20²⁰th Century Blues

A toolkit for time travel incidents, alien abductions, or long jumps to unexplored space. Though inconceivably distant time travel is the assumed conceit, the horrors of the Homo Sapiens Museum could also occur within an alien mothership's medical bay, or the Outdated Future-Weapons could be used as contemporary, experimental military-tech.

Future Societies

1. A harmonious concord between many disparate species. Customs too peaceful to the human mind to stand. Shame of human failings in the face of its beauty too much for human dignity to bear.
2. Perfectly pastoral and apparently uninhabited worlds conspire to exert an eerie will. Haunting mother nature.
3. Multiple warring singularities engaged in perpetual total war. Fractal architecture wiped out and replaced with new patterns by new masters almost instantaneously--a daily occurrence.
4. Beings with the form of thoughts, infinitely mutating according to their whims. The universe a kaleidoscope of abstract art.
5. Insectoid swarm that manifests broken and conflated human anatomies in off-putting attempts to communicate.
6. Countless clones of an apparently human original, its genetic material so deteriorated from countless reproductions that only the barest hint of vestigial humanity remains in its features, behavior, and ritual. Still-functioning and perfectly loyal machines obey every strange whim.
7. Beings too large to behold more than a small fraction of at any one time drift momentously through the cosmos, dining on planets and stars.
8. All matter is liquid, sloshing upon itself. A great lava lamp with countless layers in all directions.
9. 4th- and higher dimensional beings, worlds, and more--poorly processed by human brains. Nauseating optical illusions and painful reckoning.
10. A blank slate, wiped clean by a disappointed god.

Alien Weaknesses

1. Susceptible to human-borne disease.
2. Views humans as non-threatening.
3. Incapable of recognizing lies.
4. Defenses ineffectual against human biology.
5. Threatened by a mortal foe, a balance of power easily tipped.
6. Desperate for entertainment. Highly values the crew's lives.
7. Apathetic to destruction.
8. Ignores Androids entirely, leaving them free to act.
9. Easily poisoned by human ideas like hate and prejudice.
10. If the crew holds out long enough, the long running server cluster of this simulated universe shuts down. The higher-ups correct the error that sent the crew outside of their home cluster.

Homo Sapiens Museum

They put you with other relics of the past and quaint, human curiosities. The only shred of familiarity in an unrecognizable universe.

Outdated Future-Weapons

Grim reminders of a barbaric past long since evolved beyond, displayed behind glass.

1. Non-lethal bullets that stimulate rapid nerve growth to inflict pain far beyond natural biological capacity.
2. Device instantly destroys air within 1,000 m³, creating vacuum.
3. Micro time travel sword--skips in time to pass through a parry.
4. Undetectable nanomachine swarm, targets programmable by demographic.
5. Jump drive powered sniper rifle, mini-wormhole optics for target acquisition up to Jump-5.
6. Finely tuned EMP device eliminates human trauma suppression, triggering perfect recall. Intolerable.
7. Chemical reactant triggers solar supernova within 1 day.
8. Clonesuit: Liquidates deceased inhabitant, rapidly regrows clone from fetal state to full development inside sealed suit within a few hours. Psychological deterioration an accepted side effect.
9. Universal Android self-destruct tone.
10. Near-infinite range homing beacon for once-unstoppable alien threat.

Future Horrors

Trapped in a cold and austere cage, handled indelicately by beings who care not for your comfort, you suffer daily indignities and tortures while you bide your time to escape.

1. Served more food than you can possibly eat. Force-fed to the point of bursting.
2. Medical procedures involving total disembowelment, skin entirely removed, etc. Always put back together in a seemingly correct order, but something feels off.
3. Impossibly complex cognitive tests with painful negative reinforcement for failure.
4. Forced, confused historical reenactments: Moon landing crossed with American continental colonization.
5. Repetitive busywork fueled by increasingly powerful drugs.
6. Brain enhanced to match alien capacity, then reverted. Agonizing loss.
7. Simulated escape attempt. Convenient opportunities, lucky breaks, then crushing reality.
8. Stretching exercises devised with poor understanding of human anatomy. Pops and snaps.
9. Android benchmarking and overclocking to dangerous extremes.
10. Fight provoked between the crew. Last one standing receives the cure for a fictitious deadly infection.