Botober 28: Rupture
Oct. 28th, 2020 09:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alfvaenRandom prompts mostly lead to random story. It's just a fact. I mean, what would you do with these prompts:
Rupture
Hamnet pushed the desk off of him and looked around. There was a lot of debris--nothing in the lab was untouched, he was pretty sure--but a lot less than he was expecting, given how much energy that last reaction must have released. Across from him there was a hole in the wall, with several shards of the accelerator's shielding embedded in it.
The door to the next room had blown off, and underneath it he found Kasia, unconscious but breathing. He sat by her until she woke up. "What happened?" she said. "I'd just gone to the cafeteria to get some food, and then--"
"Pretty sure it blew," Hamnet said. "Suddenly some kind of cascade, energy levels rising instead of dropping, all that."
"So where did all that energy go?" she asked.
"My question precisely," he said.
They picked their way through the rubble, Kasia retrieving a plastic container with cafeteria leftovers on her way. Hamnet found his backpack in his locker (the door only slightly bent but still openable) and grabbed that too. Then they made their way up the narrow spiral staircase to the ground level.
"Wow," Kasia said when they emerged into the foyer. Most of the glass was gone--just gone, Hamnet didn't see any broken glass anywhere, not even in powder form--and the sky outside was...psychedelic. Like somewhere between the northern lights and the interior of a nebula. Shimmering curtains of colour and billowing clouds ebbed and flowed.
"So I'm going to venture a guess that Dr. Helvia's hypothesis about dimensional breaches and probability cascades has just acquired some solid experimental footing," he said.
A curtain touched down in front of them, and they were treated to the spectacle of a flaming volcano suddenly sprouting above ocean waves. The two of them watched as a sea anemone slid down the side of the volcano on a pair of what looked like skis; a giant cephalopod of some time floated down from the sky but just missed it. Then the curtain curled around and lifted up again, and the image vanished.
"Did our reality change at all?" Kasia asked. They looked at each other, then Hamnet opened his backpack while Kasia opened up her food container.
Hamnet took out his reading book and read the title. "'How Howie Trained The Hogs'. By Ablah Titlow. Yeah...I'm pretty sure this was Iain Banks this morning."
Kasia, meanwhile, was looking with disbelief at the contents of her container. Hamnet wasn't sure what it was either. He glanced over at the nearby cafeteria sign and read, "Enzyme-Scooped Salad. It Is Actually More Than 100% Natural!"
"You see!" They both turned to see a disheveled-looking woman emerge from a nearby corridor, caked with dust. "I was right!"
Hamnet was completely at a loss, but Kasia said, "Dr. Helvia? Umm...didn't you used to be a man?"
Dr. Helvia waved that off. "But you see? Full verification of my hypothesis!"
"Good for you," Hamnet said. "Any idea how we can make this stop happening?"
- Things: 'How Howie Trained the Hogs'
- Concepts: Enzyme-Scooped Salad It Is Actually More Than 100% Natural
- Advanced: Sea anemone skiing down flaming volcano nearly kissed by descending giant cephalopod
- Terrible: A shard from an exploded particle accelerator
Rupture
Hamnet pushed the desk off of him and looked around. There was a lot of debris--nothing in the lab was untouched, he was pretty sure--but a lot less than he was expecting, given how much energy that last reaction must have released. Across from him there was a hole in the wall, with several shards of the accelerator's shielding embedded in it.
The door to the next room had blown off, and underneath it he found Kasia, unconscious but breathing. He sat by her until she woke up. "What happened?" she said. "I'd just gone to the cafeteria to get some food, and then--"
"Pretty sure it blew," Hamnet said. "Suddenly some kind of cascade, energy levels rising instead of dropping, all that."
"So where did all that energy go?" she asked.
"My question precisely," he said.
They picked their way through the rubble, Kasia retrieving a plastic container with cafeteria leftovers on her way. Hamnet found his backpack in his locker (the door only slightly bent but still openable) and grabbed that too. Then they made their way up the narrow spiral staircase to the ground level.
"Wow," Kasia said when they emerged into the foyer. Most of the glass was gone--just gone, Hamnet didn't see any broken glass anywhere, not even in powder form--and the sky outside was...psychedelic. Like somewhere between the northern lights and the interior of a nebula. Shimmering curtains of colour and billowing clouds ebbed and flowed.
"So I'm going to venture a guess that Dr. Helvia's hypothesis about dimensional breaches and probability cascades has just acquired some solid experimental footing," he said.
A curtain touched down in front of them, and they were treated to the spectacle of a flaming volcano suddenly sprouting above ocean waves. The two of them watched as a sea anemone slid down the side of the volcano on a pair of what looked like skis; a giant cephalopod of some time floated down from the sky but just missed it. Then the curtain curled around and lifted up again, and the image vanished.
"Did our reality change at all?" Kasia asked. They looked at each other, then Hamnet opened his backpack while Kasia opened up her food container.
Hamnet took out his reading book and read the title. "'How Howie Trained The Hogs'. By Ablah Titlow. Yeah...I'm pretty sure this was Iain Banks this morning."
Kasia, meanwhile, was looking with disbelief at the contents of her container. Hamnet wasn't sure what it was either. He glanced over at the nearby cafeteria sign and read, "Enzyme-Scooped Salad. It Is Actually More Than 100% Natural!"
"You see!" They both turned to see a disheveled-looking woman emerge from a nearby corridor, caked with dust. "I was right!"
Hamnet was completely at a loss, but Kasia said, "Dr. Helvia? Umm...didn't you used to be a man?"
Dr. Helvia waved that off. "But you see? Full verification of my hypothesis!"
"Good for you," Hamnet said. "Any idea how we can make this stop happening?"
