Contest: LNHY: High Concept Challenge #3: The Birds And The Bees
Saxon Brenton
[Contest][LNHY] High Concept Challenge #3: The Birds And The Bees
High Concept Challenge #3: The Birds And The Bees
A Legion of Net.Heroes Y [LNHY] vignette
Written by and copyright 2009 Saxon Brenton
So. There had been a fight against some demons. It hadn't been
some great battle. Instead it looked to MegaMetal BlastLord that it had
been simply a random attack. Was it planned at all, some type of ambush
or assassination attempt? he wondered.
"Could be," said Brion, who leaned against the fence and tried to
rub some of the mud off his face, but only succeeded in spreading the
mess. "On the other hand, sometimes the base types of demons are simply
driven wild by the mere presence of the holy. It might have just been a
frenzy."
MegaMetal BlastLord glanced at the muddy Brother in blue jeans.
"You know, despite all the powers to the contrary, sometimes I don't feel
particularly holy." For emphasis he willed away his metal bioarmour,
turning back into plain old Martin.
Brion laughed. "Despite *my* St. Francis of Assisi shtick, sometimes
I don't either." And as if on cue, Sparrow returned. "Well, hello.
Thank you for the warning back there." The bird cheeped and took a
proffered bread crumb.
"Give him my thanks as well."
Brion nodded and said a few more words to the bird.
Curiously Martin asked, "You can understand him. Can he actually
understand you?"
"In general terms, yes. But, you know, he's an animal with a
comparatively small brain. He can understand danger, and has enough of a
sense of family that he'll give a warning to a friend he really likes
before running away. But for a sophisticated conversation I'd have to go
talk to something like a squid. For a sophisticated conversation that I
wouldn't run too much of a risk of being confused by, I'd go and talk with
a land based mammal who was an omnivore. Probably one of the great apes."
He stroked Sparrow's head and brought out a second crumb.
Martin chuckled. "So no Disney movie style mice in waistcoats, huh?"
Brion looked at him archly. "Well, mice in waistcoats really exist,
just like most comic book superhero weird sh!t really exists somewhere.
And they're every bit as annoying as you'd expect. But, really, by the
time you get to anthropomorphic animals with opposable thumbs who wear
clothes, you've passed through the grey area between 'animals' and 'people'."
Sparrow cheeped and flew off on whatever task he considered important.
Brion wiped his still muddy hands. "Come on. Let's get back and
tell the others what happened and get cleaned up."
==============
Author's notes:
Written for the notion of the third High Concept challenge: someone
who can communicate with animals. Also written very quickly now that
I've finished the August 2009 _End Of Month Reviews_. You'll notice that
the concept isn't part of the story, it's presented in an info dump in
the midst of a completely different story.
This was tangetially inspired by Tom's story. It suddenly occurred
to me that how (and how sophisticated) an animal's point of view was
formed would depend on all sorts of actors, ranging from brain size and
how the neurons were hooked up, all the way through habitat and means
of feeding.
-----
Saxon Brenton University of Technology, city library, Sydney Australia
saxon....@uts.edu.au saxonb...@hotmail.com
"These 'no-nonsense' solutions of yours just don't hold water in a complex
world of jet-powered apes and time-travel." - Superman, JLA Classified #3
Arthur Spitzer
> [Contest][LNHY] High Concept Challenge #3: The Birds And The Bees
>
> High Concept Challenge #3: The Birds And The Bees
> A Legion of Net.Heroes Y [LNHY] vignette
> Written by and copyright 2009 Saxon Brenton
Wow. Another LNHY story! By someone other than me!
Perhaps I need to dust off the old LNHY NAQ (Never-Asked-Questions) and
update it...
Arthur "Assuming I can find it..." Spitzer
Andrew Perron
> Wow. Another LNHY story! By someone other than me!
>
> Perhaps I need to dust off the old LNHY NAQ (Never-Asked-Questions) and
> update it...
Which reminds me, I've been meaning to write a story in that continuity...
hmmm...
Andrew "NO .SIG MAN" "Juan" Perron, too many projects
Martin Phipps
recall there were just three stories, Saxon's, Tom's and Arthur's.
Did I forget one? I actually liked Arthur's the best because it had
the funny twist of somebody being able to talk to animals but then the
animal lying to him.
Martin
Tom Russell
(1) setting the concept and (2) the deadline, as well as (3)
collecting the votes and (4) announcing the next winner. You've done
the first one, of course, and I think we can all agree that the
second, even if not set formally, is more-or-less over, which just
leaves (3) and (4).
==Tom
Martin Phipps
People can just respond to this thread then. Or e-mail me at
martin...@yahoo.com. It;s 2 am here which means it's 2 pm on the
East coast. I would say the dealine for voting is one week from now.
There were three stories:
Saxon: The Birds and the Bees
Arthur: The Dog Whisperer
Tom: Regent of Atlantis talks to a fish
Martin
Scott Eiler
> People can just respond to this thread then. Or e-mail me at
> martinphip...@yahoo.com. It;s 2 am here which means it's 2 pm on the
> East coast. I would say the dealine for voting is one week from now.
> There were three stories:
>
> Saxon: The Birds and the Bees
> Arthur: The Dog Whisperer
> Tom: Regent of Atlantis talks to a fish
I submit this also, posted Sep. 29th:
Scott: MISC, CONTEST: Superhuman World 2009: The Trillions
Martin Phipps
Oh, sorry about that. Anyway, I got two votes by e-mail and both of
them were for Tom's story about the regent of Atlantis talking to a
fish ("Glub Glub Glub"). So Tom is the winner.
Martin