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Prompt: As he flicked through the letters, a small, handwritten envelope caught his attention and his heart began to thump

As he flicked through the letters, a small, handwritten envelope caught his attention and his heart began to thump.

It was addressed to:

Sir David White of the Eastern Castle, otherwise known as

6666 Youngton Drive

Lockston, Alaska  

The return address: 

Love, Lucas O'Mykrin

6666 Nowhere Street

City or State?  Try to guess.

David grinned knowingly and tore open the envelope.

Hello again, friend!

It has been awhile since we spoke, hasn't it?  In fact, the last time I saw you was when I lived in Tenessee.  You remember, don't you?  The little baby griffin we met near the ice cream shop?  Well, I came back for her after you left and took her home. She's doing well, her name's Greta and she's three years old on Monday.  But enough reminiscing about the past, dear pupil.  I have something for you.

Taped to the letter was a note.  A short note, two or three sentences long, written on plain lined notebook paper in sparkly purple pen.

"Who Inspires Me?" Sarah Hesse

Why should you care who inspires me?  This assignment is absolutely absurd.  Maybe it's Oscar the Grouch or maybe it was my uncle Ilya; why do you need to know?  Inspires me to do what, anyway?  Sit here in class learning about the alphabet?  I know Russian and Spanish already and I once met a dragon, lady, I'm not two years old. So hush with your ridiculous assignments and learning and circle time.  And by the way, my "Mommy and Daddy" did NOT write this for me.

And don't call me sweetheart.

David, astonished, carefully peeled off Sarah's paper to reveal more of the letter.

As was noted, she isn't two years old.  She's five, and I believe she did once meet a dragon.

Emily and Marcus had  a daughter named Sarah, did they not?  A wild thing, always causing trouble.  A funny little one.

I found this on my recent trip to Hawaii, just a-floating in the breeze. But even that's not as interesting as this: Carrying the letter was a magnificent orange bird, glowing like fire in the sunlight.  A phoenix.  

David wrinkled his brow.  A phoenix?  They didn't live in earth.

"A phoenix?  They don't live on earth." you protest.  Indeed they don't.  And the fact that one exited the spirit realm- to carry your deceased neice's letter, no less- is world-changing.

If you remember anything from our lessons, you'll remember the spirit world is different from the afterlife.  The phoenix could not have met Sarah.  Furthermore, she died when she was two.  As this letter claims, "I'm not two years old."

There is something upsetting the spirits, and you and I are going to find out what.

Pack your bags.  We leave today.

With love,

Lucas O'Mykrin

He hadn't even read his old professor's signoff when someone knocked on David's front door.

Since I didn't read the first part carefully enough, I am re-submitting.

Prompt:  Start your story with the line, “You wanna do something fun?”

HOW DID THIS HAPPEN?

Written by Pancake

"You wanna do something fun, Josh?" asked Shadow Greene, one of the well-known people.

In this school, kids ranked each other. I was not a well-known. I was an unknown. So why was he talking to me?

"Um, sure. What did you have in mind?" I asked.

"Well, after school, we got the whole year! School's shutting down for a year after today. Let's pack our bags and go exploring. This world got to have more than this," Shadow said.

"Sure. I can drive and I'm pretty sure you can as well," I said.

"Actually, I can't drive. It's just gonna be You, me and Kaila!" He said.

"Kaila? You mean Kayla Brown?" I ask. She was well-known.

"Yeah! We gonna get you to the top of ranking! After all, an adventure! That's something!" Shadow said.

"Yeah! Should we mke a list or something?" I ask.

"You handle that. I'll do the shopping. You make the list!" He says.

I make the list whenever I can. At the end of the day, I give it to Shadow. He looks over it and I drive him to the store. We get everything we need and pick up Kaila. We chat for a bit about where to go. Finally we agree. Camping.

"So this is the campsite we want. Camp Honor!" I say, driving along the route.

When we get there, we set up. There is a crowd of people. We head over and see Ebony Winter, a movie directer.

"We need people for our new movie! You can all try out right now!" He shouts.

Everyone tries out, including us, because why not? When we get the part, it feels amazing! We decide to start now. The movie goes really well. I won't tell you the details, because it was kind of boring. And now we are sailing home.

I look at the sky. It looks dark. I try to tell the captain that but the ship lurches forward. He wakes up just as it starts raining. Someow, five minutes later, the ship is sinking and we are swimming to a nearby island. Which may or may not be inhabitited. We decide to wait out the rain before building a shelter. I clear out the ground under a pine tree and lay down. Soon I fall asleep thinking, How did this happen?

In the morning, we build a shelter and play in the water because it is so clear. After about a week, we are picked up. We decide to end our trip a month early. After all, who wants to explore after getting lost at sea?

Slightly short, but I hope you like it! 

Prompt line: "A girl stands at the edge of a chasm."

A girl stands at the edge of the chasm. Black rocks, black sheared cliffs, black dripping from somewhere; there's black everywhere. But there's white too. Bleak white skies, clouded white air, white in her eyes; white is everywhere too. 

She stands, hair swaying like reads in the wind; everything else unmoving. Her mind is racing, weighing options but the world is none the wiser.

Should she stay? There's so much left still to explore in this world, so much to learn, to read, to write and see. There's so many more moments to experience and secrets to unlock... Probably.

Is it okay to leave, just like that? She thinks about the people she's met. Many are gone now, but there are still some left; reeling in the emptiness and aftermath of their losses. They probably had so much to say. So many more stories, so much more support to give and take, so many more memories to form.

The girl peers down, and fights the urge to stagger backwards. It's a long way down, into whatever lies beneath the haze in that abyss. Maybe there won't be anything. Or maybe there will be something better than anything she could ever imagine. Perhaps there would be endless riches, colours and sensations galore, more endlessly glorious adventures, and perhaps even the people who had disappeared; maybe they had simply moved on to explore the wonder of this fantastic new place!

But maybe there will only be hard, black sharp stones, just like there is up here. Perhaps there will be endless dark rivers with no bottom that could ever be reached by a mere mortal, cold and sapping the life from its poor entrapees, victims, with every painful breath one closer to eternal slumber. Who could possibly say for certain.

The girl thinks of everything she has been through, all her troubles and struggles and past adversities.It does not take long for her to make her choice. 

The only thing that is certain is that it is a long way down to the bottom of the chasm. If there even is one, that is.

She jumps.