GAME: Hook my first line and sink her in to a paragraph!

[sinister42]

The oceans swallowed the last landmass in the planet with rushing inevitability and a big "gulsh" sound that reverberated throughout the Earth, finishing with an equally big "glup". The moon looked down with disdain. "Say 'Excuse me," at least!" She had always been a stickler for table manners.

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On the top of the tallest saguaro a mockingbird sang.

On the top of the tallest saguaro a mockingbird sang. It wasn't the tallest saguaro because it was tall, so much as it was the only saguaro left, after the Old Ones had eaten the world. The mockingbird, being an avatar of Groth-Golka, sang to the creatures in the shadows, calling them forth to take their rightful place as rulers of what was left.

***

The fire consumed all, but burned none.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

The fire consumed all, but burned none. It raged through the immortal bodies of the gods, searing them with unending agony. This was the price of humanity's faith and worship. For every desperate prayer from a mortal, the gods suffered. They were powerless to intervene in earthly matters, but their infinite compassion doomed them to torments known only to one who was fully empathetic to human sufferings. If only some unbeliever would release them!

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I am not normally given to extravagant gestures.

 

[Tim Murray]

The fire consumed all, but burned none. It raged through the immortal bodies of the gods, searing them with unending agony. This was the price of humanity's faith and worship. For every desperate prayer from a mortal, the gods suffered. They were powerless to intervene in earthly matters, but their infinite compassion doomed them to torments known only to one who was fully empathetic to human sufferings. If only some unbeliever would release them!

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I am not normally given to extravagant gestures.

I am not normally given to extravagant gestures. Sometimes I might spare a life on a sudden whim or fancy, not today. You represent the most abhorrent evil known to all. Your actions have placed you in the annuls of the worst criminals that have breathed our nitrox-laced air. It has taken me years to track you across the galaxy, I'm not letting you go now, not ever. I can forgive you for killing my parents and my sister, but the last life you took was unforgivable. I had one of only five pet fish on the planet before you turbo-flushed him. For that, you are going to die. No one flushes Harold and lives to tell the tale!

Scratch the surface, that's what he said, how was I supposed to know I would dig up a...

 

[Reybax]

Scratch the surface, that's what he said- how was I supposed to know I would dig up a nightmare? The mark on my face, itchy for weeks, finally exploded under the pressure, and the writhing young burst out in a stream of floating gossamer, surrounding my head in the mist of the newborn. I coughed and tried to clear the air, and my hand was seared with pain, a lightning of needles that swarmed up my arm as the tiny larvae feasted upon their host.


It is often wise, my father always said, that when confronted with a dead-

 

[Ihe]

It is often wise, my father always said, that when confronted with a dead--"Zombies!" shouted Laura. It was too late. The horde had overtaken us while I mused on my father's teachings, giving the camera my best in-deep-thought look. This survival reality show had gotten out of hand. The sound man was the bravest. He stood with his boomstick held high till the end, and recorded the juiciest, crunchiest zombie noises ever heard; live.
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Juan promised himself to never do it again.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Juan promised himself to never do it again. Halfway through the 5K run his legs shrieked in agony and his lungs burned. Why had he agreed to participate in this charity event? Having compassion for other human beings was a terrible burden.

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At high tide the water came nearly to the front door.

 

[Duttster]

At high tide the water came nearly to the front door. Ever since the quakes the landmasses had shifted dramatically. The water levels had risen at an astonishing rate, overwhelming its inhabitants. Jess looked at the water lapping at her feet, then turned to look back into the house. "Mum, it's time again."



Shaking with disbelief, Michael stared at the body lying before him, then down to his blood soaked hands.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Shaking with disbelief, Michael stared at the body lying before him, then down to his blood soaked hands. He had tried every technique he knew, desperate to save the life of the man lying on the surgical table. No use. The patient's heart had failed, and not even direct massage could bring it back to life. He was about to admit defeat and go wash himself when the corpse sat up and laughed.

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The tide rushed out, revealing what was hidden.

 

[J Riff]

The tide rushed out, revealing what was hidden. Clams, crabs, plastic bottles, stray driftwood and grimy seaweed greeted Dagmar's aching eyeballs.
As beach-janitor, he was used to such sights but on this day something was different. He was wandering along the shore trying to figure out what had changed when IT came out of the water and stood there, 900 feet tall, dripping and obviously hungry. Dagmar wondered briefly if he had wandered onto the set of Godzilla, but then it was all over in a blaze of smashing claws, flailing, screaming and foaming waves of terror, in a flash, and the ocean returned to its preternatural calm, lurking like only a truly big body of angry saltwater can do.

The tiny wandering planet landed in Dagmar's garden and he chuckled grimly.

 

[Ihe]

The tiny wandering planet landed in Dagmar's garden and he chuckled grimly. The Space Lords would never find it here. It'd been hell to negotiate with the Dagmarans for this safe passage. He grabbed it with gravi-pincers and inserted it into the name tag of his cat's collar. He could swear there'd been a movie long ago that had done it just like this. Visionaries.
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Ron stabbed Harry straight through the heart with his own broken wand.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Ron stabbed Harry straight through the heart with his own broken wand. The wand's spell of healing corrected the birth defect that threatened to shorten Harry's life. "Thanks, friend," said Harry. "Maybe I can do a favor for you sometime." Ron grinned and pulled out the wand. It left a neat hole in Harry's chest that sealed itself up in a matter of seconds. Now they could get back to the important work of designing a new scenario for Dungeons and Dragons.

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I tore the envelope open with trembling hands.

 

[J Riff]

I tore the envelope open with trembling hands. My legs wobbled as I read the news from Enid and Bunky, far far away in the land beyond the hills and over the sea where the war raged on like it always had... and I sighed. Would it never end? Would I never see my friends again? Would they ever send back the fifty bucks I had lent them? Apparently not, but I read on anyway, and the thought of my friends pinned down by Argarthian Reptilian mortar fire in a strange land was enough to start my lips to trembling too, so I chucked the letter in the fireplace and went outside to feed the dinosaurs. Time would tell.

It was raining so hard that fish swam past in the air as Gerald struggled to keep his notes dry.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

It was raining so hard that fish swam past in the air as Gerald struggled to keep his notes dry. "Dang it," he said, fist raised to the raging sky. "I'm almost done with the first draft of The Imperfect Storm and this has to happen." He clutched the pages of his manuscript to his chest and ran for shelter. Now that the floodwaters had reached the sixteenth -- or was it seventeenth? -- level of the Happy Howard building, his only hope was to dog paddle into an open window. Yes! There it was! He swam desperately, pages held over his head with one hand while the other one splashed like the fins of a mad dolphin. He emerged into an elegantly decorated office, where the water was only waist high. At last he would be able to submit his masterpiece to Happy Howard's Meteorological Magazine.

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It was a long way to fall.

 

[sinister42]

It was a long way to fall, so Gerald stepped back from the edge and decided not to. He'd had enough of standing here on top of humanity's latest insane venture - a skyscraper that literally scraped the sky. Well, not literally, there's no real way to actually scrape sky, but still. It was as close as made no difference. The dome of the earth rotated below him, while the vacuum of space lay just out of reach above, the black visible above the blue. The glass enclosure of the viewing platform was a tenuous perch of safety that swayed gently in the stratospheric winds. He wasn't relishing the half hour elevator ride back down to the surface crammed in with a thousand other gawking tourists, but again, it was a long way to fall, so Gerald had no choice.


My dead hamster keeps appearing in my dreams.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

My dead hamster keeps appearing in my dreams. That may seem silly to you, but I was truly fond of him. Jolly Joe we called him, me and the kids. Strange, isn't it? I never dream of Rosalind. You'd think a widower would dream of his lost wife, and not of a pet. But the mind does funny things.

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The lights blazed out of the darkness and the first chord sounded.

 

[J Riff]

The lights blazed out of the darkness and the first chord sounded. It was D-flat mi/ma7-9, and Dagmar knew he'd made a terrible mistake. He had been studying 'jazz' chords in the dressing room before the gig, and his mind had slipped gears, and he had played an inversion of a chord from a Charlie Parker tune, instead of the massive root/five powerchord required for the intro to 'War of the Dragon-Zombies' ... and everyone in the band glared at him, and he knew he would be fined, probably five thousand dollars, which was peanuts to a rockgod like himself... and heck, nobody in the crowd seemed to notice or care... yet, Dagmar, comsumate pro that he was, winced, but only minutely.

The sound of giant angry sparrows invaded Lucy's dream and her eyelids fluttered like hummingbird wings.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

The sound of giant angry sparrows invaded Lucy's dream and her eyelids fluttered like hummingbird wings. Which is to say, really fast. This was because a strobe light was flashing at her. The dream inducer was on the fritz again. It was supposed to be tiny friendly dolphins, darn it.

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"Our true enemy," the captain said, "is the terrain."

 

[Ihe]

"Our true enemy," the captain said, "is the terrain."
Harrey splintered from the group, leaving the crew to pull on the newly-made canoe. He stepped forward, near the shore, to eye said terrain with a nod and a knowing look about him. "Great insight, cap. Who would've thought a lava sea infested with fire piranhas and magmatic eight-headed sharks could pose any serious challenge to this expedition," he looked back to the canoe, "it's too bad all we found to build the ship was straw and asbestos..."
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Jonn was pushed through the wall with great force, but had the instinct to twist in mid-air and land on his hands, spinning on bleeding palms like an acrobat.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Jonn was pushed through the wall with great force, but had the instinct to twist in mid-air and land on his hands, spinning on bleeding palms like an acrobat. He flipped to his feet and spun to face his attacker. "Nice try," he said, sweat dripping into his eyes. He kicked the masked assassin in the face. The man fell with a grunt. Just another day in the life of a kid drafted into the Enhancement Corps.

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Time does not heal all wounds; some remain painful for the rest of our lives.

 

[J Riff]

Time does not heal all wounds; some remain painful for the rest of our lives. And a bazooka is not something to fool around with. Despite many advances in modern medical science,and after many surgical operations, the large hole through Dagwood's midriff was acting up again.

When I first came to Sunny Hollow, all the animals were cute and friendly.