Pisces

Once the internet had begun to compile knowledge, being a librarian focused on compiling and storing as full a collection of human knowledge as physically possible wasn’t exactly viewed with respect. After Mina refused to allow her books to be put online, she quickly lost sponsors and patrons, slowly the various technical magazines and updated editions stopped coming.

But after The Greatest War, it became an invaluable resource, since the internet went down four hours after the missiles began to fly. A collection like Mina’s, it would help society rebuild.

Had the sprinkler system worked and put out the fire.

Aquarius

Lynn Adams was not having a good day. And for a woman whose average day involved dealing with aggressive wildlife, looters and navigating ancient temples, that was saying something.

She worked best alone, but she had been forced to bring along Dr. Wasser on this trip in exchange for funding.

When they entered the temple, Wasser ran to the engravings on the wall.

“Ooh, I can translate this!

These pots are… eight, five and three… sahkoos deep. Pour four sahkoos into bowl to unlock-“

That was as far as she got before Lynn (safely) blew the charges on the door.

Capricorn

The International Oceanic Wildlife Summit was not going well at all. Far too many delegates were unwilling to negotiate and compromise on reducing fishing numbers, or declaring no-go zones, or any of the dozens of possible responses to the rapid decline in fish numbers worldwide.

But then this President Makara of the Hircus Islands, he slowly but surely, step by step, he began to get people to come to the table and work out a deal. Thanks to him, the “Reduction of Fishing” accords were passed.

No-one noticed the Hircus Islands were exempt from it till it was too late…

Sagittarius

“And why are you interested in Archery?”

He’d been asking that question for years with every new student. Most of time the answer was some sharp eyed superhero or hungry woman champion or something. But this one kid stared at him for a few seconds too long to be comfortable.

“To see if I’m good at it.” the kid eventually said.

A little unnerved, he began the lesson, teaching the child the basics of safety and etiquette, then let the kid take his first shot.

It missed the target.

The next shot was a bullseye.

So were the next eight.

Scorpio

Tara knew he was cheating on her. She found his second mobile, although she couldn’t unlock it, and she noted the odd hours he kept, how he’d be ‘out with his buddies’ without said buddies. But they weren’t that rich, so she couldn’t afford to hire a private detective.

So she set up a trap, with help from her best friend, she set up a fake online presence and began to flirt and court him over the internet. He seemed to fall for it, until he told ‘Arachnid’ that he couldn’t meet her, he was already in love.

With ‘Victoria’…

Libra

Tula had been performing scales for over three hours. Whenever she waivered, he’d berate her and order her to continue. Eventually, her voice raw, she turned and demanded to know what she had done to warrant this treatment.

He sniffed at her and then pulled out a letter from the papers on the piano. He brandished them like a weapon. He accused her of wasting his time, that if she wanted to go off and study the law, then he wouldn’t bother teaching her to perform, she had to choose.

She didn’t, instead she lied and continued doing both, successfully.

Virgo

I saw her slowly running a chocolate finger along the DVD rack. Luckily her glass was empty, so I had two ins. I walked over with the red in my hand.

“Care for a top up?”

She turned, and her piercing eyes were the color of wheat, distracting me from her holding out the glass until she shook it.

As I poured, I glanced at the DVD she had begun to pull out.

“‘The 40-Year-Old Virgin’? You haven’t seen it?”

“No. Was thinking it could give me tips on avoiding the problem myself.”

I dropped the bottle. She wasn’t impressed.

Leo

The jeep’s wheel caught a hole and flipped. She was the sole survivor, or at least was the only one to crawl out of the wreckage. After throwing up, and making sure the blood on her clothes wasn’t hers, she turned to face the wreck, and saw the lioness.

She froze, naturally. This wasn’t on the brochure. She stared as a couple more lionesses slowly padded out, looking at her with obvious aggression. As they began to move towards her, she closed her eyes, and prayed.

Luckily the pride attacked the hyenas behind her first.

Then they took her down.

Cancer

Craig’s best friend was Tommy, and the two would often hang out. When they hung at Craig’s house, things were fine. But Tommy’s house was a lot less inviting. Tommy’s mother was very strict, always telling Craig off for not wiping his feet or for not being ‘polite’. Well, she did whenever she was awake. She would often not leave her room, taking several ‘naps’ daily. This was a little better, but when she was ‘napping’ or out with her appointments, Tommy’s family seemed gloomy. Craig eventually asked what the matter was.

She was just a bit crabby, Tommy said.

Gemini

It wasn’t every day that Judge Castor had to deal with someone suing themselves.

When he saw ‘Pollux V Pollux’ he had assumed it was a couple, but when the defendant and claimant asked to sit in between the desks, he brought everyone to his chambers and demanded an explanation.

He was familiar with dissociative identity disorder, or at least the Hollywood treatment of it. And the idea that one identity wrote was plausible enough. But when the other didn’t want the resulting memoirs printed, it was a problem.

But both Polluxs seemed satisfied with calling it an ‘Unauthorised Autobiography’.

Taurus

For years, the various small villages scraping a living in the cliffs of the Tavros mountains (so called by the King and his men, those living there didn’t bother naming things) had traded with “Gordon and Buckhannon’s Travelling Traders”. Each year, Gordon would come with his wagon and his donkey and trade what little the villages had for what they needed from outside. He drove a hard bargain, as Buckhannon was a stubborn ass and wouldn’t be moved unless Gordon got an ‘acceptable’ deal. The people would sympathise, and then Gordon would pull Buckhannon’s reigns and off they’d go again.

Aries

“I’m telling you, it’ll work!”

Ramsey had been trying for hours now, sure that his calculations were correct. He’d been sent all over the base, each level of military bureaucracy unable or, as he got higher up, unwilling to flat out refuse him. Now all that was left between him and the banks of missile launch controls was the General and the Chief Scientific Officer.

“We launch the missiles in… seventeen minutes and twenty-five seconds, we can destroy the largest chunks of the meteor!”

Finally, he got the OK. He turned and rammed his USB stick in.

And snapped it.