Hey guys! I need to write a cryptic 7 part story and have no idea where to start. Anyone got any ideas they'd be willing to throw at me?
Shameless self bumb with another Martin Van Maele picture
>>29227281
Part 1:
A young man awakens to find himself in a white room with 4 doors. Going through one of these doors, he finds himself in the exact same room, the door he just came through disappearing behind him. He continues going through the doors, and tries each one, finding they always lead him to the same room.
Content doesn't really matter I just need to be able to extend it for 7 short parts
>>29227315
hmm lemme see what I can do with this
>>29227281
>>29227315
>>29227344
Part 2:
The boy cannot determine if there are multiple rooms that look exactly the same, or if he is in an infinite loop of the same room. He decides to leave an article of clothing on the floor, and goes through a door. When he goes through the door, he finds himself in the same room with the same article of clothing on the floor, just a different color. His red shirt, for example, turned yellow, blue, and green. The last door returns it to the color red
>>29227281
>>29227344
>>29227315
>>29227297
>>29227327
Part 3:
The boy decides to do some more experimenting. He opens the door on the far right, and throws a piece of clothing through. Looking behind him, it did not appear in the room he is currently in.
He then decides to go through the door on the far left. The piece of clothing is in there, but has become a different color entirely - a mixture of the two colors each door is associated with. There is a fifth door in this room.
>>29227438
>Part 3:
This is getting good I'll post when i've written i
>>29227438
>>29227527
it* oops
Somewhere in 1600 something ye old england
A little boy walks into an old womans puppetshop
time passes by, he walks around feeling each toy
intriguing fashion, alive eyes, soft hair.. fascinated by the attention to detail.. perhaps too interested
the old shopkeep hobbles over and asks which figurine he likes
Thomas McKinnley of course, a popular seller, a little sailor boy of the royal navy said to be made after the admiral himself!
she picks him off the shelf and asks if the boy knows how to walk a puppet
he shakes his head, the puppet does a little dance to the whistle of her majestys navy, the boy giggles with glee
she hands both crosses to the boy and says "try it for yourself lad"
a natural! the puppet takes one no two no THREE steps worth.
An ungentle nudge snaps a string, the boy panicks and drops it. A leg breaks, but not all is normal. no.. a tear came from the puppets eye
The old woman becomes irritated and tells the boy to leave in a witchy tune, he fled for the exit and ran home
>>29227623
oh jesus christ shut the fuck up
>>29227438
This is so hard fuck I'm taking way too long lmfao
>>29227315
>>29227359
>>29227438
I awoke in a grey room, single bulb hanging from the cieling, dirty brown mat on the
floor. 4 doors surrounding me. Alone with only the clothes on my back I opened
and walked through each one to find myself in the exact same room.
I'd begun to frantically walk through the doors, unsure of whether this was
illusion or an endless loop back into the horrid, dull, grey room. Decandently, I
decided to leave my shirt on the mat in the room I'd begun to know. The same grey against
that dirt brown.
Through every door I ventured, to the South the room was a green the shade
of the leaves, as was my shirt. To the West, the room screamed red. The sharpest shade of
anguish lay on my once grey shirt. North, the room blinded me with yellow, a late spring
breeze feigned past. To the East was the deepest blue I'd ever seen, the sound of the sea
came to my ears.
Back through the door I went, to find grey against the mat once again. I snagged my
shirt and shook it off. Feeling bold that I'd figured it out, I decided to get daring.
The west door I opened, and threw my shirt into, quickly closing it behind me and
turning to watch. Surprisingly, no shirt came through the door I'd previously entered from.
Through the east door I went and found my shirt strewn across the floor. Something
wasn't right.
>I didn't proofread
>>29228206
My shirt was uncomfortably black. The room was an indistinguishable color, with the lights
dimmed to only see the presence of the doors. There stood an unnatural door in the center of
the room, the same color as my shirt, on that same brown mat. It was calling for me
glowing with the screams and sea.
I put my shirt back over my torso and felt a longing to open the door. As I walk through
the frame my pulse drops and I'm laying in the center of the first room yet again. I felt...
different.
To the North the grey shirt flew, and to the South I entered. This time finding a room an
indescribable absence of color. No light was necessary in this room as all was illuminated,
including another door in the center. On a now cleaned brown mat. The feelings of relaxation
came over my body as I celebrated this room. My shirt now white, I put back on and went through
the door. As I reached for the door I walked out onto the same, dirty brown mat. I felt...
different.
>>29228206
>decandently
not a work. And the word decadently wouldn't work either.
>>29228243
Why not? I'm trying to display that he's feeling completely out of place in this environment.
>>29228290
to the point of leaving the room that he already knows well
>>29228301
decadent, which you spelled wrong
decadent means extremely self-indulgent (decadent chocolate)
or
degenerate
so what you are saying is he put the shirt down in a manner that was extremely satisfying to him and made him feel really good, or you are saying he put the shirt down in a manner that was morally wrong
>>29228419
okay I see what you're saying. Like I said I didn't proofread cause I didn't want the thread to die. I still feel like decadent works, because it was purely to satisfy his mind. Is their another word you could suggest me to that may fit what I'm trying to convey better?
>>29228206
>I began bursting through door after door, desperately searching for *something* to change!
>Could this be the same room, or was I stuck in a building filled with rooms that look exactly the same?
>There was only one way to find out. I decided to leave my shirt on the mat in this room that I had come to know. A soft grey cloth on the mat's rough brown.
>>29228597
meant for >>29228597
this was not a comment with original qualities, but adding this sentence made it extremely original
>>29228597
That's really good, thanks for the tip! Do you have any other criticisms I could hear? Anything to improve the story really
>>29228644
it really isn't good, its 6am here I need to go to sleep
>The sharpest shade of
anguish lay on my once grey shirt
This doesn't really make sense
>Feeling bold that I'd figured it out
Feeling bold AS I had discovered this new piece of information
or
Feeling bold BECAUSE I had discovered this new piece of information
> I snagged my shirt and shook it off.
I picked up my shirt and shook off the dust.
>The west door I opened, and threw my shirt into, quickly closing it behind me and
turning to watch.
You are trying to sound too much like Yoda.
-----------
I opened the western door and hurled my shirt through. I snapped my head behind me as I shut the door, but found no shirt flying into this room.
This confused me. Leaving the shirt on the ground led me to believe each door led to the same room... but now my shirt was in a room that was not the one in which I stood. This was deeply confusing.
------
>>29227281
7. Seven. Ven. Venn Diagram. 7 Pillars. 7 Aspects to the diagram. Place the aspects as you please to experiment with your newest universe. Will you have strife combine heavily with love? Do you even know which pillars align to which aspects?
>>29228731
i'm not trying to be direct but like I want the red to represent anger and lust. The feelings of the room are supposed to come over him, only enforced by the colour. the red is sharp as if it stabs in the side, the anguish lays on the floor materialized as a blood red shirt.
>trying to sound too much like yoda
loled, I like the way you phrased it better but I was going for a disorientated feel to the phrasing of that line
>>29228816
Inverted writing can be a useful tool for changing the order in which actions are observed. However, it is possible to overdo it, and you did overdo it in a few sentences.
Similes and metaphors can also be useful for conveying emotions, such as the anguish on the floor. However, because anguish isn't tangible, it doesn't make sense for it to have a position within space. Therefore, saying the anguish is on the ground just sounds weird and doesn't make sense. It sounds like you are trying too hard to be deep, which you can't really do in this story because it is only a short story and it is not a poem. You can only easily do that in longer stories or, more frequently, poems
>>29228915
hmm logical. Should I just remove the anguish thing? I'm afraid it won't convey the right emotion
>>29228951
the emotion is correct, but the way in which you said it does not convey it correctly.
>To the West, the room screamed red. A blood red anguish lay on my once grey shirt.
is better, in my opinion, as it explicitly describes the shirt's color while keeping the emotional word
>>29229067
Agreed, any other pointers? I'm about to post it and go to bed but I appreciate the help you've been giving me as a fellow writer.
>>29229150
Ha, I'm not a writer, just an engineer.
I can't think of anything else. The writing isn't terrible great, everything seems a little bit exaggerated and the plot seems MUCH too rushed, even for a short story.
I would recommend starting off with multiple paragraphs detailing the young man waking up in the room, thinking to himself how confused he is and doesn't know where he is, examining his surroundings with caution (there might be danger), and choosing which door to open. Then, he chooses another door and gradually becomes more impatient as each door leads to the same room.
Eventually he gets pissed and runs through door after door only to find himself running in circles.
As he is bent over, hands on his knees panting, he comes up with the idea to leave something in the room so as to determine if he is travelling into a different room or the same room.
The introduction of a story is extremely important, because in reality it's the hook of the story. As most people know, the first impression a person gets of something (whether it be another person, a videogame, a food, or a story) is the most important impression, as humans try to justify their first feelings of something even if it gets bad.
AKA why women don't leave abusive husbands who were kind to them at first, why someone who loved the first season of a TV show will still watch the whole second season of that show even if it's terrible
It's actually documented human psychology that humans will try to justify how they felt when they first made a decision (such as to read your story). So if the person reading your story really likes the beginning and feels it is good, the rest of your story can be simply mediocre, but they will convince themselves it is almost as good at the beginning of the story.
Unless you really fuck up the middle and ending, in which case psychology will no longer be on your side. Every human has a limit to how much they will try justify their feelings.
>>29229236
I'm trying to keep it super short, if somewhere down the road I decide to expand upon it the story will definitely be longer. It's gonna be posted over the next 5 days in queued posts. Before I put them up I'm gonna make a post explaining how the story was written over night since I didn't know what else to post, if the reception from my peers is good maybe it will become an album and short novel someday soon
>>29229291
is this for a grade? Like, for school?
>>29229291
nah I need to make a bunch of posts on facebook but am not going to be near a computer until thursday, so i figured I'd just set it all up now to que post.
>>29229404
meant this at >>29229355
but also not an original comment so heres a haiku
I need to sleep now
Can't fucking sleep man, this sucks
will just sleep during drive
