The pirates caught the ship's human in their jammies and socks. The human captured them by shuffling feet on soft surfaces and touching the pirates. The touches leaving painful spots. Rumor spread humans could shoot lightning from their fingers. Those that knew better knew it was just static. -- Fighting Fit
Ships' night is normally a strategic time for space pirates to attack. Unfortunately for these pirates, normal and Humans don't mesh. Human Zorq was in their BVD's and socks when the pirates breached the hull. Since this was in the Edge territories and before the UFTP, few had seen a Human before and less knew what they were capable of.
To the pirates, Zorq looked like a defenseless fleshy cogniscent caught with their pants down. Then they wondered what the hell they were up to when Zorq shuffled their socks over the thick, shaggy flooring.
It gave them so much pause that they almost forgot to aim their weapons or threaten anyone for the cargo. The crewmates of the Soft Trader knew what Zorq was doing and immediately reached for any exposed metal. The pirates, watching, slowly raised their weapons, thinking it was some instinctual threat dance.
Then the Human stopped showing empty hands and speaking in a soft, calming voice as they approached. "There now. There now," Zorq cooed. "There's no need for any of this. Our cargo's only valuable to Pinkus North, where they're having a famine. You don't want two thousand standard tons of enriched rice. You don't want us as hostages, we're common as muck, but you also don't want trouble from the CRC. But most importantly--" close enough, Zorg swung an arm around to an exposed patch of pirate skin. A little bit of lightning shot from Zorq's fingertip to the pirate's exposed skin.
Too much electricity for the pirate, who fell down unconscious. Zorq wrested the weapon out of those limp hands, turning it in the remaining pirates.
"Now I have one of your guns. Ho ho ho," crowed Zorq. "Wanna dance, fucknuts?"
They surrendered, but the rumour that Humans could shoot lightning lasted quite a few decades.
[Photo by Amos from Stockphotos.com on Unsplash]
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I once was dragging my feet because my back really hurt, and then touched my bed's metal frame. The ZAP I got was so hard, it actually pushed my hand back and caused a small red mark. And no, nothing electronic was touching my bed. It was just static. You can build up quite a charge doing that.
Yup. Polyester/polymer clothing makes it even worse.
Interestingly, pure cotton clothing is less likely to generate static electricity. It's why those who mess around with black powder have a lot of cotton in their wardrobe.