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Blame Game, a story of Superheros (or possibly Science!) for the Giraffe Call

Feb12

This is to ellenmillion‘s prompt here to my February Giraffe Call.

It is either in my Science! verse or Superheroes, possibly both.

Names from <a href="http://www.seventhsanctum.com/generate.php?Genname=superheronameorg
“>Seventh Sanctum.

“Hurry up. The cops are going to be here soon.”

The three safebreakers were professionals, but they were the sort of professionals you hired fifty percent for their discretion. Austin – Dr. Lawrence – had gotten them in, Dr. Lawrence would get them back out, and in between they just needed to break the safe and not ask questions.

Hurry up counted as questions.

“I am going as quickly as is feasible. This isn’t a snatch-and-grab, you realize.” Dr. Lawrence was hanging upside-down from a very thin wire, using tweezers to move very tiny components. She was almost done. But the safebreakers were getting nervous.

“They’re going to know we were here. They’re really going to know we were here if they catch us.”

“They will know that someone was here. They will blame it, as they have done the last seven events, on either Cold Chase or Hurricane Deluder.”

The doctor ignored them, then; there were three more parts to move, and it was the most sensitive part of the operation. Not being complete dunces – the other fifty percent of their hiring requirement – the safecrackers waited until they had hauled Dr. Lawrence back to the hallway, and, being very smart, actually waited until they were all in the getaway van and several blocks away.

Then their leader turned to stare at the doctor. “Wait. ‘The last seven events.'”

Dr. Lawrence nodded. “Yes.”

“Including that one they blamed Cold Chase and, what’s his name, Monster Truck for?”

“Including that one, although that was a bit of a botch, sadly.”

“Yeah, well, that’s why Monster Truck got blamed. Look, I don’t know what you’re up to…”

“That was part of our agreement, yes.”

“But Hurricane Deluder is my cousin. So look, if you’ve got to peg stuff on the criminals…”

The doctor nodded slowly. “That is fair. Tell me, do you have any relation to Venom Pacer?”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/665290.html. You can comment here or there.

Through Biology, two drabbles

Feb11

These are to [personal profile] thnidu‘s prompt here to my February Giraffe Call.

Addergoole/Fae Apoc Post-apocalypse (probably), and Science!

Addergoole has a landing page here; Faerie Apocalypse has a landing page here;

Science! has a landing page here.

“It’s not like it’s hard.” The man in the big armchair shrugged. He was, of course, smirking. “The difficult part isn’t spreading the seed, it’s waiting until it’s sprouted and cultivating it properly.”

The woman – standing, though she’d been offered a chair – was not smiling. She was, indeed, contriving to give the impression that she’d never smiled. “You speak of this like it’s agriculture.”

“Well, in a sense, isn’t it? I am farming myself a nation of followers, an army of those who will be loyal to me and mine. It’s slow, but I will rule the world.”

“They’re seeds.” Cara didn’t so much look unimpressed as give off a complete air of dis-impression. “Tiny seeds.”

Seeds were bad. Seeds could lead to a situation like Jay. Better to cut this off in the bud, as it were.

Gabrielle, Dr. Deloach, was not going to be cut. “They’re the start of something new. It’s a mood-changing plant-”

“Like tobacco?”

“Oh, no, nothing that mild. This is an edible, a carrot hybrid. It makes people susceptible to suggestion, especially in certain sequences.” Dr. Deloach smiled. “Conveniently, my father owns a broadcast station & my mother’s a caterer.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/664493.html. You can comment here or there.

Alibi, a story of Science!

Jan2

To [personal profile] rix_scaedu‘s prompt to my daily bonus from [community profile] dailyprompt.

There weren’t any witnesses, which helped matters, just three fuzzy surveillance vids and circumstantial evidence: Dr. Potter had motive; he’d been seen walking into the building, and he’d called the cops when it was all over and been first on the scene, hands covered in blood as he tried to hold Dr. Ahluwalia’s life into her body.

Dr. Ahluwalia’s last words had been not particularly helpful, either. “You bastard. I know…”

Of course, Dr. Potter and Dr. Ahluwalia were both employed by Those Madmen in the Tower, so there was no knowing what the late Doctor had known. And, while the police swore that they’d seen Dr. Potter for a moment as they arrived – long enough to hear those words – 1700 of the world’s best and brightest scientists were willing to testify in court that he’d been in another city at the New Ideas and Orthodoxies (NIO) Conference, giving a speech on ends vs. means. Dr. Ahluwalia had intended on attending, but backed out at the last minute, which the police felt sounded suspicious.

Even more suspicious, however, was the topic of Dr. Potter’s speech: On the ethics of cloning and the uses thereof; What to Do With Yourself.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/627670.html. You can comment here or there.

P is for the Possum Postulate, a story of Science! for the Giraffe Call

Apr25

For stryck‘s prompt.

“It’s the Possum Postulate.” The new applicant seemed promising, for such a young face. Cara had thought, at first, that he was going to be an intern, but the boy – Platya Perdido Proda – fresh-faced and with no beard to speak of, although that could have been ancestry rather than youth – was signing on to be their new point scientist.

(The Lab had no “lead scientist” except Liam; Point Scientist was more or less “person who gets all the attention,” and was always a newcomer.)

“Possum.” She and Alex had gotten stuck with doing the interviewing after Liam had killed off three candidates – two in a fit of pique, one when his test experiment threatened to blow up the entire Lab.

“Postulate.” Alex was no more thrilled about this than Cara was. He hadn’t even bothered to dress up, and was wearing old jeans and a shirt with, Cara thought, the bloodstains of a former Point Scientist still on the collar.

“Yes.” Proda cleared his throat. “It’s a probability postulate, designed to predict within ninety-nine point nine seven percent accuracy a range of events given a certain set of parameters. It’s immensely complicated, and thus I’ve programmed it into this piece of equipment-“

“Not into a standard lab computer?”

“Well, I did that first, of course, but a computer requires certain things to run. This, on the other hand, requires sunlight and liquid. You could run it on a dessert island.”

“You created a probability generator that works on piss?”

“Precisely.” Proda was un-fazed. “I needed something as simple as possible.”

“How do the possums come in?”

“Well, they’re a metaphor. No possums were harmed in the making of this machine.”

“Pity.” Cara was beginning to enjoy herself. “So…?”

“The machine has as it’s default, ‘everything dies,’ and as its secondary default ‘play dead until the threat is gone.'”

Cara and Alex shared a glance, and then looked back at Proda. “Let me get this straight.” Cara spoke slowly. “You made a machine to test the probability of different outcomes, given a series of inputs.”

“Yes.”

“And its default answer is ‘everyone dies?'”

“Yes.” The boy was beginning to look nervous. Panicked, even.

“Perfect.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/519571.html. You can comment here or there.

In Theory, a story of Science! For the Giraffe Call

Mar31

For [personal profile] kelkyag‘s prompt

“In theory, it should work.”

If they had a dollar every time they’d heard that, Alex mused… they would be far poorer than they were. Because for every 100 times a phrase like that ended in failure, there was once where it succeeded wildly. And Cara and Alex had shares in the company.

“Which theory?” Alex bit, because this new one was interesting. Also cute, but that was probably beside the point.

“Clarke’s Third Law.”

“Clarke’s…” Alex glanced at Cara. Cara would know.

“Arthur C. Clarke. Sci-fi author? Jeanne down in PR is doing some research on his theories.”

“Oh, that Clarke. What are you trying to make, Juris?”

Their newest scientist lifted the blade from the vat of bubbling blue liquid. It shone brightly, even against the fluorescent light of the lab. “In theory, it should talk to the wielder, make small corrections for better aim, and glow in a nice pretty way, especially in the presence of ill-intent.”

Cara and Alex shared a look. “You’re making a magic sword.”

“Well.” Juris beamed. “It seems the best way to test the theory.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/502504.html. You can comment here or there.

16-Minute Saturday: 100 Per Cent

Mar17

This is written to the image prompt here for “Sixteen Minute Saturday,” something I adapted for alliteration from Ty Barbary’s 15-minute Fiction.

I’d love if more people played along!

“It’s data tagging.”

“Like facial recognition?”

“Exactly like facial recognition. They pass by this camera… see? And then we know which one they are.”

“Doesn’t work for the females, though.”

“No, we’re still working on that. But the antlers are very close to unique.”

“Very close to…”

“Well, all right. It’s not an exact science by any means.”

“Aren’t you in the exact science department?”

“No, I’m in the tracking animals department. Exact sciences is down one floor and over three rooms.”

“Right, right. So. It doesn’t track the females and it’s not one hundred percent accurate at tracking the males. So what does it do?”

“Well, it projects the patterns on to them, too, in a hard-light display that is really pretty nifty.”

“It’s nifty.”

“Yep. Really nifty. And, what’s more, mating interest is up one hundred percent for females looking at the males with the nifty displays.”

“…One hundred percent.”

“That’s what I said.”

“So, are you the growing-antlers department, by any chance?”

“No. That’s up one floor and over two rooms. And it hurts like hell. But let me tell you… totally worth it.”

“One hundred percent?”

“In clinical trials – me – more like one thousand percent.”

“Going.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/493107.html. You can comment here or there.

Shows Promise, a story of Science! for the Giraffe Call

Jan18

For [personal profile] imaginaryfiend‘s prompt.

Science! has a landing page here

“U…”

“If he says ‘Eureka,’ I’m going to kill him and save the boss the trouble.” Cara’s low mutter only carried as far as her partner’s ears, and he was prone to agree with her. Some people just gave mad science a bad name.

“…guys have got to see this.” Archibald Antipone had promise, at least from Cara and Alex’s point of view. He did good work, reasonably, and didn’t tend to cackle to himself or throw things. He had yet to invent a sentient anything and he could, unlike most of their new hires, actually socialize to save his life.

It might save his life, around her. Usually the guards shot indiscriminately because they were pretty certain none of the scientists were actually human.

“Got to see what?” Cara carefully closed down her workstation and locked her case, leaving her intern Martin to finish his half of the project.

“We’ve got to call the boss, first.”

“No, no.” Alex shook his head. “Let us check things first. Trust me, you don’t want to get the boss involved before his first cup of coffee.”

“Well… all right. Look at this.”

“It looks like…” Cara frowned. “Hrrm. Your degree is in retromechanics, isn’t it?”

“My first doctorate.” He nodded distractedly; he was still tinkering with some long length of copper tubing. “My second is in sociology; it’s how I got this position. And now!” He came up, pointing another long tube at the two of them. The end of it flared into some sort of funnel.

Cara reached for the disintegrator she always carried at her hip; Alex’s fingers danced a warning pattern on his invisible keyboard. “Put the weapon down, Archie. We don’t want to hurt you.”

“Weapon?” He laughed. Not a cackle, thank the formulae. Just a laugh. “No, no. This is no weapon. It’s a sin detector.”

“A… sin…”

“Detector! Yes. See, looking at you, Cara, I can see that you have engaged in…”

Cara and Alex added murder to their sins before he finished the sentence, and swept up the dust before Liam had finished his coffee. “Sin detector.” Alex tch’d. “And I thought he had such potential.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/455540.html. You can comment here or there.

Making Friends, a story of Science! for the Giraffe Call (@Anke)

May13

For [personal profile] anke‘s Prompt.

After Re-Engineered and Engineered.

“Jason’s up to something.”

Liam paced back and forth across the command center of their base, his cane thumping angrily.

“I can tell he’s up to something.”

Cara and Alex shared a glance. Of course Jason was up to something. He’d taken over an island. He had carnivorous roses. They were waiting for him to gengineer sentient seaweed and start expanding his one-man empire.

Jason had, before he defected, been Liam’s fair-haired boy, his protégé. Cara and Alex, perpetual hard workers, perpetual second fiddles, could do nothing but watch their boss now, as he paced and obsessed. And they couldn’t touch Jason…

“I, ah.” Cara wasn’t like the shiny people who came through. She didn’t shout “eureka.” She didn’t brag. She tried not to laugh maniacally. “Well, a couple of my birds made it in, and brought back some genetic samples, boss.”

“You have genetic material? How did you get it?”

Wordlessly, his senior assistant pointed at her “birds.” The sandpiper, which was sitting in its cage, pecking at clover, was her most efficient model – half bird, half courier device.

“We modified her primary courier to shunt fifty percent of all gathered material to its carrying pouch, and then we modified it to prefer foliage, especially sap.” Viji, her favorite intern, was new and very enthusiastic about everything. He’d learn, she hoped. He’d have a lot of potential if he survived his first year with the team.

Liam stared at the bird, with its transparent stomach. “And what did you learn?”

“He’s still breeding his plants.” She pointed at a series of DNA maps on her light box. “He’s gotten rudimentary brains into some of them.”

She stepped on Viji’s foot before he could reveal what else she’d gotten from Jason’s work. They almost had the duck-footed cottage ready, and now it would have its own floral armament. They could wait to show it to the Boss until it was complete.

“We think he’s trying to breed friends.” She pointed at one particular sequence. “Kind of like Namae Sauter’s tree-girl, but with less free will.”

“And I know what’s missing from his formula… so we should probably watch out.”

“What’s that?” Liam leaned forward over his cane. “Ah… shit. I see.”

Cara nodded. Namae had started from human zygotes. Jason would probably need the same.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/338257.html. You can comment here or there.

Golden Egg? A drabble of Science!

Mar25

“We think we’ve come up with a problem for the oil shortage.”

“You’ve what?”

“Look at these duck eggs. It took us a bit of finagling to do it, and more than a few changes at the genetic level, but now instead of needing calcium and laying calcium-rich eggs… they take in a variety of supplements and lay plastic eggs. The shells can then be recycled for their plastic, and the egg inside is still perfectly viable. There’s just one flaw…”

“There’s always a flaw.”

“In order to get out of the eggs, the hatchlings needed…

“You made duck Unicorns.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/306898.html. You can comment here or there.