Challenge 391
The First Rule of Game-Playing:
Know the Rules
In Peter Cawdron’s “Little Green Men,” the inhabitants of the planet understand and take literally Johnson’s remark about “little green men”; therefore the natives understand English. And the natives seem to understand human emotions. Why, then, do the natives put on a bloody and elaborate charade? Why not simply tell the prospectors to stop what they’re doing?
Jason Earls’ “Light of the Beast” functions at two levels: realism and fantasy. In the fantasy, Megan overcomes her fear of the unknown and accepts her own uniqueness. In the real world, Megan faces down a classroom full of bullies.
Is “Light of the Beast” actually a horror story? In view of reported consequences of bullying in the real world, what might readers infer from the ending? Since Megan has trained herself to use “light-projection” as a weapon, can the story be read as, for example, an inverse of the Montreal Massacre of December 6, 1989? Or is Megan a suicide bomber?
In R. R. Brooks’ “The Deist”:
- What appears to be the cause of the priest’s unbelief? Was his faith ever more than shallow? Is the priesthood for Fr. Thomas a vocation or simply a job?
- Assuming the Big Bang occurred roughly 14 billion years ago, what is the largest possible current radius of the universe? What is the greatest straight-line distance between the most remote objects in the universe?
- How long will it take for the magic spell’s effects to become noticeable?
- What moral can one infer about uttering a magical incantation when you don’t know who wrote it and it’s in a language you don’t understand?
- Trick questions: Where is the edge of creation? Where is the center of the universe?
Copyright © 2010 by Bewildering Stories
What is a Bewildering Stories Challenge?
