26 )
.
I saw a program about Alaska. I then remember a show last year that showed some people caught by a wave from ice falling from a glacier into a bay. That seeded this concept.
It was a wild planet and they went to the worst area the planet had to offer. It was suicide tourism and it was a big money item in the empire.
People wanted the ultimate danger and were willing to die experiencing it. All paperwork and psychological analysis was done to make sure the people really wanted to do this. A computer chip and some chemicals were added to their brain to fix them into this path.
The trip to the planet was reasonably luxurious. The trip to the planet was extremely safe, with every safety precaution practiced. That right there was a bother to many.
They then took a cruise ship up the coast, viewing the wonderful scenery and visiting several quaint cities. Their activities were limited in the cities so they would not get hurt.
Finally then reached the wilderness. it was awesome. glaciers flowing into the sea, forests to the waterline, stony snow covered mountains rising high almost within reach of those on board the ship.
Based on their profiles, the people are lead out on different trips. Many will go on many trips before they reach their demise. There were games and rewards for the ones who survive. first, biggest, last, the rewards were basically useless, but something the people strived for.
People on kayak paddle to the foot of a glacier actively calving icebergs. they are all suggested to bring back to the service s hip a big chunk of ice. Several are sent back because the piece of ice is way too small. it is supposed to be a big heavy piece of ice.
Suddenly the ice splits off the face of the glacier and falls into the sea. half a dozen kayaks are crushed beneath the ice, two dozen are upended by the flood. Several people had set up on a rock bar nearby to have a snack together. They are washed into the ice water. Rescue boats go in and those tourists still afloat have to help gather the bodies. Some never are found. The chip in them will be tracked down later.
In another place, there is a game where they are told they must bring back some fur from a grizzly. They are sent out into the forest. Several people find a grizzly. One walks right up to it and jerks on some fur. It does not come out. he does not live long enough to know it. the others converge on the beast, one working from behind while the others distract the beast. it does not work. The last one turns to run and never gets a second step. Officials gather the remains, and track down the missing chips which are found in droppings.
There are foot races up a glacier. the people line up across the glacier and run The first one to a flag wins. the flag is on the other side of a crevasse. This race is best right after a heavy snow. One by one, the people disappear, falling to their deaths in the crevasses.
Desmond had an ulterior motive for being on this trip. He was escaping the mob. He had all his belongings in a pack. He had studied arctic survival and studied the life on the planet. Of course he had the chip and chemical added to him, but because of his studies, he took the antidote to the chemical. it was not a perfect antidote. he lost the desire to die, but he did not lose his lack of fear.
He had also studied the way the tours worked. He had some idea the kinds of games they had the people play.
He sort of avoided the obvious death games. He was after something where he had some choice in the matter.
A group of people were flown high in the mountains. They were given canoes and were told to race to the bay. Desmond fell behind quickly, not being very good at paddling the canoe.
He made it through the first rapids. He knew there were several waterfalls that would suck the canoeists to their death. He entered the second rapids, which was really violent. He got the canoe to the side and beached it and got out. It was a hard climb out of there, but he lashed the canoe to his back and climbed. He had to pull it up with a rope several times.
He finally got to the top and entered the wilderness. he took the canoe with him mainly to throw the officials off on his trail. It would be a while before they would look for him and then take longer searching for him or the canoe before they figure out what he did.
It was a cumbersome carry but he was later glad he had the canoe as he used it to cross a lake and follow up a stream several miles. He also used it as a tent for the night.
The next morning, he dug into his pack and slipped on a special cap. It was a shield for the chip so it would be more difficult to trace. He also dressed for the weather. He started living off the land as he traveled up the pass to cross the mountains.
At one point, he saw the air craft the officials used searching miles away, far down hill from where he was. later that day, he entered the snow line.
The officials stopped searching for him when the ship was scheduled to leave the region. they figured out that he planned to die of exposure. Good enough. They would search for him some other time.
They would passively search for him and be really puzzled at not finding him. the reason was that he made his way to the other coast, then crossed to another continent where they would never look for him. it would be a couple decades before he was accidentally found and retrieved. The suicide chip was removed. Because he still had the effects of the suicide medicine and the antidote, he faced down the mob to make them leave him alone. On the planet, he hunted down and killed some impressive animals and fought deadly creatures. He had no fear of the mob and was skilled enough to do something about their activities. the mob decided it would be best to forget about him.

27 )
.
The planet was four times the diameter of earth but weighed considerably less. With the rotation, the gravity at the surface was approximately that of Earth. There were plenty of lakes around the surface but no seas to break up the surfaces. One could walk around the entire planet in any direction fairly easily.
The colonists found that living on the surface itself was not really effective so they abandoned their cities very quickly and began migrating. They developed walking machines to traverse the planet, gathering the supplies they needed from the land.
A system developed where when one became an adult, one left the parents in a two legged walker one built. Usually you would follow the parents until you had rebuilt the walker to a sufficient size and complexity to where you can be on your own. One would go off on your own until you met someone who would be a good mate and join the walkers into one machine. As you traveled, you would combine skills to improve the walker, and as children were born, would add to the walker, increasing the size to handle the extra babies and the needed supply storage.
There were some who developed the practice of joining with several people, using the additional skills and capacity to have moving towns, rather than just individual families. They would use small walkers for foraging.
Over time, the youngsters would be off on their own and the adults would age. They would get to the point where maintaining their machines was becoming too difficult and the machine would start failing. They would fall behind the herd and the system would collapse with them alone.
There were those who started the practice of finding the failed carcasses and dismantling them for parts and resources. they worked individually and in packs, some single people others families and some the walking towns. Certain parts of the carcasses are difficult to make use of efficiently and over time, there would be skeletons laying across the landscape.
Because resources are spread apart, and the planet had strong seasons because of the orbits, the herds wandered the planetary plains to gather what they needed. There were those walkers that stayed put near a good collection of resources, but they depended most on machines that did not survive well.
Some areas were rather difficult to negotiate or because of the patterns of travel, age of the passing machines was such to cause more failures (it may take several years to follow the migration route so people who become individuals in certain areas will end up dying at the same places on the route) so that helped those groups that stayed put.
Some peoples took on the tactic of piracy. They would attack other walkers to steal supplies, people, or the whole machines to use or dismantle. Some of them stay in certain areas, while others follow the migration route.
Each machine is designed for how they are used. Predators developed tools to stop and dismantle machines fast, sometimes ripping parts off with a single grab. There were those that would gather their own supplies but take advantage of opportunity, like an omnivore, there was the "vultures” that did not need to dismantle too fast but be able to take care of less than "fresh" supplies, and the rest are like herbivores.
When a predator attacks a walker, it will do the damage to the machine itself. the people inside will use hand weapons and even missiles to defend themselves. The Predators tend to be heavier armored so they can take some of the damage. The predator crew will take out many of the defenders and then overwhelm them, possibly using gasses and such. Once the crews are under control, the supplies are then transferred, then the fuels, processing equipment, and then parts. As long as the captives are submissive, they are allowed to live and the young ones might be trained to become hunters themselves.
A ship from the home planet enters orbit and sends probes down to skim the surface. What they see is strange and wonderful. They really don't have anything to put what they see into perspective.
A young artist who had visited the home world wildernesses gets an idea. She takes images the probes are bringing in, and changes the planet and the creatures to home world scales. She then takes the sound track of a home world wilderness show and converts it to describe the new world.
She somehow obtains prime broadcast time for her show. The crew of the ship watch a wilderness show where the "life" is to scale of the planet and they are living exactly like they did in the home world.

28 )
.
Aliens attacked the space colony. They released some gasses and microbes into the atmosphere just before they were beaten back and then destroyed.
The stuff the aliens delivered caused a change in the life on the planet. The people started getting sick with many different ailments. Animals were dying fast. Carnivores did better than herbivores. Test found that the plants had changed to become poisonous. The aliens used a brilliant tactic where they changed just a couple proteins in all plants. The plants expressed the proteins into different poisons or combinations of poisons.
Toxicology tests showed that the poisons were at a low but dangerous level. They were also of a type that the body can safely eliminate if not taken in high doses and if given time.
There were several groups of people who were not getting sick. They all people who ate wide varieties of plants in their meals.
Word got out that people must eat a wide variety of foods, giving generally a week between meals of the food. A search for anything edible among native life started and soon harvesting and farming of all sorts of strange things become the industry.
Food processors worked out ways to filter out toxins from some food products, but they were not really much when done, basically a bean like protein and a starch substance. They were used to supplement the diet, and even then, people were told not to depend on one particular brand for all their foods. Each factory might make a mistake or there are "acceptable levels" of the toxins in their products. Mixing brands of manufactured products made sure one was fairly safe.
It would be decades before many of the foods lost their toxins, but by then, eating wide varieties of food stuffs became common. They also found out that some toxins in the native foods wee there all the time and some never changed from before the attack. They remained in the food choices as people had learned how to handle the toxins.

29 )
.
Super heros appeared among the population, most developing their powers beyond puberty. Usually, the powers they developed are a surprise. Once someone with power is detected, they are taken to the hall of heroes and trained to use their powers properly to the maximum of their ability. No two powers wee exactly the same, but there were similar trends.
The enemy had super heros also, but they were referred to as villains. Much of the activities of super heros was to take out or avoid the villains while accomplishing missions.
Some super heros, when they got old, became powerful. Some time later, their minds became effected and they became super villains, trying to undo the "good" they did before. A pattern is slowly becoming detected as to who becomes really powerful and who changes. It will likely be a century before they fully understand it as so few achieve that level of power.
Dan Michael grew up in a restaurant and when he became an adult, he started his own restaurant. He was in a poor neighborhood but it was a big place with plenty of seating. His big problem was getting people to come and visit.
On a holiday where people dress up, he dressed up as a super hero, with floppy tights and a cape. There was a big SD on his chest. He had a soup special, free soup with a meal.
Each person who came in, saw him and joked "Super Dan." One after another named him that way.
One customer came in unnoticed and had taken a seat. When Dan went to him the man asked who he was. "Super Dan." Dan replied.
"I'll take soup," the man said.
Dan did not know why, but he reached behind his back and a steaming hot bowl of soup appeared as he pulled his hand out. The man looked at him in surprise and tasted it. "This is good!"
he then checked on each of the other customers. Each one asked him who he was supposed to be. he would say "super dan." and they would say "Soup." and he gave them free soup. each bowl was the person's favorite. Soon people were lining up both to see Super Dan at work and to eat. He billed the people a dollar a bowl for the soup since it was not costing him supplies.
He soon needed hire a cook to fix dinner as he was serving more customers than he could cook for. Many came in just for soup. One could fill up with just a few bucks. The dirty soup bowls disappeared before they were to be washed so the dishwasher had a limited amount of work to do.
The government heard about Dan Michael's special powers and after much intense debate, decided he was doing better where he was than in the military.
One of the neighboring soup kitchens was being kicked out of their building as it was condemned. He made an agreement with the kitchen. They would run his kitchen for his restaurant. He would serve their customer their soup. Any other food would be provided by the kitchen. While his regular customers did not care that much for the new clientele, it filled the place and the food they got was better cooked and more timely provided.
He worked his kitchen for years. He actually made good money on his free soup as kitchen donations went into customer meals. He also worked hard, showing up before lunch and closing the place up late at night.
One day, a very pretty girl came in and set down. She looked at his outfit and asked who he was supposed to be. He said "Super Dan." which he always said.
She smiled coyly and said. "I'll take Dan......"

30 )
.
In this financial market, people are suggesting that you buy silver and gold for protection. If the government money becomes worthless, one can use the precious metal, which can be used as an alternative money, to buy what you need. There are also word that this is the start of the "end of time" where Revelations of the Bible and the return of the Maudi in the Koran, are to happen. Evil will come over the land.
They saw the problem coming decades before and worked to prepare for bad times. It could best be described as an artist's commune. Several hundred people working and living together in a nice tract of land.
They gathered parts for machines, metal stock, precious metals and jewels, works of artists, storage of food stuff, tools, and even technology. they lived fairly simple, making what they used and what excess money they had, they converted into stuff placed in storage.
Of course, it took far longer than they expected for the end times to approach. Few of the founders still survived and none could work. They brought in other people with knowledge and skills to add to what they had. Each child went through an intense schooling so they entered college level classes while still a teenager and were professors by the time most normal people were entering college. Each person was to teach the children some of their work, enough that they were semi competent at it. It did not matter if it was as a lawyer, a doctor, a machinist, a farmer, making clothing, setting stones. Each child had some training by many of the experts as they grew up. They could later choose to master some skill of the community.
Most of the adults worked off the compound and of course, many of the children had to go through outside schools to work in their selected profession. They breezed through the schools easily.
The collapse finally happens. Within just a few years, the entire community is working within the community as there are no jobs outside. they watch what news is left about how strange things are happening in different parts of the world.
The religious leader of the community suddenly realizes that what they see is a sign of evil flowing out into the world.
Since they have a large storage of materials, they start helping the people around them. They give some raw materials to shops so they can stay open since shipping of any kind has stopped. they get some stuff they need because of it. Gold has become the money of choice so everybody is carrying precious metal coins on them.
The evil suddenly reaches the area. Some people are taken over by evil, while others are not. At first no one knows why. It does not seem like there is any rhyme or reason for it. Also some households are immune from the evil and others are not. It does not matter if the people are know to be evil or good. The community seems so protected that several nearby neighborhoods are protected.
One day one of the community lawyers was visiting a friend. The friend suddenly was attacked by Evil. Without a reason, the lawyer tossed a gold coin and said, "Catch." the evil shied back instantly. The lawyer ran up and gave the man a few other coins and the evil left.
Immediately, word spread rapidly that precious coins provided protection from Evil. Decorative precious metals was not quite as effective. No one was sure as to why.
The lack of evil near a home soon told people who had a stash of precious metals and who did not.

31 )
.
The aliens were a society where regimentation was the name of the game. The lowest level people had to dress act, and live under strict rules. They were not allowed to relax, to be themselves. They were on display all the time. They wore certain styles of clothing that changed periodically, had to throw parties and outings to please others, live in garish homes where everything had to be placed perfectly at all times.
As one went up the scale of rank, one worked in plush offices, and garish apartments. Some people worked in garish buildings in groups and were forced to discuss unimportant things according to specific rules.
As one went up in society, they received some freedoms in how they could live, work and act. They were not required to have starched clothing, live in garish homes, work in big offices. They could be more themselves.
Their king and other government leaders lived on a farm, worked, talked without any of the preciseness required on low ranking people, he could dress shoddily and do things like pick his nose and not bathe.
The goal of the people was to be totally free of any social rules of their society.
In their society, you tell the king or high official something important, it is dealt with. The only thing is to get in touch with them which is not easy as they are not required to be in contact with everybody all the time.
They find a planet and send a ship. The ship studies the planet carefully. They study picks out where the planet's highest ranking people are likely located. They know the king will be in the most lush, largest areas of the planet. They eliminate most continents fast. Their officials were always on farms, not in forests, so they picked out the best farms.
Finally, they take shuttles down to see if they can locate a king or high official. They find a lot of lower ranking people, but it takes them time to find the right kind of person.
They find the one they figure has to be among the king's closest advisors, if not the king himself. The introduce themselves and give their message. Something was not right about that visit so they search until they find another and give the message there too.
They finally leave and wait. After a time, they cannot figure out why nothing of their message has been acted on. What they translate from communications is something about "space aliens," and unidentified flying objects, and Country bumpkins. The try with several more officials and get the same reaction. They cannot figure out what they are doing wrong.
.
Someone once asked why aliens never land in Washington DC and talk to our government people. Now you know why. The alien society was the opposite of ours.

32 )
.
On the colony planet, there was a microbe that effected the colonists. It made them adverse to the sun. They had to have a certain number of hours of sunlight each week to be healthy, but they were not to spend much more time than that.
Glockenspiel worked in an office during the week. On weekends, he worked a garden with a bunch of other friends. They each worked several hours, two days a week in the garden, and shared the results of the garden with each other. With their gardening, they got their required maximum time in the sun. During the rest of the week, they stay indoors to stay healthy. At work Glockenspiel sit at his desk most all day long.
Because of the health requirements, Others of the office would go out side each day, on company time, during work time, to get some sun. They would lounge in the sun rather than work during that time.
The company officials did not like it, but the people said they had to get their sun to be healthy. They divided their maximum time between their work days so they were pushing their limits each week. This amounted to a lot of time as the calculated in "recovery time" in their calculations which gave them extra time not working.
Over time Glockenspiel's co-workers started telling him that he needed to get some sun. They did not want him to get sick as it can be contagious. He ignored them. He knew he was getting enough sun.
Their insistence that he get some sun during work hours got stronger. They were ragging him about his fear of the sun.
The group finally confront him with the company officials in attendance. They say they are in a panic that he is going to make the whole company sick because of his refusal to get some sun. The company officials are also worried about it.
Glockenspiel let their complaints set in, looking like he is listening carefully. When they are done, he finally speaks. "You have a right to be concerned about illness in the company. You should also be concerned about getting the work done. I happen to be a member of a garden club and I max out my sun limits working in our garden. This is on my own time. this allows me to spend my full day working for the company. Because I got a sun on my own time, I am not wasting company time lounging around."
One high official then looked at the other workers. "Why is it that you don't get your sun on your own time?"
There were changes, especially that Glockenspiel's coworkers took a strong hatred for him.