Story prompt: Science fiction sleeper ships

So... Science fiction has that idea of sleeper ships, like in Wrath of Khan...
Sublight speed is too slow to travel between stars, stars are too distant, so you place everyone in deep sleep hibernation, and wake them up in a few hundred years.

Some possibilities occurred to me...

Like

Comment

Share

Comments

• 

  Torsten Adair Aliens find a sleeper ship, use the human cargo as a deep freeze of food.

  2

  • Like
  •  · Reply
  •  · 2y
• 

  Torsten Adair Ship arrives, passengers discover that humanity was eliminated by galactic government due to sociopathy. Minds are wiped, passengers exiled to quarantine planet for study, possible correction.

  • Like
  •  · Reply
  •  · 2y
  •  · Edited
• 

  Torsten Adair Con job. Passengers were sold a dream. A hundred years later, ship returns to Earth, passengers discover utopia that was promised.

  1

  • Like
  •  · Reply
  •  · 2y
• 

  Torsten Adair Con job: passengers were sold a dream. Ships dispatched with bare bones tech, no specific destination. Multiple plot possibilities.

  • Like
  •  · Reply
  •  · 2y
• Active Now

  [REDACTED] "It's a cookbook!!"

  • Like
  •  · Reply
  •  · 2y
  • 

    Torsten Adair "supply ship"

    1

    • Like
    •  · Reply
    •  · 2y
  • 

    Torsten Adair "Chronos' Cafe" Fashionable restaurant, retro decor in an old spacecraft. Amazing menu. Meat is sourced "locally".

    1

    • Like
    •  · Reply
    •  · 2y
    •  · Edited

  

  Write a reply...

  
  
• 

  Torsten Adair Old plot: Guy wakes up early on purpose, wakes up moll. Moll doublecrosses, kills guy, wakes up real lover.

  • Like
  •  · Reply
  •  · 2y
• 

  Torsten Adair "storage locker". Ship found as salvage, aliens bid on contents, then monetize cargo.

Reaction Shots: Octopi Candy

• Nice work if you can get it.
• You need me to cover your shift at the next game? No problem, Hubie.
• His name is "Roman Gillman".
• What are the other arms doing?
• I see everyone is dressed for water sports.
• "That's not my tentacle."
• Make sure the hickeys don't show.
• Necessity is the mother of invention of the water bed.
• What the marching band plays during Halftime:
  
  (Yes, I did that on porpoise, for the halibut!)
• It ended sadly when the eight Aquanettes left him for his mascot nemesis, Nemo the Squid.

Are you pondering what I'm pondering?

I think so , but SHOULD you play "It's A Small World" on the bagpipes?

MU WHA HAHAHAHAHAAHAHAA!
Sing along... you must! None can resist!

Oh, are you immune to the bagpipes that keep calling?
How about a polka band?
JAWOHL! Yew Vill TANZEN! Mit ein Bierstein in yer handt!

EVERYVUN ZING!

Diese Welt ist klein, so klein

Diese Welt ist fein, so fein

und in dieser Welt,

da wollen wir Brüder sein!

Oh... immune to that, are you?

Not ONE, not TWO, but THREE ACCORDIONS, from Lawrence Welk!

EVERYBODY POLKA!  

Or perhaps your loins yearn for some Latin loving?

Hay tanto que compartimos

Que es el momento somos conscientes

Es un mundo pequeño después de todo!

Or.... if you're really randy, you can go around the world!

OOOoooohhhhhH.... I love that announcer!

In multiple languages! NO ONE IS IMMUNE!

I'll teach your grandmother to suck eggs! (Ooops... ahem... sorry... got lost in the moment...)

Or perhaps... a television extravaganza from... 

NORTH KOREA!

EUROBEAT!  

You are getting sleepy....soon you will be under my control...so sleeeeepyyyy....*SNORE*

All the Wrong Reasons to Become a Librarian

A tip of the hat to the Library Think Tank - #ALATT on Facebook! 

1.The male:female student ratio was highest in those college classes.
(Except for my Modern Dance PE class. I was one of two men.)

2. Because smart women in glasses are my kryptonite.

3. Mister Rogers hero worship.
(Where else can you wear Chucks and a cardigan to work?)

4. Free access to the photocopier, and no lines.

5. It was the easiest way to get access to the restricted stacks.

6. Because the reference interview is the Socratic Method without the hemlock.

7. Two words: badge ribbons.

Source: https://lowcountryafricana.com/rootstech-wrap-couldnt-attend-check-highlights-online/

8. A predilection for rubber stamps.

9. I'm working off my overdue fines.

10. So I can be first on the holds list when the new Dog Man graphic novel hits the shelves.

11. I'm a pathological introvert, and this seemed like the perfect job to avoid interacting with other people.

When and Where is Your GEOGRAPHICAL New Year's Day?

---

It's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine...

For roughly the past one hundred years, humanity has used a system of meridian time zones to standardize and synchronize time across the planet.

Theoretically, centered on the Prime Meridian (0°), every fifteen degrees of longitude would equal another hour (360°/24 hours). Due to national and local boundaries, pride, and other excuses for human behavior, time zone boundaries rarely follow that Fifteen-Degree rule. 

Back before trains and GPS and national broadcasting networks, every place on Earth had their own local geographical time. You stick a ...stick in the ground, and note when the shadow disappeared, or pointed at True North (wait for the Sun to set and find Polaris). Draw a circle, and you've got a sun dial. (Mark Noon each day, and you've got a calendar.) Create a mechanical device which mimics the movement of the shadow, you've got a clock, and you can track time after sunset. 

Now... let's figure out your "Personal Midnight". To make it interesting, let's pretend there's an annihilation wave wiping out everything on the surface of the Earth. It's stationary in orbit, so as the Earth rotates, everything is scorched. A big wall of disintegration, blasting everything in its path! 

It starts at Midnight, Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), right on the Prime Meridian. BAM! Accra, Valencia, and London are blasted with almost no warning. (Paris is spared, for now.) People panic as the news spreads. The wave continues methodically. When will it hit your state, your city, your house? 

Simple... we know that every 15 degrees of longitude equals one hour.
So every 1 degree of longitude equals four minutes (60 minutes/15 degrees).
That means for every 1 minute of time, the wave travels 15' of longitude.
For every 1' of longitude, 4 seconds of time have elapsed. 
One second of time equals 15'' of longitude.

Generally speaking, the wave is moving at a speed of 1200 feet per second, or roughly 800 miles per hour. (So forget about boarding an airplane and outrunning the wave!) 

Now, let's calculate your personal midnight.
I'll pick a nondescript landmark...The Biggest Ball of Twine in Minnesota!
Wikipedia lists the coordinates as: 

DMS Decimal	45° 5′ 46.79″ N,  94° 24′ 37″ W 45.096332,  -94.410276

We'll want to use longitude, the second number in the coordinates: 94° 24′ 37″

First, multiply 94 degrees by four minutes. 376 minutes. That's 6 hours 16 minutes. You could stop there...if you're going to die, a few more minutes won't matter much, right?
But let's say you've had that crazy, only-if-you're-the-last-person-on-Earth, no regrets sex. You've shot a man, just to watch him die. You've broken 8 of the Ten Commandments. So while you wait for the last minutes to tick off, why not compute the exact moment, for complete closure?

24' multiplied by 4 seconds equals 96 seconds, or 1 minute 36 seconds.
37'' divided by 15'' is 2 and 7/15ths, or almost 2.47 seconds.

Add it all up, and the exact time of your demise would be 6:17:38.46 or 12:17:38 Central Standard Time.  

For those locations EAST of the Prime Meridian, subtract the east coordinate from 360 degrees, and then do the math.

---

What's that? You don't know what your local geographical coordinates are?
Oh... that's easy to find!

1. Go to Google Maps. 
2. Search and locate the address. Click your exact location on the map, and a big red pin will appear.
3. Right-click on the big red locator pin and select "What's here?"
4. A window will appear at the bottom of the map. Click on the coordinates listed. Google Maps will then search via the coordinates, and display them in degrees-minutes-seconds. Use the west or east coordinate to calculate your exact Midnight.

---

Ultimate CLUE !

---

For those who find "Clue" to be too easy and boring, I present 

"Ultimate Clue"! 

(Cluedo if you're British.)

The board is from any version of "Risk". (Kids may use a Monopoly board, or Candyland.)

One person is the Judge. This person sets the murder combination, sets the Death Traps and Distractions, and hands out the murder tokens privately to each player. Before the game commences, the Judge hands out score sheets which players use to deduce the murder. One score card is notated with the traps and distractions, as well as the murder combination. This score card is handed to the actual murderer, but no one knows who that person is. 

The murder tokens are any Monopoly tokens, past or present. The number of tokens equals the number of players. The player without a murder token is defined as the murderer and uses deceit to confuse the other players. 


If there are fewer than six players, all players may lie.

The suspects may be any "man" ...chess pieces, mini-figs, patron saint medallions... anything which can fit on the board.
Only the players are suspects.
The maximum number of players is determined by the regions on whichever version of Risk (or Monopoly) is used.

Death Traps and Distractions

Domino pieces are used to create random penalties such as death and distraction. They are placed on the board by the Judge before game play commences.
Death traps are represented by a double domino. Distractions are noted by even-numbered dominoes.

The number of Death Traps is determined by the number of players, limited only by the number of double dominoes available. Half of the remaining spaces are reserved for distractions. The rest of the remaining spaces contain "normal" odd-numbered dominoes.

The murderer knows where they are located, and players can note the number of "safe" areas remaining during game play. (The murderer may throw people off the scent by triggering the bomb.) Given that there are only 42 regions (depending on the Risk board used), this happens quickly.
The player who triggers a Death Trap is redefined as a "ghost", shown either the location card or the murder weapon by the Judge, who in this instance is playing the ghost of the victim. They continue playing the game. Ghosts do not trigger dominoes. Ghosts may tell falsehoods for the remainder of the game. For example, NOT showing a card to disprove a hypothesis, or showing another card to the questioner, making others think that the hypothesis was false when part of it might be true.

There are non-player characters which distract the players. They are defined by even-numbered dominoes. Each reveal loses a turn. (Players refer to this as "In the Pantry with the maid and a bottle of sherry.")

If all players are killed via Death Traps, then the murderer has won, and is given the distinction of being a serial killer. (This is made more difficult as the ghosts learn part of the actual murder combination and might solve the game.) Murderers may also note the number of total players killed before deduction for further distinction.

[Any further suggestions? Let me know in the comments!]

---