Maybe the idea of mixing your watercolour paints with the growth medium was a little unorthodox, but – it worked! You hold the petri dish up to the light. A cluster of puffy bacterial colonies dots the glass, as well as a weird, spidery-looking growth. What is that? And why is it moving?

Hurray – you made something! Whether a piece of art, a new thruster for your spaceship, or an odd-looking bacterial colony, this is exciting. Congratulations! Or – do you rather wish you hadn’t made this? Sometimes, your own creations can backfire on you.

Or, maybe it wasn’t you who created the thing. Was it someone else? Or something else? What was the thing that was created? And what will you do with it?

What stories do you know where the inciting incident was the creation of something – wonderful or, maybe, horrendous?

What could be created on your planet?