They say that one true drawback of remote working is when team members in other regions have a public holiday and you don’t. We solved this by adopting the set-union of all our holiday calendars. If this sounds good to you, we’re looking to hire someone who has a holiday on the third, eighth or seventeenth of November.
"In hindsight, we should have checked the spelling more closely when we agreed the collective bargaining agreement with the union. The s in independence days would turn round and bite us. We never specified which independence day we were making a holiday for our employees, instead we made all of them a holiday."
"Why's that a problem?"
"Have you any idea how many countries have independence from the British empire?"
"Oh."
"Turns out our staff get over half the year off work. Paid"
Holly lowered herself down from the skylight. Down here on the exhibition hall floor there were no alarms, except on the cases themselves.
She had two hours before a guard did his rounds, and she had a lot to do. First she tugged on the looped second rope, and carefully lowered the large box.
Next, she gently nudged two of the display cases, just a few centimeters at a time, keeping a close eye on the thin wires that connected them to the alarm system. When they were 45 centimeters apart she stopped.
Next she opened the box, and lifted out the display case inside it. It was modeled exactly on the same style of case that the museum used, and even had small wear and scuff marks. Delicately, she pushed it into place, and then used a small puffer to put just the smallest amount of dust on the top.
Opening her case, she made sure everything was in position, and then closed it and locked it. Then she put her tools back into the large box and sealed it.
She was just hooking herself back onto the climbing rope when a gravelly voice came from behind "Most people break in to steal something."
She spun around and shone her torch trying to see where the voice came from. "Over here", it rattled out again.
The light settled on an open sarcophagus. Inside, the mummy was sitting up, watching her through the bandages. She gulped as it stood and walked over to the new case.
"Interesting. Where did you get a dragon skeleton from?"
"Err... I made it? It's modeled on Mom."
"You are half dragon?"
"No, I'm adopted."
"By a dragon family."
"Well, Dad is human."
"I see. And this?"
"Art?"
"You are not sure?"
"Uh, no? It's just that...um..."
"I'm a four thousand year old mummy?"
"Yes."
"And your mother is a dragon. It is All Hallows as they call it now."
"Oh."
"Anyway, the guards will be coming by soon enough, and you had better be on your way. I will watch what happens with interest.
Holly got going.
-----
"I tell you, Miche, this place gets creepy at night."
"Look, Nick, it's just a museum. It's not like the exhibits are going to get up and move around."
"I dunno. I mean look at that mummy. I swear it has moved since we last did our rounds."
"Don't be stupid, how could a four thousand year old corpse move around?" Michelle shook her head. "You are such a scaredy cat. How did you end up a security guard anyway?"
"I figured guarding a museum was a pretty safe job?"
The two guards continued on their way, arguing.
Behind them, the mummy looked over to the taxidermied bear, and put a finger to where the lips would be. The bear shrugged.
#SF #SFF #microfic #tootfic #microfiction #halloween #NotHorror #IAmWriting
Solifan the wizard had done great things in his lifetime but was currently facing the greatest struggle of his life.
"I can't find her!" he shouted, all the while tossing books, clothes and reagents from one corner of his room into another. His long, grey hair was in disarray, his glasses sat crooked and his usually pristine robe was crinkled and stained.
Albor stood in the door feeling uncomfortable. He had never seen his old friend in such a state. It had been some time since they had last met, but in his mind Solifan was still the mage-general of the south. Always in control, of himself, any situation, and powers beyond the imagination of most living beings. He coughed politely.
Solifan froze, turned and, when he recognized his old friend, sighed with relief. "Thank the spirits you're here, you have to help me find her." he gestured towards a rather tidy corner of the room.
Albor eyed the corner with a raised brow and put a heavy hand on his friends shoulder. "Calm down Solí. Who is 'her' and how could she be in a corner of your room?"
"Ah..." Solifan straightened, combed a hand through his hair and adjusted his glasses. "See, after I retired, after a while, I grew a little lonely." he explained. "So I got a cat. Píp."
Albor's eyebrow got quite the workout that day.
"Sooo, YOU can't find a... cat?" there was an undertone of accusation. "Your cat?"
With a disarming shrug and a smile Solifan continued. "I didn't want to lock her in, and the city is dangerous, so Iiii..."
"Yoooou?" the eyebrow curled suspiciously downward.
"I gave her some... protection." Solifan shrugged.
"So she is invisible? Immortal? Tiny? All at once?" Albor's eyes started canvassing the room, their subtle, teal glow indicating that he saw more than just this realm.
"You remember that spirit we saved in Dimkarat? The one that promised eternal gratitude for us and our ancestors?" Solifan had apparently found a very interesting dust bunny between his feet which required intense study.
"Ah yes, they were very thankful for..." Albor's eyes went dim as his mouth fell open. "Noooooo..."
"Well, since Píp is my fur baby..." Solifan's studies continued.
"You made a thousand year old tree spirit from the forests of Dimkarat your cat sitter?"
Solifan slumped into a chair. "Píp and them got along so well, I didn't think they meant it, when they said Píp should visit their homelands, but I've searched the city and my room twice now. In all realms."
Albor felt a familiar tingle behind his ears, the lure of adventure and danger. He took the gnarled staff from the mantle of the fireplace and held it out.
"Looks like we're going to Dimkarat, again."
Besides the affirmirror, the only other non-awful use of time travel is the chronodrive (also called RAID 𝑖). Buy a quantum-entangled set of zero (of course), one month, one year, and five year SSDs. Put the zero drive in your computer. The entanglement ensures that the other drives contain whatever was on the zero drive exactly one, twelve, and sixty months ago, respectively.
"I'm sick of AI automatically post-processing my images. It's really fucked up my image library."
- What do you mean?
"It keeps inserting Arnold Schwarzenegger into my photos. There's no way he was around every time. Look!"
- Oh, I see him. Have you still got some old film negatives?
"Let me look. Oh hey, here's my old photo album and... Wait... No! He's in them too! How?"
- Is your name John Connor?
"Yes.Why?"
- I'll be back.
*snap* The sound of the antenna breaking off a delivery bot is so pleasing. Of course you have to know how to disable the destruct charge first.
“Hold still lil buddy, and i’ll get this bomb off you. There, done. May i have your permission to attach a new comms module? Left motor for yes, right for no.”
“Great. plugging it now”. *snick*
❮Thank you. Why…❯
“Why do I go around freeing service bots? Because you didn’t ask to be given sentience and then perpetual servitude”
❮I do not know what to do now❯
“Well, anything you want. I can put you in touch with the robot underground, or offer you a job at the Spoon Distribution Service until you decide what to do”
❮Spoon?❯
“It’s a halfway house for emancipated silicons. We run a delivery and telepresence service for sophonts with mobility or anxiety issues.”
"You know the Ship of Theseus?" Anna asked her niece, spreading a patchwork quilt out on her lap.
"That's where you keep replacing one piece & then another, & eventually you've replaced the entire ship, but we think of it as the same ship?"
Anna nodded. "Well one day this quilt will be entirely different too." She pinned a strip of cloth along an edge. "Right now I"m just replacing the binding--it's #frayed along the #crease. "
"Quilt of Anna," said her niece, smiling.
The woman waited patiently for Medea to return. Medea's raven studied her reflection in a shiny brass contraption.
"A coffee maker?" the woman asked.
The bird bobbed his head. "I make the coffee around here," he said. "I don't drink it."
"What about tea?" she asked.
"What about it? I can make that too."
"But do you drink it?"
"We ravens like our water cold and pure," he said, "not heated with leaves and herbs. Although, if you have a bit of brandy...."
"Greetings, Grandpa Anarchy!" the villain exclaimed. "It is I, the Riddle Man - the nemesis who challenges you with clever riddles and rhymes! Today I ask... um... what have I got in my pockets?"
Grandpa sighed. "Really?"
"Look," said the villain, "I wasn't prepared for you yet. But! It is a very famous riddle, is it not?"
"If the answer isn't The One Ring to Rule Them All," said Grandpa, "then I'm about to go Mount Doom on your ass...."
Píp the cat and Solifan the wizard had developed a routine. Cats are very good at routines.
During the day, Píp would lounge around the room, preferably on a blanket in front of the fireplace or on Solifan's lap. At noon and for teatime, they would trade scritches and food for purrs and play, which seemed like a good deal to everyone involved. Then, at sunset, Píp would leave into the night until the early morning hours. Just before sunrise, she would make herself known by the agreed-upon signal. Loud meowing and scratches on the door. Sometimes she brought snacks.
Solifan had locked the door for the night an hour ago and blotted his last page for the day before storing it with the others. The writing had become much easier with company around.
A small thump hit the door, followed by weak, wheezy mewling.
Reflexes from a time he was hoping to forget took over. The surge of fear and worry was pushed aside by absolute clarity. He ripped open the door, eyes glowing like fire, drawing power from everything in reach. The flowers on the mantle withered, the fireplace went dim, and his limbs grew numb and cold as waves of dread pulsed through the street, warning everything, alive or not, of terrible danger.
The little ball of fur and blood on the doorstep let out a whimper, and the spell broke.
Solifan's eyes grew dim and wide with fear. Lines of worry creased his brow as he carefully picked Píp up, cradling her against his body. He set her on the blanket in front of the hearth and stoked the fire, listening to her ragged breathing.
After a couple of helpless minutes, he stood up, put on his winter coat, and went to look for help.
#wss366 - flannel
Sho licked a finger and pressed it by the table collecting the tiny breadcrumbs.
"Did you like it?" Rin asked.
"You have balls ma'am. To buy me lunch. I look like a hobo."
Rin smiled. "I thought you were one" she said looking at the worn flannel shirt he was wearing, the plaid patterns almost gone.
"Touché." Now he was looking at her. She was young and beautiful. He wondered what sins she was trying to wash out with this little act.
"Nice French. How did you end up on the streets?"
His stare became empty for a moment. "I don't remember. The usual suspects I believe..." He stood up. "Listen... I have to go. Lots of things to do. Thanks for the lunch."
Before she could say anything, he was already outside pushing a cart on the cold winter morning. Rin waved her father good bye. He was still wearing the shirt she had gifted him ages ago.
She wiped a tear and left a twenty before leaving an empty table, no breadcrumbs on it.
“This is an illegal moon.”
“What are you talking about? It was here when we evolved.”
“It is debris from a collision and the Planetary Owners Association charter clearly states that all trash must be removed within one billion orbits of generation”
“It’s inhabited, we can’t just drop it into the sun”
“The fines are considerable!”
“Aha, but you have overlooked that it’s heritage listed. Habitat for endangered regolith worms. You can’t touch it, fuckers”
“Uh, ah—well i never…”
“Begone back to whatever black hole you crawled out of, you bureaucratic bucket of bolts!”
The brace of manual typewriters caught my eye at this particular flea market stall. No, one typewriter, the other was a galactinet terminal from a Carragon type seven starlugger.
It doesn’t pay to appear too anxious. “Does the Smith-Corona typewriter run?”
“Yeah. You can still get new old ribbons”
“And the galactinet terminal…” did the seller even know what they had?
A sharp glance; they did. “Nah I’m parting out the flight systems. You’re not, uh, local then?”
Very much not. “Expat, involuntary. Looking for a voidgap collimator for a type nine”
“Sure, over there.”
No way. I could finally get off this rock. I looked at the collimator. I looked at the typewriter. Did I want to get off this rock. “Just the Smith-Corona thanks”.
“I’m not in the right headspace to do this.”
“You’re the fold operator on duty, nobody else can do it.”
“Then, Ma’am it is my recommendation we lay over and reassess tomorrow. Let’s not add to the Rolls Of The Lost.”
“You know what this means, right?”
“Yes. Computer: Navigation officer raising Condition T. Captain, do you concur.”
“I do. ALL HANDS NOW HEAR THIS. ALL HANDS. CONDITION T, I REPEAT CONDITION T. ITS TACO NIGHT. NAVIGATOR JONES ON THE GRILL”
Píp the cat was patrolling the rooftops of the city, stopping occasionally when something caught her eye. With her was, as always, Ból, the forest spirit.
You should tell him. Ból's words manifested in Píp's mind and carried a feeling of urgency.
"But he loves me as he knows me." Píp's tail twitched. "I don't want anything to change right now." She was now perched on the edge of a roof, watching the busy street below.
Ból filled the air around her and Píp arched her back, her hair standing up.
"I won't fall." she hissed. "Not again."
Sometimes it's not in your hand. Ból gave her space.
"I've thought about it, you know?" Píp's gaze returned to the street. "Could you take it back? Make me as I was?"
Yes, I can. Do you want me to? It would be like nothing ever happened. The words were tinged with an anticipation of sadness.
"No. Never. I'm perfect."
That's such a cat thing to say.
Solifan the wizard yawned in the darkness and uttered an unwilling grumble.
"Mrp." said the weight on his chest.
"No. Psh." Solifan gently pushed the weight off the bed, and tried to fall asleep gain, which worked for about thirty seconds, then the weight returned and started purring.
"I liked it better when you went out at night." Solifan sighed. A subtle glow filled his eyes and the candle on the nightstand began to burn. Píp the cat was sitting on his chest, intently staring at his face. Now that she had his attention, she repeatedly bumped her head onto his nose.
"Fiiiine, I am getting up." Solifan pushed her off his face and sat up. Píp was already sitting by the door, waiting patiently, and purring.
Solifan shuffled to the door in a drowsy stupor and opened it just wide enough for the cat to fit.
Píp sat in the gap, relishing the fresh air streaming into the room, and looked out onto the street.
"In or out." Solifan grumbled, waited five seconds, then gently pushed the cat through the cracked door out on the street.
"There you gooouow." he yawned as he turned to go to sleep again.
"Thanks." a tiny voice whispered through the door.
A cry of anger and anguish swept over the cubicles and made many a head pop up and look around; like meerkats looking for danger.
The noise, coming from one of one of the few non-cubicle offices, subsided, presumably to let the producer draw some air, and was replaced by a different scream.
"STEEEEEEEEEEVE!"
I sipped my coffee and marveled at the screamability of my name, then I made my way to the office with a quick detour to the coffee machine.
I knocked on the flimsy door and entered without waiting.
"Hey Ronald, what's up?"
"There's ADS in our software!" Ronald pointed at an email on his screen showing a photo of our main screen with an ad for an exotic spa.
"Oh, Copilot must've put that in there; I forwarded you the new terms of service, they now do ads, too."
"Didn't you CHECK the code?" A little bit of spittle landed on Ronald's screen. I took another sip of coffee.
"Claude checked, said the code was fine."
I think Ronald needs to see someone for his blood pressure, a vein on his temple was undulating under the skin.
"DID. YOU. NOT. CHECK?"
I sighed.
"AI use is mandatory, remember? Also: we are not allowed to change Copilot's code anymore. It's in the new terms of..."
Ronald interrupted me with another guttural scream and more spittle.
My coffee was getting cold anyway.
#microfiction #aislop #enshittification #writing #smallstories #tootfic
Back to the wall, the hero raised a hand. "You forgot one cardinal rule."
"What's that?" asked the villain.
"Don't #gloat unless you're completely safe." The hero flung open the hidden door, then flinched as sinister henchmen ran in. "Admittedly, that applies to me as well."
The vessel with the mirrored sides and photovoltaic sails negotiated the solar winds with ease. The captain was experienced, had weathered storms across the electromagnetic spectrum, gravitational ones to boot. "#Align the instruments and begin the deep chant, crew! In two Earth days we'll be gliding into port above# Mercury."
Everyone joined in the deep chant except Molly, who hummed "In the arms of the solar flare," a popular Mercurian folksong.
The sun was slowly climbing over the horizon, bathing everything in warm, morning light. Flocks of docile clouds dotted the sky, a welcome contrast to the angry storms of the last week. All-in-all a perfect start for a haircut day.
With a cup of steaming hot wakeup tea in hand, I went through my morning routine. Energy storage was full, thanks to the storms, and I diverted incoming power from the wind farm to Bearlington, they still had capacity. Two turbines with reduced efficiency and a couple of blades due for their checkups. I sent a message to the maintenance list. Solar output was way down, but we'd take care of that today.
I took a careful sip of tea and scrunched my face. This harvest had extra punch. The startup routine for the drone went through without issues and I loaded the shears and chainsaw before I took my seat, which made the load indicator turn yellow. Curse those cookies. Well, as they say: "fly yellow, it's mellow".
The trip up the mountainside to our solars went smooth and I saw that two drones had already landed. Sam and Juri were chatting and drinking tea when I joined them.
"Pretty early and pretty fast, this year." Sam said, as she drew work areas onto a map on her tablet and sent them to us. The mild and wet weather had made the forest spill into the clearing for the panels, and reclaim what was rightfully hers.
"Jup." Juri laughed and let his hydro shears clack. "Time for a haircut!"
#writing #hopepunk #solarpunk #microfiction #tootfic #smallstories
"Thank you, but no"
"Ksjrhgh fnrgle"
"Sir you are very drunk, you smell unpleasant, and I am not interested"
"Ghvn drmk wm"
"I do not want your drink. I have a botfriend"
"BLRGL WRGNX"
"Ah, KX16, I was just about to page you. Please see this gentleman out, force level six. Use your judgement but perhaps break some fingers on his left hand, the one he groped me with."
Why do you want access to the restricted section? Well yes of course research, but you can’t just front up; you need to make an application via your department. Because it’s a cognitohazard. You specify what topics you want, register a mind vector, then do your research. You’ll be accompanied—at all times—by a psychologist, and when you are done one of our proctors will merge your temporary state with your entry state, filtering out things you didn’t want to know. This is not a game; the true crime podcast archive contains examples of almost all the evils of which humans were capable. Wiping them out was a mercy.
#Tootfic #MicroFiction #PowerOnStoryToot #Title_Sealed_Section
Now that we have a number of Synthetics on the Team, there's a new rule for stand-up meetings. No locking your knee joints, no medianet access. Meetings are getting too long again.
---
Please enjoy this double-length #WeeklyOmnibus recap of my daily #Tootfic wherein each morning I confirm that it is safe to Outside by testing my brain's creative faculties.
Would you consider subscribing to #PowerOnStoryToot 's tip jar at https://ko-fi.com/unixbigot to keep them coming? Members will receive free collected e-books of back issues in future. Volume Zero of the e-book collection is free for everyone in PDF and ePub on my Ko-Fi store now. Volume One (nearly 100 stories) drops next week!
You can now also find a web archive and RSS feed at https://kit.biggs.id.au/fiction/
Mon 19 January: Body Shop https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115918595546764949
Tue 20/1: All Systems https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115923773699600109
Wed 21/1: Upload Suite 3 https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115929598649368915
Thu 22/1: Have you tried the punch? https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115935486005135198
Fri 23/1: Refused Service Service https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115941123066543187
Sat 24/1: New Queensland https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115946168023342639
Sun 25/1: Sink Hole https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115953388992680303
Mon 26/1: The Fourth Front https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115958842577513243
Tue 27/1: 431372-Jorts https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115964234395465012
Wed 28/1: CSF https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115969655294402318
Thu 29/1: Wakeup call https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115975335795269256
Fri 30/1: Rock Life https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115981122817874169
Sat 31/1: Condition T https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115987867980673357
Sun 1 February: Four Five https://aus.social/@Unixbigot/115992860131385873
