IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 20

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Today’s Prompt:

Write about the letter X.

Courtesy: Writing.Com

Link for Day 20: DAY 20: Xcalibur Word Count: 1,160

Have you ever wondered why, every time you chance on the letter X on a platform besides a board displaying the English alphabet, you fasten your mental safety belt even without deliberate intent to do it?

The main character in this story explains through monologue, the value of x within and outside the walls of a classroom to his son who is visiting at his house. From the x inscribed on light poles to movies like the X-Files to the customized x on Lovecraft’s grimoire, the legendary Necronomicon, you might very well be tempted to pluck the x out of your name after reading this story.

Read the full story here, DAY 20: Xcalibur

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 19

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Today’s Prompt:

There are two men sitting in the booth of a diner eating dinner together and talking. A woman sits outside in a parked car, watching them through the window. Who are they? What is their relationship to one another? What are the men discussing? What is the woman thinking? What does she do next? Write a story that opens with this scene and explores these questions.

Courtesy: pw.org

Link for Day 19: DAY 19: The Redding Syndicate Word Count: 1,422

In point of fact, I changed the concluding part of this story a dozen times over in my head before I scribbled down the end and the paragraph, which became the end of the story came just as I was typing the preceding line. I was amazed by the twist but I guess I wrote it and it’s natural for me to appreciate my invention. That means you get to decide.

One of the men in the booth is a detective called up by the second man who is the fiancé of the woman sitting outside in a parked car. The woman, Cordell, is Chief Security at a biotech laboratory located in the deep of Obudu Ranch somewhere in Nigeria. A few nights before this time, a gang of thieves staged a heist at the facility and made off with a top-secret package. Cordell happens to be the only one who had the number combinations that unlocked the safe. Two top researchers were found terminated in their apartments and the Board issued her an ultimatum; get the criminals or we have your head for supper.

The detective smells a trail of conspiracy and only Cordell’s testimony can clear the air. That is, if her fiancé Mayak can get her to spill her guts.

Read the full story here, DAY 19: The Redding Syndicate

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 18

Courtesy: moviescontinued.wordpress.com

Today’s Prompt:

After a long night out, you return to your house to find that every picture and painting in your house can speak to you. What do the characters in the artwork and photographs say? Write a conversation between you and one of them, or a conversation between two of them.

Courtesy: writersdigest.com

Link for Day 18: DAY 18: Jimi Hendrix Was Right Word Count: 1,118

Willis didn’t find anything funny about the pictures on the walls of his house getting animated.

He wasn’t freaked out by the idea far from that, he was familiar with fantasy stories so he took it all in his stride.

If ‘a picture is worth a thousand words,’ what’s the worth of a talking, moving picture?

The mind is a monkey, I should know since I’m the one given the mandate to write Willis’ story. As you read, you might uncover the essence of Jimi Hendrix’s words and ravel why Willis believes Hendrix was right when he made his statement that,

Craziness is like heaven.

Read the full story here, DAY 18: Jimi Hendrix Was Right

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 17

Courtesy: Wikipedia

Today’s Prompt:

You and your three closest friends decide to go camping. You arrive and set up camp nearly three miles away from where you left your car. Late that evening, as you sit around the campfire roasting marshmallows, one of your friends reveals a deep dark secret that turns what was to be a fun weekend into one of the scariest weekends of your life.

Courtesy: writersdigest.com

Link for Day 17: DAY 17: Graffiti Word Count: 1,241

Who’s scared of a creature as innocuous as a housefly?

Not me. Probably not you as well. Perhaps, the people in this story would have said the same thing if someone put that question to them before the story reached a climax.

The character Inyang, and a fine storyteller he is if I do say so, turns an evening of fun into a life-threatening situation when he narrates a cabin in the woods story about killer-houseflies.

To reiterate my stand, I’ve never known a fly to scare up a storm. I don’t know, you might see the need to have your mental repertoire rearranged under a sickle moon that gives off a sick orange glow. Maybe, if you look at things from a different angle, a fly might be a harbinger of evil tidings and a guardian of ancient landmarks.

Read the full story here, DAY 17: Graffiti

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 16

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Today’s Prompt:

What if you’re going to write a story about desperation with an evangelist as the main character and a memo as the key object? Set your story in a ghost town.

Courtesy: creativewritingprompts.com

Link for Day 16: DAY 16: Long Dark Morning Word Count: 1,508

Imagine a ghost town called Terracotta Country placed under a spell so it ends up looking like a scene carved out of a King Midas’ tale. And this young evangelist who is not really an evangelist but a traveling bible salesman (who got dubbed evangelist because of his trade) chances on the town and realizes the whole town is gone on mass vacation.

The doors are left wide open; properties are left scattered from hell to breakfast and a visitor could have said it’s business as usual only there’s nobody home to do business. However, Daka—that’s the name of the bible salesman—soon discovers something peculiar about this town. The darkness in each room he enters is a solid thing. He can shut out the persistent hum that will no doubt, drive him off the bend if he stays in there too long.

Plus, and this is the highpoints of the drama, everything that should be alive—human and livestock—is composed of, you guessed right, terracotta and is frozen, like statues in place.

Read the full story here, DAY 16: Long Dark Morning

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 15

Courtesy: Wikipedia

Today’s Prompt:

You are 15 years old and, while still living with your parents, you discover a secret room in your house. It is filled with all sorts of strange things, but one thing in particular catches your eye. It’s a love letter to your mom from someone who isn’t your dad. What’s more peculiar is that it is dated five years into the future. Write a scene where you confront your mom about the letter.

Courtesy: writersdigest.com

Link for Day 15: DAY 15: Final Descent Word Count: 1,321

A mother and son try to stop their husband and father from catching his flight.

It would have been easier if the man was not one of those folks who lived only by what their five senses tell them.

Mother and son sedate the man in their lives and hope he wakes up late and misses his flight.

But what if the forces of nature act in favor of the man and urge him on towards his final descent?

Read the full story here, DAY 15: Final Descent

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 14

Courtesy: themoraltimes.com

Today’s Prompt:

Christina Cruz and Scott Peters meet after a failed experiment. One of them is seeking revenge. Write their story based on this quick plot: “Patient turns murderous after a near-death experience.”

Courtesy: creativewritingprompts.com

Link for Day 14: DAY 14: Virus Word Count: 1,113

The prompt shoved the character names down my throat and I swallowed it.

A researcher desperate to climb a step further on the management ladder infects a man with a flesh-eating bacteria and after a botched experiment to neutralize the virus, blames it on a senior researcher. The deal works for the contract length of deals made with the devil. And then on the rebound, the researcher gets it worse.

Read the full story here, DAY 14: Virus

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 13

Courtesy: popfi.com

Today’s Prompt:

A picture on your mantle unexpectedly falls and crashes to the floor. As you go to pick it up, you notice a note hidden behind the picture. The message is from the future—and written by you. It instructs you to do something important. What does it say?

Courtesy: writersdigest.com

Link for Day 13: DAY 13: Crib Death Word Count: 1,694

Imagine a Postal Service that delivers mail to the past.

A mad scientist tries to harness what he calls infant intelligence from the brains of dead infants. Question is how does intend to tap into it if he succeeds, and exploit it for the good of humankind?

A lab assistant writes a letter to his past self, giving him detailed instructions on how to stop the man who is about to bring ruin to the universe through perverse research. 

Read the full story here, DAY 13: Crib Death

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 12

Courtesy: jschumacher.typepad.com

Today’s Prompt:

What if you’re going to write a story about self-expression with a cab driver as the main character and a fire escape as the key object? Set your story in a funeral home.

Courtesy: creativewritingprompts.com

Link for Day 12: DAY 12: DOA Word Count: 1,855

A cabbie and a Private Investigator play their parts well and set the ball rolling in a story that mixes humor with a little danger.

After a fire outbreak razes down an apartment building, th insurance company brings in a PI to investigate the incident. He meets with a cabbie (the only witness) in a funeral home and there is a modest clash of class.

Read the full story here, DAY 12: DOA

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 11

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Today’s Prompt:

Two men stop you on your way into your local post office. One flashes a badge at you. They tell you about a top secret sting operation they are about to execute and they need your help. They can’t give you any of the details, only that you are to walk into the post office, go up to the counter with the gentleman named Bert working it, and you have to say to him, “My stamps are looking a bit square these days, if you know what I mean.” Write what happens next.

Courtesy: writersdigest.com

Link for Day 11: DAY 11: Mr. Massacre Word Count: 2,107

The secret service gives me screaming meemies. They don’t exactly call what they do secret for nothing, do they?

When I had to do this story, I kept that thought on the back burner allowing it to simmer and boil over into the overall plot of the story. In this story, no one can be trusted. Just like nobody is innocent. Not even the guy stopped by the two men on his way into the post office. Especially, not that guy.

Keep an eye on him as you read.

Read the full story here, DAY 11: Mr. Massacre

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 10

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Today’s Prompt:

You are helping out at a charitable center by organizing donated items. When searching through an old suitcase, you find a suicide note dated six months prior. What’s peculiar is that you know the person. What’s even more peculiar is that the person is still alive. Write the story about what happens when you pay that person a visit and ask him or her about the note.

Courtesy: writersdigest.com

Link for Day 10: DAY 10: Trunk Word Count: 2,039

Kenam, a rehabilitated drunk, who should be dead, is saved by a peculiar stint of fate—cattle fell off the truck ahead of his vehicle and reduced the impact in what would have been a fatal auto accident.

One day, while acting as volunteer at a charitable center, Kenam discovers a suicide note in a trunk, that leads him to reassess his life. He discovers he’d been gradually but definitely, drafting a personal suicide note; one bottle at a time.

The peak of the drama was when, just before he threw away the note, he decides to check the name of the author. His mind reels as he reads out the name of the man who delivered him from a life of alcohol. He pays the guy a visit at his home but things turn out much differently than he expected…

Read the full story here, DAY 10: Trunk

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 9

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Today’s Prompt:

You wake up, go to the bathroom and look in the mirror. A different face stares back at you. Begin your story here.

Courtesy: creativewritingprompts.com

Link for Day 9: DAY 9: Window into Hell Word Count: 2,131

                “A mirror can be a real pain in the butt, sometimes.”

Enter the world of Emma as she makes a horrific discovery about her mirror. One morning she wakes up to find what she calls grime on the surface of her looking glass. Her big mistake? She never should have touched it.

A mirror is a portal into the parallel universe we call reflection but Emma’s mirror became the ultimate weapon of world domination for alien species existing side by side with our universe.

Is that really your reflection staring back at you when you look in the mirror?

Are you for sure?

Read the full story here, DAY 9: Window into Hell

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 8

Courtesy: Wikipedia

Today’s Prompt:

You are at the neighborhood garage sale, looking for nothing in particular. Something inside an old, wooden box catches your eye. The old woman who is running the sale comes over to say something about the object. What is it? What did she say and why?

Courtesy: writersdigest.com

Link for Day 8: DAY 8: Yard Sale Word Count: 2,122

Imagine stopping by a yard sale and spotting an old wooden box, which touches a chord. You walk up to it and lift the lid. There’s a bunch of odd-looking keys inside and nothing else. Just a bunch of ancient-looking keys is all. So, of course, you decide to put an egg in your shoes and beat it. But not before being enlightened by the old crone running the show. She picks the keys out of the box, tells you it’s value, cheap and offers to sell you the thing, which she claims opens doors.

What else is new?

But hey! Who needs the keys to some ancient castle that’s probably converted to an archeological site, by now?

You tell granny, “Thanks, but no thanks.” Hell, I’d do the same thing.

Next thing you know, you’re home and turning the lock to go into your apartment and right there in your hands is the odd bunch of keys from the yard sale, opening the door to your house. You don’t recall taking it from the old woman not to mention, paying for ‘em.

Broadus, the main character in this story, shows you why a yard sale should not be an alternative for window-shopping.

Read the full story here, DAY 8: Yard Sale

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 7

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Today’s Prompt:

You strike up a conversation with a stranger in the check-out line at the grocery store who, as it turns out, is not a stranger at all.

Courtesy: Writing.Com

Link for Day 7: DAY 7: Lethal Evenings Word Count: 2,447

‘Forgetting isn’t always voluntary. Sometimes it’s willed.’

Idara and Angie, two women, programmed by fate to bump into each other a second time.

Their first encounter at a party in an out-of-the-way mansion, which turned out to be a house of horror had awakened a malign force that must be laid to rest or there will be blood.

Like there had been before.

When they collide at a grocery store, their memories of the past had been reshuffled. The question was, by trauma or by evil spirits? The victory or defeat of the women at the hands of evil depends on them unbottling their past.

In an instant of total brilliant recall, their memory gushed to the surface of their consciousnesses and with it a horror they would rather forget.

Idara and Angie must complete their assignments yet; they may not live to see their grades.

Read the full story here, DAY 7: Lethal Evenings

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 6

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Today’s Prompt:

Take two people who dislike each other and stick them in the backseat of a cab. What happens?

Courtesy: creativewritingprompts.com

Link for Day 6: DAY 6: Icebox Word Count: 2,206

An artist and an advocate, next-door-neighbors cum sworn enemies, are constrained by a sudden cloudburst to take refuge in the backseat of the same cab. They’re barely aware of each other until they’re both seated and try to say Hi. The mismatched company is like the weather in The Odyssey. It’s only a matter of time before the cab is transformed into an icebox.

The question which stayed on my mind through the crafting of this story was, is this going to come out as the funnies or is it going to end up being a Tai fu/taekwondo treat? The cabbie really adds the twist to the story. He, it was who got me decided and takes the helm in steering the plot through the fun part.

Fasten your seat belts, you are about to take a ride on the mobile court of law.

Read the full story here, DAY 6: Icebox

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2013: DAY 5

Courtesy: visualfunhouse.com

Today’s Prompt:

You get to your studio to develop pictures from the hour you spent in the park. All of the pictures turn out well, except for a select few. In six photographs, there is a man in the frame. Something seems slightly off, and rather strange about each picture. Who is he and what is weird about the photographs?

Courtesy: writersdigest.com

Link for Day 5: DAY 5: The Picture Inside the Picture Word Count: 2,102

I tried to write the man in the picture off as an assassin who, while stalking some rich dude’s family out on a picnic, is accidentally captured by a freelance photographer at dubious angles. But I thought hell, I don’t have the time to draw up a gun fight, not today, phew, into the wastebasket.

Option two, I thought, what if the man’s alien? There’s a part in my story where two freelance photographers go for a walk at the beach and end up snapping photos. The idea was to replace the man with a woman on the beach and make it appear like there’s more than one of his kind on earth and somehow, these guy’s tools are the only thing that can see them. Then I thought, That’s way too much energy. Just stick to the prompt, will ya? Phew, into the wastebasket.

Now, here’s something I actually did do for a change.

I used the story to explain the human condition. Sometimes, we encounter circumstances we can only come to grasps with by admitting our inadequacies as humans. A lot of stuff happens around us that are beyond our abilities to control or comprehend and the only way to prevail is by learning to thrive regardless of it.

The characters in this story never ID’d the man in the picture. But they carried on with their lives and lived like they gotta live.

Read the full story here, DAY 5: The Picture Inside the Picture

Keep your pen bleeding.

Akpan