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We'll need to chop your clock off
Although I suppose the blame lies ultimately with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
telophase, I maintain it is all thistleingrey's fault that I am not yet asleep, because she introduced me to the random steampunk generator. It is a piece of genius. That is not throwaway praise. Most random generators create momentary hilarity: many of these would be functional story prompts.
It begins with a champion in the Khyber Pass. This person meets a mercenary and together they encounter automated giant squid and gears. The story winds up in an opium den and features role reversal. The overall narrative is about what happens after the revolution.
Your story begins with a beloved enemy. The villain is a fool who is not as foolish as others believe who also has a hat with a feather. Plot elements include the changing of the seasons and war.
The text starts as a samurai encounters a fan used as a weapon while in Shangri-La. The overall narrative is a comedy of manners.
This one, for that matter, is nearly flash fiction unto itself:
It begins in an airship hangar. There is epic friendship and a lady who meets a misguided genius. It ends with teleportation.
But this, I believe, is the true piece of cake:
A team of adventurers consisting of a daring airship captain, a criminal, an itinerant clock-mender, a man with spectacles, and a reclusive genius inventor discover a clockwork acrobat and Talos, the man made of bronze, in a bakery.
watermelontail? rushthatspeaks? greygirlbeast? Somebody help me out here—I want to read that story!
telophase, I maintain it is all thistleingrey's fault that I am not yet asleep, because she introduced me to the random steampunk generator. It is a piece of genius. That is not throwaway praise. Most random generators create momentary hilarity: many of these would be functional story prompts. It begins with a champion in the Khyber Pass. This person meets a mercenary and together they encounter automated giant squid and gears. The story winds up in an opium den and features role reversal. The overall narrative is about what happens after the revolution.
Your story begins with a beloved enemy. The villain is a fool who is not as foolish as others believe who also has a hat with a feather. Plot elements include the changing of the seasons and war.
The text starts as a samurai encounters a fan used as a weapon while in Shangri-La. The overall narrative is a comedy of manners.
This one, for that matter, is nearly flash fiction unto itself:
It begins in an airship hangar. There is epic friendship and a lady who meets a misguided genius. It ends with teleportation.
But this, I believe, is the true piece of cake:
A team of adventurers consisting of a daring airship captain, a criminal, an itinerant clock-mender, a man with spectacles, and a reclusive genius inventor discover a clockwork acrobat and Talos, the man made of bronze, in a bakery.
watermelontail? rushthatspeaks? greygirlbeast? Somebody help me out here—I want to read that story!
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A team of adventurers consisting of a boy disguised as a girl, a boy who cries, a cold-eyed assassin, a person who is not evil but misunderstood, and a shaman discover inept crooks and constrictive clothing in a hot spring.
!!
I don't understand why people would wear constrictive clothing in a hot spring, but I really want to find out now.
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Neat -- I'll have to try out the generator.
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Man with spectacles.
changing of the seasons as plot element
beloved enemy
marvelous!
Did you see (I saw thanks to
I want that story too.
This is just another piece of association.
Also, that's an all female group of adventurers, except of course for the man (with spectacles).
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[info]watermelontail? [info]rushthatspeaks? [info]greygirlbeast? Somebody help me out here—I want to read that story!
If you leave out the bakery bit, you can-- it's called His Dark Materials and was published, in three volumes, by Phil Pullman.
...whom, I must say, I never thought of as steampunk until now. His metaphysics are a bit too... clean, I guess. (Well, when compared to China Mieville, anyway.) But, yeah.
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...I think this would work better as silver age, or maybe steampunk, actually. Start off with a poetry slam, and have the plot turn on people trying to persuade the detective to actually detect. But still amusing.
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Hahaha, I wonder if you'll be writing something soon from this. I have to go try it out now. Fascinating. And yes, probably addicting.
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Your story is a romance between a poet and a mad scientist. The lovers experience primitive robots driven by Babbage-style programing cards and automated whales while in a boardwalk during winter.
Because a) I can see watching automated whales from a boardwalk during winter being really pretty, and b) I have glimmerings of a teleportation story where there's a pair of lovers, one who is one of the scientists working on the teleporter and the other her lover, who is a poet who would be writing complicated poems about how teleportation will divide the soul from the body and her lover will be dead if I could write poetry.
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For. The. Win.
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MOAR.
Your story is a romance between a cold-eyed assassin and a secretary. The lovers experience automated giant squid and gingko leaves while in an asylum. One of them is motivated to prove self-worth.
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Interesting question, indeed. Although... could it be that the constrictive clothing was left in the hot spring, because whoever had been wearing it didn't wish to wear it in the hot spring?
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But the bakery is the plot element I really love!
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Thank you! That's brilliant.
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Yes. The hat with a feather is another favorite detail.
Did you see (I saw thanks to tithenai) Weird Tales' contest involving spam?
Does it involve using spam names for story prompts? I'm so there.
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Airships, the Khyber Pass, and bakeries. For what more could we wish?
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It's an oracle generator!
story prompts
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If you can write Puck in iambic pentameter, you can write poetry . . .
Re: MOAR.
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Hey, when I finally crashed, I had steampunk-influenced dreams about souls swapped into imperfectly resurrected bodies. It could be worse.
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Don't forget the automated giant squid!
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"Talos in the Bakery" is even a good title . . .
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Or something Philip K. Dick would have written.
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I think they must.
just around this corner.
This is just another piece of association.
Also, that's an all female group of adventurers, except of course for the man (with spectacles).
These all seem to be the same link . . .
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It does at that!
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Hee. Thanks for sharing!
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You're right. We can't forget that.
Actually, as I think about it--Hogwarts had a giant squid in the lake. Giant squid are salt-water creatures. Perhaps that was an automated giant squid?
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Let me know when you do . . .
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Yay.
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When I have the time!
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I'll read it.
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Your story begins with flirting with food. In a Turkish bath there is a samurai who has goggles. The protagonist experiences things like problems of justice and navigating the aether. It finally ends with a cataloging system containing all knowledge.
Awesome!
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Seriously!
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Nine
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I'm not waking up on my own these days, so I don't retain more than a few images from the dreams; I did want to do something with this set, though. Maybe it will convert into a poem.
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The story begins in the Casbah, when a man with charm and a prisoner of war meet because of wit. It features what happens after the fairy tale is over.
Isn't that the plot of Casablanca?!?
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. . . That's awesome.