the prompt exchange: #8
during a space vacation, your character finds an adorable creature and decides to smuggle it home as a pet. describe its mysterious powers and destructive habits.
Another Sunday, another delicious prompt exchange. We hope this post finds all you readers so so well! This one was, as most are, very challenging and very stimulating. Veronica and I, Meriona, have never delved into the world of literary sci-fi, so please be nice as you read these stories [lol]. The most challenging part was the infinite possibility. Creating the appearance and nature of a space creature is limitless in its boundaries, but also demands very unique, foreign elements. But we did pretty damn good for first-timers, if I do say so myself!
Let me give you a refresher on the prompt at hand, selected by me this week from the book 5-Minute Daily Writing Prompts by Tarn Wilson, and get into what we each crafted!
P.S.- Grab a snack, these are pretty lengthy. Enjoy :)
Prompt 104: SCIENCE FICTION; HUMOR. During a space vacation, your character finds an adorable space creature and decides to smuggle it home as a pet. Describe the creature. The creature has mysterious powers and destructive habits. Describe the trip home.
Dëstres’s version.
The Day I Meet Ooba
The year is 3022.
It’s day 22 of the 7th annual Family space vacation and somehow it’s already too much.
I slip out of the space pod party hall to have some alone time,
my brother thought it’d be a hilarious idea to invite my ex.
The same ex who won’t leave me alone.
I shake my head when really I’d rather be shaking my ass forgetting he exists.
I head towards the lemon craters.
The lemon craters are each filled with water,
glowing a swirl of colors.
Every 33 seconds a couple marble looking bubbles float up and pop
letting out a high pitched whistle.
Legend has it that when that happens an alien angel is given its wings.
I stop to take it all in.
I see the earth out in the distance and memories begin to flood my mind.
I realize how long we’ve been gone.
26 earth years and 7 space years, uhhh yeah that sounds about light.
“I miss being there, and most of all, I miss them”
I think about the life I could’ve built especially with them
but I couldn’t leave mama to do this alone.
Mama is the head of Project Planet Auto.
Project Planet Auto is the mission we all are currently on.
Attempting to build another earth.
The goal here is to make this planet earth 222.
I sometimes wish mama could’ve been something as simple as a baker or even a nurse
but this is just the way it had to be.
A couple moments go by as I ride the waves of my thoughts.
“Ooba scubadoobyahhh, ooba oobaaa”
I pause.
“Whose there?”
I look around, nothing.
I start walking.
“Ooba scubadoobyahh,ooba scuba”
The sound is coming from the crater to the left of me.
I turn my head slowly and make my way towards it.
“Oobascubadoobyeahyeahhhh”
Getting closer to the voice.
Finally I get to the crater and slowly peak my head in to
find this soft orange loaf looking creature with purple and yellow stripes and 2 lime green star shaped eyes.
“What the f*** is that”
It looks up at me reaching a finger towards my head in a very ET like way
and quickly changes directions to the smiley face patch on my suit.
It begins to smile with its 4 razor sharp teeth, 2 on top and 2 on bottom.
I slowly go in to pick her up.
“Where’d you come from little fella?”
As I hold her in my arms, she looks up at me with these big, glossy, green star shaped eyes.
I think to myself “I’ve always wanted a pet”
“Hmm what can we name ya?” I say as I run my fingers through her fur.
She goes “OOoba Ooba”
“Ooba!” I smile
I feel a very strong connection to this little creature
Almost like we’ve met before.
Ooba starts laughing.
As she laughs the lemon craters dont just glow..they pause.
The bubbles freeze mid air and the whistling stops.
Ooba jumps out of my arms, pressing her paws into the water.
“Ooba?”
She begins moving her paws left to right, creating these huge waves.
“Oobascubyaoobahdubabooooooo”
The water begins to ripple outwards, showing a montage of images.
It’s all happening so fast, impossible to look away from.
Earth, green and whole… earth, burning..
Mama standing in a yellow room I’ve never seen before, her hands are shaking and eyes blood shot..
Me as a child laughing.
Me, older, crying in places I have yet to see.
The waves crash higher..
“Oobaa Stop!!!” I shout,
but my voice seems far away, almost like I’m under water.
Then everything disappears.
The water settles..the bubbles rise again and whistling is back like nothing ever happened.
Ooba jumps back into my arms, curling into my chest.
“So you’re a weird little bean huh”
We then spent hours running through the lemon craters,
speaking in a language that didn’t require words, just an exchange of energy.
I put Ooba in my backpack and we made our way back to the Pod Party hall.
We find my mom tearing up the dessert powder table to the right of the entrance.
“Drada! Where have you been?! The party is just about finished. What is this furry little loaf in your hand and why is it moving?”
With Ooba in my left arm, I pick at the dessert powder table.
“I saw her all alone while at the lemon craters and anyways she’s part of the family now”
I scoop up a brownie sundae for Ooba.
“DRADA! No! Enough with your bullshit. You know how much this means to me. We need to stick to the plan.”
“Mom! I risked a lot to be here with you so me having a pet shouldn’t really be an issue. Don’t even start”
“Drada. Honey if you’re going to really keep her, no one can know and I mean NO one can KNOW!”
“One thing I know how to do is hide things as you know so that won’t be a problem here”
“Let’s go Ooba! Let me show you around your new home”
Ooba peeps out of the backpack and waves at mama as Drada walks into the party pod.
“Hey Drada”
My ex Simon jumps in front of me.
“Hi Simon! Nice to see ya but I gotta go”
I slip past him before he can respond, pulling the backpack higher on my shoulder.
“Ooobascoobayoobahchoo”
Ooba peeks out of the backpack and shoots lasers out of her eyes towards Simon’s pants.
Simon’s junk is on full display, everyone starts laughing including me as I zip Ooba back in and head to my room.
I move through the Pod Party hall, lights flashing, people laughing, music thumping against these metal walls.
I’m now back at the sleeping pod.
I sealed the door shut and let out the breath I had been holding in.
I unzip my backpack, Ooba jumps into my arms.
“Ooba” I whisper
“You gotta stay quiet in here, okay? No crater stuff, no visions, no whatever that was or whatever I haven’t seen yet, got it?”
“Ooba Oooba” she replies.
Ooba then jumps out of my arms, exploring the room.
I go over to plop on my airTress.
Ooba jumps on up, she begins to fall asleep.
As she sleeps she turns blue with pink polka dots.
“Hmm thats strange”
I begin to rest my eyes..
I let out a whisper.
“I’m glad I met you Ooba”
meriona kross’s version.
Marnie’s Memories
Marnie had been in space for twenty-three days. Her stomach, miserably embracing dehydrated strawberries and boiled chestnuts, was yearning for Earthly foods. As her spaceship approached the last planetary destination of her journey, she fondly thought of the meals she could taste in just a few short days. Steaming, fluffy white rice. Cozy yellow curry with soft carrots and potatoes. The juicy, audible bite of a honeycrisp apple. “Sprite”, she whispered to herself with a giggle. She’s gotten accustomed to talking to herself through this journey. She understood before her departure that it would be a lonely time, and this she was okay with, but still, Marnie didn’t deprive herself of the whimsy of conversation. “I’m getting a Sprite as soon as I touch down in Texas”, she said.
The spaceship, which Marnie cleverly named Icarus, rocked sideways as it found its footing on the surface. She geared up in her suit, the inside now smelling a little tart, and tugged open the door latch. She took a few slow steps down, appreciating the last time she’d take part in this intimate and exploratory ritual.
“So… this is Venus.”
With her hands on her hips, and already sweating, she took a few moments to take it all in. The ground beneath her spaceboots was rocky, and looked like the aftermath of a demolition or a war. The pressure was crushing, and the sky was churning with clouds that donned the air of ill intent. Yellow… very, very yellow. It was as if she had just landed in the middle of the Badlands during a brewing summer storm. The kinds of storms that would be humid but rainless, and would send her whole neighborhood block without electricity for days during her childhood. Too, the mountains here were eerie– they stood up to the sky audaciously with pride and power, like castles.
Marnie let her mind run free with imagination. She wasn’t here for scientific research or any sort of cosmological data collection. “So… the Venusians lived here, perfectly and regally, once upon a time,” she whispered. “The castles, disguised as mountains, obviously, gave the Venusians a chance to live in secret, out of the telescopic gaze of the evil martians and the dim-witted renaissance humans. The Venusians were beautiful, both a strength and a liability. They were wiped out, eventually, from a solar flare that scorched everything that once walked the planet. The end.” She felt a bit evil as she exhaled these words into her helmet, like some sort of sick-minded conquistador. She didn’t even know what a solar flare really meant, but the word sufficed to capture the series of images spontaneously painting her mind. She trudged the surface for a few hours, letting the barren view fill her mental fairytale with miniscule, historical details before heading back to Icarus.
She climbed into her ship, latched the door behind her and removed her helmet with an eagerness to run her fingers through her soft hair. She grabbed a sharpie and checked off the last box on her list, “Venus, check.” Marnie was more than ready to get back to her life, to tell these stories to her husband, Kevin, and her girlfriends at last. Revving the space engine and aiming for her destination, Starbase, Texas, she took a seat back and let Icarus do his thing. They hovered over the ground and up they went. As Marnie was watching her world change out of the windshield once again, she heard a small squeak come from behind her.
She rose, thinking maybe the door latch wasn’t tightened completely, and walked toward the back of the ship. From behind her space boots, a glimmering, fearful eye stared back at her.
She paused. Marnie wasn’t one for immediate reaction, so she approached cautiously. What is this object, that to her, mimics a living creature? What crazy mirage is her brain willing into existence right now?
Stepping into its full view, Marnie looked down at something she’s never seen before. Fully registering the reality of this sight, she screamed. “AHHHH!”
The creature, startled, shrieked back. “AHHH!”
Marnie took a few steps backwards, “what the hell. What did I do? Oh my god. What is that?” The creature, in a helium voice, but at the same exact melody of Marnie’s, repeated “wha da hee. Wha deed eye doo. Ah mee gah… wha eez dahhh.” Marnie cocked her head. “Are you… repeating what I say?”
“Ah yoo… ee-peeting wha ee sayyy?”
Marnie was frantic. She looked at the geo-map. She was already 800,000 miles away from Venus, and she only had enough gas to get her right back to Starbase. This she knew. This, she planned for. Turning around at this point would leave her stranded. She paced the ship, doing mental gymnastics and struggling to find even where to begin…
“Okay, you… you can breathe… oxygen?”
The creature looked excited. “Ca na! Ca na!”
“You can… okay. What… is your name?”
The creature cocked its head with a smirk, as if it were about to tell a riddle. “Spee-reeee-toooooo,” it squeaked.
Was Marnie about to smuggle an alien creature into Texas? Her mind raced with what they would possibly do to her. They’d confiscate Speereetoo, destroy it, and she would be banned from space, or even worse, imprisoned on Earth. Her life would be over. “My life is over”, she whispered.
“Maiiii liiiife eez… ofah?” the creature mocked back.
An exasperated, confused, desperate giggle escaped Marnie’s mouth. And then laughter. Hysterical, slap-happy laughter. She was clutching her stomach for breaths as her eyes teared up, her cheeks were hurting. She couldn’t stop laughing. Speereetoo inched out from behind the spaceboots, looking nervous and curious to understand what bodily function Marnie was displaying. It tried to mimic human laughter, but sounded rather awkward and throaty. “Agh.. ghah, hakh, ghakh.”
Marnie recollected herself and felt almost tipsy. She sat with defeat on the floor of the ship. “Are you friendly? You look friendly… come here.” The creature slowly trotted towards her and sniffed her feet. It had long extended ears, like that of a donkey’s, but with small horns preceding them. Little fangs peered out from its mouth. Its nose reminded her of a cat’s, and it had the pompous tail of a Samoyed dog, similar to that of Marnie’s dog, Bear.
Its body was petite, probably no more than 15 pounds, and it had the posture and legs of a kangaroo, but its feet were capped with the hooves of a horse. Its fur was gleaming a cartoonish yellow, but a pure, clover green was ombre’d throughout its body, on the tips of its ears and tail. Marnie couldn’t help but appreciate the new being before her as she stared into its round, sparkling eyes. “Speereetoo, huh?” Marnie smirked, “I’ll call you Sprite, for short.” Sprite cocked its head, and repeated “Spee… rite… Sprite.”
“Sprite, we are going to be on this ship for a few days, okay? We are going to Earth,” Marnie explained slowly, unsure of whether or not Sprite had the capacity to register the meaning of her words.
“Ah… stah-base… teck-saahs…” Sprite murmured. Marnie’s eyes widened. “What did you just say?”
“Stah-base… home... kee-vaan… be-yaar…”
How did this Venusian creature know the name of Marnie’s hometown? Of her husband Kevin, of her dog Bear?
Sprite twiddled its fingers and looked off to its side, and spoke as if sheepishly confessing a mistake. “Brek-fahh… fah-murrz omm-let… oh-ranj… joooos… roze-maree baaaay-kin…”
The farmer’s omelette, a fresh squeezed orange juice and a side of rosemary bacon was Marnie’s usual order at the Brunch Club, a local diner where she met her girlfriends every Sunday morning. Marnie and Icarus would be landing on Earth on a Friday, and she already had plans to reunite with her friends there the following Sunday. Marnie was at a loss for words.
“How… do you know these things? Are you… reading my mind?” No, no. Marnie wasn’t necessarily thinking of Kevin, of Bear, or of her Sunday breakfast order at this particular moment. For Sprite to be reading her mind didn’t make sense. “Do you…” She was almost afraid to say it…”have access to my memory?”
Sprite perked up. “Ca na! Ca na!”
“Oh my god.”
Marnie rose to her feet. Was she dreaming? The tipsy feeling was wearing off, and reality began to set in again. She’s not sure what this meant- what this power that Sprite honed would mean over their next few days together.
Sprite hopped forward. “I laaav yoo… huh-nee…. Yooooll beee fiiiiine…”
Marnie’s heart skipped a beat. I love you, honey. You’ll be fine. The last words her mother ever said to her before she died seven years ago.
Marnie felt light headed… Kevin… Kevin. Who is Kevin? Words were echoing in her mind: I love you, honey. You’ll be fine. I love you, honey. You’ll be fine. What did these words mean? Who spoke them to her, once upon a time?
She paced the spaceship. She caught a glance of a framed photo of a dog. A beautiful Samoyed dog, laying happily on a picnic blanket in a park. She studied it intensely. “Whose dog is this?” she whispered.
Sprite followed behind her. “Haiii… ma-ma… yoo laaav me… youuu feeeed meeee..”
Marnie was disoriented. What? She loves it? She feeds it?
She felt faint for a moment before coming back to. She looked down at Sprite and picked it up. The words escaped her mouth almost mechanically, but she had no reason not to believe them. “Aw, I love you, Sprite. You must be hungry, are you hungry?”
Sprite didn’t just have access to Marnie’s memory, it was able to manipulate it to its liking. Sprite was telepathically re-organizing the contents of Marnie’s inner world.
Marnie continued to ramble on as she held Sprite in one hand and rummaged through her space-food pantry with the other. “I’m so glad you could join me on this trip, Spritey. Haven’t these last few weeks been so fun? What was your favorite part? Mars… Mercury… Venus? I really liked Mercury. Oh! Chestnuts. You like boiled chestnuts, right?”
Sprite gazed up at her. ”No… youuuu feeeed meeeee…”
Marnie froze for a moment, her face expressionless as the neurons in her brain tweaked and fired in new directions.
“Oh! Right. Silly me, sorry Spritey.”
She set Sprite down and began undressing herself. Once she was fully nude, she laid down on the cold titanium floor of the spacecraft with her limbs spread out, as if ready for surgical inspection, and locked her eyes on the ceiling. Sprite flashed its claws, and then its fangs, as it sliced open the soft flesh of Marnie’s torso from top to bottom, peeled her open, and began hallowing her contents. It chewed on the organs viciously, painting the walls red, and then burrowed itself comfortably into Marnie’s ribcage. Sprite fit like a puzzle piece.
Marnie smiled. Tears escaped her eyes and spilled over her cheeks as she felt what would be her final slow heart beats. Sprite slept soundly, and Icarus flew on.
[INSERT ART PIECE HERE - once it’s finished. Sorry guys I had no time and got really tired, check back tomorrow xoxo]
So, yeah. We had fun. This was one of those writing sessions that was very spontaneous, with no clear path, and believe me, I was just as surprised as you. But hey, we did it. We went to space! Via thumbs and keyboard, that is. NASA, please don’t come for us with your technical critiques of the physics and technology of our fictions, we beg you. Just go with our flow, hehe.
P.S.- how cute is Ooba? Oh my god. What a girl’s girl.
Thank you so much for reading! We’re here every Sunday with a new completed prompt that we announce the week prior. So you’re always welcome to join in on the fun and post your own versions, either on your own Substack or here in the comments. Tag us, we want to readddd
And for next week, you ask? drum roll please
Prompt 301: PLOT. Write a scene in which a character tries to get somewhere quickly: make it to the hospital before someone gives birth, say “I love you” before their beloved marries someone else, etc. To continue the story, imagine two outcomes: one happy, one sad.
Ah! Kind of rom-com vibes… Exciting. I can’t wait to see what we each decide to do with this. We’ll see you next sunday, our lovely birds~
XOXO,
Meriona Kross & Veronica Sweetz
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