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[Supermikhail]

But not in the (relatively) usual way. Basically, I'm tired of complex plots, well, actually of needing to look ahead at all. So I ask you to give me a single scene that I could work on without much pressure. Example? Well, if I could work it out myself, I would have. Maybe someone could provide a general theme, or storyline, but then I would need individual scene ideas or little plots. I would do one scene then pick another one and tack it on the end of the first, hopefully creating some semi-logical connection. It probably could be discribed simpler as "community writing where someone else does the writing." I don't want to try to impose on anyone, so random ideas are welcome, in the vein of "someone did something / went somewhere / talked to someone etc."

Well, here's hoping for a rescue from my mild case of writer's block.

[Enzo]

Doctor Hedgerow Hughes, in the service of her majesty, infiltrates the lair of Baron Von Moorstead and disables the central power transmitter of his clockwork automaton army, thus preserving the future of the Empire.

[LordBucket]

Doctor Hedgerow Hughes, in the service of her majesty, infiltrates the lair of Baron Von Moorstead and disables the central power transmitter of his clockwork automaton army, thus preserving the future of the Empire.

However, the power transmitter not only supplied power to the clockwork army, but also to the lights and doors in the facility, thus trapping the good Doctor inside at the bottom of a hermetically sealed, 7-level underground lair. Over the course of his attempts to find his way out, he encounters the single other living occupant of the facility: a humanoid chimera that is the Baron's only surviving experiment in genetics. Since it is completely dark, Doctor Hughes is unable to actually see the creature, but it turns out that she is female, and very lonely, because she is the only creature of her kind.

[Armok]

Que incessant shiptease.

[Supermikhail]

Well... I had quite a strange sleep pattern since I started this topic. I don't know about my writer's block, but it appears I cannot escape the curse of over-complicating things. Specifically, I came up with the following passage.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Shadows lay spookily. Hedgerow Hughes, a Doctor in Her Majesty's Secret Service, creapt through them, and constantly congratulated them on doing a great job with spookiness. He leapt past a moonlit window and behind the shield of a suit of armor decorating the hallway. Wheezing and sweating from tension, he peeked from under the shield and studied his surroundings. Then he withdrew his head and froze, silently cursing his parents for giving into their instincts one boring winter day (he imagined) a little over his age ago. So, philosophically it could be considered an eternity, since he hadn't existed then and neither had the world. Well, he'd forgotten what he was startled by. He peeked out again. Nothing moved. "Phew," Hughes said.

"Bless you," said a voice.

"Well, er, thank you," Hughes said. "Even though it was "phew", not "achew."

"Er, my bad," the voice said.

"No problem," Hughes said. Then he carefully recollected the direction which the voice was coming from. "Are you a suit of armor by any chance?" he asked.

"Why, you could say so, couldn't you?" the suit of armor acknowledged cheerfully. "While in fact I am a sophisticated machine complete with the latest model of an em-core and an adjustable moral manipulator."

"Whoah," Hughes said. "That's... that's certainly impressive. Well, I'll be going then."

"Uh, okay," the machine said with a hint of disappointment in its voice. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah, pretty sure. Got switches to kill, people to flip."

"Oh."

Hughes slipped from under the shield and started walking away.

"Hey, are you by any chance an enemy spy?" the machine wondered.

Hughes froze. So, it came to this. It had to be this way. He drew himself up.

"Nah," he said. "They always confuse me with him. Common mistake."

"Ah, sorry," the machine said uncertainly. "I guess you could say you look awfully like him."

"Yes yes," Hughes confirmed. "Well, toodles."

And so he was on his way. He darted into the next shadow, and it was just too deep. The stone plate of the floor cracked in the middle. Its parts slid apart with a disconcerting rustle, and Hughes plunged into the netherworld.

It should sound pretty desperate. Although, in my defense, the scene description wasn't exactly a description of a single scene, but I shouldn't complain because I didn't provide any example and other things. Well, I don't know what to do with what I have written, besides half an idea to start all over because I don't seem to be getting close to disabling the central power transmitter, and instead went in some completely sidewise direction.

[Armok]

Funny, but a bit over the top. It reads like a comedy sketch.

[Enzo]

That was indeed a bit silly. Doctor Hughes is a gentleman adventurer*, sir, not a charlatan!

*Also a doctor.

He darted into the next shadow, and it was just too deep.

I did like that line though.

[Fniff]

In a radiation-soaked post-apocalyptic world, an insane AI who became malevolent too late goes very quickly through the stages of grief about the fact the humans died before he could even start.

[Supermikhail]

Sorry, not doing requests right now. I've got a mind to take a good rest. Maybe that's what my writer's block needs. I think I'll wait until I get really inspired to start doing something again. Maybe forcing myself to write everyday and not meeting some perfectionist deadlines and especially NaNoWriMo wordcounts is what's made me so frustrated.

[Fniff]

I suggest one page per day, though. It might help.

[mr. macduggan]

When I'm stuck when writing (though I kinda suck) I force myself to write a page in 10 minutes flat. Do this once a day, and don't beat yourself up about the inevitable low quality of the hurried writing, and your ideas will flow MUCH easier from your mind to the page. If you find this limit easy, you could always increase the amount you have to write, but these speedwrites always break my blocks.

[Supermikhail]

Er... C'est impossible. Opened a new reply to try this exercise, and plunged into a bout of procrastination. But besides that, I've never been able to write that fast. I mean, I'd usually barely get to a page in a half-an-hour, that is on a good day. I still want to push the "everybody is different" clause. And "burnout".

But now the idea of one page a day seems inspiring. I think I feel about relaxed enough for that. But what to write about? I still don't know how to follow up on that little Hughes romp. I mean what interesting thing could happen in the "netherworld". And the AI idea, I'm not sure how to make it funny.

[Fniff]

Who says it has to be funny?

[Supermikhail]

Spoiler: One more (click to show/hide)

While he was falling, a creepy child on a landing spoke to him accusingly, watching him with her disproportionately large eyes.

"You aren't a real doctor, are you?"

He didn't let it get to him that a random creepy child with disproportionately large eyes caught on to his act so fast, and persevered in his falling.

He landed on some buns. The air smelt strongly of mold, and a reddish-yellow lamp shone desolately at the ceiling. In the semi-darkness, a pair of... pairs of pairs of small glazed orbs glistened.

"Well well," said a voice like the cutting of paper with very sharp brass scissors. "If it's not another bipedal fly."

Hughes got up from the buns indignantly. He considered countering with a similar insult, but wasn't sure it was actually an insult he had just been handed. Then, step by step, pair by pair, eight spindly hairy legs swung forward, and he knew what it was.

"Sorry, I think it's a wrong door," he said smartly, in spite of his guts.

"Oh, no!" the monstrosity exclaimed. "You're not getting away this time!"

"Well, now I'm sure you've got me confused with someone," Hughes said. "What was the last person's name?"

"MEAT!" the creature grated.

"What a happy disagreement, my name's..."

The abomination rasped. Hughes squeaked and ran away. He ran around the room, weaving among tapestries of spider web, claws clicking at his heels, until he came to a wall. He turned and ran in a different direction. He came upon another wall and considered it a strange coincidence and maybe an unhappy point in favor of the spider-thing's theory. He turned again and saw a dental chair.

"Are you in need of dental work?" he pleaded.

"What?" The grotesque paused and munched its mandibles.

Hughes leapt for the chair.

"NO!" he heard a scream behind him.

"Good for you," he remarked and grabbed the drill. It didn't have the thingy in it which drills! He searched frantically and could almost feel the wind on his skin as the fantasm moved closer. There they were! He grabbed the largest thingamabob and pushed it into the hole in the drill. It didn't want to go in! He tried again! And again! And he had blisters on his fingers! And the doodad finally entered and clicked, and he couldn't believe he hadn't been eaten yet!

He turned around. The freakish thing stopped looking over his shoulder and shrank back bashfully. Then it recomposed itself and reared with its mandibles spread and quivering.

"Aaaaaa!" Hughes said, revved up the drill and plunged it into one of the mandibles. Sparks flew as metal ground on metal; the beast pressed on, Hughes' hand ached.

Suddenly the spiderosaur withdrew. "Time to wind up," it said. Then it turned around and waggled away.

Hughes sank to the ground.

"What did you want to eat me for, if you're all mechanical?" he said with disappointment. He dropped the drill, then lay down. Just in time, a lamp lit up in his head. "Wait!" he exclaimed, jumped up and ran after the chelicerous automaton. His goal was close.

Who says it has to be funny?

Well, I for one. In short, I think there are few things that make fiction readable, especially on the Internet. One of them is humor. Others are sex, and zombies. Which would you like to be featured in your idea?

Also, I think that's really something I wrote. There is a chance it'll make peope puke. And it might cut the things I can put into my writing to the last two... Well, I smiled while writing, but... it's just me.

[Capntastic]

I was going to go line by line and red pen the whole thing for you, but it's really too incoherent for me to sit through.   I'll point out what I noted from the first few lines though:  'Creepy' isn't a useful descriptor, you can't really express anything by saying 'a creepy little girl', without relying on people's subjective conceptions of what that actually means.   Further, 'disproportional' is being used in the same way, since it means out of proportion.   You're not explaining what it's out of proportion to.   Obviously you mean the rest of her face but there's still a mental gap between making that connection.   And then you sort of use the same descriptors:  'creepy' and 'disproportionately large eyes' like a sentence later.  Random is also a really empty word to use.