To make up for my missed Writing Prompt Wednesday last week, I now present you with the short story I wrote over Memorial Day weekend for Kansas City, Missouri’s ConQuesT 44 science fiction convention’s Story in a Bag contest.
What in the heck is a Story in a Bag!?!? you might be asking. Well, good question. The Story in a Bag contest involved the following: drawing five random prompts out of five different brown paper bags. Taking your five prompts and writing a story using all five prompts in ONE HOUR. Maximum length for these stories was three double spaced typed pages or five double spaced handwritten pages. If you typed your story, you had to have a way to print it out yourself. At the end of the hour, the stories were posted anonymously in one of the con’s suites for anyone and everyone to read, if they were so inclined. Readers could then also vote on their favorite story for each category and genre. At the end of the convention, the votes were totaled and winners were announced at the Closing Ceremonies.
Genres were Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror. You could choose your category after getting your prompts and semi-formulating your story, of course. Categories were Pro (three short story publications or one novel publication), Amateur (no publications) and Young Writer (under 15 years old).
Despite the somewhat daunting task this challenge presented, I was very, very excited for it. Mostly just because of the fact it offered just that: a challenge. An opportunity to really flex the creative muscles. Recently I have been aggressively seeking to step beyond my comfort zone with my writing, because I’ve realized how beneficial that is to improving my writing as a whole, as well as helping to improve my ability to come up with new and fresh plot ideas.
Maya Angelou certainly knew what she was talking about when she said,
“You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.”
So, I decided to participate in this insane venture. My prompts were:
- “He watched the ship as it hovered, then landed not five feet in front of him.” – as my first line. You could not alter the order of the first sentence, but could correct typos if there were any. (I added the comma.)
- A parade.
- A leather corset.
- A clown.
- Being chased by a pack of werewolves.
Despite having lugged my none-too-light laptop around the con all day, I had resigned to handwriting the thing as I scrambled for a place to sit… though I hate handwriting full stories these days, especially ones on a time schedule. My hand cramps. I can’t write fast enough. I change my mind on sentence wording and have to scribble out words, it’s just a mess. But… I had no way to print. There were no printers available in this particular room.
But then a fellow sci-fi/writerly friend of mine who was also at the con and also participating in the contest, Rod Galindo, mentioned that we could print out our stories at the hotel’s business center. Brilliant! I thought. That settles it, I will type it up and leave myself ten minutes to print it out!
But that meant I only had 50 minutes to write the thing, and I still had to fill out the short (but still! Every minute counted here!) registration form, which was how your story was identified when it was time to announce winners, so it was important to fill out.
I grabbed a seat and fired up my laptop while filling out the registration form. When it came to Title, I left it blank, as I still had only the foggiest notion of what I would write based on my prompts. As soon as my computer was ready I brought up Word and began typing as fast as I could… well, slower in the beginning, to be honest, but speeding up at the end as my time dwindled. By the time I was done, I didn’t even remember the last two paragraphs! But no time to review or edit, I still had to print!
Exactly three pages double spaced, 1,010 words, ten minutes left. WHEW.
Oh no wait… the business center was two floors up, accessible only be elevator as far as I knew.
CRAP!!!!
I bolted from the room with laptop tucked under my arm. Only to find upon arriving at the bank of computers and printers that the damn thing wasn’t working. As in, if I plugged the printer directly into my laptop, the software wouldn’t download. I tried to connect to my email with their wireless unsecured network, but it wouldn’t connect, so I couldn’t even email the document to myself to print it out on their computers!!!
For all appearances, I was screwed. And none too happy about it, either.
A fellow Story in a Bag writer was also there, having the same problems. Rod arrived to find us both exasperated and irritated, then vanished again, only to reappear a minute later and tell us the front desk had agreed to print our stories for us as long as they were on a flash drive.
I didn’t have a damn flash drive!!! Rod had one, but it was in his car… AGH!
BUT WAIT! The other wonderful woman there, who we later were formally introduced to as Athena, had a flash drive, and very kindly offered to let us put our stories on it so we could take them all to the front desk.
It was now 1:57pm, and the deadline was 2:00pm.
We transferred the docs to the USB as fast as possible, then literally ran to the front desk, waited very impatiently while they printed them, and as soon as they handed the sheets over, still warm off the printer, Rod snatched them up and literally sprinted off down the hallway, Athena and I on his heels.
But then I remembered I had left my registration form on the desk next to one of the business center computers, so I had to run back and get it!!! I also took a spare scant second to title the story then, off the top of my head scrawling out “A Lovely Day for a Parade”, which was the first thing that came to my head.
By the time we reached the contest room again, Rod had already handed our stories over and we had made it JUST in time to submit them!!!!! WHEW!!!!
So you see, without the help of Rod and Athena, I never would have even been able to submit my story, and it never would have won by popular vote in the Science Fiction Amateur category! Nothing is ever done completely alone, and I am very grateful for their parts in getting that thing to print – it’s really all about teamwork!
And that’s one thing I really love about the writer community… we are such a helpful, generous, friendly bunch, willing to lend a hand to other writers when needed, sharing advice and experience on a regular basis, encouraging each other to succeed.
Just another reason why I LOVE being a writer!!! <3
And oh yeah… you probably want to read that story now, huh? Here it is!
(Note: I needed a name for the protagonist fast, and I was still working on “The Transference”, so I stole the name Zachary from there, hehehe…. Also, I liked this result so much I fully plan on turning it into a novel at some point!)
***
Gorgeous woman featured on this self-made cover is Deviant Artist MADmoiselle Meli.)
***
He watched the ship as it hovered, then landed no more than five feet in front of him. Hot air blasted over him on a wave of dust, and he threw an arm over his nose and mouth, coughing. The ship’s engines powered down with a heavy whine, the access ramp hissing as it began to open. Zachary glanced over his shoulder, back to the noise of the parade still clanging and banging down Main Street. They had agents there too, he knew, but he might have a chance of getting lost in the crowd…
He turned and bolted back down the alleyway, hearing the sound of boots hitting pavement behind him. Soon after came an echoing shout, and the sizzling blue blast of an ionic stunner shot over his shoulder. He increased speed, pumping his arms, and crashed into the ranks of the local high school band full force, sending clarinets and tubas flying. A few spectators screamed as another ionic blast zapped the nearest drummer and dropped him to the pavement in a heap.
“Sorry, sorry,” Zachary mumbled, shoving away from a shocked flutist and tearing off through the forward ranks of the parade. If he could get to the werewolf float, maybe he could duck inside – they always had the largest float, and besides Gregor owed him a favor for getting that distemper vaccine.
More screams and even more curses followed in his wake as he dodged color guards and baton throwers, clowns and antique cars and a fire department hovercraft. He saw the werewolf float ahead, so close, but then the roar of the ship thundered overhead and he instinctively ducked, almost falling flat on his face. The ship circled above the parade, which was now beginning to look more like a disorganized riot as people began to panic and run.
Gregor himself rode on the top of the werewolves’ float, a giant round moon advertising their newest werewolf-friendly brew, supposedly meant to ease the transition from human to wolf to human again. Everything was easier with a little alcohol, wasn’t it? Well, that’s what they said anyway. Zachary leapt onto the base of the float, clinging to the side of the moon.
“Gregor!”
The werewolf stared up at the ship, awash in the swirling dust, but at the sound of his name he turned, and Zachary almost lost his grip on the paper mache as the man gave him a ferocious snarl. “You brought them here!? How dare you!”
Zachary frowned, surprised at his friend’s ire. “I didn’t mean to –“
The ship opened fire, obliterating the false moon in a fantastic shower of flames and burning strips of colored paper, and Zachary briefly flew. White flashed in front of his vision as he landed hard and rolled, then moaned in the dirt, clutching his ribs. Now people really panicked, and all he could see were fleeing feet and tiny fires still burning on the debris. Howling joined the screams, long low howls and keening high howls, making the hairs on his arms stand up. He knew what that meant.
He pushed himself to his feet and dared to glance back to where his friend had once stood. There were bodies there now, surrounded by the remaining survivors of the pack, all howling their mourning song.
A third blast from a stunner skimmed past Zachary’s nose so close he could smell the ozone, jolting him out of his daze. He swore, turning to run again just as the other werewolves twisted to glare at him, and he knew his plan to hide in the parade had been a truly terrible idea as they all tore off in his direction.
He took off again, as fast as he could, winding through alleyways and back streets, now chased by the hunter from the ship as well as a pack of very furious werewolves, and his hopes of escape dwindled as quickly as his breath. He brought up his comm, hitting speed dial.
“Lily!” he screamed. “I need pick up right now!”
“Who did you piss off this time?” she drawled back, as if they were on vacation.
“They found me, damnit! The hunters found me now get down here right now!”
“Well, why didn’t you say so?” She clicked off the line and Zachary swore again, his lungs and legs burning. Sweat plastered his shirt to his skin and ran into his eyes, the dust choking him. The pounding feet behind were gaining, gaining… werewolves were ridiculously fast, they would be on him soon, and changed or not they would rip out his throat…
A colorful blob appeared out of the side alley in front of him and a driving force stopped Zachary in his tracks as efficiently as a brick wall, throwing him backwards to land heavily on his back, wheezing for air.
One of the clowns from the parade leered over him, his overly large painted red smile truly evil. “Thought you could escape, eh? Not this time, boy.”
But then the werewolves were on them. “Back off, clowny,” one of them snarled. “This is our fresh meat.”
“I think not,” a female voice replied, and Zachary looked up in a daze to see a woman in a leather corset approaching, her knee-high black boots brown with dust, the badge on her shoulder showing her as a hunter. “We’ve been after this one for a long time. No way you curs are taking him from us.”
“Do all hunters wear corsets?” Zachary found himself gasping, realizing only after he asked the question that he shouldn’t have opened his mouth. She pointed the stunner at him, right at his nose, but one of the werewolves stepped in front of it.
“I told you, he’s ours,” the man growled.
The sound of thrusters washed them all in vibration, and then a very familiar personal transport vehicle hovered overhead, its small but very effective cannons trained on the crowd of people clustered around Zachary’s prone form.
Despite himself, he couldn’t help but grin. “Lily, your timing is impeccable.”
***
This is awesome!
Thank you!! I’m so glad you liked it!!! I actually had a whole heck of a lot more fun writing it than I thought I would on such a timeline! 😉
The steampunk pic for the story is great!! Where did you get that?? Who is MADmoiselle Meli?
I’m glad you like it! I added the effects and the text, but the pic itself I found by Google image searching “steam punk”. Which led me to this AMAZING steam punk website: http://xerposa.com/category/steampunk-cosplay, which featured one of MADmoiselle’s pictures, and that’s how I knew who she was. You can find her page here: http://madmoisellemeli.deviantart.com/ … she has some awesome other pics too!
Holy cow, I think I’d have a heart attack if I had to write a story in less than an hour! And for having been written that quickly, I’d say it was pretty good 😀
I won’t lie, it was intense. Kind of euphoric though actually, because you get in that zone and it’s just strange because then it just slides along and you don’t even realize what you’re writing! If you’ve never had that experience while writing, I’d recommend trying it out somehow, somewhere, lol. Sign up for a NaNoWriMo and do a word sprint with a fellow writer or something… there’s something that happens when you force yourself to be almost 100% intuitive in the writing that’s pretty exhilerating (which I can only accomplish by being on a super tight deadline). Not that I want to write like that ALL the time (it doesn’t always come together coherently, lol, but you at least get some darn good ideas!), but once and awhile is super fun and invigorating, really! 😉 Glad you enjoyed the story and thanks for the comment!
This could make a really nice book. You have some elements here, like the werewolves, Zach’s background, and these other characters chasing him, that would be great to see expanded upon! It’s impressive that you wrote this in an hour–for something so short, it’s fairly tight and you’ve definitely captured some intrigue. 🙂 Congratulations on winning, too!
Yay! I’m glad you enjoyed it! 🙂 Yes, I think it would be really fun to explore that intrigue further! Plus I get the feeling this Zachary and his Lily are quite the fun pair… heheheh. Thanks for reading and commenting!
This is fabulous JRF. The tight deadline really comes through in the pace of the writing. And I love the creativity given so little time to invent – werewolves, ionic blasters, hunters… really great stuff.
I’m so very glad you enjoyed it! 🙂 Action gets you a lot of words and a lot of, erm, well, action, lol, in a short amount of time, so it seemed only natural. Didn’t have a choice in the werewolf decision, as it was one of my prompts, but it really turned out to be quite fun! One of my favorite elements, in fact. I wrote another short featuring Zach and Lily and werewolves but I’m saving that one to try and submit somewhere. I have at least a third in mind as well in that same universe, and might someday release them all as a type of ebook, or something. We’ll see! Pretty excited about it, though. 🙂 I really like that world!