Each weeks, prompts arrive, hurled from the sun like spears of light to nudge the moon out of its path – no, wait, the eclipse was earlier this week. Let me try again. Each week, writing prompts land gently on the lawn, gift-wrapped with a silver parachute – hmm, that’s not right either. One more time. Each week at More Odds Than Ends, creative prompts are submitted by perfectly normal people – hey, why are you laughing?
| Piker | Spear | Halberded |
| AC Young | A triptych of portraits, each full-length and showing a different femme fatale. | nother Mike |
| Becky Jones | The river wound through the city, directing the traveler to its hidden gems. | Leigh Kimmel |
| nother Mike | The visitors brought gifts, explosives, and chocolate! | Becky Jones |
| Leigh Kimmel | The shadow raced across the planet’s surface — but it had no moon to cause an eclipse. | AC Young |
| Padre | “One does not simply walk into the kitchen.” | Fiona Grey |
| Fiona Grey | It was the greatest of mysteries and the simplest of answers, if only they were willing to admit it. | Padre |
Right, well, if you’re done chuckling and bobbing about with wheezes of laughter that we Odds could pass for normal for longer than thirty seconds, there are also spares! Pluck one from the prompt tree if you’re inclined to play along, and don’t forget to drop your creation in the comments.
| Spare | No rosin for his bow |
| Spare | “First of all, keep yer yap SHUT. Information is high pressure and leaks ALL OVER THE PLACE. It don’t need any help!” |
| Spare | Who would have thought that a ship like that could bring down a bridge? |
| Spare | It’s scary when you realize that we suffer from multiple personalities, and you aren’t the real one… |
| Spare | The RV was full of cats! There was even a cat driving it! |
| Spare | The temple bell rang, a deep booming sound that seemed to go on forever… |
Need just one more? Why not combine a prompt with the image below?
That’s all for this week — stay safe out there, and don’t stare into the sun.
Header image by Fiona Grey; image prompt created by Fiona Grey using MidJourney.
More Odds Than Ends 
Leigh Kimmel tossed me a spear this week: The shadow raced across the planet’s surface — but it had no moon to cause an eclipse.
—
“… Shall we see what our last group have produced for the model filming assignment?”
The next film appeared on the large screen. The first short scene showed an alien landscape, all blue plants and green rivers. Then a shadow appeared; a deep, dark shadow, surrounded by a noticeable grey penumbra. It raced across the planet’s surface, from the top of the screen to the bottom.
Then the camera panned, and the cause of the shadow came into view. It was a spaceship, an ellipsoidal core with two wings, one on each side.
“That was very good. Not perfect, but very good. Now does anyone have any comments?”
There were various comments, mainly positive, from the other students.
Finally, the teacher gave his commentary. “That shadow is an excellent effect, it spurs the mind. We want to know what causes it, and whether the cause is friend or foe. When we see the spaceship, that answers some of our questions, but leaves us with others.
“However, the scale is off. Comparing the spaceship with what is on the ground, it looks like it’s several hundred metres long. However, to create an eclipse effect, a spaceship operating just above the atmosphere would probably need to be in the low kilometres in length as a minimum.
“I must note that most people won’t spot this. They will enjoy it or not as you intended them to. It’s only those who are interested in eclipses and similar who will notice it.
“Fortunately, solving the problem without increasing the size of the model isn’t too difficult. One way: Rather than using one torch to create the sun’s light, use three in a row. This will widen the combined beam, and will consequently generate a more realistic shadow.
“If the umbra is essential to the effects desired, then the model needs to fly much closer to the ground. Since this will imply that the ship is in the atmosphere, there may need to be some atmospheric effects shown.”
After some more discussion, covering all the film clips presented during the session, the lesson came to an end. The teacher dismissed the class.
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[…] This week’s MOTE prompt challenge came from nother Mike: The visitors brought gifts, explosives, and chocolate! This snippet just sort of unrolled itself as I typed. My prompt went to Leigh Kimmel. If you mosey on over to More Odds Than Ends, you can see what everybody has done for these challenges. If you feel like joining in, it’s easy and fun! […]
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oh, boy! And after the housewarming, when do the gremlins turn up? So much fun learning about a new neighborhood… very good!
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Well, now I want more info!
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[…] Check out more over at MOTE! […]
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And now mine is up on my LiveJournal at https://starshipcat.livejournal.com/1513890.html
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AC Young tossed the spear…
A triptych of portraits, each full-length and showing a different femme fatale.
[check the dictionary… right, triptych does mean three portraits. So, we have the three different femme fatale…]
[Agatha Christie, Ngiao Marsh, Dorothy L.Sayers… ]
[oh, Drat, I don’t think I will have the time to really walk through this, but…]
A923-768-3412 lifted one manipulator, and flipped open the triptych of portraits on top of the bar.. Each portrait was full-length and showed a different femme fatale from the era of movie mysteries, of the noir persuasion. The other androids laughed, and told 3412 that it could see a hundred pictures on the VR screen, but it liked the old paper and wood frame better. And 3412, as it preferred to be known by friends, wanted so badly to trade in its shining metallic shell for one of those old time dames.
After all, there was a body lying over there on the bar floor. And what they needed right now was for one of those femme fatales to step forward and start solving the crime. Who dun it? Why’d they do it? And how could she catch them and make them confess?
Meanwhile, the cleaning bots started coming out of the wall paneling.
3412 hissed, then sent out the order on the WiFi. “No cleaning in here until the police give you the green light.”
The bots stopped and milled for a moment, then slid back into the walls. The panels slid shut again.
3412 shook its head. Silly basic bots, didn’t they know that you can’t clean up a crime scene? Well, they probably weren’t advanced enough to read fiction, actually.
3412 looked around the bar, and wondered just where everyone was. It had wandered in here, as usual, just about when the bar would usually close. It knew that many humans preferred to avoid android company, but the bartender here let it come in and even talked to it sometimes. But this evening, it came through the door, and no one was there.
Well, except for the body. Sensor readings showed the body was already cooling off, and 3412 waited to see if anyone came to deal with it. While it waited, it started thinking about those old time femme fatales and what they would do if they walked into a bar with a dead body on the floor.
And that’s when 3412 decided that it would solve the crime!
[after all, a robot’s gotta do what a robot can, right?]
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I would read this book…
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