Welcome to the first week of the Spring Writing Challenge!
We’re so excited to get started on these stories. It’s time to roll up your sleeves, set your fingers on your keyboard, and get writing. Will your story contain aliens? A prince in disguise? Maybe even a sweet summer romance? Whatever happens, we can’t wait to see what you come up with!
So, without further ado, here’s your very first prompt!
Week One Prompt – The Dialogue Prompt
“If you know something bad is going to happen, do you have to try and stop it?”
“I just got here.”
Wait…what’s a dialogue prompt?
A dialogue prompt is a conversation between two characters. It doesn’t matter who says it, or if it takes place in the beginning, middle, or end of your story. However, one character must say the first sentence, and the second character must respond with the second sentence.
Before you start writing, there are some important rules to follow.
Writing Rules
1. Please keep the content of the stories you post to a PG rating. Please avoid real curse words. Violence/fighting should be limited and purposeful. Please do not include any spice. Moderators may remove stories and comments for any reason at any time. Moderators may remove any member from the challenge at any time.
2. Your story must be 1,000 words or less, and must contain the prompt to be counted for the challenge. You’re not required to post it in order to “win” the challenge, but if you want it to count for your team, your story must be posted by Sunday at 11:59 PM ET, and you must include your team name.
It’s time to post your story as a comment down below! We can’t wait to see all the fun directions you guys take this dialogue prompt. If you have any questions, feel free to email us at info@writers.company!
Happy Writing!
Ava,
Your story was very well written! I enjoyed reading it! 👏
Melissa
Ooh, what a fun story, girl! Fantastic job!
Wow, this is beautifully written!
I love your writing style!
Wow, I’m very impressed. The worldbuilding here feels grounded and real, the characters fleshed out, and the prompt just flows so smoothly with the rest of the narrative. Great story here!
I hope this part of something larger. I was totally sucked in.
Thanks for sharing your work. 🙂 Enjoyable read.
great opening line!
Beautiful story! Great job!
Absolutely loved it
i NEED the rest of this asap! i would love this as a book series. its excellent! The world-building is so good. you did a great job. i especially love how the characters are already full of the knowledge of the world and there is no need for any one character to outright explain things. again, have i expressed how i literally want this in my life so much!
Great details! I was brought right into the world you built!
Such a fun story! Loved the comical banter between characters
Team A:
The Vengeful Summon
I sat on the low-cut stump gazing in wonder at the purple, red, and pink fiery sunset colors all stirred together in splendor over the distant treed hill.
—Oh, sorry. Allow me to introduce myself. For starters, I’m a mouse, so I typically don’t care for much company. It is no use trying to explain that to certain individuals, however—in particular, that crazy chipmunk that ran into me the other night, as I was enjoying watching the magnificent sunset in peaceful solitude.
“If you know something bad is going to happen, do you have to try and stop it?” asked the frazzled chipmunk, scurrying onto the stump, nearly knocking me over.
“I just got here.” I replied, disgusted at being interrupted from my peaceful musing. “I don’t even know what you are talking about —or who you are, for that matter.”
“Yeah, I know. You just moved here today,” the chipmunk chattered impatiently. “That’s why I thought you might have better insight on the matter.”
“Would you mind telling me what you are even talking about? I mean, I could give you the rough-cut Biblical…”
The chipmunk interrupted, “For starters, I and some of my pals moved here a while ago. There was an abundance of feed, so we stole a little now and then from the bird feeder. Then the squirrels moved in and stole even more and started destroying things, and …”
“Hold on a second. You are talking so fast I can hardly understand you!”
The chipmunk stood catching his breath.
“What do you think is going to happen that you might need to stop?”
The chipmunk turned his little head from side to side as if looking to see if anyone was watching or listening. Creeping closer and putting his mouth nearly in my ear, he whispered, “My friend plans to summon the weasel.”
I nearly jumped out of my skin. “What!!!” I shouted.
“Shhhh! Not so loud!” the chipmunk whispered frantically, shaking his tiny hands.
“Why would anyone call up the weasel? Is your friend insane? That weasel is like the rodent version of a serpent. Weasels are like a whole raccoon packed into a frame two or three times my length, but no bigger around. They are unstoppable! They kill everything they can sink their teeth into without mercy! They…”
“I know.”
“Then why? Why the weasel?”
“Because.” The chipmunk sat down and wrapped his fluffy tail around his dainty toes. “My friend has suffered greatly for his theft. Now he is so bitter that he thinks of nothing but revenge. Hate has eaten him up and poisoned him. All he wants is to get even with the one who hurt him, no matter the cost.”
“Doesn’t he know the weasel would destroy him too?”
“Maybe he does… but he probably hasn’t thought that far.”
“Why don’t you tell him? Why don’t you warn him and try to convince him not to call for the evil that will kill him too?”
“Last time I spoke to him —when he told me about his plan to call the weasel— I tried to calm him down, but he only grew angrier. My poor old pal, he turned on me, said he hated me, would sick the weasel on me too —as if the weasel would do his bidding.” The chipmunk hung his striped head. “I’m afraid he’ll kill me if he sees me again.”
“But he’ll get us all killed if you don’t.” I sighed.
“Maybe I should just pack up and get out of here before it’s too late. Of course, there probably won’t be a safe place to hide once the weasel is on the loose.”
We stood side-by-side watching the sunset like fire on the hill. The fiery rays shot across the ground towards us. Neither of us spoke for a moment. At last, I broke the silence.
“If a watchman is set on a tower and sees the enemy coming, he has two options: sound the alarm and annoy the people, or stay silent and let the enemy destroy those he is set to protect. If he sounds the alarm, it is their duty to decide what they will do. However, if he fails to warn them, their blood is on his head.”
“But he hates me already.”
“Maybe he will listen to your warning, maybe he will not. But you will have done your part.”
“I don’t know how he even plans to summon this weasel without just getting eaten on the spot. If he does manage to bring it here… there will be nothing left for us here. The only one who can lift a finger against the weasel is the very one the poor Chippy hates so much.”
“Remind your friend of this; if he continues to drink the poison of hatred, it will destroy him, though it will not likely harm the one he hates. Better to move on with what you have left than let bitterness burn up what’s left.”
“I’ll tell him.”
The fiery sunrays were almost fully retracted now. Still, we sat in peaceful silence, gazing at the last light of dusk.
You packed a LOT into these 1000 words! The world building here was done well, sprinkling just enough information about the narrator and the chipmunk and the world they live in, all the while setting up the big threat! And the best solution…
I’d read more about these little critters and their big world.
To Change the World, by Ava Murbarger
P.S.- sorry I missed the meeting, we were out of town. I hope to be at the next one!!
The sky was bleeding again.
Rust-colored clouds hung over the City like bruises, pulsing faintly. Rael kept her eyes fixed on them, one hand on the rail of the Watchers’ Tower. Her gloves were too thin. The steel was cold enough to bite.
Behind her, a door creaked open.
“You’re late,” she said without turning.
Boots scraped against the stone. A new recruit, probably. They sent one every week now. Fresh eyes, fresh loyalty.
“I got lost,” the boy said. He sounded too young to carry the badge. Too soft to hold a blade. “Sorry.”
She turned and looked at him.
Dust-colored coat, too long in the sleeves. Wide eyes. Not from the City, then. One of the Outer Rings. Maybe even farther. She sighed.
“If you know something bad is going to happen,” she said, “do you have to try and stop it?”
The boy blinked. “I just got here.”
“Well, obviously.” She crossed her arms.
He shifted nervously on his feet.
Rael turned back to the cityscape. “The answer is yes, by the way. At least, if you’re cursed with a conscience.”
He joined her at the rail. Together they watched the distant flicker of drones weaving patterns in the smog. A red warning rune glowed briefly on the horizon, then faded. Rael knew what it meant. The Reclamation Agents were moving again. Soon, another neighborhood would vanish.
“Why do you do this?” the boy asked.
She laughed without humor. “Because no one else will. Because the High Council stopped caring two winters ago. Because someone has to.”
A long pause. Then, “Is it true the Watchers can see the future?”
“We read the signs,” she said. “Patterns in weather. Seismic anomalies. Political shifts. The Council says it’s superstition.” She paused. “But when the streets burn exactly seven hours after the rats vanish, over and over again, you stop calling it chance.”
He was silent. Good. Maybe he was listening.
“You said you got lost. But you still came up here. Why?”
“I heard the bells.” He hesitated. “They said you can’t hear them unless you’re meant to.”
Rael glanced at him. The brass bell on the tower hadn’t rung in years. She narrowed her eyes.
“Name?”
“Wren.”
“That’s not your real name.”
“It is now.”
She smirked. “Fine, Wren. Welcome to Watcher’s Hill. Welcome to the losing side.”
Another alarm rune lit the smog. Closer this time.
Rael pulled her scope from her belt and scanned the eastern edge of the city. “Sector Four. They’re burning the food lines again.”
“That’s the second time this week,” Wren said quietly.
She lowered the scope. “Third.”
He didn’t speak for a long time. Then he said, “My sister was there.”
Rael’s fingers tightened around the rail. She didn’t ask if the girl had survived. That wasn’t the kind of world they lived in anymore.
Instead, she reached into her coat and handed Wren a folded map, inked with lines and red X’s.
“There’s a storm tunnel under the old trainyard,” she said. “It’s not on any schematics, and it’ll get you to Sector Four faster than any street. But it’s dark. And crawling.”
Wren took the map with trembling fingers. “Why are you helping me?”
Rael looked at him, really looked. The wide eyes weren’t wide with fear, not completely. It was fire. Just hidden under the ash.
“Because sometimes the only thing worse than seeing the future,” she said softly, “is doing nothing to change it.”
Wren nodded. His jaw set. “Then I’ll go.”
Rael watched as he turned, vanishing back into the tower’s dark. When the door slammed shut behind him, the bell gave a soft chime. Just once.
And far below, the wind began to shift.