Like, insane human or pointless art. “And apparently attempting to convince him that, by his own logic, all humans were fish.”

“…i was under the impression that i was doing well…” Charlie squeaked.

“Sorry to say so, but you were so bad that the citizen of GDN actually called in the medical emergency.”

“Is there anywhere I can hide until the Galactic Alliance forgets who I am?”

“Don’t worry,” soothed the nurse. “Your place of employment has been reprimanded and your quarters adjusted to suit your needs. Everyone goes through something similar sooner or later. All will be forgiven and forgotten soon enough.”

Charlie shut herself back into her booth. She certainly didn’t feel forgiven or forgotten at the moment.

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Also about domesticated animals.

Almost every domesticated species, whether predator or prey, has been a social animal, with an internal hierarchy. Humans domesticated them by inserting ourselves at the top of the various hierarchies, and doing so consistently for generations, until the species is considered domesticated.
This can lead to absurd scenarios such as a human chastising a predator-species that was behaving inappropriately, one that masses more than they do, with a jaw that could shatter their bones easily, can outrun them

On “Humans are crazy” in general and pets in particular.

Humanity’s domesticated species are, for the most part, herbivores, right? So what possessed us to decide that the animals we let into our homes would largely be carnivores? Now, imagine a species where that is not true.

“AH! Look out! That predator is near your young!”

“Oh, that’s just Missy, she’s harmless.”

„,And then just when they’ve adjusted to that, they see why even

A guy who is nice, as opposed to a “nice guy” – RecklessPrudence

(#00507 - A132)

Sid’s first question, whenever he encountered someone who was having trouble was, “Would you like some help?”

It was a good question, simply because some people were only experiencing temporary difficulties and tended to get angry when other folks just barged in.

And there were other questions that came first. Like, “Is this guy bothering you?” whenever he saw a

Wow. This isn’t fractal denseness, it’s origami denseness. It’s like a beautiful work of art that you can unfold to make it seem even more dense. – RecklessPrudence

[AN: Prompt edited to be less offensive - I hope]

(#00506 - A131)

“Let me get this straight,” said Security Officer Trel. “Someone actually told you that they’d go out with you if you managed to clean… The Glunk.”

“Damn straight. Fine ass

You are not just wrong. You are wrong at every conceivable level of resolution. Zooming in on any part of your worldview finds beliefs exactly as wrong as your entire worldview. – RecklessPrudence

(#00505 - A130)

“So?” said the wilfully ignorant specimen from Greater Deregulation (Upper West). “That don’t mean we can’t have a good time. All you gotta do, honey, is shut up, put out, and pretend to enjoy it.”

Shayde turned a

‘Why? We’re the Good Guys, aren’t we?’
'Yes, but that rather hinges on doing certain things and not doing others, sir’, – RecklessPrudence

Tony made a face at JARVIS’ snide comment. “Urh. Fine. I get it. The heroic thing to do, yadda yadda yadda. Steve’s been a bad influence on you, admit it.”

“On the contrary. I rather think Steve has been a good influence. On the both of

“Wow, how’d you get it to work?”
“I ran a Physical Impulse Mechanical Stress Routine”
“Huh?”
“I kicked it.”
“Ahh.” – RecklessPrudence

“And you’re charging me three Minutes for kicking it?”

Atole the JOAT tidied imaginary dust off her JOAT coat. “Fees and charges, friend. Two Seconds for the kick, and two Minutes, fifty-eight for the knowledge of where to kick it.”

Telos grumbled, but

The universe is probably littered with the one-planet graves of cultures which made the sensible economic decision that there’s no good reason to go into space—each discovered, studied, and remembered by the ones who made the irrational decision. – RecklessPrudence

(#00502 - A127)

The Ch'debrithett did not know how lucky they were when the aliens came. They were a relatively quiet civilisation that worked to maintain a balance after years of nigh-catastrophic extinction-for-profit. Or, as it has become known in