I'll take the other thing.

[in_the_blue]

I miss the days when I used to host writing challenges right here in this very journal.

So. Now that the seventh Harry Potter book has been written... I think it's time for a different kind of writing challenge. I used to host the short-short ficlets, 300 words or less, open fandom.

Today, I'm going OC. And that doesn't stand for Orange County: it stands for original character.

Ready? 3, 2, 1, let's... get inspired to write original fiction, folks. The theme for the challenge is change: take 500 words to introduce an original character and demonstrate some measure of change for him, for her, for it.

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Rules:

• Fandom: original only


• Word count: 500 or less


• Main theme: change


• Ratings: No restrictions.


• Duration: Challenge opens now (August 30) and closes at 11:59 p.m. in whatever time zone you inhabit on Wednesday, September 5.

Post your ficlets as comments to this entry. Feel free to do as few or as many as you want, and if you see one you really like, be sure to leave a review or a comment. Remember, original fic only. I'll crack my knuckles and get going as soon as I get a few hours' sleep.

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NOTE: All ficlets in comments here are the property of their respective writers. Consider them copywritten with all rights reserved. If you want to quote, copy, or redistribute, please get the author's permission first. Otherwise, I'll have to lock this down. Thanks.

Comments

[kit-the-brave.livejournal.com]

I don't know where this came from, but here it is:

Footsteps on the stairs meant someone was heading for their office. There was nothing else in the basement but the snack machine, and no one had used that since rats had moved into it last winter. The rats were gone now – like half the staff, they hadn’t stayed after Sierra had been named division chief – but nobody wanted to eat from a formerly-rat-infested vending machine. Gabriel said they shouldn’t tell the new staff. Clara would argue with him, but it was pointless. There wasn’t any new staff. And there wasn’t likely to be any. No one would send more people to an office that didn’t do anything. Clara had knit three pairs of cabled socks since July. Her feet would be warm this fall, if it ever got cold.

“The vending machine had rats last winter,” she yelled out the door, but the footsteps continued.

“What?” said a voice, and a man stood in the doorway. “Is that a code?”

Clara dropped her yarn. “Um, no. It’s rats.” He was wearing a badge. He had red hair and freckles and looked like that actor, the one who wore armor in all his movies. “I thought you were coming downstairs to get food because you didn’t know any better.”

“I was coming to find Captain Sierra,” he said. “I need to give him my transfer paperwork.” He held up a sheaf of papers and then looked around the office. He didn’t say, “What the hell?” but Clara could tell he was thinking it.

Clara looked guiltily around the room. It was large, but it was also where everyone in the building had put things they didn’t know what to do with for at least four decades. There was a manual typewriter on one of the desks. Gabriel freely scavenged everything that people left alone for more than half an hour, but that didn’t make the office look any neater. What with Gabriel’s tinkering and the general lack of any real work, it looked like a cross between a machine shop and a yarn store.

“Yes,” she said. “I’m Clara Lindgren. Gabriel went to get pizza. The Captain won’t be in until later.”

“Pizza,” he said, with the air of someone grasping at the one thing that made sense. “Because the vending machine had rats.”

“Right,” Clara said. “I’ll call him and tell him to get extra.”

“I’m Kieran,” he said. “Cavanaugh. Are you really Clara Lindgren? The Clara Lindgren?”

She was blushing, she knew it. She wished she could hide, but the only door besides the one he was standing in was the door to Sierra’s office. “Probably,” she said. “But whatever you heard probably isn’t true.”

He looked at her seriously. “I heard you destroyed an army of gargoyles single-handedly, refused promotion and ended up in, you’ll excuse me, some backwater dump.”

“Oh,” she said. “Well, that’s true. Gargoyles have smaller armies than you would think, though. Their generals aren’t good at keeping them loyal. It was only about sixty-five.”

He was staring openly now, and only looked away when he seemed to realize he was being rude. He examined a wall calendar with an array of take-out coupons stapled to it. Clara pushed her bangs to the right, making sure they still hid the scar on her forehead.

They both turned at the sound of someone coming down the hall. Clara expected Gabriel, but it was Sierra. He grinned at her – he knew she was embarrassed, drat him – and then shook hands with Cavanaugh. “Glad you’re here,” he said. “If Gabriel ever gets back from stuffing his face, I need to talk to you all.” He looked at Clara. “You’ve got a case.”

[arasnaem.livejournal.com]

Hee! The gargoyles were a great twist! I love the disreputable feel of the department, and would love to know more about Clara. How cool is she!

[kit-the-brave.livejournal.com]

Oh, thanks! I'm glad you like her! I'm not sure what her background is myself, but I wanted to give her a kind of old-fashioned Grimms'-fairy-tale name. Maybe I'll write more!

Oops...I didn't reply to you the first time...

[govcampbell.livejournal.com]

ooh, interesting! Where do they work, is it army or police? I love the 500 word guideline, because there's just enough here to whet our appeties for more!

Very nice!

Re: Oops...I didn't reply to you the first time...

[kit-the-brave.livejournal.com]

Oh, thanks, I'm glad you like it!

I think I'd call it "very weird police," but I'm still working that out myself. :)

[acusa-dora.livejournal.com]

I like the grimy feel of the setting. Rats! Eww! I also like the fact that Clara is famous. She's like the John McLane character in the Die Hard movies. Everyone knows what she did and likely expects magic from her or writes her off the way some people wrote off John in the subsequent films and were then proven wrong.

[kit-the-brave.livejournal.com]

Oh, thanks, I'm really glad you like it! And now I'm picturing John McLane in my little office... :D

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

This is very... noir. It reminds me of police procedural animes. I like it!

And I tried to stretch my thoughts out and make them last longer, but that's all that wanted to be said about it.

[kit-the-brave.livejournal.com]

Hee - I'm glad you like it! And I should mention that the rat-infested vending machine is the only true thing in the story. :) Of course, the actual rat-infested vending machine was out in the wilderness, rather than being in a gritty urban setting...

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

Are you going to write more?

[kit-the-brave.livejournal.com]

Yeah - I think I have an idea for Gov's fic challenge with the same people, and then maybe I'll know enough to keep going!

[slaversbane.livejournal.com]

Please keep going.

I want to have a big gun and be a part of this squad. The setting is like summer rain on old cement great. Reminds me of Hellboy and Shadowrun.

[erised1810.livejournal.com]

Kit, i seriously hope you don't stop here .I want to read aboutthe case she gets and i already havea crus hon the man who jsut walked in... You're doign great with this!