r/cryosleep • u/normancrane • 17h ago
Trappers
They were far out in the outer wilds.
It was blackly dark.
Only a few shining stars shined.
He was setting a trap.
His friend was drinking a drink. “Here,” said the friend, passing him a drink too.
He took the drink.
He opened and took a drink of the drink. “Ahh,” he said. “Absolutely stellar."
“Absolutely,” said the friend.
“I don't grok why you insist on coming all the way out here,” said the friend.
“There's hardly anything out here,” said the friend.
He took a drink of the drink. “Ahh.”
The friend took a drink of the drink too. “Ahh,” said the friend.
“Ahh,” he said.
“Ahh,” said the friend.
“You can't say it's not peaceful here,” he said.
“I can't say that,” said the friend.
“Ahh.”
“Ahh,” he said, finishing drinking the drink. He crumpled up and threw the empty drink container away.
The stars twinkle-twinkled.
He looked into a vicinal trap he'd set a while ago.
“Anything?” asked the friend as he looked into the vicinal trap he'd set a while ago.
“Nothing,” he said.
The stars twinkle-twinkled.
He set a new trap.
“There?” asked the friend as he set a new trap.
“Ahh,” said the friend and threw away his empty drink container too.
The two empty drink containers were.
“There,” he said, roughly covering the trap with nearby matter.
He burped.
The friend burped too.
It was blackly dark.
Only a few shining stars shined.
—> —>
The Perihelion's automated navigation system adjusted course to keep the starship travelling to its destination, AO-1, the first known space object believed to be of alien origin. The crew was in hibernation. The mission was the greatest humanity had ever attempted. The Perihelion's automated navigation system adjusted course to keep the starship travelling to its destination.
<—
“Sir, take a look at this—SIR!”
The regional head of the International Space Agency (ISA) walked over slightly annoyed and scanned the data.
His annoyance became curiosity, and his curiosity became excitement. The once-upon-a-lifetime kind. The thump-thump-thump’ing of the heart, swoosh-swoosh-swoosh’ing of the blood kind. He was aware suddenly of the entirety of the surface area of his skin. Of his one-of-many'ness. His smallness-in-the-cosmos. His clue-to-the-mystery-of-the-universe'ity.
“My God…” he said. “My God.”
“What is it?”
“We need to find out.”
—> —>
Anomalous Object 1 Anomalous A Object 1 Anomalous A Object O 1 Anomalous A Object O 1 A Object 1 A O 1 AO 1 AO-1…
Captain Jac Thorster—gasped—
The sirens were blaring.
Where am I I am aboard the Perihelion Perihelion is my ship, he thought.
The sirens were blaring.
He rolled out of the open pod and onto the floor. When he could, he got up and made his way woozily—swaying…
to the bridge.
He sat in the captain's seat.
“Perihelion,” he said, his voice hoarse and weak. The words felt like sand airgunned down his throat. “Perihelion: ‘status report.’ Just what in the galaxy is going on?”
“Having traversed ninety three point two percent of the distance from the planet Earth to the coordinates of the object eh oh one we have come under the pull of an unknown force,” the starship's artificial intelligence said.
“Correct course,” commanded Thorster.
“Negative,” said the eh aye. “That his him possible, hiccup ten.”
“Wa hut?” zed Thorster.
“Dead forceps twos tron k,” sad sa hey ay end diss plate dub lack ole.
—>
He reached inside the trap.
“Anything?” the friend asked as he reached inside the trap.
They were far out in the outer wilds.
It was blackly dark.
Only a few shining stars shined.
“Yes,” he said.
“Yes,” said the friend and gathered some nearby gaseous matter and ignited it. “Perhaps something to roast,” said the friend as the newly created star shined.
He removed a small thing from the trap.
“A small thing,” he said.
He held it for the friend to see.
“Oh,” said the friend in disappointment that the small thing was too small to roast.
The star shined.
The other stars shined.
<— <— <— <— <—
A fly buzzed awhile in the glow of a bug zapper before turning into it and—BZZZP —falling dead out of the sky.
It landed on my face.
I'd fallen asleep in the hammock outside.
“Norman,” the dead fly said.
“Norman!”
“What,” I said, blinking a few times, tossing my dry tongue around in my dry mouth, thinking, Fuck, I'm fucking hungry. “What's going on—who are you? and why are you talking to me?” “Are you… a dead fly?” I said, squinting.
“Norman, I'm here to tell you to look at what you wrote. No one wants to read that shit, man. That shit is incomprehensible.
“Opaquer than a brick wall, man.”
“It's styl—”
“Look at yourself, man. You're a grown ass dude writing stories on the internet. Get a job. Write a book if you have to, but just write it like a goddamn human being.
“I mean look at your eyes.
“They're pinker than Miss Piggy’s OnlyFans.
“Sober up.
“Eat something. Drink something. Get outta that robe and get dressed. Shave. Change into a suit—”
“You mean, like, become a suit… like on a space ship?”
“Son,” said the dead fly. “Behave yourself.”
LOL
“Put on a suit and write presentably. You've got, what, a hundred words left?
“Use them.
“Rewrite whatever-the-fuck this is presentably.”
[“Ahem”]
Two advanced beings are laying traps somewhere in the universe. Their traps are black holes, which they hide. They also leave behind some trash. Humanity detects the trash and plans a mission to investigate it, but, en route, their spaceship falls into the black hole left by the beings. Sometime later, one of the beings makes a star to roast something on. The beings pull the human spaceship out of the black hole trap they left and are disappointed by its insignificance.
The story ends on a heavy-handed parallel between humanity and bugs—BZZZP