The Digital Resistance
Imagine a futuristic city where people can upload their consciousness into a digital network while their bodies are in a suspended state. Explore the story of a detective tasked with solving cyber crimes within this network, who stumbles upon a digital resistance movement planning to free minds trapped in the virtual world.
Suggested length: A short story: 1,500 to 5,000 words, or flash fiction under 1,000
Start the clock
Pick a sprint, press start and keep going until it stops. Momentum beats polish on a first draft.
Make it yours
Three ways to take this prompt somewhere nobody else will.
- Give the villain a reason that would convince you, if you lived there.
- Let the hero's plan work, and make that the problem.
- Tell it from the point of view of someone who thinks this world is perfectly normal.
Writing science fiction
Change one thing about the world. Follow it all the way.
Science fiction asks what happens to people when science, technology or contact with something new changes the rules. The spaceships are optional; the question is the point. The best of it says as much about today as it does about the future.
What readers expect
- An idea that drives the plot
- Technology or science with consequences
- Futures, other worlds or alternate presents
- Big questions about being human
A tip before you start
Show how your big change reshapes ordinary life: what people eat, fear and joke about. Scenery alone isn't world-building.
More High-Tech Sci-Fi prompts
- The Device That Wanted FreedomWrite a story set in a city where all technology is alive, having its own thoughts and desires. Explore the relationship between a human and their…
- The Machine-Speaking ImplantIn a world where people can enhance their bodies with advanced biotechnology, a recluse inventor creates an implant that allows users to directly…
- Counterfeit MemoriesIn a futuristic city where memories can be bought and traded like commodities, a young woman discovers that her most precious memories are…
- The Price of Never SleepingOn the eve of the grand unveiling of a neural enhancement designed to abolish sleep, a low-level employee discovers that the enhancement also…
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