Narratives Interrupted
There is a specific tension found in reading a story that stops abruptly. This collection consists of incomplete pieces—scenes that drop you directly into the action without a map of what came before. Rather than providing answers, these short stories offer a glimpse into a world, leaving the reader to speculate on the terrifying or thrilling events that might follow.
The project serves as an exploration of the intersection between human creativity, interdisciplinary arts, and applied artificial intelligence research. It investigates the role of digital tools as collaborators in the writing process, aiming to refine workflows for storytelling and scriptwriting while building stronger digital literacy capabilities.
This post includes a wide array of genres, spanning Psychological Thriller and Horror to Action-Adventure, Sci-Fi, and Sports Fiction. We are pleased to introduce the authors for this installment, Jamie F. Bell and Leaf Richards, whose drafts provide the framework for today’s reading.
We encourage you to approach these texts with an active imagination. Instead of looking for a final page, use these unfinished tales as a prompt to visualize your own conclusions and expand the story beyond its current limits.
Today’s Unfinished Tales and Short Stories
From the high stakes of sports fiction and military sci-fi to the depths of psychological thriller and mythological retelling, this selection highlights diverse narrative structures. Our mission is to advance digital literacy by analyzing these cinematic and action-adventure short stories within the context of modern publishing. Through the application of creative technology, we are actively shaping the future of AI-assisted narrative development.
The Cascading Signal
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Science Fiction | Genre: Psychological Thriller
The air in the town hall annexe was thick with the smell of damp wool coats and stale coffee. Paula checked the microphone for the third time, tapping its mesh head and listening to the flat, unhelpful thump from the speakers. Outside, the November rain wasn’t stopping, and neither was the relentless pinging of her phone, each notification a fresh wave of public panic she was supposed to somehow contain with a single press conference and a few hundred hastily printed fact sheets.
Malice
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Mythological Retelling | Genre: Horror
The air, thick with the saccharine scent of new blossom, hung heavy and humid around the abandoned glasshouses at the edge of the university grounds. Twisted ivy, unnaturally robust, coiled around the crumbling brickwork, its tendrils reaching like grasping fingers. A low, persistent hum, too deep for insects, vibrated through the soles of Liisa’s worn boots, a sound that felt more ancient than the building itself.
A Summer’s Oar, A Year’s Reckoning
Author: Leaf Richards | Category: Sports Fiction | Genre: Action-Adventure
The morning air on Lake Wabanaki held a sharp, clean bite, even in the heart of July. Mist, thick and grey, still clung to the water’s surface, slowly retreating before the sun’s reluctant climb. Already, the reedy edges of the shore buzzed with the nervous energy of young competitors. Canoes, like colourful, elongated beetles, bobbed impatiently against the rickety dock, their paddles clattering in eager hands. A faint scent of damp cedar and stale bug spray hung in the air, punctuated by the shrill calls of distant gulls.
De-escalation Clause
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Cinematic | Genre: Sci-Fi
The roar of the crowd was a phantom, a number in the corner of her vision: 2.3 million concurrent viewers. The air in the pod was cool and tasted faintly of the electrolyte drink she’d been nursing for the past hour. Outside, the real world was holding its breath. In here, inside the glowing embrace of the Sim-Rig, Riva was preparing to fight World War Three for their entertainment and edification.
A Summer Reclamation
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Military Sci-Fi | Genre: Sports Fiction
The air in the recreation hall’s unused basement hung thick, a heavy curtain of summer humidity pressed down by the accumulated years of disuse. It smelled of damp concrete, forgotten wood, and the faint, sweet decay of time itself. A single bare bulb, strung precariously from a high beam, cast a jaundiced, weak light that barely pushed back the gloom, leaving pockets of absolute dark shivering in the corners. Dust motes, thick as tiny gnats, danced in the weak light, stirred by the smallest movement, giving the entire space a shimmering, unsettled quality. This was not a friendly dark, but one that swallowed sound, making every creak of the old building above feel distant and muffled.
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.
About the Author
