The SST AlterNet
Explore writing-prompt responses by character, arc, theme or available text.
Browse the collection below.
Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] In an endless city, you are an urban explorer. One day, you enter an abandoned warehouse, and what you find is unlike anything you have ever seen before.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] As you sit idly in a park staring into nothing, you suddenly see a figure appear out of nowhere under the shade of a tree. They look around furtively for a moment then begin to walk off.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] Civilization has finally found the means to exit our universe and into another. You are apart of the first to enter into another universe and you find on the other side...
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You are a powerful warlord, feared by all. You receive news that a 10-year-old girl is somehow tearing through all your armies like they're made of wet paper. Shortly after your messenger tells you this, the door collapses in a cloud of dust, and said girl steps out.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Original prompt heading [WP] Smash 'Em Up Sunday
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] At once, and everywhere, each living person has heard a voice in their head: "Hey! It's me, God. I've noticed there's a lot of confusion, so I've created a website called "Will I go to hell and why dot com". Just write your name in the search bar. And don't forget to share, like and subscribe."
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] Since you were a child you've had the capability of freezing time. You've mostly used it to sleep and read as much as you want. one day on your time frozen bike ride home, you notice someone else riding their bike as well. You make eye contact and they quickly ride away.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] Breaking News: All life on Earth will be destroyed by a meteor to hit earth... in exactly one year.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] While you're looking for classes for this college semester, you come across one that you haven't heard of before in the College of Arts catalog: MGC 101 - Intro to Basic Arcanum.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] At the end of everyone's life, their soul goes to the afterlife or next step of the cycle of the religion they followed. You never explicitly followed any religion, but always believed in life after death in some form. Your time finally comes.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You're out in public, idly playing through old childhood memories, and smile as a familiar old thought resurfaces, and you think to yourself if perhaps you're the only one who can't read minds? Everybody around you stops, and stares in your direction.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [SP] You've come to realize she's not entirely human. You've also come to realize you love her.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] "In this job, you get one a year. Once you hit 5, you get no more until you use them" said your new boss. "But what are they for?" you ask. He just winks and walks away.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] The Earth has finally run out of fossil fuels to use as energy and, with the only other option being to turn to clean and renewable energy sources, the U.S. has decided to take drastic measures: trying to reach into alternate dimensions to find oil and other fossil fuels.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] As you watch the news, you see an image of protesters with signs that say "There is no Earth 2!" You smile to yourself and wonder what they would do if they knew they were already on Earth 19.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] The internet can now connect to millions of alternate realities! After finding out about this your phone buzzes, and when you check to see it, you've been invited into a group chat of other versions of yourself!
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] The guild has posted its newest batch of quests. There are the normal monsters and the "Sue really needs this medication" but a new one catches your eye - there's no description just a time and place and the reward.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] *Something* just broke containment at the top secret research facility you work at. You've shut yourself in your dorm room as the entire compound goes into lock down. But as you pass your bedroom, you hear something move in your closet.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] Time loops are always interesting... until someone walks up to you and says that they're looping and they want your help. It's even worse when you take into account that they're an asshole who's made life miserable for you.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] Because you're lazy, you made a wish that everything you need a day will be prepared in the morning in order to go to school/work on time. You got something weird today.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You have the ability to learn anyone's skills or experience just by touching them. You try it on a chef, a programmer, and a star athlete. Everything changes when a mob sends a Hitman after your power and you touch him.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] The worst criminal ever, every time they open a legitimate front for their illegitimate business, the legitimate business does better than the illegal one.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You've known since childhood that you could use magic. But a mishap with your powers has left you blind and terrified of your own abilities. Everything changes however, when you meet a wizard who tells you that not only can he train you. But with your powers you will be able to "see" again.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] A dragon has kidnapped your grandmother. You grab your sword and track it down, only to find them seated around a fire eating freshly baked cookies.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Original prompt heading [WP] Smash 'Em Up Sunday!
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] There exists a Master of Spiders. Spiders are naturally attracted to them, won't ever harm the master, and will accept their commands. The last master has just died and you have been chosen to take their place. Only problem is you're arachnophobic.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] A young couple moves into an apartment block and meet an old man who tells a story about the residents of the building.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You wake up one day in an almost perfect replica of your bedroom, almost. You opened the door to find an empty white corridor stretching for miles and miles either way.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] Billy brings his grandpa to show and tell. Grandpa is a retired government spook who knows the truth behind all the secrets and conspiracies. Grandpa decides to tell.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] The world we live in is a simulation used to rehabilitate prisoners. You have just been paroled.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You technically operate an illegal, underground bar/clinic/therapy center. However, no one bothers you because its for supers. Describe a day listening to the woes and achievements of heroes, villains, and supers just trying to get by as you serve them liquor or patch them up.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] Your best friend calls you up in the dead of night, asking you to meet them deep in the forest. You expect they'll ask you to help bury a body. But when you get there, what you find defies all expectations.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You had been sick for weeks, then eventually you croaked. You thought you had just fallen asleep and woken up, but upon opening your eyes again you find yourself in some 80s looking office with a single desk, and on it sat a ringing rotary phone.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You die, but because you cared so much about the environment when you lived, you were reborn with nature inside of you. You get the elemental power of your choice.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] A giant monster attacks a city. Doing the usual stuff, destroying buildings, flipping boats, eating people. There is only one problem, you are a simple civilian.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You wake up in the middle of the night to find a stranger eating from your refrigerator.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You are quietly sitting in the Fresh Start Clinic, holding the leaflet you found this morning on your commute: "Selective Memory Erasing and Character Rebuilding since 2018!" Today, maybe, it's finally your chance for a new life.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You have a seemingly useless superpower. You can see a sort of... loading bar above peoples heads. Sometimes it's completely full. sometimes it's empty. Sometimes it's a different color. You've had this power for twenty-three years and you still have no idea what the loading bars mean.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Original prompt heading [WP] Smash 'Em Up Sunday!
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] While cleaning, you move a carpet in your basement and find a hidden manhole cover. Curious, you open it with a crowbar, and surprisingly the air coming from it doesn't smell nasty. Actually, it smells... fresh.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You have been living completely off the grid for ten years. The only outside contact you have is when your brother comes to visit every October 1st. He brings you news from the outside- however, the news seems so ridiculous you are starting to doubt him.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You were born with the power to learn the contents of books/documents by simply touching them. One day after breezing through your school exams, you bump into a man in black. You help pick up his fallen documents. What was inside the doc-wait, an inter-dimensional transporter? Forbidden arts?
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] She can bring candy to life, and manipulate its size. That's her power. You've seen her sentient Rolos rolling around campus before, so you're pretty sure you've got this sparring match in the bag already. As you face each other she pulls out a pack of gummy bears and you start to get worried.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] Everyone has different theories on the end of the world, a deadly virus, a giant meteor, zombies, nuclear war, solar flare, aliens, and even global warming. Apparently they were all right.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You are a former secret agent, now retired; today, you just found the beautiful and dangerous femmme fatale that always tried to kill you at a pizza parlor, dressed in a nerdy hoodie and eating an extra-large pizza.
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You've lived your whole life thinking you were the last person on Earth, as you were sitting in your home you hear the doorbell ring, you open it to discover someone asking "You ordered a pizza?"
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] Time literally slows down whenever you are around your crush. One day, he/she gives you a strange look. "Hey, everything is moving so sluggishly around us, any idea why?"
Read the moment ↗Before Stellar Tour · unassigned stories
Writing prompt [WP] You have successfully created fully functioning nano bots that aid in strength, speed, agility, recovery, healing, and regeneration. The science board won't allow you to do human trials so you inject yourself to see the results. Today is the first day you start feeling the changes kicking in.
Read the moment ↗