Monday Flash Fic - Old Magic

New entry for the Monday Flash Fic. Visual inspiration is this:

Word count: 139

Waking up to find a large, hungry, and somewhat confused bull shark hanging above the bed was not an every day occurrence for Ethel Higginbotham. The traditional saying was that it was raining cats and dogs, so she knew her magic was going a little out of control when, after a night spent dreaming of her previous incarnation as a mermaid, it became apparent that it had instead been raining sharks and whales.

Ethel was easily the oldest in her coven, and this kind of thing - dreams taking control of a witch's abilities and bleeding through into reality - was usually an early sign of dementia, although she hadn't heard of it being quite so dramatic before. Or, given the proximity of such a large mouth full of so many rows of very sharp teeth, quite as terrifying.

Monday Flash Fic - A Cracking Time

My latest entry for Monday Flash Fics.

Here's the visual inspiration:

This little vignette is set in the Jenkinsverse universe, and takes place some time in the six months leading up to the "little green paws" incident. It is NOT canon - unless Hambone sees it and declares the awesomeness to be too good to pass up!

For those unfamiliar with the Jenkinsverse stories, the idea behind the stories is that Earth is an extremely dangerous level twelve "deathworld" - a planet so dangerous that most aliens will die within hours or even minutes of setting foot on it. As a result, Humans are incredibly strong and resilient compared to most aliens, and have innate tactical skills which far outstrip those of even the Corti (Roswell Greys - previously unchallenged as the most intelligent alien species). Also, even the most insignificant of Earth's viruses or bacteria can be devastating to alien life.

The Hierarchy is the space illuminati - the dominant faction of the Igraens, a species of digitised sapients responsible for ontold numbers of atrocities, beginning with the extermination-by-asteroid of the V'Straki civilisation 65 million years ago. The Hierarchy's goal is to exterminate any and all sapient deathworld species, which they view as a threat to their (secretive) dominance of the galaxy.

The Gaoians are mustelid-like sapients with a clan-based social structure who have only recently joined the interstellar community. They are generally favourably disposed towards humanity as both species face many of the same prejudices. The dominant Gaoian clan is the Clan of Females (about 20-25% of the population) which completely controls the more numerous males' ability to reproduce, granting "mating contracts" based on merit. The result is a comparatively fast rate of evolution, with few males getting to reproduce at all, and only the most impressive - like Daar or Regaari - siring large numbers of cubs. Daar is the Gaoian equivalent of Hafthor Julius Bjornson (AKA "The Mountain") and one of the few aliens physically powerful enough to defeat a human, while Regaari's intelligence is easily the equal of any Human or Corti.

Regaari and Daar, along with the other characters, are all soldiers in the SOR (Space Operations Regiment) a joint NATO-Gaoian military force made up of two teams: JETS (Joint Extra-Terrestrial Scouts) and HEAT (Hazardous Environment Assault Team). The Human HEAT members are the product of a Corti drug, Cruezzir, which is normally used to speed up healing following severe injury. This, combined with the structure of human muscle tissue, allows for rapid muscle growth, resulting in immensely powerful - and immensely heavy - warriors. So yeah - the combined weight of Warhorse, Righteous, Titan, Highland, Regaari and Daar is easily more than a tonne!

Cruezzir also increases intelligence, by extending and expanding the brain's ability to assimilate large amounts of information. Unfortunately that doesn't necessarily improve common sense...

Total word count: 653

 Daar caught sight of their reflection in a small lake – no, a tarn, that's what Highland called them - and chittered quietly to himself. If there was anything the group didn't look like just now, it was the premier Human-Gaoian strike team. Kovač still wore her silk dress, and Warhorse, Righteous, Titan, Highland and Regaari were still in their tuxedos. Daar had refused to wear one; Human clothing might be fine for a Whitecrest like Regaari, but it didn't work with his Clan Stoneback aesthetic. No self-respecting Stoneback would ever hide his scars.

The little cottage they were approaching was about as isolated as it was possible to get, one of only a pawful on an island so small it didn't even have a ferry service, and more than a hundred miles from any real city. Highland had said it was in the “Outer Hebrides”, which was apparently where his mother was from. Clearly he got his physical toughness from that side of his family; no Gaoian could live somewhere like this. Daar was even surprised that Humans could, although perhaps he'd just underestimated Human hardiness again.

You'd think he'd know better by now.

He cast his mind back to the vidphone briefing they'd had from Stainless during the chopper ride over from Edinburgh. A Hierarchy biodrone had stolen a jump beacon, but was killed before she could activate it - which would have been fine if she hadn't managed to send it onwards to this place instead. Stainless believed another biodrone was enroute, so the SOR needed to get there first. Failure was not an option: a jump beacon would allow the Hierarchy to bypass the Guvnuragnaguvendrugun-built system shield, and turn every city on Earth into another San Diego in a matter of days.

“Anything?” Warhorse asked Kovač.

“No EM of any kind,” she said, looking intently at her scanner. “Or any sign of a Hierarchy cloak.”

“You can detect those?” wondered Daar.

“Scotch Creek and Clan Highmountain reverse engineered their cloaking tech,” she said. “We can't replicate it ourselves yet, but we can detect if it's being used within a roughly fifty-five kilometer radius. This scanner is a prototype, and this is its first real test.” Kovač turned back to Warhorse. “I recommend you tread carefully all the same.”

“Always do,” he said.

“Was that what happened to my scales?” she asked

“Or Stainless's decking?” said Titan.

Warhorse gave that puppy-dog grin of his, then turned back towards the cottage. “Ready boys?”

Getting into the cottage proved disconcertingly easy, and the emptiness of the place filled Daar with dread. They hadn't come to the wrong place had they? Human-built jump beacons were large by galactic standards, and therefore difficult to hide, but their search still came up empty. What if it was somewhere else?

“Any way you can detect if it's here with that scanner?” asked Warhorse, coming into the room Daar had just finished searching with Kovač.

She fiddled with the scanner. “There's the lithium power cell,” she said. “It's... beneath us?”

Titan, Righteous, Highland and Regaari came in just then, and they all stood in the middle looking at the wooden floor. “I guess we'd better start rippin' this thing up then,” said Righteous.

“Not sure you'll need to,” said Kovač, taking a step back towards the door. Daar heard what she meant a split second later – a thin, ominous cracking sound. The floor bowed, then gave way under the combined weight of well over a tonne of muscular male Humans and Gaoians.

Daar had the good fortune to land on Warhorse. Not that Warhorse would've described it that way, but even a Gaoian as tough as Daar would've risked serious injury from a ten-foot fall. The first thing Daar was conscious of, though, was his Whitecrest cousin's excited chittering in his ear.

“Found it!” yipped Regaari.