Law, Life, and Future Realities
Contained within this collection are unfinished tales, presented as crucial moments rather than complete narratives. These incomplete segments function as pages torn from a larger book, inviting readers to engage actively by imagining the events that led to these scenes and the outcomes that might follow. Each piece is a gateway to further creative thought.
This project represents an experiment at the intersection of human creativity and artificial intelligence. It explores how digital tools can function as a partner in the writing process, fostering new forms of storytelling and advancing digital literacy. The aim is to demonstrate technology’s potential to augment and diversify creative outputs.
Today’s selection delves into the high stakes of Legal Thriller, the intimate observations of Slice of Life, the futuristic visions of Cyberpunk, and the transformative journeys of Coming-of-Age. Leaf Richards and Jamie F. Bell have contributed their insights and craft to these distinctive genres, offering a rich array of human experiences.
We encourage you to step into these narratives not just as an observer, but as an active participant. Allow your mind to complete the stories, filling in the unspoken details and envisioning the full arc of each character’s journey. Your imaginative engagement enriches every tale.
Today’s Unfinished Tales and Short Stories
Discover compelling Legal Thriller, Slice of Life, Cyberpunk, and Coming-of-Age short stories, enriched by Espionage / Spy Fiction, Hardboiled Noir, and Western Style BL categories. We are dedicated to cultivating digital literacy and redefining publishing practices, utilizing creative technology to illuminate the evolving landscape of AI-assisted narrative and the future of digital publishing.
The Unsealed Brief
Author: Leaf Richards | Category: Espionage / Spy Fiction | Genre: Legal Thriller
The old building creaked, a symphony of settling timbers and groaning pipes against the relentless winter wind. Outside, the city was a watercolour blur of grey and white, streetlights haloed by falling snow. Inside, the only light came from the pools cast by a brass desk lamp, illuminating the dust motes dancing in the frigid air and the mountainous stacks of legal briefs that dominated the mahogany surface. The faint smell of aged paper and something faintly metallic, like static electricity, hung heavy in the air. Each tick of the grandfather clock in the reception hall felt like a hammer blow against the silence, a stark reminder of the hour.
Bentonite Pixels
Category: Slice of Life | Genre: Slice of Life
A freezing garage in Northern Ontario turned into a high-tech editing suite, filled with the hum of overworked computers and the smell of stale coffee.
Three Questions for Oliver
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Cyberpunk | Genre: Cyberpunk
The lift shuddered, an old metal beast groaning against its cables, hauling me upwards through the belly of a building that had seen better centuries. Outside, the perpetual autumn drizzle blurred the already distorted reflections of corporate towers against the grime-streaked glass, a watercolour smear of neon and grey. A familiar scent—wet concrete, burning copper, and the faint, sweet tang of decay—clung to the recycled air, a signature of this lower sector. My jacket felt heavier than usual, saturated with the city’s damp, its synthetic fibres clinging. This was Oliver’s world, far from the polished towers of OmniCorp where my data-slate and moral compromises resided.
Maple Syrup and Cold Feet
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Hardboiled Noir | Genre: Slice of Life
A spring morning at Mrs. Thomas’s kitchen table in Northwestern Ontario. The air is cool, the light muted. Three young people – Tyler, Sandra, Ben – and two older community members – Mrs. Thomas, Mr. Jenkins – are gathered. They are discussing the ambitious plan to convert the disused recreation hall basement into an arts and culture space, but the conversation is fraught with practical concerns, cynical observations, and the weight of past failures.
A Chill in the Air, A Hollow in the Chest
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Western Style BL | Genre: Coming-of-Age
The air carried the sharp, metallic tang of coming rain and the faint, sweet decay of fallen leaves. It clung to Laurie’s coat, a familiar chill that felt less like weather and more like a permanent resident in his bones. The old railway bridge, a skeletal arch of pitted iron and faded green paint, loomed over the ravine, the wind whistling a low, mournful tune through its corroded beams. It had been their place, once. A place where the world felt limitless, perched high above the sluggish river, a ribbon of dull grey twisting through the early autumn landscape.
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 an experimental, creative research project by The Arts Incubator Winnipeg and the Art Borups Corners Storytelling clubs. Each chapter is a unique interdisciplinary arts and narrative storytelling experiment, born from a collaboration between artists and applied AI researchers, designed to explore the boundaries of creative writing, automation, and storytelling. 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.
