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
Tales of Truths and Tricks
Tales 1: Foresight
I feel like I am floating. Nothing but air below me and above me. Freedom, I think, as with my eyes closed, I reach forward and catch the trapeze bar I know to be there. My hands wrap around it as I smile. Using my momentum to carry me forward, I swing upward. As the bar reaches its highest point, I swing my legs forward, gravity trying vainly to hold back my body as I tuck my legs close to my chest, using my momentum to pull myself into an almost sitting position on the bar, the long braid of my amber hair sliding over my shoulder.
I grin, opening my eyes as the bar descends. Quickly and carefully, I let go of the bar, wrapping my arms around the ropes attaching the bar to the ceiling. I then let my feet slip down, dangling them as my bare toes brush the nothingness below me. I sigh, joy filling me as I prepare for what is next. Most people would find being suspended over fifty feet above the ground with next to nothing to catch them to be terrifying. However, I, Aurora, the Flying Star of the Fae Light circus, have never felt more at home anywhere else. Here I was safest, here I didn’t have to be careful, here I was myself.
As I prepare to start my next exercise, I notice movement out of the corner of my eye. A man, a few years older than me, is near the entrance to the tent, looking around as if he is searching for someone. He’s dressed in a sleeveless sky blue tunic and baggy navy blue pants, which match his deep blue hair. He looks up, spotting me, his eyes an eerie yet intriguing sight. The left the coldest silver, and the right a complex kaleidoscope of purple and blue diamonds. He vanishes suddenly, and I blink. Then, from behind me, “Good morning.”
I jump, nearly falling off the bar, as I swing around, turning towards where he now stands on one of the many platforms attached to poles of the tent. I scowl at him as he chuckles, my face warming with both embarrassment and something more. “You can’t do that, Dayson. I could have fallen.”
He shakes his head, grinning, “Would you have?”
I sigh, “Probably not.”
I pull my feet up and then under me, balancing on the bar as I stand up on it carefully, entering my next exercise. Dayson was one of the newest additions to the circus, and honestly, probably the only person I felt cared about me beyond my skills as an acrobat.
As I begin to climb one of the ropes of the bar, I remember a question that had been on my mind since I had first seen Dayson’s and his unusual right eye. It was known as the Eye of Fate, a powerful magical gift that allowed one to see the future and do things that most would find impossible. Carefully hoping he doesn’t find my question offensive, I ask, “If you know something bad is going to happen, do you have to try and stop it?”
Dayson blinks at my question, looking at me curiously as I continue to climb.
“I just got here, and this is the first question you ask me?” He asks.
I nod, using my feet to wrap the ropes around my left leg, then carefully knot the ropes around my using my feet. Then I let myself hang down, my body spinning as I stretch out my hands and right leg, only the knot around my left leg supporting me.
“So?” I ask.
He sighs and sits down on the platform, already understanding why I ask this question.
“Well, it depends,” he says.
“On what?” I ask as my spin slows.
“Well, mostly on whether or not I am in a position to help and if I am called to help or not.”
I cock my head to the side, “Why wouldn’t you be able to help?”
“Well,” He says, “If I am too far away or not able to get to the location in time, then I can’t really do anything about it.” His eyes fill with sorrow.
I feel the knot begin to loosen. I carefully wrap my hands around the bar and then, using my body, force it to begin going back and forth, the knot coming undone in the process, and my legs begging to be pulled me down and adding to my momentum. I let it carry me away from Dayson, then let it pull me back towards him.
As it does, I spin it around so I face him and the platform he sits on. As I reach the crest of the bar’s arc, I release it and spin in the air, landing perfectly next to Dayson. I sit next to him, noticing that his face is still downcast.
Not knowing what to do, I carefully wrap an arm around his shoulder. I had seen others do this to friends who were troubled or sad, but I wasn’t quite sure if we were friends.
Dayson doesn’t object, saying, “Sorry, sometimes it’s hard to relive certain memories.”
I nod in understanding. So many people, especially men, are told they have to be the ones to stand strong and be a foundation. However, this often meant that they could never really show weakness.
One last question comes to mind, and I hesitantly ask it, “What happens if you see two bad things at once?”
Dayson’s shoulders slump. I see in his eyes a grief I can not comprehend, “Then I have to make a choice.”
Instinctively and without thinking, I hug him. It may be weird, it may be wrong, but I could tell he needed it.
Dayson first freezes, but as I continue to hold him, he relaxes and leans into me, tears falling silently down his cheeks.
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.