#<- new story name as well | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

marlynnofmany · 1 year ago

Text

Stars and the Slapping Thereof

If the last spaceport had been a flat parking lot kind of place, this one reminded me of a hollow skyscraper made for birds. I don’t know how the whole thing stayed up, honestly; the walls were more open air than anything else. Spaceships parked at every level. Elevators and gravity tubes zipped around vertically, while moving sidewalks spun in opposite directions.

From where our ship sat, I had a fine view of a mixed-species group in teal uniforms all trying to crowd onto the inner sidewalk ring at the same time. They moved off to the right with only minor awkwardness. Behind the ship, I heard the unmistakable sound of a human falling over and swearing about it, most likely after stepping on the other ring accidentally.

Not that I’ve ever done that, mind you. Nooooo, not a bit of personal experience with undignified pratfalls.

“Is that— No, that isn’t them,” Paint said, paying attention to something completely different. “I hope there will still be a spot near us when they get here.” She rubbed her knuckles together in agitation, orange scales clicking.

Zhee flicked an antenna. “Kamm is always punctual,” he said. “It will be fine.”

I leaned out of the ship’s shadow to count the empty spots. “We can always go stand in one to reserve it for her.” I reconsidered. “Right? Or do the pilots land too quickly here?”

Zhee was saying something disparaging about the general population’s safety awareness when a hoverchair separated from the crowd and whirred up to us. The driver was a pale human with glittery star crystals in his dark hair, thin legs that clearly didn’t get much use, and bare feet. The toenail polish was even more galaxy-patterned than his hair. Stylish. He called out as soon as he was within polite speaking range.

“Is this the Unflattenable?” he asked, pointing at our ship.

I looked up and back. “Oh! No, but it’ll be here soon. We’re waiting for it too.”

“Ah,” he said. “Sorry. Your ship looks a lot like it.”

Zhee didn’t move, looking in both directions with his big bug eyes. “Same manufacturers,” he said.

Paint was more enthusiastic. “We haven’t seen them in forever!” she told the man. “They’re going to help us deliver a bunch of stuff in one trip.”

The man nodded. “They’re bringing cargo for me. I hoped they’d be here by now.”

“Should be soon,” I said, peering around at the many directions a ship could approach from. No sign of another lemon-looking craft with solar sails.

He nodded again. Everyone was awkwardly silent for a moment. A distant ship landed with a thump of faulty thrusters. Pedestrians on both sidewalks held loud conversations as they slid past.

“So what’s your ship called?” the man asked.

Zhee straightened up. “This is the good ship—”

Paint beat him to it. “Slap the Stars! Isn’t that a great name?”

The man burst into laughter, then apologized at the angry tilt to Zhee’s antennae. “Sorry. I love it. I’m not much of a spacer, and I keep being surprised by some of the names that ships have around here.”

“That is a perfectly normal name,” Zhee told him with an abrupt motion of one pincher. “Strongarm manufacturers. It is human ships that have the truly absurd titles.”

I grinned at him. “You’re still not over the droid jousting ship Hold My Beer, are you?”

Zhee’s tone was extremely dry. “I will never be over that.”

“I saw some great ones earlier!” Paint said, unfolding a screen and connecting to the port’s public information hub. “Let’s see, there’s the Glorious.”

“A fine Mesmer name,” Zhee put in.

“The Deep Thrum; I like that. Might be Frillian? Oh, and there’s the human warship Funwrecker.”

I laughed. “Yup, definitely human.”

“And the Better Than You.”

“That could really be either human or Mesmer,” I said with a look at Zhee.

Zhee flexed his pinchers, looking haughty. “It all depends on whether it is true.”

Paint kept reading. “What about the Solar Flare? That could be anybody.”

“Heatseeker,” Zhee said. “Solar flares are hot.”

Paint, a Heatseeker herself, scoffed quietly. “Not everything is about heat.”

“Don’t most Heatseeker ships have food names?” I asked with a glance at the other human, who was following all this with open curiosity. “Pretty sure Captain Sunlight has family with a ship called the Worm Jerky.”

“I guess they do,” Paint said thoughtfully. “It’s a good luck thing. I didn’t realize it was that common.” She looked back at the screen. “Oh, and that might explain this other ship called the Raw Flesh.”

The human spoke up at that. “The what?”

I held up both hands. “It’s got to be a translation issue. A food thing. Some specific uncooked dish. Like sushi?”

The human just shook his head and made a face like he’d tasted something unpleasant.

“There’s also the Conqueror of the Next Ocean,” Paint offered. “That one’s probably Strongarm.”

“Yeah, that makes sense,” I said. “They’re so proud of crawling out of their first ocean.”

“Strongarms are the ones with tentacles, right?” the human asked.

“Right,” I told him. “They look kind of like an octopus or a squid.”

“You said your ship was designed by Strongarms? What was it called again?”

“Slap the Stars,” I said. “Strongarms do slap a number of things with those tentacles. It’s a fun bit of sass in a ship name.”

“It’s not sass,” Zhee said scornfully. “It’s an intent to master all things, whether the things want to be mastered or not. Very admirable confidence.”

Paint looked up in distress. “I thought it was a game!” she said. “Something with pebbles on a table, right? Isn’t that a thing?”

The door to our ship opened to admit the scaly yellow form of Captain Sunlight. I turned to her for answers. “Hello, Captain! Can you tell us what the name of our ship actually means?”

Unflappable as ever, the good captain barely quirked a browridge as she walked over to join us. “Something about slapping stars, I imagine,” she said. “I always thought of it as a nod to the way damp tentacles can put out sparks of flame without getting burned.”

I threw my hands skyward in mock exasperation.

Captain Sunlight kept talking. “But then, I’m not a Strongarm. Let me ask one.” She spoke into her communicator, addressing the pilot on duty. “Wio, what is the Strongarm association with slapping stars?”

Faint and tinny, Wio’s voice said, “Pretty sure it’s something about gathering food. Spiky ones. I don’t know; I’m from a different planet.”

The human was chuckling quietly to himself at this point, while Zhee looked grumpy and Paint scrolled through more names for clues. Captain Sunlight glanced at me.

“Looks like we’ll just have to ask someone who was actually there when the ship was named,” she said, nodding toward the next dock. “Here she is.”

A bright yellow ship with folded solar sails came in to rest beside ours, remarkably stealthy when I wasn’t paying attention. The other human said a quick goodbye to us before scooting over to wait for the hatch to open.

As eager as we were to see the crew again after long last, we kept a professional distance while they did business. A pair of Heatseekers brought out the human’s crate — a fancy model with its own hover engine — and a Strongarm tactfully proffered the payment tablet.

Then Captain Kamm herself appeared, in all her deep green glory, with a polite greeting for the human and an enthusiastic wave of several tentacles toward us. “Hello over there! It’s been too long!”

“It has!” Captain Sunlight said, strolling over while the human handed back the tablet and hitched the crate to the back of his chair. I followed, with Zhee and Paint right behind. Captain Sunlight continued. “We’ve got a burning question for you. What was the original meaning behind our ship name? We seem to have come up with several. I’d ask Pockap, but…”

“But he’s far away, and also an idiot,” Captain Kamm finished, speaking about her cousin with complete honesty. He’d only been in charge for the very beginning of my time on the ship, and “idiot” was generous.

“As you say,” Captain Sunlight agreed.

“Well, if I recall correctly, it was actually inspired by a human thing,” said Captain Kamm.

“What?” I blurted. In my peripheral vision, the other human paused before going on his way.

“That thing you do,” Captain Kamm said, waving a tentacle. “Slapping each other in camaraderie.”

“We what?” I repeated, sharing a baffled look with the other guy.

Captain Kamm waved the one tentacle again, then flopped two against each other, making a wet sound. “You know,” she said. “You slap hands. Very friendly. The idea was to bring that kind of cheerful energy to the stars.”

I held my hands apart, thinking of applause, then it hit me. “Oh! Do you mean a high five?” I turned and demonstrated; the other human matched it perfectly.

“Yes!” Captain Kamm said. “That! That’s what your ship is named for!”

I laughed; I couldn’t help it. Zhee made an opinionated hiss while Paint exclaimed that that was much better than the game explanation.

“Glad I could be a part of this,” said the human. “See you around! May you slap many stars.”

“The same to you!” I said, waving as he steered onto the walkway. “Hooray for solving a mystery that we didn’t realize needed solving.”

“Those are the best kind,” said Paint, and I had to agree.

~~~

The ongoing backstory adventures of the main character from this book. More to come!

#hey did you know I've written over 40 stories about this crew #without naming the ship?#well it's got a name now #and I love it #also a new favorite way to wish people well #'may you slap many stars'#my writing #The Token Human #humans are weird #haso #hfy #eiad #writeblr #short stories #spaceships #there's a story about the good ship Hold My Beer if you missed it #that one was fun #called Stabby the One and Only #you can guess what kind of droid jousting they do

155 notes · View notes

prince-liest · 2 years ago

Text

I’m reading Witch King by Martha Wells, and now that I have read more than one (1) series by this author, I have been suddenly brained with a two-by-four sharpied over with “realizing that I really enjoy novels by Martha Wells because they live in the specific niche created by the intersection of casually and thoroughly queer casts and non-romance storylines”

I am as ever a sucker for non-human main characters struggling with their very human feelings, which is why I jumped on Witch King the moment I saw “the author of Murderbot wrote another book with a main character that’s non-human,” but I live in this dichotomy where I can really enjoy reading queer romances but I don’t really identify with non-ace characters (which is not actually something I figured out how to differentiate until I was Last Week Years Old). so there are lots of books out there that I enjoy reading but it’s comparatively rare for me to read something that feels like it was written For Me and Martha Wells does that very well

anyway, give me more ace it-pronouns human-spliced robot main characters and people-eating demons who consider rank over gender when finding new bodies to inhabit

#text posts #martha wells #witch king #personal #her castes and universes are also very culturally and ethnically diverse but I've had ace-ness on the mind lately #so it was relevant to my ongoing thoughts #I never really read books that are advertised as specific types of diversity representation #especially with queer books what I like to read is books that are very queer but aren't ABOUT being queer #so I tend to steer clear when people are like read this the mc is a nonbinary lesbian witch without even really saying what the plot is #but martha wells writes books that are queer and brown and INFLUENCED by being queer and brown but #the characters still get to have their stories be ABOUT whatever fun sci fi fantasy shenanigans are ongoing #((inb4: this is my preference not an overal value judgment))#((I just want to read the same books I read when I was a little kid and have them just ALSO be lovingly diverse))#((and I only really read SFF))#in other news I was trying to figure out how to name my flavor of ace #and then I looked up the difference between demi and gray #and I realized gray is what I am looking for #very very dark gray

339 notes · View notes

the-admin-but-dumber · 9 months ago

Text

"A canvas for you to paint."

I got some new brushes, decided to sketch these guys for the first time in a WHILE. I do like how it turned out, for something so rushed. Small drabble under the cut.

"O' Creator of worlds, master of swords, Romeo. What do we do now?" Romeo lets out a rough snort of amusement of his parnter's fancy language, he tilts his head to the admin beside him who crawls from the in-between beyond the bedrock. Together they stand under starless skies, only the glow of their armour offers light in a new world, untouched, unmoulded.

Romeo feels his muscles twitch, his fingers do as well, eager, planning out how he'd soon shape the world. It would be a fine world, perfect, but bland, colorless, his eyes glance to Wheatley who meets his gaze back. They wait for his response, an inhuman stillness in how they never breathe.

"We shall build a new world, one without flaw, one we will call our own." He responds, his chest wells with pride, Wheatley follows him across the endless valley of bedrock and pitch black skies. Wheatley does not respond, their thoughts filter back to The Underneath, Xara, Fred, could this truly be a world without flaw? Without them, surely not. But it could still be beautiful.

Following Romeo, they flicker between space, appearing and disappearing, chasing each other through barren lands until they stop. Romeo goes ahead, and Wheatley stands at the border, watching dirt form under their talons and grass bloom from the centre of the world. It splashes outward like a drop of water, curling and twisting to bloom life where it could touch. Wheatley takes a step forward, they fly up to not become trapped beneath a sea of stone and dirt, albatross wings growing from their spine to take them higher on a well placed breeze. Briefly, they consider letting themselves fall, so that they may grow into the world, but they do not.

Romeo terraforms and Wheatley watches, a blank canvas of towering mountains and deep oceans, valleys carved by a single blade, but so bland. The red admin meets Wheatley from their perch in the clouds, brazenly drifting circles until they rise to give him attention, Wheatley bows their head for the first time.

"I've carved mountains and valleys from the void," Romeo starts, he speaks with many voices, none his own. "A blank canvas, and one I will not paint myself."

Romeo takes their hand, they rise from the clouds, following Romeo into the open sky, darkness stares down at two traitors. "O' Master Artisan," he addresses, "my first gift to you, paint these skies for me, bring life to the land so this world truly sings with our power."

It's a soft request, and Wheatley accepts it.

In slithering forms their coil through the air like ribbons, Romeo keeps them steady and Wheatley paints the skies with all the colours they could. They create stars from their blood and with their hair, trees bloom across the once empty fields of grass and stone. Romeo carves caverns and caves, Wheatley fills them with light and jewels, they give life to the animals Romeo shapes from pieces of the past.

And then, their people, they create the first people together. Romeo forms their bodies from all the pieces of their world, and Wheatley breathes humanity and the ability to be what they chose to be.

Their first gift to this world, is existence.

36 notes · View notes