01. Ian Phillips - The perils of Drink
It's an age old trick and he had fallen for it. Passing an evening in a bar, gazing out at the planet beneath as it slowly revealed it's secrets to anyone interested enough to look.
She was alone, seemingly enraptured by the scenes underneath her. Drinks were bought and drunk. Conversation filled the hours and they reeled out of the bar laughing and bumping into each other.
The morning brought a sore head and a sick feeling in his stomach. He groped frantically though his clothes, but it was gone. His ship entry pass had vanished, together with his ship.
02. Luniticisi - The injustice of it all (99)
"I had a terrible time entering the station" Clive explained to Derek, over a pint in the Thargoid and Fer-de-Lance.
"One officer come up to me and he said, "Look! Your Cobra's weaving all over the Space-Station!"
I told him, "What do you expect? I'm drunk out of my mind!
Stone me! Can't you see that? I've got four empty bottles of scotch in the cockpit..
...I'm swigging from a bottle of scotch now.. can't you understand why I'm swerving about?...
...Isn't it bleedin' obvious!... I'm Drunk!
He arrested me.
Do you know what technicality he got me on?.....
.....Murder."
03. T.j - Taking the ....
The room is dark and freezing.
I stare for a eternity at the glass on the table.
The moisture glistens as it slowly collects into droplets which descends to collect on the table.
A involuntary shudder courses across my flesh as the aroma fills my nose and invades my senses.
My hand reaches out and lifts it towards my parched, cracked lips
I take a deep breath and brace myself for the inevitable onslaught that will assault my taste receptors very soon.....
The silence continues to deafen me ever since the lifesupport failed last week.
Damn, I hate Urine recyc.
04. Cassius - Drunk
Yer know, I had a Cohbra like thats one once. Was a pritty fing. All blue ands, errr grey. Handulled like a dream. Had a crackin pic on her bottom, just like all the best girls eh?!... an angel with her baps out! Hahahahaha! Loved her more than the wife. Then dem dern pirates show up an pick her apart like a mouthy Riedquantian hooker.
Corse insurance wouldn’t pay out. Found me driftin in my Remlok, but checked my blood whiles still under! Said I was intoxi *hic* intoxicated.
Lend us a cupola creds. I fink I need anufer drink...
05. Darkoba - Happy landings
The synthesiser-recycler broke last week, so I had to cook raw gunge over a heat sink plate an' a had ta drink an' cook in alco'l 'steada water.
Fin'lly, station's in sight an' I got lann'in permission. It looks like there's two lann'in' bays, an' they're both spinnin' roun' an' roun'... Oh yeah, gotta match spin!
Which bay do I go for? Oh, s'awright, screen's got two aimin' sights. Coo, tha's good, inni'?
The ship lands safely.
Intercom says "Nice landing. Welcome to Barnard's. Enjoy your stay".
Engines off.
See? A'm drot so ninc as some thunkle peep I am.
06. Bikky - Getting away with the drink
A bashed up transporter scraped into the space station, All eyes watching as it left a gouge along the top of an Anaconda.
‘That’s gonna cost.’ Sergeant Morris stated.
The transporter richoched its way from ship to ship.
‘Best get ourselves over there Sarge.’ commented officer Rymes
‘Aye, best we might.’ The Sergeant replied.
They arrived at the landing pad, as the transporter touched down, without landing gear, and slightly askew.
A slovenly person emerged and staggered towards the officers. ‘Ham not has thunk has drinkll peep hayam hosslifer.’
‘Well sort this mess out for you Admiral.’ Sergeant Morris replied.
07. Frank - Chasing Rainbows
Jim saw a glimpse of a rainbow ten o'clock low. He smiled when he saw nothing in his scanners. It must be massive, and it was; thousands upon thousands of kilometers of glass-like asteroids.
The instruments had already confirmed the purity of the water but Jim now had the luxury of doing things any way he wanted.
He was now out in the velvety blackness of space with a myriad of massive chunks of diamonds overhead. He chipped off some "ground", put it in a glass, and cracked open a bottle of Jameson's which hissed off into vacuum like Champagne.
08. Insanephoton - Travellers Rest
This beer tastes so good, I savour every last drop. It's the first in over a month as I've been hauling supplies for the big expedition. The journey is dry as every gram of cargo counts.
Every time I get back to a station I have my ritual; a cold beer, a hot shower, real food and some pleasant company.
The trips are getting longer every time. I only have a few days leave before I have to head back out again. Still, it could be worse, the poor saps in the survey team have been out there for months.
09. Psykokow - The Thirst
15 weeks in deep space, the drives are still not functioning correctly and its left me drifting..
Bottles are strewn all around me, mugs and jugs broken and disgarded floating slowly around.
Red Stains decorate the rest of the ship cabins, with bones and fleshy globules hovering all along the walk ways.
Here I am in the cockpit, held in the chair with the belt. My skin is dry, lips cracked and scabbed, my eyes still and focused, red staining on my chin and cheeks from my last meal.
Such a strange saying when its true...I’d kill for a drink.
10. Yaffle - The bottom of the glass
I recall it now as it was then. My child, my poor child spinning, twisting, shields incandescent, then gone. Nothing over the comms but screams of human and metal. I had them right there in my sights; every last drop of energy to my lasers, there were two flashes of light, the two flashes extinguished back to darkness.
I searched for hours. A corpse would bring closure. It’s wrong for a parent to bury a child, but not as wrong as failing.
Tears blur the starfield ahead. I drink again. It all looks better through the bottom of the glass.
11. Eyota Winterwalker - Fortified Madeira
Barley Wine, Cask, Stout, Stock, Fruit, Lager, Pilsener, Schwarzbier
Cider, Perry, Plum, Huangjiu, Mead, Sake, Sonti.
Sangria, Champagne, Fortified, Madeira, Sherry, Vermouth.
"Once drunk," Yin claims, "a cup of wine can bring 100 stanzas," The drunker the bard, the more the words flow.
I quietly drop another "no 'chol" tab, pouring two drinks, one for me one, for Yin, and we're starting on the whiskeys.
Finally he forgets me and stands, obviously spinning, leaving his pad on the table, staggering for the rotating floor.
The pad, unguarded holds a start sequence, code to Yin's Cobra, that I memorise with interest.
12. azdour - A Route to Drink (101 words)
Drink was Peter's mistress, and as a trader he seen and experimented with many types.
He would travel to the edges of the known systems and beyond to get his hands on new ones.
But age forced him to settle down.
He opened a large bar with exotic drinks shipped in from every known systems so that people could try them.
So popular did his bar become that he soon offered his services to ferry people to and fro. He even changed the bars name to Drink. All so his happy customers could say that he 'drove them to Drink'...
13. AlexGS - To Drink, or Not to Drink
Through clouds of breath in the flickering gloom, Brian watched the drips. Every ten seconds, plik!, a drop into the jar.
Water, stale-tasting and yellowish, from the silent engines far above? Hydrogen-burning drives could certainly produce water. Or was it some other, more harmful substance? Engines teemed with those.
The dripping was painfully slow... but in another way much too fast, because once he returned to where the kids were hiding, huddled, freezing and dehydrated in the dark, he’d have to make the decision.
This stuff might keep them alive for a few more hours. Or it might kill them.
14. Darren Grey - Last Drink
My last hit was a funny one – a Federal politician, alcoholic, racist and hopelessly corrupt. Directive: make it look like an accident.
My chance came on a Beluga cruise. He got drunk on the free alcohol, eventually slipping asleep. The bottle floated near his face. My gloved hand grabbed it, steadied it, and then squeezed. The clear liquid flowed out, forming a small sphere in the air. I gently, ever so slowly, pushed his face forwards. The liquid seeped into his open mouth and up his nostrils, forming a film over his face.
Glug glug, senator. Last drink.
Funny, eh?