Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY
IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I
generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family
rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to
write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration
(quote, website, podcast, etc) and then a thought or two that came to mind.
These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat,
irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if
anything comes of them.
SF Trope: “All
Planets Are Exactly Like Earth http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AllPlanetsAreEarthLike
Current Event:
http://arstechnica.com/science/2015/07/a-super-earth-found-in-the-habitable-zone-of-a-sun-like-star/
Hamsa Mohmand
squirmed in his wheelchair and muttered, “This isn’t exactly how I envisioned
meeting an alien welcoming committee.”
“Be happy the
*trill*Geh are willing to meet with us at all,” said Layan Joya. “There are
indications their culture has no tolerance for handicaps.”
“We’re not
handicapped!” Hamsa exclaimed.
“To them we are.
Now be quiet.” The airlock from the lander to the outdoors irised open. A fresh
breeze blew across their faces. Layan said, “Dill weed.”
“Lemon.”
“Alien,” she
said, then sneezed. She glanced at Hamsa, eyes wide, “What if we’re allergic to
them?”
“Allergens would
have shown up in analysis. There’s never been a meeting so carefully coordinate
and planned as this one.”
“Yeah, from
fourteen hundred light years away!”
“Good thing we
have the q-no.” The quantum nonlocality device allowed them to speak with
anyone on Earth without delay. Their first encounter with the *trill*Geh was
being broadcast back on Earth in every format and language.
“A lot of good
that’s done us…”
“Quiet, they’re
here.” A broad moving platform on multiple small wheels rode up to the foot of
the ship’s gangplank. On it lay a living being that looked like a biological
version of the vehicle – wide, flattened, and covered with what appeared to be
gray leaves that lifted and fell in a rhythmic, faintly nauseating pattern. “Watching
them never made me feel queasy from the ship,” she whispered.
“It’s the direct
contact and the smells and the double gravity – all together. One of the
braniacs on Earth said this might happen.” He sneezed.
The *trill*Geh
moved off the vehicle with a sinuous, millipede-like stride. The forward
portion of the creature lifted from the ground and four pairs of tentacles
unrolled. The tips of the uppermost two and lowermost two twisted together, the
central four stretched out at forty degrees from each other. The effect was of
a six-pointed star. At the top was a crown of blue cilia that never stopped
moving. Abruptly, every one of the leaves stuck out and the *trill*Geh dropped
to the ground. It was instantly back on all of its feet again.
“What was that?”
“I have a funny,
unfunny feeling about this…”
Names: ♀ Afghanistan;
♂ Afghanistan
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