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Prompt

A 480-post collection

Challenge #00906-B175: Change of Afterlife-style

The Horned God is fed up with all these blood sacrifices. It is making such a mess in the nether realms and he has too many goat familiars now. The Horned God demands some claw maintenance and a horn buffing, and then he will listen to your petition. Puny mortal.

“Look,” said the manifestation of the Horned One, Devourer of Flesh, Imbiber of Blood, Craftsman of Nightmares. “Blood’s all well and good, but sometimes… a god craves a little something different, you know?”

The sacrifice bleated on the altar. “You… don’t want the goat?” said the hooded figure. The knife held uncertainly above their head.

“Sweetie… I have ten million goats with me in the nether-realms. Even for a goat person, that’s a lot of goats. All I’m saying is - what’s wrong with a little chat? Some chamomile tea, some chocolate cake…”

“Chocolate cake?” winced the acolytes.

“Come on, who doesn’t love chocolate cake?”

One by one, the assembled coven had to admit that The Dark One, Terror of Shadows, Torturer of the Unworthy, had a point.

The knife slowly descended into its ritual case. “Er. But. We’re supposed to sacrifice? Something?”

“Keep the damned goat. Look after her. You get milk, and maybe you can make some cheese. Or soap. I hear goats milk soap is wonderful for your skin.“

One of the acolytes raised a hand. “I think I know a place that’ll sell a decent gateau at this hour?”

“Brilliant. Let’s do this.” The physical manifestation of Evil on Earth, the Dread Lord, the Bane of Righteousness, clapped his hands. “Who’s got their mani-pedi kits?”

[Muse food remaining: 14. Submit a prompt! Ask a question! Buy my stories!]

Challenge #00905-B174: Easter Egg

The best kept secret of the jaegermonsters

Jaegermonsters hunt in packs. That much is self-evident. Jaegermonsters are not the brightest candles in the window. That, too, is self-evident.

Lord Palinquest thought he was being clever by separating the invading Jaeger pack in disparate cells in the middle of unique booby-traps in the labyrinth under his castle. He’d even tune in when he was bored to see how they were doing.

What he didn’t know, what none but the most observant

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Challenge #00904-B173: Cat Day

Steven Universe - Lion’s adventure

Lion finished his patrol of the city and curled up near the house of the Scion. Soon, very soon, it would be warm in just this spot. Warm was always good. The Scion would need Lion today. Lion couldn’t tell exactly when, but he knew. He was going to be Needed.

And in the meantime, there was sleep.

“Is it safe to just… lie on him like that?”

Lion peeked. The human friend of

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Challenge #00903-B172: One Thing in Common

Francoeur and Sweetie Belle

Her big sister had a really big visitor. He was immense enough to make a full-grown dragon wary. All black and sharp spikes and luminous red eyes…

…and a gentle, almost foal-like way of investigating the world with all four hands.

Sweetie Belle thought she was well-hidden until he offered her a rose and cooed, “…joli petit poney…”

“Oh, don’t be frightened, Sweetie Belle,” Rarity singsonged. “Francoeur is as gentle as a lamb.

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Challenge #00902-B171: In a Shared Domicile on Amity...

Random number prompt - use a random number generator and redo a prompt from the first year of instants - do NOT read the first story before writing the new one.

[AN: The random number was 133: Anywhere in the story: “The element of surprise didn’t so much rest upon someone hearing you but registering the significance of your approach.” (I hope altering one word counts)]

There was an important lesson in here, somewhere. Living with Deathworlders taught them well. Continuing

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Challenge #00901-B170: Strange Creatures

Alternate universe prompt: The X - Mares

[AN: Of course I instantly thought of MLP:FiM]

Things went very quickly bad when the entirety of Ponyville discovered that Fluttershy’s strange friend was stranger than they had believed possible.

His glowing eyes almost bugged out of his head. He smiled with sharp, sharp teeth. He vanished in a puff of sulphur. He didn’t have hooves. He had paws. And his tail… was more like a dragon’s than a pony’

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Challenge #00900-B169: Mama Bear

Murphy’s law of Babies 2:  Toddler gone? It’s with the humans.

Nita almost didn’t notice the curious little Numidid until she nearly stepped on the poor child. She was big for a human, and this little scrap of pinfeathers barely cleared her boot.

“Whoops,” she said. “Hello, little peep. Where did you come from?”

Alas, the tiny child was still talking Scribble. Multilingual Scribble, but still Scribble. It varied between Numidid, Amity English, and Galstand. She sounded irritated, and

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Challenge #00899-B168: Rule of Innocence

Murphy’s law of Babies: When you look away for two seconds and your child has absconded, it will invariably be found in whatever situation would cause the quickest messy death or most political upheaval if an adult were in the same situation.

Luckily children can get away with anything by virtue of being children, and will not be immediately vaporised for hiding behind Graknor, Conqueror of Galaxies’ legs.

Sahra let her toddler go so she could tuck herself back in. Poor

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Challenge #00898-B167: Rule of Cute

Observation: The more fragile a species is, the less danger it is in (physically) from the humans. The ones that can withstand them are treated aggressively and with much suspicion, and the dainty little ones are coddled and cooed over. And petted if the humans can get away with it.

[AN: Just FYI, not all Havenworlders are tiny. But loads of them are]

It should have been an ordinary shortcut. Just a quick dash home to pick up her LifeAlert bracelet. She

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Challenge #00897-B166: Adult Onset Responsibility

So if the first person to contact another world is automatically ambassador, what happens if an accident involves first contact being between the alien civilisation and Bigot McAssface, who would fit right in on that Greater Deregulation. Specifically, the rest of BMA’s civilisation, especially the ones interested in galactic alliance, would usually say the complete opposite of anything he does, but now he’s their galactic spokesperson.

[AN: This story will contain slurs because my main character is an arsehole]

“Keeping

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Challenge #00895-B164: The Old Heart-Stopper

There is coffee, there is turkish coffee, there is paper-due-in-six-hours was-coffee-once, and then there is whatever you just made and drank.

Grace watched Sara cautiously as more and more ingredients kept
coming out of random storage places. Turkish Coffee steeped in its
special apparatus. Espresso poured out of the little budget coffee maker
that pushed hot water through little capsules, and it did so on a near steady stream. The finished cups of steaming liquid went into a cooking
pot that already

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Challenge #00893-B162: Perish the Thought

(Was trying to find the post that inspired this, but couldn’t)
Considering that literature professors, English teachers, and mandatory readings have managed to make Shakespeare boring, even with the subject material, jokes, innuendo, memorable insults everywhere, and masterful handling of it all, imagine the travesty that will be lessons on Discworld in a few centuries.

Time’s winged chariot… renders all things boring.

They were
doing the Pratchett section of English Lit, which was only slightly less
dull than the Victorian

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Challenge #00887-B156: Can't Eat, Won't Eat

A cooking show for all of us with allergies, medical conditions and on medication which won’t let us eat common items. Grapefruit, garlic and members of the cabbage family come to mind.

“Welcome to the cooking show that we all love, but chefs love to hate! It’s Can’t Eat, Won’t Eat!”

Applause and hoots.

“Our judges tonight include somebody on bloodthinners, he’s also allergic to the entire cabbage family and won’t eat onion!”

The judge waved.

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Challenge #00886-B155: Unexpected Bastion of Safety

“Deportment and propriety in High Society 101” at Lady Favisham’s, a mandatory course for young ladies.

(AKA “How to break a man’s wrist without letting go of your fan”)

“Men,” began Mistress Carlysle. She said the word as though it were an epithet. “They own the world. They run the world. The spend their lives believing that whatever they see… they own. They believe they have the right to help themselves. And it is up to us… It

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Challenge #00885-B154: Dawn Technology

“Like many other things, if you know what you’re doing, an open fire isn’t particularly dangerous.” Says the person wearing no safety gear, having lit a campfire with flint and steel and currently rearranging the burning sticks barehanded.

“You’re… burning raw cellulose,” said the alien, through its translator. “There is no safety equipment.”

“Got a shovel,” soothed Tanja. “Got loads of sand. We’re good.”

“You are not knowing if this cellulose is loaded with toxins.”

“I live

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