Posted on by Chris Sarantopoulos

Inspirational Prompt 31

I think most of you must have heard of the story of the pied piper. How about you attempt to retell the story? Perhaps a kid wants to save kitties (from someone or something) and lures them to safety, or maybe the child heard of the folk tale and wanted to do the same, but only managed to lure one cat (a neighbour’s cat or from someone who needed the cat; you can expand on that and create conflict).

Or the flute is magical and is the only way for the two of them to communicate. Perhaps the cat (or any other animal you choose) understands the child needs her and guides him to the flute.

You can go any way with this one, I think.

Posted on by Chris Sarantopoulos

Inspirational prompt 30

Today I learned the truth. Today my father’s actions made sense for the first time; why he always locked all the doors and windows every time I went to bed, why he scratched those strange markings on their frames, but mostly why my door had so many of them. Why he had the village healer inscribe both my eyelids with the same symbol. Today I learned why the entire village feared me, and cast me and my family away in the forest. Today, under the ancient weeping willow at the heart of the forest, I reshaped reality. My reality. I’m not sure, but I think there’s three of me now, and the other two were not very happy they were held captives for so long.

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Inspirational prompt 29

“If we want to be completely honest with each other, my short friend, it was the silence that woke your queen, not I.”
The constable still struggled to maintain his grip on the ever shifting apparition that looked like that feisty woman from last year, the only one who had managed to ruin a perfectly well-organised execution. “Don’t give me that. Silence doesn’t wake anyone, nor does it put them in a slumber afterwards. We saw you -”
“You saw me doing what exactly?”
“Pulsing,” the constable said and made a point by waving a fat hand before her face when no other descriptive word came to his mind, “over her head. Now she can’t wake up.”
“That’s ’cause she stopped listening. It demands her attention. Mine as well, and your voice is so annoying.”
“Listening what? What does it say? Who says it?”
The shimmering woman paused, focused on the air around her, listened earnestly. “It says, ‘we should talk about your unborn ancestors and the crimes they’ll commit’.”

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Inspirational prompt 28

Tom blew smoke from the edge of his mouth and eyed me askance through the haze. “Back again? You going for a record or something? How did it happen this time? No, wait. Lemme guess. Bullet, right? Angry husband.”
I sat on the chair facing him – more like collapsed, to be precise. ‘Re-establishment,’ as I liked to call the procedure back then, was – and still is – a pain in the ass. Drained all my strength for a whole day. I barely had enough energy in me to reach out and snatch his cigarette. “Nah. Not how I died this time, man.”

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Writing prompt 26

“I’m trapped. This is where I had died.”
Jeremy twisted his head a little to the left. Nope, that didn’t help either. Strange how anyone had written a message in such a way. At least Miranda’s pocket mirror was good for something other than checking her eyeliner every five seconds. If only it were a decent-sized one instead of the tiny thing he had to work with; such a pain trying to read the mirror image of a backwards message through something half the size of his palm. He sniffed the air, crinkled his nose. What’s that smell anyway? Like rotten lavender. Damn; it was from the letters. The more of the message appeared, the more it smelled.
“Hey, Jerry,” Miranda said, “another line appeared on the far corner, I think.”

I’m actually quite intrigued by this now. I may actually sit down and write a story about it, hehe.