This week, we’re mixing it up a bit! No, we haven’t become DJs. No one wants the earworms.
Normally, it’s send a prompt, get a prompt. Not feeling it, grab a spare. This week, thanks to a handy internet emotion generator, we’re adding in another category. The prompts work the same, but this time, it comes with an extra assigned emotional zinger.
| Prompter | Prompt | Emotion | Prompted |
| Fiona Grey | The llama ate it. | Fury | Cedar Sanderson |
| AC Young | An advert stuffed through your letter box: “Trudie’s Pet Tours: We’ll give your pet a holiday they’ll never forget!” | Sorrow | nother Mike |
| Becky Jones | Satisfaction | Fiona Grey | |
| nother Mike | The warning label on your new sofa says, “The company is not responsible for injuries due to tickling the toes of your sofa.” | Pleasure | Becky Jones |
| Leigh Kimmel | Running a Resistance is a lot different in the Space Age. | Optimism | AC Young |
| Cedar Sanderson | The instructions for installing the fold-space warp into the new bookshelves were confusing | Anticipation | Leigh Kimmel |
| Spare | The frying pan became a tactical skillet. | Guilt |
| Spare | The laid-back ears indicated an extremely unhappy donkey. | Disappointment |
| Spare | There was a toad on the birthday cake. | Passion |
| Spare | A paper-wrapped pickle. | Contentment |
Will this add to the challenge or result in chaos? Does it guide the story idea too much or spark ideas faster? Let us know in the comments – with your offering, of course. (Hey, lurkers – what do you think? And thanks for reading!)
Header image by Fiona Grey
More Odds Than Ends 
Leigh Kimmel supplied this week’s prompt: Running a Resistance is a lot different in the Space Age.
As an additional challenge, my specified emotion was: Optimism.
The set-up to a Resistance isn’t all that optimistic, but I tried to end on a suitably optimistic note.
—
Elysium II was in a state. The warships of its owner had been driven off, and the enemy had landed troops on the planetary surface to control the territory. The enemy troops had defeated the loyal troops in pitched battle, and all experienced military personnel from the owner had been locked away in internment camps.
Hera Hellion had lost her husband in the bombardment. Her son was serving in the navy – as far as she knew he was still alive; the navy fighting to return and liberate Elysium. In the meantime, she had to survive, and ensure that there was still a loyal world left to welcome them home.
With most of Elysium’s men either killed or locked up, it would fall to her women to lead the resistance movement, and serve in the shadow government.
Hera had downloaded everything she could lay her hands on about resistance movements of the past. She’d printed out as much as she could – paper being easier to hide than bytes in an electronic-information-based society – and had started to read through the forest.
Her plan was to pass the information around those friends she thought she could trust. Between them (hopefully) they would start the Elysian Resistance.
There were limits to what they would be able to do. Resistance movements of the past had been able to rely upon the support of foreign powers to supply weaponry and other essentials that the occupiers didn’t want them to have.
But in this case they were days away from any support, and there was no option of any surreptitious supply drops any time soon. So no access to modern weaponry, so they would have limited capacity to take on the occupying forces. Still, there were alternatives.
Hera was planning on being inspired by Laurence of Arabia. She intended to keep the occupiers trapped in the cities, leaving the countryside free of their taint.
There wasn’t anything that she could do about the occupiers when they were in the cities, and the air would be theirs for the foreseeable future, but she could deny them large parts of the countryside. Blowing up the larger bridges would prevent the enemy from crossing the rivers with their tanks without affecting the locals too badly. Judicial selection of the mid-size bridges would deny the enemy access to large swathes of the countryside with their infantry vehicles as well, but the selection would have to be made with care, as a lot of these were important for transporting goods the locals needed around the place.
It wouldn’t be easy. It would be very dangerous. But it had to be done. Hera was determined to prevent Elysium from becoming just another occupied planet, beaten into the ground by its occupiers.
Elysium would survive. It would rise again from the dust of defeat like a phoenix from the flames. The navy would return to liberate them, and Hera and her resistance would be ready and waiting to assist them in returning the planet to the rule of its people.
No matter how long it would take, Elysium would survive. Elysium would be freed. Elysium would thrive once more.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think you nailed the optimism!
LikeLike
Not a fan of the random emotional attribution. If the provider suggested, sure. But I know if I were to take on any prompt that unless things just happened to align, I would merrily, perhaps even POINTEDLY ignore random emo-trashing of it.
LikeLike
AC Young reminded us that…
An advert stuffed through your letter box: “Trudie’s Pet Tours: We’ll give your pet a holiday they’ll never forget!”
Mix with a dash of sorrow? Okay…
[a quick sketch…]
Haylie looked at the ad and sighed. An advert stuffed into his letter box proclaimed: “Trudie’s Pet Tours: We’ll give your pet a holiday they’ll never forget!”
It made him think of little Blackie. Blackie had enjoyed trips, as long as Haylie went with him. Heck, he even seemed to enjoy that last trip to the vet, even if he was in pain.
Haylie thought back to that August day. Blackie had hardly been able to walk, and Haylie asked a friend to drive them to the vet. Blackie perked up when they got in the car, and looked around at the passing landscape. He stuck his nose out the open window and sniffed, his long hair and ears blowing in the breeze.
It didn’t take long for the vet to diagnose the problem. Blackie’s kidneys had quit. When Haylie asked about kidney machines, the vet chuckled. No such option for dogs, but he could keep Blackie alive for a few days. The vet explained that they would inject water into the abdominal cavity, and then extract it again. Haylie had gasped, and asked if that was painful. The vet nodded, but said if Haylie wanted a few more days with Blackie, they could do it.
Haylie shook his head, and said no. He did take a walk into the parking lot with Blackie. They walked slowly around the edge of the lot, and stopped. He held Blackie for a few moments, and talked to him. Blackie listened, then licked his cheek. Then they walked back into the vet.
Haylie had held Blackie in his arms while they administered the euthanasia drug. Blackie breathed his last.
Haylie let his friend drive him home. Then he cleaned up the food and water dish, and the little bed. Then he sat and looked around his apartment. His empty apartment.
He shook off the memory, and looked at the advertisement again. And now they offered him a trip for Blackie? Too late.
The paper crumpled into a nice ball in his hand.
[ouch. Too strong?]
LikeLiked by 1 person
*sniffles* Dang it, Mike!
LikeLike
Very well done. A good description of someone being thrown onto a tangent by sudden emotion.
LikeLike
[…] (because I’m pretty sure I’m the only artist in the group right now) head on over to More Odds Than Ends. We’re trying some new things in the next few weeks, so feel free to join […]
LikeLike
and I went off the reservation this week. https://www.cedarwrites.com/2022/06/28/odd-prompts-fury-of-the-llama/
LikeLiked by 3 people
So, whe;the teacher asks where is your homework, the answer is, “The llama ate it!” Complete with art to prove it! Nicely done!
LikeLiked by 1 person
[…] week, we tried something different at More Odds Than Ends. And I goofed, but it worked! In adding a randomly assigned emotion, I listed enough for the usual […]
LikeLike
And mine is now up on my LiveJournal at https://starshipcat.livejournal.com/1170141.html. Still rough, but I’ve been busy with a convention this past week, and eventually all these segments will have to be pieced together to make a story.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think he needs the left-handed wrench to tighten the bolts on that warp… especially if they’re dancing to songs from the Rocky Horror show!
LikeLike