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[Evan Balster]

I propose a writing game as both a bit of fun and a means of exercising our skills.  Each poster writes a little piece of this story (whatever they'd like, really) and if desired appends a few thoughts on structure or direction, or a critique of prior writing.

I think these sorts of collaborations can be fun as they get us writing about places we would not dream up on our own, thinking about new situations or types of characters, et cetera.



The room was cramped.  Three of the four walls were covered in decaying pinstriped wallpaper; the other was glass, but coated with black paint.  The few places where it wasn't completely covered let in hints of reddish light; the only illumination.  In the gloom, a figure reclined on a rusting chair, its legs stretched over top of an uneven table.  The molding carpet left a dead smell hanging thick in the air, but it went unnoticed.

The chair let out a loud creak which echoed through its frame.  This had once been a respectable office, though it had grown no smaller since those times.  Why one would be built here of all places, or what purpose it had served, were irrelevant mysteries.  It served a purpose now, in this little sliver of time.  It was a welcome respite.

The figure's hand was on its face, as could be seen in the darkness were there anyone to watch.  Its fingers poised on the bridge of a nose in an unmistakable gesture of tired frustation.  The chair let out another creak, this one in protest, and the body in it bounced a little lower.  If the rusted metal gave out, perhaps the mood might be lightened.  Perhaps it would be worth a private laugh.

But it did not.  A sequence of white flashes from outside illuminated the room more brightly, rendering briefly visible little details, which in turn left shadows which followed the eye.  Little ghosts as would be seen if one glanced at the sun.

The grim possibility that the sun might not be seen for a while was enough to stir the figure from rest, and there came a screech of relief as it turned and stood.  Then, footsteps.  The turning of a door handle--another painful sound--and the click of the pins retracting.  Amidst the quieter complaint of the hinges, the small room was bathed in fluorescent-green light.

[Inanimate]

There was another thread like this, I forgot exactly where... it was about an old wizard looking for his wife or something. Had bikers!

Anyway, how shall this begin?

[Evan Balster]

(It already did...  Go ahead and continue it!)

[Xion]

If it gave out, perhaps the mood might be lightened.

I think it's unclear as to what 'it' is in this sentence. The figure? The chair? The mood?

If no one else has started writing a continuation yet, I will, and edit this post with the results. Elsewise stop me now.

edit: okay


The figure - revealing itself in the light to be just that; a figure, androgynous, humanesque but undefined, a gesture of the person that it had probably once been - glanced back into the tight space. Its eyes lazily drifted to each hole in the black of the window, reassuring itself of the persistence of the light that trickled through. Not a trick of its broken mind. Not a wishful thought made briefly visible through wishing hard enough. The flashes of light indeed persisted, and with a certain regularity, even.

The figure turned once more to face the bright and verdant green (that was still somehow dead for all its vivacity) and took a few tentative steps out into it, turning briefly only to close the door, tenderly, behind. With the 'ch-click' of the closing door, the fluorescent green light dimmed to a more human piss-gray.

The new light recalled Old Man's natural habitat: factories and offices and stale, routine, indoorsy places. The place reflected it, too - or a twisted parody of such locales: a narrow hallway floored with broken and filthy porcelain tiles, many missing. Walls lined with wallpaper of indeterminate pattern, peeling and soggy for some reason (as if there were some invisible ghost who made a job of going around and sogging everything). An electric hum sounded from behind a frosted glass ceiling - strangely whole, strangely clean - that emanated that fluorescent green and, now, the piss-gray light. At either end of the hallway was an old wooden door just large enough to reach from one wall to the other, and from the ceiling to the floor. Or maybe the hall was just large enough to accommodate the doors.

The figure, standing in the middle of the hallway looking something like a wisp of person, began to move towards the door on its left. Feet bare and black from filth, it went in a strange, slow, rhythmic sort of dance. The figure stepped deliberately, carefully scouting out the next sane footfall before slowly lifting its leg, wiping the spot off with its heel in a sweeping motion, and then firmly planting its foot down, squelching as it went, a victim of the sog-bringer. The figure continued this odd motion down the hallway: pause, lift, wipe, step, pause, lift, wipe, step. The electric hum coming from the piss-gray light provided a tribal chorus to the figure's ritual, and soon enough it had reached its destination: the door on the left.

[RCIX]

There was another thread like this, I forgot exactly where... it was about an old wizard looking for his wife or something. Had bikers!

Anyway, how shall this begin?

Yea i know, i wrote about half of it >.< It died from the Curse of Bvanevery as OP.

I might toss my hat in, just don't have time ATM. Maybe tomorrow!

[Xion]

er, in case it was missed, I updated my post as I said I would.

[RCIX]

Checking the door handle, he found it locked, though there was light leaking through the edges of the door. However, jiggling the handle revealed that the door was lose and would possibly come open with applied effort. He grabbed one of the loose floor tiles, and jammed it in between the door and the jamb. It was fragile though, and broke.

Looking around, his eyes came to rest on the light. More specifically, the frosted glass covering; if he could get that off, then it would make a good lever to pry open the door. As good as he's going to get, anyway, considering he's in a hallway with nothing else laying around to use.

The Old Man reached for the panel and prodded it. Not only could he barely reach it, but it appeared to be firmly glued in place. Perhaps the room he had just come from would hold a more useful implement. He shuffled with that awkward gait back to the door, and opened it (the light behind him flaring to green again). Examining the chair, he saw that one of it's legs was particularly rusty, and would possibly give. He yanked, pushed, pulled, and twisted on it for what seemed like an eternity before it broke, making a dull groaning sound while it did so.

Armed with this makeshift crowbar, he slowly marched back across the hall. He left the door open this time; the dirty grey light seemed to have a demotivational quality, as if it was bleaching out what little color and strength he had left in him. Getting the oddly shaped leg into the side of the door was a challenge, but he did it. Exerting what seemed to be all of what energy he had left, the door flew open with a loud crack from the breaking lock. A bright light flared, blinding the Old Man and causing him to stagger back as if in a strong wind. After a time, he felt something changing in him that could only be described as life. Shortly thereafter, the light didn't seem so bright, and he could see a vibrant landscape through that door.

Something didn't look quite right though, and this made him wonder whether it was an illusion. He had heard of things like this before; illusory worlds created to taunt those foolish enough to accept them, falling apart just as they started believing. In any case, the only way to figure it out was to try, so he started moving in the direction of the landscape.