Recent comments in /f/WritingPrompts

[deleted] t1_jconhld wrote

Reply to [WP] Every time something bad happens to you, e.g. someone tries to mug you, you attempt to warn the perpetrator away for their sakes. The reason? One of the gods of old, who has unresolved maternal urges due to their roles e.g. Artemis, has decided to focus all this energy onto poor you... by MidgardWyrm

It was supposed to be a silly one-time tradition. Something I did on my wedding day to appease my grandmother, who insisted I burn some wedding food as an offering. It was SUPPOSED to be a tiny moment between a woman who was clearly losing her mind and her grandson on his wedding day, a tiny act he did to appease her.

In retrospect, it was that, but that tiny moment clearly meant everything.

I didn't notice it at first, but my new wife suddenly started to be more attentive to my needs. She would ask me questions about how my day was, and suddenly at night, she developed this sweet habit of playing with my hair. I remember once when we were dating I mentioned it, that I wondered what it felt like. To have your hair played with as you fall asleep. And she suddenly just... did it and hasn't stopped. It's become part of our routine.

That's not to say I haven't been reciprocating. I kind of have a theory that's why this situation has escalated, but I'm getting to that. I started bringing her flowers when she messages that she's been having a rough day with her kindergartners, or surprising her with a night out dancing. I cleaned the house and even suggested a cooking class together to have some fun. We don't talk about the Butterscotch Incident or else we dissolve into laughter. When we learned she was pregnant, I started rubbing her feet nightly as we talked about our days and she would still play with my hair as we went to sleep.

Three years and four months after my wedding day, I was mugged. I was on my way home, desperate to get there and help my wife with our sick son, and despite every instinct screaming at me not to cut through this one part of the city, I had to. My family needed me.

The barrel of a gun, the angry and desperate voice demanding my wallet, and the wild look in that kid's eyes as I raised my hands and tried to talk him down. He screamed and made to attack me - and then there was the golden light. Just filling every sense, consuming me.

I only have a vague recollection from there, but it was enough. A tall woman standing over the young man, robes curled around her royally, and the faintest outline of peacock feathers behind her, like an emblem of power. She spoke, but I couldn't hear her over the ringing in my ears, but my attacker sure did. He scrambled to his feet, and sprinted away, leaving the gun behind.

I remember her huffing and then helping me to my feet, still dazed. She brushed away grime from the alley, even licking her thumb and wiping off a spot on my cheek. I suddenly felt like I was eight again, and my mother was helping me up after I skinned my knee falling from a bike. Safe and assured, surrounded by warmth and unconditional love. I could only stare but try as I might, I couldn't make out her face for the halo of light hid her eyes from me. The woman smiled lovingly at me, pat my head tenderly, and suddenly I was home. Clear-headed and with a shopping bag with some baby formula that I didn't remember buying. No trace of the mugging on my clothes.

During Christmas dinner a few months later, I managed to pull my grandmother aside and ask her. I hadn't told my wife yet, I felt like I couldn't. But when I finished telling her, I asked her what she thought. My grandmother smiled and simply declared, "Alexander, you are a faithful and devoted husband. You gave a sacrifice on your wedding day to the defender of men. Of course, the Queen would protect you, my boy."

I didn't have time to ask her what she meant because I heard my wife calling for help with the baby. I wish I had asked more because my grandmother died not two months later. Books and research could only go so far. But from then on, I gave silent thanks to the Queen whenever I could. When my son took his first steps, I thought I saw her there next to my wife, smiling with pride. When my wife was in a car accident but somehow walked away unscathed, I burned some more food for the Queen in our fireplace, apologizing for the lack of ceremony but pouring my gratitude into my prayer. When my wife and I would argue but still find ways to make up and communicate, I sent her a silent prayer of thanks as I held my wife in my arms. When I disowned my sister for adultery, I begged her to help me to never stray.

I am remembering all of this because it has been fifty-one years since then. My son has grown and is married. Jason and his husband are wonderful and adopted a little girl. She would be finishing college soon, I think. On his wedding day, I instructed him to make an offering and said nothing else. But I felt it. The Queen was happy. Jason would be safe.

My wife has already passed - bless her soul. My own queen.

But now? Fifty-one years since that fateful mugging, I am remembering all of it in detail. Because there is a thunderstorm above, and some punk with a knife just got the better of me. I am bleeding out behind a small store, slumped against the brick, and not sure if the freezing sensation I feel is from the rain or the shock from the blood loss. I know better than to blame the Queen for it, as lightning arcs across the skies. I guess the King got too jealous of my devotion and trust in the Queen.

But it's not her fault.

I should rest now.

I hear arguing, but I can't pay attention. I hear the words 'jealous' and 'tryst' thrown around but it's not my business. Not a mortal's business.

But a final clap of thunder, a roar of frightening rage - and the argument ends. The rain begins to slow.

The clouds are parting now, and I hear footsteps. I see a light. I should rise. I should look at her and smile. I should thank her for my wife and my son, I should ask her to protect my son and his family. I should, but I am just so tired now.

I should rest now.

I hear my wife's voice. She's smiling and calling me to her. Beside her, stands a tall woman, draped in royal robes, and smiling at me from beneath a halo of light that hides her eyes. I swear I see peacock feathers behind her.

She touches my shoulder as my wife takes my hand, and I know. I know my son and his family will be safe. I feel the fierceness of a mother's love surrounding me, as I had felt it since the night in that alley where Hera Alexandros had first saved me.

​

(I bit of a different take, but this is what I came up with at 4 am on a coffee-fueled spur-of-the-moment choice. Please be gentle, I haven't written properly in years but this prompt jumped at me and I had to scratch the itch, so to speak.)

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SNUFFGURLL t1_jcon2eu wrote

Reply to [WP] Everyone knows the hero won't defuse the bomb until the are less than 10 seconds left. That's why I've set it to explode at 20 seconds. by Sh4d0w927

“Wouldn’t that defeat the point of the timer?”

I shook my head, clasping my hands together. “Quite the opposite, actually. The timer plants the idea of a certain amount of time, a window to defuse the bomb. The timer never has to be timed to the bomb itself, merely displaying a number, and then when a certain number is displayed, that’s when the bomb triggers, but that mechanism is seperate and not linked to the timer’s visual display, and is instead linked to a remote. As such, the supposed heroes are caught off guard.” I tossed the remote around in my hand, grinning with excitement. Not because people were going to die, no, more because I was proud of myself

I got some stares from around the room. Whatever. This was my lab, and if these losers didn’t approve of my science, they could screw off. I turned back around to tend to my stereotypical wall of electronics and screens that the technology efficient villain has, but mine was mostly used for monitoring people. Monitor the base, monitor the locations we would bomb, et cetera. When nobody made a sound, not even a motion to leave the room and get planting the bomb, I turned back to glare at them.

It was just a little bit funny seeing them all shuffle out awkwardly, and even the big boss was a bit stunned looking. Huzzah. Having proven my genius once again, I swung back around to my monitors, typing in the coordinates of where the bomb was about to be placed. It took a little while to get set into motion, but as I was remotely controlling the bomb, I didn’t care. The gaggle of uber losers(‘heroes’) shuffled onto the scene. The leader, with his ugly spandex suit and his even uglier face, declared that he would be the one to bravely defuse this bomb, while the rest of them should look out for ‘innocents’. Stupid. There were no innocents here! Corrupt CEOs and politicians was more like it. But of course, heroes live to serve those that pay.

He fumbled around with the wires. He was so bad at it that I figured I might not even need the remote- he’d explode himself before I would. I zoomed in, watching as the timer ticked down. This was fun. I wish I had brought popcorn, but I had forgotten. Shame. As he failed miserably at dismantling the bomb, I checked my other screens to make sure those other heroes were being held up, that nobody could get out of the building. A few of our goons were fighting valiantly, keeping them at bay and even taking hostages. I would recommend the ones that survived the ordeal to the big boss, they needed promotions.

One hero, the token girl in terrible spandex, was trying to rescue some stupid billionaire. I didn’t care much for this, and it annoyed me to see her succeed. A bit of me felt pity- she probably didn’t know the extent of the evil this man had committed, the people he had harmed, but the rational part of my brain stomped that notion out. Those who have more money than they could spend in a lifetime get there by exploiting people, and those trying to protect them just want in on the exploitation. I pressed a couple buttons, and some goons came to stop her seconds later. I was used to this song and dance. They had been stationed everywhere around the building, and there was more than usual this time, so they were easy to alert, and would swarm those maggots that call themselves heroes.

Looking back to the main spectacle, the spandex clad loser with too much gel in his greasy brown hair only had a minute left. By now, I thought he would’ve cut a few decoy wires, at least, but none. The explosion would probably cause some significant damage to the building, and to him, but since he had some stupid superpowers or something, he’d probably recover. My goal wasn’t to harm the heroes, though. It was to make a statement, to reveal what went on within that specific building, and to knock off a few jackasses in the process. As the clock ticked down, I noticed that, on one of my screens, a hero was headed for the location of the bomb. I didn’t bother to stop him. I could trigger the bomb early if anything went wrong, so I just watched and waited.

He sprinted up to the main loser, tackling him with a muffled ‘get down!’, which I doubted the usefulness of, as he was already making the other man get down, as it were. For dramatic effect, and maybe to cause less damage to the heroes themselves, I triggered the bomb. Narrowly out of the fray, they moved to investigate the damage. And, more importantly, the human trafficking operation hidden right underneath their noses, and exposed by the explosion.

(not my best. not my worst. I’m tired. hate capitalism.)

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Krutaun t1_jcolr3f wrote

Reply to [WP] Everyone has something referred to as “Narrative Potential Energy” the higher this value is, the more involved in a story you are. Protagonists have a high amount as they drive the story forward, and background characters have little. Somehow you have negative narrative potential. by -Mothonawall-

I feel the world freeze around me,
People stop, wait, and delay,
Heroes and villains, once sure of their actions,
Are now unsure of their ways,

The beasts who menace and devour,
Suddenly lose their appetite,
The sworn rivals put down their swords,
And finally give up their fight,

I know it might sound crazy,
But you'll just have to see,
How everywhere I go,
The world freezes around me,

I feel the writer's blood boil,
As I jump onto the page,
His fingers twitch and face turns red,
As I rob him of his brain,

"Why did I write this character?
He's a boring little fool!
I want to make people laugh and gasp,
Not sigh and yawn and drool!"

Yet the writer is mistaken,
He's the fool, not I,
For he tries to write around me,
Why does he even try?

I've made this world my home,
And I like it to be neat,
Not filled with noise and clamor,
And the marching soldier's feet,

He can start another project,
Because this project is now mine,
He's wrote himself into a corner,
And there's no writing out this time,

I much enjoy his anger,
I much enjoy his hate,
But I'd much prefer the silence,
When he gives up on this place,

The kingdom is all silent,
The peasants are a bore,
The knights are out all playing cards,
As the sleeping giants snore,

So give up, oh dear writer,
Let me have my peace,
Let me enjoy this boredom,
This banal and mundane feast,

If you come back here,
I might take a little more,
And turn your sci-fi setting,
Into an awful, lengthy bore

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YALBO t1_jcoktba wrote

Reply to comment by Professional_Issue82 in [WP] Everyone knows the hero won't defuse the bomb until the are less than 10 seconds left. That's why I've set it to explode at 20 seconds. by Sh4d0w927

That's rule 15.

> I will never employ any device with a digital countdown. If I find that such a device is absolutely unavoidable, I will set it to activate when the counter reaches 117 and the hero is just putting his plan into operation.

I'm not really convinced of the wisdom here. It's important that you and your minions should receive an accurate measure of how long you have before the explosion. But there was also point 215:

> If I ever MUST put a digital timer on my doomsday device, I will buy one free from quantum mechanical anomalies. So many brands on the market keep perfectly good time while you're looking at them, but whenever you turn away for a couple minutes then turn back, you find that the countdown has progressed by only a few seconds.

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Sonnyboy1990 t1_jcoh07w wrote

Reply to [WP] Everyone knows the hero won't defuse the bomb until the are less than 10 seconds left. That's why I've set it to explode at 20 seconds. by Sh4d0w927

"JUST CUT THE FUCKING WIRE!!"

"HANG. ON!" I roared back.

This shit is easy when when all you need to do is wait for ten seconds to appear. Now there's basic maths involved and I'm completely lost.

"IT NEEDS TO BE LESS THAN TEN SECONDS!"

"WHAT ARE YOU...JUST CUT THE THING AND LET ME OUT OF HERE"

I put a finger to his lips and shush him. Everytime he shouts, I lose my place and have to start the equation all over again.

"Shhhhh. Look if the bomb goes off at twenty seconds and I need to wait for a least ten seconds left to defuse it and there's fifty six seconds remaining and the clock is decreasing by two seconds each time due to the wrong wire bring cut, at which point in the timer do I nee.."

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AutoModerator t1_jcog8mj wrote

Reply to [WP] Everyone has something referred to as “Narrative Potential Energy” the higher this value is, the more involved in a story you are. Protagonists have a high amount as they drive the story forward, and background characters have little. Somehow you have negative narrative potential. by -Mothonawall-

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Michelle-Virinam t1_jco6g4v wrote

Reply to [WP] A man has been living with the awful power to make everyone in the world happier, the sadder he gets. He's gotten so depressed over the years that the world lives in a global utopia. One day he looks around and sees the happy world, and this starts to make the man feel better... by TapiocaTuesday

The world is beautiful. I wasn‘t always, but somehow things have just been looking up in the last few years. This park is just one example, but it is a pretty one. A meandering gravel path at the side of a lake winds itself through grass and bushes and flowers in full bloom. It‘s almost perfect, just like the weather has been recently.

It‘s a sliver of paradise, which is why the man sitting with his head in his hands and his jacket closed up tight is jarring. I hadn‘t thought it possible that the sunlight could provoke anything other than warmth and contentness. How could one be cold here?

But still, if there‘s anything I‘ve earned from the last few years it‘s that happiness is infectious. A single person laughing and smiling whenever you see them can completely shatter your outlook on life until you too smile and laugh and pass that on to others.

So I saunter up to the man sitting miseerably on a bench in paradise and say „Hello, it‘s a beautiful day, isn‘t it.“

For some reason that inspires laughter in the man, and not true laughter but spiteful and mocking exhales of air.

„What more do you want?“, the man asks wihout lifting his head.

„What do you mean?“

„You want money? A better job? A family that loves you?“, the man asks as he finally lifts his head. His eyes are red with tears and hard with resentment.

„No“, I reply, taken aback by the turn of the conversation, „I have all that and I‘m quite content to enjoy the weather.“ Happiness really is infectious. I definitely wouldn‘t have just enjoyed the weather by itself before everything got better.

The man snorts, though it‘s an overacted, mocking act, and stands up to leave. „As if. People are never content.“

I don‘t know whether it‘s his still hunched in form or his suddenly tired eyes, but I just can‘t let the conversation lie. „Please wait“, I say, „Do you want to talk about it?“

„Talking wil just make it worse. I should go“, he answers, though he doesn‘t seem convinced by his own words.

„Then do you want to talk about something else, something innocuous? You seem quite lonely“, I propose, because apparently I‘m just desperate to wipe that haunted face from a complete stranger. He really needs to catch some happiness.

„Yeah, sure“, he gives in and lets himself fall back to the bench.

I start talking and I don‘t stop. I tell him stories from my friends, stories that have until now made everyone who heard them laugh though they only elicit a small smile from him. I tell him stories of my family and how the new cancer therapies saved my dad, which causes him to avert his eyes and start crying. I tell him stories from work and of the unique people I meet there, people that are part of the world just like everyone, but that you rarely see.

I‘m in the middle of a story about how a no-nonsense businessman loving held and comforted a screaming child so that the mother could get out her card to pay, when he laughs for the first time. „You really don‘t want anything, do you? Not a better job? You work in a supermarket, shurely there somewhere you would make more money?“

„No, thanks. I like my job. The people I work with a nice, customers are all happiness carriers, and it‘s an important job but not one with a lot of responsibility. It‘s perfect“, I explain.

„That‘s good to hear“, the man sighs, „That‘s really good. I hope you get to keep your happiness when it all goes to hell.“

„What do you mean?“

„I…“, the man pauses and recollects his thoughts, „God, I‘m so selfish. I just wanted… My sister shoved me out the door today. Said I was depressed and to take a walk and call a therapist before the last one retires. The thing is, I can‘t do that. I can‘t be happy. I…“

I want to interrupt, to tell him how stupid that is, that of course he can be happy, but he holds up a hand. I get the feeling that he couldn‘t start talking again if he stopped now.

„Six years ago, everything got better, right? Global warming gone, penguins are happy, that sort of thing? Well, six years ago I was told that I can make eyerone in the world happy if I‘m sad instead. It‘s a proportional effect too, so for the world to be so happy as it is now… You get the picture.“

Yes, I get the horrifying picture. I can‘t help but reach out to the man to offer some comfort and surprisingly he lets me put my hand on his shoulder. „That‘s awful“, I tell him, „That‘s terrifying. Wow, you must be so much stronger than I am. I don‘t think I could take the suffering of the world.“

„It‘s not really any suffering I take“, the man admits, „It‘s more like I draw the happiness from myself and give it to others and since it‘s a zero sum game, the sadness that gets left is overwhelming, but it‘s still only my sadness.“

„So then what do you mean, „when it all goes to hell“? That seems like a pretty stable state,“ I ask because I still can‘t quite wrap my head around the concept. I‘m not even sure he‘s not delusional, but he seems to believe what he says.

„I… I enjoyed listening to you. I enjoyed the sunshine and the breeze and everything. Don‘t you understand what that means?“, he almost shouts at me.

„No, that‘s good, isn‘t it?“

„No, it‘s bad. Very, very bad. If I‘m happy, then the world is unhappy. You‘re not happy right now, right?“, he rambles frantically.

„I‘m not happy, but that has more to do with the conversation“, I admit, „But in any case, happiness is not a zero sum game. You know that, right?“

„Of course it is“, the man scoffs, „I‘m unhappy when I make others happy.“

„But you‘re not unhappy enough to have given happiness to eigth billion people. You‘re not unhappy enough to have given happiness to all the world“, I argue.

„So what, the world just improved on it‘s own? It was all for nothing? Six years depression for nothing?“, the man says with a voice laced in desperation.

„No, think of it more like a seed or… I know! Think of it like a virus. You‘re infected with a small amount, but it then expands exponentially inside of you and you can pass it on to others“, I explain.

The man is at a loss for words.

„So you see“, I continue on, suddenly afraid that he‘d disregard me and continue torturing himself, „We can create our own happiness. We can be happy without making anyone unhappy. Do you want that?“

„Yes“, the man whispers with a smile, „I want that very much.“

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Nicvonkaiser t1_jco1bzp wrote

Reply to [WP] Everyone knows the hero won't defuse the bomb until the are less than 10 seconds left. That's why I've set it to explode at 20 seconds. by Sh4d0w927

“John!” Shouted Plaus. “The book!”

John finished his hero monologue and turned. To his horror, the book that the pair had been hunting for the past two years, was tightly secured between the arms of a man; his hip containing a little black box with a timer on it.

“We can negoti-“ and the man slapped the book on to the box, and the clock could be heard ticking its springs and twisting the fuse of packets of powder.

The man looked up and locked eyes. Ten seconds passed until finally he bellowed: “The CIA and KGB will never take me alive!” Before charing at them.

Plaus froze in terror, John simply held out his hand and let the man run into a brick wall, knocking him out. There was now only about five seconds left, and John, the hero and just, threw the man’s body up into the air like a firework. The crimson blood showering the skies like a firework.

“Anyway, that’ll be $50 bucks please.” John said to the crowd. There were cheers and beers being poured onto the streets. John smiled, until he felt something burning his nose, then something pecked him on the head; and that’s why this town you see now is called “Metal Hail” by the locals instead of Johnvsbookville.

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