John Perkins
Story Page
Have you ever read 'Choose Your
Adventure' books? This is meant to be sort of like that. You read for a bit,
then you are asked to make a choice (go with the men- turn to page 37, go
investigate the crash, turn to page 26). You turn to the appropriate page, read a bit more, then make another choice, etc..
My idea is to have people read up to a choice that hasn't been followed yet. When you get there, you're supposed to pick one of the choices and write what happens when the reader makes that choice, up to the next choice. For example, let's say no one has written what happens if you investigate the crash. You could write what happens if the reader makes that choice. Maybe there's a strange object there- you could leave the reader with the choice of whether to touch the object or not. As more people contribute, the story will grow in many different directions. I don't know where it will go, and that's the main point. Let's see what happens.
There are only 3 rules. First, whatever you write, it should be consistent with what's happened so far, depending on what choices were made to get wherever you are in the story. Second, you can respond to only one of a given set of choices, but not both. You can respond to one of the choices that you yourself just wrote, but not both. The idea is to keep any one person from dominating the story. Third, try to keep it in the PG range, certainly no further than PG-13. No cuss words, please.
Fourth, don't hog the story. If you want to say that a character's
favorite color is green or that he/she doesn't like mice, that's fine.
But don't describe every last detail of the character's appearance,
preferences, etc. in just one section of the story.
I'm a terrible writer, so we have my friend Jason to thank (or blame) for the opening. Also, feel free to make any suggestions you want. A different title for the story, something more imaginative than Story Page, etc..
That's it! Responses are first come, first serve. Here's the first part of the story...
Our Story Begins
After six and a half hours of sleep, you awake in your bed and see that you've beaten the alarm clock by about a minute. Just as it goes off at 6:30am, you reach over, turn it off and groggily swing yourself out of bed. Despite waking up, you've never been a morning person, and the dim light filtering through your window due to the overcast morning does nothing to improve your disposition.
Normally you'd head straight to the shower to wake yourself up, but the hunger pains in your stomach are doing a pretty good job of that right now. Getting up off the bed, you shuffle out of your room and into the kitchen. Figuring that it'll take too long to open the fridge and get milk for cereal, you head to the cupboard and grab a packet of pop tarts. Quickly opening them up, you pop one in your mouth and take a bite, and as you chew, you hear a knock at your apartment door.
Wondering who it could be, you walk over and open it up. Immediately afterward, you wish you hadn't.
Standing before you are two white men in black suits with shades and earpieces, looking just like the brutally efficient government agents you've seen in TV shows and movies. As you chew your pop tart dumbfoundedly, the one closest to you speaks.
'Sir, you're going to have to come with me, your country needs you.'
As his words sink in, you gain enough presence of mind to say, 'Say what?'
'There's no time to explain, you've got to--'
You hear a loud crash in your bedroom.
To go with the men, <write
it>.
To investigate the crash, <write
it>.