Unfinished Journeys in a Digital World
The collection presents unique unfinished tales, each a moment captured mid-scene or a page torn from a larger story. These short stories invite readers to step into narratives already in motion, urging imagination to complete what came before and what might follow. The incomplete nature offers a space for individual interpretation, making each reading a discovery.
This collection is part of an experimental program exploring the intersection of human creativity, interdisciplinary arts, and applied artificial intelligence research. The project investigates how digital tools can act as a partner in the writing process, shaping new forms of storytelling, scriptwriting, and enhancing digital literacy skills and workflows. It highlights a future where creative processes evolve with technological assistance.
This selection spans genres from the personal growth of Coming-of-Age to the complex ethics of Medical Drama, interwoven with high-stakes Action-Adventure and the dystopian visions of Cyberpunk. Authors Jamie F. Bell and Leaf Richards contribute their distinct voices to these compelling unfinished narratives.
We invite you to engage with these unfinished tales, not simply as an audience, but as a co-creator. Allow your mind to navigate the missing pieces, to craft your own endings and beginnings, and to experience the power of imagination in completing these stories.
Today’s Unfinished Tales and Short Stories
Direction Measured in Poplar Bark
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Boys Love (BL) | Genre: Coming-of-Age
The compass was a joke. Noah knew it before they even left the trailhead. The cheap plastic housing and the bubbly, sluggish needle felt wrong in his palm. But Mr. Davies, the gym-teacher-turned-outdoorsman for the week, had clapped him on the shoulder and said, ‘Same model the army uses, son!’ which Noah knew for a fact was a lie. Now, with the autumn sun bleeding out behind the dense wall of spruce and birch, the cheap plastic felt like a death sentence.
Currents and Cracks
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Satirical / Ironic | Genre: Medical Drama
The wind off the Red River, still carrying the bite of winter’s retreat, whipped at Jamie’s parka. Mud, thick and clinging, gave way to patches of stubborn ice on the trail leading into The Forks. A lone goose honked somewhere near the half-thawed banks, its call a raw, almost desperate sound that cut through the city’s dull hum. Spring in Winnipeg was a hesitant thing, a slow, grudging thaw, and the landscape felt as uncertain as the knot in Jamie’s stomach.
Minus Forty and the Broken Heater
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Crime Noir | Genre: Coming-of-Age
On a dangerously cold day in Winnipeg, a young runner navigates the downtown skywalk system to complete a petty illicit transaction, confronting the bleak reality of his choices along the way.
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.
The Gutter’s Glimmer
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Romance | Genre: Cyberpunk
The alley reeked of stale synth-ale and ozone, a familiar tang in the sprawling, rain-slicked underbelly of what used to be Thunder Bay. Megacorp banners, perpetually damp and flickering with glitches, cast a lurid purple sheen over the rusted-out shell of an old delivery drone. Wet maple leaves, crunched to a pulpy paste under Liv’s boots, plastered themselves against the grimy concrete. The air, sharp with the approaching cold of late autumn, bit at her exposed skin, even through the worn collar of her synth-leather jacket. Overhead, the constant thrum of aerocars provided a bleak, indifferent soundtrack to the city’s slow decay, but tonight, even that noise couldn’t quite drown out the frantic thumping in Liv’s chest.
Storytelling and the Arts, Skills Development and Digital Transformation
AI-Assisted Storytelling and Scriptwriting: In our “Storytelling and the Arts” research, we are thoroughly examining AI’s role in creative development, with particular attention to genres such as Coming-of-Age, Medical Drama, Cyberpunk, and Action-Adventure. We investigate how AI can assist in mapping character development and self-discovery arcs in Coming-of-Age stories, simulating complex medical scenarios and ethical dilemmas crucial to Medical Drama, building intricate futuristic worlds and technological concepts for Cyberpunk narratives, and choreographing thrilling sequences and dynamic pacing in Action-Adventure. Our studies aim to understand AI’s capability in generating compelling plots, authentic dialogue, and innovative narrative structures within these diverse genres.
Talent Development and Training: A significant focus of our research is on equipping creative professionals with the new skills required to excel in an AI-enhanced landscape. The process of developing these chapters, from personal growth stories to high-tech medical crises and futuristic escapades, offers practical insights into the evolving demands of digital publishing and film production workflows. We prioritize the cultivation of robust digital literacy, expertise in prompt engineering, and strategic approaches to managing AI tools, empowering artists and writers to leverage these technologies as essential collaborators. This ensures they are prepared not just to adapt, but to innovate and lead the digital transformation of creative industries.
We’re excited to learn about these new technologies and how they can be applied to expand the boundaries of human storytelling. We encourage you to keep reading, keep imagining, and keep exploring the incredible potential that opens up when creativity meets technology.
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 interdisciplinary arts and narrative storytelling experiment. It is part of a creative arts and research program by The Arts Incubator Winnipeg and the Art Borups Corners collectives. This project focuses on two key areas: AI-Assisted Storytelling and Scriptwriting, exploring AI for generating ideas, plot structures, and alternative story arcs; and Talent Development and Training, studying the skills and training needs for creative professionals managing AI and immersive technologies to inform future training curricula. Funding and support were generously provided by the Ontario Arts Council Multi and Inter-Arts Projects program and the Government of Ontario. We thank them for supporting the arts, digital transformation, and applied Artificial Intelligence (AI) research for northern innovation in Ontario.
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