Tag: writing prompts (Page 4 of 27)

“Forbidden Hill?” Matt sneered, his face pale above a burgundy polo strangely reminiscent of a slightly too small pajama top. He tilted his head back and drained the rest of his beer, tossing the bottle to the side and reaching for a new one. “That’s a stupid name.”

“Watch it, new guy.” Dari snapped the words, then nestled her own bottle into the dirt by her feet with exaggerated, tipsy care. “I don’t want to deal with exploding glass because you’re too drunk to keep empty bottles away from the bonfire.”

The fire popped, and Terry leaned forward with a stick to give it a few pokes. Someone paying attention might have noticed his casual maneuver to roll Matt’s bottle away from danger, but most of the group had left careful observation behind well before the sun had set.

“Sure,” he said finally, and leaned on his stick. “I mean, yeah, it’s a dumb name. Most people go up sometime as a kid. Some return wondering what the big deal is.”

Matt leaned forward, elbows on his knees, brow furrowed. “What’d you do?”

“Ah.” Terry poked the fire again, and sparks flew in the air. “I went up with a group when I was fifteen.”

“Terry’s our eldest,” Dari informed Matt, gesturing at the group. Two women darted by in the background, shrieking merrily before collapsing into a giggling pile of darkened greenery. “He’s the responsible one.”

The alleged elder shrugged from the lofty reaches of twenty-five. “I just never felt the urge, but you know how it is at that age. We ran up the hill and back for baseball conditioning, and then one day we wandered in.”

“So is it a big deal or not?” Matt prodded. “What’s up there that’s so forbidden?”

“Ruins,” Dari informed him. “Ancient ones. Prehistoric.”

Terry studied the white and orange flickers. “Turned out, what I saw wasn’t what the others saw.”

“Some people claim it’s a whole ‘nother world,” one half of the giggling bush said.

He glared at Em, wishing he’d never told her what he thought he’d seen…but he’d been young and in love, and careless. At least he hadn’t shared everything.

The other half of the bush chimed in. “There are all these rumors about people disappearing.”

Rolling his eyes, Matt gave a deliberate yawn. “Runaways, probably.”

“They tried destroying it, but even the ruins retain the power once worshipped there,” Dari said with ponderous drama, waving her arms in the air and splashing beer everywhere with a sizzle. “I just saw rocks. Wish I’d seen another world when I went up Forbidden Hill.”

“No, you don’t,” Terry said quietly, but neither of them heard his words.

That was fine with him. No one else needed the burden of what had really happened to those unfortunate souls who’d been caught in the other world.

***

Well, that got dark, but I’m pleased with this quick little bit inspired by AC Young’s prompt! We had a trade this week – check it out! And there’s more, over at MOTE!

“Izz,” Greaves said.

She grunted in response to the AI’s call, teeth gritted. The wrench slipped, and she tightened her grip until it dug bruisingly into her palm.

A sigh, then the disembodied voice cleared its nonexistent throat. “Captain Isabella.”

“Going formal, are we now?” she said lightly. A final tap of her free hand had loosened the bolt at last. Izz caught the storage netting’s frame and eased it onto the ship’s deck along with the tools. Straightening, she eased a hand against her aching lower back.

“Captain, you wished to know when I made a discovery regarding the map you found.”

“Without giving away that you’re an illegal sentient AI to every database in the galaxy, yes.” Izz raised an eyebrow. “And your speed has me concerned about that.”

“Only a sentient AI could detect another,” Greaves said with an utter lack of concern. “Similarly, that’s exactly what I found here. A spot of utter blackness, from which nothing reflected, nothing at all…”

“You interrupted my storage bay repairs to tell me your big discovery is nothing?”

“Multiple forms of nothing,” Greaves said. “Voids all over the map. Voids where gravitational map comparisons say none should be. Voids that a thousand years ago, would have been a pathway to somewhere, although I’m clearly still missing galactic map data. I expect entire planets were excised — I’ll have to extrapolate mere outposts.”

Izz froze. “And no one noticed your comparisons?”

Electronic laughter carried over the ship’s speakers. “I made sure to download several academic papers explaining their existence away with utter purported scientific nonsense.”

She tapped her chin, shifting her other hand to one hip before tugging on her coverall’s zipper. “Where’s the nearest outpost with sufficient supplies to get us to the first void and back?”

“We’re already on our way,” Greaves answered. “Although you’ll have to stop and salvage if you really want a good logistical buffer. And I suggest we shake that pirate who started following you before we restock.”

“Did you say pirate?” Izz’s hip twinged as she bolted for the cockpit.

***

Thanks to Leigh Kimmel for the prompt this week about voids, which fit in nicely with some existing short stories that will helpfully build into something more. My prompt of too many tabs went to Parrish Baker. Check all of these out, over at MOTE, and come join the fun if you like as well!

“See, at first, the crocodiles in the city sewers only came out at night,” Mike said, and blew out the last of the smoke as he tapped his cigarette on the railing. “And then…well. Then they found the kazoos.”

Mike fell silent, and Jay waited for him to continue the story while the heat and humidity dissipated ever-so-slightly as the sun dropped behind a clump of magnolias and swamp moss.

Finally, Jay acquiesced and took a sip of his drink, then nodded acceptance. “Kazoos. No one likes kazoos.”

Mike crushed out the burning ember and stared into the bayou. “They spent the nights rock’a’noodling, buzzing away on their kazoos, keepin’ the whole neighborhood awake. And after three days of tired babies screaming…”

Jay nodded again, and they settled into silence. He didn’t think he needed the details after all. Why his new neighbor had a crocodile-leather living room set that could seat at least a dozen folks – well, that was none of his business.

He did, however, wonder whether the crocodiles wanted revenge, and vowed to unpack his shotgun. Just as soon as he finished his beer.

***
I’m running late! There’s more excitement over at MOTE, though!

“The butterflies are mobbing the cake, Stella. Unless that’s some kind of wild decoration?” Jay sounded skeptical.

She barely glanced at the undulating wings, mounded purple and iridescent over a crisp linen tablecloth. She didn’t look at the larger scene, either, despite it being green and sunny. She certainly didn’t try to find the icing she’d spent so much time on before they’d arrived.

Yes, it had been the perfect spring picnic, until they’d arrived, swarming the cake and completely ignoring the quinoa salad the birthday grandmother insisted was “good for you” that no one wanted to eat.

She liked eating. And maintaining the ability to eat. So much so, she’d eat the whole bowl of quinoa if it meant catering job would still be a paid one.

Stella looked into her assistant’s eyes instead, and saw the reflection of flat desperation in Jay’s pupils. At least it wasn’t mirrored.

Yet.

“I cede the cake,” she said gloomily. “Little sugar fiends. No one ever suspects the butterflies.”

***

A slight modification of nother Mike’s prompt this week, although just a sliver of story: The butterflies were mobbing the cake, like some kind of wild decoration…

My prompt went to Leigh Kimmel: Shining copper pots hung from the ceiling, nestled amongst bunches of dried lavender and thyme.

Check out more, over at MOTE – new prompts coming tomorrow, and there’s still time to send one in to play along! (Missed your moment? Snag a spare!)

“I swear,” Mandy mumbled around a mouthful of egg salad in the break room. “Sometimes I wonder if they’re using elves in the call centers because nobody would ever dare complain about struggling to understand their accents. I mean, if they knew who they were really calling.”

Her boss lowered his tablet and reached for his tea, studying her thoughtfully with suddenly golden, slit-pupiled eyes. “And here I thought you were handling the existence of elves so well.”

She choked on her sandwich, feeling her cheeks heat in shame. She’d only been on the job for three weeks, and had just stepped in it with her boss. “I just meant – no, there’s no excuse. I’m sorry. It’s been a long day. I didn’t mean anything by it, but it was awkward at best. I’m sorry. Please don’t fire me.”

“And they’re messing with you,” he said levelly. Jet set down the tablet to reveal a grinning mouth of pointed teeth that she thought might be an attempt at reassurance. “Your resume didn’t lie.”

She opened her mouth, then closed it cautiously. “You wanted an admin who’s good at languages.”

“And you picked up the hjurnan language so quickly that they’ve been using their home dialects. Much harder for the human ear, especially when you’re getting at least six variants at once.” He nodded. “And also, we weren’t sure whether we could trust you, so they kept their voices low and switched to dialect when you were around.”

“Umm.” She took another bite of her sandwich, thinking hard about her words. “It’s just IT work, right?”

Jet didn’t reply, just studied her with that cool, assessing gaze. “People know who they’re calling, if they have this number.”

She swallowed, a squishy lump of paprika-flavored egg caught in her throat. “It’s not just IT work.”

Both hands raised the teacup to his lips. “Let’s just say that these elves are…specialists.” Jet tilted it back, dran, then set the cup down carefully. “I’ll tell the boys to knock off the dialects. And get Mason to start teaching you self defense.”

“Mason?” It came out as a squeak, and her head whiplashed to gaze out the break room door into the call center.

A head with pointed ears, piercing azure eyes, and long black hair held back with a leather wrap came to attention. The elf took off his headset and stood, folding tattooed arms across his chest.

“Mason, the scary-looking tattooed muscle-y guy who’s suddenly staring at me?” Mandy dropped her gaze, feeling small and weak.

“Sounds about right,” Jet answered cheerfully. “He’s our best assassin.”

“Perfect.” She studied her hands. Her pale, weak hands, still holding half a squashed sandwich.

“It really is.” Jet tapped his tablet and pushed his chair back. “I just updated your job duties. Bring workout gear starting tomorrow, all right?”

***

Gemma inched her pickup truck through the wrought iron gates, windshield wipers furiously flashing. Peach trees lined either side of the quarter-mile path and did nothing to lessen the rain that pounded the vehicle. “Kind of appropriate.”

A low laugh came from the black-clad figure passenger seat. “Two goths moving into a possibly haunted century farm, in the middle of a popup thunderburst? Excellent aesthetics for our first home together, my lady of storms.”

She smiled, the points of her black cat-eye sunglasses briefly rising, and reached out to squeeze his hand briefly. “Glad my dad insisted on hiring the moving van, or the boxes would have been soaked. We’ll wait out the storm to bring them in.”

“Farms and weather. It’ll be worth it.” Michael leaned toward the window. “Hey, did you see something scurrying? I would have thought all those falcons we saw swooping about during the showing would have taken care of a rodent problem.”

“Those aren’t rodents,” Gemma said slowly, and pulled the four-by-four onto the right side of the circular drive. The rain lightened enough to see the orange and white rental truck pull around to the other side.

“Are you sure?” The rain and truck both sputtered to a reluctant stop.

“One was carrying an umbrella.” She shoved her sunglasses to the top of her nose and opened the door. “There. They’re in my fountain.”

She’d fallen in love with the chipped and moss-covered stone, with its streaks of black running from a woman’s still face. “Stop!”

Michael splashed across the brick drive, an umbrella held like a club. “Where is it? I’ll take care of it. Point me in the right direction.”

“No, not that! Make them stop! Please, stop cleaning!”

“What?”

Michael wasn’t the only one to ask the question. So did Gemma’s dad – and the dozen garden gnomes hastily scrubbing at the fountain from inside the basin. All of them stared at her, bewildered.

“I like it that way,” Gemma said. Her hand hovered over the edge of the fountain, still distinctly green with years of lichen. “Really.”

Michael detected a hint of desperation in her voice and pointed to the stone woman’s face. “Look, love, she’s still crying darkness.”

“I do appreciate you trying to help get things ready.” She tried again. “Please, you don’t have to, there’s no need. Why don’t you join us for tea, and proper introductions?”

A gnome, all of six inches high, took a step forward and doffed his cap. “Aye, milady, milord. You honor us all with th’ offer. P’raps – mayhap we can tell you her story over th’ tea.”

“How lovely,” Gemma said warmly. “I even think the teapot will be easy to find.”

Another gnome, this one with a dark purple skirt and apron, bobbed an odd curtsey. “Will ye be quietin’ her tears, mum?”

Gemma froze on her way to the pickup’s backseat. “What?”

***

This week, my prompt was from Becky – gnomes in the fountain! My prompt went to Parrish. Check them out, over at MOTE!