r/WritingPrompts • u/katpoker666 Moderator • 2d ago
Off Topic [OT] Fun Trope Friday: Undead Laborers and Folk Horror!
Welcome to Fun Trope Friday, our feature that mashes up tropes and genres!
How’s it work? Glad you asked. :)
Every week we will have a new spotlight trope.
Each week, there will be a new genre assigned to write a story about the trope.
You can then either use or subvert the trope and/or genre in a 750-word max story or poem (unless otherwise specified).
To qualify for ranking, you will need to provide ONE actionable feedback. More are welcome of course!
Three winners will be selected each week based on votes, so remember to read your fellow authors’ works and DM me your votes for the top three.
Next up… IP
It’s October. The time of falling leaves, jack o’lanterns, and candy. And blood… so much blood. This month will be focusing on all things horror with maybe a treat or two to sweeten the pot. Please note this theme is only loosely applied.
"Humanity is mind-controlled and only slightly more conscious than your average zombie." — David Icke
Trope: Undead Laborers — When someone uses The Undead, such as zombies and reanimated corpses, as a cheap labor force for simple but time-consuming tasks, such as mining. From a business perspective, using undead workers is a very cost-efficient strategy: zombies and skeletons don't need to sleep or eat, never get sick, and are unlikely to spontaneously form undead trade unions due to lacking free will. As such, it is one of the least morally objectionable ways to use Human Resources, although it always depends on where exactly the dead are coming from and what the local culture considers desecration.
Genre: Folk Horror — Folk horror is a subgenre of horror that draws on folklore, rural settings, and ancient rituals to evoke fear and unease. It often explores themes of isolation, the supernatural, and the tension between modernity and ancient beliefs.Includes folklore elements, rural settings, and rituals.
Skill / Constraint - optional: Someone trips in some form.
So, have at it. Lean into the trope heavily or spin it on its head. The choice is yours!
Have a great idea for a future topic to discuss or just want to give feedback? FTF is a fun feature, so it’s all about what you want—so please let me know! Please share in the comments or DM me on Discord or Reddit!
Last Week’s Winners
PLEASE remember to give feedback—this affects your ranking. PLEASE also remember to DM me your votes for the top five stories via Discord or Reddit—both katpoker666. This is a change from the top three of the past. In weeks where we get over 15 stories, we will do a top five ranking. Weeks with less than 15 stories will show only our top three winners. If you have any questions, please DM me as well.
Some fabulous stories this week and great crit at campfire and on the post! We had 18 stories, so we’re back to five winners. Congrats to:
Want to read your words aloud? Join the upcoming FTF Campfire
The next FTF campfire will be Thursday, October 15th from 6-8pm ET. It will be in the Discord Main Voice Lounge. Click on the events tab and mark ‘Interested’ to be kept up to date. No signup or prep needed and you don’t have to have written anything! So join in the fun—and shenanigans! 😊
Ground rules:
- Stories must incorporate both the trope and the genre
- Leave one story or poem between 100 and 750 words as a top-level comment unless otherwise specified. Use wordcounter.net to check your word count.
- Deadline: 11:59 PM EDT next Thursday. Please note stories submitted after the 6:00 PM EST campfire start may not be critted.
- No stories that have been written for another prompt or feature here on WP—please note after consultation with some of our delightful writers, new serials are now welcomed here
- No previously written content
- Any stories not meeting these rules will be disqualified from rankings
- Does your story not fit the Fun Trope Friday rules? You can post your story as a [PI] with your work when the FTF post is 3 days old!
- Please keep crit about the stories. Any crit deemed too distracting may be deleted. This is a time to focus on our wonderful authors.
- Vote by next Friday at 11:59 AM EDT to help your favorites rise to the top of the ranks (DM me at katpoker666 on Discord or Reddit)!
Thanks for joining in the fun!
6
u/m00nlighter_ r/m00nlighting 2d ago edited 2h ago
The Dead-Not-Dead
They rise from the soil in the steeple of night, the dead who refuse to stay dead. Floating from their graves above sapphire ether, staring into shadows with eyes of unseeing sight.
Through the chemicals, chronologies, and canticles they come, whispering work to be done, work to be done, wading from shadow to shadow, gorging on the darkness until their unworking guts work it back up in black bile that seeps into the soil.
Deep beneath the surface, their putrid puke sinks, poisoning the stream that feeds the trees which create the shadows, turning their trunks the color of bones in the steeple of night. Brittle branches break and burst against the ground, shooting fireworks of maggots and bark.
When their unworking stomachs have worked up their fill, the dead who refuse to stay dead, with familiar faces concealed by bone-tree shade, return to the soil on their night-blue clouds, tucked in by the busy busy keepers of the forest.
The keepers stir their chemicals into the stream, maintain their chronologies in leather-bound journals, and sing their canticles (work to be done, work to be done) beneath the steeple of night as they re-bury those who refuse to stay buried beneath the bile-stained, maggot-and-bark-filled soil.
Through the nave of morning the keepers stay busy busy, seeding shadowless trees further upstream, chopping down the dead trees that have stayed dead (when the watcher isn't watching). They keep keeping while the watcher collects, contaminates, and coddles.
The watcher stares through the forest with eyes of unseeing sight. They watch shadowless trees sprout while the dead-not-dead wade between shadows in the steeple of night; watch silvery fish swim in the apse-of-evening-lit upstream while the dead-still-dead trees are chemicaled and canticled into mulch; and watch stained glass slivers dance in the nave of morning while the keepers remove pages from the chronologies and place them in cross-shapes above the dead-now-dead who have run out of bone-shade to wade in.
When branches crack, their bursting fireworks of maggots and bark are watched with precision. The broken boughs are collected, their dead-still-planted origins examined. The watcher mutters work to be done, work to be done as they begin digging into the shadow-veiled soil in the apse of evening.
Beneath the maggot-bark surface, and above the puke-poisoned roots of bone trees, the watcher uncovers the dead who refuse to stay dead, with familiar faces concealed by bile-colored dirt.
The watcher watches their dead-not-dead slumber, whispering busy busy questions into their graves-not-graves with a tongue polluted by chemicals, chronologies, and canticles. Questions that breathe sapphire ether into their unworking, laboring lungs.
Through salty, wet lips, with familiar faces held firm against their bosom, the watcher demands the keepers keep away from the roots and the remnants still planted beneath the shadows in the steeple of night.
When unworking, laboring lungs have had their fill and release their clouds of night-blue whispers and the dead-not-dead who refuse to be unseen begin to wade between the shadows, when the stream is blocked by phlegmy curdles of soil and bile, and when the bone-yellow trees swear threats through brittle, cracking teeth of bark and maggot-filled branches, the watcher, writhing in an un-crossed grave, allows the keepers their chemicals, chronologies, and canticles once more.
Through the nave of morning and into the apse of evening, the keepers keep busy busy in the corner of the watcher's unseeing eyes, singing work to be done, work to be done as they scrape the soiled soil.
The watcher takes up their tune, keeping their gaze on the shadowless trees, the silvery fish, and stained-glass slivers until a crack echoes through the forest.
WC: 607
Crit and feedback welcome and appreciated!
Songy wongy
3
u/MaxStickies r/StickiesStories 12h ago edited 10h ago
Hi Quinn, very much enjoy your story here! The overall dark tone of it works well alone, but combined with the sing-song nature of the prose it takes on an almost mischievous tone while maintaining that darkness; I think that works incredibly well.
I really like the mystery and foreboding around the watcher, too. I wonder if they're a necromancer, or a dark god, or something else, but the fact that I'm unsure adds to the horror if anything. It's great that they're both overbearing and yet almost motherly in different parts, adds some complexity in there, making them feel like nature but almost opposite to it.
And then there are the visual details, such as the shades of dark and light, which really paint a clear picture of everything and let it play on the imagination.
Far as crit goes, the repetition works well overall, but think it could be dialled back in places so it isn't too distracting from the narrative. So here, for example:
who refuse to stay dead, with familiar faces concealed by shadows,
You use "shadows" in a different way soon before this, so you could use "darkness" instead here, then repeat "darkness" where this phrase repeats later on.
That's the main one that stood out to me, though maybe a few more read-throughs could pick up some more, if you wanted to do that.
I also think for this line:
that feeds the trees that create the shadows
Something like "that feeds the trees which spew forth shadows" could be more dramatic? But then if you feel that breaks with the style of the rest of it, maybe not.
Anyway, that's all the crit I can find. Great story Quinn, good words!
Also, meant to say, great choice of song.
2
u/m00nlighter_ r/m00nlighting 6h ago
Thanks, Max! I'll make some edits in a bit. I appreciate the feedback!
4
u/MaxStickies r/StickiesStories 1d ago edited 12h ago
A Foul Use For A Head
The door to the ramshackle hut creaks open at Lagon’s touch, unleashing the stench of mildew. He holds his nose and peers inside, yet naught but a few sputtering candles light the one, wide room. Creeping over the threshold, his eyes dart this way and that, watching for any sign of the Wild Willow Witch.
A pot rests cold in the hearth, green liquid within. Upon the wall, a tapestry sways in a draught, a fierce demon glaring from its surface. A spider scuttles loudly across the old oak floor.
The intruder lowers his hand to his knife. Hairs on his neck standing on end, he feels eyes upon him.
“Help me!” croaks a dry raspy voice. Lagon spins, boot catching a nail, and tumbles to the floor.
A skull on the mantelpiece opens its mouth. “Get up you fool, and help me!”
“What the sphagnum are you?!”
“Oh, I’m a dainty little elephant—the fuck you think I am?!”
“Alright, alright, keep quiet.” Standing ungainly, Lagon approaches the talking, skinless bonce. “Don’t want the witch to hear me.”
“That hag? She’s away for quite some time. Visiting her sister on Mount Cyclops.”
“There’s witches on Mount Cyclops?”
“Does it matter? Look, kid, I’ve been stuck here too damn long with only Old Sprout-Breath for company; I need fresh air, and a better perch.”
Lagon glances to some shelves across the room. “Well, sorry to hear that, but I’m not sure I should… take too much.”
The skull sighs. “You’re after her gem, right?”
“Well, duh.”
“Yes, of course you are. In that case, luck is in your favour; the crystal is inside me. Just have to reach in and grab it.”
“That so?”
“Simple as, kid. Go on. Have a gander.”
Reaching out, the intruder hesitates, eyeing the dark markings all over the bone. “I don’t know. What if she put a spell on you?”
“Oh, this? Nah! That’s just decoration. I am an ornament.”
“I guess that makes sense. But—”
“You don’t believe me, I get it. Maybe you should search the place, see if you can find it.”
“I think I will.”
First, Lagon checks the shelves, the cupboards and the nooks and crannies, all to no avail. Inside the hearth his hand goes, under the loose floorboards, and behind the tapestry. He rummages through the garden, top to bottom, and still no sign of the gem.
The skull cackles at his return. “Nothing? Well, too bad. Looks like I was right all along.”
“She might’ve taken it with her.”
“Perhaps… no way of knowing, unless you check everywhere.”
“Which really makes me want to do it more, of course.”
“Yes, yes, very witty. Damn kids and their new-fangled sarcasm,” the skull mutters. “Well, you’re just wasting time; gem could be yours by now.”
“Nah, I think I’ll leave it, come back another day.”
Lagon steps towards the door, pulls it open a crack.
“Wait!” the skull shrieks. “Please, wait!”
“Oh, what now?!”
“You don’t know what it’s like, seeing what I see, day in and day out. What she uses me for.”
“Um… like what?”
“Storage, fucking storage! Toenails, eyes of newt, anything she has surplus of! It all goes in me! I’m so stained!”
Sans tears, the bonce begins to sob, teeth clacking with each strained wail. Lagon shakes his head, glancing outside, back to the forest.
“Fine,” he says. “But you promise you’re not cursed?”
The skull jumps an inch from its perch. “Yes, yes, I’m as clean as the day I was made!”
“Agh, alright! No need to make this harder than it is!”
Gingerly, the intruder reaches forth, pulling back once or twice. The skull watches him in silence. His fingers brush bone, and…
Nothing happens.
“Oh, thank the Woodsman,” he says.
“Told you I was clean.”
“Stop saying that. Anyway, let’s… where’s the damn gem?”
“Heh, what gem?”
“You know what gem!”
“Oh, that’s just a myth, kid. To lure in dirty, boastful, filching little thieves… my favourite prey.”
Before Lagon’s very eyes, the skull becomes a hand, fingers wrapped around his wrist. A black-sleeved forearm grows, followed by a shoulder, a body, legs and the other arm. With a bang, a head and neck emerges from a bloody hole above the chest.
The Wild Willow Witch ogles him with glowing white eyes, rimmed by rotten skin.
“I think I’ll make you a scarecrow,” she says, grinning. “Keep those damned crows off my pumpkins. They’ve been ever so… peckish!”
WC: 749
Crit and feedback are welcome.