Shayde

A 77-post collection

Challenge #01534-D073: Wyrd Customs

"How normal is this occurrence that there's automated vocal procedures to talk about the demonic presence?" -- RecklessPrudence

This lot of magicians had graduated through technology and out the other side, never once stopping in at Global Pollution Station for a long debate about how dangerous pollution was, when you really got down to it. Shayde was impressed. Not many worlds actually noticed the long-term effects of certain technologies and decided to look at other ways to do things while the water was still potable and the outside air still healthy[1].

This particular example, a tower with an impressively crystalline doorway and no door, was some form of scanning and capturing device. Once through the door, the building would either offer stairs to the larger bulk of the city, or pull away a drop to an oubliette where the officials could deal with an offender at a later date. Shayde had no fear of it, not even when their team wizard insisted that one among the party was evil. This... was just another test in a long string of tests that kept revealing that she was no more demon than -say- a rock.

She was the fourth of the party to stride in and take the stairs. And it was only slightly alarming that this lot had invented escalators without first inventing conveyor belts. The stones of the tower had a limited sort of life to them, and moved under her feet, transporting her safely to the exit platform.

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Challenge #01530-D069: Wit of the Ages

Stuff found written on walls. -- Knitnan

Corridor 3278B had been marked as a Paradox Hazard by the local representatives of the AI Alliance, thus causing something of a traffic snarl in the adjacent byways. Since she was in the neighbourhood, Officer Lyr Marken investigated, reading everything there that was still legible.

She found it easily. Beautiful, artistic script that read, Everyone writes on walls except me!

Lyr instantly went for the first suspect, dialling up Ambassador Shayde's personal comms. "Ambassador Shayde

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Challenge #01503-D042: One Dull Afternoon in an Ambassadorial Office

“I feel I’m very sane about how crazy I am.” - Carrie Fisher -- RecklessPrudence

Rael slowly turned to glare at Ambassador Shayde. She had said this out of the blue, apropos of nothing, and continued browsing on her personal screens as if nothing had ever happened. He took an educated guess, "Quote of the day?"

"Twitter feed," said Shayde. "That's definitely sommat I missed out on. One hundred and forty letters tae say somethin' cool. Brevity bein' th' soul o'

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Challenge #01493-D032: The Universal Coin

“Be kind. Don’t hurt other people. It’s all the sort of Christian ethics stuff I thought was bullshit when I was a kid. No, it turns out it’s not bullshit. Tell the truth, be kind, all that corny stuff." - Carrie Fisher -- RecklessPrudence

Above all else, do no harm. That had to be a law for landing in strange places and in weird circumstances. Of course... the landing couldn't be helped. Something there was that didn't like her

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Challenge #01483-D022: Portents of Doom

“You know the bad thing about being a survivor… You keep having to get into difficult situations in order to show off your gift.” - Carrie Fisher -- RecklessPrudence

"I wouldn't ordinarily complain about your... shenanigans," said the Cuidgari Security Chief everyone knew as Sherlock, "you have such a finely-tuned sense for skating on the borders of legality. But this is the third time this week. Are you bored, or have you and Rael had a... 'tiff' as you call it?"

"In

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Challenge #01456-C361: One Muddled Mid-morning in a Mystery Vessel

"Do you want to know how I can tell this is a terrible idea?"

"...how?"

"I'm being the voice of reason!" -- OohLookShiny

(Image source) (Artist)

The assembled cogniscents spared a moment to regard Ambassador Shayde. Widely regarded as the specific embodiment of human insanity. They then looked to each other as if daring someone to say, How did we get so far astray?

"As th' great Montgomery Scott said, Ye cannae change the laws o' physics," insisted Shayde. "Well. Unless ye

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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 #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 #01357-C262: Strange Encounters

"Why is there a man convulsing in the halls?"

"Don't worry, the king's men will see to him."

"That's... not what I asked," -- OohLookShiny

The new Ambassador for T'kerrrita was taking the Tour. Since it was between Ambassadorial Meets, the Tour was meant to acclimate them to the most amount of civilisations in the least amount of time. And, naturally, one of the stops was Amalgam Station, which always had a solid volume of Ambassadors at any given time.

Unfortunately... one

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Challenge #01353-C258: Baffling Footage

Imagine this being the only news clip in existence for this time period (like the comment says) after Shayde pops up, and people asking her about it. -- RecklessPrudence

[AN: Amalgam happens 500 years in our future, but I can deal]

Shayde didn't expect a ceremony. Usually what passed as her work was catching up with news and events she had missed[1], gathering favourites, and occasionally explaining things to a small audience of concerned Archivaas.

Today... the entire theatre was booked

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Challenge #01346-C251: Purse of Holding

Like the Tardis it's 'bigger on the inside'. It can be anything carryable from a Ladies handbag (a notorious source of strange objects), to one of those pull along "granny" trailers, or whatever you like. -- Knitnan

"Here. You'll need this."

It looked like a small, leather pouch. There was some beading on it that had evidently not been designed with hard use in mind. But, it didn't feel like a small, leather pouch. It felt indefinably heavier. "What is this?"

"Bag

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Challenge #01345-C250: Well You Took Your Time

Prompt: the hollow coconut TONK noise that can be produced by tapping the right place on top of someone's head if their mouth is open. -- Gallifreya

[AN: Grats, you got me to hit myself on the head several times]

Rael was currently being a small, blue-black dog that 'just happened' to be where this backwards colony of humans had put Ambassador Shayde.

They had evidently landed with the best technology of their launch-era, but the process of building a colony and

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Challenge #01321-C226: Lost and Found

The Ballad of Apollo XIII - sung to the tune of 'The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald', but with a triumphant ending. -- RecklessPrudence

"I can't find Ambassador Shayde."

They should have been terrifying words, but they had lost any such sparkle through repetition. It had got to the point that Sherlock and Officer Marken both used Ambassador Shayde as testing material for new recruits.

So far, only one sharp Ensign had passed the Shayde Test.

This... was not that Ensign.

"You've

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Challenge #01317-C222: For Hate's Sake...

"You idiot! Can't you see this will hurt both of us?"

"Well yes, but it'll hurt you a lot more than it'll hurt me, and I can live with that." -- OohLookShiny

There were things she could never talk about. And one of them was the battle of wits with a godlike being.

They could make their arena look like anything. Be made out of anything. They could cast a glamour so powerful that it overwhelmed her. But there was always that

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Challenge #01313-C218: No, You Got it Wrong

This is a quote from a Robert Heinlein story. "Always have your pants, your shoes, and your gun where you can find them in the dark." -- Anon Guest

[AN: I fixed your typos, Nonny]

The patient came in with a limb injury. Relatively harmless, but perplexing in the entry and exit trajectory. What added further confusion was the fact that they had a side-arm tangled in their toes, and a white-knuckled grip on one of their boots.

There was some evidence

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