num_comments int64 1 3.15k | created_utc int64 1.39B 1.66B | score int64 13 29.2k | title stringlengths 7 306 | top_comment stringlengths 458 39.5k | top_comment_score float64 10 23.1k |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
67 | 1,391,559,175 | 299 | A pink-haired girl desperately tries to not become the lead character in an anime. | It'll be fun, they said. It shows off your personality, they said. None of them told her this would happen.
"But Susan *hngkk*" The whipcord-lean man choked, the laws of our universe censoring words that would otherwise have been second nature to him to say. His hands, dark like good weathered Corinthian leather, gest... | 91 |
11 | 1,391,566,355 | 36 | A person with the power of luck (manipulating probability) is discovered by the military. The government proceeds to attempt to weaponize their powers but fail in comically improbable ways. | Research Log 154ds8: Today, we were introduced to a man with abilities heretofore considered impossible by the scientific community. Classified as L-3i, or Subject L, he exudes a passive field that manipulates the very forces of probability. Any forcible attempt to detain or imprison him would likely be impossible, so ... | 12 |
19 | 1,391,568,185 | 72 | Humanity makes contact with an aliens, only to discover that the aliens are human as well | "Well, do they speak English?"
"No General, they probably don't speak English, why the hell would they speak English?"
General Eric Walstone was not cut out for this. Hailing from a proud line of men in uniform, he was used to seeing the world a certain way. He wouldn't consider himself a racist, but he was used to s... | 39 |
37 | 1,391,598,474 | 198 | A world where people are born knowing how, when, and where they are going to die. You are a woman, 9 months pregnant, who has known all along that she dies in child birth but didn't tell anyone. You are about to go into labour. | Clara never wanted a child. Before she can even remember being able to remember things, she recalls the nightmares that woke her up in her cot in the darkness of her room. The screams of a woman in her mid thirties as the birth of a new life tears her apart. The blood, the anguish and fear in the eyes of those around h... | 128 |
20 | 1,391,599,642 | 16 | An atheist's effort to console a dying Christian child. | Hey, have you ever looked up at the sky on a dark, dark night? All those stars out there, hanging just above your head and if you could just reach a little higher, you'd be able to hold them in your hands? They're not so different than you or me, really - we just took different paths. We're both just star-stuff trying ... | 22 |
76 | 1,391,613,697 | 395 | The Death Sentence is a literal sentence, spoken by a cult of executioners, that kills the person who hears it. You are the first known person to survive this fate. | "The death call isn't working," exclaimed the inquisitor. He ran his hand through his long silver hair and sat down on an elaborately hand-carved wooden chair. It creaked with age as he sat. Next to him stood the executioner in a long purple robe and wearing a tall hat. A few feet away sat the gagged prisoner, tied to... | 289 |
3 | 1,391,625,623 | 22 | Write a story in which every character's name is Charles, and one Charles has decided s/he likes to be called Chuck. No other Charles has had a nickname before. | "Charles?"
"Here."
The teacher noted on her clipboard.
"Charles?"
"Present."
"Ummm, lets see, Charles?"
"Here."
"And Charles?"
"Here, I prefer Chuck."
The teacher stopped now, looking up at Chuck over her glasses. She took off her lenses and placed them on the clipboards.
"Now what kind of name is that, Cha... | 11 |
6 | 1,391,628,290 | 13 | A whale is summoned into existence by mistake. | "Harooold!"
Harold winced at the sound of her voice. He knew that tone well. "Yes, dear?"
"Harold," said Martha, "what is this *thing* in our living room?"
"It's a tail" said Harold. "Specifically, it is the tail of what appears to be an adult humpback whale."
Martha narrowed her eyes. "I can see that it's a *tail*... | 14 |
16 | 1,391,638,132 | 80 | Living off the grid for 15 years, and having no contact with the outside world, a hermit runs into another hermit, who has had no contact with the outside world, and has been living off the grid for 15 years. | The morning sun cut through the receding fog in the woods. As the day warmed, Alan found himself sitting next to the stream he camped by. The water was cool and clear, and he could see fish darting around under the surface. He set out a line and walked back up the hill to his small, earthen home. It had started as a h... | 30 |
8 | 1,391,642,822 | 29 | North Korean scientists successfully create time travel but the rest of the world doesn't believe the news report. |
Dateline: North Korea. North Korean scientists today announced that they have created the world’s first functional time machine, capable of both forward and backward time travel. The lead scientist on the project, Jun Ki Seok, had this to say, “The glory of the state allowed us the technology to create the world fi... | 14 |
7 | 1,391,657,910 | 14 | d-beat dad abandons his wife and children. Make me sympathize with him. | (I actually posted this story a few months ago to a different subreddit with the title "Why I abandoned my Daughter". If you'll forgive my reposting, I think it fits your prompt.)
I hated that ancient pair of shoes.
Supporting a wife and daughter meant I had to make this pair last. The backs had fallen apart and th... | 32 |
7 | 1,391,659,529 | 13 | You step onto a elevator. The door closes and you look at the panel. There are two buttons marked Heaven and Hell. The former is broken. | "Hello, Maintenance? It looks like one of the buttons on this elevator is broken" I said, leaning towards the speaker. "The top button is cracked, and doesn't go in any further when I push"
The speaker buzzed with a distant voice riddled with static "Hmm, sounds like you're having a problem, let me come over in a cou... | 16 |
6 | 1,391,663,672 | 28 | Your best friend is a conspiracy theorist and he just found out you're Illuminati. | Sarah ran her hand over the coarse leather cover of the pyramid clad book. She opened it and smelled its dusty and leathery scent. "Oh my fucking god," she said as she eyed the various illustrations of ancient architecture and mystical beings. She remembered conversations with Jenny about the mystery of the world and ... | 12 |
12 | 1,391,686,292 | 27 | A strange man knows a worrying amount about you. He’s here to help. | ‘James! James!’ the man called out as he alighted the E train at Forest Hills/71st Ave, his eyes scanning rapidly for someone. I looked his way from across the platform where I was waiting for the transfer to the F. I didn’t know him. His overcoat was rumpled and his hair blazed the color of the F train’s signature or... | 19 |
21 | 1,391,689,028 | 98 | A person with a high school education gets sent back into the 1600s and tries to explain science and technology to the people. | "So basically, magic," said the bartender. The rest of the villagers murmured in agreement.
I had stopped concealing my sighs hours ago. "No. Elec-tri-city."
The hardest part about suddenly appearing in the year 1612 is thinking you're going to change the world and then realizing you have no idea how things really w... | 59 |
25 | 1,391,691,154 | 117 | Scientists discover that we live inside of a computer simulation. They also discover DLC and cheat codes. | The first code to hit the internet was Infinite Lives and it immediately caused a rash of suicides, car chases, and monumental acts of daring filmed by spectators and uploaded to Youtube. My brother Ness was among the first in Toronto to try and climb the CN Tower with his bare hands, only to fall barely a hundred mete... | 46 |
7 | 1,391,697,106 | 20 | She was the most exquisite love you've ever had -and her betrayal of you the most intricate and damaging. | Most people say they could never tell you what makes them love someone. I was never most people. And her? Even less. It was the smile. It was always bright, always warm, always there. It was something that was more than a mere showing of teeth. It was what made her entire face light up and shine. It was what le... | 13 |
6 | 1,391,700,758 | 23 | A man writes a guilty confession to something that isn't illegal or morally wrong, but he feels that it should be. | I was just walking, you know? Just walking. Trying to get home like anyone else, hunched in my jacket because it's freaking *cold*. You were ahead of me, maybe a dozen paces.
I could tell by the set of your shoulders, or the way you adjusted the collar of your coat. Anxious. Sure, I was looking ahead. Nobody li... | 21 |
34 | 1,391,701,493 | 122 | A child born and raised on a space station experiences gravity for the first time. |
Growing up, my mother described it to me as the constant feeling of being pushed, by something you can't see, in every direction.
I had never experienced gravity in my life. You see, my parents were the only two astronauts assigned to the Space Station Helios at the time of the Flash. Back in 2028 in the middle of a ... | 206 |
11 | 1,391,705,478 | 18 | A father gets to write his childs' destiny and life. He is in a dilemma, from his horrible life experience, he knows how bad life can suck, but he knows it has its importance too. what does he do? how does he come to the conclusion? | *That won't do.* Jim thought long and hard about where his son would go in life. He thought about his childhood, his friends, his experiences in school. He thought about his love life, the women he would meet, the fun he would have. He thought about his career and his future family, the children he would father and... | 10 |
45 | 1,391,722,218 | 150 | The villain defeats the hero but the world turns out to be a better place because of his twisted views. | "Tell me, Mr. Curondo, do you think that the means justify the end?"
Mr. Curondo, tanned, well-muscled, shirtless, and strapped to a tilted surgeon's table replied with his usual bravado. The laser was slowly sliding between his legs.
"Evil is evil Raen. In the end, good always triumphs."
The black cloaked figure re... | 77 |
6 | 1,391,765,881 | 18 | A man is driven to madness by his toothbrush. | The second shelf. That damned second shelf. Every morning, and every night, I put my toothbrush on the first shelf. And every day, when I reach for it, it's on the second shelf. It was maddening. Who was moving it? Who was tormenting me?! I didn't deserve this. And then, one day, I saw him do it. He looked just like me... | 12 |
25 | 1,391,766,719 | 73 | Time freezes for all but one man, and does not restart. What does he do? | Chuck wandered through the countryside estate he most recently found himself in, the hallways and rooms silent and empty, abandoned and forgotten. It felt as if this place had been long ignored, and yet there was no dust, no sign of neglect. How many days it had been since someone else had walked these halls? Had the d... | 63 |
109 | 1,391,782,664 | 602 | The day after a near-fatal accident you receive a letter from God, saying it was just an administration error, and he asks you politely to commit suicide within 30 days. | The words which seemed a farce were printed on clean, neat stationary that somehow shimmered with an ephemeral glow, lending credence to the preposterous words written on it.
There's no way I could describe the message written on that letter, except maybe as impossible. But just as impossible had been my insane survi... | 336 |
7 | 1,391,795,476 | 32 | American Astronauts finally land on Mars, only to encounter a fully self-sustaining Soviet colony. | Commander Thompson sighed as she put down her binoculars. Flight engineer Wei Ping took them from her and carefully sat down on the martian soil, his helmet light illuminating the surrounding area where she crouched.
"Houston, Jane here, we have a protocol 7 event I think," she said into her mic. Wei began videotapi... | 12 |
5 | 1,391,802,805 | 29 | Two young men agree that if both of them make it past 90 they will try to assassinate the other to gain each other's inheritance. | Jon stared at the digital clock on his bedside.
*23:59* it told him, the digits flickering gently in the dark of his room, the colon between the two numbers dancing its rhythm.
"Tick tock, tick tock, goes the clock," he muttered, chuckling gently to himself, recalling the words his mother always used to say. It was... | 21 |
9 | 1,391,813,042 | 32 | An aspiring writer just wrote his best literary masterpiece in /r/writingprompts. It receives no comments or upvotes whatsoever. | Clearest of skies, and bluest of seas,
I poured my whole heart upon those keys,
Leaves in the wind, those moments flew by,
Beauty untouched like a summer's night sky,
Refreshing the page, my mind set ablaze,
Imagining the attention in so many ways,
Love for my writing, compliments too,
Yet ... | 33 |
48 | 1,391,858,435 | 114 | A genie granted you immortality many ages ago. The last human other than yourself has just died out. What do you do? | It began millenia ago. How many I have long forgotten. It is interesting, really. When people think of immortality they think that they will simply live to be able to do anything they want – to experience everything and achieve a form of completeness. Yet, how many mere mortals remember anything that happened in their ... | 81 |
21 | 1,391,863,896 | 40 | You are a serial killer in a support group full of other serial killers discussing each other's "problem". | **Look out! The descriptions are graphic!**
"Aw, man!" Zev says. "You know when you cut the head off and blood squirts out and hits the ceiling? Isn't that awesome? It's like a fountain!"
The other people sitting in the circle nod affirmatively. A woman, one of the few there, leans forwards in interest.
"That's actu... | 27 |
3 | 1,391,865,232 | 21 | You step outside your apartment to find a package containing a loaded gun and information about a person. The package was meant for your neighbor of six years who is apparently a bounty hunter. You were just headed to his place for your usual Friday night beers. | -038
"Son-of-a-bitch," Waldo shouted, tripping over something outside his door. He sprawled, but caught himself, tucking his shoulder and using his forward momentum to roll himself across the hall and back to his feet. He came up wary and looking to run. His eyes slicing left and right in search of danger. What he fou... | 13 |
8 | 1,391,882,189 | 15 | "She was like the girl next door, if you lived next door to a whorehouse." | She was like the girl next door, if you lived next door to a whorehouse. Long thin legs that went up to Heaven, and skinny arms covered in discount tattoos. She held herself with pride, this little girl in a woman's body. She didn't let nobody fuck with her, that one. I'd watch her through my screen door, while she lai... | 13 |
13 | 1,391,884,866 | 21 | You die and go to heaven. Everything that you've wholeheartedly believed in, was completely wrong. | I've always believed I was a good person. I couldn't really go on thinking that after I got up to the pearly gates, large as life and twice as real, and they didn't open for me.
"Hello?" I called out, a little nervous but rationalising that it was probably just some kind of mistake. Or maybe Saint Peter was on his l... | 21 |
15 | 1,391,925,613 | 19 | His super power is knowing exactly what he needs to say. | "We should just go home. It's my fault the girls bailed, man. I'm sorry. We'll never get in now."
Enrique Delgado looked his friend in the eyes. "Peter, we can go home, have some beers, play some video games, like we've done countless times before. Or we can do something different, something risky, something fun."
Th... | 24 |
7 | 1,391,929,796 | 60 | You are a pirate who's tormented spirit has been attached to your sunken ship for hundreds of years. One day the ship is salvaged by National Geographic. | "A fine vessel she was, the Cutlass. Terror of the East Indies during its heyday. I remember those days of plunder and villainy with a fond eye. We used to pillage the living daylights out of the Dutch and French Galleons that sailed the seas between Indonesia and Pondicherry. Made quite a bit of coin out of it as well... | 30 |
44 | 1,391,946,732 | 175 | You wake up in your favourite TV series. The protagonist needs your help. As you get to know him/her better, you start to root for the villain/antagonist. | I used to be a church going man. Not many churches left anymore. For the last year or so, I've been struggling to find God in the world around me. But I'll tell you, He hasn't made it easy for me.
I know I'm not the last person left on Earth. Groups of survivors pass through this town every now and then. Anothe... | 99 |
7 | 1,391,949,366 | 29 | A famous detective is actually a demon who solves murders by speaking with the dead. | Being dead and confined to earth ain't much fun if you're broke. But then, being broke is never much fun anyway. So could you blame me for starting a small business on the side? Just to drum up some capital, you see. Make myself comfortable until Lucifer let us know the apocalypse was coming. They say do what you know,... | 19 |
26 | 1,391,975,726 | 132 | A husband and wife are both secretly in online relationships. They finally arrange to meet their respective paramours and realize they have been cheating on each other...with each other. | "If you like Pina Coladas..."
Nah, it didn't happen that way. In fact, when I saw her at the Mexican restaurant, the one we always said we would try out but never did because we were "always so busy", a feeling of dread washed over me. I could see that that same feeling had overcome her too, because she had become as ... | 78 |
8 | 1,391,978,772 | 23 | You discover the message meant to be given to "The Chosen One" was wrongfully given to you. | Stan checks his watch, the little clock in the bottom-right hand corner of his computer, the clock shaped like a cat across the hall which Suzie brought in to help "break up the monotony" of the office, which only really served to make the place more office-like. It's five o'clock, still half an hour until he was allow... | 10 |
20 | 1,391,980,162 | 38 | Two brothers go to war but only one comes back. What happened? | It's hard to explain, really, but when you leave home and go to war, home isn't home anymore. It just isn't. The people change, they treat you differently; they nod and they give their respects, they thank you for your service or they ask you what it was like over *there*. Sometimes I wish I could be back with my squad... | 18 |
11 | 1,391,981,672 | 20 | An Evil prince/ess is kidnapped or caught by the Good Guys and its up to the Villain to save her. | I'm not saying that Truly was a great sidekick, or even a good wife. Hell, she wasn't even even a decent cook! But when someone insults the name of Evil... Well I, Dastardly, am not just going to sit in my throne of virgin's femurs and take it!
It started off as an ordinary Tuesday morning. Truly was making me break... | 14 |
3 | 1,391,983,858 | 26 | A dystopian sci-fi short story where spoken language evolved to use hashtags, memes and similar. | "Hashtag hey there swag!" Joanna sang out to her husband when she walked through the door. She set down her groceries on the counter. Her husband came through the connecting hallway, and helped her unload the groceries out of their paper bags and on to the counters.
"Honey, why the fuck," he paused, indicated the brea... | 28 |
40 | 1,391,989,444 | 80 | Write a terrible piece of emo fanfiction. Really make me cringe. | I stared into her eyes. They were black and unforgiving, and their gaze pierced into my soul like a samurai's katana. How could I be crying so much, and she not be? The girl was heartless — *heartless!*
"Get away from me," she whispered scathingly, her tongue licking across her teeth like a scalpel across the skin of ... | 81 |
70 | 1,391,993,770 | 192 | Superhero with the dumbest powers does something more heroic than any hero with good ones. | They all thought he was lame. All he could do was change the TV channel with his mind. Can't find the remote? Or too lazy to get up and get it from the table? This was a problem he would never know.
He was laughed out of super school for having the ultimate lazy man super power. They imagined he'd waste his life away ... | 391 |
3 | 1,391,995,497 | 19 | Facebook attempts to talk down MySpace from suicide. The ending is up to you. | F.B went to grab the door handle, but found the door already open, slightly swinging from the strong wind coming from outside. His hand hovered above the handle for a moment in confusion, but firmly pushed the door all the way open. He stepped into the dimly lit apartment, and made his way to Space's bedroom. His door ... | 14 |
15 | 1,392,021,783 | 35 | Two brothers go to war but three come back. What happened? | [WP] Two brothers go to war but three come back. What happened?
*Dig, dig, dig.* That’s all William was told to do. The art of trench warfare relied on dozens of soldiers having the thankless task of burrowing into the unknown. Still, it was better than being above ground, only the dirt could kill you down here. Willia... | 10 |
20 | 1,392,028,824 | 26 | Describe falling in love without involving looks, sex, nudity or mush | Let me tell you a little something about myself. I like sleeping.
I like sleeping a lot.
Even my nightmares are nice compared to what's waiting for me when I wake up.
At least in my nightmares, I can get out of them whenever I want even if it's into a worse universe full of things I hate.
I hated waking up.
Tha... | 12 |
33 | 1,392,036,929 | 66 | The world is at end, and there is one last ticket to Mars,a prostitute,with no family,argues with a scientist why she should get the ticket and not the scientist. | **Edited to include proper ending.**
The day I found out the end was near, I had a panic attack. They said it would happen within two years, and that they were creating a program to transfer several people to Mars. The best and the brightest would be given priority, they said, along with their families. Then, there wo... | 41 |
16 | 1,392,041,111 | 82 | You develop the ability to speak with Animals, however they don't listen / like it and instead taunt you. | "That fat fuck jerks the yerkin off to the creepiest shit, man."
Jason first heard the voice when he had just clicked away from his favorite special website, something involving feet, tentacles, and petite Asian chicks. It startled him, and also scared him on a deep level. To most everybody out there, he was Jason M... | 46 |
39 | 1,392,048,453 | 95 | Pick your favourite fantasy universe. Write about what it looks like centuries later, after entering the modern age. | Everyone says that this is the best time to live. We have heat, cities, peace, infrastructure, mass transportation, water, easy lives. You ride to work, write out copy after copy, go home to a meal and a warm bed. Honestly, I'm always sweating.
People barely believe in the past anymore. Wizards and dragons and elves ... | 43 |
7 | 1,392,049,412 | 32 | the story of humans first contact with extraterrestrial life from the perspective of the life that we visit. | With a shaky hand, Zeblong handed the letter to Zongleb. "To be frank, it doesn't look too good." As Zongleb read the letter, his eyelids folded themselves up his grey brow and revealed the gentle pink underside; the thin line of his mouth moved further to the foot of his round face, making way for the trembling eye. A... | 22 |
12 | 1,392,053,118 | 31 | You have just feverishly written down three hundred pages-worth of writing in a language you do not understand nor remember learning. Could they be from above, a new testament revealed? Are you a prophet? Are you insane? You need to find a translator. You need to know what you just wrote. | 'Ah!' exclaimed the short, be-speckled man before me 'The Cosgrove passage. I haven't seen such a complete version in years!'
I had expected ridicule, disbelief, hopefully even fascination - what I had not prepared myself for was recognition. Hell, it apparently had a name already. I placed the glass of water I’d been ... | 18 |
22 | 1,392,056,212 | 51 | You wake up in a drawer at the morgue. | I didn't have the energy to be surprised. Unfortunately, my predicament was predictable and I had predicted my predicament long before it was predicated. I'm lying on my back in the dark, utterly naked and I know, with a grim sense of satisfaction at knowing my own luck so well, that a beautiful lady (or man) will not ... | 25 |
1 | 1,392,056,845 | 28 | od finally patches the mana leak that has been plaguing the earth for centuries, and manually spawns some of the creatures that rely on it - Dragons, unicorns, etc. | >Attn:
>
>To users of system: Sol 2.1.4
>
>Subject: software patch w/ updates
>
>We would first like to take this time to say thank you all for taking part in our Beta release. We realise that there have been some glitches with the system and our developers have been working hard to fix them as th... | 30 |
13 | 1,392,062,507 | 27 | Everything's for sale! | In the bazaar you may buy laughter, whiskey breath, a Lilac breeze, or sunshine, but the compliments are free. You can buy lies, and slander to your benefit, but you should remember it's a seller's market. They sell jokes at a high price, and one liners fetch a pretty penny. They sell sorrows and woes and tears by the ... | 17 |
6 | 1,392,064,525 | 13 | You die and go to heaven. But when you get there, you realize that your heaven is someone else's hell. | I'm *lavacious*
I'm *rapacious*
Oh baby, I'm delicious and you know it
I wanna just... *oooh* right there
yes, baby
Right there
I think I've died and gone to heaven
It was a quarter past seven
An' I been hit by a bus
Up I'm floating
Cause damn I was devoted
I'm met on the door by ten thou girls
... | 12 |
28 | 1,392,073,904 | 15 | Make me hate you. | I'm the guy who'd steal candy from a baby. I care not for who you are. I most likely hate you, or will make a case to hate you. Unless, of course, you're rich and white. Then I'll treat you to a drink. The holy book is my moral guide. It's words are unflappable, exempt from criticism. I hate our president. He's black a... | 10 |
43 | 1,392,083,441 | 30 | me love the person you love | She is the worst cook you ever met.
I'm sure she would burn water if given the chance.
She refuses to pick up her messes and prefers the grime.
Hurricane Irene could be a cleaner housemate than her.
She has a habit of getting in to things, finding every nook and cranny of your personal life with her sneaky litt... | 23 |
8 | 1,392,091,680 | 17 | A lottery exists claiming to give immortality to one winner. A man or woman loses or gives away the winning ticket. | "Damn ticket," said Stanley Peterson, yanking it off his windshield. He sat down in his car, his boss' screaming on repeat in his head. He needed to think of something happy. He shut his eyes.
Childhood. He's running in a field with a stick in his hand, his German shepherd just behind him. He trips and the game of tug... | 18 |
11 | 1,392,108,073 | 38 | You're standing in your kitchen holding a glass of water when all of the water on Earth suddenly disappears. Everyone on Earth is now aware that you have the last glass of water. | What an absurd situation I thought to myself. All the water on Earth gone apart from this tiny glass here in my hand. How did I even know all the water had gone? If it wasn't for the title I would have had no idea I was in possession of the most precious material on earth. What I was holding was more valuable than any ... | 17 |
19 | 1,392,112,703 | 39 | A new drug hits the clubbing scene - cheap, very addictive, a great high and seemingly safe. | My friend died of an overdose. It wasn't really a *death* as such, just he flopped down next to me in the evening as a smooth skinned fourteen year old and downed the bottle so he could sleep. In the morning, he was nothing but a damp stain on the mattress. Kind of more an *unbirth.*
I'd heard about these side effec... | 40 |
14 | 1,392,126,094 | 25 | escribe a space battle between two massive alien fleets from the point of view of a lost cosmonaut who has passed beyond the point of no return to Earth. | Log Entry - Day 732
Calculations suggest that the *Sergey Illyushin* will indeed escape Saturn's orbit despite previous concerns. A quick check confirmed that the reflector is still fully functional. The craft should get close enough for me to take some good photographs of the planet.
Log Entry - Day 733
Conducted r... | 14 |
12 | 1,392,136,211 | 14 | Death and Santa are bored of their jobs. They swap roles for a few days. | The ethereal plane had never been a terribly comfortable space for Santa. Other, as most called it, was a place of crossing. A nexus of energy, from the familiar energies like heat and kinetic that seem to follow in the wake of passing mortals to the metaphysicals that make religious faith, scientific theory, and the e... | 15 |
13 | 1,392,136,507 | 25 | Write a hero story entirely from the sidekick's perspective. | "Hey! Listen!"
I feel like I have told him this a thousand times now.
"Hey! Listen!"
It doesn't make any sense to me. He has thrown hundreds of other peoples jug viciously for wealth. The moon is nigh, but this apparently isn't an issue to some of us.
"Hey! Listen"
Five....six....seven bushes chopped to bits. When... | 15 |
23 | 1,392,145,568 | 50 | In this world, you can instantaneously teach somebody a new skill and trade or give them a precious memory of yours, but once you give it away, you lose it yourself. | I’m old and my time is coming to an end. The Department of Traded Skills has advertisements everywhere, targeted at people like me.
*Sell your experience on the DoTS market! Apprentice and Journeyman rates comparable to your experience! Master rates pending evaluation!*
*Don’t want to wait for those drum lessons? Shr... | 46 |
17 | 1,392,148,242 | 42 | villain concocts an elaborate plan while overlooking a much simpler, more obvious, and elegant solution | He rustled about in his giant blueprints of ginormous plans to conquer the lesser known world with an sinister grin and an maniacal chuckle. His wiry grey strands of hair swim about in front of his face. "Aha!" This is the one. His greatest creation, the epitome of everything that could be, will be, or is evil. Even ... | 11 |
52 | 1,392,154,520 | 129 | There is a demon that lives in the corner of your eye, which only you can see, and all it does is stare at you. | Okay, look. I get it. You're very menacing and mysterious, and you know for a fact I've lost some sleep trying to figure out where you came from and what your plans are. And those horns - Are they horns? Or are they spikes? Well, they're pointy and disturbing and give you plenty of demon cred. Very impressive. And I do... | 143 |
24 | 1,392,157,448 | 111 | Every time someone wishes upon a star, that star is actually a satellite, and that satellite assigns an agent to fulfill that persons wish. | "Coffee tastes like shit today."
"You say that everyday, John."
"Coffee tastes like shit everyday."
My name is John Macintosh. And I fulfill wishes. Now before you start going off about how I'm some prancing fairy, my job is very technical. A satellite goes over some kids house, he or she states their wish, and, as ... | 36 |
23 | 1,392,183,071 | 127 | bulbs have gotten efficient enouh to last thousands of generations. Effecient enough that humanity has forgotten how to change a liht bulb. A light bulb has gone out. | It began as a whisper, no louder than the rustling of leaves signalling the quiet before the storm. Men, women, parents, children, all over the territory came the same murmurs. Nobody ever mentioned it aloud, but it occupied the minds of everyone, from construction droids to lawyers to gynecologists to astronauts.
"Ho... | 83 |
16 | 1,392,187,881 | 20 | The disappointment at finding out what actually happens after death | "So, this is it?"
"Yup."
"We just float around?"
"Yup."
"What the fuck? That's dumb. This is dumb."
"Calm down. It gets better."
"Can I eventually control where I float around? Or have a body or shape? Or like, interact with anything or anyone, or affect anything at all ever?"
"No. Nothing like that. But after ... | 18 |
30 | 1,392,200,479 | 101 | The moon is an egg, a shell containing a single, massive organism. | They were halfway through a pocket of Ummanote when the drillhead broke.
The force of the snap blasted three workers off their feet, and a rush of broken rocks buried them a second later. Dead, Himo knew; their suits would've been crushed like bubble wrap. The drill's support cage leaned sideways, teetering drunkenly ... | 64 |
9 | 1,392,203,100 | 18 | You are Cupid. You hate your job. | It's hard being me. I mean, for one thing, I've been trapped in a two year old's body for an infinite number of years. It's hard enough to pick up chicks when most people don't even know you exist, let alone when you're a *cherub.* And telling them I'm Cupid just makes it worse. Sure, okay, sometimes the job is funny. ... | 19 |
45 | 1,392,212,225 | 233 | After generations of space travel, humanity has found a perfect planet, almost exactly like Earth. An underground species who cannot survive sunshine studies these new radiation-immune monsters in secret. | "Activity in sector seven."
"Pull it up now!"
Across the brightly lit room, a screen as thin as paper materialized and began streaming video feed of a blue, cloudy, and peaceful sky. A shadow began to move across the land, and a vibration shook the soil down to the bedrock. The desks and chairs in the underground cav... | 63 |
51 | 1,392,214,978 | 23 | Your Reddit username is your superhero name. What are your powers and what do you do? | A lot of people claim that my powers are useless; the tabloids tend to describe them more as “powers” than *powers*. It’s funny how mocked you are when you’re not needed, but how quickly they cry for you the moment they need a hero. I’m a lot like Spiderman, in a way. Hunted, mocked—the enemy, as far as the papers are ... | 17 |
39 | 1,392,218,163 | 80 | In this world, everything is determined by the number floating over your head. Everything. And when numbers ahead of you die or get killed, yours moves closer to the coveted position of #1. You're number 22. For now. | They said Number One was on the run.
She'd gotten away from her bodyguards and vanished. Number Two, and none of the rest of us have bumped up, and we hadn't gotten a ransom notice or anything. We are pretty sure she ran off on her own.
I'd been Twenty-Two for oh, a year now. Being this high up, it's pretty go... | 68 |
12 | 1,392,219,209 | 22 | On your deathbed you are confronted by the person you could have been | I had always hated hospitals. The sterile smell, the white walls, I found it all just so... blank? I'm not sure how I would put it. I had only really stayed in one once before, when I was a child. I had had my appendix removed. I remember waking up after the operation, feeling nauseous, a large, grunting nurse shoving ... | 13 |
21 | 1,392,226,882 | 115 | A mime discovers that whatever he mimes -- sword, gun, umbrella, putting a box around someone -- actually works. | The Emperor sat on an invisible throne, which all of the dignitaries and world leaders could only imagine being lavish. No one in the audience of at least three hundred people dare speak, unless they wanted to offend the Emperor. There he sat, face a pale incarnation of death, with a single black tear running down his ... | 88 |
12 | 1,392,229,284 | 14 | The President of the United States has just contacted the Secret Service and told them to assault the Oval office and shoot the person sitting in the presidential chair. | "Jones. I need you to do something very important." the President's voice came through my phone, blaring into my ears. "I need you to kill the man sitting in the Presidential Chair."
My mind went blank. What could he possibly mean by that? Is this one of his classic pranks? Or is there actually an impostor in the Oval... | 15 |
11 | 1,392,240,728 | 17 | "Around the block I walked and walked, pretending you were with me." | Around the block I walked and walked, pretending you were with me. Through the neighborhoods we used to stroll through hand in hand. We got a couple slices. Just plain cheese for me, sausage for you. Our favorites. We petted Zeke's big mastiff, and Isaac's little pup on the corner of 18th and Frederick. Threw out... | 12 |
15 | 1,392,260,440 | 36 | - An assassin visits his therapist. | So how does being ordered to kill me make you feel?
I don't know.
I can't help you sleep at night if you don't open up.
Well, I guess, it's just that. It feels like a normal day at the office. So I just feel normal, I guess.
Go on.
Um. I usually get amped up before an assassination.
A lot of my sports-playin... | 25 |
29 | 1,392,260,460 | 96 | The rules have changed so that acting honorably extends your lifespan (and youth) indefinitely, while acting dishonorably shortens it. | It was so easy to see who wanted out. The cowards. The assholes. They were all selfish because they knew it would only be a matter of time before they'd be gone. I had heard about the old days, the days when people would brutallly murder themselves using knives, guns, and ropes. But now it was all too simple. Thos... | 87 |
3 | 1,392,275,285 | 29 | Instead of being married by a judge, couples are married by a jury. | "It's going to be fine."
My fiancée squeezed my hand and offered me a small smile. Her words resonate through the huge courtroom. I returned it weakly, staring at the six chairs that held so much presence in the room, even when empty.
“I hope so. I promise I’ll try to not screw it up.”
“I trust you. We can do this. It’... | 14 |
2 | 1,392,307,577 | 15 | A guy sits in a bar and jokes about North Korea. The story gets progressively darker as the guy starts to talk about the reality in NK | Morn joined us at the bar tonight. A stranger six months ago, he was now a fixture. My Trekkie buddies and I secretly called him Morn because no one knew his real name. He came in, sat down, drank for a few hours, then left. Never spoke a word to anyone but the barkeep.
A real enigma, ya know? Average height. Av... | 10 |
12 | 1,392,313,046 | 50 | The Fashion Police are real and more powerful than any authority on Earth. | "Weeee ooooo weeee oooo weee ooooo..."
"Oh for fuck's sake..." Winston murmured.
"Weeee oooo weeee oooo weeee oooo...." the officer continued as he trotted down the sidewalk towards him, "pull over mister!"
"I heard you," he cried, and stepped out of the flow of foot traffic and waited for his the officer to meet hi... | 30 |
12 | 1,392,318,555 | 28 | The main character is the single witness to a murder. The witness doesent feel horror, but fascination for the killing. | Art is Art. A dance is art. A story is art. The creations of the mind are all art.
Daniel wasn't an artist. He din't have the skill, or patience, or even the creative mind for art. He wasn't an artist at all, but he loved art. It was very late in the day, and Gas station Daniel worked at was finally closing up. He too... | 11 |
18 | 1,392,339,592 | 39 | A pilot floats alone, adrift in his damaged spacecraft and reflects on his life and situation as he watches his oxygen and power slowly run out. | I’m looking at the life support stats and I can still hear the computer’s voice in my head, even though I disabled it hours ago, it’s right there in red text and my mind automatically fills in the blanks, that gender-neutral voice, the matter-of-fact way in which it would read aloud to me, as if I needed a reminder, “O... | 11 |
20 | 1,392,344,657 | 112 | A man escapes the banal reality of his nine-to-five cubicle job by internally pretending all of his interactions are in the middle ages in a land where he is a famous knight. | Sarah poked at the excel spreadsheet and tapped her foot impatiently as she waited for the helpdesk guy to arrive. Oh god, he's so creepy, I hope he can just fix this quickly. Her excel continued to blink on and off, caught in a loop.
"Fair maiden, doth this foul spell vex you," Sir Alan asked with a deep bow.
"Its l... | 61 |
8 | 1,392,345,217 | 34 | All of a sudden, Kim Jong-Un dies. Write about what happens to North Korea. | The generals were waiting around in the parlor, worried silent faces filled the room, occasionally interjected by a dry cough. The highly decorated men had grown old indeed. Tonight they had been called to rise immediately. The superior leader's cold had rapidly aggravated over night. It was the crack of dawn, the dyi... | 12 |
34 | 1,392,373,207 | 58 | Being a shapeshifter in the military has its pros and cons. | Fear was the most powerful weapon that his country's military possessed.
Invasions simply were not financially feasible any anymore. Imagine if the Galactic Fleet had to be launched every time some rogue corner of a distant planet in the empire decided they wanted to make their own flag. The coffers of the Treasury wo... | 31 |
13 | 1,392,374,344 | 46 | Mankind switch to birth by selection. Women can apply to carry out children like a regular job. | “Good afternoon madam, welcome to Genetrix, how may we help you?”
“Good afternoon. I, um, have an appointment.”
“Certainly madam. Name please?”
“Amanda Smith.”
“Thank you Amanda. Please take a seat. You will seen soon.”
Amanda selected a slightly off white coloured plastic chair in the corner of the room. There wa... | 23 |
18 | 1,392,382,990 | 81 | Write about a person who planted a small tree in their childhood, lived their life taking care of it, and is now choosing to be buried beneath it - from the tree's perspective. | Hello, old friend. It’s been a few sunrises since you last sat in my shade. I am glad to see you one more time, but sad to see you so. You look so serene, but so frail. Where have gone those strong arms that I remember? Where is that spark in your eye? Mother, but I miss it so. When you looked at your woman, when you l... | 75 |
9 | 1,392,393,842 | 15 | - As you die you hear "Death is only the beginning...." | He'd been this way for months. The hospitals could only do so much. The drugs had ravaged his body to a mere shadow of its old self. Was it really worth it for these few extra months of being fed through a tube and talked to like a child. Death would be better. No, death had to be better.
It was happening soon no... | 10 |
31 | 1,392,394,571 | 27 | - Last stand of a space cruiser/battleship/destroyer against overwhelming odds | Do you remember where you were when it came?
I was in my office when I heard the noise. A terrible screeching followed by a wave that shattered glass and shook every building in the city. All across the city people heard the noise far above their heads, and thus their curious minds compelled them to look for the sourc... | 16 |
30 | 1,392,395,652 | 73 | The last man on Earth hides away from his hunters. | Lenny zipped up his thermo suit and pulled on his dark goggles. He lied down motionless next to a bush and made sure to breath down towards the ground. He felt the cold ground and began to shiver.
His earpiece came alive with a click. "Uh, Lenny they're really nearby. Just lie still."
"Its fucking cold."
"I know bu... | 99 |
12 | 1,392,399,033 | 24 | A prisoner of war somehow escapes a maximum security camp. | Ramsgard. The moment he saw the name three years ago, Larry knew his life had ended. There was no such thing as escape, no such thing as freedom, once you become a prisoner of Ramsgard. Parole had no definition, individual rights had no definition. The moment you stepped foot under the massive, steel archway, you were ... | 13 |
18 | 1,392,406,719 | 35 | You awake to find that the clock has somehow been reset, and it's early on the morning of the day you met your long-time spouse/partner. Knowing what you know, what do you do? | "Claire, come on! You need to wake up!"
"No, five more minutes. Let me sleep in for once, Theresa."
"Who are you talking to? You're going to be late for class on the first day!"
Classes? Wait, that wasn't my wife's voice. I knew it, though. I opened my eyes and saw my college roommate, not a day older than when we f... | 25 |
44 | 1,392,407,082 | 150 | r has won, WW2 is over. Write a story about what's happening in the U.S. and around the world. | Everyone thinks that if you want to change history you have to send someone back to do something impossible. "Assassinate Hitler," they said, and everything will be better.
It's not like we didn't try but the man did survive a fair number of attempts on his life from his own time (and more than a few from ours). L... | 116 |
9 | 1,392,419,037 | 18 | The United Federation of Planets has fallen.. | We had finally achieved peace.
Many thought it was impossible, especially considering how our ancestors could not keep harmony living on the same planet, much less a galaxy.
We were all so different in thought, torn apart by belief and selfish desire, for the longest time the solution was violence or to force othe... | 10 |
23 | 1,392,422,025 | 99 | A suicidal person is robbed by someone at gunpoint. What happens? | "Your wallet and phone! C'mon, hurry!" The rag over the man's mouth muffled his voice, clasped in both hands was a revolver.
"No."
He stood there, staring at me for a moment. "What do you 'no'? You can't just say no, I'm robbing you!"
"Well, I did, what are you going to do about it?" I said with a shrug.
"I suppos... | 188 |
22 | 1,392,455,875 | 175 | A married man comes to a shocking realization that he's been suffering from multiple personality disorder, and that his wife is the alter personality of him. | "How are you together all day, every day? If I was with my wife that long, we would have gotten a divorce during the first week!" This is something that I constantly heard from my co-workers. My response to them - we are best friends. It is true, though. We are together pretty close to 24 hours a day. We carpool togeth... | 45 |
10 | 1,392,464,613 | 18 | The Day Death Died | The day Death died was the day the world fell. I was in my History class, 10am on a Thursday morning and my professor had a heart attack. He clutched his chest, staggered away from the podium. One girl in the front row dialled the emergency services, choking with fear on the phone line. He fell to his knees and the cla... | 10 |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.