Writing Prompts!
A couple of weeks ago, I started sending out writing prompts on Tumblr. With Suzy's permission, I'm posting a copy here, and will update the thread every Friday/weekend when I send out a new batch.
How does this work? You're encouraged to answer the prompt from an IC perspective: a few sentences of dialogue, a set of lyrics or a poem, a paragraph of prose or even a full blown story ... it's up to you! Be warned that I've found many people intend to write small, but the muse strikes and they end up with something bigger. If you can't come up with an IC response, OOC answers are okay (besides, you can always post ICly later). The point is to make you think about your character in ways you might not have considered before. They make for great exercises in creativity.
Please feel free to post your responses in this thread!
The Prompts:
1. (Posted 5/22) Your character is alone and is taking a nice, relaxing bath with not a worry in the world. Do they sing a silly song, hum a tune? If so, what is it? Bonus feel-good points if you come up with a few lyrics!
2. (Posted 5/29) If the ten year old version of yourself could see you today, what would they say to you?
3. (Posted 6/6) Has your character ever "paid it forward"? How? If they've never done so, is there a situation in which they might? Morally adrift characters may consider that repayment towards others doesn't always involve pleasant acts ...
Last edited by Vandrysse on 2015-06-06 9:21 am; edited 2 times in total
((Thank you so much for doing these Ortelius! :-D I'm excited to see the new prompt each week!))
The hot water streamed out of the copper tube into the bathtub, fed by a large and buzzing machine that seemed to be built of flashing lights, cogwheels, and steam. Suzy walked over, grabbed a micro-adjuster off the table, and opened a hatch on the side to make a few minor adjustments.
"Now, now..." she said, "Stop your complaining, it's not like you have anything I haven't seen before. Remember, I built you! Now hold still and let's see if we can stop that noise."
A minor adjustment to the steam control matrix, and half a turn on the Khorium stabilization chamber release valve, and the buzzing increased.
"Oh! Oh really?!? I've half a mind to..." Suzy looked over, and noted that the bath was almost full. She flipped a large switch, and the machine began to grind to a halt. As it did, she looked back into the panel, waggled the micro-adjuster at the gears inside, and scoldingly said "You got lucky!"
She began to hum as she stripped to get into the bath, checking first to make sure all the doors and windows were both locked and covered - thank you very much! She continued to hum, then to sing softly as she eased herself into the bath, grabbed the soap, and began to get clean.
The tune she hummed could be easily recognized by any child who had grown up in Lorderon as a simple childhood song. The lyrics, however, were clearly Suzy just having a bit of fun.
"Hush little crankshaft, don't you whinnnne...
Suzy's gonna oil ya and you'll be fine.
If you don't shut yer buzzing traaaap...
Suzy's gonna turn you into scrap."
((This seems like a fun little exercise for keeping my writing chops sharp! Also, as you'd pointed out, a way to view our characters - and give others a glimpse - in different lights! I'll participate as much as I can find time to, I'd like to see this idea really take off! :D ))
As early evening had approached and the radiant lunar face of Elune yet hung low in the night skies, Professor Amaranthaea Crowelley breathed a soft sigh of relief as she'd concluded her last class of the day.
It had been another sunny, moderately temperate day in Stormwind City and Prof. Crowelley had almost always treated her students to an outdoor lecture on days such as this. She was teaching them the intermediate basics of Nature Magic for this course, after all! What better way to commune with Nature and all of Elune's bounties than to actually BE among it all while you practiced and learned?! Today, Prof. Crowelley had brought her students to Olivia's Pond for their classwork and lessons. One of her most favorite spots in all of Stormwind City proper! Years ago Olivia's Pond was her home, in fact, in the days when Amaranthaea was copperless and all on her own. As such, she'd learned to appreciate Olivia's Pond and always kept it fondly in her heart, along with the many memories of camping out beneath that canopy of trees and beside the soft, rushing waters of the falls nearby. But that was indeed another time... Another lifetime perhaps, it felt like.
The Summer session was in full swing now, and Prof. Crowelley could hardly believe it. One full semester here and gone since she'd joined the faculty of Stormwind University, and a new one now in progress! Many of the students she'd been teaching since the previous semester were taking her Natural Healing II and Intermediate Nature Magic I and II courses by now, and she couldn't be prouder. The pride in herself came slow and difficult; no, the swelling pride she'd felt in these moments was for her students. Many of them, by nature, could never be druids by the strange natural laws of Azeroth. Her student body comprised of Humans mostly, but she counted all of the Alliance races as represented among the rosters of the several courses she now instructed. Still, the thought of being closed off to druidism by virtue of racial makeup confounded Amara to some level. For now, perhaps her students could apply much of their teachings to a far deeper understanding of Harvest Magic or even training to become Harvest Witches themselves, but regrettably, it seemed only Kaldorei and Worgen were capable of truly and fully embracing the delicate balance of Nature as druids.
This didn't deter Amara, though. Very little ever did or could deter her in fact, as her many friends among the University faculty had quickly discovered soon after meeting her. Most of all Dean Suzanna Marris. It had always brought a devious smile to Amara's face when she'd reminisce on how much of an unholy terror she'd been for Suzy to handle when she'd first arrived! Amara was a hellraiser by nature - not open defiance - and a rather unintentional rule breaker. In some ways, it might have been a concern that she'd become a bad and disruptive influence on some of the other, more rigid and serious staff at Stormwind University. Yet at the same time, it was her incorrigible pluck and indomitable spirit that grew infectious in so many positive ways among them and won Amara many friends in time. Especially and particularly Dean Suzanna Marris herself, it seemed!
Shaken suddenly from her fond reverie, Professor Crowelley watched her students with a silent, gratified smile across her muzzle as they'd shuffled off into their social groups and began chattering enthusiastically. After separating into their various cliques, they all meandered toward the beaten path leading from Olivia's Pond toward the Dwarven District. Within several minutes, the sight of the groups of students faded into the distance along with the raucous sound of their idle adolescent banter, despite Amara's keenly heightened senses.
Amara returned her soft amber-gold Worgen gaze to the clear and shimmering waters of Olivia's Pond. She smiled inwardly, fondly recalling a time when she'd dash into those waters in either feline or ursine shift at the end of her long work days and bathe herself joyfully, without a single care in the world. She'd been raised by her parents and family to be unafraid of exposure and unashamed of her body, and as such, before then Amara used to bathe completely nude in human shift in those waters. Amara blushed deeply at her past naivete, recalling a gathering of peeping-tom fishermen that convened and hid in the high grass and reeds nearby and steadily grew in number as word had spread through the local pubs and taverns of "the Naked Fish-lass".
The moniker wasn't entirely made up by the lecherous, ogling fishermen however. As she'd bathed happily in Olivia's Pond back then, naked as the day she was born and looking entirely ripe and supple as young women go, Amaranthaea would often sing an old song she'd remembered from her youth in Duskhaven:
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Oi, weeeeeell...
I'm a Duskhaven fish-lass! So cozy an' free!
Raised up in a cottage, not far from the sea!
An' I sell fine fresh fish, ta the poor an' the rich!
Will ya buy, will ya buy... Won't ya buy, me good sir...?
Won't ya come 'ither an' buy me fresh fish?!
Oi! Oi!
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It took some time for Amara to catch on to the subterfuge of this collection of old salty perverts, but once she had, the louts startled her so completely that she'd forgotten herself and shifted straight into Worgen form! These were the days after she'd been newly afflicted and had barely any knowledge or control of her Worgen side. Amara shifted and, rightly frightened, let out a horrific roar as she leaped from the waters and bounded toward the fishermen and their hiding place. The sudden and unintentional shift also rained fiery hell on her muscles and bones, only adding to the excruciating pain that she'd been feeling at that moment.
Amara chuckled heartily to herself as she gazed into those waters, still pondering. She could certainly laugh about it now, particularly as she'd keenly remembered the terrified faces of the fishermen. The smell of the cheap booze on their breath... and the acrid scent of urine as they'd pissed themselves out of fear! Even the sounds of their deeply drawn breaths and gasps as the mostly rotund fellows ran for their lives from the snarling, slavering Worgen lass. Despite her surge of sheer lupine rage, Amara still bore the compassionate heart she's always been known for; Once she'd heard the men's hearts throbbing and pumping far more than was healthy for Human folk, she'd halted her charge and stopped giving chase.
Needless to say, no one came around for a peek at "the Naked Fish-lass" ever again, to be sure!
Amara slowly turned from the calm, clear waters of Olivia's Pond and smiled warmly as she shook her head at the now fond reminiscence. It had been a long day indeed, and she began to think about how the rest of her evening might go. Perhaps a bath and a fresh change of attire first? A nice hot, steamy bath in fact. Indoors, in Human shift, and far away from the possibility of prying eyes! Well... unless Suzy happened by, of course.
Amara bit her bottom lip with anticipation at the thought, grinning lasciviously to herself. She'd keep her razor and a small bottle of 'devil red' nail polish near the tub. Just in case! The moment she'd heard or smelled Suzy enter her flat, Amara would lift one of her long, curvy legs from the bathwater and begin shaving it to a clean and silky feel. Then she'd shave the other! As if that weren't enough of a sight to stoke the flames of lust and passion, Amara would conclude her bath and dry off, then begin painting her nails - fingers and toes - one by one with painstakingly sultry candor!
Amara decidedly thanked Elune silently for her good fortunes in the same blink of an eye moment as she'd shifted into her crow form and took wing over the bustle of Stormwind City below. She soared with great enthusiasm through the evening skies, and this time, instead of a howl of excitement, Amara cawed her joy at the moon before looping and diving back down to Stormwind City below!
