And on we go!

Ten stories written, eight more prompts in the wings, a little moral discussion into the nature of Addergoole villans.

We are $10 from the e-book! $10!

See the rules here.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/12062.html. You can comment here or there.

And on we go!

Eight stories written, nine more prompts in the wings, a new day a new game and it’s going well!.

We are $10 from the e-book! $10!

See the rules here.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/11507.html. You can comment here or there.

From ysabetwordsmith‘s prompt “What happens when dreams are stored in a bottle, then accidentally spilled into a municipal water supply?” and jilliko‘s prompt “The Dreams of Winter”

He’d been doing it for years.

To say no-one had noticed wasn’t at all true: kids noticed. The particularly sensitive and the particularly wild noticed. But it fell under “don’t be ridiculous,” a category that covered all sorts of true things it was easier to forget. And the children were so rarely silly that their brief bouts were even easier to ignore: “Don’t be silly. No-one is stealing your dreams.”

If what he had been doing was physical, eventually, someone would have caught him in a difficult situation; indeed, he’d been caught, twice, peeping. But peeping is not that big a crime, and he was old and harmless.

It wasn’t until a teenager broke into his house on Hallowe’en that the police noticed something was up. It wasn’t until she and her friends stole the rows of pretty blue bottles with the wax seals, the long dusty collection that had been growing for quite a while, and dumped them in the reservoir that anything began to change.

And when it did, even the grown-ups and the stickinthemuds couldn’t argue with it.

The stockbroker woke up wanting to be an airplane pilot. He’d always wanted to fly. He’d always wanted to be a hero. He wanted to…

“Don’t be ridiculous,” scolded his wife.

The CPA wanted to take her team all the way to State. She wanted to marry her high school sweetheart, the pretty blonde with the skyblue eyes, and join the NFL. She really believed she had a chance.

“Wouldn’t it be awesome?” she asked her husband over dinner. “Can’t you imagine me out there, scoring the winning touchdown?

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he scoffed, even though he was pondering the leading role in Swan Lake and how he’d look en pointe in front of a crowd of thousands.

The science teacher (who everyone knew hated children) woke sweating and miserable three nights in a row from a series of dreams in which she could do nothing right, nothing at all, and her teacher was laughing at her, everyone was laughing at her. She called in sick for two days and went Christmas shopping for every student in her class.

Slowly, even the dullest adults began to realize something was wrong.

“What do you want for Christmas, honey?”

“A Train!” bounced the stoic businesswoman. Her ten-year-old son looked a little surprised.

“I wanted a train once,” he told his parents, but they weren’t listening.

“I wanted a train once,” he told his friends, “and now my mom does.”

“I feel like I used to want stuff,” one of the other kids answered, “but then I grew up or something? Everything stopped seeming fun. It’s all I can do to get through the day.”

“And everyone’s acting ridiculous now,” added a third. “I bet it has something to do with that stupid stunt Ryan and Jessie pulled last month.”

“Someone’s got to do something,” the first one complained. “I feel, I dunno, wrong. I mean, everyone’s all worked up about Christmas…”

“Yeah,” his friends agreed, “it’s kind of a hassle.” One of them through a desultory snowball at the other, and they went back to class.

No-one really noticed that the kids were depressed and despondent, because they had been quiet, good kids as long as anyone could remember. They might have a few silly fantasies here and there, but they disappeared quickly, and the town had the most responsible, quiet children anyone had ever heard of. If they had a few wild tales about bogeymen, well… that was par for the course, right?

Even Jessie took a while to put two and two together. Christmas had never been all that exciting: you wanted a pony, but you always knew you were just going to get a stupid doll, or clothes from the sensible stores. And Mom suddenly wanting to be a Lost Princess of Paradisa didn’t make anything easier.

“Lost Princess of Paradisa? Wait…”

None of the kids drank tap water. Soda, juice, milk, Kool-aid; she couldn’t think of a single kid that just poured stuff out of the sink and drank it. Mom did. Her friends’ parents did. “That’s Julie Myer’s dream,” she accused her mother. “Julie. You remember her.”

“The poor girl who claimed some man had been sneaking into her dreams every night? Didn’t she end up in the mental ward?”

“Her,” Jessie agreed. She could almost taste the dream she’d poured into the icy water, pink-and-purple, with sparkles. They’d all been so bright, so wild-colored. “The old man, Mom, the one down on Clark Street.”

“The peeping tom?” But something in Julie Myer’s other dreams must have leeched in. “It’s him.” She leaned hard against the counter, paling. “He was… oh, god, Jessie, why didn’t you say something?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she answered tiredly, but her mother the County Prosecutor was already out the door. The Lost Princess of Paradisia was going to save Christmas.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/11192.html. You can comment here or there.

The Drakeathon Continues!

Free Fiction From Your Prompts!

During the Drakeathon hours (8 p.m. – midnight EST Saturday and 2 – 6 p.m. EST Sunday), leave a prompt or request and I will write 50 words on that prompt and post it here.

Donate to the Drake Fund and I’ll write 300 words on your prompt for every $5 you donate (up to $50/3000 words); additional perks for donors are listed below.

Signal boosting adds 50 words to the count; someone showing up from your signal boost adds another 50.

The first 3 free prompts each hour and every paid prompt are guaranteed to be written; paid prompts of over 1000 words may be finished after the ‘thon but within 30 days.

If I write to your prompt I will post it to the blog or as a comment in the Drakeathon thread, with the name of the prompter (or another dedicatee if you wish); plus you get a nonexclusive publication right, so you can post it on your own blog or elsewhere as long as you keep the credits intact.

If I merge prompts I will add wordcounts together, thus your 50-word prompt may be part of a 100- or 350-word story, for example.

Prompts should be left as a comment to a Dreamwidth or LJ Drakeathon post.

Donor Perks

* Your Prompt /will/ get written.
* You will be invited to a googledoc to watch me write in real time.

Other perks vary with the total donations I receive:

If I reach $20, I get a pizza Reached!
If I reach $75, everyone who donates will get a printed-and-snailmailed or pdf-and-e-mailed prettified version of the story from their prompt Reached!
If I reach $150, there will be an e-book of the stories from these prompts; sponsors will get a free copy
If I reach $225, the e-book will include a never-before-seen short story of 1500-3000 words written for this anthology
If I reach $300, there will be a print book, and donors will receive a discount on said book.
If I reach $375, the e- and print book will have professional art for the covers & a second new short story.

What won’t you write?

Anything that really squicks me. That’s generally limited to sexual situations involving food, former food, dead things, or kids, but hardcore torture has been known to bother me, too.

Fanfic, or pieces set in other people’s universes, unless it is your universe and you are asking me to write it, or if it’s my universe.

Anything involving hurting animals. Especially cats. 🙁

So what should I prompt you on?

Almost anything! If you want 150 words on daffodils, I shall give you 150 words on daffodils! If you’d like a short piece of erotica, I’m more than willing.
There are a few exceptions, see below.

If you’re stumped, I have several years’ of fiction in my livejournal. Try these tags for ideas:
More, Please – stories people have asked me to continue
FaeApoc – the setting in which my ongoing webserial Addergoole is set
Rin & Girey – a fantasy semi-romance abduction series
Cali – a slavery-and-porn series, sometimes with future!catpeople
“Vas” – a new series of short-shorts of planet exploration and unexpected findings.

If you’re here from Addergoole, yes, I will write Addergoole or Wild Ones Stories.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/10986.html. You can comment here or there.

Yawwwwn

Six stories written, 4 more prompts in the wings, tired and a bit sore but that was funnnn.

If I didn’t get to your prompt today (since there are 4 left, I missed a few), I will write it tomorrow! I write a bit slower than anticipated.

Hope to see you all at 2 tomorrow for more fun!

See the rules here.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/10324.html. You can comment here or there.

And on we go!

Four stories written, 5 more prompts in the wings, a little tired a little bouncy woooowooo.

See the rules here.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/9765.html. You can comment here or there.