Courtrooms and Creatures
These stories are presented as unfinished tales, truncated narratives that thrust the reader into the middle of the action. Whether in a courtroom or a haunted house, the scenes build tension but stop short of release. This structure challenges the reader to analyze the available evidence and predict the outcome without authorial guidance.
This project is an experimental program at the intersection of human creativity and applied artificial intelligence research. It aims to explore how digital tools can act as a partner in the writing process, influencing the creation of storytelling and scriptwriting formats while bolstering digital literacy skills.
The selection covers a broad spectrum, including Legal Thriller, Fantasy, and Horror, alongside Young Adult Contemporary themes. Jamie F. Bell is the author behind these diverse narrative experiments.
We encourage you to read these scenes with an active mind. Consider the rules of the world presented and finish the story in a way that satisfies your own creative instincts.
Today’s Unfinished Tales and Short Stories
Encompassing the suspense of legal thrillers and horror alongside the vibrancy of fantasy and young adult contemporary fiction, this post investigates the depths of psychological drama. Through stream of consciousness and dystopian adventure narratives, we demonstrate the capabilities of modern publishing. We are dedicated to advancing digital literacy by merging creative technology with the art of storytelling, using AI-assisted narrative to produce unique short stories that captivate and inspire.
A Guttering Flame
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Psychological Drama | Genre: Legal Thriller
The morning pressed in, a slate-grey weight against the city’s tired shoulders. Winter had clenched its fist around the courthouse, frosting the grand arched windows with intricate fern patterns that blurred the already dim light. Footfalls on the granite steps outside were muffled by a thin layer of fresh, powdery snow, each gust of wind a sharp, percussive slap against the heavy oak doors. Inside, the air hummed with a low, nervous energy, a cloying blend of old paper, polished wood, and stale coffee, carrying the cold seeped in through the building’s ancient bones.
The Ravine at Mile Eighty
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Adventure | Genre: Boys Love (BL)
Pinned down in a narrow, snow-choked ravine, two rivals are forced to rely on each other as a posse closes in and a winter storm worsens.
A Fraying Patchwork of Green
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Dystopian | Genre: Fantasy
The autumn air in MetroCentre Park was a manufactured crispness, piped in via carbon scrubbers that hummed faintly beneath the paving stones. Leaves, genetically engineered for optimal colour retention, clung to their branches in perfect gradients of ochre and russet. Drones, no larger than wasps, conducted silent particulate matter scans, their tiny lenses reflecting a sky that was, by official decree, ‘optimally azure’. Andrew, his shoulders hunched in a worn, recycled-fibre coat, tracked his official route along the designated ‘Mindful Meander’ path, the digital chime of his wrist-monitor a constant, low thrum against the manufactured serenity.
The Strange Gravity of Gravy
Category: Slice of Life | Genre: Horror
The cafeteria was, as always, a symphony of adolescent chaos: the clatter of trays, the shrill laughter of newly-formed cliques, the low thrum of a thousand whispered secrets. Sunlight, thick and golden from the late autumn afternoon, spilled across the linoleum floor, catching dust motes in its wide, indifferent gaze. A familiar smell of burnt cheese and industrial cleaner hung heavy, a comforting, if unappetising, blanket. Yet, for Frank, the ordinary theatre of lunchtime felt strangely… perforated, as if the reality around them was a film projector skipping frames.
Mud-Stained Ambition
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Stream of Consciousness | Genre: Young Adult Contemporary
The air, thick with the scent of pine and damp earth, pressed down. Early spring had turned the narrow track up Crimson Canyon into a treacherous ribbon of greasy mud and slick stone, each step a gamble against gravity. Overhead, the sky, a bruised purple, promised an imminent tempest, but beneath it, two figures, small against the vast, rugged landscape, pushed onward, their breath pluming in the chill.
About the Project
By design, these stories have no beginning and no end. Many stories are fictional, but many others are not. They are snapshots from worlds that never fully exist, inviting you to imagine what comes before and what happens next. We had fun exploring this project, and hope you will too.
The Unfinished Tales and Short Stories collection is part of an experimental, creative arts and research program by The Arts Incubator Winnipeg and the Art Borups Corners collectives. Each chapter is an interdisciplinary arts and narrative storytelling experiment focused on two key areas: AI-Assisted Scriptwriting, where researchers explore using AI to generate story ideas, plot structures, and alternative story arcs to enhance creative development; and Talent Development and Training, where the project studies the necessary skills for creative professionals to manage AI and immersive technologies in production, helping to inform future training curricula. The project was made possible with funding and support from the Ontario Arts Council Multi and Inter-Arts Projects program and the Government of Ontario. We thank them for supporting the arts, digital transformation research and innovation in Ontario.
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