Category: They are Smol

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They are Smol – and it’s a Smol World: Chapter 12

“What’s that?”

“Mmm?” Sensor Technician Abioye said, mouth full of instant ramen.

“That.” Sensor Technician Alezeev responded, purposefully tapping a finger against his monitor. “I know our sensors aren’t the best, but, this doesn’t look like normal traffic patterns.”

Aboiye sighed and placed his cup ramen to the side, waking up his console. It was the “midnight” shift on Reach, so the relative skeleton crew was doing relatively appropriate spooky things; checking inventory levels, unloading cargo, monitoring power systems, life support, ignoring the yotttabytes of spam messages from other ships and stations in-system, yanno. . Whereas the captain was more interested in getting his hands on physical technology to help close the gap, there were other ‘soft’ goals that needed to be accomplished – primary among them being sucking in as much data as physically possible for the wonks and skunkworks back home to digest. This data could be anything from “here’s how civilian cargo ships are painted and their number scheme” to “Here’s the layout of a colony world” to “So we saw some pretty neat satellites on the way back…” – really, it was bringing in everything they could because nobody knew what bit of random information would lead to the next breakthrough.

This, of course, meant monitoring air traffic on the part of the planet they were orbiting.

Aboiye furrowed his brow as the mass of very fast ships descended to an uninhabited section of the new Human colony. He idly overlaid that traffic pattern over the more standard pattern they’ve developed over the past few days, and…

“Yeah. Yeah, that’s not right. Chatter?”

“Seems like an emergency broadcast.” Alezeev said, his hands moving over his console in practiced ease. “…yeah. Yeah we need to escalate this.”

Admiral Smalls was having a good night, which meant that something was going to go wrong. The thing that went wrong(tm) occurred around 2AM ship time, and around 2:15 he found himself hastily dressed and on the Bridge with a Big Gulp of coffee in one hand and an open line of communication to his other ships’ captains.

“So, from what my technicians are telling me – roughly 40 minutes or so ago an emergency broadcast went out to all first responders to handle an incident within the Human district of Silver City, more specifically section G-7-4. Reasons why I woke your asses up – , nobody from administration has contacted us, which under our settlement treaty they’re supposed to. , This was, according to our count, a response of roughly 180 ships.”

“Does Silver City even have that many first responder ships?” Captain Edward John Smith murmured, looking over the report on screen.

“No. From what I can tell, they not only pulled from other settlements, but they pulled … I guess you could call it their version of SWAT.” Admiral Smalls answered, sighing. “But, there’s more.”

“Joy.” Captain Joseph Hazelwood smirked, taking a sip of his drink.

“Human section, massive reaction of emergency services, pseudo-military deployed, no coordination or communication with us – already, these are issues. What I’m about to tell you is currently secret, as it involves an ongoing investigation, but. Someone from my ship was apparently transmitting data, unauthorized. The Person I Was Talking To has been informing me that the data – which was actually structured data and not a glitch in our own systems – was sent to the local galactic network node that led to an access point that doesn’t exist, and apparently contains no data.”

There was a pregnant pause as each man raced through a couple dozen scenarios, their expressions sinking rapidly.

“So. A mole?”

“Saboteur.” Smalls said, matter-of-factly. “We’re still collecting information, but. Our … bank accounts aren’t connected intergalactically, GRC’s shifted into Dollars so, no money can exchange hands. Nothing that’s come up from planetside’s had contraband, so no physical goods either. Anarchist, maybe.” With a flick of his wrist Admiral Smalls pulled up and shared various shipping manifestos; nothing out of the ordinary popped out.

“Maybe the last shipment had something?”

“Raw material for holographic units that I personally approved, plus an Interocitor for multifunction basic construction.” Smalls responded, taking another sip of his coffee. “And that landed, safely, about 15 minutes ago and began offloading.”

“This is some bullshit.” Captain Hazelwood said, scrutinizing some reports of his own. “I don’t like this at all.”

“No, neither do I. That’s why I want you to deploy Zero-One.”

Hazelwood quirked an eyebrow. “… a hot drop?”

“Not hot, no, but I want it down there. I’ve already ordered clearance on pads 03 and 05 for the next 48 hours, so as long as Zero-One is on the ground it can buy us some time.”

“Begging your pardon, Admiral, but. It’s one thing to have a paperwork snafu; it’s another thing to deploy military equipment with no indication.” Captain Smith interjected, scratching the stubble on his cheek. “Should we wait? At least phone home?”

“I’m not advocating a hot drop, John. I’m saying that they deployed defense forces to a remote human sector en masse and then scattered, that not a few days prior we had a saboteur send something to somewhere, and no one from their administration is telling me anything. Did one of our citizens commit an atrocity… or was this a kidnapping? We’re in the dark here, and time is not on our side. We’re not deploying all of La Chancla’s payload, just Zero-One. It’s more of a… statement than anything else.”

“If you fuck with us I swear to God I’ll kill us all?”

Admiral Smalls raised his mug in a gentle salute. “Now you get it.”

“[Can you just-]”

Flop

“[Look that can’t feel good-]”

Flop

“[All I’m asking you to do is-]”

Zngrer-of-Drgrabgh sighed as the [Human] flopped the other way, acting less like a living sentient and more like a sack of dirt. Once she identified herself there was a tremendous amount of squirming, which at first Zngrer assumed was to get comfortable in her grip; granted, combat suits were not exactly built for exterior comfort, and her suit’s AI was programmed to [Human] tolerances so as to avoid harming the relatively fragile creature.

Then came the biting, which, ok. Different people act differently in a panic, and it’s up to the responder in charge to manage panicked civilians. So far, so good.

But this? This was just annoying. However, she’d take this annoyance over the other [human]’s obstinance.

Speaking of, she turned to the other human half-tucked away in a mix of harness and netting.

“[Are you alright?]”

“AM I BEING DETAINED?!”

Zngrer sighed. “[No. Again, we’re from the government-]”

“AM I FREE TO GO?!”

“[Considering we’re traveling at a height that would almost certainly kill you if you left the craft, no.]”

“THEN AM I BEING DETAINED?!”

Zngrer frowned and opened a line to her pilot. “[Are we there yet?]”

“[You’ve asked that 10 times in the past 10 minutes. What’s going on back there?]” Szreshnstrst chuckled, tilting the craft slightly to bypass some obstacle his crew was blind to. “[They pestering you with questions or something? Not calmed down yet?]”

“[Just… Please. Are we there yet?]”

“[We’ll get there when we get there. Central’s still re-routing some of the emergency craft that are late to the show, and we’re clearing out a corridor for us to slide through. I’d say… another 20, 30 minutes?]”

Silently Zngrer passed the floppy [human], who was absolutely awake but not helping in any way, from one arm to the other. Accomplishing this task, she looked at the second [human] who had seemed to only burrow himself deeper into the netting.

“AM I FREE TO GO, OFFICER?!”

“[. . . Please, ancestors, take me now.]”

“[So… just… I guess… here?]”

Wiggles began to scratch at the bottom post of a pod, her claws making light but otherwise ineffective furrows into the metal.

“Maybe, but what about the bolts themselves?” Sofia asked, kneeling to get a better look at the foundation of the Pod. The Pod itself was just an oblong egg-shaped capsule with a seamless door that slid open, revealing an interior of memory-foam like padding, emergency rations, and a few other communication options and sensors that would alert authorities to anything from the pod being used, to if there was a medical emergency, to if – God forbid – the pod ran out of snacks. The pod’s door was open and waiting, but Tipo insisted that he not let go of Abuela until the pod was disconnected and it was “safe”.

The fact that Tipo was snuggling Abuela was not lost on anyone, least of all the roughly 2-dozen patrons who ended up leaving the bar and following the group across the street ‘nonchalantly’.

Being an oddity was acceptable; they were outside the Human district after all.

… the selfies with a sleeping Abuela were a bit too much however.

“[I don’t think we have the tools here, if I’m being absolutely honest.]” Persimmon said, idly tugging at a bolt. “[These things were purpose-built to withstand some abuse from us – no offense – so they’re going to be impossible to claw out of the ground.]”

“[I mean, we could try really really hard-]” Wiggles suggested, her clawing speeding up in pace but producing no further progress. “[Or, I don’t know. Steal a welding kit from somewhere. I got a cousin that’s a fabricator-]”

“But that’ll probably take a few hours or longer, right?” Sofia said, chin resting in her hand as she continued to think. “At that point we might as well set up camp back at the cafe-”

“[That’s a good idea-]”

“[Yeah that’s fine we’re ok with this-]”

“[I can keep the shop open late for you if you’d like!]” Cheery piped up somewhere in the back around the chorus of other Jornissian approval-noises.

Sofia frowned and turned towards her daughter. “Well? Anything bouncing around up there?”

Luzita shrugged, and half-smiled. “Just one idea.” She said, pointedly looking at the impromptu hydra surrounding her grandmother.

“Ok! Lift with your knees!”

“Mama-”

“Oh! Sorry!”

Luciana facepalmed, groaning into her hand, as the hydra of Jornissians exchanged confused glances. The idea was simple, in theory; Have each sapient wrap around the base of the pod. Much like how a one-fingered grip is weaker than a five-fingered grip, one xenos pulling at the pod would be ineffective. But 5? 10? 27? That stood a chance.

The Hydra-turned-maypole shimmied into place, and after a few complaints as to who was pinching whose tail and who should be on top or on bottom, the group intertwined.

“On Three! One!”

A few flexed, rolling their spines in anticipation.

“Two-”

A tense

“Three-”

The pod did not so much come off of it’s base as it was launched a couple dozen meters into the air. The group watched it’s lazy arc in the sky, and flinched slightly as it landed with a crunch on the concrete, doing quite a bit of damage to the sidewalk below. One of the crowd slithered off to check on the pod itself, and gave an enthusiastic wave of his arm after a cursory check.

“. . . That counts!” Luciana clapped, breaking the silence. “Thank you all very much for your help! This is really, really good news for us-”

There was a heavy sound of aircraft as a squadron of sleek, jet-black ships flew overhead, making their way to the same tower that the Aleman family’s livestock was being held at.

“But that’s probably not.”

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Stories They are Smol

They are Smol – and it’s a Smol World: Chapter 11

Retail – well, the vast majority of retail out there – is a soul-sucking experience. You work in a glorified box putting other boxes on shelves and talking to people about those boxes, and if you’re lucky they don’t blame you for their wife leaving them and taking the kids. One retail job is just the same as another; you can work for Best Buy and then move to Wal*Mart and not realize there was a change other than the uniform that you’re wearing. However, there are a few places where working in retail can actually build up some skills you can use later in life (either to parlay into a better job or to just impress your friends/family/that cutie at the bar):

  • Bartending
  • Beauty Care
  • Masseuse

And of course, the purview of all liberal arts majors

  • Barrista

Now this isn’t to say that you need to go into $50,000 of debt in order to be employed by Starbucks – I mean, it helps, but it’s not a requirement. It’s simply to say that you can develop a set of skills that you take with you for the rest of your life, much like the shame of getting a degree that “was your passion” and then not following up on it with a career in that field. But some people – a rare few – end up figuring out that they like working in retail, that they like doing what they’re doing, and that they like mixing drinks and little snacks for others.

Rssesnsen – nee Cheery – happened to be one of them. She enjoyed making and mixing everything from a standard hnz’sprssen for the businessman on the go or a freshly-toasted sra-flatbread with miscellaneous toppings up to picking out and hand-mixing the dozens and dozens of loose leaf teas to steep for those regulars who came in to work on their novel that was totally going to come out one day, you’ll see. After some basic guidance from the (admittedly cute) Swipressnssren on what was absolutely toxic and what other foods should be avoided for her new guests, she began to rack her brain for some sort of flavor profile that she could use.

Most of her go-to stimulants were right-out. Of the ones that were left, they either needed to be toasted in order to bring out the flavor, or powdered to all get-out so they dissolved completely in water. Speaking of, is water the only thing she could give the warmcuddles? Or would some of the oil-based drinks work too? Tolerance for thickness in their fluids – if they didn’t mind something with mouthfeel she could go with a more porridge-like consistency, but that might actually leech out the full-bodyness of whatever else she puts in!

Good challenges were few and far between, and Rssesnsen enjoyed every moment of it as she continued to think and think and think …

“Why… is she doing that?” Luzita asked no one in particular, as the bright red giant snake-person started to writhe in place, staring off into the middle distance. What started with a simple head wiggle soon turned to full body gyrations, and now Cheery was performing loops and twirls that no human could hope to recreate – at least, with their spine still intact. It was utterly fascinating, if it wasn’t so absolutely out of place.

“[I um… I don’t know. She seems deep in thought though.]” Wiggles mused, looking at the Jornissian with curiosity. “[Maybe we just… give her some time?]”

There was a slightly-broken voice’d hum of The Streets of Cairo as a tennis ball tipped cane began to wiggle in the air just above the countertop, the Jornissian across the counter subconsciously beginning to follow it.

“Abuela!”

“Beh! I could be brewing the coffee myself-”

“Mama, give her some time-” Sofia said, lowering the cane below the counter. “And don’t be rude.”

“[OH!]”

The group jumped a little as Cheery had an epiphany, her arms a flurry of activity as she basically stayed “put” while leaning everywhere behind the bar, pulling ingredients from hither and yon. “[I think I have something for you! Give me a few moments and I’ll put that together – you want it hot, or cold?”

“Hot”

“Cold”

“Before I pass on-”

“Abuela-”

“[I’ll just make one hot and one cold! No worries!]” Cheery chirped, shaking up a concoction vigorously before dumping it into what looked like a flash-cooker, the sounds of drinkcraft quickly overpowering the background noise of the other patrons. With a bit of a flourish a large cup was produced, the hot drink poured and pushed over to Sofia. The human looked at the drink with pursed lips, before turning to look at her escorts questioningly.

“Uh, how-”

“[Ah! Allow me.]” Persimmon said, fishing in his messenger bag for a small cylindrical device. Popping a casing over the tip, he stuck it in the center of the drink, thumbing it on. “[Mass spectrometer. It won’t affect the taste at all, but we can see-]”

He was interrupted by a beep, and as he tilted the device’s base towards him a readout began pouring into his implant. “[Ah… Cheery?]”

“[Mmmmmm?]”

“[This is poison.]”

“[Excuse you, I may not make the best drinks on this rock but-]”

“[Ah! No no-]” Persimmon backpedaled furiously as the girls giggled softly, the faux pas causing him to blush lightly. “[J-just, they can’t have it. It’s not Human-approved.]”

“[Oh. What should I omit?]” Cheery sighed, stopping in mid-prep.

“[I uh. I can’t say. The spectrometer will just tell us if it’s poisonous, not what made it poisonous.]”

Cheery shared a flat look with Persimmon before dumping the half-finished cold drink down the drain, putting a broad smile back on her face. “[Well. We’ll just have to try again!]”

The first 3 drinks were mostly experiments; one tested positive for mercury, another, cyanide. The third one had a very exotic neurotoxin that acted along the same lines as irukandji venom, so that was mainly ruled out so as to not have the humans writhing in pain for the next day or three. At the 5th drink, Rssesnsen was almost certain that she had it, only to be told that that much sodium might actually kill the humans at worst, and at best was not healthy for them at all. Drinks 6 – 12 were iterations on drink until it was pointed out that the concoction smelled like a fermented shoe and that absolutely nobody was going to give that a shot. This was unfortunate because to the Jornissian palate it actually tasted somewhat hearty, earthy, with a few bright notes at the end.

Then Rssesnsen mentally smacked herself in the face because of course they wouldn’t taste things right, and tossed out almost everything she had done at that point to start over. Drinks 13 – 18 were better, but still not where things needed to be, and around drink she felt her facade crack just a little.

Rssesnsen was going to serve them a drink, by Nressre-whose-eyes-are-the-moons, or die trying. If only that manic laughter would just stop for a few seconds she could think straight-

“Um.”

“Why… is she laughing?” Luzita asked, frozen in place in that I’m-too-terrified-to-move-but-I-probably-shouldn’t-be-here kind of way. Cheery had become decidedly less so as the cups started to pile up; the initial complaint her mother was simply trying to make of “this cup is the size of my torso” had morphed into… whatever this was.

“[I don’t know, but just stay calm. We’ll protect you if necessary.]” Tipo said, making it a point to slide up to the counter proper. “[Though I don’t think it’ll come to that-]”

“[Looks like a work-related mental break-]” Wiggles said, helpfully and probably a bit too loudly, catching the attention of the slightly-more-unhinged Cheery.

“[No, NO, nono, it’s fine, it’s all fine, look at how fine it is-]”

There was the crackling sound of electricity from somewhere below the counter and a very furious ‘Abuela, not yet-’, but that was enough to snap Cheery from her reverie. With an absolutely exasperated sigh, she just gripped an entire packet of powdered spice – a thickening agent, usually – and just dumped it into a pot of boiling water.

“[We begin by the process of elimination! The drink knows what it is because it knows what it isn’t-]” Cheery began to rant, stirring the quickly-dissolving spice into the thickening water. With a flourish that was mostly “splash it close enough to the target” an extra large cup was half-filled, slid over to the counter, and the preparations for the next concoction began in earnest.

She was halfway through adding in an entire bag of spoons before there was a cheery little ding as the mass spectrometer shrugged and said “eh.” She froze with rapt attention as the far-too-large cup was then gingerly picked up and wiped clean of recently-boiling water.

“So… like I was going to say before… uh…” Sofia murmured, her gaze blocked by the forest of failure before her, “can… can we get that in a smaller cup?”

“[Sure! Suresuresuresure-]” Cheery rambled, pulling out one of each size cup she had. The XXL was right out, as was the XL, the L, and the M. The small was… ok, but, much to everyone’s chagrin, the tester cup was just right. The one drink was gingerly poured into the serving-cup, and handed below the counter to the somehow-not-dead-yet-from-waiting Isabella. She sipped from it gently, her face going from inquisitive to sour.

“Bleh.”

“[Hahahahahahaahahaaaaaaaaaaa is it bad? Of course it’s bad, of course it’s-]”

“Bad, yes. This means it’s good.”

“[W-what?]”

The little old lady steeled herself and in one swift gulp downed the entire concoction.

“Wh-”

“Mom-”

“[Nice-]” Wiggles said appreciatively.

“[Um, are you – we don’t know how that’s going to affect you -]”

“Bah!” The voice-below-the-counter said dismissively, the cup being Kobe’d back onto the countertop. “Tonight we live forever!”

Cheery looked at the two other women, who just shook their heads. “We’re fine, thank you.”

Tipo shrugged and ordered a drink.

So it turned out that “tonight”, “forever”, and “immortal” were all very flexible terms. Once the countertop was cleaned out of the various failed experiments and a few normal drinks were ordered (as well as a sly exchange of contact information) the next step was finding some place to park and enjoy the ambiance of a couple-dozen Jornissians staring at you with laser focus.

Not the most relaxing thing to happen, but, close enough. The real issue was that the options were a divot that already proved too smooth for the humans to settle into (although it was amusing for Luzita to slide around in the pit for a while) or a booth. The booths were comfy, in a word – cozy. This was not just because they were tastefully enclosed save for a single entrance/exit, but you were also sticking in three massive aliens who had to be very mindful of their various limbs as the humans nestled in between them. Awkward silence gave way to light chatter, and eventually the conversation flowed naturally. Simple, mundane questions of ‘what’s good to eat here’ and ‘what’s the weather like? Do you have seasons?’ turned into more pointed ‘stay out of this section of the city’ and ‘this company is a scam’ and all the other juicy gossip that a local can drop on a new neighbor.

One voice started strong in the conversation, but as the night drug on, became more and more rare, until a light snore broke a very pointed conversation about the universal merits of animal fat.

Isabella – Abuela – had fallen asleep against Tipo.

“Oh! I’m sorry-” Sofia smiled, touching Tipo’s arm. “It’s been a long day for her. We should probably get going back.”

“[Y-yeah. But… but I can’t move.]”

Sofia furrowed her brow as Luciana continued to make small talk with the other two guardians. “What do you mean?”

“[I mean-]” and he gave a pointed look to the little old lady currently burrowed into his side. “[If I do I’ll wake her up! I can’t move.]”

“It’s fine – look. Mama!” Sofia called, sliding her legs up to stand on the seat, leaning over the counter to shake Isabella. “Mama, let’s go now. Come on.”

Her efforts were met with a murmur and a much louder snore. Sofia pursed her lips and looked up at Tipo. “Can you shake her?”

“[No.]” Ngruzren said, surprising everyone at the table including himself with the intensity of his rejection. “[N-no. It’s fine. This is fine.]”

“Well you can’t very well just sit here for the next 8 hours!”

Tipo looked around at the rest of the cafe who were all very much ok with this idea, eventually locking eyes with Cheery who was over-enthusiastically nodding.

“[I mean-]”

“No. Come on, just… just pick her up and let’s go.”

“[But that could be unsafe-]”

Sofia rolled her eyes and turned to the other two chaperones. “Can one of you…?” She let the question linger as she motioned over to her mother, who was dead to the rest of the world.

“[I mean, we have installed comfort pods around this section of the city specifically for this purpose.]” Persimmon mused. “[We could just deposit her in one of them, let her rest, and then come back when she’s awake.]”

“[No.]” Sofia said, surprising everyone at the table including herself with the intensity of that rejection. “We are not leaving mama on the fucking street!”

“[Ah, ah… ok]” Persimmon said, raising his hands in a placating gesture. “[Well, the other option is to carry her, which could be hazardous – seeing as how she’s elderly and humans’ muscles relax to a startling degree when unconscious.]”

“Well we’re not leaving her on the street-”

“[And I don’t feel comfortable carrying her it’s fine really we can just stay like this it’s ok-]”

“Por que no los dos?”

The table turned to Luciana, who just shrugged a bit. “They’re comfort pods, but they had to have been installed somehow. Let’s just… uninstall them and carry the pod. Between the three of you, you can do that, right?”

The three aliens shared a curious look with each other, as well as a few subconscious flexes.

“[…sure. We could do that.]” Wiggles said, slowly, and was met with no opposition.

“Great!” Luciana clapped her hands, placing them on the table. “Now let’s get outta here.”

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They are Smol – and Tenured! 1 Year Anniversary Smolsmas Special!

A/N: URAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Smol is now ONE YEAR OLD! Can you believe it? I habeeb it. A few excited reddit posts on /HFY/ turned into suggestions for a Patreon, and that spawned a Discord which now has a Twitter/Pinterest/Instagram/Youtube – and then we’ve got a Minecraft server in the mix as well –

Smols are growing stronger

And to celebrate, yes, there’s your weekly dose of shitposting, but also we’re doing server events, movie marathons, minecraft battle royales to the death, apotheosis – all sorts of fun things! It’s incredible, incredibly fun, and would be incredibly awesome if you come join us.

But, as we all know, not all… events, even if they’re planned well go well. Sometimes, even the best of intentions go awry in ways no one could have speculated, leading to unintentional consequences.

And of course, no one knows this better than the people on Zephyr Station 8.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Zephyr Station 8, Now:

“I’LL KILL HIM! I SWEAR TO GOD I’LL KILL HIM-”

Glenn “Silk” Abramson was being held back – just barely – by Jonathan and a majority of the assembled crowd, as Mike crouched to defend his young charge.

“Glenn – Glenn-”

“NO. HE’S GONE TOO FAR – HE PLANNED THIS – CONSEQUENCES CAN NEVER BE THE SAME-”

– – – – –

Zephyr Station 8, a day earlier:

“[Director?]”

“Hmm?” Glenn murmured, sipping his “World’s 18th Best Zephyr Station Manager but Galaxy’s Best Absentee Father” mug, which was mostly text and also stolen.

“[I checked the calendar before approaching you-]” Rgrezneh-of-Hrzgaren said, looking around with a curious expression. “[-there’s no holiday today, is there?]”

“Ah, no.” Glenn said, motioning with his mug’d hand to the carnival being erected before them both. As supervisor it was his job to supervise and not do any actual work, so he was able to give Rgrezneh the whole story. “We’re celebrating an entire 604,800 seconds of being an accident-free workplace!”

Glenn shotgunned his “coffee” before tossing the ‘rented’ mug into the roomba cave – they would know what to do – and continued before Rgrezneh could do the mental math. “So, we decided to bring up some of earth’s flora and fauna for a bit of a petting zoo/western country fair carnival in celebration. We’ll have various booth games to win prizes, some very very unhealthy food, and possibly even a couple animal races if – oh for fuck’s sake. MIKE!”

Rgrezneh turned to see what drew Glenn’s ire, and noticed nothing out of the ordinary; There were a few compressed wood booths, her on-again-off-again-on-again boyfriend Mike, and he was seeming to fuss with an exosuit that was very obviously not designed for the quadrupedal animal he was attempting to put it on. She sighed in that “he’s stupid but cute” way, and followed the now incresingly-irate Station director over to see what was going on.

“Mike what the fuck are you doing?”

Mike, for his part, crouched and hugged the small pony defensively. “His name is Thimble and I love him.”

“Look, just… why is he in an exosuit? And are those… those are four left boots-”

“They’re all spares it’s ok!”

“Mike. What. Are. You. Doing.”

Mike scrunched up his nose before sighing, patting Thimble on his back. “I figured that this absolutely excellent pony that can never do anything wrong ever would enjoy a spacewalk.”

Glenn growled something subvocally into his commbead, pulling out his tablet and signing into it with his thumbprint. “Firstly, I know this has to qualify for animal abuse somewhere. Somehow.”

“No it’s not, Thimble likes it! Don’t you, Thimble?”

The horse just stared ahead, long since desensitized to the humans’ … eccentricities.

“See? Absolutely rarin’ to go!”

“First, Mike, no. Secondly, that’s a suit for humans and not horses-”

“The tolerances work-”

“Thirdly, no. Fourthly, Thimble is apparently a registered weapon in 4 territories. I’m looking at his record -”

“Those territories are anti-horse!”

“-14 broken kneecaps, 27 crushed feet, 4 children headbutted off of a spinning carousel-”

“Then a spacewalk will help him become a better person! Won’t it, thimbuuu~” Mike cooed, running his fingers through the apparently criminal horses’ mane. Rgrezneh frowned slightly as she stared at the smaller, weaker obviously prey animal, watching as it just stared… vacantly off into space.

“[Mike, why… are you attracted to this thing?]”

“Because when we got the animals off the elevator Thimble came right up to me and nuzzled me and we have a connection-”

“It’s called ‘you keep unwrapped granola bars in your pocket, dipshit.” Jessica so helpfully interjected, pointedly ignoring the spectacle as she carried a crate past the group. “If I carried jerky in my pockets the dogs would probably have loved me too.”

“Dogs love everyone because they’re notorious headpat sluts.” Mike replied, turning his nose up at the colonial. “This is a well-known fact, and proves that my bond with Thimble is pure.”

“I just. No. Mike, no-”

“You’re just jealous.”

“I absolutely am not.” Glenn stated with an extreme matter-of-fact tone, attempting to quash what he could feel would be another… incident. “And regardless, why are you bonding with this pony anyway? We’re just gonna be shipping it back down to earth in a few days-”

“NO. We have a bond and are gonna play games together and have a great time-”

“[Ah.]” Rgrezneh said noncommittally, as she finally connected the dots. She smiled softly as the two humans continued to argue, nodding to herself.

Of course the conclusion she drew was wrong, but that made no difference – and before she could interject her extremely incorrect opinion into the argument, Mike finally pushed Glenn over the edge.

“You’re just jealous because Thimble and I are gonna have a great time, win more games than you, and be the best-of-fair!”

“I could pair up with a fucking ant and kick your ass, Mike! I’m sick of your shit, and this is the last time I’m gonna-”

“Then do it”

“What?” Glenn said, inhaling sharply as the last few moments of traded insults came back to him

“DO it. Just – Just DO IT.” Mike said, pointedly pressing his scrunched fingers into his free palm. “Don’t let your means be dreams!”

“………”

Glenn looked up at Mike’s girlfriend for some guidance. “Can you just… do something?”

“[Mike, do you want pups?]”

The two men physically recoiled at the abrupt question, Mike stuttering for a moment while hugging Thimble for emotional support. “Wh-what?! N-no! I mean, yes, eventually, but like, no! I want an adventure! And this is just gonna be the horse-human buddy-cop adventure that we need!”

Glenn stared at the slightly-smug Dorarizin as she confidently defended the absolutely wrong conclusion, and then at Mike, who was not only aggressively defending the pony, but was threatening to literally horse around, and came to a conclusion.

“Fine.”

“What?”

“[What?]”

“Get me an ant colony – sugar ants, black ants, whatever. Setup is finished tomorrow, so we should have something by then – hell, pests come up all the time with food supplies – and let’s do it. And when I beat you-” Glenn said, rounding on Mike again, “You are going to finally act like an adult or you’re fired.”

“Oooooh…” Mike said, softly. “The hero meets his arch nemesis on his journey-”

“Goddamnit, Mike.”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Zephyr Station 8, a couple hours ago:

All in all, the first-ever “We made it 604,800 seconds without something going wrong!” Carnival and Fun Faire(tm) was going off without a hitch. There was skee-ball, dart-tossing, that water-gun target shooting thing, some bunny races and the like, all set up within Zephyr Ballroom 12-J. A few coworkers who practiced magic as a hobby stepped up to do wandering entertainment, the galley was pumping out absolutely terrible-for-you food, and everyone seemed to be having a good time.

So good a time, in fact, that they either didn’t notice or didn’t care that their station director was standing in the middle of the faire with a jar full of ants.

“Where the fuck is that little asshole.”

Glenn turned, this way and that, until he finally spotted a still-exo-suited person jogging towards him, carrying under his arm-

“Oh God Damnit, Mike!”

“No! We saw the stars and bonded! He was super energetic and we did a spacewalk and repairs on the solar panels and everything! And our bond is now strong enough to defeat you-”

“Firstly, fuck you. Secondly, Anime is a disease-”

“But you obviously watch enough anime to know that’s a trop-”

“Thirdly, did you just… jam a human helmet on the poor thing? It’s totally fogged up-”

“Well duh, we didn’t cover defogging in Thimble’s training.” Mike said, rolling his eyes. “That’s silly. He still worked the MMU unit just fine for a rookie though!”

“I… I’m not. Just. Fuck you. Three games and that’s it.” Glenn said, shaking his jar of ants. “Then I hit you with this and we file for your transfer.”

Mike put down Thimble who wobbled just a bit on his 4-left-booted hooves and struck a pose. “You cannot defeat-”

“I am going to dock your pay-”

“Fuck fine.” Mike murmured, quickly looking around. “Uh. How about that ball game over there?” Mike said, pointing towards the ‘knock down these pins and win a prize’ booth. Without a second glance Glenn walked over to the booth, standing in line with his jar of ants that still raised no eyebrows. Mike and Thimble joined him a few moments later, the horse basically needing to be dragged over to wait in line.

“Step right up, step – oh hey Glenn! What’s… with that look?”

Wordlessly, Glenn placed his jar of ants on the counter. “Three balls, please.”

Mike stood next to Glenn, Thimble’s head bonking into the underside of the table.

“This is… this is a thing, isn’t it?” The carnival game operator said flatly, crossing his arms.

“Yes”

“Yes”

“Ah.. Alright. Just. Don’t fuck things up too badly, we’re only halfway through the day.”

Three balls were placed before the two groups of contestants – nay, warriors.

“So what rules are you two… gentlemen playing with?”

“Thimble and I are proving that the bond of friendship and true camaraderie can defeat any foe-”

“Fuck if I know.” Glenn interrupted, shrugging. “One ball for us, One ball for the critter, One ball as a duo?”

Mike nodded, clenching his fist to his chest. “Good. Your heart burns with the same fire-”

Wordlessly – and indeed, without even breaking eye contact with Mike, Glenn picked up a ball and winged it at the pyramid of bottles. There was a satisfying clunk, and a few of the top and core bottles scattered behind the wall.

“Your go.”

Mike, not to be outdone because his heart burns with a fiery passion, mimicked Glenn almost bottle-for-bottle.

“N-now the … animals?” The carnival booth operator said, curiously. “I don’t even know how that’d work, to be honest.”

“It doesn’t.” Glenn said, rolling his second ball to the ground.

“So you admit defeat!” Mike grinned, standing triumphant. “Truly, the heart of this noble steed will burn just as bri-”

Wordlessly – and indeed, without even breaking eye contact with Mike, Glenn unscrewed his bottle of ants, revealing a shaker top. Like some perverted seasoning he shook out a couple onto the tabletop, grabbed the ball, and slammed it onto a group of the hapless insects. He winged it at what was left of the pyramid of bottles, another satisfying clunk denoting a few more bottles struck.

“Your move.”

“Come on, Thimble! SHOW US YOUR MIGHTY HOOVES!” Mike crowed, drawing a little bit of unnecessary attention as he placed the ball on the ground… infront of the booth. “GO! KICK!”

Thimble did nothing but stare blankly ahead – well, we couldn’t even tell that, what with his visor still frosted over.

“Um, I’m going to count that as a ground ball.” The operator said, leaning over. “And I don’t think… it’s interested in doing anything other than being pet and fed – aren’t you, hon?” The carnie said, patting the horse’s head gently through the suit. “Um. So just to move the line forward a bit – how do you plan on doing a duo with this pony?”

“I… uh. Hm.”

“One for me.” Glenn said, picking up his jar. “Skeeball next.”

Mike swallowed, hard.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

The only concern Glenn had was that his supply of ants was running low. The operator of the Skee-ball booth just stepped away when the two of them showed up – one carrying a jar of ants and the other dragging a pony in a full exosuit who apparently really didn’t want to be there, so the two of them were able to make up the rules on the spot.

Each ball was to be a team effort, if teamwork was meant to prove love and friendship could yadda yadda. Glenn just kept smashing ants and scoring points on a pure technicality, while Mike was doing his best to encourage Thimble to help, just a little.

Thimble, for his part, slumped forward, nosing a single ball slightly up before it came down and bonked him on the helmet.

“Look, Mike. Maybe… I was being too hard on you, saying you’d get fired, but I’m definitely sick of your shit.” Glenn said, rolling another ant-covered ball to raise his score up to 115. “All I’m saying is, you have to be better if you’re in a position of power-”

“I will never join the dark brotherhood! My power is noble and pure-”

“G- just. Ok. It’s 115 to 0. I’m out of balls. What say you? Done? This is 2-0.”

Mike looked at Glenn, that fire still in his eyes. “No! SUPER FINAL BONUS ROUND-”

“Fuck.” Glenn sighed. “Ok. We do this SUPER FINAL BONUS ROUND-” he said, mockingly, “-and then you go planetside for heavy training. At least 3 months. I don’t know how you got past all the screeners to get this position, but we’re gonna make sure you can actually do your damn job. What’s the bonus round-”

“A race.”

“Fuck.” Glenn said, as Mike grinned widely. “And it has to be a team race… and this?” Mike patted Thimble’s back as the animal slowly began to lean into his human captor. “This is my trusty steed.”

“Fine. Honestly, I don’t give a damn anymore, you’re still doing training-”

“Not if I win the SUPER FINAL-”

“No. Fuck that, fuck you. Where we racing to?”

“Uhh… uhh… Funnel cake stand!” Mike said, pointing to the food stall about 100 feet away. “On the count of three!”

“Fine. One?”

“Two.” Mike said, leading Thimble to turn around and mounting him, settling down to ride no-saddle.

“Three!”

Glenn darted forward, jar of ants held high above his head, as he sprinted for dear life. He had no idea how fast a miniature horse/garganutan pony could run, all he knew was horses > humans when it came to fast. With a passing apology here and a grunt from a collision there, he weaved in and out of the foot traffic – some parting to make way for him, others oblivious to the speeding madman until he was upon him. Panting and nearly out of breath from the sudden sprint he skidded to a stop, slamming the jar down on the countertop – terrorizing the patrons, smashing the glass and giving the ants a worthy death as they burned in sugar and pastry.

“FIRST!”

“Fuck’s SAKE.” Jonathan said, arms up in reaction as shattered glass and ants were scattered around his food stall. “What the ABSOLUTE FUCK, Glenn?!”

“I beat him!”

“Beat whom’st’d’ve? Jon said, waving his spatula about. “If you’re talking about everyone in line for a churrocake, then yeah, sure, but what the fuck-”

“What do you mean, whom’st’d’ve?! Mike!”

“Mike? He’s – What? Which Mike?”

“Th- the one on the horse!”

Jonathan just stared flatly at his clearly-insane director. “Dude. There’s no one else here.”

“What?”

Glenn spun on his heel and saw… nothing. A parted crowd, a few dirty looks, but no other racer. He wandered back to the skeeball booth – slowly at first, as if he was expecting an ambush, but soon with a light jog as he noticed something concerning.

Mike was cradling an entirely limp Thimble.

“WHYYYYYYY~! I BROKE MY BEST FRIENNNDD~”

A crowd had gathered – with a few familiar faces, thankfully, and a few people were doing their best to pull Mike away from the distressed animal.

“Jessica what’s going on?”

“I have no fucking clue, man. One minute I’m chugging down my 12th greaseburger and the next Mike’s over here cryin’ loud enough to wake the dead.”

“I KILLED HIII-”

“We KNOW Mike, fuck.” Jess murmured, rolling the horse onto it’s back. The movement jiggled it’s helmet slightly, and Jess stuck a finger into the gap.

There was a pause as everyone assembled put two and two together.

“Mike… did you take this animal out into hard vacuum with an improper seal?”

“Iiiiiii…. Wait what? I didn’t crush him because I’m now suddenly thicc?” Mike said, his tears drying up surprisingly quick. Jess frowned and twisted the helmet, three of the other four seals clicking to an unlock position. With a slow, careful movement she pulled the helmet up to finally expose Thimble to fresh air.

The horse – well, ex horse, was exposed to the world, a scream of terror frozen on it’s face.

“You fucking… idiot.” Jessica said, glaring at the fucking leaf. “You pulled this pony out from it’s stable to die screaming in the void!”

“I… I thought he was just awestruck by the majesty of the universe and realized his place in it, and that epiphany was what caused him to stop moving.”

Everyone in the crowd shared a look with each other – you know the type, the look that says ‘he’s honest, but goddamn is he an idiot.’ And in this case, yes. It was true. Mike was an idiot.

Glenn sighed as he felt his moral lecture gland tingle.

“Mike-”

“I just didn’t-”

“Mike.”

There was a moment of silence, and Glenn continued. “First, we’re going to take the horse to medical – maybe we can revive it, maybe not. Either way, it’ll be useful for our boys to practice a hard-vacuum recovery. Secondly, Mike, this is why I’m so hard on you. When will you learn? When will you learn – that your actions have consequences? We clean up your messes most of the time, and most of the time you’re a good enough guy that we don’t mind doing it, but it’s tiring.”

Glenn knelt, placing a hand on his friend’s shoulder. “Look. You’re in management, people are going to look up to you. You’re in power, you have to start making the right calls. You and Sheila are thinking of kids-” Mike leaned back at that, but Glenn kept his grip firm. “-or at least, she is, and you yourself said you want to be a dad someday. What if this was your kid, dude? You need to start acting like the adult you are.”

There was some silence then, as Mike stared at the frozen stiff pony. There was some hard mental work going on; firing of synapses, connections being created and destroyed, and Mike’s entire face took on another look entirely. With stone cold eyes, he looked at his friend, and deadpanningly asked him a single question:








“If Thimble wasn’t alive this entire time, does that mean you were beating a dead horse?”

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Stories They are Smol

They are Smol – and it’s a Smol World: Chapter 10

A/N: Sorry about the delay – both from last week and tonight – but the major drama in my life is over, and we should be returning to normalcy. ILU all. <3

The layout of the Silver City Human district made a tremendous amount of sense, if you were the type of paranoid asshole who believed that everyone was out to get you. To the other species – all of whom had never seen human architecture up close or in person, there was nothing amiss; The partition wall was there for everyone’s safety and to stop people from wandering in and out, the mixed markets had plenty of relaxation pods, 24/7 food courts, mixed-species seating and entertainment, with creeping vines and flower arrangements sprouting out of the walls themselves!

Only a paranoid – nay, delusional sapient would notice how each building’s corners and cafe-facing walls were structurally reinforced, and how each flower arrangement could be popped out – the hole being a little larger than a machine gun’s barrel… and how those holes would allow for overlapping fields of fire. No alien looked at the shared-species plazas of the human sector and thought that they were in danger; if anything, the layout was kind of quaint.

It was the anti-aircraft missile batteries tastefully disguised as water fountains that tipped everyone off and drove away business for the first few weeks, but those were eventually removed and replaced at the city planner’s behest with the “4D Hologram Light Show Projector and Not an Underground Missile Silo” installations.

Therefore, as the misfit band of adventurers made their way down from the landing pad, they had to pass through multiple checkpoints, discrete scanning stations, a few winding corridors (blamed on the ongoing construction, you understand) and one section that Luciana was certain was based on that pre-contact “Legends of the Hidden Temple” show. What would normally and naturally have taken roughly 10 minutes of walking stretched out to roughly 45 minutes, so by the time the 6 sapients emerged from an official checkpoint hole-in-the-wall the sun sat low and fat on the horizon. What little natural orange light could be seen was washed away by the harsh, artificial blue light of the city tinging it to some unnatural shade altogether.

However, Isabella – sorry, Abuela, did not care one whit about the harsh light pollution or the extreme architecture of the city that surrounded her new home; skyscrapers lifting literal miles into the sky did not make her bat an eye. Abuela, for all intents and purposes, was on a very simple mission – albeit one that grandmothers and mothers had embarked on since time immemorial. 

Luciana, her beautiful, smart, wonderful, kind, sweet and a couple-dozen other adjectives aside granddaughter was painfully single. This means no great-grandbabies, and this simply will not do – and the obvious solution was to have the older, wiser women of the family help her make some of the appropriate introductions.

“Is there a place around here to get coffee? A cafe, maybe?” Abuela asked utterly innocently, stopping her shuffling gait on the alien sidewalk.

“[I think there’s a [Human]-approved cafe about 5KM away from here – would that work?]” Wiggles asked, pointedly keeping her body ramrod-stiff.

“Beh! No moving sidewalks, no transportation – no! My feet are beginning to swell anyway- is there something closer?”

“Um, I think… that’s a cafe of some sort!” Luciana exclaimed, pointing with her thumb at a corner store not a couple-dozen yards away. “Maybe we go there? I mean, they’re all sitting outside, and it looks…comfy enough.”

“[Oh, uh. That’s a primarily [Jornissian] establishment, [Luciana].]” Persimmon said, arcing his body over to hover near her head. “[Although we can’t legally stop you, I don’t recommend you go there. They may not have approved refreshments, and we would have to test-]”

“Fah!” Abuela exclaimed, reaching out to loop each arm with that of her progeny. “What’s the use of living this long if you don’t try to get into a little bit of danger now and then! Besides, with it being this close, they’ve probably served humans before.”

And so, arm-in-arm, the three humans began a slow walk towards the cafe.

“”

“shut up right now->”

“recording them you dull-scaled idiot->”

“<No->”

To say that the warmcuddles were causing a bit of a stir at The Comfy Coil was a bit of a misnomer. True, most of the Jornissians at the establishment had seen humans before, and to still be allowed to work this close to their settlement had to take some form of cultural enrichment training – their mannerisms, physiology and the like weren’t totally unknown to the patrons. There was certain surprise when the youngest warmcuddle motioned to their establishment, and some shock when they started to make their way over. Wobbly gait, unsteady spine, all these things and more were adorable.

However, all of them looping arms and crossing the street together was totally unnecessary.

“TOGETHER->”

“crush you if you keep yelling->”

“”

The Comfy Coil – not it’s real name, mind you, but the name closest-enough translated – was a galactic concept made regional; You could go in after a long, tiring day, get some hot food and a nice pick-me-up drink, and if you so choose to find a booth or a divot for a power nap. This place, and places like it, basically ran themselves. This was fine when you were dealing with exhausted patrons and the occasional couple on a date, but was woefully inadequate when dealing with…

…well. Whatever this was going to turn out to be.

“<PATRONS!>” Rssesnsen thundered, using her outside voice as loudly as she dared. “”

A few of the Jornissians shrunk back into their seats somewhat chastised, and a few just… continued. With a sigh Rssensen reached under the counter and clicked off a few buttons – the heated pads of a few choice patrons began to cool, rapidly.

The Comfy Coil did have a few non-verbal ways to get straggling customers out of the shop – closing time is sacred in retail, no matter the species. With a few chilly bellies the last of the belligerents were calmed down, and the heat was turned back on – literally, not figuratively. Rssesnsen dared to look out the patio to the group approaching her, and an almost manic smile spread across her features.

This should be illegal, she thought, as she checked to make sure the shop’s security cameras were recording everything. On the monitor, slowly approaching, were three Warmcuddles with their arms looped around each other – for safety? A cultural thing? She did not know – and neither did the almost writhing with unbridled joy Jornissian behind them. They were preceeded by a stiff, almost robot-walking Spiritual-Stargazer, and directly behind them an incredibly nonplussed Clutchmate-Seeker just… watched everything unfold. She caught herself staring only when the group had made their way to the front door and were having some sort of … conversation.

It was the elder warmcuddle that seemingly had a problem-

“no.>”

For everyone else, Jornissian or even the rare non-Jornissian counterpart who would find themselves in The Comfy Coil, the outside entrance was something so mundane as to be wholly ignored by the conscious brain. A few entry signs, an automatic door, and the grippy entry/exit way for fast traction, and that was it. What Rssesnsen now found, much to her delight and slight horror, was that the steps installed that were of no consequence to any of her other patrons were just a bit too high for the elder warmcuddle.

She couldn’t get in.

There was some animated conversation outside, a couple interesting arm and hand gestures, and an attempt by the younger warmcuddles to climb the first step and help the elder up – this did not succeed. Eventually the clutchmate-seeker, with all the care in the world, wrapped his arms around the frail creature and hoisted her up the step.

The first step. Of Five.

By the time they finally made it into the cafe proper Rssesnsen, the patrons, and their escorts were practically vibrating with energy.

Abuela scanned the room, daring a motherfucker to say something.

She knew she – and the girls – would be of interest to the locals, but she didn’t expect the entire cafe to stop what they were doing and watch them cross the street as an almost single hydra-like entity. Granted, the left batch of heads seemed… overly enthused at their arrival, but everyone seemed to settle down before they ended up at the front door. She had been moved by men before; sometimes from a barricade, sometimes from danger, sometimes… well. That’s for a flashback that’s not rated for this website. But never for something so mundane as walking up steps – so when her feet finally touched the gritted floor of the cafe, Isabella knew she had to reassert dominance.

Hence, the steely-eyed glare. The slight frown was just an added bonus to prove that yes, she would cut you, and no, you shouldn’t try.

“Hm! Well! What’s good here?”

“[OH HI!]” An almost cherry red Jornissian cried out a little too cheerfully, rapidly rearing up from behind the counter. “[I um. Hello! Welcome to The Comfy Coil! Would you like a seat or could I get you something from our drink or food bar?]”

“Oh, hello!” Sofia said, smiling. “It’s a pleasure to meet you – um… Cheery!”

The Jornissian full-body wobbled back and forth a bit while the Translator implanted in her head worked out her new name, and Rssesnsen did a little twirl once it was done. “[Why, thank you! And what are your names?]”

“I’m Sofia, Luciana’s mother and this is Isabella, my mother.” Sofia said, patting her mother on the back gently. She was rewarded with another “Hm!” as the elder Aleman kept shifting her eyes across the cafe, continuing to establish dominance. “And we were hoping to get something to drink – caffeine is one of our safer stimulants, but I think there are a few others we can have if you don’t carry it.”

“[Oh! I’m certain we can fix something up! Ah… is there anything on the menu that you’d like to try first? I can see about substituting ingredients-]”

“Certainly. That sounds lovely.” Sofia smiled wide, walking up to the counter that… started to loom kinda high. By the time she made it up to the countertop proper, it was almost at her eye level. She looked up at the Jornissian, the predator looming over her with far too much cheer for someone who was working in the equivalent of fast food.

“Um… so… what’s uh. What’s the deal of the day?” Sofia asked, as she was soon joined by her daughter who draped her arms over the chin-height countertop.

“[We have a sea-reed slurry soup which is mostly carbohydrates and fiber, to be honest, with your choice of either synthetic protein, plant, animal, or insect-based protein-]”

“Eeh, no! No insects, please.”

“[Oh, alright! So then, if that’s not your choice for tonight, you can take a look at some of our smoothie options!]” Cheery cherry cheerfully chirped.

The two humans looked at the board behind the Jornissian, the third one using her cane to bat away a helpful pair of feathered arms each time they made ready for a lift.

“Ah…”

“[Oh! Don’t worry about the GRC there – for you, all substitutions are free!]”

“No, it’s not that-”

“[Oh! I can assure you, all our protein is raised in cruelty-free environments! All our stock is vaccinated – takes the light right out from behind their eyes-]”

“It’s… ah. Persimmon?”

The humans’ Jornissian guide gently curved his body around the now fighting-not-fighting abuela vs. Wiggles deathmatch happening in front of the counter, lowering his head down to her eye level. “[Yes?]”

“I can’t read. I mean, I can’t read the signs. Our… implants are voice only.”

Swipressnssren – nee Persimmon – stared with an unfocused gaze for just a few seconds before raising himself up to a normal height. He made eye contact with his counterpart across the counter, and they shared a quiet conversation that basically boiled down to How can they be like this all the time.

“Ha!”

There was a slightly meaty thap, and a tennisball-tipped cane connected with Wiggles’ snout, dissuading her from any further attempts to lift Abuela up to non-manlet heights. She scanned the room one last time with the most what did I just tell you look, before rapping her cane against the corner of the counter.

“Give me your strongest stimulant!”

“Abuela, no-”

“[Is – is she serious? I can’t… tell.]” Cheery murmured, staring through the serving-area to where she was almost certain the elder stood.

“[Just do it.]” Murmured the Dorarizin, sighing heavily. “[What’s the use of living so long without a little excitement, right?]”

“Ha!” the cane waved, triumphantly. “See? I like Tipo! One for him too! Tonight, we are invincible!”

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Categories
Stories They are Smol

They are Smol – and it’s a Smol World: Chapter 9

A/N: Hey everyone – sorry for the delay in posting! I was getting over some health issues that suddenly cropped up, and they really kinda just… stopped me dead in my tracks. But the troubles are behind us, and we should be back to our regular posting schedule! To make up for the lack of smol, please accept this late superpost!

– – – – – – – –

Gentle Expanse was an alien planet, and if this is a fact that surprises you at this point in the story, I honestly don’t know what to tell you. I point it out merely because when we see Star Wars or Star Trek or Star Tzar (very popular in the 2080s) we tend to either (1) land on a hostile planet whose atmosphere is poison, temperatures are deadly, where any surface liquid is acid, or (2) Land somewhere vaguely Earth-ish, but with one or two odd plants.

Gentle Expanse was picked because it was Earthlike; The gravity was just a little heavier, the days a bit longer, but the atmosphere was basically the right composition and water flowed freely on it’s surface. There were mountains and valleys and rivers and lakes and oceans, and it’s about at that point that the similarities ended. A separate, non-terraformed planet in the goldilocks’ zone would have it’s own tree of life and it’s own way of doing things.

Seeing as how they weren’t allowed the land far from the city and civilization, they picked the furthest point from their bustling neighbors to build their homestead. It … the spires of the city rose in the distance, kilometers away, so you could pretend that you were far out, but civilization still seemed to loom close. Andres Aleman, or as his friends and family called him “Double-A”, reflected on these facts as he tested the earth. There wasn’t so much “grass” on the planet as small, crumbly… well the closest thing would be some sort of multi-hued fungus with a stiff root system, and once you got that out of the way the little critters – all names unknown to human science – skittered out of the way to show a slightly gray hard-pack earth. Double-A took his spade and struck it into the ground, it yielding like wet clay under the metal’s edge. Turning it over he found it somewhat porous and teeming with life.

“So, how does it look?”

Double-A turned towards his elder brother, Tomas, and shrugged. “Hell if I know. There’s a good ecosystem here, sure, but. I have no idea if any of this would eat roots, or if we can even plant here.”

Tomas frowned and knelt, the setting of his new home’s one large sun painting his back a vivid orange in the dimming light. He poked at the mass of dirt, watching it break apart easily under his tool. “Well. At least we won’t have issue plowing, but… is that all fungus?”

“I don’t think so. We sent ahead our specs to the UTF, and they wouldn’t just send us out here without-”

“Double-A, you still trust that the government isn’t inept. This is why you fail.”

Tomas was rewarded for his playful snark with a lump of alien soil tossed onto his shoes. “Ass.” Double-A said, taking another spade of dirt out of the land before them. “But seriously. Fungus destroys our crops, and we can’t have root-eating pests. These are basic things that would’ve been covered by the Agriculture Department of the United Terran Federation, right?”

“I’d assume so, or else this is going to be one hell of a short-lived colony.”

“So… what first? Wheat? Corn? I’m voting corn-”

“Corn tortillas are the best, but I think we might go with potato-”

“Potato?! Are you MAD?” Double-A said, reeling back in somewhat-fake shock. “Latkes are heresy, and it’s physically impossible to make a mole matzah ball soup! That’s how we lost Grandpa Bimbo, God rest his bear-loving soul.”

Tomas just stared at his brother for a few moments, desperately trying to determine if he was being serious before shaking his head. “No, you idiot. They’re easy to grow, nutritionally dense, are used in multiple cultures and pretty hardy – we can sell them to basically everyone. We’ll also be able to determine with them exactly what here eats what, so we don’t waste our other seed crops. We have the budget for hydroponics, but…”

Tomas stared ahead in contemplation, the meadow stretching out from their haphazardly-built landing/homestead site. The not-fungus grass stalks swayed slightly in the breeze, a few of them opening up in “blossoms” from some external or internal stimuli that was just as alien as the landscape before him. Insects – probably? – darted from open bloom to open bloom, and in the distance strange noises of small things echoed in the encroaching dusk. The meadow continued for some acres until hitting, for lack of a better term, the “woods”; large spindly swaying growths, limbs fat and lumpy with… fruit? Sap? Tomas didn’t know. They reminded him of fat yet barren oak trees, soft-looking yet ponderously huge and heavy limbs intertwining with their neighbors for mutual support, forming almost a singular structure if you forgot to see the forest for the trees. The wind went through them, sometimes whistling, always rustling – and that, at least, was close enough to home that Tomas could appreciate the whole thing, tamping down the subconscious desire to set fire to the whole damn thing and grow proper plants in their stead.

“…fire.”

“Hmm?”

Tomas blinked and stood up, rolling his shoulders. “We should get a fire going, seeing as how it’s going to be night here soon – we can get some cooking done, keep warm and keep setting up camp.”

“Aren’t fires illegal? I mean – they made a big to-do about using light generators instead-”

“Yeah, but fuck’em. We’ve got fire suppressant gear, and it’s not like we’ll be making some sort of massive blaze. Just something to cook with, yanno?”

“Eh. Yeah, sure, I haven’t started a fire in years. We still got that chorizo?”

Admiral Smalls was, first and foremost, not a small man – that joke had been made many times before, and had caused a few fights as well. At 5’11” he towered over the rest of his crew, though that was mainly due to him being seated at his station on the bridge – which, of course, necessitated that he be at the highest point to look over everyone’ shoulders. The initial un-docking of Reach and her escort was exciting, the forming of the trans-spacial field and the activation of the warp drive was historical, and the actual jump itself was-

Well. It was fun, though he’d never admit it openly. Seeing everything blow by you, punching through your home system in a matter of hours what would have taken years, if not decades, and then the great expanse. A trillion trillion points of light, moving around your ship in every direction. Each one a new star, a new galaxy, a new adventure–

He sighed, dejected. That was probably the reason why the UTF refused to name any ship “Enterprise”; that call of adventure and discovery was intoxicating, but as it had been drilled into him a thousand times already, warping into systems you haven’t mapped is how you die via instantaneous deceleration. Although he’d love to land on strange new worlds, he didn’t want to do it face-first and at speeds that would vaporize him into his constituent atoms.

So he did the next best thing; piloting well-mapped space lanes that no human had done before. Still got to discover things, still got to see things before anyone else, and much like the rest of human history when some new place was “discovered”, you just had to push the locals out of the way and plant a flag to call it a day.

However, now all that was done; they warped into a new system, there was a bit of a lightshow, pictures and videos were taken and shared and now… now they just sat there in orbit, an impossibly heavy ship seemingly suspended in the heavens by the will of some god. Sure, shuttles were going to and from the surface with perfect regularity, and slowly their holds were being emptied of their cargo – both passengers and livestock – but there was nothing to do. Gentle Expanse was not a port of call, per se – it was a simple self-sustaining colony world, whose main exports were nothing more than a few generic sauces and a bright, iridescent powder that they sustainably harvested off of some local wildlife. There was no place for him to give his crew shore leave. There was no allied shipyard to do work on Reach, if there even was anything to do. There were no pirates, no battles to be fought, no exotic aliens to meet – or seduce – no ancient artifacts to meddle with.

This, of course, only left paperwork.

For the past week and a half, once their geostationary orbit was settled in, the only thing that crossed the Admiral’s desk were the same shuttle schedules, the same cargo manifesto debriefs – he responded by rubber-stamping in the same place his approval for that day’s schedule and sent out to Gentle Expanses’ colonial government the same request he made every day, which basically amounted to “ya got any junk tech lying around? I’ll haul it away for free.”

For this was his life now; Admiral Smalls, first among peers to be given the prestigious honor of leading mankind to their first off-system colony world had been reduced to rummaging around in alien trashbins for bits of broken tech. Partially because Humanity didn’t want to always build things from scratch (fixing things up saved resources after all), but as it was told to him by one of the R&D wonks back on earth, “why innovate when you can reverse engineer?” Gentle Expanse had it’s blacklist of technology it couldn’t give us, sure, but who’s to say that an old generator or broken transport wouldn’t yield some secret that would advance Human technology by decades?

A gentle pip interrupted Adm. Smalls’ musing, followed closely by another. He tapped his consoles’ screen, maximizing both messages.

The first one was a nice surprise: Apparently Silver City had spun up a few civilian training courses for human interaction, and had an excess amount of damaged and/or malfunctioning hard light projectors, and was willing to part with all them for the paltry sum of 1,750KG of Au. Done and done.

The second pip… well, it was a surprise, but a curious one. It originated from deep within the bowels of his on-board tech department, and wasn’t so much of a red flag as it was an inconsistency. Adm. Smalls tapped a few icons on his station, pulling up a secure connection with…

Well. We’ll just call them the spooks. You know who I mean.

And so Admiral Smalls and The Person He Was Talking To discussed an interesting spike of EM radiation that was transmitted from his ship to the local galactic network node that led to an access point that didn’t exist, and apparently contained no data.

Hisssssss-pop

Double-A sighed as the fire crackled and murmured, fed on broken crates, paper stuffing and wooden pallets. Its’ fuel wasn’t pretty, but it was comforting none the less, the orange glow of the fire casting jumping shadows against the temporary shelter. Temporary was a bit of a misnomer; it was a modular home, a space double-wide, but the build quality was such that there was no real reason for it to not be permanent, save for the fact that it looked ugly as hell and Double-A could swear he heard banjo music play softly whenever he used the restroom.

“Did you find the pan?” he called out behind him, kicking in an errant piece of wood with his boot.

“No! We’re gonna have to use foil.” Tomas called out over the sound of rummaging. “That’s all I found. Foil and butter.”

“Didn’t mom say she packed everything we’d need though-”

“Yeah, well! Uh.” Tomas poked his head out of the temporary shelter, giving his best I have no fucking clue expression. “Mom probably put them somewhere.”

“Did you check the fridge?”

“I…”

“Really-”

“Shutup, fuck you, I’m tired and this place is weird.”

Usually Double-A would have continued the banter, playfully trading jabs with his brother, but in this case… he was right. The place was weird. Admittedly, everything outside of Earth was “weird”, but in different ways; the trip up the spire, the alien simulations, the interior of a spaceship – sure, weird, but somehow… human. You were in odd places doing odd things that your grandparents couldn’t dream of, but it was still somehow comforting, even if every experience was new and somewhat terrifying, because someone had been there before. Somebody – some human – had planned out that sector, had riveted that corridor together, had swept the halls and painted the walls. But as Double-A looked out over the night that held no moon over the not-grass as strange sounds echoed through the not-woods, he shuddered.

This place was weird.

The wind passed through the trees – Double-A forced himself to call them trees – the sound almost comforting to his overworked mind.

“I found the things!”

“Good!” Double-A called, tossing another few wood scraps onto the fire, orange light burning bright. “I’m really considering putting up some of those generators, yanno? Like. I get the whole campfire feel, but-”

“—-Ö—.”

Double-A stopped mid-sentence, his breath hitching in his throat. What was that noise?

… … …

He shuddered, again, and held out his hands to the fire. If this planet at least had a moon there might have been a chance for a lit night, but as it stood the darkness around their little settlement was all-encompassing and impregnable. It was… it seemed to swallow the light, and in some sort of ancient defiance, Double-A tossed on a few more scraps of wood, stoking the fire brighter.

“. . . öööö-”

“Yeah ok that’s definitely something-”

“What’s definitely something?” Tomas called out, carrying tinfoil-wrapped chorizo-and-butter bundles. “Cause if you’re talking about my new interstellarly-famous buttered sausage then-”

“Sssh!” Double-A hissed, staring out into the void. There was a hasty silence behind him, and he was soon joined by his brother, who wordlessly passed him a shotgun.

“What? Wild animal?”

“I don’t-”

“Öööööööööööö~”

“What the fuck-”

Safeties were clicked off, shells were racked, and the two Aleman brothers stood defiant against the night.

“…well that was anti-clim-OHGODDAMNIT-” Tomas cried out as something descended silently from above, it’s wings beating silent against the night, great compound eyes glowing balefully in the reflection of the single sputtering firelight. Double-A turned, the butt of his shotgun slamming into the beast and seeming to both skid off of it’s chitinous shell and sink into it’s soft flesh, the beast letting out another mournful ‘öööööö’.

Horrifyingly, the call was returned – above the brothers, behind them, before them. There was the sound of somethings landing on their home, landing on their equipment, landing on them.

Silver City was an established city on an established colony world in an established system. This meant that public services were basically everywhere they needed to be; if you were in a city or space station you could rest easy knowing that power, water, atmosphere, life support and various other necessities on the bottom of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs were basically guaranteed. Even if you weren’t – say you found your ship sputtering out of fuel near the diamond cloud – you could take it easy knowing that at worst, within a couple local days a rescue barge would be towing you back to the nearest port. At best you’d be close enough to a well-traveled lane that someone would just pump you some fuel for a tenner.

This, of course, meant that there was an entire apparatus of the state that was purpose-built for mundane surveillance; no matter how freedom-loving and privacy-guarding a populace was, it was important for the government to know where the water pipes were breaking, where those electrical surges were coming from, and exactly what the heck was causing the nitrogen levels to climb in cargo bay 7. When you’re monitoring water/gas/electric/sewage/atmosphere you might as well stick a camera there too, if only to dissuade illegal tampering and to check up on your maintenance crew.

As with any municipal government there were local laws; don’t speed near the heliosphere or you’ll ionize your hull. Don’t dive into our gas giant’s planetary rings or else you’ll wind up destroying them – for one, and for two you’ll have to pay to smooth them back out. But one that had been ingrained into the very architecture of Gentle Expanse itself was simply thus:

Only use blue lights.

Blue, from deep azure to an almost pure “white” was acceptable. What was absolutely not acceptable was anything else. So when there was a pinprick of orange in the natural-park-turned-colony-site, there was concern and a few raised flags amongst the city planners. When the orange light grew, an animal control/rescue unit was dispatched.

When the fireball lit up the night, central services sent everyone they could.

“YOU MOTHERFUCKERS”

“ÖÖÖÖÖÖÖÖÖÖ-”

There was the rapport of gunfire and the beast darted back and up into the darkness, disturbingly fast. They were legion – diving towards the brothers, throwing themselves against toppled machinery, and most surprisingly – eagerly, ecstatically diving into the fire, the force of their impact catching the dust in the air alight. Beating their wings they fanned the flame, and some – screaming – would take to the sky again, igniting in the air in a burst of ichor and color, like some twisted biological firework. The ichor itself also seemed flammable – or something, Tomas couldn’t tell – but the house was on fire. The transport was on fire.

Everything was on fire.

There was the blast from Andres’ shotgun somewhere to his right; he was still alive. Good. Tomas raised his own weapon and fired a round into the skull of one of the creatures that circled the remnants of the camp, the force knocking the beast off of the tractor’s cabin. A few moments later it shakily lifted off, listing hard to the right – and with another shot it was felled.

“WHY WON’T THEY FUCKING LEAVE-”

“I DON’T KNOW – HOW MANY MORE SHELLS YOU GOT?”

“ÖÖÖÖ-”

Two more shots rang out into the night. “FUCK, UH. MAYBE FFFFFGODDAMNIT-”

There was the sound of a scuffle and of a few meaty thuds, and then the blast from his brother’s shotgun going off.

“DID YOU KEEP YOUR GUN?”

“YEAH! FUCK AROUND AND FIND OUT.” There was the sound of another meaty kick, and the call-and-response of ÖÖÖÖ in the night as the swarm beat around and within the camp, a haphazard orgy of animalistic confusion and instinct sewing chaos. “WHERE ARE YOU?”

“NEAR THE TRACTOR. YOU?”

“AH. SPRAYER.”

“WHAT THE FUCK ARE THESE THINGS?!”

“I DON’T KNOW – LOOK! EYES, uh, SOUTH! THERE!”

Tomas guessed where his brother was pointing – the night sky was alight with a pinprick swarm of lights coming from the nearby city, and at what he was hoping was an incredible speed.

“FUCKING FINALLY.”

“{Time to target?}”

“[45 Seconds.]”

Zngrer-of-Drgrabgh checked her harness once more as her partner/pilot Szreshnstrst skimmed them low against the ground. They were approaching the [human] homestead in question at near mach-1, so the deceleration was going to hit them fast and hard. Planetary special forces were rarely called out for rescue missions, especially on Gentle Expanse, but considering the fireball that lit up the night sky a few minutes ago, the [Night-Terror]-beasts most likely whipped up into a frenzy. The planet was, well, infested with them, and there was no real way to kill them without damaging the local ecology. Dissuasion and containment were the best ways to go, so…

“[15 seconds.]”

So she and another team were going to swoop in fast and hard, pop floodlights to disorient the dumb beasts, fast-rope down and evac the [humans]. When the dawn broke they could survey and repair the damage, but right now safety was the most important priority.

“[3…2…1… BRACE-]”

Zngrer-of-Drgrabgh gritted her teeth as she was slammed, hard into her harness, her suit cushioning her from just a few of the nearly 30Gs of force her body felt as they went from nearly mach 1 to a standstill over the course of a few yards. The blast of air from their interceptor shuttles scattered most of the swarm, punching a hole wide enough to allow for an exfil. Wordlessly Zngrer-of-Drgrabgh swung the door wide open and fell into the night.

For a few moments she fell into darkness, and then a dazzling light beamed behind her, bathing the devastated homestead in a pure, white light. The two [humans], disoriented, fired up into the air – much to her chagrin, one of the rounds smacked harmlessly into her stomach. With a heavy thud Zngrer landed near one of the [humans], wrapping her forearm firmly but gently around his torso.

She was rewarded with a shotgun-stock strike to the head.

“{CITIZEN, YOU ARE BEING RESCUED.}” She spoke, calmly but with authority. “{PLEASE stop resisting.}”

“[THEY CAN SPEAK NOW, BATTERY-TYPE-A! THEY GOT ME-]”

“[DON’T GO INTO THE LIGHT SMALL-BUT-FORGETFUL! THAT’S HOW THEY GET YOU-]”

Pursing her lips she activated the retrieval winch, and both her and her charge were pulled smoothly into the air. The [human] squirmed in her grip for a few more seconds before going utterly limp, seeming to accept his fate.

“{Don’t worry, [Human]. I’m from the government and I’m here to help- why are you squirming again calm down-}”

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