Rei stood silently in the middle of the room for perhaps 30 seconds, looking down at the blank, bare floor beneath her feet with an expressionlessness that was remarkable even for her. When, at length, she spoke, her voice was low, flat, almost entirely without inflection.

"HK-47," she said. "Orders."

HK-47 snapped to attention. "Ready!"

Rei gestured slightly to the emptiness of the floor on which she stood. "Get it back."

HK-47 drew his blasters. "Query: special parameters?"

Rei shook her head. "None. I don't care what you have to do. Your contempt level for this assignment is ten."

If HK-47's faceplate had been equipped to do so, it would have broken into a huge grin. "Rapturous exclamation: Oh, Master! You have made a simple droid very happy."

Rei looked up from the floor, turning toward him. Her face remained as blank as ever, but for her eyes. They burned with an intensity of fury - of very personal and bloody hatred - HK-47 had seen in few humans in his long history, and only once or twice before in his present master.

Now her voice seethed with the same barely contained wrath as she hissed, almost inaudibly, "I want my rug back."

HK-47 nodded. "Observation: It did really tie the room together, Master."

"Contempt Level" - a Future Imperfect Micro-Story by Benjamin D. Hutchins
special to the Eyrie Productions Discussion Forum
© 2012 Eyrie Productions, Unlimited

BWAHAHA!

Dare I ask when and where this happened?

--------

this world created by the
hands of the gods
everything is false
everything is a LIE
the final days have come
now
let everything be destroyed

--mu

>BWAHAHA!
>
>Dare I ask when and where this happened?

This scene occurred to me, complete and as presented, in the shower about six years ago - before the invention of the Mini/Micro-Story format. I jotted it down and plopped it in the staff notes box, where it amused a couple of Suspects, and then forgot all about it until I ran across it while doing a recent sweep for disused threads in that box to archive. It has, and indeed needs, no context. :)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

Which will eventually lead to the following line:

"Befuddled query: He fixes the cable?"

>It has, and indeed needs, no context. :)

While I would agree that it requires nothing more, I also think that this is one of those little hooks that would make a great starting point for a larger story. Heck, part of me thinks that this would make a great hook for a story <i>contest</i> - using that intro, write the best story surrounding it. If a few other limits were imposed (e.g, no bigger than a certain size, must include or exclude certain elements, etc), I bet you could get some really creative results...

Of course, I'm guessing you'd rather not have people doing that, but who knows - maybe it's time you let us amuse you with our writing? :)

Offsides

#&91;...#&93; in order to be a realist you must believe in miracles.
-- David Ben Gurion
EPU RCW &#pi;
#include <stdsig.h>

>>It has, and indeed needs, no context. :)
>
>While I would agree that it requires nothing more, I also think that
>this is one of those little hooks that would make a great starting
>point for a larger story. Heck, part of me thinks that this would
>make a great hook for a story <i>contest</i> - using that intro, write
>the best story surrounding it.

I wonder what the over/under on excellence vs. serious injury would be in that scenario...

It's an interesting idea, and something I might look into sometime, but in this particular fragment's case I rather like that it doesn't go anywhere. I imagine, in fact, that it's entirely apocryphal. I would like to think that even at her Sithiest, Rei wouldn't authorize HK-47 to murder his way indiscriminately across the cosmos just to get a rug back. :)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

"Excitable query: Can I use the really big chainsaw?"

"If you must."

"Childlike glee: Best meatbag EVER!"
---
"Yeah, I'm definitely going to hell/But I'll have all the best stories to tell" -- Frank Turner, The Ballad of Me and My Friends

LAST EDITED ON Mar-24-12 AT 02:16 PM (EDT)
 
>>While I would agree that it requires nothing more, I also think that
>>this is one of those little hooks that would make a great starting
>>point for a larger story. Heck, part of me thinks that this would
>>make a great hook for a story <i>contest</i> - using that intro, write
>>the best story surrounding it.
>
>I wonder what the over/under on excellence vs. serious injury would be
>in that scenario...
>
I'm guessing that you'd probably get a couple of really good ones, a couple of so-so, and a bunch of junk. Although, given the high-level of the writing here, some of the people who wrote junk might decide not to submit, you you might have better odds that usual...

>It's an interesting idea, and something I might look into sometime,
>but in this particular fragment's case I rather like that it
>doesn't go anywhere. I imagine, in fact, that it's entirely
>apocryphal. I would like to think that even at her Sithiest, Rei
>wouldn't authorize HK-47 to murder his way indiscriminately across the
>cosmos just to get a rug back. :)
>
Hmm... Unless the "Contempt Level" is more about making it messy and embarrassing, rather than messy and deadly. Though I must admit that I find that unrealistic :)

Offsides

<...> in order to be a realist you must believe in miracles.
-- David Ben Gurion
EPU RCW #π
#include <stdsig.h>

>Hmm... Unless the "Contempt Level" is more about making it messy and
>embarrassing, rather than messy and deadly. Though I must
>admit that I find that unrealistic :)

Heh. Conceivable, although canonically (in Scud the Disposable Assassin), a Scud's Contempt Level is the measure of how little the robot is programmed to care about collateral damage and bystander casualties in the pursuit of its target. A Scud set to Contempt Level 0 will go to ridiculous lengths to avoid harming anyone or anything other than its target, while one set to Contempt Level 10 will cheerfully lob an orbital colony at the city where the target lives if it can get hold of one.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

>>Hmm... Unless the "Contempt Level" is more about making it messy and
>>embarrassing, rather than messy and deadly. Though I must
>>admit that I find that unrealistic :)
>
>Heh. Conceivable, although canonically (in Scud the Disposable
>Assassin), a Scud's Contempt Level is the measure of how little
>the robot is programmed to care about collateral damage and bystander
>casualties in the pursuit of its target. A Scud set to Contempt Level
>0 will go to ridiculous lengths to avoid harming anyone or anything
>other than its target, while one set to Contempt Level 10 will
>cheerfully lob an orbital colony at the city where the target lives if
>it can get hold of one.

Yeah, that would be rather messy. In which case, I must agree that it's unlikely Rei would really have given that order over a rug. Oh well :)

[...] in order to be a realist you must believe in miracles.
-- David Ben Gurion
EPU RCW #π
#include <stdsig.h>

Depends on where she's living at the time, I would guess. After all, there are some places that could use a good rampage-slash-cleanup.

>Depends on where she's living at the time, I would guess. After all,
>there are some places that could use a good rampage-slash-cleanup.

Seriously. There were times during her extended search operation on Jisatsu when she was very tempted, but since that was a rescue and not an elimination, she wasn't entirely sure HK wouldn't screw it up completely if she let him off his leash. :)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

"Statement: The Droid abides."

Ebony the Black Dragon

"Life is like an anole. Sometimes it's green. Sometimes it's brown. But it's always a small Caribbean lizard."

Eyrie Production works are always some of my favorite things to read. But the Micros in particular are some of the most amusing little punctuation marks to my day. This one was definitely one of those. Short but oh so sweet.

Upon reading this, I chuckled. When my girlfriend asked me what was so funny, I thought about it for a second, and then replied with "It would take longer to explain the backstory involved in the backstories to start explaining why it was funny then it took to tell the joke."

Which is, btw, one of the things that I adore about EPU. :)

--
-Pasha
What was that feeling again?
Oh yes.
-Rage-

I love this, though part of me wonders if it's HK-47's equivalent of the "Chasing the rabbit" dream. :)

>I love this, though part of me wonders if it's HK-47's equivalent of
>the "Chasing the rabbit" dream. :)

This is the best explanation I've seen yet. :)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

Sold!

Offsides

[...] in order to be a realist you must believe in miracles.
-- David Ben Gurion
EPU RCW #π
#include <stdsig.h>

I'm still wondering a few days later, if Rei is the Dude in this scenario, and presumably HK-47 is standing in for Walter ... who's Donny?

>I'm still wondering a few days later, if Rei is the Dude in this
>scenario, and presumably HK-47 is standing in for Walter ... who's
>Donny?

Probably Atton from Knights of the Old Republic II.

--G.
He could totally have been played by Steve Buscemi.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.