Hey friends! As I mentioned in last week’s update post, I’m doing the micro prompts again. Here’s what I did with this week’s prompts!
February 3rd – Fantasy
“I thought you said you were writing a modern thriller?”
“I am!”
“This is fantasy. Again.”
“What? No! It’s definitely a thriller! The main character is a detective on the run!”
“He’s a DRAGON! He’s flying and breathing fire!”
“Yeah, so?”
“Sara. No.”
“SARA YES.”
This is a self-own/call-out because I can never seem to write any story without adding some element of fantasy to it. But also, dammit, now I want to write a story about a shapeshifting dragon detective.
February 4th – Frantic
The glowing red digits on the clock read 6:45AM.
Frantic, I leap out of bed and into my closet.
“Wassgoinon?” my love groans from the covers.
“My alarm didn’t go off. I’ll be late for school!”
“Darling come back to sleep. We’ve been out of school for years.”
I meant that last line to say “we’ve been out of school for years and it’s a Sunday” but somehow I forgot that last bit. Maybe it wouldn’t have fit any way.
February 5th – Atlas
Tal cradled Raia’s broken body in his arms. She had been their last hope against the Dasamor, but the burden was too great even for her.
His comm crackled. “Report!”
He closed her eyes. She could rest now. “Atlas has fallen.”
“Repeat?”
“Atlas has fallen. It’s over.”
I wanted to try something a bit different with “atlas” and not go the map route or even the mythical demigod route, though in the end the code name was an allusion to the world-bearer. And of course it had to be tragic because why would I write it happy?
February 6th – Ritual
Pat watched the birds congregating in the dry grass at the edge of the shed again. One by one they lined up and squawked at the open air before forming a ring and spiraling back to the sky. They had performed this daily ritual for a fortnight. She would never know why.
I had already used “ritual” once this week, in the very first prompt with “script” but instead of elaborating on that one and describing whatever ritual was going to take place, I decided to go a creepier route of animals behaving in an odd manner that could be perceived as ritual. I don’t know why these birds are doing this or why Pat never finds out why, but that makes it spooky.
February 7th – Enchanted
“I can’t believe I’m really here!” Emily squealed.
Lucia laughed. “What would you like to see first?”
Emily’s eyes sparkled. “The enchanted forest you told me about!”
Lucia frowned. “I said it was haunted.”
“Magical places can seem spooky to some people…”
“…Em, no.”
Enchanted was too easy. Everyone was writing about enchanted objects or using it as a greeting (“Enchanted to meet you”) but I strive to do things a bit differently. I already lean towards the fantastical and enchanted forests are cool but I thought what if the magic is dark and it’s not magic but ghosts/spirits/demons haunting the heck out of a forest cause forests are actually often creepy? The line “it’s not enchanted, it’s haunted” came to me and I ran with it.
February 8th – Mule
“All I want is one year for my parents to get me a birthday gift I ask for.”
“Didn’t you get a pony when you were a kid?”
“They gave me a mule. You know how hard it is to ride one of those things? There’s a reason stubborn people are named after them!”
Gotta say I was not expecting this prompt. Felt super constraining and I almost passed on it. That’s partly why this post is coming so late (aside from the fact that I’m apparently becoming a gremlin who doesn’t sleep before 2am) because I still hadn’t written today’s (yesterday’s) prompt as of midnight.
I’ll have another fresh batch of these next week! Stay tuned for our regularly scheduled weekly update post later today. More prompts are on their way and I’ll probably talk about how awesome Birds of Prey was. See you later!
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Closet Full of Notebooks 